Cover Reveal and a Question!

Okay, gang, we are looking at releasing–very soon!–the fairy-tale anthology I’ve been promising you for awhile. In fact, here’s the cover!

toadcoverblog

(Was I supposed to do a big reveal there? Errr…play a little drum roll on your desk, maybe?)

(Also, Twitter told me to do that jacket quote. When I get some more blurbs, I may change it to something slightly less meta.)

Now, this is not the annotated fairy-tales, which I can’t actually sell for copyright reasons–those are best treated as weird fan fic–but stuff like “Toad Words” and “The Sea Witch Sets The Record Straight” and “The Wolf And The Woodsman.” Basically, most of the short stories and weird little things I’ve posted here over the last few years* plus–excitement!–an all new novella called “Boar & Apples” that has been seen nowhere before!

There is poetry, but not much of it. Hopefully not enough to damage your enjoyment.

Depending on proofreaders and my own mad schedule, I am hoping to get this out sometime this week. However, here’s the thing…

Smashwords is…well…frustrating and very slow to push out to vendors and in a number of ways behind the times. And there is a service called Draft2Digital that will get the book into iBooks, Kobo, and B&N, and do it much faster than Smashwords and without the various griefs, which I’d kinda like to use. (Plus Amazon, on Kindle, obviously, but I want a non-Amazon alternative as well, because eggs, baskets, etc.)

The only thing that would be lacking here that Smashwords does is offer various formats, like .pdf, .rft, read online, etc, which would not be available if I don’t go through the Smashwords Meatgrinder.

So my question is—is anybody using those formats here that will be completely unable to access the book if I don’t do Smashwords? (If you want to read on your actual computer, there’s a free program called Calibre that will take an epub, and the book would be in all the various stores.)

I’d kinda like to skip the Smashwords step, now that Draft2Digital is an option, but I don’t want to lock anybody out of reading if I can help it, so I want to hear from you guys!

(Alternate possibility–skip Smashwords, and if you cannot do any of those other reading methods, e-mail me and I’ll sell you a file directly–trying to avoid direct sales because I don’t want to be tech support for that, but I could probably manage a couple if people really need .pdf or .txt!)

As always, Toad Words would be completely DRM free (or as free as I, as creator, can manage it–can’t swear that various services don’t get shady on the back end, but I’m opting out wherever there’s an opt out.)

Anyway, let me know your thoughts, everybody!

*Except “Elegant and Fine” which is fan-fic for another five or six years, until the first Narnia book falls out of copyright.

12 thoughts on “Cover Reveal and a Question!

  1. Amy says:

    My only flag of concern is whether they push to different regions of bookstores at the same time. I use the Nook store if I can’t buy the book standalone through a service like smashwords, and the book selection on the US Nook store is not the same, nor is it always priced the same, as the UK one. I can rejigger things to circumvent region issues, but I’m always afraid it will stop working.

  2. kayliealien says:

    I’d usually use pdf to read on my phone but for your work I’ll gladly download the kindle app on my phone.

  3. Jamie says:

    First, HOORAY! I am so excited about this publication!

    Second, having a PDF would be really helpful for me, as I’m likely to read this on my computer eiwithout other reader type apps. Perhaps I could purchase it through the center site, and email in the receipt to request a PDF copy?

  4. Lisa says:

    The Nook app is also totally free and will read EPubs from anywhere as well–I got it specifically because the system isn’t proprietary and works with Zola Books and the like.

  5. C. S. P. Schofield says:

    I cannot tell you how delighted I am to learn of this. My Lady and I think TOAD WORDS is one of the best modern takes on a fairy tale we have ever encountered, up there with the work of Robin McKinley or E. Nesbit. We will buy multiple copies and press them on unsuspecting relatives and friends.

    HOORAY!

  6. Mean Waffle says:

    First: I do not need anything that only Smashwords provides.

    Second: (Also, Twitter told me to do that jacket quote. When I get some more blurbs, I may change it to something slightly less meta.) No, no, no, no, no. Only change that blurb if someone provides something funnier. That’s a good blurb.

    Third: Sah-WHEEET!

  7. Lionel says:

    I bought this on Smashwords recently & loved it. 🙂
    Please don’t change the jacket quote, because it cracked me the hell up. The only one I’ve ever found funnier was the infamous one by the London Met, on Banksy’s Exit Through the Gift Shop.

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