New Cover

I have been tinkering with the cover of my book on Amazon. I made some minor changes to it. Let me know what you think.

Week End in Review

Well, it was a great weekend. Friday night I finished the third game of my Modern Chain of Command campaign before they returned home. Saturday was spent attempting to get the house straightened up before the family came back. The family returned all safe and sound but exhausted from travel. I was glad to have them back. Mission Accomplished.

CSS Appomattox

I am not sure if there is any meaning to the stats that Amazon places on their various books. There is a section called product details that lists some items about the book. These include file size, length, the unique ID number of the book and so on. At the very bottom of this is a section called: "Amazon Best Sellers Rank."

I have no clue if this has any meaning or not but I was intrigued. As of this morning, this is what it listed:
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #18,757 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#33 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Alternative History
#59 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Historical > Alternate History

Now this is interesting to me. This is the best ranking I have had on Amazon. I have not been out there long but still, this in neat. To put things in perspective, In the Name of Roma's ranking is: "Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,304,722 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)."

The two lines below the Sellers rank are new to me. I have no clue of how many books are in each category but I am actually rather pleased that this showed up at all.

In addition to this, I now have 3 reviews for the book. Two are five stars and one is a four star. The four star review was extremely helpful to me. It was great feedback that is helping me improve the book. The other two just made me feel good.

Anyway, I have started on the sequel. I know where I am going with the story and that is kind of exciting. The hardest part is coming up with a good name for the book. Going by most of the working titles of my scenario supplements, I really stink at it. Rich came up with all of the good ones. For instance, I came up with "Campaign for Greece" while Rich came up with "This Land Divided."

CSS Appomattox One Week Later

Thank you to everyone that has purchased the book on Amazon. I have sold books now not only in the US and in England, but I have also made sales in Australia and Canada as well. Something In the Name of Roma did not achieve.

If you are one of the ones who bought the book, can you do me a favor and let me know what you think. Either post here on the blog, on Amazon, out on DriveThruFiction or just shoot me an e-mail. Let me know if it was worth your time or if there is something I really need to fix. Any feed back will help me get better at this.

I am still working on a better cover. Hopefully I can get something together that will be more eye catching. Any suggestions? Also I am fiddling about with the Amazon Affiliate program. If you are feeling generous, please take a look at the book through the link below.

CSS Appomattox is Published

I have just published my first novel, CSS Appomattox. This story is about the adventures of a Confederate Airship crew captained by Thomas Devareaux. The book is alternative history and a touch steampunk (but only a touch). The time period is the 1880s and the Confederacy has entered into a mutual defense treaty with Spain and is involved in protecting the Spanish Caribbean possessions from the Empire of Germany.

This is the current cover of the book. My graphics layout talents are not the best but I kind of like it. I have been told that the font is all wrong for it but I could not figure out a better one. Any amateur artists want to take a shot at it? :)

I am selling it on both Amazon and DriveThruFiction. Both places I have the book up for $2.99. I never know what to charge for things so I looked at other similar length self published stuff to come up with this price. Time will tell how it does.

What I would really appreciate is reviews on both sites. If you are so kind as to get a copy, please let me know what you think even if you decide not to publish a review.

CSS Appomattox - Novel and Roman Stuff

Well, I have submitted my book to some folks who are proof reading it. It looks like by the end of the month I might be able to put it up on Amazon. That might be wishful thinking given the notes I received on the first chapter.

I think I mentioned this project once before. It is set close to 1880 in an alternative history where the Confederacy won its independence through the recognition of France and Great Britain. The Confederacy has aligned itself with Spain and is fending off the colonial ambitions of the Germans who are trying to seize Puerto Rico.

I am excited to have this project mostly completed. This puts 2 items close to being published (Mud and Blood supplement that Rich is working on).

Roman Stuff

The tower now has a base that it is resting on. I am trying to figure out how to do the stone work for the base. I will be cutting up some matchsticks to frame it and provide the base for the ladder to reach the door. Next up will be making the tiled roof. I am not sure why I want to go with a tiled roof other than I just want to. I have a plan for how I will go about this. It will be based on round, plastic coffee stirrers. Basically, I plan on cutting them in half long ways. Then over lap them to provide the tile look. Glue the mess together and when it is dry, cutting it in strips and gluing it down. It probably won't work but I have high hopes. I will try to take pictures as I go.

Next up are some more Roman Auxiliaries. The miniatures are done all but for basing and shields. The standing pack of CB roman auxiliaries all came with the shields as part of the miniature. These had the shields separate. I actually like that better. I have the shields painted except for the edges. Then I still need to dip them in my watered Windsor and Newton ink and varnish. The designs are the same as the other Romans but I don't think I had quite as steady a hand this time. I will probably base the miniatures first before finishing off the shields.

I only have 2 more packs of CB auxiliaries left to paint. Both are with swords drawn. They should be at least started before the week is out. I will then have 34 auxiliaries. That is a less than half strength centuria but enough lead to start pushing around the table to see if some of my ideas will work. I will probably get a bag of Rebel minis Auxilia to flesh the centuria out. Any day I should get my QRF centurions.

That is it for this update. Hopefully I will have more soon and with pictures.