Well, you can't win 'em all, but...

Greetings, Fellow Bearers!

So I gave the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards a shot.  Unfortunately, I didn't make it past the first round :(.  But one of the other contestants said that it's more based on how well you wrote your sales pitch than the actual novel itself.  That's something I'll have to consider, because I don't consider myself much of a salesman-type person, and sales pitches aren't something I spend a lot of time working on.  Oh well, it was worth the shot.   And it was fun to try to do as well!

On better notes, I was recently featured at the Indie Spotlight website, a place for indie authors to get recognized.  Doing these interveiews are a LOT of fun for me, and I hope to do some more in the future!  I've also sent some submissions to Pop Culture Zoo, Compulsive Reader, and a couple of other places that I hope to get responses from in the near future, so hopefully the word about the Vein will spread!

And again, a big thank you goes to all of those who have been purchasing Clade Josso.  I hope that you're enjoying the book, and tell other people about it in the process!

Clade Josso submitted to Amazon contest...

Greetings, fellow Bearers!

Well, I come bearing (hopefully) grand news today: at the end of last week, I submitted The Summoning of Clade Josso to the Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Award Contest.  This is a shot for people to become exposed en masse to the novel, which would be awesome.  To tell the truth, I'd be perfectly happy with just getting a bigger exposure for the novel, win or lose the contest.  Perhaps, God willing, it'll happen.

On another note, the short story "10:15" has become (for me at least) a runaway hit!  over 70 downloads in three days: considering I'm not a big time author who's well-known, I'm pretty happy about that!  If you are one of those who downloaded and liked the short story, please check out my other works as well. Even though Clade Josso isn't a horror novel, it does have some elements of horror to it that will appeal to the horror fan.

So, in the meantime, thank you for reading,  keep the downloads coming, and enjoy my increasing library of works!

See you in the Vein!

J. Dean

Prepping another short story...

Greetings, Bearers!

While OLD VELT is wrapping up, I thought I'd let you know that I'll be posting another short story on Smashwords in the next week or so.  This one is called "10:15", another one about an incident taking place in a school, still maintaining a horror element, although it's different than "Fraidy-Cat" on a few levels.  All I need to do is get the cover for the story ready (Smashwords won't put stories on their premium catalog lists unless you have a good cover), and finish some minor formatting points, and we'll be ready to go. 

While I'm thinking about it, another round of "thank yous" goes to those of you who continue to keep "Fraidy-Cat" and the other stuff I've put up on Smashwords popular.  It's still getting downloaded and read, which is very cool to see. 

And for those who have downloaded CLADE JOSSO lately, a thank you and hat off to you as well.  I'm hearing good things from people who have read the novel.  If you happen to be one of those people, please don't hesitate to put up a review on Amazon or Smashwords-the more, the better!   

So keep up the good work, and I'll get back to working on OLD VELT!
See you in the Vein!
J. Dean