Indie Genre Zines are on Fire

My view on the E-book has changed immensely over the last several years. Even last year when I wrote Why E-books won’t Kill the Writing Stars, I assumed that the current fad with e-books was one that would coincide with their paper versions and serve very few other purposes. A little while later I wrote another post, The Game has Changed, which spoke about John Locke and the emergence of self publishing in the current electronic reading phenomenon.

I never imagined the impact e-books and e-readers would have upon the writing community. With the advent of such easily accessible and cost effective literature on hand, the potential for writers to embrace broader markets is full of amazing possibilities. Just recently on my new Kindle Fire, I picked up an indie magazine Abomination and several other smaller e-zines and the quality is amazing. Without the capability of discovering such publication, I would never have been introduced to now some of my favorite authors of short stories.

 

The possibility for new magazines to flourish in our new e-book age is empowering to all those indie-at-heart writers out there. The next several years will be interesting as to how the market may shift to favor self-publishing/small presses. Let’s see what the time brings.

 

So what do you think of indie-magazines and the e-book? Think it will supersede the print-book? Think it already has? Leave your comments below!

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The Game has Changed

On June 20th, 2011- 60 year old John Locke has hit a quota few can actually brag about: selling over one million e-books on Kindle. Amanda Hocking (the young self-pub author who I mentioned in this article here) claims she has also sold one million e-books, but not on Kindle yet. With Amazon, Barnes n’ Nobles, and now even private publishers taking the role in the e-book trade, what will be left of the paper world? E-books are now the most convenient format of literacy, available across Kindles, Nooks, I-pads, smart phones, computers and any other device that has a screen and an internet connection! I’m a fan of books (just love the smell of a newly purchased book in my hand), but now I wonder if in this next decade how such printed books will fair against their versatile competitors.

I first came across e-books sometime back in 2006, when I was only thirteen. A man I had known from Boy Scouts (yeah, yeah shut up), carried around a Palm PDA that he would use to carry phone numbers and important stuff like that. He knew my interest in books, so he pulled me aside one day and showed me something called an e-book. Essentially, it looked like a .txt file just displayed across the screen, but it was the start of a revolution we are witnessing now in this day. Of course, learning of this I booted up my dial-up and searched for any sort of e-book area. I can’t remember spotting any huge sites, except maybe E-pub, and the Gutenberg Project (a collection of public domain books, free of charge). Nothing seemed to interest me. Even back then, before the e-book hoarder frenzy, I’d Google Harry Potter e-books and find a thousand listings of pirated scans or crude type ups of the original tale. Now J.K. Rowling is releasing her HP tales via Pottermore.

Vampire Diaries Author Fired… old news but…..

Well I may be a day(several months) or so late on this one, but I figured I’ll bring this up to those of you who are still in the dark (if anyone is). If you are unfamiliar with the series, it is a vampire-romance-esque sort of series that was published as a trilogy back in 1991. Pressure from fans forced L.J. Smith to write a fourth novel and equal pressure/encouragement would lead to another eleven or so books being constructed. This is old news, but I read a post on the Anne Rice fanpage a piece of news delivered at The Wertzone regarding the firing off L.J. Smith from her own series. Though she will still be recognized as the creator of the franchise, she will no longer be working on any future novels in the series.

Bummer.

Now in all legality there was no foul-play conducted. Harper Collins owns the copyright, not the author so they can use the work as they choose. How about morally? Supposedly, the reason she was booted from the series was her take on the new trilogy being written. Smith was deviating away from core character relationships strengthened in the early novels. So they fired her?

Why Ebooks won’t kill the Writing Stars

Creativity is an object of desire which cultivates due to the easier techonological mediums of the day. In 1440 we saw Johannes Gutenberg create the first printing press under the Holy Roman Empire. Several hundred years later we see the rise of the trade-paper back, and when the late 1990s came whizzing by we first were faced with the rise of the E-book. Now over ten years later we have E-readers, and E-book sales are growing in proportion with each month.

Will paper prints die?

Not for the next thirty or so years. As long as the babyboomers are still alive and well they will continue to buy paperbooks. Some people love the feel of paper in between their fingers, and the smell of a new paperback is amazing. I for one, have a Nook and I do read novels on there, but I also have tons of books off on my shelves.

Eighth Harry Potter book revealed!

This morning J.K. Rowling has stated that the eight book in the Harry Potter series

Hogwarts

will be released as early as July 14th, 2011. The novels title is currently unrealeased, however, Rowling has stated that it may reflect something of a darker merit. The seven book chronicles of the young wizard have taken a different turn as Harry Potter, the chosen one, now works as an auror for the ministry and his three children are attending a now rebuilt Hogwarts.

The series that spawned major motion pictures which have drawn in over $5 billion dollars in revenue, now are looking to release the novel rather suddenly. Rowling’s agent believes that by doing so a more exclusive release shall be held in London, New York and Paris exclusively; a larger booktour may follow as the second-part of the Deathly Hallows movie is released.