Pulseless Pandemic - First Rating is a 5 Star

My second zombie book, Pulseless Pandemic, has its first rating on Barnes & Noble and it's a 5 star. No words, but I'll take it.

Advice to Readers....Don't Ever Rely on the Rating of One Person

My Amazon ratings are based on 1-3 ratings. As an example, my first book, Flatline Virus, suffered from a single early bad rating from someone on Amazon who clearly was expecting the Pulitzer prize-winning author by my name. I also later found he was a regular negative reviewer of many things on Amazon. My book was the last he ever reviewed. Must have killed him.

On the other hand, my book sales at Apple (my largest selling channel) for 'Flatline Virus' are much, much better and based on 29 reviews. 4 starsin fact.  An early bad review hurts. An early good one helps as in my Apple book store experience.  Eventually, it almost works out, but my advice is always to not rely on a single review.

The Scoop About Poop Now Available on Amazon for $0.99 !!!

Book 5 is now available on Amazon and priced at the low price of 99 cents. It took them a matters of only a few hours to review the book. I'm very curious, based on how different this subject matter is from my previous books, how fast the first sale develops.

Scoop About Poop is now published on Amazon...

...and will be available within 12 hours according to them.

Book 5 is Published on Smashwords

Over the next couple days, I hope to have it also available on Amazon. Smashwords, my distributor is now reviewing it for Premium Distribution to Apple, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Diesel and others. This can take a few weeks.

The name of this nonfiction book is 'The Scoop About Poop'. It's 17,800 words long. The book cover image is off to the right on this blog. A brief description is as follows:

The author uses serious facts and a sense of humor to tell the story of poop.  The subject is crude, profane and vulgar. But it's also what all of us do mostly every day. The various chapters include everything you did and didn't want to know about fecal matters, including: the composition of poop; derivation of sh*t words; the history of poop; its uses; coprophagy; why it has various colors; types of stool; diarrhea and constipation; colonoscopy prep; poop as an embarrassment; semantics, idioms and sh*t as an expression; animal feces; the curious; personal hygiene and toilet paper; fake poop; synonyms; statistics and jokes. No photos. Not a medical reference manual. Just a lot to read about your favorite subject.

I have mixed feelings about my new book. Those around me wonder why I wrote a book about poop. "What would your mother think about it?" I was asked. A good question. She might wonder a little about the subject matter, but she always seemed proud of everything I did. I know my father would have enjoyed it.

I will admit. The subject matter is profane, but no matter what we do, poop is here to stay with us as a part of our lives. It's in our language. It's part of our health, personal hygiene and environmental discussions. So, why not write about it?

On the other hand, my other books have required more intellectual effort. Despite the science fiction and zombie topics, I researched the background information thoroughly, delving pretty deeply into viruses, super intelligence, space travel and the moons of Saturn among other topics. The research into poop just didn't reach the same level of intellectual effort, as I'll refer to it.

I guess I chose something that would be entertaining, have some shock value and maybe create more sales. Did I sell myself out for shit? Some might say so. I'd argue no. There is an informational aspect to learning about poop. It is somewhat of a unique subject about which to publish. I'm guessing I haven't seen more (or any?) books about the topic because it's so profane or other authors believe it won't sell. I'm willing to take the chance...with whatever reputation I may have (as an author). If it doesn't sell, it doesn't sell. I took a chance.  

Here are a couple excerpts from the book: 

(describing a type of poop)

The Bowl Vandal - You rush in to the bathroom and just make it to the toilet. What comes out is a wet, gassy, nasty-looking mess of shit shards going in every direction. It leaves the bowl looking like a gang spray-painted it brown with whatever else you ate or drank.

(describing the derivation of the word shit) 

The acronym theory for the derivation of the word S.H.I.T. has been put forth on the internet but it's full of crap.

The theory of the origin of shit was that manure was valuable as early fertilizer, and as such, was shipped all around the world. Of course, it was important to keep the manure dry. If it became wet, it was much heavier, creating navigational issues for the wooden ships. But much more important than that, wet manure produces an inflammable gas, methane to be precise. The gas could generate pockets of highly inflammable, even explosive gas, resulting in a dangerous situation aboard an ocean-going vessel. So, manure was transported with the directions to 'Ship High In Transit' to keep it from getting wet in the interior of the ship, with the acronym SHIT.

Readying Book 5 for Publishing

I've finished the writing...pretty much. I just need to go through the book one more time. I've been working on a book cover and am making good progress on that. Further, I have a title (not to be given here yet). The book length will be a little over 17,000 words. As I indicated, it will be a sort of reference manual for a well-known, but unusual subject for any book.

Flatline Virus - 4 Star Rating in Apple Bookstore

Flatline Virus enjoys a 4 star rating in the Apple bookstore with 19 of the 29 ratings either 1 or 2. The two written reviews are positive. Check it out to the right if you can read it. I had to shrink the image.

I'm getting close to finishing book number 5, a handbook/guide/reference manual of an unusual subject. I don't think there's anything else like it. I'll price it at $2.99 just like my others. It is untitled as of now and I am in the process of editing it for the final or next to final time. So far the word count is just under 17,000 words.

Major Increase in Words Written for Book 5

The word total is up to over 16,000.  

Book #5 is a Reference Manual

At least that's what I'm calling it now. I have 10,000 words thus far. It is the kind of book that invites photography, but when you see the title (working on it), you'll understand why I didn't add any. I'm not about to provide the photos for this manual. Call it a guide. Call it a manual or a reference manual. Or just call it which has a lot of information about something we are all familiar with.  I haven't seen anything similar on the market. Well, that's it for now. Back to work.