Me Me Me

Mr. Monk is a Reader’s Choice

by

My friend Dave Zeltserman just passed along the good news that my story "Mr. Monk and the Seventeen Steps" was the fourth-ranked finalist in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine's 2010 Reader's Choice awards. Here's the list of the Top Ten stories, as chosen by readers of  the magazine:

1. Dave Zeltserman, "Archie's Been Framed" (Sept/Oct)
2. Doug Allyn, "The Scent of Lilacs" (Sept/Oct)
3. Doug Allyn, "Days of Rage" (March/April)
4. Lee Goldberg, "Mr. Monk and the Seventeen Steps" (Dec)
5. Brendan DuBois, "To Kill an Ump" (Sept/Oct)
6. Clark Howard, "Winter's End" (Dec)
7. Clark Howard, "Last Dance in Shanghai" (June)
8. Evan Lewis, "Skyler Hobbs and the Rabbit Man" (Feb)
9. Stephen Ross, "The Man With One Eye" (Dec)
10. Carol Biederman, "The Changelings: A Very Grim Fairytale" (Nov)

Also in the May issue, is Jon Breen's rave review for MR. MONK IS CLEANED OUT:

 The latest hilariously funny and devilishly clever novel about TV's obsessive-compulsive sleuth Adrian Monk is an impossible-crime lover's delight. How could the driver of an otherwise empty, constantly observed vehicle be garroted? How could a Madoff-style Ponzi scheme operator under house arrest and constantly wearing a state-of-the-art tracking device leave his home to murder former associates? The best comic set-piece, in which the financially ruined Monk, having lost his consultancy job with the San Francisco P.D., becomes a supermarket employee, is also one of three self-contained mystery puzzles unrelated to the main plot.

Thanks so much, Jon! 

Here's the trailer I made for "Mr. Monk and the Seventeen Steps."

Let’s Schmooze in the Writer’s Chatroom

by
The Writer's Chatroom
     
Chat with Dave Zeltserman and Lee Goldberg
 Dave Zeltserman is the Shamus award winning author of JULIUS KATZ. His 'man out of prison' crime noir series features the novels SMALL CRIMES, PARIAH, and KILLER.

SMALL CRIMES was selected by NPR as one of the five best crime novels of 2008 and by theWashington Post as one of the best novels of 2008. PARIAH was selected by the Washington Post as one of the best novels of2009. Dave's novel THE CARETAKER OF LORNE FIELD is a finalist for a Black Quill Award for best dark genre novel of the year.

Dave lives in the Boston area with his wife,Judy, and after spending 20 years developing network management software for several of the world's leading technology companies, he now splits his time between writing crime and horror fiction and studying martial arts, where he holds a black belt inKung Fu. His upcoming crime novels include OUTSOURCED (Feb. '11) and THE ESSENCE OF MONSTERS (Fall, '11). OUTSOURCED has already been called a 'small gem of crime fiction' by Booklist and has been optioned by Constantin Film and Impact Pictures.

(See more of Dave's books here)

Lee Goldberg is a two-time Edgar Award nomineewhose many TV writing and/or producing credits include Martial Law, SeaQuest,Diagnosis Murder, Spenser: For Hire, Nero Wolfe, Monk and The Glades. His books include The Walk, Successful Television Writing, The Man With with The Iron-On Badge and the Diagnosis Murder and Monk series of original mystery novels.

As a TV development consultant, he's worked forproduction companies and broadcasters in Germany, Spain, Sweden, and theNetherlands. He currently serves on the board of directors of the Mystery Writers of America and is the co-founder of the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers.

(See more of Lee's books here)

Dave and Lee are both members of the Top Suspense Group.  http://www.topsuspensegroup.com/ 

 
WHEN?

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Eastern USA Time…..7 PM

Not sure what time that is wherever in the world you are? http://www.worldtimeserver.com

WHERE?

The Writers Chatroom at:  http://www.writerschatroom.com/Enter.htm

Scroll down to the Java box. It may take a moment to load. Type in the name you wish to be known by, and click Login. No password needed.

Please note:  The chatroom is only open for regularly scheduled chats. 

 


 

 

Paperback Parade

by

Mygunhasbulletspod_2-001 My two "Charlie Willis" novels, MY GUN HAS BULLETS and DEAD SPACE, are now both available as trade paperbacks. These are the best-looking print editions of those two books yet, thanks to cover artist Carl Graves and designer Steven Booth.

 MY GUN HAS BULLETS, in particular, really looks nice...and it's about time. It was published back in the 1990s in hardcover by St. Martin's Press and I've never been satisfied with any printing of the book until now.

Those two books join THE WALK, THREE WAYS TO DIE and MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE, which are also available now in trade paperback editions.

Farewell to the Mystery Bookstore

by

IMG_0057 Tonight, the Mystery Bookstore had their farewell party. It was a bittersweet event. It was great to see so many mystery writers and fans in one room…but sad to see a legendary, independent bookstore close down.

 

The owners and employees, in their good-byes, observed that they've never met a nicer, more supportive group of people than mystery writers and what a pleasure it was just having the chance to get to know them all.

They're right. As I was looking at all those faces, and talking to all those writers, I was struck by what an incredibly friendly, warm, and out-going group they are…and how much I like them.

Unlike TV, where there is a real class system…you don't see showrunners hanging out with staff writers and treating them as equals… that isn't the case at all among mystery novelists.  Everyone mixes together. The superstars like Michael Connelly and Robert Crais are as friendly, approachable, and supportive as the least-known mid-list writer. They don't just hang out with other writers in the bestseller list. Everyone treats one another with mutual respect. Sure, there are a few in the biz who don't, but those are the exceptions. 

The Mystery Bookstore was like our home, the place where all of us could get together several times a year, like a family gathering for the holidays, and talk shop and catch up with one another. Losing the store is like losing our home. I wonder now how often we'll all get together under one roof now that we've lost the store…my fear is that it will be hardly ever.

The loss of independent bookstores, which are really so much more than just places that sell books, is one of the real, and painful, downsides of the success of the Kindle.

(Pictured: Lee Goldberg, Dick Lochte, Thomas Perry)

You Can Become a Kindle Millionaire, Part 21

by

The_Walk_FINAL This was, far and away, my best month ever for sales of my out-of-print backlist on the Kindle.

I sold 3075 books and earned $6624.40 in royalties.  My biggest seller was THE WALK, which sold 1083 copies and earned $2230.98.  

I also did nicely on Createspace with the trade paperback editions of my books, earning $483.94 but not-so-well on the Nook, earning  just $211.46 (though I am told B&N was having accounting problems this month and may be adjusting those numbers upwards, as they did in December).

The grand total in royalties for January, not including Smashwords (Apple, Diesel, Kobo, Sony) or Amazon UK sales, is $7319.80.

By comparison, in January 2010, I sold 536 copies and earned $775 in royalties.

Unbelievable.

(My poorest selling books are the four JURY titles, formerly known as the .357 VIGILANTE series. I blame that, in part, on the negative reviews they've received due to sloppy proofreading. No matter how many times I've gone through the books, errors still seem to slip past me. So the books are now in the hands of a professional copyeditor…when she gets them back to me I will relaunch the books, give way free copies for fresh reviews, and update the product descriptions). 

Mr. Monk on the Road Raves

by

MR MONK on the Road (1)

Two rave reviews for MR. MONK ON THE ROAD just came my way, both from long-time fans of the books. Debra Hamel at Bookblog says, in part:

Goldberg’s books aren’t only about the crimes. More important are the series’s wonderful characters. The development of Monk and Natalie’s relationship over the series makes for many sweet moments, but in this outing the focus is on Ambrose’s interaction with Monk and Natalie and with the world at large. As usual in the series, there is some very funny dialogue. Usually this is centered on Monk’s abhorrence of all things unsanitary, but Ambrose’s social ineptitude also makes for some funny lines. I really enjoyed this one and the series as a whole, and I’m hoping the books never stop coming. 

Ed Gorman liked it for a lot of the same reasons. He says, in part:

Lee Goldberg has cast the new and extremely enjoyable Monk book as a picaresque adventure.[…]I’ve given up trying to rank the Monk books. I’ve read them all and think they each have different pleasures to offer, which is a tribute to Lee’s savvy as a writer. But I have to say that putting both the Monks in a RV with Natalie-take-no-crap-Teeger has got to be the funniest premise yet. A truly hilarious read with a surprise shout-out to the movie “Duel” coming out of nowhere. Among many other surprises.

Thank you Ed and Debra for the great reviews and the continued support!

You Can Become a Kindle Millionaire, Part 20

by

I've got a new guest post up on Joe Konrath's blog charting my Kindle experience…and the complete change in my thinking about ebooks. A lot of what I'm saying there you've already read about here, so let's cut to the chase:

This January, if sales continue at the current pace, I will sell about 3100 books this month and earn $6600 in royalties.

That’s a 166% increase in sales and a whopping 751% jump in royalties.

In just one year.

On out-of-print books that I wrote years ago that were earning me nothing before June 2009.

If those sales hold for the rest of the year, I will earn $77,615 in Kindle royalties, and that’s not counting the far less substantial royalties coming in from Amazon UK, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble and CreateSpace.

Even if my sales plummet tomorrow by fifty percent, I’ll still earn about $38,000 in royalties this year…and I’d be very, very happy with that.

My most profitable title, in terms of hours worked and pages written, is THREE WAYS TO DIE, a collection of three previously published short stories. In print, it’s a mere fifty-six pages long, but it’s selling 24 copies-a-day on the Kindle, earning me about $1500-a-month. That means I could potentially earn $18,000 this year just from those three short stories alone.

That is insane.

But what would be more insane is if I took my next, standalone, non-MONK book to a publisher instead of “publishing” it myself on the Kindle.

That’s right. I’d rather self-publish. This from a guy who for years has been an out-spoken, and much-reviled, critic of self-publishing. But that was before the Kindle came along and changed everything. I was absolutely right then…but I’d be wrong now.

Yes, it's happened. I have become a complete convert to self-publishing and the Kindle. But do I recommend it for you? It depends. I go into more detail in the post on Joe's blog, so check it out.

Dead Tree Books

by

Irononbadgepod_3-001 Those of you without Kindles, Nooks, Kobos, iPads, or Smartphones with e-reader aps can now get your hands on trade paperback editions of my books  THE WALK, THE MAN WITH THE IRON ON BADGE, DEAD SPACE (aka "Beyond the Beyond") and THREE WAYS TO DIE.  

MY GUN HAS BULLETS has been out in trade paperback for six or seven years through the Author's Guild/Back-in-Print program…but I am yanking that edition and will be releasing a new, cheaper edition in a few weeks.

I am also toying with the idea of releasing a trade paperback of THE JURY SERIES, all four of my early "vigilante" novels combined into one edition. 

With all the attention being given to ebooks lately, I am surprised that I have been able to sell 100 copies a month of THE WALK in trade paperback. I will be curious to see if the other books do nearly as well.

Confidentially Speaking

by

If you haven't already had your fill of me blathering on about TV and ebooks, I will be a guest tonight on Ed Robertson's podcast TV Confidential, blathering some more.  You can catch it at 7 pm on ShokusRadio.com and again on Tuesday at 9 pm. on InternetVoicesRadio.com, Friday at 5 & 8 pm on KSAV.org, Saturday at 9 pm on KWDJ-AM in Ridgecrest, and it will be broadcast directly into your brain while you are sleeping tonight. If they still fail to reach you, the program will be archived at TVConfidential.net.