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Arrested

March 30, 2011 in News | No comments

One of the wisest and most compassionate writers I know is Bahraini, Mahmood Al-Youssif. For several years, I’ve been following his blog, Mahmood’s Den, admiring his relentless campaign for freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and freedom of religious persuasion.

UPDATE: 31st March: This evening, after a huge international outcry, Mahmood was released, unharmed. Sanity prevails! Many others remain missing or under arrest in Bahrain for their political views.

At 3am on 30th March, Mahmood was taken from his home by Bahrain security guards. This is for Mahmood.



ARRESTED

I’m awake, and it’s my bed. My body. I check the pieces. Fingers, ribs, kneecaps, toes. All intact. Just a nightmare then. Fix it in memory before it fades away.

No they didn’t hurt me. But I feared their power to hurt. Their eyes were yellow. They licked their lips in anticipation. I heard demons moaning in their cells, a scream. And they questioned me, already knowing the answers.

- Did you know him?
- Yes.
- Why did you do nothing?
- I don’t know.
- You could have helped him.
- Maybe.
- Then why did you do nothing?

He brought his face close. He spat.

I woke. Three thumps at the door. Five. Not my door. His.

- Security! Open up!

Still dark. Three o’clock.

More thumps. A woman’s voice inside:

- Wait!

So it had come to this. I told him. I warned him, the fool.

- That stuff you write. It’s dangerous.
- It’s the truth.
- But it’ll get you into trouble.
- I’m protected. We have freedom of speech and opinion.
- Not if you criticise. Not if you take sides.
- I take no side. I’m a unifier. I teach people not to hate.
- That’s why they’ll get you.

And now they were getting him. But only in my dream. No need to worry. No need to do anything. I could sleep. Dimly, more voices. A woman crying. A man shouting.

But now it’s morning and the nightmare has passed. I shift the curtain and it’s a beautiful spring day. Traffic is moving, almost normally. Some of the tanks have moved back. Thank God the worst appears to be over.


References:

Global Voices Online – news of the arrest.
Mahmood’s Den – Mahmood’s blog.
Storyful – ongoing developments in the story
Follow the Twitter hash-tag #FreeMahmood for more news.
Wednesday evening: AlertNet reports US state department has now criticised the arrest.
Time magazine article.
Committee to Protect Journalists reports 4 CNN reporters also arrested in Bahrain, then released.
Evening – 31st March: Mahmood is released, unharmed. The developing story continues to be tracked on Storyful.

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We’re Lendle-ing again – but maybe not in Japan

March 25, 2011 in News | 10 comments

Lendle-ing again

Well two-and-a-half cheers! eBook-sharing is back on the agenda again.

One day after stopping Lendle in its tracks, Amazon relented and they’re back in business again, with just a teensy bit of sync-ing goodness (‘useful but non-essential’ say Lendle triumphantly) removed. If only we could deal with all the world’s great crises so amicably!

And for indie publishers and writers, it’s an important victory too, because it leaves us the right to choose whether we want to share our books or not. If Lendle is to survive, so will Booklending.com, and both figure in my long-term marketing plan.


… With Reservations

But the news doesn’t quite get the full three cheers.

First there was a thumbs down from Shiori, the Japanese student who’s been living with us for several months now. I used ‘Lendle’ for a few harmless pronunciation exercises. Sadly, she now hates the word, and says the thing would never catch on in Japan anyway, with a name like that.

Not that she needs to worry, not yet anyway. Because when I started the sign-up process with Lendle, this was the Welcome I got:

Please note that Lendle is currently only available in the United States. We expect Amazon to allow book lending elsewhere soon.

Well, I’m a Brit, and the news wasn’t entirely a surprise. You know what we’re like, we’d be awful at returning books on time – though perhaps not as bad as your George Washington who, I hear, had a book out on loan from 1789 until last year – and then got off without paying the $300,000 late fee.

But the Japanese, the Germans, the Swedes … surely you could have trusted them!?

My guess is that Amazon will want to install a GPS book-sniffing device inside each eBook before introducing sharing outside the US, so that recalcitrant foreign libracriminals can be hunted down. Whether the expiry of the Patriot Act at the end of May will have any impact is hard to say.

But at least the principle seems now to have been accepted – that writers should have the choice whether to offer their books for sharing or not.


With big reservations

Of course, there will still be writers who think that Amazon’s change-of-heart will open the door to unspeakable evils, and this view has been eloquently expressed by Steven Lewis on the Kindle Writers blog. In an open letter to Jeff Croft, co-founder of Lendle, he writes:

Maybe I don’t have Mr Croft’s vision thing. Have I even understood your business correctly? (It is a business, right?) After all, as a publisher, I have what Mr Croft calls an old school business model, that’s the one where I expect to be paid for my work.

Perhaps you agree with Steven. That’s fine. If so then you don’t need to offer up your books for sharing. Everyone should have the right to opt out too. But before you come to a decision about it, take a look at the comments following Steven’s post. As well as a response from Croft, you’ll find other writers making a cogent case for participating in a book-sharing scheme – because they’re convinced it will increase both readers AND income.


Getting started with sharing

We’ll let the argument rage over there. Assuming you have made the decision to be a book-sharer, where do you go from there?

The starting-point is your copyright notice – and I was delighted today to get a ringing endorsement for the wording I’ve proposed from none other than Andy Woodworth, the co-sponsor of the eBook User’s Bill of Rights. So you could share this too.

Treat this ebook as you would a printed book. If you enjoy it and want to share it with friends and family – as we hope you will – then please do so. The best support you can give is by helping to spread the word about a (publisher’s) author or book. All we ask is that you respect the author’s right to make a living from his art: so please do not re-distribute this book in any format for commercial purposes, or modify the content in any way.

But that’s only the start. Just because I allow people to share my book, it doesn’t follow that anyone will want to do so. There are 130 million other books published (according to Google, whose plans to scan all of them came to a crashing halt yesterday at the end of a long-running law-suit). Over 18 million WordPress blogs – and probably as many more that are not WordPress). 200 million Twitter users sending 1 billion tweets a week, as Twitter celebrates its 5th birthday today. How has your book got a chance unless it’s either extraordinarily good – and even then maybe not – or extraordinarily bad?

That’s where we’ll start next time – with a look at how to create passionate early adopters, those who will help to launch your book out into the world.


Sources

References::

Related posts – Writers without Borders:


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Whose eBook – Yours, Mine or Amazon’s?

March 22, 2011 in News | 2 comments

lendle

About 15 minutes after my last post, recommending that we writers should pro-actively encourage lending, news started circulating that Amazon had forced Lendle to close down.

To be honest, I didn’t know of Lendle – it was after all only 6 weeks old. But I’m learning now that many thousands of book-lovers were already signed up, lending and borrowing their Kindle books just like those who use the service I described yesterday, Booklending.com.

Before I go further, let me make it clear that these sites were NOT latter-day Kazoos, designed to encourage indiscriminate copying of an artist’s work. The borrowing process was carefully circumscribed, using the API that Amazon itself introduced at the turn of the year: a single purchaser could lend each book properly purchased once only, and the book would be automatically returned to the purchaser after 14 days.

Why should I – as a writer – be keen to encourage this? Doesn’t it deprive me of sales? Absolutely not, if I take the long-term view. If I look at the books and the authors I love best, almost without exception I started reading because of the recommendation of a teacher or reviewer I respected, or a friend or a family member. In many cases, I was a borrower, then a convert, then a purchaser.

Seth Godin, social media’s poster-child, understands this. His latest scheme, The Domino Project, seeks new ways to spread ideas – through books – quickly. Godin is frustrated that while a tweet or a blog-post may gain exposure a thousand times in a few minutes, the book – ‘still an ideal tool for the hand-to-hand spreading of important ideas’ – is held back by slow publishers, inflexible and ill-considered pricing, and antiquated distribution.

Godin’s solution? His latest book, Poke the Box, was first released for $1 to early adopters, people who were sure to spread the word. Now officially released, the book is priced at $4.99 but readers who love it and want to share it with their friends or colleagues can get a special price for a 5-pack or a 52-pack of books – buy 14 and get 38 for free. Echoing Tim O’Reilly, Godin says:

Our enemy is not piracy; our enemy is not our best readers not paying for it; our enemy is obscurity.

Sharing then, borrowing, lending. All to spread ideas, to get people listening. And who are the co-sponsors of The Domino Project. Why, Amazon!

The same Amazon who yesterday told Lendle, in a no-reply email, that their website “does not serve the principal purpose of driving sales of products and services on the Amazon site.”

Search for #Lendle on Twitter and you’ll see, not anger, but sadness and resignation. Jeffrey Zeldman, (the inspiration behind the wonderful “A List Apart”), tweets:

“Sad to see Amazon shut down @jcroft’s lovely Lendle. Yesterday’s futurist is today’s future obstructor.”

Wasn’t it really inevitable that Amazon would yield to the publishers’ demands. Unlike Godin, publishers don’t peddle ideas; their bottom line is sales. And right now, immediate, short-term sales. Remember Amazon’s statement? They talked about their “principal purpose of driving sales of products and services”. So we know which camp they’re in. Not that I’m blaming them for trying to make money.

But there’s another issue. Here’s Jason Kincaid at TechCrunch:

It isn’t terribly surprising that Amazon is shutting Lendle down as it could conceivably lead to people buying fewer books, but it’s another reminder of the frustrations associated with DRM-laden content — you may have just paid $10 for a novel, but you don’t really own it.

Here we come to the real point: who owns our ebooks?

When I chose to be an independent author, I did so because I wanted to retain control over every aspect of my book’s publication. The cover, the pricing, the line-spacing, the distribution method, the relationship with my readers. Everything. Perhaps I would make mistakes along the way, but if I did, they would be mine too. Perhaps you’ll think me arrogant, but I’m not saying I won’t listen to advice, or ask for help, or listen to criticism. It’s just the same as being an employer, not an employee. If I get it right, I may win; if I don’t, I’ll fail.

I’m not saying either that any other writer has to make the same decisions as me. Some will want to encourage book-sharing; others may completely disagree with me. But that’s their choice. The point is, we have a choice.

One of the choices I’ve made is to allow my readers to share with other readers. I’m giving them the right to OWN the books they buy from me, with all the rights that ownership confers.

As I write, there’s still no sign that Amazon will try to snuff out Booklending.com too. Early days – I sincerely hope not. But if that were to happen, it’s not the end of the story. Seth Godin has shown us that we can still poke the box: if we want to allow our readers to share, we just need to use our imagination.

And there’s something else. Technology is inevitable. So we might as well embrace it.

24 hours after this article, Lendle was reinstated by Amazon and the service is now fully restored (- see my post “We’re Lendle-ing again – but maybe not in Japan“). However, the points I made in this post about ownership are still valid … so I’ll leave the post here.

References
The official announcement from Lendle
Seth Godin talking about The Domino Project at The Kindle Chronicles. (Find the audio clip below the fold, just above comments, and start listening at 20:00.)
Godin’s Poke The Box
Techcrunch: Amazon Gives Kindle Book-Swapping Service Lendle The Axe
A List Apart
Booklending.com – still operating – and waiting for you to share The Lebanese Troubles!


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New cover design for The Lebanese Troubles

March 15, 2011 in News | 4 comments


The Dog River – Nahr Al Kalb

Our little rubber boat swirled and twisted in the boiling, ice-cold water. Circling above us dizzily, the thick green pines and the mountain peaks, here and there flashes of snow gleaming in the spring sun. The Dog River – Nahr al Kalb. Somewhere up here last year, they said, a father had hacked his daughter to death because she’d run off with her lover. Now that same blind fury was sweeping us down from the primitive heart of Lebanon, down towards its narrow rich Mediterranean plain.


Well I’ve finally gone ahead and done it. Changed the cover design for The Lebanese Troubles. And this is it. I’ve left the original cover over on the right for you to make comparisons.

Why not until now? Two reasons. First, I absolutely love Tom Young’s painting which I used on the original cover. When I first saw ‘Twenty Years’, it seemed almost to have been painted for TLT, perfectly reflecting the mood at the end of the book, even if it shows a scene that never actually happens.

But what I’ve learned in the past year is that artistry and appropriacy is not enough for a good front cover, especially for ebooks. The reader normally only sees a thumbnail sketch of the cover; nevertheless the impression it creates will very often determine whether the purchase is made or not.

My problem was that the original cover was bleak, and it seems that readers don’t buy bleak. Worse, it gives the impression that the whole book is about war. Today’s readers want blood and guts, that’s true, but only when the perpetrator is a vampire. Reading for many is a form of escapism: they want to suspend their disbelief, not be confronted with grim realities.

I haven’t managed to slip a vampire into the story yet. But if you’ve read the book, you’ll know that there’s a good deal of humor and energy, and that was not reflected in my cover.

The second problem was that I couldn’t find a good alternative. But today I found it – the picture I’ve used – license free, in that great resource, Wikimedia Commons. A little bit of work to do with the titles, using the free design tool, Paint (here’s a tutorial on how to create your own book cover), and we were good to go.

Several readers told me they thought the book would sell better with pictures of Monique and Claire on the front cover. As you can see, I didn’t. I thought long and hard about it, but in the end decided that I just didn’t have the skill, the time or the money to do it well. I’ll consider that again in the next iteration.

Another thing I didn’t do was to change the title of the book, despite frequent criticisms. Again I thought about it: “Sinners in Paradise” perhaps; or “The Land of Nod”. My favorite was “East of Eden” … but that’s been done before. What about “An Apprentice Hero”? In the end I rejected them all. The things is that I’ve spent months building brand recognition and getting “The Lebanese Troubles” to the top of the Google listings. If I change the title now, all that good work will be lost … and I’ll immediately invalidate those oh-so-important reviews. And besides, TLT is really quite a subtle title, exploding into a new meaning towards the end of the book.

Back to the cover design, and you’ll see a new Rapscallion logo at the bottom left. Thanks here to my good friend from TNBW, Greta Stone, who kindly developed four alternative designs for me, all with a spiky humorous touch. At thumbnail size, we’ll hardly see the logo, bur at full size I think it works, don’t you agree?

Let’s hear your views on the changes. Will the new cover make customers more likely to stop and look again than previously? How does it work for you? And in the coming days, I’ll let you know whether it really does make a difference to sales.



Please note that TLT will not be available at Amazon for a few days while their version is updating. But Smashwords has already made the changes, and the book is available there as normal – just follow the link in the sidebar.

I posted yesterday a longish sample from TLT, describing the mood in Beirut on the first day of the civil war. It seemed particularly appropriate as Bahrain seems to be headed in the same direction. How I wish people would learn to accommodate and celebrate their differences instead of using guns to enforce a point of view. Anyway, if you’d like to read the sample, you can either click here, or use the ‘Sample’ tab at the top of the page.

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Bahrain: lessons from history

March 12, 2011 in News | No comments

I’m increasingly worried about Bahrain. After 10 years there, we left a couple of years back, and I’m an observer now, not a reporter. But what I’m observing brings back dark memories of the early days of the Lebanese civil war, back in 1975.

Expat friends and colleagues tell me not to worry. It’ll soon blow over. There’s been worse before. The ruling family know what they’re doing. It’s just a minor inconvenience.

And so it was in Lebanon. Here’s an extract from The Lebanese Troubles

While we watched we discussed whether people would be working the next day, how long it could go on, whether the Palestinians would get involved. For several days, I entertained visitors by reading out the set of instructions I’d picked up at the British Embassy.

… When there is shooting in your area do not show yourself on your verandah or balcony. Do not attempt to use binoculars or cameras or take any action that could be misconstrued by the militias. If you are stopped at a barrier, identify yourself using the Arabic word ‘Ingleezi’. ‘Britaani’ or ‘Britaanieh’ have sometimes been misunderstood. (I hope that Scots, Welsh and Irish will forgive us for this advice.) It is safer to comply with the requests of anyone who stops you. For example, if you are told to move over to the side of the road, do so immediately without protest. Under no circumstances should you attempt to crash through a barricade …

The handout was a perfect reflection of our attitude: the troubles were a sensational, alarming, but finally preposterous fiction. There was no danger because, although we were Lebanese and we lived our lives on a daring enormous scale, we were also the foreigners, and we weren’t involved.

For a couple of weeks Bahrain has been out of the headlines, with Libya providing the journalists with plenty of good copy. There were a few good signs: negotiations with some of the protestors; a $20 billion fund for Bahrain and Oman from the other Gulf states. Would that be enough to close Pandora’s box?

Apparently not. According to CNN reports 774 people were injured and 107 were hospitalized in clashes yesterday.

Anti-government demonstrators in Riffa had planned a march. A crowd numbering roughly 8,000 set off on the march, according to Bahrain’s ambassador to the United States.

But they were met by hundreds of people carrying swords, hatchets, metal pieces, cricket instruments and pieces of wood with nails hammered into them. The opposing group had already taken up positions in an effort to stop the planned march

Swords, hatchets and cricket bats. It’s not exactly Lebanon’s rockets, mortars and machine-gun fire. But real trouble’s brewing – here’s The Lebanese Troubles again:

War creeps up on you like a cancer.

At first it’s nothing. An irritation, a nagging pain, a minor inconvenience. It’ll be gone in an hour or two, in a couple of days. It’s something you think you can ignore, but wishful thinking doesn’t make it go away. When the symptoms get worse, you begin to worry. So off you go to get advice and treatment, and for a while the medicine seems to work. But you’ve only stabilized the condition, not cured it. That little black malignancy lingers just beneath the skin, tainting cells, infecting organs, poisoning hope, building a malevolent army of decay, ready for the signal to go on the march.

Like Lebanon, an underclass demanding political and economic rights, a ruling class determined to hang on to power and privilege. Like Lebanon, sectarian labels fanning the flames. Like Lebanon, a potential battleground for the world’s ideological wars.

Let’s remember George Santayana’s law of repetitive consequences: “Those who do not learn from the lessons of history are condemned to repeat them.”

The Lebanese Troubles is available free at Smashwords for Read an Ebook week – ending today, March 12, 2011.

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How to stifle dissent

March 7, 2011 in News | 4 comments

It’s been a while. A long while. I’ve ignored my poor novel for the past nine months, while giving birth to another creative baby in the real world. It’s no fun up there, let me tell you, in a place where an author’s ability to control people and events is absolutely zero.

In the meantime, reports have been filtering through to me about trouble in my novel – unrest amongst some of the main characters, demonstrations against Richard ( – who I left in control of things), calls for me to resign as the author, even a suggestion that the title should be changed from The Lebanese Troubles to Middle-EastEnders, in a misguided attempt to reach out to a mass-market audience.

So I did a deal with them, offering a few concessions that should keep them happy and me in power. I’ve promised to clean up this blog, making sure that all the links still work. I came to an arrangement with Smashwords, offering the novel free during the Read An E-book Week – that’s March 6 – 12): with lots of new tourist-readers coming visiting, that should keep all my characters busy and feeling self-important again. And I’ve given them the right to form a union with characters from other books – what they want me to do is go out and make contacts with lots more novelists.

Privately, I feel betrayed. After all, who would they be without me? But I’m biting my tongue and keeping my powder dry for now. Compromise isn’t such a bad thing, if it preserves my status quo.

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New Rapscallion Release – Daddy’s Machine

April 12, 2010 in News | 3 comments

Daddy's Machine - Cover

Today we published a new Rapscallion short story on Smashwords – Suki Michelle’s remarkable and disturbing voyage into the tortured mind of a Down’s Syndrome child who has miraculously been given the gift of intelligence and knowledge without wisdom or understanding – or love.

The Smashwords edition allows you to download and read the story on your computer today. In a few days time it will be available on the iPad, the Nook, the Sony Reader and probably Kindle. Just click on the picture to collect your free download of Daddy’s Machine – and if you enjoy the story, don’t forget to leave a brief review.

We’re interested in your views on the cover design. First, before you read the story. The cover is supposed to catch your attention and make you want to dive in. Does it succeed? And then after reading – has your opinion changed?

 

Next time – well, we’re going to lift the veil on Rapscallion. Somewhere between an agent and a publisher – could we help you find a route to market?

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The Lebanese Troubles – read it now at a computer near you

April 1, 2010 in News | No comments

The Lebanese Troubles

I didn’t plan to do this quite this soon.

I’ve been talking about the importance of steadily building a market for my books, engaging readers – and I’m still just beginning. I really didn’t expect to publish till sometime towards the end of April.

But something came up. An opportunity that was too good to miss.

If you’ve been following, you’ll know that Rapscallion (I know, I know, I’ll tell you about Rapscallion soon) published two short stories as ebooks at Smashwords recently, one from me, the other from Suki Michelle. Then, quite unexpectedly a few days back, Smashwords mailed me to say that they’d reached a deal with Apple for their entire list of ‘approved’ books (i.e. those that met fairly stringent formatting requirements and had an ISBN) to be available on the iPad at launch in the US on Saturday 3rd April. But new books had to be ready for publication by yesterday.

According to tech-insiders Mashable, around half a million iPads have been pre-sold. And much has been made of the iPad’s challenge to Amazon’s Kindle for a share of the e-reader market. Who’ll win that battle? I don’t really care. But what I do care about is that there’s a sudden massive surge of interest in ebooks, and it’s a good time to publish. And that’s why The Lebanese Troubles (as well as our two short stories) will shortly be available on all the leading e-readers.

Am I expecting a huge response? No. Simultaneously 60,000 other books will appear in the Apple catalog – that’s a lot of competition. But even if one or two new readers find the book, then my work in re-editing and re-formatting the manuscript this week will have been worthwhile. As I’m finding, the way to build a market is one sale at a time.

(Just a quick word of thanks here to all of you who reviewed the novel at The Next Big Writer. Lots of your suggestions were incorporated in the final edit – you did a fine job keeping me on track.)

So, you’re not planning to buy an e-reader yet? That’s fine. Nor am I. But you can still read The Lebanese Troubles on your computer right now, in any format you choose – larger font, different typeface, .pdf file. All you need to do is click on the book cover at the top of this post and you’ll be taken directly to the right place. Anyone can read the first half of the novel for free (with Smashwords, it’s up to the writer to decide how much sample material to allow). If you want to read on, you’ll need to sign up with Smashwords and pay the $5.99 $1.99 price.

Unless, that is, you want to review. Right now, good professional reviews are very important to me. I’m looking for thoughtful, honest comments, that will show other readers why they might be interested in the book (or not) – without giving the whole story away, of course. Nothing too long, and no “‘ra-’ra, awesome” reviews, thank you. So if you’re willing to step forward and volunteer, just send a reply below, and I’ll mail you a special code which will get you a review copy free of charge.

I’d also be interested in your comments on the cover design and the introductory blurb on the Smashwords page – especially if you don’t know anything about the book. Does it make you want to read on or not? What sort of novel are you expecting?

So that’s it – my novel is published. But it’s now, I anticipate, that the hard work will really begin.

Related reading

If you’re a book-reader, should you buy an iPad – Christian Science Monitor

iPad sold out – Mashable

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