Sage Fire News

	March - April 2008
	The Bitterroot Trail News
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Words from the Trail Boss:
Happenings with the novel:
Latest Sage Fire Reviews:
Advertising on my sites:
Link Buttons to Side Trails:
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Words from the Trail Boss:
I am always surprised by how many people feel that a book should be delivered only in traditional print ... right up to the point where they learn they can down load a book to their cell phone / pda and read it on the bus, subway, or train to and from work. Its purely a matter of marketing. The japanese call E-books, cell phone books; and for good reason. They purchase 5 times the number of cell phone books as they do regular print.

For most readers, its a matter of economics. If you have to go out and buy yet another $500 piece of equipment, you are not going to consider the approach to be useful. That's $500 out of your pocket. It would take a huge incentive to get someone, anyone, to purchase on the merits of reading alone.

However, if the person can buy the e-book, download it to their PDA / cell phone and use equipment they already own, other economics come into play. Like the fact that the average print book is now selling for about $17 USD and an e-book sells for about $5.50

Newer smaller, lighter laptops that cross between a PDA and a very small computer like the new apple or the new Eee PC will help more people find E-books acceptable.

The next time you want to sit down and read a good book, think economically. You might find the experience enjoyable.

Next issue we'll talk a bit about problems and solutions for e-books at libraries.

Mike

Happenings with the novel:

The Bitterroot Trail is now being sold by Amazon for their Kindle Reader. Its definately a step in the right direction. The contract negotiations between Amazon and POD publishing houses will not affect our novel at this time. A large number of other novels will become e book only as Amazon renegotiates with the small publishing industry.

Make no qualms, we would love to add POD to the means by which you can obtain TBRT. With your help we can. All it will take is a small nudge in sales to show the publishers we are worth the risk of going POD. Tell all your friends to pick up a copy of our book now.

We are also considering running a prize contest at the end of our next issue for 3 months. Right now, just tell me what sort of prizes you would like to win.

Latest Sage Fire Reviews:

Sage Fire Reviews has been chugging along quite nicely. Early this year, I was accepted into the National Book Critic's Circle; a prestigious professional association of Book Critics. More and more people are finding the site and asking for more reviews. I'm changing the update cycle from once a week to once every two weeks to accomidate the increased number of reviews which are being done.

You will want to head on over (http://sagefire.pencraft.biz ) and check out the lastest listing of reviews. We have eight new reviews for the month of March and six scheduled so far for the month of April. We are even scheduling out into May. The month of March saw a number of westerns as well as horror and romance reviewed.

I am still open to independant critics by professional authors, acadedians, or librarians. If you are not one of those or don't want to do book critics, but you would like to help out, please write to me. We will work something out.

Advertising on my sites:

A lot of people have been asking about exchanging banners and buttons with me. I have extremely low rates. I am going to be revising the links and banners page in the near future so be sure to write to me today to get your request in. And remember, since I use a common page for this, your ad will appear at all of my websites.

In case you are wondering about advertising rates with TBRT, TBRN, and Sage Fire.

"Tit for Tat" [You show mine if I show yours] exchange of banners / buttons / or links --- FREE
6 months listing of a link --- $ 6
6 months listing of a button --- $12
6 months listing of a banner --- $24

Please contact me via email webmaster@pencraft.biz with your request. I will contact you about details and then I will bill you with PayPal for each 6 months.

Ads will be shown on TBRN below the sign up box. Ads on TBRT and Sage Fire will be shown at the bottom of the link's page.