Posts Tagged by other people’s books
Heads up to all authors with Kindle Editions and to Goodreads users
| January 21, 2012 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
I started spotting notices on various editions of books on Goodreads last night talking about how as of January 30th, they’re going to stop using book data from Amazon. Affected book editions are showing notices at the top of their pages that look like this:
Goodreads Data Alert
If you click on the Learn More button a new page pops up talking about Goodread’s reasons for doing this, and displaying a form where you can fill in data from other sources to make sure that the book doesn’t vanish out of their database.
AUTHORS: Go check your books on Goodreads and make sure you’re not about to lose your only entry in their database. ESPECIALLY if your only listed edition is a Kindle Edition.
GOODREADS USERS: Check your bookshelves and see if you’re about to lose any Kindle Editions out of your various shelves. You do NOT need librarian access to rescue a book–anybody can fill in the form, apparently. But you should rescue any obvious Kindle Editions in your lists. All you need is a legitimate source of data about the book, from somewhere other than Amazon.
Heads up, ebook fans
| December 26, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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Here are some free ebooks I’m aware of in the last few days of this year. Jump on ‘em while you can, fellow ebook readers!
If you’re an Ilona Andrews fan, that particular writing team has a novella called Magic Gifts set in the Kate Daniels universe. It’s only available for a short period of time and you can only grab it off their website, so if you want it, scamper over here and yoink it down! And thank them for sharing it with their readers.
Meanwhile, I’m aware of two freebies currently available for the Kindle, and the first of these is The Devil of Kilmartin by Lauren Wittig, a historical romance. This one’s only available for free until tomorrow. So if you like your romance historical and you like your heroines gifted with healing magic (I’m a sucker for healers myself), you might grab this. But grab it fast.
Last but not least, Martha Wells, who is 
marthawells
And speaking of books that need plugging
| November 28, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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Decent self-published books need all the help they can get to get readers, so I’d like to take the time to mention mmegaera
She was kind enough to give me a coupon for a review copy from Smashwords, and I’ve just finished reading the book as of this weekend. It’s a bit of a mashup of Western, SF, and time-travel romance, and I found it a good solid read. A proper review will be coming later (I’ve rated it on Goodreads but haven’t written up a review yet), but I wanted to go ahead and mention it now. Click over to her page to read an excerpt, and if you like what you see, buy it and tell her I sent you, mmkay?
RIP Anne McCaffrey
| November 22, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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Like most of the rest of the net, I’m seeing the news today that Anne McCaffrey has passed away. The initial link I was given is here, and another early report link is here. They’re saying she had a massive stroke.
This one hurts, people.
I remember the Pern books being among the very first SF/F books I read as an adolescent. In turn, they influenced other books I went in search of–notably, Sharon Shinn’s Samaria series, which always struck me as Pern-like in flavor. And as I’ve mentioned in the past, I get huge echoes back to Pern through the Temeraire series by Naomi Novik, as well.
PernMUSH is one of the three MUSHes that formed the bulk of my online roleplaying history, and almost at the same time I joined PernMUSH, I also joined the offline group Telgar Weyr. Like many in Pern fandom, I had my share of issues with many details of Anne’s world, and eventually I actually enjoyed Pern fandom in many ways more than I did the original canon material. But I cannot deny that she created a world that had a massive, massive influence on me. To this day I have friendships that were forged because of Pern fandom.
PernMUSH established my ability to roleplay–and by extension, to write–from a male point of view, since F’hlan was the first significant male character I ever played. F’hlan taught me a great deal about the kinds of male characters I liked to play, and how to keep a long-running romantic relationship lively. (Melora, I am looking at you.)
I must also give mad props to the Crystal Singer books, since a significant bit of my roleplay history was on CrystalMUSH as well. Killashandra Ree, I loved you. You led me to roleplaying Kevlan Sharr, Tance Vokrim, Jerrik Rawn Deegan, and Tamber al-Acorrin (who had the distinction of being the first gay character I ever played on a MUSH).
Because of all the writing I’ve done for Pern fandom, McCaffrey’s influence on me as a writer has certainly also been profound. I have characters that still vividly live in my head, and make sad faces at me that I haven’t ever properly finished their stories, or otherwise adapted them into characters I can put into my own work. McCaffrey’s been a template for me on how to do strong female characters–and, since I always took issue with her penchant for setting up strong female characters only to have them eventually play second fiddle to their men, she contributed to my resolve to never do that with my own heroines. Similarly, as I was always unhappy that she gave queer males a presence on Pern but never queer women, that has set a goal for me to achieve in my own work.
I even met Ms. McCaffrey once, way back in the day when solarbird
John Scalzi has a post up for her here. The Fandom Lounge on JournalFen speaks for her here. And Tor.com has an announcement post here.
The sound you hear, O Internets, is every single dragon I have ever written or roleplayed for keening. Gold Timbrith. Bronze Tzornth. Bronze Valreth. Brown Trollith. Blue With. Green Yfandeth. Likewise, all of my characters at Far Cry Hold must mourn.
RIP, DragonLady, and thank you so much for your works and how you have molded my life. You will be missed.
ETA: lyonesse
Also, io9 now has a post up.
ETA #2: GeeksAreSexy.net chimes in here. Suvudu has a post up here.
More Drollerie authors re-pubbing
| November 15, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
C.G. Bauer, who wrote the excellent little horror novel Scars on the Face of God, has reissued his book as a self-pubbed ebook to Amazon and Smashwords. I’ve actually read this one, and can attest it was quite good; my old review post for it is here.
Meanwhile, Rachael Olivier has reissued her book The Holly and the Ivan as a self-pubbed paperback via Lulu.com. You can find that over here.
I’m hearing rumblings from a few other of my fellow former Drollerie authors that they’ll be reissuing their works in self-pubbed form, too; in particular, keep an eye out for Joely Sue Burkhart’s Shanhasson trilogy. If you liked Faerie Blood or Defiance, do consider finding and supporting these other works! I will keep posting links as I find them.
Drollerie authors finding new homes
| November 14, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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Drollerie may have fallen out from under us, but I’m relieved to see the first wave of my fellow Drollerie authors finding homes for their work elsewhere. With that in mind, I’d like to commend to your attention my fellow ex-Drollerie author John B. Rosenman, whose book Alien Dreams has gotten a new home at Crossroad Press. The book, if you are so inclined, can be found on that site here.
Give John a look if you’re SF-inclined, and tell him I sent you, won’t you? Thank you!
Sometimes, bigotry doesn’t pay
| September 6, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
I know, I know, I’m supposed to be rigged for silent running this week. I’m waking up again to post this, because it’s important.
As y’all know I’m a member of the Outer Alliance, and the word broke today over the OA’s mailing list about a particularly noxious little adaptation of nothing less than Hamlet, by Orson Scott Card. Those of you who’ve been following this issue already, or who already know about Card’s rampant homophobia, you know where I’m going with this.
According to this review, his big shocking change to the story is that Hamlet’s father was not only gay, he was also a child molester. That he molested Horatio and Laertes and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, thereby turning all of them gay. And, as a cherry on top of the bigotry sundae, Hamlet’s dad’s ghost is looking forward to his “beautiful son” joining him in Hell.
Folks, I’m not inherently opposed to adaptations of the classics. Modern popular culture is full of excellent adaptations of many of Shakespeare’s works, and SF/F certainly has its share of them. But I’m opposed to them when they go out of their way to perpetuate lethal stereotypes about queer people. And even aside from that, if the reviewer’s description of the prose tasting like “saltines without salt” is any sign, this particular adaptation is wretched even aside from its being a hatefest.
Another member of the OA mailing list has, however, pointed out a gem of hope and light here: i.e., that the small print run of this novella has not in fact sold out, indicating that not too many have elected to throw their money at it. Ditto for how the previous Tor release in which Card’s work appeared isn’t selling too well either on Amazon.
So to all of you who never knew about this work, I’m a bit sorry to have brought it to your attention, and can only hope you will continue to not only not buy it, but will specifically not buy it because bigotry is not okay. To those of you who already knew about it and elected not to buy it on that basis, I thank you.
To counter its existence, I’d like to commend to your attention the Lethe Press anthology Time Well Bent, in which catherineldf
And now I’m going back on silent running, because I need to finish my edits. But while I’m gone, I invite y’all to share with me in the comments any queer-positive adaptations of classic stories, of any genre!
The Rejectionist speaks truth!
| July 25, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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I was unable to drop a comment on this post by The Rejectionist, so I’m sharing it with you all instead, as well as the comment I was going to drop over yonder.
Speaking as someone who keeps telling her own blog readers she is on Book Buying Hiatus She SWEARS (and who just bought three new ebooks and four trade paperbacks), I totally feel the Rejectionist’s book hoarding pain. Because it ain’t like I don’t have enough books to occupy me reading for the rest of my natural life, what with the nearly 900 things on my To Read list! And it’s not like I can tell the entire publishing industry to take a six month hiatus so that I can get caught up please kthx AUGH so many awesome people writing awesome things!
Also, I totally envy her the Francesca Lia Blocks in that pile, because I read Primavera ages ago and very much want to read it again, and Ecstasia as well, and cannot find them for love or money.
But all this said, I am also quite charmed by the idea of leaving Secret Letters in copies of favorite books for other people to find. And I would totally leave a letter in a Barbara Michaels, an Elizabeth Peters, an Esther Friesner, a Julie Czerneda, or a Tanya Huff, as these are authors who were all formative influences on me. This is certainly one thing you can’t do with ebooks, not nearly as easily anyway–unless an author gets clever with an embedded hyperlink or something somewhere in the middle of an epub file.
Two lovely QOTDs for my fellow writers and readers
| June 16, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books, Writing |
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From this post by The Rejectionist:
Underneath everything, underneath the machinations of the industry and the terrible dance of agent-getting and submissions, underneath the despair and joy and wild mood swings, underneath the misery and extraordinary grace of trying to make art–underneath it all, we just want to sit together and tell stories.
Meanwhile, over on John Scalzi’s Whatever, today’s Big Idea post for Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey gives you this bit of YES:
Writing genre fiction is undignified. Reading genre fiction is undignified. If we’re going to do this, it should be joyful. We should create a little literary pocket universe where we can shuck off the irony and defensiveness and care about these imaginary people, and weep for them, feel awe when they’re awed, triumph with them when they win, and grieve with them when they fail. If there is any sense of wonder to be had, it’s there. Wonder is what we come here for.
THIS. THIS SO MUCH. That bit of that post alone has convinced me to go get that book.
Signal-boosting for Norilana Books: Foreclosure/Moving Sale
| April 19, 2011 | Posted by annathepiper under Other People's Books |
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Hey folks, for those of you who haven’t seen this news elsewhere, Vera Nazarian, who runs Norilana Books, has lost her home to foreclosure and is having to move across the country. To try to offset the cost of this, she’s having a huge Foreclosure/Moving Sale of Norilana titles. Details can be found here.
Buy something if you can, and if nothing else, pass the word on! Because foreclosure sucks.
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