Which eBook Shall We Convert to Paperback Next? #WriterlyWednesday

Which eBook Shall We Convert to Paperback Next?

At Wittegen Press, we are in the process of converting all eBooks that are suitable so they are available in paperback format as well. We've already done The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman, and Dead Before Dawn: The Vampire Curse, and The Burning Web, but we haven't yet decided which order to convert the rest of our titles.

Cat's Call

Cat's Creation

Cat's Confidence

The Burning Web

Dead Before Dawn

We would greatly appreciate it if you would help us decide which book to concentrate on next. In the Google form below are all the options we currently have in mind. We know some of our titles aren't listed yet, for various reasons, and if there is one you would really, really like to see in paperback that isn't there, please tell us in the last question in the form as well.

If there is anything else you'd like to tell us, please feel free to leave a comment on this post.

Many thanks for your input, we are really interested to see the results.

Charlie Waterman Trilogy now in Paperback #WriterlyWednesdays

Charlie Waterman Trilogy now in Paperback

Hello and welcome to my blog in what I hope will be a wonderful new year. I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season. I am starting the year off as I hope to go on with a book announcement. The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman are now available in paperback - finally! And since I've had to read them all so many times lately, I even have the beginnings of an idea for number 4!

Come on, most of us bibliophiles can agree, there's nothing like holding a real book in our hands, even if we love eBooks for their ease of access and speed of delivery. Of course with KDP paperbacks on Amazon Prime these days, we don't have to wait too long for them either! I may have gotten a little over excited when my copies arrived ... okay, so I've been showing them to everyone who doesn't run away fast enough ... but we're authors, we're allowed to be enthusiastic about books ;).

• Cat's Call
• Cat's Creation
• Cat's Confidence

Are now all available to buy from Amazon as 6x9 paperbacks. All the links above are smart-links so they will take you to your local Amazon.

The reason it took me so long to get these to paperbacks is because I took a long hard look at Cat's Call and decided I really needed to rewrite at least the first third of the book. I still loved the story, but it was one of my first books, and, when I was completely honest with myself, the writing at the beginning was simply clunky.

I didn't even attempt to edit it, I just took each scene and rewrote it. Hence Cat's Call is now a second edition. If you already have it in eBook format, I deliberately didn't release it as a a new book, so you should all be able to download the new version.

If you don't have a copy yet, it's all shiny and new in paperback and eBook :)

A quick aside: Can anyone tell me why the 6x9 format seems to be the in thing these days? I was always used to books coming out as hardback, then 6x9 then (what I used to mentally refer to as) normal size, but we ordered some paperbacks for Rob's nephew before Christmas and they were all 6x9. They were not new titles, but books that have been out for years.

Amazon Kindle Create

Kindle now have something called Kindle Create, which is a really useful standalone tool for creating eBooks for Kindle. Unfortunately it doesn't do paperbacks, so it's still a matter of using one of Amazon's helpful templates and filling them in. These templates work really well, however, so I'm not complaining :).

I used the Word templates for doing the paperback and Kindle Create for the new versions of the eBooks (I took the opportunity to re-edit Cat's Creation and Cat's Confidence as well and to change the back-matter, but they only had a few minor changes, so no 2nd edition label for them :)).

There is also a Kindle Create add-in for MS Word, but only 2010 edition and above, so I have to upgrade before I can use it, so I don't know how well it works. However, because it's is a plugin for Word and not a standalone, it does give access to all the style options Kindle Create provides while we can still use one of the paperback templates.

Other Print on Demand Options

The really big drawback of Amazon KDP for paperbacks is that they don't offer proof or author copies - if you want your paperback you have to pay full price. The only option they offer is to tell you to put it down to the min price, buy it and then put the price back up again. The risk with this is other people will see it going cheap and buy it immediately and then the authors gets no royalties at all. Given that they say it can take 72 hours to make a change (it usually doesn't, but that's the longest it can be) - this could be a really big risk.

It's a really bad system and they have been promising author copies since the beginning of last year. Apparently some people have the option, but it's only in beta, so they haven't rolled it out to everyone. It is most frustrating!

Because of this I have been looking into using other sites to get volume numbers of copies to use at home for promotions etc.

CreateSpace

CreateSpace was the precursor to KDP paperback, but it is a problem for 2 reasons:

• once a book is on KDP the same book with the same ISBN can't be on CreateSpace - if you are using Amazon or CS free ISBNs this is not an issue, but just make sure you check.
• because they only print in the US, the postage to the rest of the world is expensive if you want anything but 31 days.

However, if you are in the US, their author copy prices are definitely worth the effort.

I'm still looking at them because their author copy prices are so good that the postage might be worth it. I'm running the numbers.

Blurb

I've added one book into Blurb so far and I love their BookWright software - once I read the tutorials, rather than just jumping in and trying to figure it out myself.

When we first hit create on Blurb it offers us BookWright or PDF - the problem is, once we download BookWright it doesn't immediately point us to the right place to get started. At least I didn't find it obvious.  It also has a few quirks, but once I got the hang of it, it was awesome. Not as intuitive as Kindle Create, but easier than just using a .doc template.

It took forever to upload, however, and it didn't tell me what was going to happen next while it was uploading. Once again I had to go and look at the online help files to know what would occur next, so I could find out if I could leave it to it. FYI - once it has finished uploading it opens the Blurb site for us so we can do the next bit, so going to bed (like I did) is fine!

The base price of the book for author copies is not as good as CreateSpace - at least from what I could tell when using the Member Order Calculator on CS and the postage is still high.

Lulu

I have only just started playing with Lulu. The templates are definitely less well defined than Amazon's and it has no fancy software like Blurb. From what I can tell at the moment, their base price is also not as good as CreateSpace.

~*~

It's all so very complicated when it comes to paperbacks and it's even more so if we want wide distribution to more than Amazon and ourselves.

Has anyone already been through the pain and would like to offer their advice?

AtoZ2017 - C is for Charlie Waterman & Michael Corvin #AtoZChallenge

Welcome to Day 3 of the AtoZChallenge and the letter C. Every day in April (except Sundays) I will be making a post about shapeshifters of all kinds. Check back to see my choices and, from time to time some flash fiction too.

C is for 

Charlie Waterman

So this is where I get in a little self promotion :). My shapeshifter of the day is Charlie Waterman, the main protagonist of my series The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman.

Charlie is pretty much your ordinary eighteen year old, just getting ready to go off to university, until he decides to visit the old Magic Shop where he almost worked when he was sixteen. It's not what he was expecting. Rather than tricks and costumes he finds crystals and incense and things other people might thing were actually magical.

Charlie doesn't believe in magic.

When he is attacked by a cat figurine, he thinks he's hallucinating. Unfortunately for him, the next day he wakes up with a tail. Thus start Charlie's adventures as a shapeshifter.

The figurine was the embodiment of the Cat Spirit, one of the seven great spirits that help maintain the balance of existence. It chose Charlie to be its Questor, landing him with magic and the ability to turn into any kind of cat he wants to. Of course he needs to learn to control his new powers, which is easier said than done, example one, the tail, He doesn't really have any other choice than to travel to the magical dimension of Between, where all Questors are trained, and accept the help of his new mentor, Akari.

Along with the other six Questors it is Charlie destiny to travel between worlds, times and universes, in a bid to prevent the forces of Chaos from destroying the Balance.

So far there are three books in the series, all available in eBook form and coming soon in paperback:

• Cat's Call - Charlie learns about magic and faces his first Task as a Questor.
• Cat's Creation - Charlie and the other Questors travel to a world run Mafia style where magic is known, sorcerers tend to be very nasty and vampires are just another element in the society.
• Cat's Confidence - On a world where dragons drive the ecconomy and there is a royal wedding being planned to end centuries of division, the Questors have to figure out what is about to go wrong and stop it before it is too late.

Werewolf of the Day

Michael Corvin (Underworld)

My werewolf today is from the Underworld series of films. I love this series because it has not only werewolves, but vampires as well.

Michael Corvin (Scott Speedman) is a doctor in Budapest when the supernatural barges into his life. He is pursued by Lycans (werewolves) because they want to experimant on him, and is rescued by Selene, a vampire and Death Dealer (werewolf hunter). The Lycans and vampires have been at war for centuries.

Selene is more interested in keeping him away from the Lycans than in him to begin with, but begins to have feelings for him as the first film goes on.

Michael is a descendent of Alexander Corvinus, the ancestor of both the vampire and Lycan races. The Lycans want him for a rare genetic trait that may allow them to create a hybrid to give then an advantage in their war against the vampires. Vampires and werewolves are usually fundamentally incompatible and a human infected with by both just dies.

Lucian, the leader of the Lycans bites Michael, thus making him a werewolf, however, he is then infected with enough silver nitrate to kill him in a Death Dealer raid. To save him, Selene bits him, this making him the promised hybrid.

The first and second Underworld films press every button I have as far as werewolf/vampire interactions go, and Selene is definitely the kick ass character, no Michael, which I love. The rest of the franchise is entertaining, but the first two movies are definitely my favourite.

Many thanks for reading.

• If you could become a cat, which would you choose? A big cat like a leopard? A house cat? A pedigree?
• Would you rather be a werewolf or a vampire? Why?

Happy AtoZing - see you tomorrow :)

Click here and here to find other AtoZ posts.

Fic: Awkward Moment, (PG, Charlie Waterman Flashfic)

As I am sure you have noticed me mention, I have a new book out this week. It is called Cat's Confidence and it is book 3 in The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman. In honour of the release I have written a little flashfic for this week's Drabble Cascade. It is a tag scene to the book, but has no spoilers, so it can be enjoyed by all.

Awkward Moment

by Natasha Duncan-Drake

Charlie opened the door from his bedroom and stepped out into his living room, where Alexander was waiting for him. They were still on their break after the last Task and they'd decided to take a trip to a world neither of them had visited before. Thanks to losing himself in the library all morning, Charlie was running late.

"Sorry," he apologised and then stopped, because he saw what Alexander was doing.

His friend had one of his many books in hand and was scanning through it. When Alexander looked up and lifted one perfectly shaped eyebrow, Charlie wasn't sure what to say.

"A stake through the heart would kill anything," Alexander said, "not just vampires."

"So would beheading," Charlie agreed, "and fire," at which point he realised, that possibly wasn't the most tactful thing to say.

Of course Alexander had to have picked up the book about evil vampires. The only vampire he knew couldn't have gone for one of the ones about dragons, because he wasn't that lucky.

"Now you know why everyone on Earth thinks vampires are fictional," he added with an awkward shrug; "none of the vampire lore actually makes sense."

Alexander stood up and placed the book back on the shelf without another comment and Charlie really hoped the book hadn't offended his friend. Books about evil white guys didn't offend him, but then half the universe didn't have the wrong idea about his race, so he wasn't sure he could judge.

"Shall we go?" Alexander asked and didn't sound overly bothered, but sometimes it was hard to tell.

"Yeah," Charlie agreed and plastered on a smile.

"That book did get one thing right," Alexander added as he lifted his arm to create a portal.

"Really?" Charlie asked, honestly surprised.

"Yes," Alexander said and paused in a way that wasn't overly dramatic at all, well not for a vampire anyway, "we are all devilishly handsome and good in bed."

The whole speech was delivered with a perfectly serious demeanour, so it took Charlie a moment to catch up.

"Oh you bastard," he said and laughed, "I was really worried there for a second."

Alexander merely gave him a superior smirk as the portal flared into life.

~*~

Drabble Cascade #30 COMPETITION - word of the week is 'stake'

View more lists from Wittegen Press

Cat's Confidence out today :)

It's launch day! Yay!

Cat's Confidence is out today and for one week until 8th Oct is is $2.99, after that it's going up to $3.29, so get in early for the better deal.

It's available on Amazon, Smashwords, Apple, B&N and Kobo at the moment and will be on other sites shortly (thank you Smashwords aggregate program).

All the buy links are here at the main book page.

Summary:
The Seer says that a Questor is always prepared for the Task for which they are chosen and Charlie has been a Questor long enough to know the Seer is always right. Still, it never occurred to him that being ready would mean specific training for a specific Task. Charlie, Kaelyn and Alexander are given six weeks to become a Dragon Warrior team: all they need to do is master magical telepathy, archery, flying and, the trickiest of all, how to put on a dragon-harness in under five minutes!

Once through the portal in the land of Snijela, they must pass as veterans, make friends with other dragons and figure out why they've actually been sent on their Task in the first place. Add in a volatile young queen, two feuding nations either on the verge of peace or all out war, as well as spies, sexism and an alarming acceleration in Charlie's premonitions, and nothing is ever going to be straightforward.

Available for Pre-order - Cat's Confidence. Chronicles of Charlie Waterman #3

Cat's Confidence, Available for Pre-order Now

It's finally ready!

Thank you to everyone who has been so patient, Cat's Confidence is finished and in the pipeline of being published. The official release date is Tuesday October 1st 2013, however, it is available for pre-order.

The very nice people at Smashwords now ship to Apple, B&N and Kobo for pre-orders so we have decided to take advantage of this option. While on pre-order and for one week post the release date, Cat's Condidence will be available for ~10% off at $2.99 (or equiv - regular price $3.29).

Cat's Confidence pre-order options:
Barnes and Noble
Kobo
Apple (coming very soon - it's been submitted, but it sometimes takes them a while).

For those who use other services like Amazon, we're very sorry, there is no pre-order option, but the price will remain at $2.99 for one week after the launch date. So buy early and you will get your ~10% off.

Description:

The Seer says that a Questor is always prepared for the Task for which they are chosen and Charlie has been a Questor long enough to know the Seer is always right. Still, it never occurred to him that being ready would mean specific training for a specific Task. Charlie, Kaelyn and Alexander are given six weeks to become a Dragon Warrior team: all they need to do is master magical telepathy, archery, flying and, the trickiest of all, how to put on a dragon-harness in under five minutes!

Once through the portal in the land of Snijela, they must pass as veterans, make friends with other dragons and figure out why they've actually been sent on their Task in the first place. Add in a volatile young queen, two feuding nations either on the verge of peace or all out war, as well as spies, sexism and an alarming acceleration in Charlie's premonitions, and nothing is ever going to be straightforward.

Writing update - Cat's Confidence & Nanowrimo

So my new novel is almost ready. I'm formatting it as we speak and then it just needs some final checking and it's good to go. It's called Cat's Confidence and is the third book in The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman. It has magic and dragons and lots of other good things :).

What I like about writing the Charlie series is because each adventure is partly set on a new world I can go for a new slant in the genre. The first one is contemporary fantasy, the second is mafia and paranormal and this one has a high fantasy bent to it because of all the dragons.

It's actually taken a lot longer to finish than I thought it would, but I'm really pleased with the end result and giving my readers the best I can is always my aim. So sorry to those I have been keeping waiting, but it's ready now. Watch this space for the release date.

I've also decided what I am going to write for Nanowrimo this year. Usually I do the next in the Charlie books, but since I have only just finished the last one I'm breaking the chain.

I'm seriously considering looking for an agent again, at least for some of my books, and I have one who I would really, really like to catch. I think the novel I want to write for Nano could grab her interest and I've been meaning to finish it for a while. So far I have 10K wds and so with an extra little push I could finish the first draft during Nano and edit it up afterwards.

It's sci-fi/fantasy adventure, futuristic, but with a touch of myth along the lines of something like Indiana Jones. I suppose it could be looked at as a little like reverse gender Indie in space. My lead is called Eli, she's feisty, fearless, asexual and has a rather problematic deep, dark secret. She is backed up by Lance, who is her eccentric AI and makes it his duty to fill the gap Eli leaves in the sexual market with just about anyone he can get to enter VR with him as well as making sure Eli doesn't do anything too insane. They retrieve things that have been lost, usually in very dangerous places.

I'm at the stage where I know what happens in it, but not quite why yet, so I shall have fun diving in. I don't plan for Nano, I just write, so I think I'm actually good to go way before I need to be. Who knows I might be 30K words in by the time Nano starts, then I'll have to write something else too :).

New Competwition to win Cat's Call and Cat's Creation

Over at Wittegen Press we have a new competwition to win The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman.

We're offering three eBook bundles of the two books in the series as prizes over here at competwition.

What is a competwition, other than an obvious spelling mistake? Well it is a very nifty way to run a competition on Twitter. All you have to do is sign in with twitter, click one button and you're entered. The click automatically subscribes you to @wittegenpress, our company twitter, and tweets about the competition on your account.

If you win you will be contacted by us via twitter once the competition has closed on the 2nd April. Competwition is a great site and well worth checking out for lots of lovely prizes.

New book: Cat's Creation (Chronicles of Charlie Waterman #2) by Natasha Duncan-Drake

My new book is out today. This is the sequel to Cat's Call for all those who have been waiting for it.

NEW From Wittegen Press The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman eBook: Cat's Creation by Natasha Duncan-Drake Available 22 March 2012

Cat's Creation (The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman #2)
By Natasha Duncan-Drake
Genre:  Contemporary Fantasy, YA, Length:  Novel (~68,000wds)
Date Pub:  22 March 2012, Available NOW from: Smashwords - $2.99, Amazon $2.99, £1.53, €2.68
Coming Soon from: Barnes and Noble, Diesel, Sony, Kobo, WH Smith, Google Books
ISBN:  ISBN 978-1-908333-31-5, ISBN 978-1-908333-30-8
Link to full listing with all buying links for Cat's Creation
(http://www.wittegenpress.com/catalogue_v2/items/show/36)

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Description:  Life goes on for the residents of Between as they struggle to recover from the events that could have destroyed their home and that have left a gaping hole in the structure of their world. As one of the leaders of the Questors, Charlie feels responsible for helping to keep them strong and together, but he's not sure how. Added to that, his magic is being difficult and there is another task to deal with; one that requires all seven Questors and that will take them to, Mydarec, a world run by mafia-style families, where sorcerers and vampires are a part of every-day living. Forced to play a role that could cost him his life and plagued by a vision of death, Charlie must struggle to overcome his own insecurities and, with his friends, figure out why they have been sent to such a dangerous world.

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You do not need an eReader to view this publication; there are Kindle aps available for most devices as well as formats for other eReaders, devices and PC.

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Excerpt

"We have other properties to see," Alexander said as soon as he read Ford's new figure, "good day, Mr Ford."
The shocked expression on Ford's face was priceless as Alexander turned away.
"Wait, wait," Ford said, stumbling over himself and hurriedly did something on the device before literally handing it to Alexander.
Now Alexander turned to face the other man properly again.
"That seems more reasonable, however I will need certain provisions if we are to close this business deal."
Ford could not hide his relief at that and for a brief moment Charlie thought he might actually have glimpsed the man behind the facade. Alexander looked poised to strike and Charlie almost felt sorry for the estate agent as the two prepared to duel it out for the house.
However, he couldn't help noticing that Ford kept looking at him out of the corner of his eye, even though most of the man's attention was on Alexander. It was abundantly clear that something about him had Ford completely on edge, which, given he was the least well armed of their whole group, was odd. On impulse he smiled at the estate agent and watched Ford go incredibly pale. It was unsettling to have such an effect, but useful, never the less.
"Call off your dog," Ford said, voice quavering, "please, I get it, you want the house. All I ask is a fair price."
"After an insult like that it had better be very fair," Charlie said, not appreciating the comment at all.
The man's eyes opened wide in shock and terror and Charlie could see Ford visibly shaking. He was pretty sure he had just stomped over local form, but he also knew backing down would hinder their negotiations, so he stepped closer instead. Ford shrank away and Charlie smiled again, since it seemed to unsettle the agent so much. He only stopped when Alexander placed a hand lightly on his shoulder and a quick flick of eyes towards the back of the room was the only communication between them. He nodded and turned, playing what he was figuring out was his part as well as he could, and stepped away to leave Alexander to buy the house.
"Do not assume to know me or my people," Alexander said, voice just above absolute zero, "it will make trouble for you, you do not want."
"I'm sorry," Ford stuttered, "I'm not used to foreigners."
"Get used to it," Alexander replied as Charlie took up a position at the back wall.
He really had no idea what he was doing, but he leant back and looked casual, keeping his eyes on the man even though there was distance between them. Why he scared Ford quite so much was a question that needed answering, but it wasn't as if they could just come out and ask. As Alexander negotiated, Charlie started sifting through the information in his head to see what he could come up with. Nothing

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If you read and enjoy this title, please consider reviewing it at Amazon, or Smashwords, or one of the other eBook shops. Thank you.
And if you'd like to help a small, independent publisher: Ways you can help us to up the profile of the book. Thank you! :) There are many and varied ways to help raised the profile of this book, we've listed a selection below.

1. Tag Cat's Creation on your local Amazon site (US, UK, DE, FR, IT, ES) Just below the product details on each Amazon page is the tag section. Please tick the boxes next to the tags you agree with (please DO NOT click the agree with all tags option, because it does not help the book).
2. Like Cat's Creation on your local Amazon site (US, UK, DE, FR, IT, ES) At the top of every page there is a like link which you can click if you are logged in.
3. Like The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman on Facebook The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman on Facebook
4. Review Cat's Creation on any of the eBook sites: Amazon (US, UK, DE, FR, IT, ES); Smashwords.
5. Tweet about Cat's Creation, example tweet: Check out the NEW Nothing The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman eBook from @WittegenPress: Cat's Creation http://bit.ly/GGCmAe
6. Circle, +1 and/or Share the The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman pages(s) on Google+ The Chronicles of Charlie Waterman on Google+
7. +1 the book page: Use the +1 Button on Cat's Creation's Book Page on Wittegen Press Site