Promotion Successful.

c2011Shalako

Over the last ten or eleven days, we have given away over 4,900 copies of 'The Handbag's Tale,' a sardonic murder mystery set in Paris, at the height of the Roaring '20s.

I wrote it specifically as a promotional item, not being ready to tackle what would (or could) be my first detective novel. At that time, I was really more interested in science fiction.

It's available right now for the investment of two minutes time from Amazon.

At 11,000 words, the story took me a couple of weeks to write, and I submitted it around a little before deciding to publish it myself according to my 'everything for free' business model.

Necessity is very often the mother of invention and in my own case this is certainly true. What surprised me, was when I found that invention was the mother of virtue! But then I have a strong interest in making it work.

Later tonight or early tomorrow morning, the 5,000th free copy will go out the door, and I suppose someone will have to make a decision whether to put a price on it, or shoot for 10,000 free copies.

I say this because I am presently working on another Inspector Maintenon story, this time set in southwestern England circa 1926 or '27. It's called, 'Maintenon Gets a Vacation,' and he's on a walking tour of the moors when he stumbles across a murder.

This one has a double-whammy of a twist at the end.

I wish I could claim some credit for all of this promotional success, but Amazon lowered the price in a simple price-matching move because I was giving away free copies on Smashwords, one of my other platforms.

During e-book week, I worked my butt off to give away 130 e-books on Smashwords. Imagine my surprise to open up my account and discover that I had given away 1,700 e-books in my sleep.

There are no accidents, or so they say. I sure wish I knew how that happened; but what I did before, I can do again. Who knows, I might even be able to sell them for a buck or something.

You never really know until you try.

Note: the 'everything for free' business model controls overhead very nicely and that is what allows us to keep our prices low while maintaining the highest literary standards.

Excerpt: 'The Aviator.'

c2011Shalako

Note: 'The Aviator' is a small piece of a larger work in progress and is subject to further review.


Cold wind blasted at his face, the stench of petrol ever present. Thoughts of fire danced in his head.

Looking over the side, the village of Bevan’s Knoll passed under his wheels. Huddled in his cockpit against the icy chill, inscrutable in the helmet, mask and goggles, the beauty of the land below, darkened in irregular blotches by patches of cloud, a low mist still hanging in some of the valleys, meant nothing to him.

The clock on the instrument panel mocked his every desire, and reinforced his every terror. If only she knew what he knew, she would never forgive him. But for her, he had sacrificed everything, and it still wasn’t his fault.

It wasn’t his fault and he didn’t want to pay the price. White knuckles gripped the control column, and his head swung on a pivot, dark eyes probing everything in rapier-sharp focus. He had no choice in the matter.

The fearful burden that he bore must go with him to his grave, for surely the truth, a truth so obvious, would never be accepted. It would never be accepted of him, never in a thousand years. One little lie to get somewhere in life, and it had led him to this inescapable moment in time. The barrier looming ahead made his lower guts tighten up in anticipation. Heavy straps tugging at his body in the sudden turbulence gave little reassurance.

The white fog obscured all vision and even dulled the sound of the motor. Rarely for him, the tension rose a thousand-fold, but this was different. There was no going back now. He stared at the turn-and-bank indicator in fixed concentration. What people said was absolutely right—there was just no way to tell if you were in straight and level flight inside of the cloud, or if you were in a one-way, one-gravity death spiral, with the cold and indifferent earth rising up to meet you. If the instruments had shaken, or tumbled, or gone off in any way, he felt he might have given up and died by choice…but they were serene in their confidence to measure simple forces.

The parachute bulging so uncomfortably under him was of no comfort at all. The thought of using it for anything other than an emergency, a fire in the air perhaps, terrified him.

People also said you couldn’t really tell the difference between vertigo and sheer horror. They said it was a kind of physical, totally-detached temporary insanity, where the whole world was spinning on you. In his experience, people said an awful lot of stupid things.

Normally a very confident young man, he was finding out that this one was true as well.

Perhaps it would be just as well if he did lose control. He could at least die with some dignity and his honour intact.