SMASHWORDS Summer Sale Results

The 2016 SMASHWORDS promotion is ending in a few hours and once again it has been a big success. The trend this year was for readers to download the other books in the series besides book 1 - The Juno Letters - an indication there were a lot of return readers. I was especially pleased with the results for the last published book, The Shadow's Speed. It was the most downloaded book of the series for the month of July.

Concurrent with the SMASHWORDS promo was the release of the working draft of The Bishop's Ring. Fifty-four readers opted to take a look at this work in progress in July - up considerably from the draft for Shadow when I first started offering this version. I have had a lot of helpful comments and a couple of "What the heck?" questions. I will be posting the next upgrade hopefully by the first week of August and will continue to offer First Look options on future works.

Thanks to all of you who jumped on either one of these offers. You referrals to family and friends form the background of The Juno Letter's success in the crowded e-book marketplace.

Story Draft Update - The Bishop's Ring v4

I have uploaded a major rework of the story draft of The Bishop's Ring. If you have delved into the meat of the story, some of the changes are:

• The clerk has the seal;
• Lowe does not sell one of the jade pieces in Menen;
• Only two pieces enter the story, streamlining the conclusion

If you haven't read that far, no harm, no foul.

From here on in most of the inconsistencies and mistakes will be minor ones - I hope. I will begin revamping some dialog in preparation for the final draft that goes to my editor. Feel free to get the newest version, and check back often - I make incremental upgrades all the time.

What's New - the link to the story draft.

Good reading.

The Bishop's Ring - Story Draft

Well, it's been a wee bit since I posted anything here - I've been consumed with writing book #8 - The Bishop's Ring. It has been a tough one to say the least. Sometimes things come easily, sometimes not - this one has taken so many twists and turns as I struggled with just how to develop the story that I must have rewritten the entire story line a half-dozen times.

But it is done - the story draft anyway. And you can download it in ePub or Kindle versions from What's New.

The story draft is the first entire story line - with the caveat that a LOT of editing remains. I post each new revision as they are completed. This allows my readers to follow the progress of the final drafts. Sometimes I get feedback, but I am not after free editors. So feel free to take a look - understand that things will change. You can share this link with friends, and if you are on my email list (go to the website - junoletters.com) you will get the final version for free when it is published.

This will be the last of The Juno Letters series per se, but The Bishop's Ring sets the stage for the next series - new characters, a heroine instead of me as the main character, and some new twists and turns. So good reading!

L.W. Hewitt

The Shadow's Speed - Story Draft 2

DOWNLOAD the new version at junoletters.com/whats_new.php

Thanks to all of you that downloaded the first story draft. You may have noticed some odd things if you read through the entire story. I warned you ... here are some of the Round 2 updates:

Armin/Ambrose Ziegler-Shaffer-Keller
This character mysteriously morphed into several names as the story progressed. This actually happens often as I write in small "snippets" that are not necessarily connected and not sequential. Seldom does a character have as many names as poor Armin, but he is much better now. Even though he is dead.

The Red Circle Climax
If you managed to read through to the near-end, the sequence at the Red Circle in Munich has undergone some consistency changes - both in the lead up and the execution of the journal drop. It will go through another integration starting today. It uses what I have seen called the "Texas Two-Step" or the "Double Shuffle" technique - a series of rapid-fire sequences, mostly dialogue, that make a climax event move very quickly. It is a challenge to get the sequence right with so little space allocated for each one. It is not quite right, yet.

The Cover
This version has both the preliminary chapter quotes and a temporary cover. The cover is under design and this is a placeholder, but it will give you an idea of what the final product may look like.

Typoes and othr crazzy ishoes

I caught the majority of the typos and edits in this iteration. Thanks to all of you that refrained from scolding me too much ... the story draft is not meant for prime time. I run through a whole list of standard edits: "all of" to "all"; eliminating overuse of "that"; catching phases used too many times; and of course simple typos and errors. The free-writing process results in a pretty messy document but it does come together in time.

The Shadow's Speed is on track for its debut in February. Thanks for all your comments, and have a Happy Holiday!

Larry

Story Draft - The Shadow's Speed

The Shadow's Speed - book 7 of The Juno Letters series - is now available for readers to download. This is the STORY DRAFT - the first time the entire story is compiled. It is not yet edited - that process has begun and will continue for the next two months. The finished book is scheduled for release February 1, 2016.

You are welcome to download either an ePUB or a Kindle version in it entirety; or you can simply preview the Prologue and Chapter 1. In either case just go to What's New on the Junoletters site and click the appropriate link.

One quick note - I am NOT looking for free editors. You are welcome to send me your thoughts, but we will be examining everything in the coming weeks. Like I said, this is a draft.

I hope you have a wonderful holiday with family and friends, and hope to hear from you sometime.

Happy Holidays,

L.W. Hewitt

Building Toward a Mobile Future

I uploaded the dedicated Juno Letters mobile site today. While my basic web design works fine on tablets, and was acceptable on my iPhone despite its truncated size, it is clear that mobile sites and apps are beginning to play a bigger role in the ebook business. There are fundamental differences in the approach to mobile sites. While the main Juno web site has lots of special features, samples, even a video, the mobile version is slimmed down and simple - present the premise for the series, show the books, provide the sales links to all of the major resellers, and provide a way to communicate with me through a secure form.

One of the things I did was build a routine where if you come to The Juno Letters with a mobile device the browser automatically redirects to go the mobile version. That's not all that difficult. But what if you want more of the full features in the main site and do not want to wait to get on board with a full-screen computer? Thanks to the programming magic of Php I built a routine that lets you choose to go from MOBILE to FULL-SCREEN with a mobile device. The system remembers that's what you wanted to do until you select a home screen button that takes you back to mobile.

Ah, the curse of programming. My twenty-some years in technology sometimes creeps back in and ruins my day. Tomorrow I go back to writing book 7. I will build functionality as I see the need in the mobile site, however. Those of us in this business who don't respect the changing landscape will run the risk of being left sitting alongside the margin.

Let me know what you think about the mobile site. Just go to "junoletters.com" with an iPhone or other smart phone and let the site do the work. If you discover any bugs, break out there "Raid" and drop me a line with the contact form, or at junoletters@icloud.com. I hope to get the video up - still having issues getting the permission to use the music.

Good reading.

Last call for SMASHWORDS and kudos to Google Earth

This is the last call for the SMASHWORDS promo - visit junoletters.com/smashwords.php for details.

I write about the great wars of the twentieth century - a rich playground of drama. It is not hard to find micro-events to weave a new story around. In 1943 the Americans launched the Alsos Mission - a vintage version of "Mission Impossible" to locate information on secret Nazi weapons (specifically the atom bomb), capture Nazi scientists, and prevent the Soviets from beating them to the punch. The story of Alsos is full of intrigue, and great twists and turns.

Look for a treatment of this clandestine operation in my new book - still untitled. One of the plot vehicles I use is to find small stories and insert my characters as players within them - blurring the boundary between history and fiction. This looks like a good one.

To make this plausible I use a lot of technology to build an accurate context for the story. One of the most useful resources is Google Earth. While I have travelled through Europe, you simply could never visit enough locations within a lifetime to flush out the details of a series of novels. Instead, I walk the streets of villages and cities using Street View and use real buildings, real cafes, real streets, real vistas ... a sort of fictional travelogue. I receive email from people who have either visited or plan to visit these locations, and even had one reader give a copy of The Clan of the Black Sun to the owner of Le Cafe Reuban Vert in Paris - my private haunt in the series.

I will post updates about Book 7 as the story progresses. And as usual, I always like to hear your story ideas and suggestions.

Good reading ... L.W. Hewitt