Blog Without A Name

A Night in the Lonesome October, Roger Zelazny (annual read-one-chapter-per-night aloud with Steve re-re-re-&c-read)
Timeless, Gail Carriger (e)
The New Gypsies (if one can be said to “have read” a picture book)
The Great Steel Pier: An Illustrated History of the Old Orchard Ocean Pier, Peter Dow Bachelder
What Angels Fear, C.S. Harris (e)
River Marked, Patricia Briggs (e)
Althea, Madeleine Robins (e)
Heartless, Gail Carriger (e)
Powers, James A. Burton (e)
A Geisha’s Journey, Komomo, photographs by Naoyuki Ogino
Geisha, Liza Dalby
The Kimono of the Geisha-Diva Ichimaru, Barry Till, Michiko Warkentyne, Judith Patt
Partials, Dan Wells
Starters, Lissa Price
A Princess of Mars, Edgar Rice Burroughs (read aloud w/Steve)
Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, Grace Lin
From Whence You Came, Laura Anne Gilman (e)
Frederica, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
No Dominion, C.E. Murphy (e)
The Prestige, Christopher Priest
Cuttlefish, Dave Freer
Intruder, C.J. Cherryh (read aloud w/Steve)
Blameless, Gail Carriger (e)
Changeless, Gail Carriger (e)
The Quiet Gentleman, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Unbroken, Rachel Caine
The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Sylvester / OR, The Wicked Uncle, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Death and Resurrection, R. A. MacAvoy
The Unknown Ajax, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Black Sheep, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Stealing the Elf-King’s Roses, Diane Duane (e)
The Reluctant Widow, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Friday’s Child, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Dragon Ship manuscript, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (e)
Kim, Rudyard Kipling (e)
Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Pollyanna, Eleanor H. Porter (e)
Chimera, Rob Thurman (e)

Steve and I are often asked which bookstore sales give us the most royalties on our books.  The answer to that is:  We get the same percentage of cover, no matter where the book is sold; our piece of the action is set in our contract with our publisher.  So, please, buy our books at your favorite bookstore, but — do buy 🙂

Today brings an inquiry regarding which ebook store we prefer our novels to be downloaded from.

That’s both an easier and a more complicated answer.

The only source for Lee-and-Miller, and Lee, eNovels (saving The Tomorrow Log, Barnburner, and Gunshy, about which more in a moment) is Baen Ebooks.  Here’s your link.

The source for Lee-and-Miller, and Lee, eChapbooks, and! novels The Tomorrow Log, Barnburner, and Gunshy) is Pinbeam Books, which is owned and operated by Lee and Miller.  Here’s your link.

To reiterate, the only source for Lee-and-Miller, and Lee, eNovels is Baen Ebooks.

Now!  You may download books from Baen in all the popular formats, DRM-Free (that means you can put your books on multiple devices and aren’t locked into one bookstore, like, say, Amazon, or BN):

• Mobi/Kindle/Palm
• EPUB/Nook/Stanza
• Sony LRF
• Rocketbook
• RTF
• MS Reader
• HTML/Online

And there are instructions for putting your books on your iThing, Kindle, and Nook.

I have heard from more than one person that even with the instructions, it’s hard to get the books onto Nooks and/or Kindles.  If you’ve found that to be so, then the very best thing you can do, for yourself, for Baen, for your favorite authors, and for other ebook readers, is to write to Baen eBook Support and calmly detail the difficulties you’re having.  We all want your books to work.  Here’s the email address (you will need to put an @ in the correct place and remove the AT):  baensupportATprincipledtechnologies.com.

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Regarding eReaders. . .Let me share my experience.

My Android phone actually convinced me  that I liked reading eBooks, and led directly to my purchase of my very first eReader — the basic black-and-white Nook.  I was very happy with it, but BN stopped supporting it after awhile, and the reader itself started to act wonky, and so I looked around for another eReader to replace it.

I quickly became convinced that buying a subpar tablet tied specifically to a store that imposed DRM on my purchases was not in my own best interest.  So, I started shopping Real Tablets.  I shopped HARD, found a sale, and have been for a while the proud owner of a Samsung Galaxy 7.0 Plus, which does email, plays music, streams videos, and a dozen other things that I’ll never use (just like the Kindle Fire and the Nook), but! it also allows me access to  multiple eReaders.

I have a Nook reader, a Kindle reader, and Aldiko Premium on my tablet, so I’m not tied to one platform, and I’m not tied to one vendor.

If I had it to do over again, I’d probably buy a Google Nexus Tablet — Steve has one, and it’s a lot easier to use than the Galaxy (plus Samsung does some annoying things about trying to lock users into their protocols, which, had I known, I might’ve waited a little longer for the Google Tab, myself) — and costs no more than the new Kindles and Nooks.

So, that’s my story, and I hope it’s useful.

Herewith, the Lee and Miller (and Lee) delivery dates for the next while.

Trade Secrets (Liaden). . . . . . January 9, 2012 2013
Carousel Sun (Archers Beach). . . . . . February 15, 2013
Carousel Seas (Archers Beach). . . . . . August 15, 2013
First of Five (Liaden). . . . . . May 15, 2014
Second of Five (Liaden). . . . . . February 15, 2015
Third of Five (Liaden). . . . . . November 15, 2015
Fourth of Five (Liaden). . . . . . August 15, 2016
Fifth of Five (Liaden). . . . . . May 15, 2017

For clarity, a small review of terms:

Delivery date means the date on which a particular manuscript is due to arrive on the editor’s desk.

Publication date is the date on which a book is scheduled to be published.

These two things are not the same.  Publishers (wisely) tend not to set publication dates in stone until the manuscript has been delivered.  A good rule of thumb is to figure that a particular title will be published nine months to a year after delivery.

This is a duplicate of a spoiler space at Eagles Over the Kennebec.

For those who want to discuss Necessity’s Child.  Please, out of courtesy for those who are waiting for the dead tree edition, limit your conversation to this topic.  Thank you.

WARNING:  If you don’t want the story spoiled, don’t read the comments of this post! 

Q.  Amazon cancelled my order/I cancelled my order for the signed edition of Dragon Ship.  Are there any left anywhere within the expanding confines of the existing universe?

A. Yes!  Uncle Hugo’s Science Fiction Bookstore in Minneapolis still has signed copies of Dragon Ship on hand.  Here’s your link to the Lee and Miller catalog page.  You’ll have to scroll down.

Q.  Are signed editions of Necessity’s Child going to be available?

A.  Yes!  You may preorder it now, in fact.  In light of the kerfuffle surrounding the Dragon Ship signed editions, and Amazon’s total customer service Fail in the event, I would strongly suggest pre-ordering your signed edition from Uncle Hugo’s.   Here’s that link again.  This time you’re lucky; Necessity’s Child is right at the top of the page. Yes, the book “costs more” from Uncle.  On the other hand, not having to deal with the uncertainty and frustration engendered by Amazon’s curious lapse has got to be worth a buck or two.

Bonus A.  First chapter of Necessity’s Child, right over here.

Bonus A #2.  No, we don’t know when Baen will release the eArc.  The last we heard, via a reader, was late October-ish to mid-November-ish.

Q.  I totally missed getting a hardcover of Ghost Ship before it sold out.  Are there any left anywhere within the expanding confines of the existing universe?

A.  Yes!  Uncle Hugo’s reports have 40 Ghost Ship hardcovers on hand.  The link, one! more! time.  Yep, you’ll need to scroll down.

 Q.  I read the splinter of The Cards of Fortunate Destiny on Splinter Universe.  Will you be completing that novel?

A.  No.

Q.  How about getting a co-author to write it with you?  It would be, like, half the work for you!

A.  No.  You will have noticed that I have a co-author, and I know that collaboration is not “half as much work” for anyone involved.

Q. What’s with Trade Secrets?

A.  Steve’s working on it.  It had to be gutted and re-visioned — much like Balance of Trade, as I recall.  Teenagers!

Q.  When will the sequel to The Tomorrow Log be published?

A.  My best, conservative, guess is?  Never.

…I think that’s caught up what I have in email and other places ’round the net.

If you have a question I haven’t answered, please ask in comments.  I will answer, though it may take me as much as a day.

Thanks!

As reported elsewhere, on Friday we made the pilgrimage to Bangor for the Book Festival.  Friday evening we gathered with the other participating authors at the Hammond Street Senior Center for wine and conversation.  We were greeted there by Johnny the Cat, the proprietor, who came out from under a table where he was keeping a Very Close Eye on those gathered, to give Steve a bump and then to flop down and show belly.

The keynote was given by Richard Russo and Kate Russo.  They described the process of putting together their collaborative project, Interventions.  The project was the publication of four stories, by Richard, and four paintings, by Kate, Richard’s daughter.  Their goal was to produce a book that couldn’t easily be made into an ebook, that had numerous “moving parts,” and which would demonstrate that “book” is a multidimensional experience.  For those interested, the “moving parts” include four individually bound stories in a slipcase.  Each story has the painting relating to it inside, but not bound in; it can be used as  a bookmark, and keeps the art in front of the reader as they move through the story.

The talk was enjoyable and informative, and Richard did me. . .the favor. . .of reminding me of Stevenson’s “Windy Nights,” which is now stuck in my head.

Thanks a lot, Richard.

I’ll mention that the weatherbeans were calling rain for Friday and Saturday.  We managed to dodge the bullet on Friday, but Saturday more than made up for it.  There were several early downpours, flash flooding, and rivers of muddy water flowing freely down Bangor’s hilly streets.

We sat in the car in the parking lot across from the library for about half-an-hour, waiting for the weather to let up. When it had, a little, we grabbed our bag of goodies and a umbrella, and picked our way across the liquid street.  Even with the umbrella, we were both soaked, so it was good we had some time to dry off before the group signings.

The rain had stopped completely by the time we were due to walk down to the Rock and Art Shop and give our talk, where we had a small, diverse group, including folks who had read our entire oeuvre, and folks who were just getting started.

If you’re ever in Bangor, Maine?  Go the Rock and Art Shop.  Really.  And schedule some serious time there.

Steve had started to feel somewhat poorly — still not done with the cold from hell, apparently — so we did not stay in Bangor for the last, celebratory event, but opted to get home before it was dark (my night-sight has gone straight to heck).

In all, we had a great time, largely thanks to the help and patience of Gibran Graham, and Barbara McDade.

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So, after being feted and celebrated, today is about doing the laundry and getting my office straightened up.

One of the things that’s making my office quite so untidy are the piles of galley proofs from books long published.  I think I’m going to have to bite the bullet and throw ’em out.  Then I have to decide what to do with the nice Brother laser printer that I took with me to Temp Headquarters so that I didn’t have to deconstruct my entire home office in order to take the ink-jet with me.  The Brother is super, but, really, I don’t need another printer in this office; I already have two.

Oh!  I should mention that there is a review of the Liaden Universe® Space Regency audiobooks over here.  (Liaden Universe® audiobooks from Audible US and from Audible UK.  This has been your obligatory author self-promotion.)

So!  What did y’all do this weekend?

Have I mentioned here that Steve and I will be participating in the Bangor Book Festival, Friday and Saturday, October 18 and 19 and 20 (that’s this coming weekend!)?

We’ll be at the Author Reception and Keynote on Friday evening, 6:30, at the Hammond Street Senior Center in Bangor.  Richard Russo will deliver the keynote; you’ll remember that he won the Pulitzer in Fiction a couple years back, for his novel Empire Falls.

On Saturday at 12:30, Steve and I will take part in the Mad Group Signing in the gorgeous Bangor Public Library Rotunda (honest, the BPL is a beautiful building; if you haven’t visited, you should.  Plus — books!)

Then!  at 1:30, we’ll remove to the Rock and Art Shop at 36 Central Street to talk about the Liaden Universe® with all comers.

In addition to us, there’ll be lots more going on, with about a zillion authors and illustrators taking over downtown Bangor, so plan on taking part.

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There’s a very thorough explication of the Agent of Change audiobook Sequence, over here.  If you’ve been wary of the audiobook editions, or unwilling to commit to a long-running series encompassing. . .fifteen (soon to be sixteen) novels, you may find this review of use.

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One of the things I find that I miss terribly from my sojourn at Temp Headquarters is the walks.  I knew this was going to be so, but I hadn’t realized how very much I would be jonesing for my nice mile loop up East Grand, through the green at Little Miss Cottages, up Wavelet Street ’til it dead-ends at Sunspray condos, and back down East Grand to Temp Headquarters.  I miss it so much, that I dreamed about it, though Wavelet Street had inexplicably acquired a bakery in the dream.  Might’ve been getting near breakfast time.

* * *

For those keeping track at home, Carousel Sun stands at 63,000 words, and things are starting to heat up nicely.

Someone took me, mildly, to task the other day for having failed to mention that there is an audiobook edition of Carousel Tides, too.  So, here’s your mention, and a link, too.

And now?  You’re all caught up.