For 16 year-old Woody Elmont, life in rural Georgia is a tolerable routine of caring for his aging Aunt Zee and minding his developmentally disabled younger brother, Tick. But when Tick disappears from a nearby home for troubled youth, Woody sets off on a grand and improbable adventure to know the truth of his brother’s fate. Risking his life for duty’s sake, Woody discovers far more truth than he bargained for.
Calling Out Your Name is a headlong rush through characters and events both intriguing and menacing - a coming-of-age journey that is by turns inspiring and starkly compelling.
“Ned White has created a memorable hero…(and) a wonderful, adventurous coming-of-age story that takes the Georgia teenager on a daring journey from Macon to Malibu and from adolescence to maturity.”
- Don O’Briant, former book editor for Atlanta Journal Constitution
“The heart of the main character remains true throughout the book no matter what name he is using. Life lessons, coping strategies and people skills develop as the young man travels across the country. Description and narrative blend seamlessly to create a book that is readable, informative and entertaining. With such vibrant detail, it is easy to imagine this book becoming the basis for a movie with broad appeal.”
- Barbara Macy, Amazon.com
(2 votes, average: 9.5 out of 10)
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The newest novel set in the Star Rigger Universe, ETERNITY’S END features the search for the legendary ghost rigger ship Impris and her crew, whose fate is entwined with interstellar piracy, quantum defects in spacetime, galactic coverup conspiracies, and deep-cyber romance.
“It’s onward with [a] one-man Light Brigade, straight into the jaws of doom and destiny. He finds true love, cognitive dissonance, divisions among the enemy, ambitious schemes, another mission–this one deeper than anyone has ever gone before into the substrata of the Flux–and a final resolution that leaves the reader both breathless and satisfied.” –Analog
“A galactic epic that’s much more than space opera, filled with both drama and bold ideas. Who would have thought a futuristic pirate story could be so original and smart?” –David Brin, author of The Uplift War
I was pulled into *Eternity’s End* by the notion of a Flying Dutchman spaceship, and found so much more than I expected. I just loved this book. The Flux and the Flux interface fascinate me. Carver pulls off the admirable feat of making something illusory, subjective, and “virtual” feel utterly real and yet profoundly unknowable–he vividly describes what is essentially indescribable. The frisson of the unknown grows persistently more eerie the deeper the characters go. I loved the Narseil, and the process of getting to know them through Legroeder’s eyes (and especially the mild estrangement from human culture that I felt at one point, making me realize how immersed we’d gotten in Narseil culture). I enjoyed the heck out of the pirates and the cyber enhancements. The opening chase scene is only the beginning of a wild roller-coaster ride–you get a breath to look around now and then and ponder some intriguing new information, and then the author throws the next twist at you and you’re off again. There are “silent running” scenes with all the tense appeal of the best submarine adventures, and exhilarating dogfights, and character interactions fraught with intense and complex psychology. This is topnotch space adventure and an edge-of-your-seat thriller, but it works on many deeper levels, too. I am dying to read a sequel. Please write one, Jeffrey Carver!
– gofalus, Amazon.com
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For a long time I’ve wanted a painless way of converting ebooks to speech in my text to speech application, Text2Go. Up until recently I’ve thought the best way to achieve this would be to support the PDF standard. Although PDF is ubiquitous and a great way to distribute documents that will ultimately be printed, due to its internal structure, it’s actually quite difficult to reliably extract text from a PDF document. There are a number of software libraries that can be purchased to perform this task. However these are either unreliable, overly complex, exorbitantly priced or a combination of all three. This situation has been brought about by a combination of factors, such as PDF being a proprietary format, being binary rather than text based, and being designed primarily to accurately represent a printed document.
These problems have meant that I’ve deferred adding automatic ebook conversion to Text2Go.
The ePub format changes all this as it’s the complete opposite to PDF in a number of important ways.
Firstly, ePub is an open format, not controlled or owned by any one company. This means that anyone can download the ePub specification (actually a series of standards known as OPF and maintained at the IDPF Forums). There are no licensing costs or restrictions associated with the standard.
Secondly, ePub is built on top of existing standards. This is perhaps the most important difference between ePub and PDF and the one most likely to guarantee the ultimate success of ePub.
An ePub file is actually a zip archive, containing multiple files. You can examine the contents of any ePub file simply by renaming it to a .zip file and opening it with any tool or OS that supports the zip archive format (e.g. Windows XP and above, Winzip, gzip, 7-zip, etc).
Inside a typical ePub file, you will find the following types of file.
- metadata.opf - An xml file containing information about the ebook, such as the author, publisher, title and a list of all the other files in this ePub file.
- toc.ncx - A table of contents for the ebook.
- One or more html pages, containing the ebook text.
- Any images used in the ebook, such as a cover image, and images that accompany the text. Images are stored in standard formats such as jpeg.
Notice that the standard file formats used to build the web, such as xml, html, jpg are used rather than any new, ePub-specific formats. The benefits of this approach are immeasurable. Support for all these formats is built into every modern operating system and programming language. The technology required to create an ePub reader application is the same as that required to display a web page and just about any modern computing device, be it a PC or more importantly a mobile device ships with this technology.
One of the things I love about ePub is that all text is represented in text files, be it html or xml. There is something incredibly reassuring about being able to open a file in a basic text editor and view or edit it.
Finally, the ePub format is DRM-free. This means that anyone purchasing an ePub file can rest assured that they have full access to the content, and are free to convert it to any other format, transfer and display it on any device, print it and importantly in this case, convert it to speech. Compare this to the sad state of affairs that plagues the Amazon Kindle now that publishers are disabling the TTS feature on more and more of their titles.
The ePub format doesn’t preclude the use of DRM but fortunately to date no one has come up with a DRM scheme for ePub. Personally I hope this never happens and all titles released as ePub remain completely open. At the moment buying an ebook in ePub format is a guaranteed way of knowing the title is completely DRM-free.
Unfortunately, the above two paragraphs are just my wishful thinking. There are already at least 2 DRM’ed ePub formats in existence, as pointed out by Keith Fahlgren in the comments below 
So far I’ve found developing a reader for the ePub format a relatively painless process. This is primarily due to the fact ePub uses existing standards. I’ve got a complete toolbox of software libraries I can use to read images, html, xml and zip archives. This lets me concentrate on building the text to speech conversion process. The nice thing about xml and html is that my reader can easily ignore information that’s not needed by my application. This makes for a more robust reader. Superfluous or unexpected information is simply skipped over.
I’m very excited about adding ePub support to Text2Go and can’t wait to release it. I have my eye on the ever growing collection of ebooks published on Smashwords.com, all available in ePub format.
I believe the openness of ePub coupled with the ease of implementing an ePub reader makes for a very bright future. I can only see more and more companies, organisations and individuals embracing ePub, in the same way people embraced html on the web.
Please, please, publishers, choose DRM-free and choose ePub!
Sidenote: The ePub logo used above is not an official logo. Instead it’s one of a series of free public domain logos provide by Threepress Consulting. The sad fact is that ePub still doesn’t have an official logo. David Rothman of Teleread.org lamented this fact almost two years ago.
(1 votes, average: 8 out of 10)
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It sounds like an easy job. Private detective Deacon Bishop only has to follow a beautiful woman from the airport to wherever she goes, then report her location to a lawyer. What could go wrong with that? But Bishop is known for asking too many questions. And the deeper he looks into this case, the stranger things get. Before he really knows what hit him, he’s up against his old buddies in the police homocide department, his old enemies in organized crime, and terrorists from Russia. Well, redheads always were Bishop’s weakness.
Author Michael Paulson writes a charming hard-boiled mystery
$3.99 (Introductory price of $1.00 until June 18)
200 pages
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A series of unexplained deaths shatters the serenity of a Vancouver Island girls’ school, and Tempest Ivory, child psychologist and soprano, races to solve the mystery before it claims more lives. Tempest lands a coveted lead role in Rigoletto, but as she prepares for her operatic debut, the explosive secrets lurking behind the academy walls set her on a collision course with her past.
“…draws you in compellingly from the opening page…a gripping story of death and family secrets…The characters are quirky and sympathetic.” — The Paper Chase
“…a harrowing tale of blasphemy, insanity, suicide and murder.” — Snoop Sisters Mystery Bookshoppe
“…if you enjoy psychological, twist a minute books, A Hemorrhaging of Souls is definitely for you.” — I Love A Mystery
A Hemorrhaging of Souls - trailer
For more info: please visit Nicola Furlong’s website
Buy the e-book at: iTunes
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Mike Smith’s life was crap, living all alone, years after his wife had died and his children had grown up and moved away. Then he saw the commercial for the Daffodil. Far more than other robots, the Daffodil could become anything and everything he wanted it to be. Mike’s life is about to change.
From the author of “Princess of Amathar comes the tale of the year 2032, when robots are common… not to mention, cute.
Folding back the two flaps of the box lid, Mike looked down to find it filled with packing peanuts. Brushing some of them out of the way, he almost immediately found a patch of smooth white skin. It was remarkably real looking—pearlescent on the surface and kind of peachy pink beneath, but not a single blemish or mole or hair upon it. Mike brushed more packing peanuts out onto the floor and uncovered more skin, and then plastic with black hair inside. Finally, setting the knife on the coffee table, he tipped the box over, dumping the contents into the center of the floor. White packing went everywhere. The Daffodil rolled out and came to rest on its side, facing away from him. It was curled up tightly into a ball.
At first, Mike thought he must have ordered the wrong robot. Curled up as it was, it looked like a child. He just stared at it for a moment; at its naked back and buttocks and its black hair wrapped up in plastic. Finally he kicked around through the packing peanuts. There didn’t seem to be a manual—just a single sheet of paper marked “Quick Setup”. He picked it up and looked at it. There were two pictures and no words. The first picture showed line drawing of the back of a human-looking neck, except that the neck had three round holes in it and below them a button. The second picture showed the button being pushed by a line-drawn finger. Next to the button and the finger were the numerals 1, 2, 3. Bending down, Mike lifted up the plastic wrapped hair and examined the Daffodil’s neck. There were the three holes and there was the button. He pressed it and counted aloud “one, two, three”. Then he let go.
(6 votes, average: 6.83 out of 10)
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Have a great idea for an iPhone app but don’t know any programming? Inside Secrets to an iPhone App tells you exactly how to tap into the lucrative iPhone app market.
The books offer page after page of practical advice … via the author’s own personal journey. Carla White created the popular Gratitude Journal app, which has been praised by well known sites such as Macworld and Life Hacker. Apple even secured the rights to feature my app in their advertising.
The book is available for download at iphoneappsecrets.com for $13.99, along with two free bonus books: “Interviews with the Best”, which shares conversations with the makers of iSteam, Classics, Weightbot, and the best-selling app of all time, Koi Pond; and, “How to Successfully Promote Your App”, which is full of tips and tricks on how to market an app on a shoestring budget.
For several months, Carla spent every morning from 5 to 7 a.m. working on “Gratitude Journal” before heading to her day job. The total cost for her project? Just $500, an amazing feat when you consider that it can cost upwards of $100,000 to create an iPhone app.
“Gratitude Journal” (happytapper.com) was released in December 2008 and immediately shot up to No. 2 in the Lifestyles category of iTunes’ App Store, where it remains a popular download with nearly all five-star reviews from users.
Over eighty pages of insight written by someone who created a successful iPhone app without learning a bit of programming. You also recieve two free gifts.
$13.99
82 pages + two free books
(1 votes, average: 10 out of 10)
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This is a story of love, murder, social climbing, and class privilege set in 1940s New York, a city peopled not only by fictional characters but also by the real celebrities of that time. When the showgirl Ann Arden meets Billy Grenville, heir of a New York high society family fortune, it turns out to be love at first sight. They get married, but Ann has to face her indomitable mother-in-law Alice, the patrician matriarch who strongly disapproves of the union. Ann starts her difficult social ascent, which is suddenly interrupted the night she shoots her husband and kills him, claiming that it has been a terrible accident. But even if Alice Grenville has no doubts that her son was deliberately killed, she nonetheless uses all her influence in order to save the family reputation by ensuring her daughter-in-law’s acquittal. From this moment on the Grenvilles and their upper-class friends build up a protective wall around the tragedy and, as a result, the two Mrs Grenvilles find themselves bound together in a solid conspiracy of silence that they will have to pursue for the rest of their lives.
A Must for Anyone Who Goes to Black Tie Balls in New York
This book, like the author’s book “People Like Us” is a fascinating fictionalized account of the Billy Woodward murder in 1955 by his social climbing wife. The book includes a magnificent account of how Ann Woodward lived with her guilt and ostracism for twenty more years until she and, separately, her offspring finally committed suicide. For New York City residents who are even mildly interested in the New York social scene and its various “levels”, this book is a must. It is better than “Bonfire of the Vanities” and crosses the span of four decades, making it a sort of epic novel. Note that William Woodward the 3rd just committed suicide on May 2, 1999 bringing the real-life story to a close, except for the fact that his wife is contesting his will which said that she should get nothing of the vast unlucky fortune.
–Allen MacCannell, Amazon.com
Gossipy and fun
A quasi-fictional book, this is a delicious story about the higher echelons of New York society in the 1940’s and 50’s. It was inspired by the real life of Ann and William Woodward, and William’s murder in 1955 by his wife. She was acquitted of any wrongdoing. But the murder’s way besides the point here. The fun of this book is the insider view of those high society circles. Dunne, a writer for Vanity Fair, dishes about these folks with a giggle and takes great pleasure at exposing them and their snobbish ways. The main focus is Ann Grenville (Woodward), social climber extraordinaire, who sets her sights on Billy and his money and his lifestyle. She’s a showgirl and his family wants nothing to do with her. Once they marry, she schemes constantly as to how to get accepted in those tightknit circles that usually don’t take kindly to outsiders. And she does get eventually get included, even if she’s talked about behind her back. The parties and the hobnobbing and the backstabbing all escalate and get out of hand, of course, and lead to one fateful night. A fun, gossipy, mindless read — I thoroughly enjoyed it for what it was.
– Fanoula Sevastos, Amazon.com
(1 votes, average: 6 out of 10)
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Since starting this site my goal has been to announce one new ebook every day. I’ve managed to achieve this since the site began in early November, over 210 announcements ago. However of late I feel like things have become a little too mechanical. I’ve decided to relax my policy of announcing an ebook every day. Instead I’m going to be a little more discerning in what appears on the site and aim for a more reasonable two announcements per week.
Preference will still be given to authors or publishers who create their own announcements.
Less announcements will have a couple of benefits I can see.
- More time to search out interesting ebooks.
- Announced ebooks will appear the the top of the site for longer.
- Less likely to induce RSS fatigue in those that subscribe to the eBooks Just Published theme.
I’m going to trial this new approach for a few weeks. I’d love to hear what you think.
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A popular singer finds himself in a hazy netherworld following an accident he can’t even recall. In state of forced solitude with no day or night, David Perrin’s mission is to find out what happened to him and where he went wrong in life. Along his journey, David revisits the pivotal moments of his rise to fame and is cuided by a strange angel that bears an uncanny resemblance to his music idol, laynestaley. David wants to redeem himself for his wasted life, but he must first resolve whether he’s alive or dead.
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Cinderella, save thyself…
Daughters of Change revisits legend and folklore in tales told through the eyes of four different women. Venturing through Norway, Transylvania and other familiar realms, each story depicts arduous tasks and the heroines who must master them.
In Huldre, an ancient Nordic curse rears its head, and Sigrid must conquer it or never know true love. Firewitch has young Fredrika seeking help from Transylvanian gypsies to control her fiery new power before a wicked queen can destroy her. Succubus leads Theodora into a frightening new world her lover may not survive, and Kiss Me proves it’s never too late to find love.
Archane magick, fell beasts, gypsies and witches…Can four women overcome the dark challenges thrust upon them?
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Peter Carrot-Top is an adventure series novel that takes its readers into the land of Baja, where battles takes place between the mystical wizards of the forest and a boy by the name of Peter Carrot-Top. Peter Carrot-Top was the first ghost child to be born on earth when his parents were exiled from Baja eleven years ago. Peter developed extraordinary powers with the ability to make things disappear into a black hole. His parents tried to hide his powers and where they were originally from; but as Peter got older he started asking question about who he really was. His parents could no longer hide the fact that Peter was different from the other children, with his orange hair and extraordinary gift. Peter and his parents went to the secret forest to talk to the oracle and ask if they could enter back into Baja. Peter’s parents told him of a time when the Carrot-Tops were considered royalty in Baja; of how Baja is a child’s favorite place, with fields made of popcorn and plants that produce honey milk. Peter and his family were welcomed back only to learn that they had to save the world that once exiled them by battling twelve headed monsters, seven deadly wizards, and a host of mystical creatures to preserve and save the fantasy world every child should see.
This book was fun. I could visualize the character’s performing as I was reading. Yolanda is very creative. I hope to see more works soon.
–Wanda Almberg, Amazon.com
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When Riley Quinn tees off an investigation into a suspicious death, her inquiries pitch her behind the scenes of professional women’s golf and jeopardize her new career as part-time coroner. As the tournament progresses, she finds herself sand-wedged by a villainous environmental group, a mysterious Japanese consortium and her estranged sister.
Rubbing too little sleep from my eyes, I flipped the fax’s cover sheet and stared.
Stop the killing!
You have until July 28 or you will regret it.
Golf can be dangerous!
The terse message was a shock but I have to admit, after seven years as a member of the Ladies Professional Golf Tour and almost 18 months as a teaching pro, I had no quarrel with the last line. Some of these rich yahoos may sport the latest boron graphite shafts with high kick points and modified hosels, but look out for the ubiquitous banana slice!
The cover sheet read:
Riley,
Look into this, will you? It’s the third I’ve received in the past few months. Probably some nut, but with the Classic in ten days…? See you at the ferry.
Pitts.
– Excerpt
“An outstanding effort”, The Richmond Times-Dispatch.
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Bob Stark returns to Denver after 18 years in Southeast Asia to discover that the mother he buried before he left is dead again. At her second funeral, he sees . . . himself. Is his other self a hoaxer? A doppelganger? Or is something more sinister going on? Even worse, two men who appear to be government agents are hunting him for no reason he can fathom. With the help of Kerry Casillas, a baffling young woman Bob meets in a coffee shop, he uncovers the unimaginable truth.
“I love the story of More Deaths Than One. Pat Bertram blends mystery/suspense with history very well. Her characters are strong, and I love the slow reveal of who Bob really was/is. The hints and clues Bertram drops come together for me with the jungle nightmares. The descriptions of the places Bob and Kerry visit are exquisitely done; the places sound real. I enjoyed this story very much.”
–Rachael Wollet, freelance editor.
“In More Deaths Than One, Bertram created two characters I’m ready to watch take off. The combination of Bob and the waitress is great–she’s obviously the one person he’s letting pull him out of whatever shell he’s been in. Bertram raises so many interesting questions in her initial chapter that it definitely compels me to want to read more. Why is Bob in Denver, and where has he been? Is this a story of time-shifting madness, or what? Why are the police at the funeral? And on and on! Bertram’s writing is also well-crafted and flows so well. The dialog is a strong suit.”
– Ann Barks, fellow FCC contestant.
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Things don’t go well for Toby after he moves in with his grandmother and starts school in a new town. After an encounter in the school cafeteria, he finds himself waiting in the Principal’s office. While there he discovers a book that lets him travel back and forth to another world where he meets an eccentric hermit and makes new friends. Toby soon finds that his new friends are also having problems and he has to decide how to help them.
At home, Toby is still adjusting to his wacky grandmother. She drives a customized VW, collects cat figurines, and sends him to Alice’s Food Emporium to pick up exotic foods.
Then Toby discovers he’s not the only one who knows about the book. He is chased by bullies, has more meetings with the Principal, and is being watched by a mysterious librarian. Can Toby help his new friends and keep the book from falling into the wrong hands?
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A young D.C. history professor is lured to a cursed mythical island in the Mediterranean sea, where he thinks he will be teaching Greek students American history. Within twenty-four hours, he has met all eleven professors, one of which is from New York City. Immediately, the two of them are drawn to each other by Elizabeth’s fear and Markus’s overwhelming need to protect her (but from what)? While on a hike in the Black Forest, the professors become separated from their guide. That is when their dangerous quest for survival begins. Horrified, Elizabeth throws herself into Markus’s arms. Before she knows it, fear turns into passion, passion into love. As the Black Forest comes alive, a strange Greek mythical creature begins stalking them, endangering their lives. Unexpectedly, a Guardian comes to their rescue, leading them on an adventurous quest to a magical place of beauty, where they learn the true reason why they both were lured to this strange, unknown island. That’s when they learn their true purpose, and the real quest begins.
(2 votes, average: 7.5 out of 10)
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