Further Adventures With E-Books

By Pat Browning

In Amy Shojai’s latest blog she talks about Kindle Boards and how to pump up your Kindle sales with “tags” and reviews. She also breaks the news that Barnes and Noble will offer pubit! this summer. “This is their version of the Ebook, with a free self -publishing platform similar to the Kindle model, to publish on the Nook.”


As a thank-you to friends, fans and pet lovers, Amy offers two articles: communicating with your cats, and treating dogs whose outdoor romps invite insect bites and stings. Many thanks to Amy for sharing her adventures with e-books.


Folks, the publishing biz is changing so fast I can’t keep up. Author J.A. Konrath set the planet on its ear by selling his books to Amazon. Now, THERE’S a twist! This clip from zdnet.com about Target selling Kindle books is already old news but I only heard about it a couple of days ago.


QUOTE:
Target, a long-time Amazon partner, is going to give the Kindle a distribution hand in a small number of stores with a larger rollout later in the year.


The retailer said Wednesday that it will carry Amazon’s Kindle beginning April 25 in select stores. Specifically, Target will carry the Kindle at its flagship Minneapolis store where the retailer is based. In addition, Target will put the Kindle in 102 south Florida store. After those pilots, Target will bring the Kindle to more stores.


News of the Target distribution leaked out earlier in the month. Meanwhile, Barnes & Noble paired up with Best Buy to distribute the nook. Leading e-reader manufacturers are bolstering distribution as Apple’s iPad hits the market.


The big question is how big the market is for hard-core readers. With additional distribution at Best Buy and Target we’ll find out. Sony already distributes its Reader at retail outlets.


Target and Amazon have a solid history as partners. Amazon has hosted Target.com for years, but the parties are amicably breaking up.
END QUOTE


Meanwhile, Google is jumping into the digital book biz with an online store. This by-lined article by Andrew Orlowski appeared at www.theregister.co.uk.


QUOTE
Google has confirmed it will enter the retail digital book business, with the launch of an online store called Google Editions by July. Google Editions will also be available as a B2B service, allowing third-party retailers to sell eBooks on their own websites.

There's no word yet of any deals, and a company spokesman didn't elaborate on the question of pricing.


Currently the major publishers insist on maintaining their current flexibility with pricing via what's called an agency model, which they hope will preserve their high margins. Apple endorses such an approach to market, even though it leaves "retailers" such as itself scrapping over a smaller pool of potential profits. It's also supported by literary agents who have long-running and lucrative franchises.


Amazon looks at it a different way -- it wants to be able to set pricing, and it wants the high margins for itself. Amazon's original slice of the wholesale eBook price was an eye-watering 70 per cent, but after Apple's entry (with a publisher-friendly setup) it's since been forced to cut it back to 30 per cent.


By picking a fight with the book business, Amazon has been taught a lesson in where the power really lies. Publisher Macmillian withdrew rights to its vast catalog in the New Year, and Penguin stopped providing digital eBooks to Amazon a month ago. Apple is happy to work with publishers rather than dictate terms, because it sees it as a two-sided market -- Apple makes its revenue from hardware, and content is merely a something that makes the hardware more attractive. Amazon wants both the profits of a traditional distributor and retailer and hardware profits. Something has to give.


You may by now be scratching your head and wondering where Google will make any money, since it doesn't make any money (even indirectly) from Android, and it's not an advertising play. You're not alone.
END QUOTE


So, what does it all mean for authors? I think it means that authors who are fast on their feet are going to clean up.


And here’s Amy’s blog.

***
May 20, 2010, 4:56 pm


The news about my Kindle journey continues to be positive, with Complete Kitten Care continuing to sell well, now into the double digits in less than a month. I'm told (by them-thar experienced E-authors) that the key to sales is tags-tags-tags, and reviews-reviews-reviews. Well, that's one part of the key, anyway, but the sales puzzle has a combination lock that challenges the most savvy biz people. I'm still learning. In the weeks ahead, I plan to set up a paypal for offering the PDF (full color!) version of the book via my website.


Anyway, the Kindle Boards has been extraordinarily helpful. One of the ongoing threads supports authors with tags, each poster encouraged to tag all the other posted books in order to garner the same courtesy. One of these kind souls also posted a link to a similar Facebook-Amazon-Tag group which offers a similar service.


For those who missed the explanation in a previous blog, the tags describe the content of a given book and are suggested by both the author/publisher and by readers. Then visitors to that Amazon book page have the option to vote and agree the tag accurately describes the book. Those books with large numbers of tags in a given subject theoretically rise in the Amazon rankings so that should a visitor to Amazon search for a book with that content, YOUR book so tagged will be high on the list and get the attention it deserves.

Thus far, my Complete Kitten Care has garnered 30-58 "votes" on the various tags that include cat, kitten, breed and the like. I'm also grateful to Fran Pennock Shaw, Carol Shenold, Dena Harris and others for their glowing reviews. Note: I will happily give you and your books a shout-out should you happen to review my book. *s* Hey, as with cat training, bribes are legal, right? I'll keep you posted on when the other books are kindle-lized.


Breaking news--I just learned that Barnes and Noble will offer pubit! coming this summer. This is their version of the Ebook, with a free self publishing platform similar to the Kindle model, to publish on the Nook. Smashwords is another option which can be downloaded on the Sony reader (and yes, I'm looking into all of these option).


Meanwhile, on the article-writing front, I've been typing my fingers down to the claws. So as promised, here are some free "furry reads" as a thank you to all the folks following this blog. Please share with your other pet-loving friends.


For cat lovers -- do you understand what she's saying? Cat language stymies even the most loving cat owners. Did you know, for instance, that wetting on your bed (ew!!!) actually might be a cat compliment? Understanding felinese...cat talk...can help owners solve behavior problems and enrich the relationship you have with Kitty. Read “Cat Talk: Cat Language Explained” at http://tinyurl.com/2vlsxuo.

For dog lovers: SOOTHING BUG BITES AND STINGS
On-the-go dogs delight in outdoor adventures, but too often they sniff out pesky bugs that prove aggravating or even dangerous. Recently my happy-go-lucky German shepherd pup Magic morphed into a miserable crybaby, courtesy of “something” that bit or stung. His eyes swelled shut, muzzle inflated, and hives made fur stand off his body in an itchy checkerboard pattern that prompted nonstop scratching.


Fur offers some protection but paws and sparsely furred tummies are at risk especially in areas that host fire ants. Dogs who play with bees, wasps, spiders or scorpions suffer stings on the face, head or even inside the mouth. Bites and stings beneath the fur may be hard to see or treat, but first-aid usually is all that’s needed to relieve any minor swelling, itching or redness.

• Bees leave behind the stinger, which may continue to pump venom into the skin. Use a credit card or similar rigid tool to scrape it free.
• A cold pack or compress applied to the bite helps reduce the swelling. A bag of frozen peas or corn works well, and molds against the pet’s body.
• A baking soda and water paste works great to soothe the sting, but it can be messy when applied to fur so use only on exposed tummies.
• Ammonia works great to cool the pain of fire ant bites. Moisten a cotton ball and dab on the stings. Calamine lotion also soothes ant bites.
• For stings inside the mouth, offer ice cubes or ice water for the pet to lick and drink.
• You can also mix a teaspoonful of baking soda into a pint of water, and squirt the solution into his mouth with a turkey baster or squirt gun, if he’ll allow you to do this.
• As long as your dog continues to breathe with no problem, a veterinary visit may not be necessary even if the face swells quite a bit. Benadryl, an antihistamine, counters swelling and itching. A safe dose is one milligram for every pound your pet weighs or a Benadryl ointment can be used directly on the sting.

Hives usually go away on their own after a day or so, and sooner if treated with an antihistamine. Magic felt better within only twenty minutes of the first dose of Benadryl but it needed to be repeated when it wore off. Benedryl also causes drowsiness as a side effect so the pup slept through the night and recovered by the next morning. Today he gives fire ant mounds a wide berth.
***

Day at the Range

by Ben Small

We Americans celebrate our holidays, and we’re creative in ginning up new ones. Washington’s Birthday, Columbus Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Vasco da Gama Day, Casper the Friendly Ghost Day…

And these are just proper name holidays.

We also honor bosses, secretaries ― even though nobody has one any more ― dogs, April Fools, groundhogs, mothers, fathers, and black history.

Very few things we don’t honor with a day, week or month.

But not the NRA, the group that gave us the Denver celebration after Columbine. Who can forget Charlton Heston, a Juda Ben Hur oarlock grimace set on his face, as his strong hands pumped a rifle over his head and a dare slid from gritted teeth?

“From my cold dead hands...”

Moses waving his staff. Impressive. The French surrendered.

No, the NRA doesn’t get a holiday.

And that’s not fair.

I went to the local constabulary. Thought I might pump up some NRA support and maybe get some gun totin’ ideas from toters. Nope. The sheriff didn’t like my suggestion: standing at the U of A gates and chanting while firing AK-47s Mid-East-style into the air.

I think feds followed me home. There’s a black service van parked just outside my driveway. It’s got more antennas than NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Black, a Fed’s favorite color. Black, in the Arizona summer sun.

The Blues Brothers had more sense.

I called the NRA, hopeful they’d turn their lobbying clout on Congress. But a spokeswoman said Congress wanted to adjourn, that Congressional leadership was closing out the session working up new taxes to bail broke buddies who’d contributed heavily to campaign coffers.

Stuffed to the gills with Fanny-and-Freddy money. Something fishy going on.

Forced to curry NRA support locally and on my own, I donned my range gear, jeans, red John Wayne cavalry shirt, cowboy boots, wide leather belt with a gold-plated bull-head buckle, red patterned kerchief, and a straw cowboy hat with a fake eagle feather. On the top of my hat, on the flat spot under the furl, I stuck an NRA sticker.

Then I took my guns to the range.

The black van followed me.

The two best gun ranges in Tucson are almost next to each other, about thirty miles southwest, along the I-19 corridor, also known as Smuggler’s Alley, because it’s not far from Mexico is the preferred drug and human cargo smuggling route. County planners must have figured that so many guns were going off there anyway, local residents wouldn’t mind a few more. And smugglers and illegals need gun practice, too. Why not make the location convenient for everybody?

One of the ranges is for shotguns, the other for pistols, rifles and machine guns. Each range covers about five square miles.

Arizona loves its guns.

I borrowed a target stand from the range master and purchased some tape-on pictures of bad guys who are fun to shoot. Folks like Dillinger, Capone, Howard Stern, and the PC guy in the Apple commercials.

I picked the hundred yard range. Target berms are set at twenty-five foot intervals. Choose your distance.

The range was crowded. Several shooters had brought family members, some of them children. The only stall open was the last one on the right, next to a Mexican group. Three men, two women, a couple young children. They stopped shooting as I approached and eyed me warily. A heavy-set fellow with a pock-marked face and Chinese-symbol tattoos on his neck, held a semi-automatic pistol ― looked to be a Glock with an elongated magazine. He swung the gun in my direction and whispered to a skinny guy, five-o'clock-shadow bald. That man lifted a pistol from the table, and racked the slide.

He looked at me. No smile in his eye.

"Hi fellas," I said, waving like a windmill. "Belong to the NRA?"

They looked at each other, and their muzzles drooped. The bald guy made an eh-shrug. His pistol went back to the table.



Numerous guns decked their stall. I'd already seen two pistols. An AR-15 rested on the stone shooting table, and two more assault rifles, an SKS and an M1A stood against a beat up wooden rife stand.

I glanced beyond them to the range. They were shooting at a giant pepper.

I pointed and laughed. “Nice pepper,” I said.

I meant my tone to be friendly, but the two men snarled at me. One of the women, her brows furled, deep leathery creases tightening across her forehead, grabbed a rifle off the stand and swung it by the sling over her shoulder.

One smooth move. She’d done that before.

I raised my hands and tried to smile. Looked to our left. Several green and white Border Patrol SUVs were parked at the next range over, a hundred yards away for the far end of our range. Machine gun fire burst from that border patrol range. Some laughter and whooping followed.

My next door neighbors made the Sign of the Cross.

Careful to make my moves slow and deliberate, I taped Howard Stern to the stand, and then signaled that I wanted to take my target onto the range. The shooting stopped, and I walked out into the firing field.

I strolled straight out. Thought about walking backwards, but didn’t want my target so inviting that someone might plug it ― and me. I wasn’t gone very long, and as soon as I returned, shooting commenced.

There’s a problem with shooting semi-and-automatic rifles. They eject spent cartridges to the right, far to the right.

Hot metal rained down on me as my neighbors riddled their pepper.

I went back to the range master, borrowed another target stand. He didn’t have the Taco Bell dog, so I taped up Che Guevara and stood him facing my neighbors. I hoped they appreciated the gesture, even though Che was Argentine. Argentina’s a Latin country, isn’t it?

Now hot cartridges bounced off Che instead of me.

I looked over at the black van, saw it parked next to the range office. A guy in a suit climbed out; he looked tumbled dry. A camera hung from his neck, and he clicked some shots of Che and me before walking into the range office. A few minutes later, the man emerged, several water bottles in his arms. He climbed back into the van.

Time for my guns.

Arsenal disclosure is like the red carpet on Oscar night: Everybody’s all eyeballs. I opened up the truck and started carrying out guns. Silence along our range; everyone turned to watch me. The van-guy climbed out once again, camera at the ready.

I pulled out a few bolt actions, an AR-15, and a Ruger 10/22, perhaps the most popular plinking rifle in the world.

I waited for applause.

More bursts from the machine gun range. Laughter. Sounded closer this time.

Well, I’d dazzle ‘em with my shooting.

Smack. Heart shot. Again. Poor Howard, he never knew what hit him.

Someone called for a cease fire, a target check. But I didn’t need one; I could see my one ragged hole from my stall. As everybody walked out to their targets, I pointed at mine, pumped my arms and shouted, “NRA! NRA!”

People on their way to targets stopped and stared at me.

A toddler from the stall next door wobbled over. Most of my collection stood on my stall’s old wooden stand. The kid was stroking my pre-’64 Winchester 70, a collector’s rifle, handmade, known to most in the gun culture as “The Rifleman’s Rifle.”

I grabbed the rifle and caught it. Then I swatted at the kid.

Missed.

A woman, the child’s mother I guessed, overweight and all decked out in reds, oranges and purple, rushed over and snatched the kid away. The woman scowled at me, spit rapid-fire Spanish. Not throwing compliments my way, I discerned. She shook her fist at me and then slapped her backside.

“Well, keep your brat away from me,” I said. “Bang bang.”

I don’t think saying that was wise. One of the men dropped back and pointed an AR-15 at me. His finger was on the trigger.

Hands up. Just like on TV.

Another burst from the machine gun range. More laughter.

I ducked at the burst, afraid my stall-neighbor’s finger would tighten on the trigger and I’d end up air conditioned.

When I came up again, the guy’d put his rifle back on the stand. But he was still staring at me. And he wasn’t smiling.

I shrugged and went back to my Ruger. I’d mounted it on a precision Caldwell stand, a setup made for ten-ring shots. I fired round after round, emptied two twenty-five round magazines.

Somebody called for a target check. Firing stopped at our range.

I snatched the Ruger and replaced it with the Winchester. Then I opened the bolt and pulled out my .30-06 cartridges. Stood aside to await the all clear signal.

I’d expected to see those out on the range clustered around my target, marveling at my accuracy. Trophy-target, I thought. But nobody was there. People were admiring their own targets, busy measuring groups and counting holes.

Harumph. So much for lesson-giving. Some people just don’t recognize talent.

One of the men in the stall next door shouted something out onto the range. Must have been the Spanish version of “Hurry up!” because people started running. A moment later, somebody yelled, “Going hot!” and lead started flying.

Having blown out Howard Stern’s heart, I fixed my sights on his mouth.

I know: big target. Well, you should see it now.

TTFS (Tired Trigger Finger Syndrome) can strike at any time. Your finger twitches, you flinch with the twitch, and your other digits, feeling abandoned, go soft around the stock’s pistol grip. You’re at risk for Scope-Eye, when recoil drives the scope into your eye socket so hard that you look like the spotted dog from The Little Rascals.

I laid my trigger hand out on the stone table, saw the twitching digit.

Time to pack up. No Scope-Eye for this cowpoke.

Besides, the people next door were still checking me out, peeking from behind Che. They were making me nervous.

My brass was mostly nearby, so a few minutes crawling around and I’d gathered it all. I cased my rifles and deposited them in the truck. Then I went back for my targets.

There were three round holes in Che.

I hadn’t put them there.

A quick dodge to the truck, and a turn of the key. The engine fired, and my tires tore up a dust-and-rock storm.

Good cover.

I turned the wheel hard to the right, toward the machine gun range. I couldn’t see anything but dust behind me.

The border patrol agents were only too happy to listen. Their eyes lit up when I told them my stall neighbors were coyotes, people who traffic in people. And when I suggested they might want to tread carefully, that the coyotes had automatic weapons, the agents really went bonkers. Loaded magazines flew back and forth. I might have tried to snag one, but doing so would’ve affected my credibility. And stealing from the federal government ― unless you’re in Congress ― is not a sign of intelligence.

Next, I stopped at the black van. Told the surveillance team I was giving up on the NRA and was gonna join Amnesty International instead. The driver, a man wearing mirrored sunglasses, a dark suit, white shirt and black tie ― Fed-dress ― stared at me, not saying a word. The guy next to him tapped him on the shoulder and pointed out the window at the armed border patrol agents converging on the hundred yard range. “Coyotes,” I said. “Those guys,” I pointed to the running border patrol agents, “might need some help.”

I split, and watched through my rear-view as the van emptied and agents pulling their Sigs joined the stall-party.

As I turned the corner and picked up speed, I looked once more in my mirror. Alone, separate and distinct from the chaos erupting at the stall next to mine, stood Howard Stern.

No heart, no mouth, just a smiley face made of holes.

Next time, I’ll move my target a little further out. Like maybe to twenty-five yards.