Active Downloads

Following the successful experiment with releasing my short story SPIRITS direct to digital, I thought I'd continue to play around with that format.

So I took a collection of 3 stories I'd put together for an Espresso Book Machine experiment and uploaded that to the Kindle platform.   

To explain the EBM experiment a bit --> back when we first got our EBM at McMaster, there wasn't much content available to test the machine out, so we did a lot of experimenting.  I created a "chapbook" style collection of three of my previously published stories -- all "book-themed" which came to about 50 pages and called it ACTIVE READER: And Other Cautionary Tales From the Book World.

So I posted it to Kindle without any fanfare (unlike the noise I made when Spirits was launched) for $1.50 and a few sales started to trickle in. Neat. (At the same time, I revised the version of Active Reader that I had uploaded to Smashwords - the original version had some minor formatting issues, so I fixed them, updated the content a bit and readjusted the price on that to match)

I used the following description to summarize the three stories included in Active Reader:

Active Reader
Loyalty programs that track a reader's every preference are handy, save time and offer great discounts -- at least until your customer data gets into the hands of the wrong person.
 
Browsers
A passionate book lover is drawn into a mysterious and eerie little bookstore the way a moth might be drawn to a flame.

Distractions
How far might a desperate writer go when blinding following the advice of a popular self-help book to eliminate the distractions preventing him from completing his next novel?

Then, this past Saturday morning, I caught wind of the fact that Amazon had adjusted the price of Active Reader to 100% off (via Pixel of Ink) and the downloads shot through the roof.

By Saturday evening, over 1000 people had downloaded Active Reader, it hit #3 on the Fiction -> Short Stories list, #7 on the Fiction -> Horror list and #129 on the Top in Kindle Store list.

It has already received a favourable review and the downloads continue to fly - this morning the total is > 1500. 

So in less than 48 hours, the downloads through this single source surpassed the 600+ downloads I received when I made the digital version free through Smashwords for a much longer period of time.

Yes, if I were receiving the royalties based on the original retail price (about 50 cents is what I'd normally make on the sale of each unit), I'd be laughing my way to the bank; but it looks like due to Amazon discounting it to 0.00, my cut of the royalties are a % of the final retail price. 

At the end of the day, though, it means a lot of people are checking out my writing and might end up purchasing one of my other digital works which are available. So that's a pretty cool thing. Again, it's all experimenting - and this one seems to be going quite well.

And for those intrigued but who don't read on Kindle, Active Reader is available at Smashwords, Kobo, Sony, Diesel and a few other places like Apple iBooks.

My Father And My Son

I thought I would be feeling bitter-sweet about Father's Day, again focusing on how much my Dad would have loved Alexander, and how my son would have adored his Grandfather.

But as I was thinking about the two of them, and just how much I know they would have enjoyed one another's company, while slightly sad for the fact the two never had a chance to meet, I couldn't help but be overwhelmed with thinking about just how fortunate I am to have been sandwiched between the two of them.

I had a great Dad - I have some amazing memories of him and of the two of us doing things together. Though we shared many laughs, we never really sat down and had any serious talks about life (we did have some serious talks, but mostly we just enjoyed one another's company, in the traditional "males doing things together" capacity); nonetheless, I reaped so very much of my work ethic, my morality and my ability to find amusement even in perilous or frustrating circumstances, from the examples he continually set for me.

And every day I count the many blessings that my son bestows upon me. Alexander is such a kind, thoughtful, intelligent and funny little man. Yesterday when I was working on a light fixture while perched on a ladder, there he was, handing me the correct tool that I needed, a reminder of how he has always been involved in the day to day "business" as well as the day to day fun - minutes earlier he was sharing a joke he'd just made up. "Why did Dad go to the Beer Store?" - "To get a case of beer." (His version of the chicken crossing the road chestnut)

It's funny how much I learned from my Dad when I was young; things I still apply to my day to day life.

But it's amazing just how much I continue to learn from my son; things that continue to enrich my days.

I'm overwhelmingly blessed, because whether I look back at my Dad or ahead at my son, I see men that I truly respect, admire and love from the bottom of my heart.

I'm one truly lucky and blessed guy.

Dad and me

Me and Alexander

Pasricha Pastiche

I love it when two awesome things combine to become something equally marvellous.

A classic that's a pretty common one for most people might be peanut butter and jam.

But I'm also thinking about when companies produce something - like when H.B. Reese combined peanut butter and chocolate to make Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. My taste buds still sing out in praise of the forward thinking that led to this glorious experience in yummy.

I was similarly impressed with the simple wonder of fry sauce - which is the merging of one part ketchup and two parts mayonnaise (two of my favourite basic condiments)

And this morning, while making my lunch, I marvelled at the combination of President's Choice Smokin' Stampede Beer & Chipotle BBQ sauce with mayo to make a new sandwich spread.

I thought it was worthy of pausing, snapping a quick pic and just acknowledging the wonder when two great things combine to make a whole new thing to enjoy.


* This post is titled "Pasricha Pastiche" in honour of the man of awesome, Neil Pasricha, whose books The Book of Awesome and The Book of Even More Awesome, inspired by his blog, help inspire people to take unabashed pleasure and joy from the many very simply joys each day brings. I had the pleasure of seeing him give a talk in person last month and continue to be inspired by his outlook on life. Thanks, Neil.

HNT - Spud Wars: Epilogue

Continued from HNT - Spud Wars: The Conclusion

As father and son were celebrating the defeat of their foe, Darth Tater, they failed to hear the creaking of someone coming down the steps.

A shadow fell across them, and they both froze, wondering how the two of them could possible be caught unawares, this father and son team being so crafty and clever and cunning (not to mention their fondness for alliteration).



"What the heck is going on here?" A loud voice boomed through the basement.

Oh no! It was Francine (known to Mark as Wife, Partner, Honey Bunny to Alexander as Mom, Mommy, Meow-meow and to both as She Who Must Be Obeyed)

And Francine was not at all pleased. One might even say she was angry. But why waste words trying to explain how she was feeling? Why TELL? It's a poor storyteller tactic. It's much better to SHOW.

"What kind of trouble are you two getting into NOW?" Francine asked, shaking her head. "And WHAT have you done with the Darth Tater toy that I bought you for Christmas? You've completely destroyed it."


"But, hon, we . . . that is . . . I . . . er," Mark tried to stammer out an excuse while Alexander simply tried to crawl away and hide.

"I can understand this from Alexander. He's not even two years old. But YOU!" Fran said. "You're supposed to be the adult here. And you should learn to take better care of your things. Just look at that toy -- it's busted into a million pieces."



"It's really only about a dozen or so pieces," Mark muttered.

"Pardon me?"

"I said, it's only about a dozen pieces."

"Don't get saucy with me, mister!"

"Hon, listen." Mark said in a whiny voice. "We were playing. You know, fun make believe stuff. It was all part of our important father and son bonding. And besides, we got at least one or two people from all over the world who read my blog excited about the whole Darth Tater Spud Wars serial story. Again! Because don't you know this has been a re-telling of the original tale we told back in 2006."

"Don't get all: 'explain the circumstance and back-story through dialogue' with me, mister. Besides, you're making this confusing."

"Yes, I suppose I have been messing with the time-space continuum of this tale's supposed fictional realm, with Alexander now 6 years old and Mister Bunny having been dead since the year I first told this story. But it was fun sharing this story again. And fun to go back and re-experience it. Re-edit some stuff. Re-imagine some dialogue moments like the one we're having right now that never occurred for this long in the original version of the tale."

Francine smiled, then started to laugh. "Well, okay, since you were using your imaginations, and also using the Internet for anything other than watching Lego Star Wars videos or downloading porn, than I guess it's okay."

"What's porn?" Alexander asked.

"Er, it's a new type of vegetable that hasn't really caught on. A hybrid between peas and corn." Mark said.

"Anyways," Francine said. "I suppose you two are not in trouble anymore."

"Yaaaa!" Both Mark and Alexander said.


"Now c'mon. Get cleaned up! Supper is ready. I'm sure all this adventure and make-believe has given you a huge appetite."

"Yummm," Mark said. "What are we having?"

"Smashed potatoes and tater tots!" Francine said.

"Yaaaaaaa!" Both Mark and Alexander cheered again.

The End

Yes, it's true.

This long-winded re-run/re-boot of the Spud Wars serial adventure is finally over!

Thanks for reading!

* Please note that no actual toys or potatoes were harmed during the making of this serialized tale. 

(Although Alexander did bang his knee, Mark got rug burn and Francine needed to take some Advil)

(Also, the toys on the floor in this story DID eventually get cleaned up, but newer toys - toys enjoyed by 6 year olds and 42 year olds alike are sprawled all over that same space. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose) 

* The font used for the SPUD WARS logo above came from Boba Fonts on Fontspace - check out all their cool designs.

Is Less More, More Or Less?

There's an interesting post called "You've Got Thirty Pages" on the Melville House Publishing website talking about our addiction to amusement and our society's evolution into a desire to be entertained in short snippets of time.

The Melville House  "Art of the Novella" series - photo from their blog

The demand for readers in particular to be entertained in short "dips" in and out might just be a reflection of our continual rapid-fire changing between one source of incoming info and the next (as discussed in Nicholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains)

It's one of the reasons why I've been experimenting with trying to push out short fiction in digital format (ie, the straight to digital launch of my short story Spirits a couple of weeks ago) - I'm curious to see what the uptake is on that as compared to my book-length works.

I'm also rather curious to see where this trend leads and if it ends up making the experience of actually being absorbed with reading so much that falling completely into a book is that much MORE of a luxurious and wonderfully unique experience than ever before (For that percentage of the population who can still enjoy that, of course)

But alas, based on the assumed average modern person's attention span, I've likely already gone on too long.

How many of you have bothered to read right through to the end of this post? More importantly what's your sense of having possibly missed something else while focusing on reading this?

Doin' It Right

I was delighted to see Random House Canada announce yesterday a special digital release of a hot new Linwood Barclay novella, Clouded Vision.

Upon seeing the tweet from RHC, I immediately clicked the link to check it out.

Barclay has long been on my list of writers whose works I will buy on sight.  Clouded Vision is available in paperback in the UK, but in Canada and the US as a digital ebook release.

I'm impressed with RHC's venture into this territory, always delighted when a publisher does something new and exciting, particularly with a Canadian author.

But I was also impressed with the manner by which Random House Canada is selling the book.

Check this out:

When you hit the "BUY BUTTON" you get a pop-up window directing you to check for a list of eBook retailers.

As a bookseller  I'm always delighted to see a publisher directing customers to choose their own favourite retail place to make their purchase. (Note - for physical books, Random House Canada's BUY BUTTON allows you to select from a list of online retailers and local physical bricks and mortar stores - a great feature of their site) I love the fact there's a choice offered to the consumer, and one that doesn't compromise the partnership between the publisher and the bookseller. 

I also love the fact that I can get my Linwood Barclay fix before his next hardcover release later this summer.

Baba's Burial

We buried my Baba this past Friday.

She passed away in February. In Northern Ontario you need to wait until the spring thaw before you can bury someone. So we picked June 10th - it being a PD day, we figured Baba's great grandchildren would not be in school and able to attend.

It was a cool, overcast day. The cemetary was relatively quiet. We were a very small group.

There were two other small groups of families at a couple of other grave sites that we passed on the way in and a few maintenance workers trimming grass on a knoll in the distance.

When we arrived and got to the pre-dug hole, I realized that though Francine and I had spoken to Alexander about Baba dying and about why we bury someone, we hadn't yet explained cremation to him. He saw the small pre-dug hole and asked if that little hole was where we were burying Baba.

Perhaps because my mind works like a child's I had visions of Alexander being horrified that someone would have violently crammed Baba's body into this tiny box measuring less than half a foot by a quarter of a foot. Francine and I exchanged a quick look of parental confirmation, that unspoken and quickly resolved debate about what, how and when we should explain things to our son about the world.

So before her ashes arrived with the gentleman from the funeral home, I knelt by the grave and quietly explained cremation to him. And yes, I used the example of what they had done with Darth Vader's body (the redeemed Anakin Skywalker) at the end of Return of the Jedi - sometimes it's best to explain things using situations and settings children are most familiar with. My son is into Star Wars big time right now so that helped him imagine it with something he recognized rather than trying to imagine a casket moving down a conveyer into a giant oven.

Then the gentleman from Lougheeds arrived with the ashes.

The prayers were said, a poem was read.

I placed her ashes into the grave and we each placed a rose on top.

When asked if there was anything to say I started to talk about Baba, but choked up and cut it short at just a few quick sentences.

That's the thing with me.

I can go on and on about things that are important to me (like when I've blogged about Baba), but sometimes have difficulty speaking them aloud.

The same thing happened when my Mom and I released my father's ashes into the lake near one of his favourite fishing spots. I had prepared a short speech and a snippet from W. H. Auden's Funeral Blues which I just couldn't bring myself to read aloud because the emotions simply ran too high.

I can put the words together, express my feelings perfectly when writing or typing. But verbalizing those very words is sometimes too much.

I guess that might be one reason I chose the path of writer.

HNT - Spud Wars: The Conclusion

This blog post is a serialized story continued from HNT - Spud Wars: All This Violence


As Alexander and Darth Tater were playing violent video games, the shadows behind them shifted and moved.

Out of the shadows came a hand -- a startlingly familiar hand - a large hand, belonging, perhaps, to a man with large hands and large feet. A hand that was holding a fork!


It was Mark!

Mark?  But he was supposedly dead.

"But, you're dead." Darth muttered as he was hoisted into the air by the power of the fork. "I killed you myself! I saw it with my own eyes. And since I'm a potato I have a lot of eyes, so I saw it really, really well."

"You killed the evil Mark, not me." Mark said, laughing madly. "Didn't you notice his facial hair?"

"Aw, that's not fair," Darth Tater said. "It's the old evil Captain Kirk 'goatee' thing."

"It's called a van Dyke, not a goatee!"

"Whatever! But this is not fair at all. This is supposed to be a spoof of Star Wars, not Star Trek."

"Spoof is a spoof is a spoof," Mark said. "It's all fair game. And now, your game is up, Tater." And with that cliched statement, Mark bit down into his enemy.

Mark and Alexander then took turns snacking on their enemy.

"Mmm," Alexander said. "I love potato. Try the arm, Daddy. It's just like a French Fry."

"Mumfh klpsp," Mark said, his mouth too full of spud pieces to respond intelligently. But it sounded an awful lot like: 'Could use a little ketchup.'


When the victory snack was finished, the father and son team yelled "High Five!" and then started to do their happy dance.

But they didn't hear the creaking of someone coming down the stairs . . .

To be continued . . . in HNT - Spud Wars: Epilogue

Don't worry, the story is over - we just have that whole Epilogue thing to put full closure on the tale, which you'll find here next week in the re-booted tale of . . .

* The font used for the SPUD WARS logo above came from Boba Fonts on Fontspace - check out all their cool designs.

Tickled With My Ticker

This post is an update mostly for those who follow my blog and were waiting to hear the results of my recent heart scare.

I recently posted about a heart attack scare I had which led to the doctor's suggesting I stop running and not exert myself until they could determine what was going on with my heart. This meant I had to drop out of the 2011 10K Mud Run.

In a nutshell, due to a significantly powerful chest pain experience (20 minutes in which it felt as if somebody had slammed me in the chest with a baseball bat), I played it safe and went to the ER. They kept me for 8 hours, ran blood tests and hooked me up to machines to monitor my heart and found a borderline intraventicular conduction delay.

So last week I went in for further testing so they could get some clearer pictures of my heart and see how serious it actually was.

Yesterday I got my results back.

Except for the unveiling of high blood pressure (for which I've been put on a low sodium diet and told to continue to monitor it; if it doesn't come down soon, lifestyle changes won't be enough and medication for hypertension will be on the agenda), I've been given a clean bill of health and told I can run again.

I normally write long blog posts, but these three pictures of Homer Simpson roughly summarize the mini little saga in a fun way.

A Virtual Success

On Friday I decided to perform a little experiment and do a "launch" for the release of a new story direct to digital.

Spirits is the tale of two young lovers who caught up in the legend of The Phoenix Baby, the ghostly crying that haunts a repertory theatre in the city of Ottawa.  As they unravel the mystery, they find themselves becoming inextricably entangled to the old abandoned building.

If you're at all intrigued, you can listen to the entire story online (or download an mp3 of it) for free.

So at lunch time on Friday, as part of the joy of experimenting, I did a virtual launch via UStream, which is a streaming live video. I did what one normally does at a book launch (I read from the tale, spoke a bit about it and answered questions) - except, of course, I wasn't in a book store.

I can imagine that as the physical and digital begin to work more closely together, one might very well be able to do a virtual book launch right into a bookstore, or more than one bookstore simultaneously. I know my colleagues at Collected Works Bookstore & Coffeebar in Ottawa have done this very thing several years ago; they projected an author from the UK into their store, and filled the place beyond capacity.

I've also experimented in the same realm with my colleagues from University of Alberta Bookstore - they had an author appear there and we had an audience without our own store watching the event and communicating with the author and folks in Edmonton via a two-way video chat. And, for the launch of Robert J. Sawyer's WATCH, we broadcast the event from our store to a UStream feed, with twice as many people attending the virtual event than were in the store.

I can imagine more experiments like this, particularly as booksellers work out various ways to allow customers to purchase ebooks through their businesses.

The live broadcast was about 45 minutes, and I recorded about 30 minutes of it. This is raw and unedited video, so do be warned.



















Eighteen people attended this virtual launch via UStream. I'm not sure how many watched via the direct-to-Facebook feed that I built into my Mark Leslie page there. But in any case, having 18 people "attend" a book launch is a huge success for an author such as myself.  

And, BTW I know that my Mom (who doesn't own a computer) wasn't one of the attendees. Neither was my wife - she was upstairs cleaning the house at the time. I do know a few friends who attended and greatly appreciate their enthusiasm and support. It's always nice to look out into the audience and see a few familiar friendly faces.

Of course, that's one thing that was a bit strange for this launch - I couldn't see any friendly, smiling faces. All I could see was the green light on my web cam letting me know that I was broadcasting. Also, normally when I speak in front of a group, I can judge how things are going by the looks on their faces and can adjust my presentation accordingly. You can't get any of that feedback during a virtual launch.

There is, however, the ability for folks to pipe in during a chat stream and ask questions - and at least one person in the audience did -- one of my friends. Thanks, William!

So, ultimately, WAS the launch a success?

Well, on Smashwords, Spirits hit the Top 5 Bestsellers list within Horror and on Amazon it climbed as high as 13,693 on the Paid in Kindle Store list (up from where it started at 102,755) and it was also listed at #93 in the Top 100 Hot New Releases in Horror for the Amazon Kindle.

I'd call that a decent showing.

Do One Thing Really, Really Well

I recently won a contest from Y108 sponsored by Steamwhistle and Stonewalls.

The contest reads like this:  Everybody does one thing really . . . really well. Y108, Steamwhistle Pilsner and Stonewwalls wanna hear all about it! Nominate your most talented, thoughtful or skilled friends and you could win a Steam Whistle Home Delivery Service and catering by Stonewalls delivered to you!

I submitted a story (which I never kept a copy of, even though people have asked to read it a few times - I just filled out the online form and away it went) about my neighbour Chad.

I explained how I'd been working in the garage with my father when we first moved into our new home about 12 years ago and Chad showed up with a smile and a few cold beer in his hands. Since then, almost every time there's a lawn mover, rake, or snow shovel out at either of our homes, there's a friendly neighbour with a smile and a beer. Whether we're washing or working on our cars, watching our kids play together or having a BBQ or a smile in the back-yard, one thing has always been consistent - Chad has been leading the charge on being the friendly neighbour to share a beer with.

Basically, Chad does the "neighbour beer" thing really, really well - better than anyone I've known. In my mind, it's that neighbourly effort that helps build communities and is something worth celebrating.

So I won the contest -- or rather, I won the contest in honour of Chad.

So last night, Andrew G and Jesse from Y108 delivered the fantastic and delicious food from Stonewalls, and Alex from Steamwhistle delivered the 30L Keg. (I've long favoured Steamwhistle on tap over having it in the bottle, and that was the consensus for everyone that night)

About an hour after dropping off the catering, Andrew G was back in the Y108 studio and live on air, and he shared the story I had written in honour of my buddy and neighbour, Chad. He also played a Rush song, because we couldn't resist putting in a request when he was in our backyard, since we were listening to Y108 in the back-yard all night.

So last night, a group of friends got together and had some good eats and some good beer and a lot of laughs while the kids played in the backyard, then had popcorn and watched a movie downstairs.

Good times!

Thanks Y108! Thanks Steamwhistle! Thanks Stonewalls!

Thanks, Chad!

Launch of SPIRITS (Digital Short)

People who haven't died can still leave their spirit in a place.

That's the premise for "Spirits" the tale of two young lovers who are caught up in the legend of The Phoenix Baby, the ghostly crying that haunts a repertory theatre in the city of Ottawa.  As they unravel the mystery behind the legend, they find themselves becoming inextricably entangled to the old abandoned building.

Today I'm launching a short story direct to digital. After all, you've got to keep trying new things just to see what sticks.

The story is available on Amazon Kindle for 99 cents.

I also loaded it to Smashwords which distributes to all the major ebook retailers (Kobo, Sony, Diesel, Apple iBooks, etc) - at this point it's available at Smashwords directly but hasn't yet cascaded to all the other channels.

At noon today (EST) I'll be doing a live streaming video launch via my uStream channel - it'll be the usual thing one would normally do in a bookstore for a launch: a brief talk about the story, short reading, answering questions; or, as sometimes happens, sitting quietly or talking to myself because nobody shows up - (hey, I have to joke about it because we've all been there at "no show" author events, haven't we?)


There's also an audio version of the story which is available completely for free on my "Prelude To A Scream" podcast.

Yes, you can sample the first part of the story direct from Amazon or Smashwords, or listen to the entire story for free online or download it and listen to it on your iPod or mp3 player.

If you like that free audio experience or the free samples, or even the live streaming "event" perhaps you'll consider either buying it or perhaps posting a positive review so that others might find it.

But at the very least, you can say: "Hey, I attended a virtual book launch for an ebook." And that's got to be worth something . . .

HNT - Spud Wars: All This Violence

This blog post is a serialized story continued from HNT - Spud Wars: The Final Standoff


As Alexander put Darth Tater into an unbreakable half nelson, Darth said: "I give, I give. But please put me down, I have something important to say."

"Wait a minute," Alexander said. "That's not how it happened. That's not the exact dialogue. You're changing the story."

"It's called creative licence, kid!" A disembodied voice said. "You need to bring the reader up to speed in a continuing story by summing up the very last bit of the previous episode."

"Yes, but that's lying, isn't it? My parents said lying is not good, and if I lie they will take my favourite toys away. What do you suggest I do in this predicament?"

There was a long pause before the disembodied voice finally said: "Please, just get on with it. Darth said he had something important to say. In response, you say?"


"Okay," Alexander said. "I'm all ears."

"That's funny," Darth said. "Because I'm all eyes. Get it? Eyes? A potato that's all eyes?"

"It's not funny if you have to explain it," Alexander sighed. "That's one of the reasons why this story is such a flop. Now tell me what you wanted to say."

"I wanted to say that if you look at it, we're even. Your father ate my father as a pile of french fries, and I slaughtered your father. So we're even. We should call a truce."


"Hmm," Alexander said. "You do have a point. Maybe we should call a truce."

"Ah," said Darth. "This feels good."

"It sure does," Alexander responded. "But you know what? All this violence makes me want to play violent video games."

"Yeah," Darth said with a grin. "Me too."


And so the two sat down and turned on the X-Box and started to play violent video games, proving the age old belief that violence in the real world breeds the desire to play violent video games (and that if you have to repeatedly explain a joke, it's not all that funny to begin with).

"This is a cool game," Darth said. "What's it called?"

"Astrosmash!" Alexander said. "It's a game my Dad used to play when he was really young on his Intellivision game system."

"Your Dad was young once?"

"Yes, apparently. You wouldn't know to look at him now, though."

"Hmm, I COULD picture him as a bald little baby."


As they were engaged in their game and chit-chat, neither of them seemed to notice a strange shadow creeping up behind them . . .

To be continued . . . in HNT - Spud Wars: The Conclusion

Does real world violence actually lead to the playing of violent video games, or is it the other way around? When do fish sleep? What is the sound of one hand clapping? If a tree falls on a blog that nobody reads, does it still make a sound? Okay, you'll find the answer to none of these questions, but you WILL find out who is creeping up behind Darth Tater and Alexander in next week's concluding episode of . . .

* The font used for the SPUD WARS logo above came from Boba Fonts on Fontspace - check out all their cool designs.

And Now For Something A Little Different

Once upon a time, I wrote a story, sent it to a editor, they accepted it, the story appeared in their magazine, a few hundred people might read it, and then it would disappear.

Once upon a time, I wrote a short story called "Spirits" and ended up wanting to try something different with it.

"Spirits" is the tale of Sally and Rob, two young lovers who are caught up in the legend of The Phoenix Baby, the ghostly crying that haunts a repertory theatre in the city of Ottawa.  As they unravel the mystery behind the legend, they find themselves becoming inextricably entangled to the old abandoned building.

The story is set mostly at The Phoenix theatre on Bank Street in Ottawa, which had closed when I was there in 1991. (I took heavy liberties with the history of the building in my story, ignoring the fact it used to be called The Rivoli & was only the Phoenix for a few years - there's a great look at the history of Bank Street and its buildings in Ottawa, including the theatre used for my story on the URBSite blog)

Empty lot where The Phoenix used to stand - from "Bank Street Then & Now"

"Spirits" is a cross between the normal type of story I write (horror, dark humour, heavy speculative fiction elements), was more of a contemporary tale - a bit of a mystery, with an underlying love story to it. For that reason, it never quite "fit" with the usual markets I would send my fiction to. But because it contained a subtle speculative element, it also didn't quite fit well with contemporary or literary markets.

But it was a story I thought had merit. So I kept re-writing it, re-editing it, polishing it and sending it out.

A few years ago, when Lawrence Hill was writer in residence at McMaster University, I booked an appointment with him and he took a look at "Spirits." He offered some great constructive feedback for the tale, and pointed out several things about it that he quite liked. Knowing the tale didn't turn Larry off and that he found it enjoyable gave me fresh hope.

But I still kept getting back the classic "good story, just not right for us" response.

I had two options - keep sending it out and hoping it eventually found a home (because that's what writers do); or put it back in the drawer.

However, I thought maybe there was another option.

What if I pushed it out their straight to digital and sold the story for 99 cents? I chose 99 cents because the story might take someone about half an hour to read (at least that's how long the audio version of the tale goes - of course, I pause for dramatic effect, so maybe reading quietly might take 15 to 20 minutes) - and 99 cents is a pretty good price to pay for half an hour's entertainment, isn't it? 

When I was sending the story out, I was shooting for 5 cents/word, which is a standard pro rate for short fiction markets. That's just under $300 for a story that runs 5700 words. Thus, selling the story digitally, I'd need to sell about 500 to make the same amount of money.

And yes, it'd be cool to make that much money off the story - but more interesting, still, just to give it a try and see how it goes. 

For that reason, I loaded the story to Amazon to be available on their Kindle platform. I also loaded it to Smashwords which distributes to all the major ebook retailers (Kobo, Sony, Diesel, etc) - at this point it's available at Smashwords but hasn't yet cascaded to all the other channels.

I thought it might also be fun to do a push on Friday June 3, 2011 to see if some folks were interested in buying it, that I could get them to perhaps buy it on the same day. That might have an effect on getting it onto the "top seller" lists via Amazon and Smashwords. Or it might not. But you can't blame a guy for trying.



I also recorded an audio version of the story which is available completely for free on my "Prelude To A Scream" podcast. Yes, you can listen to the entire story for free online or download it and listen to it on your iPod or mp3 player. And if you like that free audio experience, perhaps you'd throw this writer a bone and consider either buying it, or perhaps posting a positive review so that others might find it.

The cover was put together using a picture my friend Greg Roberts took. You can tell I'm not a designer - but I just wanted something simple to represent the story in an image. I thought Greg's shadow picture perfectly captured the theme behind the tale; the fact that "people who haven't died can still leave their spirit in a place" the same way they might perhaps leave a shadow -- except, of course, the spirit is a lasting shadow.

And in any case, this is yet another experient with getting my fiction out there.

I'm curious to see how it goes.