Patty's promotion: all books 99 cents

It's that time again!  Time for Patty Jansen's 99-cent book promotion.  All books are just 99 cents.  Check it out:

Direct link:  https://pattyjansen.com/promo/2-3-february-2019-99c-promo/

My own Mind Games is among the featured titles.  If you don't have a copy yet, here's your chance to get it for a buck.

These promotions are a great way to try out new (to you) authors without spending a lot of money.  Please check out the selection.  Who knows?  You might just find your new favorite author.

In the meantime, thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting indie authors like me.

Ten chapters

First ten chapters are proofread.  I've made a few minor edits along the way, too.  Can't help myself.

Clouds of Venus is permafree on Kobo again.

Everything I uploaded to PublishDrive has been approved and sent on to Google Play.  So PD has done their thing, and it's all up to GP now.  Hoping everything goes live without a hitch.

Promotion this weekend.  Stay tuned.

Chuck Yeager tweets

He tweeted about the Challenger disaster on its anniversary.

"Well, they got their publicity..."  A savage comment, but also completely fair.  The engineers warned NASA not to launch.  They did anyway.  It cost the astronauts their lives.  That's what happens when you let the suits overrule the guys who actually know how things work.  General Yeager knows what's up.

I was in fifth grade when it happened.  It was a snow day, so schools were closed and I was at home.  I saw it happen on television.  For my generation, that was our "JFK assassination" moment.  We all remember where we were and what we were doing.

I scrolled through some more of General Yeager's tweets and discovered this little gem:

That's a heck of a sentence.  "I met Orville just after I broke the sound barrier."  From the rickety Wright Flyer to the Bell X-1 in two generations.  And from dogfighting over Europe in a P-51 Mustang to posting on Twitter in a single lifetime.

I actually read General Yeager's autobiography when I was a kid.  Fascinating stuff about an amazing man.  I recommend it for anyone who wants to know some things they don't teach you in history class.

Fixed a typo

It was in Mind Games.  I was researching something for the current book and came across a missing word.  Grr...  Anyway, it's fixed, and I've uploaded the fix everywhere except PD/GP.  And I'll do that once the book is live there.

Proofing book 3 is humming along.  About a quarter of the way done, I think.

Clouds of Venus will be permafree on Kobo again soon.

Today's "wintry mix" turned out to be a total bust.  I was expecting ice and snow and all sorts of catastrophes.  Man, what a letdown.

Uploaded the trilogy to PublishDrive

I've uploaded the Free Space trilogy to PublishDrive.  In a matter of days, those books should be available on Google Play.

The pricing was a little tricky.  PD does its conversions differently from Amazon, and the result is different prices for other countries even when the U.S. price is the same.  This might be a problem as far as Amazon's price-matching and royalty rackets go.  I really don't know, though, because PD and Google Play are new to me and I'm learning the quirks the hard way.  I guess we'll see.

I'm also not sure the paragraph breaks in the blurbs are formatting correctly.  I'll have to look into that.

I've changed the background on my newsletter's landing page.  I'm still deciding on whether or not to change it on the header of the newsletter itself.

That's all for now.  It's cold and windy here, and there's a chance of snow in a few days.  Stay warm, folks.


UPDATE:  I've decided to go ahead and raise prices on PD/Google.  It sucks for Google Play customers, but I've got other things I'm dealing with right now, and I just don't want to worry about any price-related headaches.  If you don't know just how exasperating this price-matching and discounting stuff can be, go here and read about Gene's tale of woe.  For the foreseeable future, my short stories will be $1.99, the trilogy books will be $4.99, and the Wheel of Fire books will be $5.99.

UPDATE 2:  I've uploaded the Wheel of Fire books to PD.  So all my stuff is now there.  Buddy is available at Google Play, but the rest are still in various stages of review.  But I've done my part, so now I can (hopefully) put PD and Google Play out of my mind for a little while and focus on other things.

New back matter

Okay, I finally got around to uploading new-back-matter book files for the trilogy to Amazon.  Hopefully this will result in a better sell-through percentage due to the removal of the page breaks.  We'll see.

I don't even remember what the back matter in the D2D and Kobo versions is like, so I'll have to check that out.  But I'l probably replace those files, too.

And I'll need to upload the novels to PublishDrive.

I'm also going to change my newsletter landing page.  I think a darker space scene would look better than the reddish one it's go right now.

Success!

Buddy is now live on Google Play.  :D

I've added the link to the sidebar.

I've also uploaded my other two short stories to PublishDrive.  Now that I know it all works, I'll start adding the novels, too.

Thanks, PublishDrive, and thanks to Google Play, too.  Hopefully this is the start of a fruitful partnership for all of us.  :)