The Happy Booker

Wasn’t there a book with a title that sounded something like that back in the 70s? I think there was. Not that I would read any book like that, whatever that book may have been. Nope, not me.

However, yesterday was a very bookish day for me, and that always makes me happy. As I told you in yesterday’s blog, I had planned to check over the formatted print edition of Big Lake Ranger and get it uploaded to Amazon. I ran into a snag there because I forgot to have Elizabeth Mackey, my cover artist, create the cover for the printed edition, and all I had was the e-book cover. No problem, I sent an e-mail to Elizabeth, and within an hour or two, she came through for me like she always does, and I had the printed cover. Okay, ready to go, right? Wrong.

I uploaded the book manuscript and the cover art, and when I clicked on the previewer to see what it was going to look like, it took forever before it finally gave me an error message that the cover file was in the wrong format. I knew that was a mistake because the covers are always uploaded as PDF files, and that’s what I had. I tried again, and again it took a long time before it finally gave me the same error message. Just to be sure, I checked over the file Elizabeth sent me and it was correct, so I resubmitted it. Third times the charm, right? Wrong.

This time around the cover wound up as the contents of the book, and the actual manuscript was where the cover should be, and it was all jumbled and I couldn’t do anything with it. Obviously, there was something messed up on Amazon’s end, so I just walked away from it for a couple of hours and then when I went back, it loaded up fine. As I write this at midnight, it’s in the publishing process and should be available to order sometime this morning.

With that out of the way, I moved on to the next project. When someone finds out how many different series I have written, they always ask me what’s a good book to start with. Of course, it’s always better to begin with the first book in the series and read your way through them from the beginning. But which series should they start with? I solved that problem by releasing a new e-book titled Murder, Mayhem, And Main Street yesterday. Four full-length small town mysteries in one giant e-book!

It has the first book of my Dog’s Run series, Big Lake series, John Lee Quarrels series, and my stand-alone mystery, Black Friday. It’s a great way to be introduced to all of my different mystery series for the low, low price of just $5.99. And if you’re a Kindle Unlimited member, you can read it for free. How cool is that?

I also lowered the prices on my two other box sets yesterday, the first three books in the Big Lake series and the first three John Lee Quarrels books. Those box sets are also both available on Kindle Unlimited.

But wait, there’s more! Scarlett, who formats my paperbacks, added something new to Big Lake Ranger, which she will be doing with all of my printed books from now on. She created QR codes for all four of my book series, Big Lake, John Lee Quarrels, Dog’s Run, and Tinder Street. Now when someone finishes one of the printed books and wants to keep reading the series, all they have to do is scan the QR code or even turn on their smartphone’s camera and hover it over the code and it will take them right to the series. Thanks, Scarlett, I really appreciate that.

I have a doctor’s appointment today that’s going to keep me busy, but tomorrow I plan to be back at it, working on The Hard Years, the fourth book in the Tinder Street series.

Thought For The Day – No problem is so difficult or so complex that you can’t blame it on someone else!