Yeah, this skit has it about right.

Many years ago, in what seems like a prior life, I wrote a nonfiction book on enterprise computing. At the time, I was a Chief Technology Officer for a Fortune 50 company. Since nonfiction is all about credentials, I had no trouble finding an agent and publisher. I was pretty happy. I had a Boston agent and Wiley & Sons as a publisher. This was going to be good.

I wanted to title my book Dinosaurs and Whippersnappers. I thought that would be a catchy title for a book about managing computer professionals. Unfortunately, my editor disagreed. In fact she disagreed with everything I wanted to write. She insisted that focus groups had determined that books with the word Digital in the title were in high demand. Against my wishes, she re-titled the book The Digital Organization. She also wanted the book to be about corporate America, insisting that I leverage my familiarity with a celebrity CEO. I also couldn't criticize any inane technology fad because Wiley had surely already published a book that claimed the craze would blow away all prior technology, reduce the corporate labor force by half, and eliminate childhood illness. 


None of this was good advice. By the time the book was eventually published, technologists were sick and tired of books with Digital in the title, my celebrity CEO had lost his luster, and all of my technology advice and references were woefully out of date. Business leaders, however, still had to manage computer professionals and my chapter on this subject kept the book alive in some MBA programs.

What brought all of this ancient history to mind? A hilarious skit by Mitchell and Webb. Way too close to my personal experience. Take a gander. 



The irony of all of this is that Wiley is still marketing The Digital Organization. Traditional publishing moves at a glacial pace, so this technology book was already obsolete by the time it hit bookshelves in 1997. Yet Wiley continues to offer a Kindle version for $49.95. Not many authors recommend against buying one of their own books, but I suggest you give this one a pass.

By the way, this experience taught me a lesson. Never write a book that has a shelf-life of six nanoseconds. This is a big reason why I write historical novels. They last forever. Even the contemporaneous books of Mark Twain, Jane Austen, Raymond Chandler, and Louisa May Alcott are now read as historical novels. I may not be of their caliber, but I sure want to write in their genre.

Publishing Trends Viewed from an Omaha Armchair

The digital revolution continues to roil publishing, so here are a few of my recent observations. I suspect at least three of these five are correct. It’s your job to figure out which three.

1. Shift from books to e-books is leveling out
2. Content becoming more profitable than e-reader devices
3. Amazon continues to innovate ahead of traditional publishers
4. Traditional publishers are adapting
5. Indie-e-books are a saturated market

Can traditional publishers fight off the pesky indies?

Shift From books to e-books is leveling out

For the prior five years, my printed book sales as a percent of total sales have declined. Until this year. In 2013, the ratio of print, e-book, audio, and large print sales have all held steady with 2012. In fact, in recent months, I have seen a slight resurgence in printed books. I suspect this means that the e-book phenomenon has reached a mature state.

Content becoming more profitable than e-reader devices

Amazon appears to be shifting its e-book strategy, with increased emphasis on content rather than on selling Kindles. Device prices have dropped as technology-prone readers have for the most part already purchased Kindles. Now, the big money is in selling content and annual device upgrades. Amazon has taken a couple of subtle steps to nudge e-book prices up, or more precisely to inhibit low or zero priced content.

Amazon continues to innovate ahead of traditional publishers

Amazon has recently started two new programs. The Matchbook feature allows publishers to offer a steeply discounted Kindle version to print book purchasers. This is doubly clever. Matchbook encourages book purchases through Amazon rather than competitors who cannot offer a similar deal on the market-leading Kindle. Matchbook also adds revenue without cannibalizing either format, while at the same time furthering Kindle domination. The second program is called Kindle Countdown Deal, which allows publishers to program discounted e-books for a limited time. The trick here is that Amazon "counts down" the remaining discount days to build urgency into the buy decision. Both of these are attempts by Amazon to increase their control over e-book discounting.

                                         Traditional publishers are adapting

Even a battleship can eventually turn. Traditional publishers are flexing their promotional muscles and showing contract flexibility with their bestselling authors. Mid-list authors aren't getting any better treatment, but they seldom made money for traditional publishers anyway. Few care if they jump ship. It looks like it’s turning into a build your platform first world. By the end of the publishing digital revolution, it’s possible traditional publishers will be more profitable. 

Indie-e-books are a saturated market

First giving away books for free quit working, now it’s hard to sell e-books at 99¢. When there are tens of thousands of e-books published every month, it’s hard for any particular author to get noticed, despite whatever financial shenanigans are employed. As more and more indie-authors experience weak sales, a growing number will pursue other endeavors. This will reduce supply until we reach market equilibrium. In the meantime, indie competition will be a slugfest.

If you bought print copies of my books from Amazon, get a Kindle version for 99¢

Many people are unaware that Amazon has a program called Matchbook. If the publisher enrolls their books in the program, Amazon purchasers of print books can get an Kindle e-book version for a steep discount. The price for Matchbook must be between zero and $2.99. All of my books have been set at 99¢. This means if you have ever bought one of my print books on Amazon, you can now pick up a Kindle version for less than a dollar. 



Here is a link that will display all of your eligible titles.  

You'll see all the books you've purchased that are enrolled in this program, but I'm sure you'll jump on my books first. If not, maybe second? Anyway it's a good program, especially for people who have made many purchases through the years, but have only recently acquired a Kindle. 

Happy reading.

Indie Publishing Rewrites Promotion

Kim McDougall of Castelane, Inc. recently wrote to  ask for permission to re-publish on the new Castlelane website an article I wrote for Turning Point .  I agreed, but in rereading the article, I decided it could use an update. Here is the revised article.

There’s not much you can believe about indie-publishing.  Information from indie-publishing houses is suspect, and most of the other data comes from people who make their living off striving writers.  As someone who has published with a traditional house and indie-published, I’ll try to give you the straight scoop.

First, I Indie-publish by choice.  It didn't start out that way, but now I’m convinced that indie-publishing is the best route for me.

My first book was published by Wiley.  It was an agented, non-fiction book.  After I completed my first novel, Tempest at Dawn, I secured a different New York agent that specialized in fiction.  While the agent shopped my lengthy, historical novel, I wrote a genre Western titled The Shopkeeper.  Since the typical advance for a Western wouldn't make a decent down-payment on a Nissan Versa, my agent declined to represent it.  No problem, I’d indie-publish.

Currently, my novels are in print, large print, audio, and e-book formats.  My large print and audio contracts are traditional contracts with advances, so I still have a foot in each world. I’m making money, but what is more important, my platform continues to grow.  (My agent didn’t sell Tempest at Dawn, so I ended up indie-publishing it as well.)

Why I Stay with Indie-Publishing

That’s how I started indie-publishing, but why do I stay with it after building a respectable platform? Three reasons:  speed, income, and control.

Center Point Will Publish The Latest Steve Dancy Tale

I returned from my trip to Nebraska to find a publishing contract from Center Point for The Return, A Steve Dancy Tale. They’re a great group of people, so I signed and posted the contract immediately. My understanding is that Center Point has the large print version of The Return slotted for the first quarter of 2014. (Trade paperback and ebook formats will be available this summer.)

I’m thrilled that Center Point will have published all four of the Steve Dancy novels. It also pleases me that the first three books have earned past their advances. That probably explains why Center Point bought the large print rights to The Return sight unseen. That’s a compliment I feel really good about.

Related Post:

The Future of Large Print

Can a manuscript ever be perfect?

Orgainc? Now that's embarrassing. 

A couple weeks ago, I went through the galley proof for The Return and found over twenty changes. Bummer. When I received the corrected galley proof, I found two more errors. Double bummer. The book is now in proofreading and if experience is any guide, a dozen or more errors and typos will be discovered. Makes you wonder if it's possible to write 75,000 flawless words. 

It's embarrassing when reviewers point out grammar or spelling mistakes. Yet, it invariably happens. My first book, published by Wiley, had three line-editors. That was standard practice fifteen years ago. Now, even the big houses have cut back to a single line editor. That's why you're seeing more mistakes in big-name author books. It's not the cost of editing as much as the time. Time is money, and when you have a potential bestseller waiting in the wings, publishers are in a rush to get it to market. 

Anyway, I'm rambling because I'm at a bit of a loss about what to do. The cartoon below explains my mood exactly, except I've finished writing my latest book. It's always been hard for me to start the writing process on a new book while my last novel is in the final stages. I know I'll get engrossed in new story and resent the inevitable interruptions that come form finalizing and promoting my prior book. I only allow myself to read books I've collected as reference material for my next novel. Besides, I need to let the plot percolate for a while before laying down the first word.

I think I'll head off to Pacific Beach and get in a little summer surfing. Reading and surfing ... that should fill my days nicely.

Book Cover ... by Design

Book cover design is an art ...and I am not an artist. At least, not a visual artist. Previously, I posted a mock-up of the book cover for The Return, A Steve Dancy Tale. The cover I chose was one of twenty-two different mock-ups. Here are a few of these rough prototypes.

The prototype we choose is on the left below, with the final cover to the right.

The cropping, typeface, and coloration were refined. This is a famous 1887 New York City photograph by Jacob Riis, titled Bandits Roost. I especially like Steve Dancy's shadow in the foreground.

Here are the covers for The Steve Dancy Tales. As with any series, there is a consistency in the design. Among other things, all of them use vintage photographs from the period. I'm a little disappointed in the size of my name, but I've been advised that when the author's name becomes larger than the book title, it's a signal that the writing is on a downward slide. We'll keep the name small for the time being. 

Honest westerns filled with dishonest characters

Getting Top Ranking at Amazon—Easy as PW Says?

Publishers Weekly has an article that estimates the number of sales required to reach a Top 5 ranking on Amazon. Something doesn’t look right. PW estimate that as few as 300 print sales per day will win a coveted spot in the Top 5. This is based on monitoring the ranking and sales for one book for two weeks.

You can read the full article here.

Here’s why I think the estimate is off. My best sales day was 660 books for Tempest at Dawn. This occurred  after a television appearance and sales remained above 300 per day for nearly a week. Although the book made #1 in several categories like Historical Fiction, it only briefly broke through the top 100 for general sales. Also, The Shopkeeper has had spurts of very good sales, but only temporarily has broken the Top 1,000 in books. Sales would need to increase exponentially to get a Top 5 ranking.

Is it possible that the shift to e-books has so dramatically reduced print sales at Amazon that 300 sales per day would land you on top of the heap? I doubt it. It’s more likely that faulty assumptions resulted in the smallish number. We’ll never know, of course, because Amazon keeps all of its sales data close to the vest.

The perils of being a midlist novelist

The Washington Post has done an article on the perils (and rewards) of being a midlist novelist.  Interesting reading. Mary Doria Russell was dropped by Random House just prior to release of her new book Doc, a novel about the legendary John Henry Holliday. Doc has been on my "to read" list for nearly a year. Now, I think I'll move it to the top of my list.

It’s always been tough for first-time novelists to find a publisher. A dirty little industry secret is that it is much more difficult to get a second book published if the first one flops. Baseball gives you three strikes, after a loss you can run for political office again, a musician can usually get a second gig, but writers get one shot at fame and fortune.

Midlist is a tough place to be. It’s easy to slip into oblivion. Poor sales don’t seem to be the problem with Russell’s books. She seemed well ensconced, with good reviews and a dedicated following.

The traditional publishing industry is in the throes of a massive transformation, and Random House’s actions are indicative of this change. Many have said publishing is going the way of digital music, but I think it is going more in the direction of movies. The big Hollywood studios are in constant search of the next blockbuster, while on the side a thriving indie-film industry nurtures creativity and new talent. I suspect the big publishing houses are turning their backs on back-list and mid-list books. That’s okay. Indie-publishing will fill in the gaps.


Link to WAPO article

Featured Author on Wordpreneur

Wordpreneur has a regular feature called Peeps. These are short pieces about indie-authors and they were gracious enough to do an article about me.

“Many people claim traditional publishing’s marketing prowess is a huge advantage, but they never mention that the big houses do very little for unknown authors who haven’t committed a high-profile felony. When it comes to marketing, you’re on your own whether you traditionally publish or self-publish.”

You can read the full article here.

It all depends on how you look at it—Point of View

I’m reading a thriller from a big name author. It’s a bestseller published under a Simon & Schuster imprint. Yeah, I found a few typos and stray words, but they didn’t bother me. I miss some mistakes myself, so I’m pretty charitable. What I found discombobulating were the sudden shifts in point of view. With no warning, the reader was thrown from inside one character’s head into the thoughts and feelings of another character. These were stray single paragraphs wedged into an otherwise consistent point of view. It might just be me, but when this happens, it stops me cold.

There are three proper ways to change point of view: a section break, a chapter break, or use an omnipotent point of view. (I’m not going to address tense or first, second, and third person which should be artfully reliable throughout a book.) 

Omnipotent is when the reader regularly gets inside the thoughts and feelings of different characters. An omnipotent point of view (POV) is difficult to carry off, but with a deft hand it can be done so the reader never notices. In fact, the reader should never become overly conscious of the point of view. It’s distracting.

That’s why I prefer a fourth technique. Never change POV. My four Steve Dancy Westerns and The Shut Mouth Society use a single POV throughout the entire story. This was difficult for The Shut Mouth Society because the thriller has two protagonists. I tried switching POV between the hero and heroine, but decided that it added to the mystery if the reader didn’t know what one of the major characters was thinking.

I used a different approach with Tempest at Dawn. Since this was a novelization of the Constitutional Convention, I used POV to heighten the conflict between the opposing forces at the convention. Every other chapter alternated POV between James Madison and Roger Sherman. This allowed the reader to feel the emotions on both sides of the issues.  (I first ran across this technique thirty years ago in Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer.) 




It was difficult to keep the POV consistent when Madison and Sherman were together. Revisions and editing finally scrubbed out the irregularities. In the final chapter of the book, I made an exception to a single POV per chapter. Since both men were together for the entire concluding chapter, I switched to a distant omnipotent POV. In other words, I never entered the thoughts or feeling of either man, but described scenes as if a narrator was telling a story about what he observed. This is similar to a movie, where the viewer never gets to read the thoughts of a character.

People deride the errors in indie-published books, but turn a blind eye to the increasing number of mistakes that prestigious publishers allow to get into print. Sixteen years ago, when I published The Digital Organization, Wiley had the manuscript line-edited by three different editors. They told me a single editor always missed something. I suspect that economics has forced the major publishers to cut this to a single line-editor. It’s a business mistake because this is a level of quality indie-publishers can compete against.

Three Icons of the Western Genre

Zane Grey

The three greatest icons of the Western novel are Zane Grey, Max Brand, and Louis L'Amour. Sure, other authors have written multiple Western novels, but these three made their names synonymous with the genre.  (Actually, Max Brand was a pen name.) Together, these three authors wrote nearly 500 Westerns and countless short stories.

Zane Grey published Westerns from 1908 until his death in 1939. Actually, he left such a large stockpile of manuscripts that Harper & Brothers published a novel per year under his name until 1963.

Frederick Faust, aka Max Brand

Max Brand published his first Western in 1919 and continued writing in the genre until his death in 1944. Similar to Zane Grey, publishers continued to bring his work out in new editions. For example, in 2007, Five Star Westerns published Acres of Unrest from a 1926 magazine series.

Louis L'Amour published his first Western in 1951. His last Western published  while he was alive was The Haunted Mesa (1987). Like his genre predecessors, books under his name continued to be published long after his death, many of which were short story collections.

Louis L'Amour

These three may not have been the greatest authors who have ever written about the American frontier, but they were great storytellers. (Okay, my vote would actually go to Mark Twain as the best Western author.) Storytelling has always been a revered art form and has been around since man first exaggerated his hunting prowess. In fact, storytelling might be the real oldest profession. 





In the early days, stories were spoken—handed down generation to generation. Cave dwellers began the notion of illustrated stories with petroglyphs, while during the middle-ages; stained-glass served the same purpose. The novel came to fruition only after widespread literacy and it nurtured its own artistic standards. Have these three authors ever met those artistic standards? I believe the answer is yes, especially in their best work.

Bad Review Got You Down—Even the Best Get Dumped On

Huffington Post Books published an article titled "Bad Reviews Of Great Authors." When you get a bad review of your work, it’s comforting to know that supposed experts hated these classics.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

"There is not in the entire dramatis persona, a single character which is not utterly hateful or thoroughly contemptible."  Atlas, 1848

The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike

"Mr. Updike’s descriptions of these magical doings are cringe-making in the extreme, not funny or satiric as he perhaps intends."  Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

"... the book is sad stuff, dull and dreary, or ridiculous. Mr. Melville's Quakers are the wretchedest dolts and drivellers, and his Mad Captain ... is a monstrous bore." Charleston Southern Quarterly Review, 1852

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

"no more than a glorified anecdote, and not too probable at that... Only Gatsby himself genuinely lives and breathes. The rest are mere marionettes—often astonishingly lifelike, but nevertheless not quite alive." H.L. Mencken, Baltimore Evening Sun, 1925

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

"Unfortunately, it is bad news. There are two equally serious reasons why it isn't worth any adult reader's attention. The first is that it is dull, dull, dull in a pretentious, florid and archly fatuous fashion. The second is that it is repulsive." Orville Prescott, The New York Times, 1958

Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

"... it is impossible to imagine how any man's fancy could have conceived such a mass of stupid filth, unless he were possessed of the soul of a sentimental donkey that had died of disappointed love." Rufus Wilmot Griswold, The Criterion, 1855

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

“What other culture could have produced someone like Hemingway and not seen the joke?” Gore Vidal

Polish your manuscript

It is the superfluous things for which men sweat.

Seneca (c. 5 BC-AD c. 65), Roman writer

A friend of mine unintentionally changed my attitude toward revisions. He restores antique cars and starts each project with barely more than a chassis and some rusted sheet metal. With utmost care, he painstakingly replaces every single part until his recreation is better than the shiny piece of the American dream that was driven off the showroom. When he finishes, we go on a ride and I can tell he enjoys the envious looks and honks from other car enthusiasts.

After these inaugural rides, I always assumed the cars were finished, but every time I visited, he would be in the garage replacing this piece or that piece. If he wasn't installing a newly acquired part, he would be polishing nooks and crannies that no one in a standing position would ever see. Sometimes I'd come over to find that he had painted the car a different color or replaced perfectly good upholstery.

One day I asked him if he ever tired of constantly changing an already beautiful car.

"Hell no," he said. "Building the car is work. This is the fun part."

"The fun part?"

"Whenever I start a new project car, I look forward to the day when the basic restoration is done so I can perfect it . My joy is in making it flawless. I fix the little details so people love to spend time with my creation."

"But you keep working on it. How do you know when it's perfect?"

"One day I'll walk all around it, open the doors, lift the hood, examine the truck and there won't be any more changes I want to make." He shrugged. "Then I sell it and start all over again."

Now I look forward to completing a manuscript so I can tighten and polish it until there are no more changes I want to make. Then I sell it and start all over again.

How do you pick your next book to read?

I'm a compulsive reader. I read everything and I read all the time. I suspect it started when I was in the fifth grade and I spent my breakfast reading the shredded wheat box. I even read the dividers that separated the rows of three biscuits. Nabisco sponsored the television program Sargent Preston of the Yukon and my hero was all over the box and dividers. That's how I ended up owning one square inch in the Klondike. Darn, I wish I still had my deed.

You'll be pleased to know I've graduated from cereal boxes to books. First the Hardy Boys, and then mass paperbacks. I was a junior in high school when I discover nonfiction with Theodore White's The Making of the President 1960. College introduced me to classics.

In adulthood, I wandered books stores and paperback racks looking for my next read. Bestsellers lists had already down-selected which books got prominent display, and I usually picked by author or back cover copy.


The publishing world has changed. Bookstores are becoming rarer, yet there are tens of thousands of more books available. The shelf-life of a book has been extended well beyond presence on a bestseller list. Electronic books are increasingly taking over fiction and narrative prose. Old book selection tools like magazines and newspapers are withering. Literary reviews are being displaced by reader reviews.

So how does a person pick their next book to read? For me, it's easy. I carry my Kindle with me almost everywhere. Writing has crowded out my reading time, so I read in line at the airport, in my doctor's lobby, in the car as my wife runs into a store, or while eating breakfast or lunch. I also have my Kindle with me when I watch television. It's always around when I use my computer. Why? It has to do with how I pick my next book to read. Whenever I hear or read about a book that sounds interesting, I immediately download a sample onto my kindle. I do this while talking to friends, watching television, surfing the Internet, attending book events, or when reading a periodical. After I finish a book, I metaphorically thumb through my samples, usually reading a chapter or two, then select my next book. At any point in time, I probably have twenty books queued up.

Electronic reading devices have changed the publishing industry and reading habits. It has also changed the way we chose books.

1. Back copy is less important than the opening of the book 
2. Bestseller lists mean less than frequent mention on broadcast and cable outlets
3. Social media builds name recognition
4. Word-of-mouth is even more powerful

This means emerging authors have tools to compete with famous authors. More important  sales can occur a considerable time after a promotional event. Book sales are now a long-haul business. Someone might download a book sample weeks, or even months before they make a purchase decision.

In fact, you might consider downloading samples for these books.

Happy reading.

Click to download samples.

Selling Books During the Holidays

Books are popular gifts, and the Christmas buying season has traditionally been the best month of the year for book sales. It still is ... for print sales. With the explosion in eBooks, post-Christmas is becoming another hot selling season. Not only are empty Kindles popular gifts, but Amazon gift cards frequently fill stockings and email in-boxes. These two trends are causing a flurry of eBook buying from December 25 through January.

(Please excuse my focus on Kindle. For some reason B&N and other booksellers have not been able to market gift cards with near the intensity of Amazon.)

The question for publishers is how to adjust their marketing plans to meet this shift in book sales. The simple answer is that pre-holiday marketing should focus on print format, and after Christmas marketing should transition to eBooks, preferably starting a bit prior to Christmas.

Gift givers prefer to wrap a physical item in shinny paper to be opened on Christmas, and many readers still like to hold a physical book in their hand. There is still good demand for print books, especially trade paperback and hardbound books. Publishers should focus their attention on print sales before the holiday buying season.

Sales of eBooks seem to get an up-tick as early as Christmas afternoon. My guess is that these are new Kindle owners who are playing with their new toy. To affect this market, eBook promotion needs to start before the 25^th of December.

How do you change the marketing focus? One thing I do is set all my hot links on my various web pages to my print formats, and then the 22^nd change the links to my eBooks formats. Not very clever, I know. But if I had this nailed down, I wouldn’t be posting this article in the throes of holiday shopping.

I’ll do better next year.

Related posts:
eBooks Changing More Than Just Formats
The eReader Revolution is Accelerating
Books Are The Perfect Gift

Selling Your Books on Amazon

How to Stand Out in the Biggest Bookstore in the World

Amazon is a vast book market. The size is a magnificent opportunity and a huge challenge. Amazon offers over ten million titles and is predicted to sell 50% of all books by the end of this year. Amazon provides numerous plans for publisher and authors to assist in sales, but many of them are hard to understand. It has dominance in e-books, and has growing influence in book publishing, printing, and distribution. But this size and growth presents a problem. How does a single author get noticed?

(If you would like to listen to this presentation as a webinar, please follow this link to Book Street Cafe.)

Selling Your Books on Amazon from James D. Best

Flavorwire Article: 15 Famous Authors on Why They Write

Flavorwire has published an article about why authors write. There are many links to source material which are fun to explore.

“The best thing about writing fiction is that moment where the story catches fire and comes to life on the page, and suddenly it all makes sense and you know what it’s about and why you’re doing it and what these people are saying and doing, and you get to feel like both the creator and the audience. Everything is suddenly both obvious and surprising… and it’s magic and wonderful and strange.”--Neil Gaiman

My own reason is much simpler ... There is nothing else I'd rather do.

Here's a link to the entire article.

Selling Your Books on Amazon

I'm conducting a webinar today at 2:00 PM PST at Book Street Cafe. This is a new membership site for publishers, authors, and publishing vendors. It's a fun virtual cafe hosted by terrific people dedicated to the book industry. This webinar, as well as all the others, will be posted to the site to be viewed at any time.


Book Street Cafe
Webinar Page: Selling Your Books on Amazon

Book Industry Gossip

Laura Hazard Owen has written an interesting piece about BookExpo America titled

5 things the book industry will be talking about next week

Read the article at paidcontent.org