Taste of the Caribbean

In some ways, some important ways, a lot of my storytelling relates to the Caribbean. No matter where I travel, my thoughts and stories come back to it. That makes sense, as I spent an exciting 10 years there, living on a boat, sailing other people's boats, hanging out in waterfront bars (playing guitar) and in rum shops, and writing humor and poetry for Caribbean Compass. In short, my time was occupied with taking advantage of all the cultural highlights. (Dear Caribbean Tourist People, that comment was meant in jest...I not be trying to vex you.)

There is a different pace and rhythm to life there that I grew to appreciate. The people have a sense of life that's hard to capture, and that proves an exciting challenge. My first novel, THE LEGEND OF RON AÑEJO, takes place there, mostly on boats, and focused more on the sailors than the locals. While in Carriacou, I wrote a humorous short story called THE RUM SHOP that was exclusively about some of the locals, heavily fictionalized, but they seemed to recognize themselves and enjoy the story. That pleased me more than I can say. I'm going back to those roots, if that's what they are (I'm rather rootless, so I'm not entirely sure), in writing more stories that feature the people of the region as main characters. Intrigue Publishing has contracted to publish an ebook of my new short story DEATH OF A SANDMAN, which is a murder mystery featuring a local cop named Johnny Cliff. I'm working on more stories based around him, some less crime oriented than others, but all imbued with the flavor of the region. Norbert and I expect to produce audio versions of these stories as they are released (sign up for the Float Street Press newsletter to be informed of these and other exciting developments) at http://eepurl.com/O6d3H

In telling stories of the Caribbean, the way things are said is almost as much a part of the texture as the descriptions of the people and the place. To capture that aspect, I've partnered with Caribbean voice over artist Norbert Thomas and we've recently released and audiobook of THE RUM SHOP through Audible.com. Norbert Thomas is the premier Jamaican/Caribbean Voice Over Artist with an international sound and a former Radio/Television/Stage personality with over 20 yrs in media communications. 

Along with THE LEGEND OF RON AÑEJO (narrated by Paul Aulridge), the story of the world's best Caribbean boat bum, THE RUM SHOP is available through Amazon, Audible.com and iTunes.

Note: If you are a reviewer and would be interested in reviewing the books or audiobooks, contact Float Street Press at publisher@floatstreetpress.com)

Out of writing and into publishing

For the past couple of years, I've been working with my friend Jim Beckett to write a novel about a writing and the dynamics of the current publishing world. It is now it the last stages -- out of writing and into production. We have the cover done and here is what it looks like.

The proof copies will be done soon (tomorrow, I hope) and, assuming all is well, it will soon be out in paperback (304 pages) on Amazon and CreateSpace. We will be making it available in ebook form on Amazon and distributed through Smashwords -- they get it into the Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Sony, the Diesel eBookstore, Kobo, PageFoundry, and  Baker & Taylor.

We have chosen not to distribute through bookstores, because that would raise the price. Bookstore distribution requires a markup of 40% and I know I wouldn't want to pay that sort of price. The paperback will be $9.99 and the ebook we are still debating how to price. Actually that is untrue -- I am waffling on the price is what is happening.

The book runs about 96,000 words, which is substantial, though not huge by contemporary standards. But it is long enough to tell the story. A number of people were happy to tell us where we fell short in earlier drafts and some major rewrites addressed those shortcomings. It is a story of an overeager book editor, an actor, a publisher, a brilliant but reclusive writer and the problems that  mix brings.

Print books

I still love printed books and I know I am not the only one who does. So I have released the short book Two Stories of Sailors and the Sea in paperback. This volume contains two short stories about quite different sailors, and their interaction with the sea.

It isn't available through bookstores, as we wanted to keep the price low and bookstores need a high enough price to discount. But you can find it for only $5.99
at Amazon and CreateSpace. Of course it is also available, more cheaply in ebook form at Amazon and Smashwords and Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Sony, iTunes, and Diesel.

I hope you enjoy the books.

Rainy day blogging and publishing

Sunday was a lovely rainy morning. It is easy to get my writing done on a rainy day. It is cool then and there is something about the rain that makes my thoughts seem to go deeper. Perhaps it is just that I am less distracted by things outside the window.

Thanks to those who responded to the story about the creative assistant. Pat confirmed that it was a Tokay gecko. I have to find out if this one is a mongo Tokay or just on the large size of normal. Uncle Steve reminded me that Carlos Castenada was taught divination with lizards and suggested that I not limit the new friend to the duties of an assistant. That merits investigation as well.

My apologies to those who tried to leave comments and found that they couldn't. I didn't realize that this software defaulted to letting only registered users leave comments and that has been fixed now.

Other things going on... My coauthor Jim Beckett is taking his turn on the final draft of our novel THE INVENTION OF CLAY McKENZIE, which we will be publishing in ebook and paperback. The publishing empire grows and FLOAT STEET PRESS now has four paperbacks out through CreateSpace. The first two were THE LEGEND OF RON ANEJO and FLOAT STREET NOTES, then we published an adult crime/suspense story A BURGLAR IN MALAY
by Kurt Dysan, a fellow traveler in these parts, who has been writing for years but need encouragement to publish.

Most recently we republished my friend Javaid Qazi's collection of short stories called

Unlikely Stories: Fatal Fantasies and Delusions

This first published by Penguin Books in 1998 and had gone out of print. The editors returned the rights and now it is available again, as is a single story in ebook format called THE KING OF PATIO WORLD

All of the paperbacks are available in ebook format as well. We are still
working on getting them linked together but all are available through Amazon. The ebooks also find their way into Barnes & Noble, Diesel, Kobo, Sony, iTunes and so on through Smashwords and you can always find the books in almost every ebook format there.

This will build up slowly. It has taken most of a year to get to this point, but there are many good things in the works. And SE Asia is a wonderful place to work, even if now I need to go into town and muster enough Khmer words to get someone to find and fix an intermittent problem in one of the motorbikes.

Collecting and republishing the past

I got an email today from someone curious as to what I was up to. He wanted to know if I had a blog, and I sent him the link, but I realized that primarily what I have posted is observations, not updates of the ongoing effort to proved the world with new and improved art and music. So here is an update.

When we lived on an old wooden boat in the Caribbean, part of the way I earned my keep, when not doing boat work, was writing about living on a boat. I did a monthly column in the journal Caribbean Compass for at least five years, probably longer. It was caustic, and made fun of the readers, other people who wrote for people on boats, and even the very idea of life on board. It turned out to be very popular with readers, and advertisers didn't seem to hate it. At least the editor, Sally Erdle, never complained.

As I worked to edit and republish The Legend of Ron Anejo  and worked with my friends John Pocock and Tom Tsui to finish and publish Chancy,which is also about sailing, I thought of those short pieces and wondered it they still held up. Were they still funny? Would a collection be something worth republishing as a book.

But first, did they even still exist? My traveling lifestyle has been death on any old manuscripts that I might have had. Hell, the computers haven't survived, and I threw out the 5-inch floppy disks they were stored on years ago (any of you too young to know what those are can Google to find out).

I contacted Sally in Bequia and told her of my idea of publishing them as a book. She not only had the text files, but happily zipped them  and sent them to me. Dagny and I read through them, kicked out a few, and now are editing the 60,000 words that remain into a fun book. The good news is that very little turned out to be perishable. Since I seldom  address ideas more topical than what I had for breakfast, there is little to fade.

The intention is to publish the book both in ebook and in paperback formats; the ebook should be ready fairly soon, fairly being a time interval between one and three months. Being the chief editor, formatter, designer and distribution manager takes time. And this isn't the only project going on. But here is the dummy for the ebook cover.

So, if you happen to pass up the Kampot River and don't see us swimming, you now know what is going on in those strange wooden houses along river.

New Stories

I've recently published a couple of new short stories. To be honest, one isn't exactly new. I wrote it for a small book I did a limited run of when I was living in the Caribbean. It is an account of some real, but fictionalized people in a real, and not particularly fictionalized place--a rum shop.

The other book is based in Hong Kong and tells the tale of a sailor too often trapped in the corporate world, but determined to get out onto the high seas. His story is a little chancy.

Both books are available at my

Amazon and Smashwords author pages.