The Book

I can't understand why a person will take a year to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars.
- Fred Allen

Well, for what it's worth, my mystery novel will soon be available for sale on Amazon. The cost will be $12.95 (I think), plus shipping. It will not be carried in bookstores, but bookstores can order it.

For those who have not been subjected to reading the manuscript, this is the description of the book from Amazon:

THE DARK NIGHT MURDERS takes place in Pastrana, Spain in 1572 and is based on an actual incident in the life of John of the Cross, a Catholic friar and a close associate of Teresa of Avila, foundress and reformer of the Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. At her instigation he visits a monastery where new members are reportedly subjected to brutal physical penances. John's primary task is to correct the abuses, although Teresa has asked him to look for other problems. He is accompanied by Pedro de los Angeles, a young lay brother. John discovers that the stories of abuse are true, but before he can act an unknown youth wearing the Carmelite habit is discovered dead in the monastery. John struggles to discover the murderer against a background of suspicion, resistance, visions and political tensions in the Spanish court of King Philip II.

This is all possible through an Amazon service called CreateSpace, which does all the production and shipping and marketing through Amazon without any upfront payment by the author. It is a compromise between a regular publishing and what is sometimes called a vanity press, where the author pays to have a few thousand copies printed and then has to sell them himself. The proof copy arrived today, and there are several corrections that have to be made before it is ready to go. But it is coming soon! I'll let you know when that happy day arrives.

Don't expect to see it on any best sellers lists, but it is finally out there and I will actually make a couple of bucks if anyone buys one.

(Hint, hint.)