Lorina Stephens's Blog, page 75

Goodreads Festive Season Sale

Exclusively at Goodreads, all of Five Rivers eBooks are available from now until January 1, 2011 for a mere $1.00. It's our way of saying thank you to all the people who support and believe in indie presses, and who love interesting and eclectic books. The eBooks are all in ePub format, and so easily read on most readers and computers.



If you do avail yourself of this special offer, we'd love to read your reviews either by sending directly to us here at Five Rivers, or posting to Goodreads, LibraryThing, Amazon, Chapters, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, or W.H. Smith. We'd even appreciate you blogging, Facebooking or Twittering about our books.



For those of you wishing to purchase print copies of our books, they are available at the following stores:

Chapters, Ancaster, ON
Chapters, Guelph, ON
Chapters, Peterborough, ON
Chapters, Bayview Village, North York, ON
Chapters, Festival Hall, Toronto, ON
Chapters, Waterloo, ON
Coles, Orangeville, ON
Coles, Owen Sound, ON
Indigo, Burlington, ON
Indigo, Kingston, ON
World's Biggest Bookstore, Toronto, ON
If these stores are out of stock, our books can be ordered through them and shipped in time for Christmas. You can also purchase both print and digital books online through:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Chapters/Indigo/Kobo
WHSmith
BooksOnBoard
Diesel
Ereadable
iBooks
Words Worth Books
Titles (and all EBM locations)
Goodreads

Chat with Lorina Stephens

In our continuing efforts to allow fans and readers access to our authors, we decided to open another discussion on Facebook with the woman who started it all here at Five Rivers, author and publisher, Lorina Stephens.



Here's your opportunity to query Lorina about any of her books, the writing process, and publishing.



The discussion will be ongoing. However, three participants will receive a copy of one of her books, in either print or digital as they prefer. Draw to be held December 17, 2010, and will be announced on Five Rivers' FB discussion page.



































     

Lorina Stephens at Chapters, London

This coming Saturday, November 27, our own publisher and author, Lorina Stephens, will appear at Chapters, 86 Fanshawe Park Road East, London, ON, between 1:00 and 4:00 p.m.



Marking the last book signing in her promotional tour for her cultural fantasy novel, From Mountains of Ice, the event will be an excellent opportunity for visitors to pick up a signed copy for either themselves or someone on their gift list.



Called 'an entertaining and original fantasy', by Midwestern Book Review, and 'a grand story, richly told', by Historical Novel Review, From Mountains of Ice explores the depths of one man's service to his country, even beyond death.



Lorina will also be signing copies of her historical novel, Shadow Song.





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Virtual Discussions with Five Rivers Authors

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Two ongoing discussions are taking place during the next two weeks at Five Rivers Facebook page, and for visitors it's an opportunity to ask all writing-related questions of Nate Hendley, author of Al Capone: Chicago's King of Crime and Motivate to Create: a guide for writers, and his sister, Alicia Hendley, author of the debut novel, A Subtle Thing.



The discussion with Alicia ends this week, with a draw on Friday, November 19 for a free copy of her novel for three lucky winners. The following Friday, November 26, Nate's discussion closes with a similar draw for one of his books for three winners.



You can find the discussion under here for Nate, and here for Alicia. You can also navigate to Five Rivers' FB page and click on the Discussions tab and access the fun there.



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Hope you'll come and join in the fun.

Refusing to acknowledge modern publishing

This week the literary world was astonished by news of the Giller Prize winner, Johanna Skibsrud for her novel, The Sentimentalists . Not only is she a relatively unknown debut author, but published by a small, indie house, Gaspereau Press. It's a coup of legendary proportions, now tarnished by Gaspereau's own refusal to acknowledge what many indie presses embrace -- that the only way we can hold territory in the marketplace is to be sure we can react swiftly to sales and economic shifts.



So, Gaspereau's response to the windfall of Skibsrud's success is to insist upon producing only 1000 books a week, beautiful books, agreed, but completely inadequate to meet the tsunami that has already hit them.



Yet there is an elegantly simple solution to this problem, one which allows Gaspereau to not only capitalize upon the orders in which they're drowning, but assure themselves of a healthy profit margin, cash flow and cachet. They could use print on demand.



By doing so they could produce books as needed, create a trade paperback that would meet the rabid rage of orders, and still produce a quality hardcover, beautifully hand-bound, for those who wish a more elegant addition to a permanent, physical library. They could avail themselves of the myriad of digital markets, rather than limiting themselves to one or two.



I know very well were I the publisher, with such an astonishing success, I'd most definitely have the book uploaded as quickly as humanly possible to Lightning Source, and have that book available on a global basis. Of course, that's how Five Rivers prints all our books anyway, so it wouldn't be a revolutionary step for us. And I'd also have that book available digitally on a simultaneous basis. There's an old saying, very appropriate to this situation: make hay while the sun shines.



Yet it seems to me so many indie presses establish themselves, and then operate in an outdated, ivory-tower mode that sees them wailing every time there's a Canada Council funding cut, or a spike in sales they can't meet. It's almost as though they set themselves up as artistes, doomed to failure. And Gaspereau isn't the only house to continue to cling to archiac, doomed modes of publishing. I have had similar conversations with many indie colleagues who wonder how it is Five Rivers has managed to gain the distribution we have while still remaining profitable. It's at this point I often loose all semblance of grace and apply my head repeatedly to my desk. The technology, the information, and the ability are all there, right at your fingertips, lacking only a want of will.



I know if I were Skibsrud I'd seriously be considering offers from other houses for future books, even consider striking out on my own. And that will be Gaspereau's self-made failure.

In Remembrance

For relatives in the Stephens family:



For Duncan Albert Long, June 24, 1915 - March 24, 1944. Served in WWII. RAF pilot shot down over Germany, recipient of Distinguished Flying Medal.



For Duncan's brothers, John and Jim who served in the British army and navy during WWII.



For Thomas Cecil Phillips, August 14, 1922 - December, 2008. Served in WWII. Served with the Gloucester Regiment, British Army WWII, Burma, March 1944, and returned for demobilization in Nov 1997 and discharged.



For Walter John Phelps, February 25, 1914 - January 26, 1996. Served in WWII. Enlisted in East Yorkshire Regiment. POW at Stalag Luft VII-A 2-3 years. Served with Desert Rats in Tobruk.



For George Joseph Stephens, March 12, 1924 - February 21, 1978. Served in WWII. 3rd Royal Tank Regiment, private, #22203420, tank driver. Regiment part of the British 1st Armoured Division in WWII in the Middle East, and was part of Montgomery's battle against Rommell. Later served in Malaya.



For George's brothers, Terrance, Jack, Michael, Ernest and Donald who served in British army and navy during WWII.



For Harry Page, who served in the Canadian Navy during WWII.



For Duncan Albert Long, August 12, 1890 - 1965. Served in the British army WWI, 9th Gloucester Regiment. Recipient of the Victory and Star Medals.

Discussion with Alicia Hendley and Book Give-away

Available from Chapters in print & digital
We're opening the floor Monday, November 8, 2010, to a discussion with author, Alicia Hendley on our Facebook Page. You'll be able to ask Alicia about her journey writing A Subtle Thing, and how she juggles raising a family around being a novelist and clinical psychologist.



As well, on Friday, November 19, we'll draw the names of three participants to receive a copy of A Subtle Thing.



Hope you will post all your queries and comments about this excellent novel dealing with clinical depression.



A Subtle Thing is available in print and digital formats from online retailers globally, as well as select stores. For a partial list please visit our website.

Michell Plested Joins Five Rivers' Authors

Michell Plested
Five Rivers is pleased to welcome another debut author to our conclave, Michell Plested.



In an agreement finalized this past weekend, Five Rivers has acquired the rights to Mike's YA adventure, Mik Murdock, Boy Superhero. It is a delightful and truly Canadian tale of a 12 year old boy's quest to protect his prairie town of Cranberry Flats, and in his search to acquire super-powers finds the most awesome power of all lies within his own inherent integrity.



Publisher, Lorina Stephens, says, "Mike has written the quintessentially Canadian boy's novel, an enchanting melange of Hardy Boys meets W.O. Mitchell. I laughed myself silly in places, and cried in sympathy in others. I'm very pleased to have Mike aboard."



Michell Plested has been reading science fiction and fantasy since he was six years old, and writing for almost as long. He is an author, blogger, and podcaster living in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. he writes in multiple genres, spending most of his time with science fiction, fantasy, and YA adventure.



He is the host of the writing podcast Get Published, (a 2009 Parsec Finalist) and the science fiction comedy podcast GalaxyBillies, which has been called 'Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy meets Beverley Hillbillies' by his listeners.



This brings indie publisher Five Rivers' stable of writers to nine, half of whom are debut authors.



Mik Murdock, Boy Superhero is scheduled for release in 2012 in both print and digital formats, and will be available globally through online booksellers.

Book Trailer, Al Capone: Chicago's King of Crime

Five Rivers Authors' Upcoming Events.

Five Rivers' sibling authors, Nate and Alicia Hendley will be appearing in two separate Ontario locations Saturday, October 16.



Nate Hendley, author of Al Capone: Chicago's King of Crime, will be signing books at Chapters, Festival Hall, 142 John Street, Toronto, Ontario, between 3:00 and 6:00 p.m. The book is a very human look at this icon of the gangster era.





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Alicia Hendley, author of A Subtle Thing, will appear between 1:00 and 4:00 p.m. at Chapters, 86 Fanshawe Park Road, London, Ontario, to sign copies of her debut novel. A Subtle Thing chronicles the dark and eventually triumphant journey of Beth, a young woman battling clinical depression.





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