My independently published eBooks are priced pretty much the same worldwide and across multiple retailers, (making allowances for currency exchange based on the original US$ price of course). But the prices for my traditionally published eBbooks often vary widely… which has led to a reader expressing her disappointment at the price she paid for one of my books.

Let me make it very clear she was supportive of me as an author. But….

• She had an expectation built around the prices I’ve set for my self-published, full-length novels, so it’s not hard to see why she was expecting something between 75 – 95,000 words for that price. But what she got was a 25,000 word novella. Frankly, I’d be disappointed, too!
• She blamed the retailer for the pricing. (I know if I walk into a retail store and buy a product, only to discover it’s more expensive there than at a bunch of other places, I’m gonna be snarking about the retailer, too!)
• Understandably, she rated the book on the low side to reflect her disappointment and in her comments blamed the entity she perceived to be at fault: the online retailer.

Now it would be easy to comment she hadn’t done due diligence before making the purchase — caveat emptor, and all that. It would be easy to say she should have known it was a traditionally published book and been aware that neither author nor online retailer had a say over the price set for this novella, or were responsible for the lack of information on the book’s product page. It would be easy to protest, “If she’d contacted me, I’d have told her it was much cheaper to buy the book from direct from the publisher!” But I don’t think that’s fair.

Unfortunately I can’t address her disappointments directly without leaving the information in the review section on the retailer’s product page… which forces me to rate my own book — soooo not ethical!  (I mean, do I give it one star? Three? Five? Let’s not go there.)

All readers are looking for is a good book to read at a decent price! It shouldn’t be this hard, right?

Well… no. But with the myriad of ways authors can publish these days, and so many people “doing it their way”, the information readers want isn’t always going to be at their fingertips.

So here’s what I think book-buyers should be aware of so they get the best bang for their buck.

Self-published authors (also known as independently published authors, or indie-pubbed authors) generally split into those who publish under their own names, and those who’ve formed a company and publish under their company name (in which case it’s tricky to pinpoint whether the “press” is actually a small press publisher or an author publishing under her company name). But if a book’s product information indicates the author and publisher names are the same (e.g. Seer’s Hope by Maree Anderson / Publisher: Maree Anderson) then readers can be 99.99% certain the author and the publisher are one and the same.

Why is it beneficial for readers to know this?

Because if the author is also the publisher, then the author is responsible for the following:

• The eBook’s cover, editing, layout and formatting
• Assigning genre categories that make the eBook visible when readers search a particular category
• Formats available for sale (e.g. PDF, epub, mobi)
• Whether the book is sold with or without DRM (Digital Rights Management designed to restrict readers from copying eBooks, but that also restricts readers from transferring eBooks they’ve legitimately purchased to another eReader device the reader might own.)
• Availability of the eBook at various retailers (e.g. exclusively on Amazon, available only in certain world territories, or available at a whole bunch of retailers worldwide)
• The eBook’s Product Page information
• Pricing

Sometimes, depending upon the size of the publisher (and the availability of experienced, dedicated staff to handle any of the above), the publisher will outsource steps to an independent company or contractor. For example, uploading the various eBook formats to retailers along with the eBook’s product information. And this is often where crucial information that would help readers make informed choices gets neglected.

And the publisher sets the price.

The pricing is out of the author’s control; she can’t discount it or put it on sale. She can’t tweak the price to bring it in line with other eBooks in the same genre with similar word counts. Her hands are tied. And depending on the deal the publisher has negotiated with the individual retailer, the retailer’s hands might well be tied, too. They may not be able to discount, or price-match other retailers to ensure readers get the lowest price.

(Though let’s face it: sometimes, there’s just no figuring out the logic behind pricing. Hence why one the price of my small press published eBooks ranges from US$3.50 direct from the publisher, to US$6.50 at some retailers.  Caveat emptor indeed!)

So how does a reader make sure she’s getting the best bang for her buck?

What if her preferred online retailer’s product page lacks the information she needs, or the price seems way too high?

Here are some suggestions:

1. Google the book’s title and scan the prices that pop up

2. Google the author’s website for book information & buy links
Most author’s these days have websites. And most will provide — at the very least — the genre, a short blurb, excerpt, and a bunch of buy links for of their books at various retailers. Often the author will provide links to the publisher’s website, and if that publisher has direct-to-reader sales, the price may be cheaper than at your preferred retailer.

3. Check the book’s cover for the publisher’s logo or name, and Google it
If the publisher has a website with direct-to-the-public sales, as I’ve already mentioned it may be cheaper to buy direct from the publisher than pay the MSRP (Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price) at a retailer. Publishers often offer a variety of formats which you can select from and then side-load to an eReader. Sure, the process is trickier than, say, Amazon’s One-Click button and an immediate download to your Kindle device, but the extra couple of steps involved may save you a few bucks.

3a. If the book’s cover doesn’t show the publisher, check the front matter/copyright info inside the eBook (via the retailer’s Look Inside function if it’s available)

4. Contact the author via her website contact form and ask for the information you need
The majority of authors will be thrilled you asked, and go out of their way to provide any information lacking, as well as cluing you in on the best place to buy their book.

5. Contact the retailer directly
And here’s hoping they have a great customer  service team and will get back to you in a timely fashion… like, before you give up and buy something else from somewhere else. But remember, if the information hasn’t been provided to them in the first place, they won’t be able to help.

Finally, if you are disappointed with the price you paid for your purchase, I’d ask that you reconsider rating the book poorly in the reviews section to air your disappointment. In my humble opinion, ratings are an indication of what you thought of the book – the characters, the writing etc. By all means mention the issues you have with the price — that’s immensely valuable to other potential readers! But rating it poorly potentially hurts the author… who may not have any control over the price her publisher has set.

Happy reading!

M

Enjoy!

“Brenda Novak’s Annual Online Auction for Diabetes Research is gearing up for its biggest year yet. Thanks to all who have participated in the past — both donors and shoppers — we’ve raised a cumulative total of $1.6 million. This year we are hoping to surpass $2 million to help all those with diabetes [  ].”

Hi all,

As I did last year, I’m participating in Brenda Novak’s annual auction to raise funds for diabetes research.

Like me, the chances are high that you know someone who is affected by diabetes. In Brenda’s case that “someone” is her son, Thad. I’ve gotten to know Brenda through the IndieRomanceInk loop we’re both members of, and she’s not only a talented author, but a wonderful lady all round. So when she put out the call for donations to help raise money for diabetes research it was a no-brainer for me and many other indie authors on the loop to contribute and help make a difference in the lives of those living with diabetes.

The 2013 annual online auction for diabetes research is now live, and runs until 31st May 2013.

This year we’ve again kicked in to buy eReaders, which have been preloaded with eBooks — here’s just three of the eReaders being auctioned off that might interest you:

1) ITEM #2948732: Kindle 6″ WiFi #2 Young Adult 

This Kindle comes preloaded with the following 12 eBooks:

Young Adult Paranormal Mystery:

• WILDWOOD by Helen Scott Taylor

Young Adult Paranormal:

• FREAKS OF GREENFIELD HIGH (Book 1: Freaks Series) by Maree Anderson
• FREAKS IN THE CITY (Book 2: Freaks Series) by Maree Anderson

Young Adult Contemporary Adventure/Mystery:

• GEM STONE (A Gemma Stone Mystery) by Dale Mayer

Young Adult Contemporary Romance/Ghost Story:

• IN CASSIE’S CORNER by Dale Mayer

Young Adult Urban Fantasy:

• DANGEROUS DESIGNS (Designs Series Book 1) by Dale Mayer
• DEADLY DESIGNS (Designs Series Book 2) by Dale Mayer

Young Adult Paranormal Romance/Dystopian:

• VAMPIRE IN DENIAL (Family Blood Ties Book 2) by Dale Mayer
• VAMPIRE IN DESIGN (Family Blood Ties Book 3) by Dale Mayer

Young Adult Zombie Romance:

• BARELY ALIVE (Barely Alive Series) by Bonnie Paulson
• FALLING APART (Barely Alive #2) by Bonnie Paulson
• MOSTLY DEAD (Barely Alive #3) by Bonnie Paulson

2) ITEM #2948735: Kindle 6″ WiFi #4: Erotica, Fantasy, SciFi, Time Travel

This Kindle comes preloaded with the following 16 eBooks:

Time Travel Romance:

• TIME’S ENEMY (Saturn Society) by Jennette Marie Powell

Science Fiction Romance:

• HANGAR 18: LEGACY by Jennette Marie Powell

Erotic Romance – A Scottish Historical Novella:

• HIGHLANDER IN HER BED (Forbidden Fantasy) by Cathleen Ross

Paranormal Erotic (MF Pairing):

• UP ON THE HOUSETOP (Kyron Pack Series) by Suzanne Rock

Fantasy Romance:

• A CLOCKWORK FAIRYTALE (Fantasy Romance) by Helen Scott Taylor

Fantasy:

• FEAST OF BEAUTY (Irish Fantasy Romance Novella) (Celtic Magic) by Helen Scott Taylor

SciFi Romance:

• THE SWORDS OF GREGARA-HONORA by Cynthia Woolf

Fantasy With Romantic Elements:

• SEER’S HOPE (Book 1 Of The Seer Trilogy) by Maree Anderson
• SEER’S PROMISE (Book 2 Of The Seer Trilogy) by Maree Anderson
• SEER’S CHOICE (Book 3 Of The Seer Trilogy) by Maree Anderson

Gothic Sci Fi Romance:

• APOCALYPSE BABES: THE COMPLETE SERIES (The Z Word, The X Factor, iRobotronic, Kumbaya Much, Bite Me and Apocalypse For Realz) by Bella Street

3) ITEM #2948807: Kindle Paperwhite WiFi #2: Paranormal Romance

If eReaders and eBooks aren’t your thing, there’s a huge range of other items and services to bid for, so make sure you head over to Brenda’s online auction and check them out.

Good luck bidding, and let’s hope this year’s auction is the most successful one so far!

:-)

M

Whenever I hear that kind of comment I inwardly wince and presume that the speaker doesn’t read YA — or at least, doesn’t read widely in the genre. And I feel kinda sad about all the amazing books that person is missing out on because they “never”.

One such book is on my reading list for April: Mind Games by Kiersten White. (If that name sounds familiar, she’s the author of the Paranormalcy trilogy).

Mind Games: They stole her past. She won’t let them take her future.

I can’t see the present… but I know what lies ahead.

My instincts are always right… but every move I make feels wrong.

It’s my fault Fia’s here… how was I supposed to know?

Annie will die if I don’t do what they ask… I’ll wish I were dead if I do.

Not only is Mind Games written in first person present tense, but it also swaps the point-of view between the two main characters, sisters Fia and Annie. And the timeline isn’t linear; it zips back and forth from the past to the present.

I know, I know: this book was a hot mess that was impossible to follow, right?

So wrong. For me, nothing could be further from the truth. It works brilliantly — think movie-style flashbacks. Also, those past-set chapters interspersed with the present day timeline are written linearly, starting from seven years ago and getting progressively closer to the present day timeline. For me, this gives a thread of urgency throughout the story, like we’re running as fast as we can so we can catch up to the present and finally have all the information we need to survive along with the two main characters. And then the final scene…. Well, let’s just say the past came full circle, like whoa!

The other really interesting aspect of this book is how vibrantly different each point-of-view character is. Even if each chapter didn’t have a heading i.e. Fia or Annie, it’d be very apparent who “I” was and which character was taking center stage in that chapter. Annie is blind, but she can occasionally ”see” events, so her point of view is very unique. But I especially loved when we were in Fia’s head. She’s a damaged character whose been abused in the name of “training” and forced to kill and do things she didn’t want to do in order to keep her sister safe. She “feels” wrongness. Inside her head is a pretty scary place to be. Here’s an excerpt:

I sit up (it hurts, it hurts my body hurts) and grab her hand in mine. She startles; I haven’t been touching her at all lately. I don’t like my hands anymore. I used to think they were pretty. Now they look like they belong on someone else’s body. Someone who kills people. “Listen to me. Do not tell them. Don’t tell them you’re seeing more. Don’t tell Clarice. Don’t even think about what you’re seeing.”

“Why?” Fia, you’re scaring me. Why won’t you tell me what’s going on?”

“Promise me you won’t tell them!”

“I won’t! I promise! What’s going on?”

I drop her hand. “Nothing. And stop trying to see me. You won’t like it.” I walk out of her dorm room.

Down the hall.

Down the stairs.

Doesn’t matter where I go.

Outside the entrance hall I nearly bump into a boy. He’s wearing a coat and he is tall and he belongs black-and-white and shirtless on the wall of a clothing store and his warm brown eyes are completely glazed over. I simultaneously want to kiss him and to get as far away from him as possible. He feels wrong, he feels dangerous; my heart speeds up the same way for him that it did for the stun guns.

Everything here feels wrong all the time. But he feels exciting wrong.

“Hey,” he says, grinning, his eyes tracing over me without apology.

“Hey.” There are no boys here. Not teenagers, anyway. Only men. With weapons. (It hurts, it hurts my body hurts.)

“James. Keane. James Keane.” He sticks out his hand for me to shake it.

I keep my murderer hands to myself. “Keane as in the Keane Foundation?”

“The very same!”

“I should bash your brains in right now,” I say, but I am too tired to do it.

“You’re the third person to say that to me today!” He winks, then takes my arm and links it through his own. “Why don’t you take me on the grand tour of the secret school?”

“Why don’t you take a walking tour through rush-hour traffic?”

He laughs. “I like you. What did you say your name is?”

“Sofia.”

“Sofia. Soooofia. Sofia, I have done something very bad.”

It is wrong to go with him as he pulls me down the hall toward the empty classrooms. I go anyway. “I’ll bet I’ve done something worse.” Tap tap goes my finger.

“I would love to hear it if you have. But I get to go first. I have” –he looks both ways down the hall in exaggerated caution, then leans in and whispers right in my ear (wrong, wrong, but it doesn’t stop the shivers from going up and down my spine; he is gorgeous, I have never been this close to a gorgeous boy) –”broken into a boarding school for special teenage girls.”

I shove him back, glare. “That’s it? That’s pathetic.”

“It’s not! It’s very, very, bad. You see, I brought whiskey with me. Stolen whiskey.”

I yawn, patting my hand over my mouth.

“Stolen from the dean of my college.”

I check the watch I’m not wearing for the time.

“After he expelled me.”

I look him straight in the eyes. “I delivered a package bomb that killed two people.”

This book is captioned on the back cover by author Holly Black as “A brutal, exciting gem of a book.” And it certainly is.

In the acknowledgements, the author thanks her agent (Michelle Wolfson) for letting her write a book she “wasn’t supposed to” and for sending it out “in spite of its being ‘crazy’”. I’d like to thank Michelle, too. If she hadn’t taken a chance on this book, it might never have seen the light of day. And that would have been a huge shame for readers like me, and my daughter, who loved it to bits… and can’t wait for the next installment. Please let there be another installment!!!!!

And here’s my reading list for April:

• The Touch of Twilight (Sign of the Zodiac 3) by Vicki Pettersson
• Mind Games by Kiersten White
• Crossing The Line by Katie McGarry
• Newborn Baby For Christmas by Fiona Lowe
• The War Hero’s Locked-Away Heart by Louisa George
• Dark Kiss by Michelle Rowen
• Shadow City by Diana Pharaoh Francis
• What The Librarian Did by Karina Bliss
• Breathe by Sarah Crossan
• Divergent by Veronica Roth
• City of Souls (Sign of the Zodiac 4) by Vicki Pettersson
• Cheat The Grave (Sign of the Zodiac 5) by Vicki Pettersson

Happy Reading!

:-)

M

I guess this wouldn’t be such a problem if we could truly take the nice things that people say about us — the genuine compliments, I mean — on board. But all too often we dismiss those compliments with a wave of a hand… and go back to seeing ourselves the way we’ve always seen ourselves. And most of us are stuck with a huge pile of past baggage — years of it — that colors the person we see when we look in the mirror. That’s normal, right? But sometimes what we see can become a self-fulfilling prophesy.

Here’s a personal example:
An author friend of mine emailed me the other day to congratulate me on a recent success. In her email she commented that she was glad this had happened to me because I was “so nice and such a good writer”.

What a sweetie, huh? But instead of a warm glow when I read her words the first thing I thought when I saw the “nice” comment was, Yikes. I’m not nice. I’m self-centered, sarcastic and impatient. And sometimes I’m downright mean. How can she think I’m nice? And I immediately discounted the “good writer” comment — just dismissed it entirely. In fact, when I located her email to check the accuracy of what I remembered to include it in this post, I was surprised to see that particular comment. I hadn’t remembered reading it. It was like I’d blanked it from my mind.

At the time I mentioned her comments to my husband in an incredulous way, expecting him to agree with me that I’m not nice. In fact, often I’m the farthest thing from nice you could possibly get. He looked me in the eye and said, “She’s right. You are a nice person. You’re one of the most caring people I know. And you are a good writer.” And even though this man I love and whose opinion I value is telling me the opposite, all that’s going ’round in my brain is, Nah. Delusional. They don’t know me at all.

But what if people who’ve given me genuine compliments do know me… better than I know myself? What if what they see when they look at me is the real me? What if I am attractive? What if I am a nice person, a caring person? What if am a good writer? What if I deserve a little success after all my hard work?

Wow. Hold that thought ’cause it’s just a little mind-blowing….

Um, yeah. It’s obvious I have some work to do on myself, isn’t it? Most of us do, unfortunately. And we’re always harder on ourselves than we are on others, right? It’s the normal human condition. But “normal” — the status quo — is not always a good thing or a healthy thing. And sometimes we need a bit of a shake-up to see that and to realize that we have to change the way we see ourselves.

This morning I just had one of those shake-ups and it spurred me to write this post.

If you’re still doubting that others see you differently than you see yourself, if you always dismiss compliments out of hand, if you’re not convinced those people who tell you you’re a good person and worthwhile and worthy happen to really mean it, and they’re being genuine when they say those things, then you might like to watch this video. It follows a forensic sketch artist sketching woman from their descriptions of themselves, and then as others describe them. I spotted it on Dear Author and (now that I’ve stopped crying) had to share.

All I ask that you ignore the fact it’s plugging a product. Don’t take it at face-value because the deeper message is worth far more than a bar of soap. And perhaps you might want to have a tissue handy in case it happens to resonate deeply with you as it did with me.

Today I reached a bit of a personal milestone as an author…

…by hitting Number 1 on iTunes Top Romance Free Books list with The Crystal Warrior! (Plus, it’s currently sitting at Number 3 on the Top Free Books chart across all categories, which is Pretty. Darned. Amazing.)

And yes, you’d better believe I screen-captured that Number 1 on the chart spot before it disappeared!

(Yep, that’s my book, waaay over to the left of the screen capture.)

Even more surprising, the next two books in the series aren’t doing too badly in the Top Romance Paid Books, either — currently sitting at No.7 (Jade’s Choice) and No.8 (Ruby’s Dream):

Earlier this week another of my freebies, Seer’s Hope, made it to Number Two on the Top Sci Fi and Fantasy Free Books before being bumped back a few spots,  and believe me, I thought that was exciting! Same with having the next two books in the trilogy (Seer’s Promise and Seer’s Choice) showing up on the top 200 chart in Top Sci Fi and Fantasy Paid Books, along with a heap of SFFP heavyweights that I’m in total awe of. But there’s something about hitting that Number 1 spot. Validation, perhaps? Whatever, I’m not going to analyze it to death. I’m just going to bask in it for a little while because it’s a way the heck cool-as feeling *g*

Thanks for letting me boast, and I promise it’ll never happen again. Well, unless one of my books manages to do something really extraordinary ;-)

:-)

M

But you might not know I was so freaking clueless after completing that first manuscript, that when I turned up to my very first Romance Writers of New Zealand Auckland Chapter meeting in February of 2004, I didn’t know I was a romance writer. And I only suspected my manuscript with a blind heroine snatched from her home and transported to a world of magic and capricious gods was a fantasy — I didn’t know for sure.

So why join Romance Writers of New Zealand if I didn’t know I was a romance writer?

I joined specifically to enter the RWNZ Clendon Award in the hope of getting feedback about my manuscript — especially since I was already well into manuscript number two of what would eventually turn out to be a trilogy. And I hoped RWNZ Auckland Chapter members would turn out to be a nice bunch of people and I might learn a few things. And they were. And boy, did I learn a lot… and realize how much I still had to learn. Heck, I didn’t even know the difference between paranormal and fantasy, let alone how to calculate word-counts. (Back then it was convert your document to Courier or other acceptable non-proportional font, and double-line-space it so you’d get an average of 25o words per page, and multiply the number of pages by 250. Me? I was ahead of time *g* because I was using computer word-counts.)

Turned out my manuscript was a fantasy, and at the very least could be described as having romantic elements (given the manuscript didn’t have a traditional happy-ever-after due to the three-book arc I’d kind of planned in my head). And to my delight, that very raw first manuscript went on to final in the Clendon Award with enough encouraging feedback from first-round reader judges to make me realize that this was want I wanted to be: a writer. The rest, as they say, is history.

If you’re a fan of my other stories, so you know exactly what to expect (and borrowing from a previous post) here’s what you should know if you’re considering checking out The Seer Trilogy:

• This trilogy is very much a nod to my longtime love of epic fantasy, and I think it’s accurate to term them “fantasy with romantic elements” rather than romances.
• There are multiple characters and the main ones have point-of-view scenes (i.e. these stories are not restricted to only hero or heroine’s point of view scenes like the majority of my other books).
• There are a few made-up words to go with the made-up world that the main characters inhabit (when they’re not travelling across worlds and causing trouble back on earth, that is). Please don’t panic: it’s easy to figure out meanings from context, but there’s also a glossary at the back of each book.
• Each book could be read as a standalone as it has it’s own complete story arc, but they’re best read in order.
• Hope’s full story spans all three books, although the focus in the second and third books moves to her daughter Romana (Book Two) and her son Ryley (Book Three).
• The books do include love scenes (I’m primarily a romance writer after all!), but they’re not explicitly described love scenes like those in my Crystal Warriors books (or my erotic romances). I’d be quite happy giving these books to a teenager… if they liked fantasy with romantic elements of course.
• Clarifying the possible YA crossover appeal, Hope is twenty in the first book, Romana is eighteen in the second book, and Ryley is mid-twenties in the third book. And I’d recommend as more suitable for older teens due to sexual content (i.e. they do include love scenes).
• They’re longer books — each is around 100k.
• Yes, there’s a reason why the characters on two of the covers have freaky gold-colored eyes! (And the only reason why the character on the cover of Seer’s Promise doesn’t have freaky black eyes is because we figured that would be too… too… freaky!)
• Seer’s Hope (Book One of The Seer Trilogy) is FREE at a bunch of places — check out the Books page for updated download links.
• If you’re keen on a good deal, The Seer Trilogy Bundle (with all three eBooks) is out now for US$5.99 (or US equivalent where applicable).

SEER’S HOPE
Book One of The Seer Trilogy 

Hope is snatched from her home and transported to a primitive world of magic and capricious gods. The Dayamari people believe she’s a Seer and their only hope of salvation, but she’s blind — she can’t see anything at all, let alone the future. She must accept her destiny and learn to wield the awe-inspiring powers the gods have bestowed upon her. And if she’s to save those she loves from the horrifying evil that lurks in the darkness, failure is not an option.

SEER’S PROMISE
Book Two of The Seer Trilogy 

Hope’s Sehani powers have finally grown strong enough to risk returning to Earth. Gods willing, she’ll find a way to rid her daughter of the soul-eater that possesses her, and convince Romana to return with her to Dayamaria.

Romana is captivated by the prospect of becoming a powerful Sehan like her mother. But her dreams are shattered when everything she’d hoped for is bestowed upon someone who couldn’t care less about wielding Sehani magic. Romana craves power with every fiber of her being… and when she finds a way to take what she wants the cost is devastating for gods and humankind alike.

SEER’S CHOICE
Book Three of The Seer Trilogy 

Ryley has traveled across worlds and discovered his soul mate living in the Earth town of Seaview… his mother’s hometown. Watching Rowan from afar is one thing, but actively interfering in her life? That’s against “the rules” in so many ways—especially when your mother is the most powerful Sehan in Dayamaria, and your grandmother happens to be a goddess. If anyone discovers where he’s been disappearing to—and why—there’ll be big trouble. But he can’t give Rowan up, especially now her strange powers have spun dangerously out of control. And then Dayamaria is threatened by a deadly predator immune to magic, and Ryley must choose between the woman he loves and the people he left behind.

Briefly:

FREEBIE #1

THE CRYSTAL WARRIOR (Book One of The Crystal Warriors Series):
Paranormal romance,  92,000 words, is currently FREE to download at:

| Smashwords | B&N US| B&N UK| Diesel eBooks |
| iTunes US | iTunes UK | iTunes NZ | Kobo |Sony |
| Amazon US | Amazon UK |
| All Romance eBooks |

Note: the book hasn’t been price-matched across all Amazon outlets, so at Amazon DE, FR, IT, ES, CA etc., it’ll be the foreign currency equivalent of US$0.99c. If you can’t access the Amazon US store, you can still get hold of a free mobi file to sideload to your Kindle at Smashwords or All Romance eBooks.

FREEBIE #2

SEER’S HOPE (Book One of The Seer Trilogy):
Fantasy (with romantic elements), 107,000 words, is currently FREE to download at:

| Smashwords | B&N US | B&N UK| Diesel eBooks |
| iTunes US | iTunes UK | iTunes NZ | Kobo |

Note: I’m hoping to upload the PDF, epub, mobi to All Romance eBooks, and the mobi to Amazon, early next week. But unless Amazon price-matches immediately after I upload — highly unlikely! sorry — it’ll be US$0.99c (or foreign currency equivalent ) at Amazon stores. So if you want to get hold of a free copy, then you can grab one from Smashwords or (all going to plan, in the next few days) from All Romance eBooks.

And on the subject of freebies, look at what I spotted on the Books/Romance section of iTunes:

Isn’t it pretty? I <3 this banner sooo much!

And color me gobsmacked that iTunes would choose one of my eBooks to feature here, and design such a fab banner for it. Wow. A Kiwi author such as myself can only dream of this kind of exposure… so of course I screen-captured it. You know, just to prove to DH when he got home that his wife wasn’t delusional *g*

BTW, I sent a thank-you message to iTunes Customer Service and got a really lovely response from a rep, too. Still smiling ’bout that.

Happy reading!

M