Tag Archives: Kindle

Using Archive.org to Research Your Novel

The Internet Archive, archive.org, has to be one of the most valuable resources for any historical novelist. The Internet Archive contains a lot of things from archived versions of internet pages, to audio and visual material including films. But for me the most valuable resource is the number of scans of old, out of copyright books. In particular the number of printed editions published in the 19th century of historical documents such as chronicles, registers, parliamentary documents etc, is simply staggering. A number of these books have been scanned from the collections of various libraries and in particular large US Universities, so if you want material from non-English speaking countries then other resources might be better. And sometimes they haven’t scanned every book you might come across. For my research of the Pontvallain campaign I did find that other repositories of material were useful as well, but by far the largest source has been the Internet Archive.

You might say – “hasn’t Google books” scanned a lot of out of copyright books? Yes you’d be right – as have Microsoft. But often the best place to find these scans is at the Internet Archive – for whatever reason Google Books often doesn’t display the full version of these scans and the Internet Archive is easier to use.

So how do you get started?

I am assuming that you already have your bibliography together. If you need to research titles then somewhere else might be a better place – probably a general history of the period with good footnotes and bibliography of primary sources.

For this example I am going to be searching and downloading the Issue Roll of Thomas de Brantingham, bishop of Exeter, Lord High Treasurer of England…, A.D. 1370, ed. F. Devon (1835)

1. Searching

I would suggest you search by the title of the document rather than the author name. The search box is pretty straightforward, but if you search for the Editor here, Devon, you get the following:

search - devon

But using the title you get:

search results

2. Which Title

There are likely to be different copies of each text – presumably because scan have been provided by different libraries. I would generally choose the one with the most downloads as its likely that other users have found this to be in the best conditions – some scans can be messed up – blurred images, bent pages!

3. Book summary page

This is where you see the metadata for each book. Key things you might want to check are the publication date, copyright information and language. On the left you will see a list of file types. Ignore this list! Go straight to the link for All Files. If you go straight to PDF for example here, you might be redirected to Google Books and then find you can’t get the PDF for some reason – but you can.

book page

4. All Files list

I would always select the file type ending .pdf as this will be the best version. Sometimes you will have the option to choose colour or black and white – the colour version looks pretty but takes longer to download.

All files

5. Download!

Be warned this can take sometime – each PDF might well be 50 MB or more in size. So be patient.

downloading

6. What about Kindle, ePub, text versions!

Well unfortunately as these are scans of books producing images the text is not particularly well rendered, so you may well get nonsense. Some of the text comes out fine, but some will be rubbish. See the example below:

text nonsense

This is from the text file, but the text is used to make the ePub, Kindle formats as well, so you will have the same problem.

PDF is the best option.

Check out the Archive

I hope this guide has been useful. The Internet Archive really is a great resource for any historical novelist or anyone with an interest in history and in particular primary sources.

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How Sustainable is the $0.99 ebook Price Point

inflation
inflation (Photo credit: SalFalko)

In terms of eBooks the $0.99 price point is still very common – its taken some criticism over the last few years, but by and large a lot of self-published and public domain classics still retain the $0.99 price point. I don’t use it for pricing my novel length titles, but I do have some short stories at that price.

But how long will it last? Surely with the effects of inflation we won’t always have the $0.99 price? The retailers will realize the costs associated with selling titles at this price are unsustainable at some point. When will that be?

I thought it would be interesting to see how much the revenue for indie/self-published publishers has declined at the $0.99 price point over the last few years and what might happen in the future.

I’m not economics expert, so if my maths is awry then let me know. I used a US Inflation Calculator to do the sums.

Let’s say you started publishing titles in 2010 at $0.99. If you are publishing via Amazon you get 35% of that back in royalties, which is $0.35/sale according to the reports I get from Amazon.

That $0.35 is now worth in reality $0.33, 6.8% less than it was worth in 2010. That’s quite a dramatic difference! Customers are paying effectively the equivalent of $0.99 – assuming of course their disposable income has increased at the same rate as inflation.

What would happen if inflation was a similar rate for the next 5 years say?

If you go with an inflation rate of 2% a year, then $0.99 in 2018 is worth only $0.89 now, the royalty is $0.32, not too bad perhaps, but still a 10% reduction. If you applied that over all your sales you can see that sticking at a $0.99 is unsustainable.

I think it’s likely that those sticking with the $0.99 will inevitably have to start putting up prices fairly soon. And I suspect there will be more pressure from retailers to decrease the royalties on books below a certain price.

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Hell has its Demons – Free on Kindle this weekend

Hell has its DemonsMy new novel, Hell has its Demons, will be free on the Kindle this weekend.

The promotion should be starting today, Friday, 28th June, and will last until Saturday.

Get it while you can at Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | and their other stores!

Here’s a bit more about the book:

What if the demons portrayed in the Middle Ages were real and could be conjured by necromancers?

And what if those seeking power decided to use demons to get what they wanted? In Hell has its Demons a plot unfolds to use demons to take the ultimate prize of all – the crown of Edward III, King of England.

Investigating an infestation of demons in the town of St Brett’s is the last thing that Jake Savage wants to do this summer. But for his master, the controversial Oxford scholar Roger Sotil, it is a chance to prove that demons can be conjured and avoid charges of heresy.

In St Brett’s Roger sees demons possessing the townspeople. Jake thinks they are just acting very strangely. The people are scared and want answers fast. A beautiful woman, Isabel Haukwake, is accused of witchcraft. Roger feels sure that she isn’t guilty. Jake knows she isn’t. He was once engaged to marry her, until his father took her from him.

Hell has its Demons is the first novel in a trilogy.

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Quick update from me and a question about eReaders

Just a quick update to let anyone who is interested know that I have some stuff to announce soon – a short story collection and some new short stories as well – 3 I think that I haven’t announced on the blog yet. However, I’m waiting for them to filter into all the different eBook channels before announcing them – some are very fast (Amazon/Kobo) but some are rather slow – Barnes & Noble for instance, but despite this I would like to give them all a fair crack of the whip. So when that finally happens I will announce each new publication.

Although I do publish a lot of my work as eBooks, I don’t actually have an eReader as such – I occasionally use my iPad. However, I have considered requesting one for Christmas, and with Kobo and Nook now available in the UK, that at last means there is more choice. Any recommendations? How does the Nook match up against the Kindle? I would be interested to hear your views.

Little Boy Found – New Science Fiction Short Story Free for Kindle until Sunday

I have published a new science fiction short story called Little Boy Found as an eBook for the Kindle. It will be free from Friday to Sunday via these links:

Little Boy Found on Amazon US

Little Boy Found on Amazon UK

Here’s some more information about the story:

Alone in space, one little boy is a long way from home.

His ship has been damaged beyond repair and he is the only survivor. The boy’s only chance of rescue is a spaceship captained by Paddy Smith. But this spaceship belongs to an opposing civilisation that believes in the benefits of Artificial Intelligence. The boy’s own Kingdom of Kes regards Artificial Intelligence as an abomination.

Caught up in a war between two ideologies how will the little boy find his way home?

Little Boy Found is a science fiction short story.

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Demon River now free on Amazon for a limited time only

Until the end of Monday my short story Demon River will be free for download to the Kindle.

Demon River on Amazon US
Demon River on Amazon UK

Set in a fantasy world of dark magic, Benetus, the King’s chancellor, fears the return of a rival he had thought banished from court. Benetus turns to the help of demons to rid himself of his enemy. But things are not always as they seem in the spirit world.

“Recently I had even felt the beginnings of optimism. After years of cloud and storm, the sun had broken through and I could at last bask in the success that I deserved. After all, who else now stood between me and the ear of the King?”

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Demon River Promotion – Free on Kindle from 2nd March to 4th March 2012

My fantasy short Demon River is now free for Kindle for three days, from 2nd March 2012 to 4th March 2012. Enjoy!

Set in a fantasy world of dark magic, Benetus, the King’s chancellor, fears the return of a rival he had thought banished from court. Benetus turns to the help of demons to rid himself of his enemy. But things are not always as they seem in the spirit world.

“Recently I had even felt the beginnings of optimism. After years of cloud and storm, the sun had broken through and I could at last bask in the success that I deserved. After all, who else now stood between me and the ear of the King?”

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