Who says authors can't autograph ebooks?

By Judith Yates Borger

Yeah, but you can't autograph a Kindle is the response I often hear after I've listed all the reasons why an ebook is a perfectly fine way -- the best, in my humble opinion -- to read crime fiction, or any other, for that matter.

The honest truth, though, is well, yes, and no. There are at least a couple of fledgeling ways to offer an autograph. They just aren't refined enough yet. Autography is one, Kindlegraph is the other. I've also run across a couple others, but it doest appear they've been used much yet. If you've had any experience with these, please let me and other readers of Crime Fiction Collective know about it by posting a comment.

I first learned about Autography from a link in the New York Times last April. I check on the website and placed a call to the phone number listed more than two weeks ago. I said I was researching Authography for a blog. As of this evening, no one has called me back, so I'm wondering if Autography is operational yet. If you have any experience with Authography please let us know.

The second, Kindlegraph, is owned by  ... wait for it ... Amazon.com.  Like everything else Amazon, Kindlegraph is fairly straightforward for authors, with one exception. It must be accessed through a Twitter account. I don't understand why, but that's how I got to it.

Then I followed the simple instructions. Instantly, almost, I was listed among the new authors. Then at about 5 p.m. central time today, November 29, 2011, I asked myself for a personalized inscription and autograph. Again, instantly Kindlegraph confirmed that I had fulfilled my own request and showed a PDF to prove it. Every hour since I have checked the beginning of both books looking for my groovy inscription and autograph on Where's Billie? and Whose Hand? in my Kindle. So far, I see nothing.

According to information released last spring, Barnes & Noble upgraded it software in a fashion that uses Autography, but I haven't seen any concrete example of that. Again, if you know anything about that, let us know.

And then there's Bookiejar beta, a 2011 ebook publishing company. According to the company's release from September,  authors can set up generic or dedicated inscription and autographs for their ebooks. "A reader is now able to have his/her copy of an ebook personally signed by the writer at a book signing event. This has never been possible before, "says the company's president, an ex-Microsoft guy. Has anyone heard of anyone doing this?

This experiment begs the question: Who pays for eBook autographs? There are really only three options, the reader, the writer or the distributor. I can see someone advertising "Get your own personalized eBook for only 10 percent more."

Can authors autograph their books? I haven't seen it work yet, but I sure would like to. No one is more important  than our readers.  I suspect readers would react warmly to a personalized dedication that shows they are always top of the mind for us.

If you know more about this topic, please comment so we can all share in the knowledge.

I'd Love to Visit Your Book Club

By Judith Yates Borger, who's offering free ebook to any book club that sets up a Skype or FaceTime visit.

A writer friend refuses to visit book clubs because, she says, they tend to drink too much wine and grill her about why her character has premarital sex. Well, actually, it only happened once but it put her off book clubs forever.

I, on the other hand, love to visit with book clubs. In my little intro I tell them that I have very thick skin after working on newspapers where a good day was when only two people called me up swearing. I invite their criticism as well as their praise. They have never failed to heap on both, and I have learned from each comment. In fact, I made some changes in my second book, Whose Hand? because of comments about my first book, Where's Billie?

I've also learned there are a few key questions book club members ask every time:

Q: What is your writing routine?
A: I'm highly productive between 10 and 10:15 in the morning. The rest is slogging through mud.

Q: Was your car really blown up as portrayed in Where's Billie?
A: Yes, I wouldn't let that research go to waste.

Q: Are any members of your family characters in the book?
A: Note to my children: NO.

Q: Are any of your characters real people?
A: Lots of characters are an amalgamation of people I know or have met.

Q: How long did it take you to write the book(s)?
A: Start to publishing for Where's Billie? took three agents and seven years. For Whose Hand? it was about two years. I'm getting speedier.

Q: Do you get paid more with ebooks or paper books?
A: This is a classic Minnesotan question. What they really want to know is am I getting rich but they're too nice to ask directly. The answer is I get 70 percent royalty on ebooks, because I self publish them. I get five percent on paper books — about 80 cents for a $16.95 traditionally published book.  A reasonable follow up question here would be: Why in God's name do you work with a traditional publisher? But no one ever asks it.

Q: What is the husband in Where's Billie? doing? Fooling around? Out on assignment? Going through chemo? Then they often debate that point for up to 45 minutes.
A: Buy Whose Hand? and find out.

Three days ago I was asked: What will you be in five years?
A: Eligible for Medicare.

All of this is great, but my problem is I can't drive/fly/bus/take Amtrak many miles to visit book clubs. However, I'd really like to chat with readers from outside the Twin Cities. So ....

I'm offering  free ebooks of either Where's Billie? or Whose Hand?—your choice—to any book club willing to set up a time for me to visit  via Skype or FaceTime. Let's face it folks, the technology is there to reach out and touch someone face-to-face. Let's use it.

Email me at Judy@JudithYatesBorger.com to set up a date/time. I promise I'll be there. Go to my website, www.JudithYatesBorger.com, for descriptions of both books.

What I learned about print reviews

 By Judith Yates Borger, who never really lost faith in the power of newspapers

Because my emphasis is on epublishing, I hadn't paid a lot of attention to print reviews. That changed this week when my local newspaper, the StarTribune ran a Sunday review of my next book, Whose Hand? A Skeeter Hughes Mystery.

The reviewer, Steve Weinberg, a Columbus, Ohio journalist, said that Whose Hand? is "filled with places and events recognizable to Twin Cities residents."  He added that it's written by "a skilled stylist, and the plot unfolds without flaws of illogic. Far too many mysteries are bedeviled by illogical plot developments." Weinberg, who collects books about journalists, paired his review of Whose Hand? with a review of Killing Kate, by Julie Kramer, whose protagonist is also a reporter. It's unusual, he said, to have two books about two different female journalists released at the same time in the same city. He hailed both books as "first rate."

Whose Hand? is only available right now through Amazon Kindle and Barnes and Noble nook. It's in pre-order and will be published in paper in mid-August.  But apparently the review moved people who own ereaders to act. By Sunday late afternoon, Whose Hand?'s ranking on Amazon had zoomed up 175,000. My first book, Where's Billie? had gone up 200,000 ranks.  Both books were among the top 9,000 best sellers among Kindle's 750,000 ebooks. 

What's significant here is not so much the ranking but the huge swing in ranking caused by just one review. In a newspaper, no less.

By contrast, Publishers Weekly called Whose Hand?  a "diverting regional mystery with appeal to readers beyond the Twin Cities." I could not see any significant change in my Kindle sales after the Publisher's Weekly review.

I think there are two lessons here. It doesn't take a lot of sales to move an ebook way up the sales list. But more important, we have to pay attention to good, old newspaper coverage. It matters. 

Have you had a similar experience?  Tell us about it.

Where Do You Get Your Ideas?

From the time I started as a journalist at 16 -- paid five cents a column inch, thank you very much -- I've been asked how I get ideas for stories. When I switched to writing mysteries about 10 years ago readers asked the same question.

The short answer is, I don't know. Frankly, I wish I did. Many ideas come to my subconscious, roil around there for a while, then pop out when I'm least expecting. Others are the result of semi-disciplined record keeping.

In an effort to sort this out for myself, I'll try to explain.

Subconscious

At a recent book club meeting a reader asked me how I got the name Skeeter for my protagonist, a newspaper reporter. Other times when I was asked this I replied that it just popped into my head. But a few weeks ago I was watching the last of the Harry Potter movies. Surprise, the newspaper reporter in the Harry Potter series was named Skeeter.  That particular Potter book came out just as I was writing the first Skeeter Hughes mystery, "Where's Billie?" Hmmm. Is that where the name came from? When I pointed out the "coincidence" to my husband he reminded me that he'd told me about it two years ago.

Other times a short sentence can launch a whole book. Peter Bognanni, a St. Paul, MN author, told a book group recently that a guy at a party had told his wife that he "lived in a geodesic dome with his grandmother." That image so fascinated Bognanni that he wrote a charming book called The House of Tomorrow based on that one idea.

Why did that so captivate him? Who knows? But the point illustrates how ideas work in the subconscious.  The concept bumped around in his brain and he couldn't seem to get it out. He began researching geodesic domes in Iowa. He researched Buckminster Fuller. Then the idea morphed into punk rock bands and a kid who'd had a heart transplant. Read The House of Tomorrow. I think you'll like it.

Semi-disciplined record keeping

As a former newspaper reporter, I'm a news junkie. I read mostly online newspapers, watch both NBC and CBS evening news -- despite the ads for Ciallis and Bonina -- and my car radio is set permanently on Minnesota Public Radio/National Public Radio.

We had a saying the newsroom, back in the day, that "you can't make this shit up." Whether it's Bernie Madoff, the lady who tried to mail her son a live puppy or the earthquake that hit Japan, news is always better than fiction. That said, I write fiction, and keep a file on my desktop titled, "You can't make this shit up."  It's crammed with links to all the wonderful stories that I can embellish. I try hard to make nonfiction into believable fiction.

David Housewright, a Minnesota writer on his 11th or 12th mystery, I can never remember which, keeps a file of overheard snippets. Standing in the grocery store line, pumping gas, ordering coffee, whatever, he sometimes hears strange little quotes and jots them down. A year later he may pull the perfect line from the file that exactly conveys a thought in words better than he could have written  himself.

That's a good idea that I should adopt, but I haven't, which is why I call it semi-disciplined record keeping.

What was the source your best ideas? Comment here so we can all do what we do, better.