Future of Books and Emerging Authors

The future of books... but first:

This week Australian Women Online feature an article on Emerging Australian Women Writers, by journalist Belladonna Took. I am very humbled and excited to be included in this article with talented emerging authors, Kymberley Gaal, Emma Gibson and Karen Tyrrell. If you'd like to read the article, click here.

I signed up for 'Book Camp unconference' a little uncertain of what to expect. I mean, what's an UNconference? The theme of the day was to question and discuss the future of books and emerging authors and technologies. I like to question and discuss, so I was up for it.

The day was hosted by author Simon Groth from if:book and we were asked to volunteer to lead sessions. I love this upside down module. 

Looking at the model of the traditional book, what it has now emerged into and where it could go was something most participants were curious about. The traditional pathway of author to publisher to reader or even author to reader may change. The reader is not necessarily the best client for your product. One scenario raised was with choose-your-own-adventures that are locality-based. This method was trialled at an Adelaide festival with posters and QR codes. This storytelling involved the 'reader' to walk the streets of the story while finding the codes for the next part. In this example only about ten people finished the story. If your goal is to do something different, experimental then there's no problem, but if you're wishing to earn an income from your skills... well, you can see the problem with only ten potential customers, but it's important to acknowledge many authors require an income from their skills. This requires rethinking the author to reader model. You could consider a commercial or government client, such as the Department of Tourism. They would have the capacity to market this type of activity to readers/visitors. Or, you could make location-based stories containing QR codes that provide information on the localities, you wouldn't have to be present in the location (I see this being a good alternative for famous locations like the Eiffel Tower, The Great Barrier Reef, etc).

Craig Mod led a discussion about the affect of digital on our sense of living. The point was raised that if we do not post our experiences on social media in many ways they don't count as real, they become disconnected with our understanding of experience. We live in the instagram era, as soon as we see, do or taste it, we upload a pic.

The issue of quality from self-published authors and service providers was enthusiastically discussed. The days of appreciating free crap is over. Readers want product that lives up to the promises.

And the thing that stuck with me most was on the necessity of social media for authors to reach readers. There are many examples of great authors that sell millions of books with no online presence. It was generally agreed that if you are an amazingly talented author, you don't need to interact with the public. Lucky for me I actually like social media!

Read More

Marketing your ebook and links

Today you'll find a post by me over at Romantic Friday Writers. The post is all about marketing your novel once you've published, and has some helpful tips for self-publishers. Please head over and say hello!

So that my blog is not completely empty this week, here are some fantastic links on story structure and finding a formula for your plot:

1. The Lester Dent Pulp Paper Master Fiction Plot
2. Structure by Screenplay Mastery
3. Get a Little Conflict in Your Scene
4. Writing Novels - Formulas and Structures
5. How to Write Your Novel Using a Formula
6. Story Structure and Plot - Novel Writing Tips
7. Plot and Pacing Part One, Plot and Pacing Part Two and Plot and Pacing Part Three
8. Story Elements Checklist for Brainstorming Index Cards
9. Writing Lessons by Richard Setlowe
10. Novel Endings 

Read More

O is for Onomatopoeia - Plus a Freebie!

O is for Onomatopoeia

Today's post is adapted from one I used previously - I've had a lot of dental work this week and am just not zippy with the ideas today. 

One of my favourite Onomatopoeia words at the moment is 'nom nom nom', the sound of Zombie Dog eating brains... and for just 2 days you can download MY ZOMBIE DOG for FREE! 

Descriptive words that sound like an action or noise when spoken out loud, create the effect of onomatopoeia. For instance, the word to describe water falling in small portions from a tap is called a drip - drip, drip, drip. Poets tend to have a natural talent for using onomatopoeia words, but they can be effective in fiction as well, especially if you're writing for a younger reader.

If you are anything like me, you can sometimes get overwhelmed by all these literary devices and rules that we should be including in our writing. My humble advice is... just write your story, when you go through in your revision you can tighten your plot, characters and writing style. These sound words are simply another way of showing instead of telling.

Imagine writing about a bad guy pointing a gun at his intended victim - instead of saying he shoots its, the simple word. 'BANG' lets the reader know what's going on and can make them feel like they are there. Here's an example of sound words I'm using in The Warracknabeal Kids:

THWAT (slingshot shoot at poor innocent chicken)

AUWK! (sound made by poor innocent chicken)

Sometimes I find examples that I don't think sound like the real action at all (like a dog saying 'woof' or 'Zzzzzz' for snoring). Really listen to actions and try to work out what sound they make, I've used: 'Hmmnn, Hmnnn?' for a puppy's whine. Have some fun with it :-)

Read More

F is for Free

F is for Fossil, the inspiration for the MY ZOMBIE DOG

If you've been following my blog, twitter or wireless telegraphs, you'll probably know I've release My Zombie Dog and have tried a few different promotions with this book. One of those promotions was the KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) FREE day. For the three months that you sign your book solely to Kindle, you can elect up to five days to have your ebook available for FREE on Amazon. 

I have no concerns about trying different marketing/promotions with this book. It's my first release and I'm happy to learn from the experience for the next books coming out this year. I do have concerns sometimes about the bigger picture. I need to make sure the decisions I make are not positive for this one book but detrimental to the Indie ebook industry as a whole. 

My concern with free is an old philosophy I have, 'don't think you're doing your client/employer a favour by decreasing the cost of your service, in the end that is what they will think it is worth and will resent paying normal price'. I came across this article that made me worry that free, 99c, $1.99 ebooks are devaluing the book as a concept.

So what if my book is downloaded thousands of times, if it's free is that helping sales? Turns out it does. 

• Each time someone downloads my book it lifts in the rankings, bringing it to more people's attention. MY ZOMBIE DOG reached number 2 in children's free 'Spine-chilling Horror'.
• People download multiple books, so in future when someone is browsing a book, underneath it says Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought... and you increase the chance of your book showing up there.
• My book received a lot of tweets and sales at regular price spiked the next day. This was my second best day of sales since release.

As a customer, for me the novelty of free books is wearing off, I don't mind paying for books, in fact I prefer to. But obviously free is still popular with a lot of readers. Perhaps it will also result in more reviews which may help sales as well. 

I'm still investigating the affect of free on the Indie book industry, but here are two articles with varying opinions:

Are eBooks Too Cheap?

Using free ebooks as a marketing tool

Read More

Book Launch - WIN A KINDLE

MY ZOMBIE DOG has officially launched for the Kindle version and as this is the first book I've launched, I'm taking notes of my progress and promotions for this release. As you may know there is a giveaway with this launch, for every person who purchases the book, or simply blogs about the book or the contest, they go into the draw to win a KINDLE! This is open international, so get your entry in!

If you would like to enter, simply go to the last post to find the entry form HERE.

I've posted about creating a professional book cover, and when the competition is over I'll share all the data on how I formatted my ebook.

In the meantime, I've signed up for the following reading challenge - how could I resist? 

And I'll leave you with the book trailer for MY ZOMBIE DOG (I'll tell you how to make those soon too - promise):

Read More

WIN A KINDLE FIRE

March 1st is the big release date for MY ZOMBIE DOG and I'm promoting the book by giving away a free Kindle! (If the winner is a lucky US resident, they will win the Kindle Fire, for everywhere else the prize changes to a Kindle Keyboard 3G - due to Amazon shipping rules).

There's two ways to enter:

Buy MY ZOMBIE BOOK by clicking here and then fill in the entry form below. You will be asked for your receipt number from Amazon (it will be on the receipt Amazon email you - keep a copy of your receipt as proof of purchase if you win). Also, Tweet this competition with a link to this page and you get a second entry! You'll be asked for your tweet link, but if you're not sure how to do that, just use the hashtag #zombiedog in your tweet so it's easy to find.

or

Blog about this competition or about MY ZOMBIE DOG (you can review, talk about or interview) and then fill in the entry form below. You will be asked for your blog post link in the entry form. If you'd like an interview for your post, you can email me at charmaineclancy@gmail.com. Also, Tweet this competition with a link to this page and you get a second entry! You'll be asked for your tweet link, but if you're not sure how to do that, just use the hashtag #zombiedog in your tweet so it's easy to find.

Too easy! This competition runs from now until 31st March 2012.

You can only have one entry for blogging but if you blog and buy the book, you'll get two entries (plus another if you tweet about it!). Each entrant has the possibility of earning up to 3 entries.

Already own the Kindle Fire (I'm jealous!), it'd make a fantastic present to someone you love!

Why I'm doing this:

I love you guys and it's the blogasphere that has helped me to get serious about writing and learning the importance of a professional approach.

Also because of this book:

MY ZOMBIE DOG

On Zane’s 14th birthday he had to bury a dog. The next morning it’s in his room, tail wagging.

This is not the dog he wanted. No, Zane longed for a cool Collie or Shepard. Now he’s stuck with this scraggy, smelly undersized mutt. As if the dog wasn’t embarrassing enough, his mum wants to name it ‘Fluffy’. No way. Zane figures it dug itself out of the ground, so its name is Fossil. 

Fossil's a mean dog and will snap and bite at people... but why are those people bitten turning sluggish and craving strange food items like brains? Can Zane rid himself of this mutt and save his town from a zombie outbreak?

Now... Enter, and GOOD LUCK!

Read More

DIY Book Covers

MY ZOMBIE DOG is nearly here!

Confession: I got it wrong. I thought I should format my ebook before the cover. You can learn from my mistake. The ebook needs to be formatted when it's ready to go live, BUT, you can use your cover for promotions and marketing leading up to the release of your book. I think you should finishing writing your novel first, but then get an image to place on your blog or on other peoples blogs. Get people familiar with your book before it's released. That's why I'm posting on covers before formatting:

Book Covers for the Indie Author

I've come to see there are two effective ways to produce your book cover, the first will usually generate a more professional effect and is a lot easier.


1. Pay a professional graphic artist to do it for you.
I know, it costs money and that worries you. This is an investment in your art. It doesn't matter how good your story is, if you do not market it to your target audience in an effective manner, they will never read it. I have been interested in the blurb of books, only to dismiss them because the cover looks crappy. I know I'm not unique, there's a whole cliche supporting my view. If the cover is crappy, it stands to reason that the formatting might be crud, which probably means the writing sucks - this is the train of though of your potential customer. Give them 100% on the WHOLE package. And if you do it yourself and you struggle, isn't that a week you'll be behind in your writing? Shouldn't you be getting the next book out there too? Budgets for book covers seem to range online from $50 to $200. I have a talented graphic artist working on my covers and my website. The end result will scream 'professional'.

2. Create your own book cover.

Despite telling you my first choice is to pay a professional, I did create a book cover for MY ZOMBIE DOG. This is for the same reason I formatted the book myself. This is my first book release and I wanted to understand and experience every step of the process. In future, I'll be able to have informed meetings with my graphic designers and digital publishers. It was also curiosity - I have a philosophy in life: how hard can it be? I then proceed to discover... quite hard.

If you are going to create your own book cover and you feel you have some talent in design, composition and colour, you'll need the following:

• An up-to-date computer with reasonable speed.
• Background image
• Fonts for text
• Tagline, Title and Author Name sorted (back blurb, review quotes, ISBN and barcode for back cover if you're producing a print book)
• Program for editing pictures, such as Photoshop
• Program for producing quality print media such as InDesign
• Pool of honest people to give feedback and advice

Background image

I love Shutterstock for photos, illustrations and vectors. It does have a subscription system where you can pay to download unlimited pics for a month etc, but I just buy a bundle of 5 pics at a time. This works out to about $10 per picture and you can download it in any size from small to extra large. There are plenty of other sites, just Google 'stock photos'. When you purchase a picture you are purchasing the license to use that picture for a particular use, such as book covers, t-shirts etc. You can manipulate the picture in Photoshop and I recommend you do, if it resembles the original too much, there is nothing stopping another author using the same pic for their book. I do see a lot of book covers duplicated on Amazon.

Fonts

Surprisingly, I think this element is the most important and even more important than your cover picture. The easiest way to spot a DIY cover seems to be in the typeface. Too many authors are just throwing any old text as their title on the cover and thinking 'that will do'.

Clarissa Draper did a great series on book cover design and this is her post on fonts.

The text type will depend partly on your book's style and genre, but titles should be big and easy to read (unless you're as well known as Stephen King don't put your name as big or bigger than your title).

To read more about why fonts should be big and clear go to Joel Friedlander's:

5 Great Fonts for Book Covers

One important thing to know about those 'free font' sites, is that some of them only give you license to use the font for private use. You need to find a site that offers commercial use, a good one that still has free fonts is Font Squirrel. I think it's also polite to acknowledge the font designer somewhere in your front pages (or back pages) where you would put credits for the graphic artist who designed your cover. By receiving recognition, artists can continue to find value in offering free products.

Play with your fonts, make your title pop. You can do this in InDesign by adding a 'stroke' (an outline to each letter), outer glow (light shines from behind each letter) or a drop shadow (kind of obvious what that is). I suggest making shadows anywhere from 30% to 75% opacity, solid 100% looks a little clunky and draws attention away from the letters.

Make sure your text contrasts nicely against your background, which means you need to make sure the colours stand out against each other but also that the tones and shades are different. If your blue text is the same shade as your green background, when Kindle converts your cover to greyscale (black and white) it will not be easy to read.

Text content

Of course your title has to be decided by this stage. Make it short and snappy. There are a few examples of successful long titles, but when appearing as a thumbnail amongst many other book covers on Amazon, a snappy title will stand out. I like big titles, I like to be able to read what they say even as a tiny thumbnail. Author's names can be small, even smaller should be your tagline, which can be read when the cover is opened. Check out the size of covers on Amazon and make sure you can read your text at that size. 

Pool of honest people.

I have you. My bloggers. For my cover art for MY ZOMBIE DOG I also used twitter (you can attach pictures) and asked people to please critique the cover. Google+ was great too. I mostly use my circle of writers in Google+, but I have another circle called 'iFriends', these are all the computer, techie and graphic people I follow. I rarely post to them (they're not so interested in hearing about my writing adventures) but I did post my cover to them and got some great suggestions for changes (my name was originally thicker and stark white, but it stood out too much). People like to be helpful, but I've noticed friends (including blogger friends) are reluctant to say anything negative incase they upset you. You need to give people permission to be honest in their feedback, and when you get negative feedback you need to be genuinely appreciative of it. This is the feedback that will help you improve.

This is also where you can get review quotes for your book. I'll be asking blog reviewers soon if they would consider reviewing MY ZOMBIE DOG or hosting me on their blog to talk about the book or about writing/publishing the book.

Want to know exactly what dimensions and size file your book cover should be? This is a detailed post by Webbish Books that will explain why you need two different sized images for your book cover:

Kindle Book Cover Size

You can also see:

4 Rules for Book Covers

Ugh - I have rules about blog lengths, but today I really needed to share all this information with you, hoping that some of it will help you out in your journey to publishing your book. And feel free to add honest criticism for the MY ZOMBIE DOG book cover! It's still a work in progress (my daughter wants to add a chomp mark out of one of the letters and I love that idea).

Read More

200 Word Challenge

The challenge from Rach Writes was to:

Write a short story/flash fiction story in 200 words or less, excluding the title. It can be in any format, including a poem. Begin the story with the words, “Shadows crept across the wall”. These five words will be included in the word count. 

If you want to give yourself an added challenge (optional), do one or more of these:

• end the story with the words: "everything faded." (also included in the word count)

• include the word "orange" in the story

• write in the same genre you normally write

• make your story 200 words exactly!

I needed this exercise, I've been busy formatting, compiling and converting MY ZOMBIE DOG into a Kindle book this week. It's been very educational for me, but my brain was techno-fried. In my next post I'll share what I learned and some links for formatting ebooks.

Here is my flash fiction and I'm proud to say I met every one of the challenges above - Are you going to give it a go?

Just the Wind?

Shadows crept across the wall. Hector sucked in his breath.

Just moonlight flickering through trees. Nothing more.

Creak, creak, creak. What was that? His eyes bulged. The covers were pulled tightly to his chin despite the humid night.

It’s just an old house. Old houses creak. Hector wasn’t scared. He was thirteen now, not a little kid.

Scratch, scratch.

Maybe his parents were home early? But they wouldn’t be. He was big enough to be left alone, they would not be home until well after midnight. Downstairs, the grandfather clock chimed twelve times.

Midnight.

He was a big kid, too old to be scared. He leaned to his beside table and grabbed his torch. The light glowed a soft orange. Great, batteries going flat.

Rattle, clink, clink.

Just the wind blowing chimes. Wait… did they have chimes?

Squeak, clang.

The front door? No. Just his imagination.

Thump, thump… up the stairs!

Hector leapt up, but tangled in bedclothes he tripped. Sprawled on the floor he gasped as the handle to his door turned. He scrambled to stand, thrusting the torch out as a weapon.

“Hector? We’re home early.”

“I was fine alone.” 

The torch light flickered once, then everything faded.

Read More

The Writing Business - My Plan

In my last post I spoke about the need for a writer to have a plan. This could be as elaborate as a detailed business plan or as simple as a list of steps you need to take to become published (and then don't forget the steps to market what you publish).

Today I thought I'd share with you my list - this is not complete, there are previous steps I've already completed (write an author bio, get a blog or website, get a good author pic... oh yeah, write a novel...). Maybe you'll find some helpful ideas on there, or maybe you can suggest some things I've forgotten! As I tick off each step I'll share my experience and you can learn by my (hopefully rare) mistakes. I'll be sharing my experiences organising book covers next.

From Manuscript to Book:

Edit book

• Check out professional editing organisations
• Circulate amongst Beta readers

Cover design

• Search contacts for artists, graphic artists and professionals at book cover design.
• Check Shutterstock or other photo sites for good stock photos.
• Check online resources.

Format e-book and Print On Demand book

• Check with State writers groups for contacts for digital publishers.
• Look at CreateSpace
• Kindle
• iBooks
• All others: Smashwords, Dymocks, Fishpond etc.

Advertising material:

• Bookmarks
• Postcards 
• Book Trailer - speak to Luke or Rhonda
• Slogans ('cause I have too much time on my hands):
• Zombie Dog hates your guts... loves your brains.
• Tell Zombie Dog to heel, and it’ll bring you a nice fresh one.
• Zombie Dog’s best trick: ‘play dead’ (Zombie Dog is not playing).
• Zombie Dog thinks you look nom nom.
• Zombie Dog, nom nom nomming her way into your heart (cross out, replace with brain).
• Brrrraaaains means I love you.
• (picture of two mafia guys tossing a body rolled in a rug to the doghouse) Sometimes Zombie Dog comes in handy.

Read Amazon guidelines

Decide on release date - promote book leading up to release

PROMOTE

• Check out books on promoting your novel.
• Read the John Locke guide
• Check out guides to ebook publishing
• Giveaway - Kindle?
• Organise blog hop
• Look up other promotional ideas
• T-shirts (overkill???)
• Talk to contacts in programming about creating a game app to pair with the ebook.

Read More

Writer Reading

I'm in the middle of reading Be The Monkey which is a conversation on the future of publishing and ebooks between J A Konrath and Barry Eilser. I've seen this book raised online often, so I may be the last writer to read it.

The text explores the growing popularity for digital books vs traditional publishing and they certainly put forward a good argument for self-publishing. It's definitely worth reading if you are uncertain of which path to take or just want to support your decision to produce an ebook rather than paper copy of your novel.

The speakers are well informed on the subject, J A Konrath running the popular blog:

A Newbie's Guide to Publishing

And Barry Eilser hosts:

The Heart of the Matter

There is a lot of talk about the future of books, will paper eventually die out? I doubt it, I love books as do most writers, but I love ebooks too. Probably like most of you, I worry for the popularity of the traditional book, and most definitely for those cute little boutique bookstores I love to frequent, and I've found some new ones up here in Brisbane. But what about the traditional publishers? Does anyone worry for them?There are some that I love and look for in bookstores. One of my favourites was Black Dog Books - why? Because they had a little dog as their logo. Now they've merged into Walker Books (which are still a great children's book publisher). I'd be sad to see some of these publishing houses go. I guess they can turn to publishing digital books, but once again, what about the bookstores? What will they sell?

Read More

Unrequited Love

Amazon broke my heart.

I was so excited about the new release Kindles, even though my latest Kindle is only 6mths old I was keen to jump in with a new e-ink touch screen Kindle. 

Then I read the small print.

US only.

Kindle Fire then?

US only.

It seems the only new Kindle they will ship internationally is the cruddy cheap model that has no touch, no keyboard and no robot to read the ebooks to me! I had grand plans of a Kindle Fire giveaway with the release of my first ebook (still a whiles off) but now I feel like I'm sitting by the phone making up excuses for why that guy didn't call. The truth? Maybe Amazon are just not that into me.

I could retaliate by switching to the iPad as half my family have, but I don't want to act too rashly - maybe I could just move to the States?

Or, I realise, I could just keep reading on my current Kindle that I was more than happy with a week ago (Nah, that's just crazy talk).

Read More

Exciting Times for e-books!

I woke today to some exciting posts in Google + - Amazon have announced their new Kindle!

I am a huge Kindle lover, I have hundreds of titles on my beloved Kindle and I take it everywhere with me. I've even gotten used to the robot voice for listening to books on the writing craft while driving (I prefer the woman robot to the man robot).

Our house is a little torn with our devices. Hubby and Matilda (10) love their iPads and read on those, whereas Emily (13) and I are Kindle all the way. I love the e-ink reader for reading long passages without straining my eyes, plus the tablet won't read to me. So if I love e-ink, why am I excited about Amazon producing a tablet device that is smaller and less sexy than the already iPad (which I already don't want).

At first I wasn't at all impressed. I couldn't understand why Amazon would produce a device in an already overcrowded market when they are already winners with their Kindles and the fact that the non-Kindle devices still host the Kindle app (so even if it's not their device they sell books through it). While out shopping I looked at some iPads and figured if Kindles were going this way then I might as well buy the real thing. I didn't. I realised if I had an iPad I would hardly ever get any reading done because of the lure of Facebook and internet and, and, and. Never mind trying to get my manuscripts written.

But.

Then I saw the big news today - lots of Kindles!

There will be the Kindle Fire selling US$199, an e-ink touch screen kindle from US$99 (that's the one I want) and an introductory Kindle at only US$79. At these prices Kindles will become more accessible to the public and will probably fill quite a few kids' stockings this Christmas.

Add this exciting news to the fact that Kindles are now available from Woolies, BigW, Dick Smith (and probably more places) in Australia - I believe ebooks are about to experience a whole new BOOM! 

Authors who are prepared to handle their writing as a professional business and produce QUALITY ebooks have a real opportunity opening up to them. Exciting times. I have shivers - how about you?

Here's a great article by Andrew Wilson, on why ebooks are the way for authors to control their future:

How you can make a million writing your own e-book

Read More

Phooey to the End of Books

I don't think so!

Many conversations about the future of books, publishing and reading seem to be gloomy these days. I read blogs, hear radio conversations and even meet authors that think authors will suffer great income loss over:

A. the introduction of ebooks

B. cheap ebooks (99c)

C. competing with tv, movies, internet and gaming for children's attention.

I say phooey to all that. I think the future of books is brighter than it's ever been. Here's how I validate my excitement for this industry:

1. The introduction of ebooks has enabled MORE people to access fiction in a variety of mediums.


2. By having a novel available online, you have opened your readership up globally. You don't have to rely on only reaching a national market. If an Australian publisher prints one of my novels, I will still have to try to secure an agent/publisher for each other international market such as the UK or US.


3. Cheap ebooks have excited readers and tweaked an interest in otherwise cautious customers. This in turn develops a fad of reading, the more you read the more you want to read. 99c will gain initial interest, but readers will evolve to be more aware of their own taste and more discerning towards the quality of fiction they read. I now scrutinize my purchases and do not base my choice on price. I trust other readers to do the same.


4. Hooray for technological distractions. The iPads, laptops and iPhones might be popular with teens for the games they supply but the wonderful phenomenon I'm noticing is kids that wouldn't usually want to buy books now want to, all because they can download them onto their iPod etc. I had a yr7 media class (12-13yr olds) and introduced them to online books via Amazon. I showed them how you can get Kindle for your iPod. They were all so excited about this and most downloaded the app. A lot of these kids would have scrunched their noses up at me suggesting they borrow a book from a library.


5. Ebooks are making reading a very popular trend. This in turn makes people want to own books and buy books for their shelves as well as their iPads. It has almost become a fashion statement for our living rooms. Don't believe books are trendy? Department store catalogues are expensive to produce and distribute, this makes space on them prime real estate. As you can imagine, front page is pretty special. In the past. I've only noticed books get a small corner of a page in the middle somewhere. Yesterday I was so surprised and pleased to see a Big W catalogue feature the first TEN pages all for books and that they now sell the Amazon Kindle here in Australia!

So, aren't you excited?!

Read More

Will the App Replace the Ebook?

The Kindle VS iPad for reading debate is about to heat up again. For some time now bloggers and book people have been discussing the possibility of the ebook completely replacing paper books. I still love both, so can't see that happening, but I do see a shake up of the book industry and a complete revision of how books are chosen and a shift in power. The new book industry will be consumer run rather than publisher run (sorry writers, there'll still be someone to answer to - the customers).

But what I do see as an interesting innovation is the apps that are appearing in place of ebooks and books. Probably the best known one being Al Gore's Our Choice, as presented by publisher/app creator Mike Matas:

Just shows what books can become. But my favourite was when I came across this app for a children's book. Check this out it is amazing (and an Australian publisher!):

I was blown away by how easy the language could be changed (I'd love these for my Spanish class), the interactivity and the ability to have the book read to you (audiobook style, not Kindle robot style). This book wouldn't work well on my black and grey Kindle, but is a treat on the iPad - have they finally found a way to push Kindle aside? Maybe Kindle will produce a colour touchscreen device (rumoured for mid 2011).

I LOVE the idea of books as apps, although I'm not keen on fiction being distracted with videos and such, but maybe having an audiobook embedded into the ebook, so you could read, but switch to audio when you are driving or tired. It would sync to your place for you. Can you think of any creative ways to turn fiction into book apps?

Want to know more about the publishers of the children's book app? Check out:

Blue Quoll Publishing

Read More