tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post3911313323163311948..comments2024-02-16T14:10:12.166+08:00Comments on Bibliophile Stalker: Essay: How PDFs Changed My Life and eBook PiracyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-50324372213234643662010-05-30T10:22:56.965+08:002010-05-30T10:22:56.965+08:00I made a book.
It has my name on it and the titl...I made a book. <br />It has my name on it and the title I chose. I am proud of it. It is one of the few stories I vowed to finish and I did. <br />Buckyball is a first person narrative. James Pissola tells the story of how one night of partying with his best friend in South Beach changed his life. Listening to a specific song always transports him back to the same time and place, which happens to be the Miamillennium nightclub in Miami. These flashback moments are called life-turns and James claims to have lived over one hundred and seventy-one of them, some lasting between 13 and 26 years.<br />In order to make Buckyball concrete I had to venture into the realm of (hard swallow) vanity publishing.<br />It wasn't my ego that ultimately pushed me in that direction. It was an editor's reject letter that injected in me the confidence I needed to vainly go in that direction. <br />An editor had actually read my entire manuscript. She had even liked it. It wasn't a good fit for her publishing needs but it was good enough for her to read through, finish it and positively comment on it. <br />Buckyball was great fun to read. What an imaginative and smart idea! And it holds together well, and fails to become repetitive, as it so easily could have done. James is a compelling character, and you create great sympathy for him and his plight. Congratulations on a fine achievement! Alana Wilcox, Senior Editor, Coach House Books. <br />I naively celebrated by purchasing a publishing package on the internet.<br />I made a book and it was dead on arrival.<br />It's not the e-publishing house's fault, it's just that my ego has a budget. I've contacted several reviewers, sorry no vanity press books. I understand. Barnes and Noble has a great program where you can send them your novel for consideration for shelf space in their stores but my book is not eligible. I would have to purchase a 'book sellers return program' from my e-publishing house for $799 just to be considered. That's not an option. So I find myself reading articles about how to self promote your book. <br />Start small, start locally. I live in a rural French Canadian village where the market for English speaking novels is zero. <br />Another suggestion in the how to promote guide lines was to blog your way to success. I wasn't convinced. It seemed hypocritical and self serving to embark on a journey where you try to shove your book on sites where you hope someone will bite. Having never blogged or even followed a blog I surfed. It did not take me long to find out that I was not the only writer on the block. I've followed a one way street down a dead end. I'm throwing mud at the wall in front of me. You happen to be on the other side. Sorry. At this point I do not know if my novel is good or bad. It does not help that my target audience are guys who'd rather watch a movie than read a book. Shot myself in both feet with one bullet with that tag line.<br />I will gladly send anyone who wants to read BUCKYBALL a pdf copy. <br />All in all I wish anyone and everyone who reads this the best of the best of success in all of your endeavours.<br />Sincerely, Fabien Roylokisarrowhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16287808712310510168noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-63768437666004444062009-06-10T22:00:25.062+08:002009-06-10T22:00:25.062+08:00Sorry, I'm an idiot and misread about the lase...Sorry, I'm an idiot and misread about the laser printer. :-)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-54337409639856419952009-06-10T21:58:48.407+08:002009-06-10T21:58:48.407+08:00A 3mb PDF vs a 1mb HTML file is an insignificant d...A 3mb PDF vs a 1mb HTML file is an insignificant difference to people with high-speed Internet. HTML and TXT are more popular in the eBook world (be it piracy or eBook friendly publishers) because they're reflowable (they keep the content and page formatting separate). A PDF uses fixed pages, with specific text on each single page, as well as headers, footers, and page numbers. HTML is vastly superior for reformatting and converting to different eBook formats like Mobipocket and ePub. If someone has an eReader device like Amazon Kindle or Sony Reader, PDF is the worst possible format to obtain.<br /><br />By the way, if you haven't already, you should ditch the laser printer and get an eReader. :-)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-79601883343043567622008-07-24T17:22:00.000+08:002008-07-24T17:22:00.000+08:00Sorry, my eddress is info@twocranespress.com.Sorry, my eddress is info@twocranespress.com.Jason Erik Lundberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18159887257065611447noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-19029725784063184982008-07-24T17:21:00.000+08:002008-07-24T17:21:00.000+08:00Speaking of PDFs, would you be interested in one f...Speaking of PDFs, would you be interested in one for <I>A Field Guide to Surreal Botany</I>? If so, <A HREF="info@twocranespress.com" REL="nofollow">please send me your email address</A>, and I'll let you know when it's ready for viewing.<BR/><BR/>I haven't gone the extra step to make the PDF completely free to download and distribute, mostly since I have 49 authors and I'd have to get permission from everyone. However, the eBook is free to pretty much any interested reviewer or blogger. As Cory Doctorow is fond of saying, the problem is obscurity, not piracy.Jason Erik Lundberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18159887257065611447noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8903848080840259127.post-43137231063961759512008-07-23T21:46:00.000+08:002008-07-23T21:46:00.000+08:00Interesting. Never thought of reviewing an entire ...Interesting. Never thought of reviewing an entire book as a pdf file. I'm an editor at The internet Review of Books, we've found the cost of mailing books publishing houses send us to reviewers outside of the US,to be higher than our finances allow, and yet we often need just such "outside" perspective on a particular book.<BR/><BR/>Proposition? Would you be interested in writing a feature article for one of our IRB issues? Let me know.<BR/><BR/>http://www.internetreviewofbooks.comRuth L.~https://www.blogger.com/profile/01008932486010118709noreply@blogger.com