Lawrence Block's Blog, page 18

LB's Personal Bestseller List for November

As y'all probably know, I self-publish the ebook editions of quite a few of my books—with more due in the coming year. Most of them are available on all platforms—Kindle, Nook, Kobo, Apple, etc.—but it should come as no surprise that the great bulk of my business, like everyone else's, is carried on at Amazon's Kindle site. And their up-to-date and extremely transparent reporting makes it easy to see what's moving and what's standing still.

So why not share this information with all of y'all? I could wait, the month has a few days left in it, but today's Thanksgiving, after all, and I'm grateful beyond measure for the advances that have made self-publishing a viable option, and the readers who have made it a gratifying enterprise. So here's my list:

#1 - THE GIRL WITH THE DEEP BLUE EYES. Hard Case Crime is the publisher of the handsome hardcover edition, and will follow with an equally handsome trade paperback in July. Mike Dennis narrated the audio version for Recorded Books in his trademark noir fashion. And I'm the publisher of the ebook, and it's our bestselling title this month.

#2 - A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES. #10 in the Matthew Scudder series, and still getting a boost from Scott Frank's brilliant film, in which Liam Neeson is the perfect embodiment of Scudder. I'm also the publisher of the trade paperback edition. (Innit pretty? You wouldn't believe how hard it is for me to write "trade paperback" without prefacing it with "handsome.")

#3 - A STAB IN THE DARK. The fourth Matthew Scudder novel, and it generally runs neck and neck with AWATT in the sales derby. We publish both the ebook and the handsome TPB.

#4 - A LONG LINE OF DEAD MEN. Scudder #12. When Scott Frank and I talk about a sequel to A Walk Among the Tombstones, this is generally first or second on our list. Not that it matters, as the odds against anybody green-lighting a sequel are pretty high at the moment, but sharing our thoughts on the subject gives us a handy excuse to have lunch. (And yes, the handsome trade paperback is ours.)

#5 - THE NIGHT AND THE MUSIC. Scudder #18—the complete Matthew Scudder short fiction, and increasingly regarded as an 18th novel, covering the full span of Matt's career and concluding with the elegaic "One Last Night at Grogan's." I self-published TNATM a little over four years ago, as an ebook and trade paperback, and it's always among our lead titles. (I also narrated the collection for AudioGo's audiobook.

#6 - DEFENDER OF THE INNOCENT. The complete collection of stories featuring Martin Ehrengraf, the dapper little lawyer who never loses a case, and hardly ever sees the inside of a courtroom. Bill Schafer's legendary Subterranean Press is the book's hardcover publisher, and still has a few copies available; we publish the ebook and trade paperback editions. And audio fans will enjoy Don Sobczak's spot-on narration.

#7 - OUT THE WINDOW. This novelette, which first appeared 40 years ago in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, was the first work of short fiction featuring Matthew Scudder—and is thus the opening episode in THE NIGHT AND THE MUSIC. Ever since AWATT hit movie screens, OUT THE WINDOW has wound up on a lot of people's Kindles, giving them a quick introduction to the series. (It's obviously a much better deal to scoop up TNATM for $4.99 than to pay $2.99 for OUT THE WINDOW.)

#8 - THE BURGLAR WHO COUNTED THE SPOONS. Bernie Rhodenbarr's eleventh and most recent adventure. Come Christmas, it'll be two years since I published this title—as an ebook and trade paperback. (And as a deluxe signed-and-numbered leather bound Collector's Edition, which is currently on special at a remarkably low price in LB's eBay Bookstore. But I digress...) Subsequently Subterranean issued a hardcover trade edition, so there are many ways for you to add this book to your library. And all of them seem to be popular these days...

#9 - THE BURGLAR WHO DROPPED IN ON ELVIS. One of a handful of Bernie Rhodenbarr stories which we've made individually available for Kindle. This one first appeared in Playboy; others currently available



are THE BURGLAR WHO SMELLED SMOKE, and LIKE A THIEF IN THE NIGHT. (THE BURGLAR TAKES A CAT is an extract from THE BURGLAR WHO TRADED TED WILLIAMS, while A BAD NIGHT FOR BURGLARS is a sort of precursor to the entire series; it's not exactly Bernie, but you can see where he came from.)

#10 - I KNOW HOW TO PICK ’EM. A short story which appeared initially in DANGEROUS WOMEN, an outstanding anthology edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois. It came too late for inclusion in my own most recent collection, CATCH AND RELEASE, so it's only available as a single.

So there you have it, my own personal bestseller list for the month. No idea at this point whether this'll turn out to be a continuing feature or a one-off, but I suspect time will tell.

Cheers,



 

Coincidence? I don't think so!

You don't have to believe in coincidence to be struck by the way things tend to coincide.

I've been busy these days, working on an expanded and updated edition of Writing the Novel from Plot to Print. The book's been a leader in its field since 1978, but a few things have changed since then. (I thought I was technologically advanced because my Smith-Corona Portable had an automatic carriage return. I was still getting used to it, and sometimes I'd bat the air with my left hand, trying to perform the function manually.)

But you digress, LB.

I do, don't I? Point is the book's still sound, but there's a lot missing. So I've been spending a couple of hours a day, going through each chapter in turn, leaving the original text essentially unchanged but adding new material where it seems indicated. I've probably added ten or fifteen thousand words to the body of the book.

That was the easy part, or at least the obvious part. A few days ago I ran out of text to diddle with, and it was time to break new ground. So I wrote a chapter on the phenomenon of self-publishing, and why Gentle Reader might be well advised to go that route. And I followed that with a chapter on why that might not be such a good idea after all. Like everything else, It Depends—and writers who read both chapters may be well positioned to make their own decision. (The next chapter, which I'd be writing now if I weren't writing this, will talk about how to publish your own work.)

One reason not to self-publish is that you won't have a professional team to promote your book. And one reason to go ahead anyhow is that every day brings new promotional opportunities for the indie author.

Okay, I get it. But where does the coincidence come in?

Right here.

A few weeks ago, my first very own indie (i.e., self-published) book, The Night and the Music, was selected for the Dark Justice StoryBundle. Along with nine other books by nine other indie authors, it's available for a very limited time at what strike me as irresistible terms.

Oh, please. I can resist anything.

But do you really want to? See, here's the deal. You name your own price.

C'mon.

Really. If you figure $4.99 is a reasonable price for an ebook (and it's typical of indies, which makes it less than half the average cost of traditionally-published ebooks) then a fair price for this deal would be $49.90. Pay half of that and you'll be a genuine hero. Pay anything and you'll be genuine winner.

And I get what exactly?

Ten excellent ebooks by Rebecca Cantrell, Julie Hyzy, David DeLee, Kris Nelscott, Libby Fischer Hellmann, Patrice Greenwood, J. Daniel Sawyer, Melissa Yi, and Dean Wesley Smith—and, um, some dude with my initials. You probably know some of these writers, and you've heard of a couple of others, and a few are brand new to you. And that's the whole point, because the incentive for the writers is to get their work into the hands of new readers.

Like me, for instance.

There you go. And, just as I was writing about promotional opportunities for the self-published, the Dark Justice story bundle went live. Click on the link and you'll learn more about these writers and their books, and you'll be able to reward independence and initiative while loading up your Kindle or Nook or iPad or Kobo Reader or Keurig Coffee Maker with ten truly excellent books. Go ahead, do it now. I can wait.

...Okay, I'm back.

And?

What you figured. I went for it.

A good deal, innit? What did you decide to pay? And did you get all ten books?And—

Leave me alone, will you? I've got reading to do.

Okay. I'll leave you alone. I'll leave all of y'all alone. I've got writing to do.

Here comes our Blue-eyed Girl!

And not a moment too soon. I'm back from five weeks on the North Atlantic, the same cruise I took two years ago to write The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons. This time I shared my cabin with a beautiful woman instead of a novel in progress, and I have to say it was an improvement. We enjoyed ourselves no end, but we're home, and just in time for Hard Case Crime's publication of The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes.

September 22 in the official on-sale date, but there'll be plenty of first-edition copies for me to sign at the Mysterious Bookshop on Thursday, September 17, where I'll share the stage with Nathan Ward and Reed Farrel Coleman. (They're both fine gentlemen and outstanding writers, so come on down even if you've grown understandably weary of me. The party starts at 6:30 at 58 Warren Street, New York NY 10007.)

You'd think I'd be used to all this, wouldn't you? It's been something like 57 years since my first book was published, and I'm not sure exactly how many have followed it. But it's still exciting, not least of all because the book has been generating more than the usual amount of buzz and pulling in terrific reviews. Traditional media have to curb their enthusiasm until the release date, but bloggers and online reviewers are under no such constraint, and they've been posting plenty and tweeting up a storm. Modesty wouldn't stop me from quoting them, but space considerations will; you can see a good selection on Hard Case's Amazon page.

If you want an autographed copy, well, that's easy. Just the other day I signed copies at the publisher's offices, and they went out to these superb mystery booksellers, any of whom will cheerfully sell you a copy while supplies last: The Poisoned Pen Seattle Mystery Bookshop Mysterious Galaxy Uncle Edgar's Mystery Books Book Carnival Murder on the Beach VJ Books

And, of course, Mysterious Bookshop will have a good supply. If you want your book personally inscribed, call Ian at (800) 352-2840 to place your order. (You might want to do this, um, sooner rather than later. Right away, in fact...)

Will you be offering signed copies in your eBay bookstore?

Why would we do that when we've got all these excellent dealers on board? David's back from vacation, so LB's Bookstore is open again, but we won't be stocking Ms. Blue Eyes. (Not now, at any rate. A couple of years from now, when she's out of print and enterprising folks are asking $99 a copy, we'll look like heroes when we price ours at $50.)

Any book tours planned?

Nope. I'll be going to Raleigh October 8-11 for Bouchercon, and along with a couple of panels I'll have a signing session there, but that's hardly enough to qualify as a book tour. I toured relentlessly for many years, as some of you will recall, and Lord knows I enjoyed it, but I'm afraid those days are over; the business has changed almost beyond recognition, and so have I. I'm not the eager young lad I once was.

Besides, I've got other things I need to do.

Like what?

I had such a good time putting Dark City Lights together, I've got another anthology in the works. It's too early to tell you more than that, but I spent this past week writing my own contribution for it, and I have to say I'm pleased with the way it came out.

Next on my to-do list is Writing the Novel from Plot to Print. This was my first instructional book for writers,published in 1979, and until a couple of years ago it never went out of print. What it did manage to become, however, is out of date; a friend who's a regular reviewer of writing books told me the book's still one of her favorites, but it needs updating. Updating and expanding, I've since realized, and in a properly designed universe there would be elves who'd take care of it for me, but the little rascals are thin on the ground in these parts. So there's really nothing for it but to put my nose to the grindstone and my shoulder to the wheel and bite the bullet, which is no easy task in that position.

You'll have a lot to add to the new edition. Ebooks, self-publishing...

All that and more. And thanks for reminding me about the ebook of The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes, which is available right now for pre-order at Amazon Nook Kobo and Apple.

And what else can I tell you? I don't want to forget Buffalo Noir, edited by Brigid Hughes and my friend Ed Park, with stories that reveal my hometown as a dark place indeed. The book's not out yet, but PW certainly liked it.

And that's enough from me. I taped the women's US Open semifinals, and once I get this on its way I'm going to go all glassy-eyed in front of the TV. It's a rich life...

Cheers,



PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.
LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

A KELLER SAMPLER: a new book with a free introduction

I've just published A KELLER SAMPLER, designed to introduce the five-book Keller series to those who many have missed it, or whose experience of Keller is limited to a single book or a couple of short stories. While it's a hefty volume, running to 85,000 words, all of its contents have appeared before, and if you've read them all, from HIT MAN to HIT ME, the only words that would be new to you are the introduction.

Which you might well want to read, but why should you have to pay for the privilege?

So here it is, entirely free and worth every penny:

KELLER: An Introduction
In the summer of 1989, I settled in for a month-long residency at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. I had a book to write, and I got a prodigious amount done in a week’s time.
And then I stopped, realizing I’d gone off in the wrong direction altogether. The work I’d done was important in that it helped me find my way into the story, but I wasn’t there yet, and knew I wouldn’t be ready to write that book for a minimum of several months.
Which was fine, a writer’s life is replete with false starts, and I was confident the book and I would eventually be ready for each other. But what was I going to do with the rest of the month? VCCA was a pleasant institution in a beautiful bucolic setting, but if one wasn’t working, why be there at all?

So I decided to write some short stories.

I managed to turn out several in the time available to me, and the first or second told of a hired killer dispatched to the town of Roseburg, Oregon, to put an end to a renegade mob accountant now running a quick-print shop in the Witness Protection Program. The hit man, Keller, makes the mistake of getting to know his assigned victim, and begins to sympathize with him. He finds himself considering retirement, thinking he could move to Roseburg and buy himself a similar turn-key business. He gets a realtor to show him houses and envisions the life he might live there.

And then one morning he wakes up, comes to his senses, kills the guy, and flies home.

* * *

I called the story “Answers to Soldier,” and you won’t find it here; it’s the first chapter of the first Keller book, Hit Man.

Not that I foresaw anything of the sort back in 1989. I’d written a single short story, and my agent sent it off to Alice Turner, the brilliant fiction editor of Playboy. Alice snapped it up, and the magazine published it, and in due course it was shortlisted for the Edgar Allan Poe award for Best Short Story.

It didn’t win.

By then I had found the handle on the book I’d been trying to write, and in due course went off to another writing colony (Ragdale, in Lake Forest, Illinois) and wrote the book. It went much better this time around, and was published as A Dance at the Slaughterhouse. It too was nominated for an Edgar award, in this case for Best Novel.

It won.

Meanwhile, however, I reread “Answers to Soldier,” and found myself thinking some more about Keller. He had an Urban Lonely Guy quality that I found engaging, and it struck me one day that he was just the sort of fellow who’d try psychotherapy sooner or later. And what would that be like, a hit man going to a shrink?

(This, I should point out, was a good many years before James Gandolfini wound up on Lorraine Bracco’s couch in The Sopranos.)

So I wrote “Keller’s Therapy,” which you’ll find here. By its end Keller had traded a shrink for an Australian cattle dog, which most people would call a step up. But how could a peripatetic hit man cope with the ownership of a dog? That led to another story, “Dogs Walked, Plants Watered,” which you won’t find here, but which followed “Answers” and “Therapy” into the pages of Playboy.

More important, it made it clear to me that what I was doing was writing a novel on the installment plan. More stories followed, and when there were ten of them William Morrow brought them out as Hit Man.
Followed in the fulness of time by Hit List, Hit Parade, Hit and Run, and Hit Me.

* * *

And what have we here?

A sampler, really, of the five-book Keller saga. “Keller’s Therapy” and “Keller on the Spot,” are from Hit Man, and first appeared in Playboy. “Keller’s Horoscope” was written for a German anthology of crime stories with an astrological theme, and subsequently appeared as an episode in Hit List. “Keller’s Adjustment” originated as a novella for Ed McBain’s stellar collection, Transgressions, before serving as an anchor episode in Hit Parade, the book that also includes “Keller the Dogkiller.”

While the first three Keller books could be described as collections of short stories, I prefer to think of them as episodic novels, as each has an overall story arc chronicling Keller’s ongoing history. They’re episodic because the nature of Keller’s occupation makes for an episodic life, but taken together they constitute a novel. (This is not the case with, say, Defender of the Innocent. It is, pure and simple, a collection of short stories. And, it should be further noted, its protagonist, the criminous lawyer Martin H. Ehrengraf, is neither pure nor simple.)
The fourth book in the series, Hit and Run, is categorically different. A single storyline carries the book from the first page to the last. I’ve chosen to give you a taste of the book here in the form of the substantial opening sequence, here entitled “Keller in Des Moines.”

Hit Me, the fifth and to date the final Keller book, is represented here by “Keller in Dallas.” And, finally, I’ve included “Keller and the Rabbits,” which closed out Hit Parade and seems a good choice to close this volume as well. It was written as the behest of my friend Rochelle O’Gorman, who wanted a short-short for her audiobook website, and I think it at once wraps things up and refreshes the palate for whatever adventures Keller might have in his future.

* * *

Keller, I’ve come to realize, is a guilty pleasure for many of his followers. A woman who came to a signing some years ago in Marin County made the point vividly. “I was sitting in my living room reading Hit List,” she said during the Q & A, “and at one point I looked up from my book and gazed off into the middle distance. And I said out loud, ‘Well, so he kills people. What’s so bad about that?’”

After reading that same book, my late mother reported to me that she felt baffled by her own reaction. “I kept worrying that something bad would happen to Keller,” she said, “and I kept reminding myself he was a murderer, so why should I care what happened to him? But I did.”

* * *

Will Keller make the move from the page to the screen?

It looks that way from time to time. Shortly after it came out in 1998, Hit Man was optioned for a theatrical feature film, and a couple of scripts were written, the final one by myself. An A-list actor was attached, and the option was extended for several years, but the picture never got made. Later another deal came together with the series optioned for TV; a pilot got written, the option was extended, and then it lapsed and that was that.

As I write these lines, Keller and all his works have been optioned for a third time, with the hope that he’ll find a home on cable TV. If he does, plans call for me to have a role in the process, as a consultant and possibly as a writer.

We’ll see. Meanwhile I’m pleased to offer you this sampler of the entire series. If it’s your first taste of Keller, I hope it leads you to Hit Man and on through the rest of the series. If you’ve already read some of the books, perhaps it will provide a pleasant refresher course.

Enjoy!

~Lawrence Block
Greenwich Village
April 2015

Well, there you are. At the moment, A KELLER SAMPLER is eVailable only, priced at $4.99 for Kindle, Nook, or Kobo. It will be coming soon as a CreateSpace paperback.

Curtain up! Light the lights!

The Dark City Lights, that is to say. That's the title of my new anthology, coming April 28 from Three Rooms Press, and it's already getting a heartening amount of buzz. I could tell you that the book contains 23 terrific stories by 23 sensational writers, but wouldn't you rather get a sneak preview yourself? Just click here to see a Pinterest page with a pop-out quote from each of the stories. Go ahead, have a look. I'll be right here when you get back.See what I mean?

And how did I get such a fine mix of stories from such exceptional writers? Okay, here's my secret. First, I picked the right people. Then I asked them to write any kind of story they wanted, just so it was set within the five boroughs of New York City. They did the rest. I cheated a wee bit—I've reprinted a wonderful and rarely seen story of SF Grand Master Robert Silverberg ("Hannibal's Elephants," in which extraterrestrials invade Central Park). And my own contribution, "Keller the Dogkiller," has been published before, but I wanted to include one of the wistful assassin's rare New York assignments.

Some of the writers have names you'll recognize, and a shelf of books and awards to show for their efforts. Others are new to the game, with those awards very much in their future. I should emphasize that this is not a collection of crime stories, although many of them do fit comfortably beneath the genre's broad canopy.

A bit of human interest: A distinguished actress and novelist, my great friend Elaine Kagan had never tried short fiction until I persuaded her to write me a story. She was justifiably delighted with her effort, and showed it to her daughter, Eve, who wrote a story of her own in response. Elaine sent it to me, and I read it, and while I'd thought the book was full up, I'd have had to be a fool not to take it. So Dark City Lights contains the first published short stories of a mother and daughter.

And I know how proud Elaine must feel. Oh? And how can I presume to know this? Well, have a look at "The Lady Upstairs," the second published work of its author; her very first story, "Like It Never Happened," appears in the current issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. Her name, coincidentally enough, is Jill D. Block.

Believe me, I know just how Elaine feels...

And in fact I'm uncommonly proud of the whole book. You may lock in a low price by pre-ordering either the trade paperback or the ebook from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. I have a feeling you'll be happy with the book. It's my tenth anthology, and I think I'm beginning to get the hang of it. I'm hoping for the chance to do it again.

As the poet has assured us, April is the coolest month. On April 30, a mere two days after Dark City Lights goes on sale, Subterranean Press will release their hardcover trade edition of The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons. You can pre-order the book now from Amazon or B&N.

While this is the book's first hardcover trade edition, I self-published Spoons on Christmas Day in 2013, as an ebook and trade paperback... and in a deluxe signed-and-numbered leatherbound limited edition. I still have copies of the limited edition for sale at LB's eBay Bookstore, and for the next week or two all orders will include a FREE copy of the trade paperback.

Sometime the first week in May I'll be on Leonard Lopate's radio program on WNYC, along with Brian Koppelman, S. J. Rozan, and Jonathan Santlofer, to let the world know about Dark City Lights. And on Thursday, May 7, I'll be at the Mysterious Bookshop (58 Warren Street, New York NY 10007) with several of the book's contributors, to sign copies. Barring a shipping delay at Subterranean Press—I think it's done snowing for now, but I've been wrong before—I'll be signing copies of their hardcover Spoons that evening as well. You can call Ian at (800) 352-2840 to order Dark City Lights or The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons—or, ideally, both.

Is that enough for now? I think it's gonna have to be. As the governor of North Carolina probably never said to the governor of South Carolina, it's been a long time between newsletters. And it's also been the longest and deepest winter I can recall. It seems to be spring now. I'd say it might as well be.

Cheers!



PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.
LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

It's hard to be a burglar...

When you’re a burglar, life can be hard…

…and sooner or later you’re going to need a cover that’s every bit as hard, hard enough to shield you from the slings and arrows of outraged householders. Consider Bernie Rhodenbarr, whose latest adventure gives him all sorts of grief—enlivened, admittedly, by some sparkling conversations with Carolyn Kaiser, some amazing Taiwanese food from Two Guys From Taichung, and an adventure or two with a young woman…or two. (And if you follow in his wake, you’ll learn a lot about American Colonial Silver and Button Gwinnett and A Visit From St. Nicholas and F. Scott Fitzgerald and—oh, never mind.)

I published THE BURGLAR WHO COUNTED THE SPOONS on Christmas Day in 2013, and the reception has been heartening. I brought it out as an ebook , available exclusively on Amazon, and as a trade paperback , with a cover by Emanuel Schongut, the very man who made Bernie visible on the very first books in the series, published in the 70s by Random House. (And Manny’s beautiful painting also appears on the leather-bound signed-&-numbered limited edition , available from LB’s eBay Bookstore.)

In the UK, my publishers at Orion brought out both a beautiful hardcover edition and an ebook, with a paperback edition coming in the spring.

So what’s been missing?

A hardcover trade edition for the US, that’s what. Bill Schafer, the intrepid publisher of the indispensable Subterranean Press, has long been a fan of Bernie’s, and has a special fondness for SPOONS. (He liked it so much he plugged our Limited Edition in his own newsletter, and took orders for it.) Back in July, when I was holed up in Philadelphia writing a new book (of which more later), Bill got in touch and called this omission to my attention. A bunch of readers, he said, would like to have a US hardcover on their shelves, and so would a lot of librarians, and he figured he could bring out a book of which we’d both be proud.

And, really, how could I be otherwise? I’ve been unequivocally delighted with every book of mine Subterranean has issued over the years. So I said yes quickly, before he could change his mind, and I’m now delighted to report that you can pre-order The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons right now.

(If you type "Lawrence Block" into their site search box, you'll find two titles of mine currently available—SPOONS and DEFENDER OF THE INNOCENT—along with eight other titles of mine that SubPress published over the years, in trade and limited editions, all of which have long since sold out and are only to be found in the aftermarket. This always happens with their editions. They very rarely go back for a second printing, and when a book of theirs is gone, it’s gone—and can only be had at a premium. Will this happen with SPOONS and DEFENDER? Yes, probably. So this constitutes A Word To The Wise—and to you too, Arnold.)

Jeff Wong’s dust jacket is a complete departure from both Manny’s painting for the paperback and the Brooklyn brownstone steps that grace Orion’s edition—and I find it quite elegant in its simplicity. The book around which it will be wrapped will be the high-quality printing and production that is Subterranean’s hallmark. I’ll tell you, if I didn’t know I’d be getting author copies, I’d run out and pre-order this one myself—and I can only urge you to go now and do likewise.

Now let me see. There must have been something else…

Oh, right.

Sometime soon—and we don’t yet know the publication date, and aren’t yet taking pre-orders—I’ll be self-publishing THE CRIME OF OUR LIVES . It’s a collection of the various pieces of nonfiction I’ve perpetrated over the years, all of it touching upon the genre of crime fiction. Keying things off is My Life in Crime, a personal overview of the field I wrote for American Heritage 20+ years ago. My Mystery Scene columns are reprinted here, with a few cuts dictated by MS’s space requirements now restored. Also included are various articles and appreciations and intros of various books and writers, some of whom you’ll know (duh, Chandler and Hammett) and some that may be new to you (People Like Us, by Edward Anderson). It should be ready a couple of months from now—don’t worry, I’ll contrive to let you know when—and in three formats: ebook, trade paperback, and trade hardcover. (And I expect to publish an audio edition as well, and will probably handle the narration myself, shy and self-effacing fellow that I am.)

Oh, yeah. Speaking of audio…

As you may know, I’ve been publishing audio editions of some of my titles hitherto unavailable in that format. These include Borderline , narrated by The Man With the Noir Voice, Mike Dennis; two Jill Emerson titles, Thirty and Warm & Willing , both expertly voiced by Emily Beresford; and Defender of the Innocent , the Subterranean Press Ehrengraf collection, brought to life by Don Sobczak.

Well, two more titles just are their way onto the shelves at Audible, Amazon, and iTunes. One is Enough of Sorrow , and Emily sent me this message along when her work was done: "Hi Larry, I'm always so sad when I finish your books because I am amazed at how incredibly you write from a female perspective. Pure magic! Thanks so much for choosing me to be the voice of your ladies. If you decide to put any more of Jill's books into audio, I would be honored to work for you again."

That can’t happen, as all of Jill’s work is now audioVailable, but I’ve another book or two that might call for a female voice, including the first book I ever wrote, published by Crest with the title Strange Are the Ways of Love and the pen name Lesley Evans. (As neither the title nor the pen name were my idea, I might reissue the book with a new title, and Jill’s name on it. I could even try to reconstruct the chapter that some ninny at Crest persuaded me to cut. That last part sounds a lot like work, and I hate work, but we’ll see.)

Meanwhile, Don and I decided to roll the dice and find out if audiobook fans would cotton to the works of John Warren Wells. Wide Open: New Modes of Marriage went on sale just days ago, so the jury’s not in yet. Why don’t you listen to a sample and see if it draws you in? If sales indicate a demand, we’ll do some more. As you can see, the good Mr. Wells has quite a backlist.

Voulez-vous coucher avec moi? Non? Eh bien, voulez-vous lire mon livre?

If you can’t make sense of that, you won’t be hugely interested to learn that an early book of mine, Such Men Are Dangerous , is now eVailable in a brand-new French translation by Sara Sugihara. I’ve been very well published in France over the years—by Calmann-Levy, Seuil, and Gallimard, primarily—but many of the early stand-alone titles are either out-of-print or were never published. Sara and I found each other through BabelCube, and her expert rendition— Des Hommes Dangereux —is on sale now at Barnes & Noble , Apple , Scribd , and Inktera . (And yes, it’ll be on all the Amazon sites as well, but it’s not there yet.)

When it was published back in 1967, Publishers Weekly said “This will hit you right between the eyes. It’s terrific!” And Kirkus added that the book “goes through you like a dose of salts and stings like iodine.” That should do it for the masochists among you; I’ll only add that Dilys Wynn, founder of the Murder Ink bookstore, was a big early fan of the book. And, for that handful of you who are francophonically challenged, please note that SMAD is widely eVailable in English for Kindle, Nook, and well, just about everybody.

And will Sara and I be doing more of this? Well, we’ll have to see, won’t we? Even as we’ll have to see what other books BabelCube translators might render into other languages. The whole world is changing at warp speed, as you may have noticed, and that’s at least as true of publishing as it is of anything else. Are you having fun yet? Because I have to say I am.

David, who’s been reading this over my virtual shoulder, promises there’ll be an eBay auction soon, overflowing with goodies including rare ARCs and galleys and manuscripts. I'll get out a newsletter to alert you when it’s ready to happen. And he wants me to remind you that LB’s eBay Bookstore is even now replete with signed books, a majority of them priced under ten bucks. Consider yourselves reminded.

And that’s more than enough from me. I wish you all the very best for 2015, and can but hope you spend some of it reading my books.





PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.
LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

Tis the season...

Here's a newsletter that went out Monday to subscribers:

'Tis the season...

...to sit around doing next to nothing, at least in our house. I should have spent the past several weeks peppering you with newsletters, reminding you of all the perfect gifts reposing on the virtual shelves of LB's eBay Bookstore, and instead I've done sweet Fanny Adams, and it's hard to say why. My Frequent Companion and I spent Thanksgiving in Scotland, as the guests of an Unemployed Former Talk Show Host of Scottish Origin, and I suspect we came back slightly jet-lagged. Alas, we seem to have embraced the ensuing inertia as a Way of Life.Ah well. I've bestirred myself as best I can, and will supply some seasonal suggestions to gladden the hearts of those bold-faced names on your gift list without kicking holes in your budget. But first a couple of announcements:

~ If you missed A Walk Among the Tombstones during its too-brief theatrical run, the DVD goes on sale January 13. I think it ought to work almost as well on the small screen.

~ Defender of the Innocent, the complete 12-story Ehrengraf collection, is still available as a Subterranean Press hardcover, and in ebook and audio form as well. The Mysterious Bookshop and VJ Books have a limited number of autographed copies.

~Don Sobczak, whose audio rendition of Defender has been winning ears and minds everywhere, has taken on the tricky task of bringing John Warren Wells to life. First up is one of JWW's best-selling titles, Wide Open: New Modes of Marriage, and I think audio fans will like what he's done with it.

And now let's see what we've got in the bookstore:

1. A Walk Among the Tombstones. No hardcover copies and no DVDs, but we've got signed books in English, French, Polish and Spanish, signed movie posters w/ free lobby cards, and the signed audiobook. Limited quantities on all of these!

2. 8 Matthew Scudder signed paperbacks. Make eight people happy or one person positively ecstatic. We call these books "reading copies," but they're new books, individually signed, and the price is $49.99. We have four sets left, and once they're sold, they're gone.

3. 8 Bernie Rhodenbarr paperbacks. Same deal, different character. We've got five sets of these.

4. Any writers on your list? Jerrold Mundis explains how to Break Writer's Block Now, and you can get ten friends scribbling furiously for a total price of $29.99 postpaid. Or give them signed trade paperbacks of Write For Your Life or Telling Lies for Fun & Profit. Or a rare hardcover first edition of Telling Lies. Or how about a thirty-year-old copy of Fiction Writers Market? The market information is laughably out-of-date, but the essays and articles are timeless, and the price is right.

5. Bernie Rhodenbarr's latest adventure came out a year ago this month. Believe it or not, there are people around who don't yet own a copy. (I know, I know. Go figure.) That's opportunity knocking—for a good friend, pick up a signed trade paperback of The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons; for someone you genuinely adore, take a deep breath and spring for the Limited Leather-Bound Collector's Edition. (It comes with a free signed copy of the paperback. So you could buy someone a handsome gift while picking up a choice reading copy for yourself. Or the other way around. I'm, like, just saying...)

6. Bargains galore! Of the 136 titles on offer, 77 listings are prices at $9.99 or less, most of them with free shipping.

7. But not everything's that inexpensive. Here, for convenience, are some high-ticket items.

Oh dear. I believe I sense jet lag coming on again, and what's the point of fighting it? Before I go back to bed, let me urge you to make your selections sooner rather than later—so that we can deliver in timely fashion, and while we've still got all your items in stock. (Many are one of a kind.)

That's it. Merry Everything and Happy Everything Else!









PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

Oh, no. Not another book???

I know, I know. Believe me, I've been trying to quit. But you know what Solomon said, in what strikes me as the most heartfelt passage in Scripture: "Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh." Or, as the Duke of Gloucester put it to the author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, "Another damned thick, square book! Always scribble, scribble, scribble, eh, Mr. Gibbon?"

Well, it's a weariness of the flesh, all right, but in the present case I've been spared much of the scribbling, in that most of the ink's been dry for years.

And I've had this new book in mind for several of those years. (Having a book in mind is easy enough. There's no need to do anything. You just think of it from time to time, and sigh, and think of something else.) I've written a fair amount of nonfiction, and while most of what I've written about writing has been gathered up into books, most of the rest has not. In the course of thinking about it (and sighing, let us not forget) I've divided this material into two virtual stacks.

One consists of miscellaneous pieces I've written, many about my travels, many about New York City. That stack will have a while to wait. But the other is composed of writing I've done relating to the crime fiction field. There's an American Heritage article,"My Life in Crime," with an overview of American crime fiction and an annotated list of 16 favorite writers. There are my Mystery Scene columns, "The Murders in Memory Lane," essentially remembrances of writers I've known, some well, some fleetingly. There are introductions and forewords I've written for other writers' books, articles on Hammett and Chandler commissioned by GQ and the Japanese edition of Playboy, and...well, there's a lot of stuff, over 70,000 words worth.

And that's the one you'll be able to read in a matter of months.

I'm not sure what got me past the sigh-and-think-of-something-else stage, but I suspect The Getaway Car may have had something to do with it. That's the book of Donald E. Westlake's nonfiction miscellany so skillfully compiled by Levi Stahl and so well published by University of Chicago Press. The book's only defect is that it's posthumous, and it struck me that the best way to guarantee prehumous publication of my own book was to kick my own ass and get to work.

So I did. (And, in the section on Mr. Westlake, I made sure to include my foreword for The Getaway Car.)

A couple of days was all it took. They were long hard days, I must say, but at their end I had a file to send to Colorado Springs, where it will get fixed and formatted and fiddled with to a fare-thee-well. I've been referring to on Facebook as ICCUWATY, but that's not a title, it's an acronym.

While you puzzle it out, I'll run down my plans for the new book. I want to publish ICCUWATY myself, not least of all because, having taken this long to turn it into something publishable, I don't want to wait another fifteen months to see it in print. By doing it myself, I can make it available as an ebook and trade paperback—and almost certainly a hardcover as well—in a matter of months.

I'm thinking Valentine's Day. That's what, three months from tomorrow? Yeah, that'll work.

What about the other book? The travel pieces and New York stuff?

Is it okay with you if we take this one book at a time? Which is not to say that the question hasn't crossed my mind. My guess is it ought to be good to go in early 2016. But right now I've got other things to talk about.

Oh?

I'll start with some happy news for fans of Evan Tanner, that global adventurer with a gift for languages and a permanent case of insomnia. All eight Tanner novels, starting with The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep, are now eVailable on all Amazon platforms throughout the world. (And that now include the Netherlands, with amazon.nl, which just launched yesterday. Sooner or later I'll log my first amazon.nl sale. Are you in the Netherlands, Gentle Reader? Would you care to be first?)

But I digress. The Tanner books have been outfitted with sprightly new covers and sport the LB logo in the upper left corner. Each is numbered, on the cover and in the product listing, so that it's easy to read them in order. They're not available in the US or Canada, where HarperCollins still holds the rights, but everywhere else they're bargain-priced: £1.99 in the UK, €2.99 in Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and, yes, the Netherlands, AUD3.99 in Australia, INR199 in India, 399 Yen in Japan, and R$7,28 in Brazil. (And if you live outside the US but can access amazon.com, the price is $2.99.)

Is that all?

No, of course not. There's still John Warren Wells to talk about, and audio.

Sometime last month I cut the Kindle prices on all of my John Warren Wells books on sexual behavior from $4.99 to $2.99. (Most of JWW's books are exclusive to Kindle, but a few are also on B&N, and the price cut spurred Kindle sales enough to make it worth extending across the board. Note that the new price may take a day or two to show up at B&N.)

I've enjoyed self-publishing audio books through Audible's ACX division. Mike Dennis's rendition of Borderline is our top seller, with Don Sobczak's Defender of the Innocent moving up strongly. I began to wonder if there might be an audience for JWW in the world of audio, and realized Don would be a perfect choice to voice the books. I picked the title with the most sales in October (file that under Extensive Market Research) and pitched Wide Open: New Modes in Marriage to Don on a shared-royalties basis, and we decided to roll the dice. He'll be finished any day now, so the audiobook should go live by the end of the month, and what I've heard so far sounds very fine indeed. If enough of y'all download it, there'll be more.

I think that does it. Yes? Did you have a question?

Back to ICCUWATY. Did you say you were considering publishing a hardcover edition?

It's a good possibility. We'll see how the numbers look. If we do, it won't be super-fancy, like our signed-and-numbered collector's edition of The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons. But if we can offer you a high-quality hardcover trade edition at a reasonable price, I'd be inclined to do so.

Um, about that acronym...

I Can't Come Up With A Title Yet. And I can't, not one I'm willing to share. But as soon as I do, y'all will be the first to know.

And that does it. You can expect a newsletter sometime next week from David, who'll have a full report on what's new in the bookstore. Meanwhile, if it's still warm where you are, enjoy it. If not, bundle up and read something!

Cheers,



PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

HOT TIMES AT LB'S BOOKSTORE!

David Trevor here, wondering if any of this makes any sense, starting with the headline. Hot times? There's a lot going on at the bookstore—new listings, reduced prices, and a 18-item auction—but there ought to be a better way to begin. I think the template's okay. It's certainly seasonal. But I don't know about that headline, especially the exclamation point. (But I tried it with a period, and it looked even worse that way.)"You write this one," LB said. Graciously, all Lady Bountiful, like I ought to welcome the chance as an opportunity for personal growth. Right.

I'll start with the auction. If I manage to time this email correctly, the auction will be live on eBay by the time you read this. The first lot goes on view at 5pm Eastern time on Wednesday, October 29, and they pop into play every ten or fifteen minutes until around 8:30. (And one item, a nice new Random House edition of The Burglar Who Studied Spinoza, is already live, because I skipped a step and posted it immediately instead of setting a delayed start time. The culpa, as LB would say, is entirely mea. I mention it because the effect is that it gets hammered down a day earlier than the others, so you'll want to pay attention to closing times. It closes Sunday afternoon. The others close Monday evening.)

And what's in the auction? Several items from LB's mother's library, some of them personally inscribed to her, others identifiable as such by her address label on the flyleaf. These include Burglar and Scudder first editions, a Penzler Books Tanner hardcover, and a scarce galley of When the Sacred Ginmill Closes. We've also included small-press limited production—a gorgeous ASAP Press first edition of Ehrengraf For the Defense, the G&G boxed limited lettered edition of In the Midst of Death with the Martin Cruz Smith intro, and the boxed limited Dark Harvest edition of Time to Murder and Create, signed by both LB and Jonathan Kellerman. It'll take you less time to see the 18 items for yourself than you'd spend reading an explanation from me, so I'll stop now. Just click this link and see for yourself.

Besides the auction lots, I've been able to add several new books to the bookstore listings, and dropped the price on some popular items. Additions include signed copies of some of LB's foreign-language editions. A couple of years ago, when LB moved his office, we wound up discarding many boxes of books for lack of space—and we hated to do it. So I've put up a batch of French and Spanish and Portuguese and Italian and Chinese books and priced them at $9.99 apiece with free domestic shipping, and if they find a market I'll post more.

Oh, here's one you can't have for $9.99, and isn't it beautiful? It's a 4-volume boxed set of the Chip Harrison series, and I'm posting a picture of one side of the box here, but you'll want to see the Pop Art covers of the individual books in the store listing. We've got five of these, and my guess is they're the only ones to be found outside of China. Our price is $39.99, and we can only ship this item to US addresses. What an great gift for someone who can read Chinese! And so what if you can't? I'd like to have one of these myself, just to put on the shelf, and I can't even cope with the Specials menu at the Golden Panda.

What else? A batch of ARCs, four or five new audiobooks, and a couple of boxed lots of signed paperbacks you wouldn't know about unless you saw our Facebook posts. 8 Burglar paperbacks, 8 Scudder paperbacks—all of them signed, which makes them great stocking stuffers. (Alas, we can't ship these large lots to addresses outside the US. Sorry!)

Did I mention that we've cut some prices? The most dramatic reduction—was $99.99, now $39.99—is for the UK hardcover edition of Even the Wicked. Check the listing to see what makes it special. As for what made us drop the price through the floor, well, LB realized he'd rather sell the books than have them on the shelf where he can admire them.

We've reduced several popular trade paperbacks as well. A Drop of the Hard Stuff is now $4.99, Hit Me and Getting Off are $9.99. Telling Lies for Fun & Profit, LB's most popular writing book, is rare in hardcover, and we've been selling signed first editions for $24.99. But, see, we haven't been selling many of them, and while the book's scarce everywhere else, it's not scarce in our storeroom—so I've just cut the price clear down to $9.99. Now that's been our price for the paperback edition, and how can we sell them both for the same price? I asked LB, and he said to revise the paperback listing so that it's still $9.99 but the shipping is free. So that what's I've done.

When A Walk Among the Tombstones opened last month in theaters worldwide, we were able to obtain a supply of posters and lobby cards, and sold more than half of them right away. But we had a problem with the 11 x 17 lobby cards. We mailed them flat, and while most of them arrived with no trouble, a few postal employees ignored our DO NOT FOLD instructions, and when a couple of buyers complained, LB had me take the item off sale entirely. So here's what we're doing: We want to sell off the remaining 15 copies of the 27 x 40 poster, and if you buy one we'll include a lobby card absolutely free; it'll ship safely in the same square tube as the large poster. You'll get a nice item at absolutely no cost, and we can stop wondering what to do with the damn things.

I think that's all. It seems to me there was something else I was supposed to do, perhaps because there almost always is, but I can't think of it and I've already put in too many hours today. There's probably a better way to phrase that.) Check out the auction, check out the store listing, and get a jump on your Christmas shopping. I'll be adding items for the next week or so, and probably cutting some more prices while I'm at it, but if you're a frequent visitor to the store you'll have a good chance to snap up the one-of-a-kind bargains before I can tell the rest of the world about them. Hot times at LB's Bookstore, by Jingo!

David Trevor for

Oh, right, almost forgot: PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock

He never writes, he never calls...

Here's a newsletter that went out to subscribers this afternoon:

I know, I know.

It's been a while since you've heard from me. I try to strike a certain balance, neither overloading your mailbox ("Damn, another of these? I haven't read the last three!") and appearing so infrequently that you forget who I am. And I'd rather not write until I have something to tell you.

(Which reminds me. Some years ago I'd promised Otto Penzler a baseball story for an anthology. I wrote one, " Almost Perfect ," and when I gave Alice Turner a first look, she snapped it up for Playboy. I called Otto and explained the situation. I'd like to write another story for you, I said, but I don't have an idea. Long pause. "Well," he said, "that's never stopped you in the past." I couldn't argue with that, and wrote "Keller's Designated Hitter.")

So? Have you got anything to say this time around?

A couple of things, as it happens. Remember Ehrengraf, the dapper little lawyer whose clients are always innocent? Well, Defender of the Innocent: The Casebook of Martin Ehrengraf is out now from Subterranean Press. It contains all 12 Ehrengraf adventures, from the very first, published in EQMM in February '78, to a pair of new stories that make their first appearance here. If you pre-ordered a copy, you've seen for yourself what an attractive and well-made volume it is. If you haven't, well, please be mindful of Subterranean's tendency to sell out in a hurry—and never go back to press. I can't say that this will happen with DOTI, but I can't say that it won't, either.

But I can get an autographed copy from you, right?

Wrong. We're not offering the book in LB's Bookstore, not wishing to compete with the many booksellers, online and offline, who have the book in stock. If it's important to you to have a signed copy, these two sellers have a good supply: The Mysterious Bookshop in New York and VJ Books in Tualatin OR.

Hardcovers are great on the shelf, but I've come to prefer eReading.

You're not alone. The DOTI ebook is selling briskly on all platforms— Kindle , Nook , and Smashwords . Ah, I see another hand, and I bet I know what you're going to ask about.

Audio?

We've got you covered. Don Sobczak voices Ehrengraf brilliantly, and the audiobook's been getting good reviews on Amazon and Audible . (And you ear-readers will want to check out the three other books we've self-published in audio, Borderline , Thirty , and Warm & Willing . Mike Dennis's Borderline is an acknowledged triumph, and Emily Beresford, whose renditions of Thirty and W&W have been winning hearts and minds and ears, is currently at work on another Jill Emerson title, Enough of Sorrow .)

Paperback?

Not for a while. We self-published the ebook and audio—note the LB logo in the upper left corner—and we'll bring out a handsome trade paperback a few months down the line. Be assured that I'll let you know when it's available.

 

Anything else? Are you gonna try to sell us Ehrengraf Tote Bags? T-shirts?

No, but some "Get Out Of Jail Free" cards might be appropriate. Remind me to check with our marketing people. What's next, however, is an oddment I came across today on IMDb , concerning a short film made in 2005 from a short story of mine called "Cleveland In My Dreams." It's got a slew of very strong reviews, and I don't suppose every last one of them could be from relatives of filmmaker Mark K Sullivan. I think there's a way to download it from the site, though I haven't figured it out yet myself. Alternatively, we still have a handful of signed DVDs left in LB's eBay Bookstore , yours while they last at $14.99. Or you can grab the story for your Kindle for $2.99.

That's pretty reasonable, $2.99. I wish everything was $2.99.

Even dollar bills? Never mind, I get it. And I'm sure you'll be thrilled to learn that I've just slashed the Kindle-price of 17 of my titles from $4.99 to $2.99.

The books in question are those I wrote as John Warren Wells. They deal with sexual behavior, and are presented in interview and case-history form. Some of the cases are indeed the product of interviews, correspondence, and personal experience; others owe a bit more to imagination. You may read them as reportage or fiction, as you prefer—or not at all, for that matter. JWW is hardly everybody's cup of tea, but neither is a six-ounce pour of Lapsang Souchong. The new low price makes it easy for you to conduct your own taste-test—and, if you like what you get, to scoop up more at the same low cost.

The $2.99 price applies to all John Warren Wells titles at Kindle. (11 of the 17 are exclusive to Kindle, thus available for borrowing by Kindle Unlimited members.)

What about the JWW ebooks you're selling on Nook? Are they $2.99 also?

Not for the time being. The new price is an experiment; if sales go up, I'll peg the books at $2.99 all across the board, including Nook and Smashwords. If not, they'll stay as they are on those platforms, and the Kindle books will pumpkin back up to $4.99.

And what's next? John Warren Wells on audio?

Actually, that's under consideration. Hard to know whether it would work, but it's not out of the question.

But as for what's next, well, that'll have to wait for the next newsletter. David's assembling items for an eBay auction, including some rarities and an original manuscript or two. He tells me we ought to drop a batch of prices at LB's eBay Bookstore while we're at it, to encourage purchases for holiday gift-giving. I've found it easier to let him do what he wants than to try to talk him out of it, so sometime next week he'll clutter your In Box with yet another newsletter.

So brace yourselves...

Cheers,



PS: As always, please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might find it of interest. And, if you've received the newsletter in that fashion from a friend and would like your own subscription, that's easily arranged; a blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with Newsletter in the subject line will get the job done.

LB's Bookstore on eBay
LB's Blog and Website
LB's Facebook Fan Page
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock