I’m very happy to announce that faceless has made it into the Quarter Finals of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest in the Young Adult Fiction category (because the main character is 17 years old).

A quick outline of the contest rounds and number of entries:

1. 5000 entries submitted in each category (Adult / Young Adult)
2. Top 1000 entries chosen based on 300-word “pitch” (I won’t give you the pitch because it spoils the whole story)
3. Top 250 chosen based on 5000-word “excerpt” (announced here)
4. Top 50 chosen by Publishers Weekly editors, who read the whole book (to be announced April 24, 2012)
5. Top 3 chosen by Penguin editors.
6. Winner chosen by Amazon customers.

We’ll see what happens next. It’s fun to be in the contest because no matter what, I’ve already got the book finished!

Get all faceless news updates delivered to your inbox by subscribing here.

• And the Title Is: Chinese 24/7
• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• Book in Hand
• Vote on the Book Title

The paperback is still available too, of course, but it ships from the USA so the eBook may be more realistic for expats.

SPECIAL NOTE FOR CHINESE LEARNERS: Because the Kindle conversion process is a little bit tricky (read: I don’t understand it at all), all hanzi in the book (don’t worry, there’s not that much and it’s not important) has been converted to images. I borrowed a friend’s Kindle to have a look at them and they look a little bit… well… like images of hanzi instead of the crisp, clear characters we’re used to seeing on our computer screens. Sorry about that. I’m too ignorant about all things Kindle to have figured out a better way to do it.

• The Pinyin Wall
• Stump the Chinese: Hard Hanzi
• Read Chinese (NFLC) – My Review
• Stump the Chinese: Kànglì 伉俪
• Chinese Hanzi Adventure Method

It’s not about learning Chinese. But it does have some Chinese in it. And, without giving anything away, I would like to say that any reader who knows Chinese will appreciate at least one little joke more than readers who don’t know Chinese. If that’s not a reason to read a whole book, I don’t know what is!

If you’d like to see some sample chapters and/or the back cover text, they are available at the companion website.

This blog will get back to Chinese-learning tips soon (within the year).

• Contest: Name the Book I Wrote
• Book Contract Signed
• Receive Updates about my Book
• Book in Hand
• And the Title Is: Chinese 24/7

A few people have contacted me saying they wanted to write a review of Chinese 24/7 on Amazon.com but couldn’t because they didn’t have an Amazon account. I told the publisher about that problem and they told me the best alternative to writing a review on Amazon is writing one at Barnes & Nobel.

Here’s a button to write a review of your own:

Advantages of Amazon

• I think the reviews on Amazon.com are more widely read and therefore probably more prestigious.
  

Advantages of Barnes & Noble

• It’s simple to do (don’t think you’ve got to use all those little categories of stars, just an overall rating is enough).
• You can create an account and write a review without purchasing anything from their website. With Amazon you have to purchase at least one product from them before you can write a review.
• Not all Barnes & Noble stores (North America) carry Chinese 24/7 yet, and the more positive customer reviews they see on their own sight the more likely they are to carry the book on their shelves.

So all that to say: if you’ve been meaning to write a review but haven’t because of Amazon’s rules, you’ve now got a place to do it. (And if it’s really glowing we might even put it up on the special reviews compilation page.) Thanks again!

• Book in Hand
• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again
• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Update: Editing done. Proofing almost done.

This will most likely serve as my final communication to the book updates news letter, for a while at least.

But there are a few final bits and pieces to tell you about:

1. If anyone in China who ordered the book via Amazon actually receives it (and I have no doubt you will), would you please let me know how long it took to get here from the shipping date? I’m curious about that.

2. The publisher has told me the most helpful thing anyone can do (besides actually buying the book) is to write a review on Amazon. Apparently, those are the real currency of online book sales (whatever that means). If anyone who has the book finds it useful, would you consider typing out a few kind words and clicking a few golden stars here? You have to register an account with Amazon, but that’s pretty easy to do. I’ve also added a “Write your own review” button to the sidebar for easy findability later.

3. If you’d like to see the “audio companion site” for my book, it’s here. The MP3s are all free, but you’ll need to get the book to see the transcript and translation (and sometimes the excuse) for what’s being said. Doing it this way saved us from having to press CDs and shrinkwrap them with the book.

4. Last and certainly least: because of peer pressure from MDBG, I’ve created a Facebook page for my book. I have no idea what that means or what it’s for, but I have a feeling that someday I could post book-related news on there as well as here. If anyone can explain what in the world a Facebook page is good for, I’m all ears?

Thanks again to everyone for the support during this process. It finally feels like this project is over. Now I can get back to work on those 45 draft posts that have been glaring at me for so many months.

• Review Chinese 24/7
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again
• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Contract Signed

I promised (someone at some point) that I’d tell ya’ll when my book went back up for sale on Amazon and now it is (right here). Who knows why it disappeared for a while.

1. Write book
2. Editing
3. Design / layout
4. Proofing
5. Print book

The publisher is the only one who has any hard copies of the book right now. They’re promoting it at a conference in Chicago. In a few more weeks it should be available at stores or your mailbox (even though Amazon is hedging their bets by saying May 1).

I’ve been crazy busy finalizing the audio tracks (164 of them!) and getting the download website built (not really my specialty) but it should all be drawing to a close soon.

Thanks again for the interest and support.

• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• Receive Updates about my Book
• Book in Hand
• Review Chinese 24/7

If you pre-ordered Chinese 24/7 from Amazon, you probably got an email recently that said:

“Hello from Amazon.com.

We are sorry to report that we will not be able to obtain the following item(s) from your order:

Albert Wolfe “Chinese 24/7: Everyday Strategies for Speaking and
Understanding Mandarin”
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1933330821

Though we had expected to be able to send this item to you, we’ve since found that it is not available from any of our sources at this time. We realize this is disappointing news to hear, and we apologize for the inconvenience we have caused you.

We have cancelled this item from your order.”

In addition to misspelling “canceled,” [I see now the error of my ways. It's a perfectly normal alternate spelling] Amazon now shows there is only one copy of the book available and the the price is $97.82! I strongly recommend against paying that much for it

Anyway, as soon as I found out about that email, I immediately emailed the publisher to ask what’s going on.

Here’s the reply from Stone Bridge Press:

“I don’t know why Amazon is including that wording, as other times books are delayed or out of stock they give expected availability info.

In any case, please let people know that the book is shipping the end of this month and should be available from Amazon in early to mid April.”

Amazon seems to be confused because of the delay from the original projected release date (Nov, 2008). The book will most certainly be available next month. I’m working very hard right now on getting all the accompanying audio files for the book ready for download by April 1.

I’m very sorry for the delay, confusion, and inconvenience caused by these little setbacks. Thank you again to everyone for your interest in this book. And thanks very much for your continued patience.

• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• And the Title Is: Chinese 24/7
• faceless Through to Quarter Finals (top 250)
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again
• Unlimited Wireless Internet

I’m happy to announce that after an intense proofing process, Chinese 24/7 is finally at the printers!

1. Write book
2. Editing
3. Design / layout
4. Proofing
5. Print book

It’s hard to believe that some machine somewhere is putting actual ink on actual paper at this point. It’s all been digital to me so far. The great thing about this proofreading process has been that technology allows instantaneous marking and correcting of changes. I’m in China but I was proofreading a book being printed in the USA. Thanks to Adobe PDFs and email, it’s possible for a group of people almost as far away as they could be (and still be on earth) to work together to create a book.

So when will it be available in stores?

The book ships from the printer on March 24th and I was told it should take about 4 weeks after that to make it to stores. That puts it on the shelves sometime around the week of April 20. Those who pre-ordered on Amazon should get it before anyone else though (at least those in the USA).

Speaking of Amazon

I’m afraid I have some bad news for those who have pre-ordered: the price of the book has been increased to $24.95 (from $19.95). The publisher sent me an email the other day saying that they’d increased the price. They really wanted the price to be $19.95 but the book is a little longer than they expected and the editorial and layout costs were higher than they projected. The information on Amazon (which I’m hoping will be updated soon) is about six months old and was an estimate (which explains why the release date shows as Nov 1, 2008 but you can still only pre-order!).

I guess this happens all the time in the publishing world, but I’d like to say I’m sorry to anyone who pre-ordered the book on Amazon and will now have to pay a few extra dollars. This decision was completely out of my hands. The good news is, just as you didn’t pre-order it for the full $19.95 price, Amazon will be offering the book at a discount less than $24.95 (although I don’t know exactly how much).

Thanks again to everyone who pre-ordered and thanks for your patience while we all wait in this final “limbo time” when the book is neither on my computer nor in your hands.

• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again
• Book Update: Editing done. Proofing almost done.
• Book in Hand
• Vote on the Book Title

1. Write book
2. Editing
3. Design / layout
4. Proofing
5. Print book

I was very privileged to have Chris Pitts from Lonely Planet edit my manuscript. He is not only very knowledgeable about the language, but also quite savvy about reader-friendliness. It was a great honor for me to work with him.

When Can I Hold the Book in My Hands?

Yes, that’s what we all want to know. The publisher is still shooting for a March 2009 release, and we seem to be on track for that. The book is already for sale at Amazon if you want to reserve your copy now (I’m currently ranked number 16 in new releases about Chinese).

[UPDATE (Thur, Jan 29): My linking to the Amazon rankings seems to have been the kiss of death. Not only am I not number 16 anymore, I'm nowhere in the top 20 (where I'd been for weeks). Also, the top 20 used to be top 36. Morral of the story: Keep Amazon rankings to yourself. Got it.]

• Book Update: Proofing done. Book at Printer.
• Book in Hand
• And the Title Is: Chinese 24/7
• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again

I’m glad to announce there are now over ten people outside my family who have expressed interest in my book. And because they’re asking very reasonable questions like, “How’s that whole book thing going?” and “When will it be out again?” I’ve decided to provide a little mailing list just for book updates (the answers are “fine” and “sometime early 2009,” by the way). This post is sneakily serving as a test of the new service.

You can subscribe to this special RSS feed or special email list (also in the sidebar under the picture of the book) if you want to receive updates about the book only. If you’re already a subscriber to Laowai Chinese, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll get any updates about the book with your usual (once in a blue moon) updates.

Thanks again for the interest in the book. And to you loyal readers of this blog (if you’re still around), I promise to post one of the 34 draft posts I’m working on as soon as…um…I post it.

• The Great China Quest
• Book Printed and for Sale on Amazon Again
• Will Amazon Sell Chinese 24/7?
• Book in Hand
• MDBG Dictionary Plugin for WordPress