A more perfect gift?

In my last post, I said that books were the perfect gift. Judging from my sales, evidently Amazon Kindles were a popular gift as well. A year ago, barely 10% of my total sales were e-books. Kindle sales now average 21.6% overall, with a whopping 42% so far in January. Wow. Evidently, readers are loading up their new Kindles and depleting their gift cards. Combine these numbers with the introduction of the Barnes and Noble's Nook and the Apple Tablet, and one has to question the direction of book publishing.

I'm not one of those who predict the demise of the printed book. I'm a Kindle owner and love having my entire library at my fingertips, but I still prefer to read many publications in print. In fact, I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal on my Kindle—which is handy because I travel a lot—but I read the paper version when a hotel offers a free copy.

That said, e-books are a tsunami hitting the publishing industry. And tsunamis do their most damage when they recede, sucking everything away from the landscape. Publishing is older and more staid bound than the music industry, and will have more difficulty adjusting their business model. But adjust they will, and after this wave has receded, the major publishers will remain the dominate power driving popular books.

Traditional publishers provide four services. They act as quality gatekeepers, edit and design books, print them, and do large scale promotion. Although all the services are affected, an e-book only eliminates printing. Publishers still represent an arbitrator of market-worthy material, but e-book readers are giving increasing credence to customer reviews. At the present stage of technology, e-books have reduced the value of book design, but that will change with future generations of e-readers.

That leaves book promotion, which remains fundamentally untouched. Here, the almighty power of the traditional publisher remains intact and bestsellers will continue to be the domain of the large houses. Nationwide and global sales require hitting the market right, eye-catching design, and media clout. (Sounds more like an ad agency, doesn't it.)

Paper-based books won't go away, but print runs will become shorter, which means the unit cost will be higher. If this analysis is correct, publishers will probably whittle down their backlist and much of their mid-list. Publishers only gave these authors puny advances and zero promotion anyway, so this won't hurt too much. Besides, the growth in e-books gives authors an easy to reach, low-cost market. I just hope these self-published authors remember to buy editing and proofreading. Just because it starts with a lower case e, doesn't mean e-books can be as sloppy as email.

The Perfect Gift

Books are perfect gifts. They're already a great value, but with the speed the world is going to those nifty electronic readers, books will soon be valuable antiques. Heck, in the near future, you may only be able to gaze at books in those brick and mortar museums they call libraries.

My bet is that children's books won't go electronic anytime soon. We always search for autographed storybooks for our grandkids. A great find is when the author and the illustrator both sign the book. We've done this for several years, so now our grandkids' bedrooms have dedicated shelves for signed books. The icing on the cake is that we get to read them a story from one of these books when we visit.

Several of our relatives have hobbies and special interests. Some people can be hard to buy for—unless you pick a book about their hobby. Whether your relatives or friends are interested in the Civil War, railroads, guns, cooking, or collecting old comic books, there's always a book around that will grab their interest.


Books are the best entertainment value around. They provide hour after hour of personal pleasure, and then they can be passed on to another person. I also like that when I give a book as a gift, I can write a personal note that won't get tossed out like last year's Christmas cards.

By the way, if you're thinking about a gift for me, I collect vintage Western books from the first half of the twentieth century. I especially like the ones with great illustrations on the dust cover. But if you give me one of these, do me a favor and write your personal note on a Post-It.

Characters Matter -- Continued

The protagonist in my Westerns is named Steve Dancy, and people ask if he's modeled after me. I tell them no, but I don't think they believe me. (Maybe I should start saying yes, because women seem to like him.) A fictional work has a single writer with a single personality. If you populate your work with slight variations of yourself, you'll create a homogenous universe that will bore people silly.

A writer must suppress his own personality when developing characters so they're all different from each other. It's not enough that they look and talk different—they must think and act differently. The fiction writer's personality will show up in the total work, but it's best if it's not directly reflected in the characters, especially the protagonist or antagonist. Have fun with these two. Make them unique from yourself and every other character in your work.


Here is a brief example from my new book, Tempest at Dawn.

James Madison gave him a friendly nod, then scurried across the lawn like an eager child who had spotted a new toy.
“What did the little titan want?”
Sherman turned to see Dickinson. “Now I remember why I avoid the State House Inn. Everyone bothers a simple man trying to write a letter to a friend.”
“Every part of that sentence is a lie. You’re not a simple man, delegates hurry in other directions when they spot you, and no one besides myself can abide you.”
“I am writing a letter.”
“Rebecca?”
“No, John Adams.” Sherman set the letter aside. “Pull up a chair. I’ll buy you lemonade or an ale.”

Tempest at Dawn

The completed manuscript for Tempest at Dawn is in the final editing process and the book should be available in November of 2009. The historical novel is a dramatization of the Federal Convention of 1787, what we now call the Consitutional Convention. This is a book that has been over ten years in the making and I'm relieved to see it finally close to publication.

The infant periods of most nations are buried in silence, or veiled in fable, and perhaps the world has lost little it should regret. But the origins of the American Republic contain lessons of which posterity ought not to be deprived.--James Madison

Old West Weekend at Los Rios Rancho

Los Rios Rancho is hosting an Old West Weekend on August 15 & 16th. The ranch is located in Oak Glen, California in the San Berdino Mountains.

It looks to be a great event. Many Western authors, including myself, will be signing their books. Here's a chance to talk personally with authors and asked them questions about the genre or writing.

Link to Los Rios Rancho

Just completed a fun interview with the Tainted Archive. If you like this Western blog, you ought to take a look at the Cowboy Corral, as well.

Western Genre Article Trilogy

I've completed a triology of articles on the Western Genre and posted them on Ezine.

Is the Mythology of the Old West Dead?

The Future of the Western Genre

The Virginian, A Classic Western Revisited

Link to all three.

The Future of the Western Genre

I've posted an article on Ezine about the future of the Western genre.

"For the last couple of decades, enthusiasts have lamented the demise of Westerns while the rest of the world has gone about its business, ignorant that anyone might care about a genre relegated to a few obscure shelves at the local bookstore. Westerns were hugely popular for over a hundred years. Not only were they popular in the United States, but the whole world devoured them. The Western was a staple of fiction, Hollywood, television, and daydreams. What happened?"

Follow this link, to read the full article.