Leta Blake's Blog, page 34
January 6, 2015
Price Confusion on Amazon UK- VAT issues or just effed up? #problems #pricing
So I decided to make sure that the new VAT laws weren’t causing any problems with my titles at the various Amazon stores. I admit, I’ve rarely paid attention to the prices in other countries, so I have no idea if these discrepancies are new or not. But, honestly, they are maddening and I’ve yet to hear back from the Amazon peeps. (Though I admit I only just emailed them last night and so I’m being rather impatient.)
Anyway, check this out. As you can see below, Training Season and Smoky Mountain Dreams are both $5.99 at all US outlets.
Amazon US
All Romance Ebooks
Barnes & Noble US (I only have The River Leith at Nook UK)
Smashwords (SMD gets a bit cut off, but you can see that it is $5.99)
Which brings us to the pricing at Amazon UK:
So, what’s the deal there? Am I paying the 20% VAT from my royalties these prices? I believe I am, right? So I should want both of them to be more like the Smoky Mountain Dreams price…though that seems a bit steep. Math isn’t my best subject, but I’m pretty sure that price difference is more than 20%? And the Training Season price doesn’t even cover the 20% VAT, I’m pretty sure? So I’m losing money on one and making a bit than I should on the other? And where did they even get these prices? My understanding was that they would be automatically increasing the UK prices to add in the tax. And yet these two books, which are the same price everywhere else, even at Amazon.de, are pretty differently priced at Amazon.uk. What’s up, dudes?
Another weird example is Keira’s and my book via Ellora’s Cave, Love’s Nest. Now, in my opinion, that book is overpriced in the US, but the difference between the US prices and the UK prices make zero sense, to be honest. Check this out.
WTF, dudes, this is the UK price.
Even if we claim price-matching is happening, that doesn’t make sense because the UK price doesn’t come anywhere close to even the lowest US price. No makey-sensey. Or does it and I’m just not seeing it?
Help? Anyone dealt with this before? Is it a VAT glitch or something else entirely?
ALSO? Argh. I don’t want to waste my time on this kind of thing. Very annoying.
January 5, 2015
“A Forbidden Rumspringa is without a doubt one of the best books of the year” Review of A Forbidden Rumspringa #gay #amish
“Heart-rending, poignant, and unbearably moving, A Forbidden Rumspringa is without a doubt one of the best books of the year.
Raw, real, intense, this is a story of a forbidden affair, a Rumspringa of the heart, a sexual awakening of the deepest kind.”
via Goodreads | ~~Dani ��� semi-colons~~ The United States’s review of A Forbidden Rumspringa.
Buy now:
All Romance eBooks | Amazon | Barnes and Noble
iTunes | Kobo | Smashwords
Help Will Come, But At What Price? Check out Guest Blog & Gift Card Giveaway & Fated by Indra Vaughn #gay #mmromance
I’m so excited to have one of my favorite authors, Indra Vaughn, as a guest on today’s blog. I was lucky enough to beta read the first two books of her Shadow Mountain series, the first of which, Fated, is now available at Amazon, Dreamspinner, Barnes & Noble, ARe, and most other retail outlets!
**
Hi everyone!
I���m so excited to be visiting with Leta Blake! *fangirls* We met last year during Rainbow Con, and I can tell you, she���s exactly as awesome as she seems.
As much as I love the holidays, I���m pretty pleased things will be returning back to normal now. And while winter will still be very long from here on out, it always feels like I���m already racing toward spring now. (Don���t accuse me of being an optimist, I have a reputation to uphold���) So! Fated, the first Shadow Mountain book. I can���t believe it���s actually here, all pretty and shiny. I mean look! *fondles cover*
Fated (Shadow Mountain Book 1)
It���s a three part series that will have its own mystery in each book, while the romance and the paranormal thread stretches over all three. Hart is a police Lieutenant in his early thirties, and he has sort of resigned himself to putting up with his younger neighbor���s endless flirting, at least until Isaac finds someone else to chase after. In the meantime he has to deal with the death of his father, dead bodies left right and center, a sassy (and awesome) Chief Inspector who he has to partner up with for a while, and some mysterious creature that haunts the Mountain. I can���t blame him for having an extra glass of wine in the evening���
Anyway, I hope you���ll check out the book if that sounds good to you, and in the meantime you can take a peek at the giveaway below.
I hope 2015 will be a good year for all of you!
***
[ETA from Leta: Dudes, that’s a pretty good giveaway. I’d go check that out. (Psst, it’s a gift card. For money. For BOOKS.)]
***
Two towns flank the looming Shadow Mountain. A dark myth of the Predator drifts through the dense trees, a tale Police Lieutenant Hart never paid much attention to.
When one unresolved death follows another���some people dying without discernible cause while others are clearly, and often brutally, murdered���he can’t ignore it any longer. Truth may lie in myth, but this one is spread to deceive everyone. The Predator exists, but he’s not entirely human. Hart will have to find the connection between the mysterious figure and victims with only one thing in common: a faint tattoo on the backs of their necks, a mark left when someone healed their incurable diseases.
Isaac Lasko has been in love with Hart since he moved in across the street seven years ago. He���s been helping Hart renovate his home, and their friendship grows more intense with the years, but Isaac can’t help wishing for a deeper bond. When he finally breaks through the lieutenant’s armor, the mystery surrounding the Predator threatens them both. Help will come, but at a price.
Fated (Shadow Mountain Book 1)
January 3, 2015
Confession: I Sometimes Really Don’t Think I Can #writerprobs #selfdoubt
Wow, so I drafted the following in May of 2014 and never posted it. Well, here it is January of 2015 and I finished the book I was angsting about and am now in this exact same place with the next book. In a way, I find this comforting. In another way, I find it horrifying. Will this crippling self-doubt ever stop? It really sucks.
From the unposted draft archives:
Despite the fact that I’ve got four or five books out now, whenever I’m working on a new one, I always reach a point where the following thoughts go through my head:
“What the eff are you doing? Who do you think you are? You can’t write a book. You’re not even capable of writing a book. You don’t know how to write a book. You don’t know what you’re doing and you will never know what you’re doing.”
That’s the worst part of writing. It’s the part that really gets me down sometimes.
For some reason, though, I keep on writing. I’m pretty sure it’s because I have to write to survive. So write I do. Hopefully I’ll be wrong and a book will come out of what I do. Still, that nasty little voice is there. Despite evidence to the contrary, there’s always part of me that thinks I can’t.
But I can.
And I will.
*
I DID. Here’s Smoky Mountain Dreams, the book I was certain I couldn’t write.
Sometimes holding on means letting go
Christopher Ryder and Jesse Birch are two men hanging on to the past. While Christopher has let go of his failure as a country singer in Nashville, he’s still trying to please his narrow-minded, non-accepting family. His beloved Gran loves him the way he is, but Christopher feels painfully invisible to everyone else. He’s happy enough performing at the Smoky Mountain Dreams theme park in Tennessee, but even when Christopher is center stage he aches for someone to see the real him.
There’s more than meets the eye when it comes to bisexual Jesse. He’s raising two kids and fighting with family after a tragic accident took his children’s mother. There’s no room in his life for dating, his kids are his priority, and he doesn’t want more than an occasional hook-up. He sure as hell doesn’t want to fall hard for his favorite local singer, but when Christopher walks into his jewelry studio, Jesse hears a new song in his heart.
Smoky Mountain Dreams is available now at:
AMAZON
B&N
SMASHWORDS
iTUNES
SCRIBD
OYSTER
And now at KOBO.
January 2, 2015
What I read in December
Oh wow! Ellen Gregory reviews Smoky Mountain Dreams, Training Season, AND The River Leith at her blog! Thank you, Ellen! So happy you enjoyed the books!
Originally posted on Ellen Gregory:
Yet again, I read a fair few books in December. In fact, I’ve become somewhat addicted to nose-in-kindle and am at the point where I get a little agitated if I try to take a break.
Seriously. I wasn’t joking in my last post when I said I’d spent every day since Christmas on the sofa with a book. Some days/evenings I tried to stop upon completion of the latest novel, but then the next moment I was downloading a new book on to my kindle. (That Amazon one-click ordering is dangerous!)
So, yes, the December tally is looking hefty.
However, I do intend to follow up this post with my 2014 top 10, so I will TRY to keep this brief… but somehow that doesn’t always work. [No. It didn’t work… oops]
(NOTE: In keeping with the theme for 2014, all books in December seem to be…
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Leta Blake on what inspired her to write The River Leith plus excerpt from the book | Rainbow Gold Reviews #gay #amreading
I’m not terribly excellent at keeping up with my blogging. Oftentimes, I’ll make a draft of a blog post and never manage to get it scheduled. I now have twelve pages of never published drafts of posts. My aim over the next twelve months is to get those posts…well, posted. :) So some of the material might be dated, but it is still relevant to the books available over to the right on this blog.
First up, a guest post/interview I did at Rainbow Gold Reviews for The River Leith! :D Yay!
“I’m so excited to have Leta Blake on the blog today, talking about what inspired her to write her latest book The River Leith. You can read my 9/10 pots of gold review of the book HERE.
During my research of amnesia and memory for the writing of The River Leith I read through a number of extraordinary cases and it became clear to me that no one amnesia case is exactly like another.
read more of my interview over at Rainbow Gold Reviews via Leta Blake on what inspired her to write The River Leith plus excerpt from the book | Rainbow Gold Reviews.
The River Leith is available now at:
AMAZON
B&N
SMASHWORDS
iTUNES
SCRIBD
OYSTER
And now at KOBO.
Memory is everything.
After an injury in the ring, amateur boxer Leith Wenz wakes to discover his most recent memories are three years out of date. Unmoored and struggling to face his new reality, Leith must cope anew with painful revelations about his family. His brother is there to support him, but it’s the unfamiliar face of Zach, a man introduced as his best friend, that provides the calm he craves. Until Zach’s presence begins to stir up feelings Leith can’t explain.
For Zach, being forgotten by his lover is excruciating. He carefully hides the truth from Leith to protect them both from additional pain. His bottled-up turmoil finds release through vlogging, where he confesses his fears and grief to the faceless Internet. But after Leith begins to open up to him, Zach’s choices may come back to haunt him.
Ultimately, Leith must ask his heart the questions memory can no longer answer.
January 1, 2015
Great Rafflecopter of many books! Go Check it out! Tams Top 10 of 2014 W/Giveaway | TTC Books and more
“Happy New Year everyone, and welcome to 2015!!I thought I’d usher in the new year with a nod to some of my favorite reads from 2014. I read and listened to over 150 books last year so it was quite difficult to narrow down a list of favorites, but I had to put a limit on the list or we’d be here all day. I’m including the buy links and the link to my review with each book synopsis so you can grab a copy for yourself, if you’ve missed out on these great reads. “
via Tams Top 10 of 2014 W/Giveaway | TTC Books and more.
The River Leith is in Tam’s Top 10 and part of the Rafflecopter Giveaway! :D
December 31, 2014
The New Year #2015 #newyearseve #storytime
I found this going through my old writing. It was never meant to go anywhere, so I’ll post it here. It ends where it ends, with the expectation for something more. The way a New Year’s Eve should.
The New Year
The beer bottle dangled from his hand as he sat outside on the front steps. His other hand he stuffed in the pocket of his blue jeans, keeping it warm in the burning cold of the winter midnight. The sound of laughter and toasts to the New Year echoed in the house behind him and encroached on his sense of solitude.
They were his older sister’s friends, all of them almost thirty, most of them married, each of them anxious in the way of people with something to prove. Their laughter sounded breakable, like the champagne glasses they kept refilling. Time had them in its grip, propelling them forward into adulthood, and old age, and eventually death. The terror of truly coming to understand the passing of time lent a falsity to their party and he could sense it, hated it, and knew that one day he’d join them in it.
He brushed his hair out of his eyes, lifting his gaze to the sky, explosions from the country club’s fireworks audible but not visible. He didn’t turn around when he heard the stick and give of the front door opening. He didn’t move as two bare lovely legs covered in goosebumps folded beside him, and long blonde hair swung into his peripheral vision.
“Happy New Year,” she said, clinking her champagne glass against his beer bottle.
“Cheers,” he answered, lifting the beer to lips and taking a sip.
Taylor Swift Says She’s ‘Obsessed’ With This Mashup of Her Songs ‘Blank Space’ and ‘Style’
This is the shit! Unf! Yay!
Originally posted on TIME:
Here’s a belated Christmas present for everyone who loves Taylor Swift’s most recent album 1989 — that is, all people who have two ears and a heart.
It’s a lovely acoustic mashup of “Blank Space” and “Style” that Tay-Tay herself says she’s “obsessed with.” She posted her approval on Twitter:
OBSESSED.
@louisawendorffhttp://t.co/gXrXYEZx1B
— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) December 27, 2014
The video comes from Nashville-based musicians Louisa Wendorff and Devin Dawson, who take the two songs and put a stripped-down, folky spin on them. In fact, these covers evoke Swift’s acoustic country roots rather than her new 80’s-inspired pop sound.
Give it a listen — because if Tay endorses it, then you know it’s great.
[time-gallery id=”3540517″]
Read next: Listen to Taylor Swift’s 1989 in 3 Minutes
[newsletter-the-brief]
Listen to the most important stories of the day.
For Leelah Alcorn — Sail On
For Leelah Alcorn who took her own life in Ohio on December 28, 2014.
This is her suicide note. It isn’t pretty and it’s not sweet but read it anyway. Please. I hope her message is heard and I pray no one else follows her example in sending one of their own. Please let Leelah’s life be enough to begin to fix this world.
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Cold night, strange dreams
Memory stuck like glue
Her face, her voice
Sail across the seas with you
Can you hear all the angels?
When you feel like you’re out there on your own
Know there is someone watching over you
When out at sea, feels love can let go
Oh sailor, we will blow the wind right
But if you die out there, tearing you into two
I hope you know that you could sail right on
I hope you know you got the ocean blue
No sound worse than silence
A curse that grows
Big words kept in
Whispers of dreams untold
Just don’t fight all the angels
When you feel like you’re out there on your own
Know there is someone watching over you
When out at sea, feels love can let go
Oh sailor, we will blow the wind right
But if you die out there, tearing you into two
I hope you know that you could sail right on
I hope you know you got the ocean blue
