eReader update

Some years back, I purchased a Palm device as an eBook reader. Oh, I might not have chosen it if the only thing it could do was display books, but it does more than act as a reading device. For half a decade, I have read scores of eBooks and used the Palm for my calendar, quick notes, and as a portable phone/address book. At the time, I thought spending a hundred and fifty bucks was a bit much for it, but in the long run, I have enjoyed cheaper books, being able to read at night, and less junk in my purse. Nowadays, it will die after just a couple of hours of reading, and battery life has always been a problem. In the past few months, the cover has worn out, the charger won't work so I have to use the USB port to recharge it, and when I pull it out, folks look at it the way folks in the eighties would look at an eight-track tape deck. Like other fans of eBooks, I am looking for a replacement reading device.

Being an Apple aficionado, I view the iPhone as a good candidate. Like the Palm, an iPhone would serve multiple purposes. But, that small screen won't be much better than what I have now, and newer should be markedly better, don't you think?  No doubt, well-heeled eBook readers who like Apple products will probably opt for the iPad, and that is the most appealing alternative. But, it won't fit in my purse, and while it is a real computer, it won't really replace my Macbook, so I can't see spending the bucks for one of those.

Amazon has been perfecting, and dropping the price of the Kindle. The second generation device isn't as butt-ugly as the first one, but I am not ready to buy one just yet. Amazon's content is probably better than most, which is a better selling point than the reader itself. If I were a student again, having to read large textbooks, the oversized version would catch my attention, but black and white magazine content is so retro.

I considered the eBookman, marketed by Fictionwise, five years ago, and there are a few of those still around. But its successor is the Nook, a WiFi capable dedicated eBook reader sold by Barnes and Noble. The price of this device is currently $149. Since Fictionwise, my favorite eBook vendor, is now a BN.com subsidiary, moving my pre-purchased content should be easier if I decide on the Nook. Barnes and Noble has my sophomore novel, Trinity on Tylos, on sale for under three bucks. That's a deal, folks! If other small press books are priced similarly, that would put new books into used book price range. Quite frankly, when just purchasing the content, and not the paper and cover, I think that a new eBook really should be less expensive than a new print copy, so plenty of low priced content is absolutely necessary. And, of the eBook readers available now, apart from Apple's elegant designs, the Nook has the best form factor, too.

Let's see... we have price, content, and long battery life. If it only had a light for night reading, I might be sold on the Nook.

In the mean time, I am reading Girl Gone Nova on my Palm and Interred with Their Bones in print.

Trinity on Tylos available at Barnes and Noble.com

As the title (and link) state, my science fiction adventure, Trinity on Tylos, is now at available at Barnes and Noble online. This is not really "news" in my mind, because BN bought eBook vendor Fictionwise a while back. For the moment, both are still operating independently, but I have noticed that Fictionwise now gets eBook versions of the good stuff early on, and that has to be due to the partnership with BN. Now, a few months after, BN.com customers can purchase eBooks from small presses. My publisher sent out a notice, which is what prompted me to look at the listing. Alas, it is barebones, with no editorial reviews and only one customer rating.

Will an additional outlet increase sales for small presses? I suspect that it won't, especially with minimal information in the listings, but I hope that I am wrong. Many good books are only available via small presses, and I enjoy reading offbeat works, so I have been a good customer at Fictionwise. As FW adds titles from the big six, I don't know if small presses will continue to use it as a sales vehicle.

Regarding sales of my own titles, I have noticed an upward trend for The Gift Horse, via Amazon and via a local retailer. I'm pleased by those sales, of course. I've done absolutely nothing to promote it in quite a while, so such sales are due to product placement and word of mouth.

I'm glad that readers continue to find The Gift Horse an entertaining read. And, I wish more readers would discover Trinity on Tylos, for it, too, deserves an audience.

Laptop in limbo

My beloved G4 iBook was DOA last evening. Hubby and I made an early morning trek to the Apple Store at Lenox Square in Atlanta this morning, where I made an appointment with an Apple Genius, who did what I did at home, plus trying to run it via a remote server and came up with the same conclusion that I did: hardware problem. That means a trip to a service center, and I have applecare on it, so the repair won't cost me, but my hard drive may or may not be salvageable. I do write some of my Pam's Pages posts a bit ahead of time, and I have one on getting published ready, but it is on that computer and not on this one. If Lazarus makes it back, I'll have that post in a week or two.

In the mean time, I'll mention some of the things going on in the publishing world—
•A romance ebook publisher, Triskelion, just folded. Some of their authors are scrambling to find new homes for their books, so that will make publishing that genre and method a bit more difficult for a time.
•Whiskey Creek Press continues to have issues with distribution. Right now, the authors on their Yahoo group are bemoaning the fact that Barnes and Noble stores won't even order a trade paperback book from WCP, saying they are non-returnable. Actually, WCP does take returns, but B&N is quite arbitrary in their policies, so good luck changing that, folks. Unless WCP will bow to publishing conventions and use a distributor such as Ingrams, the books will experience very slow sales indeed.
•Some of my author friends are saying that My Space is the way to promote authors and books. One of them told me that his My Space profile gets more hits than his website and his blog, combined. I don't yet have a My Space. I have looked at it, but it seemed so busy and confusing that I just went back to blogging. I have looked at some profiles of my teenager's acquaintances, and all I can say is that the entire site should be rated "R"or "X" and I prefer to have my promotions be family friendly.
•POD pricing, which was high to begin with, is getting higher. Booklocker went up on set-up fees and cover prices in June, and they are among the cheaper such publishers. It will cost approximately $500 to get into print there, and you'll pay a bit more for Lulu or iUniverse. Xlibris, once a viable printer, is up to a couple of thousand, so I wouldn't recommend that to anyone, although I have done so in the past.

That's it for this week folks. Let's hope the repair facility can resurrect my computer without sacrificing my hard drives' contents. BTW, all of my current manuscripts are on it, and they haven't been backed up lately. If it goes, so does a few months of work...