I would like to welcome Michael Cargill to The Avid Reader today. Thanks for stopping by Michael. Please be sure and check out Michael's novel Underneath. I have an excerpt of Underneath for you to read. Oh and check out Michael's guest blog: Ebook piracy, and why authors should embrace it, rather than fight it.
Book Title: Underneath
Author: Michael Cargill
ASIN: B008C3HIA2
Published: June 17th 2012
Publisher: Smashwords
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 127
PURCHASE
Underneath
BOOK TRAILER
Underneath
BLURB
Underneath
Look at the person sitting just across from you. It doesn't matter whether they're a loved one, a friend, or a complete stranger.
Now look at their face. Are they happy? Are they sad? Or are they angry? Can you even tell?
How well do you actually know the people closest to you?
Have you ever seen the real person that lies just underneath what you see...?
EXCERPT
Underneath
For most of the night he was friendly, charming and flirty. A couple of times, however, she thought she saw something unsettling and sinister about him. It was something she would never be able to actually explain, but it was as if she had seen another person somewhere underneath his pleasant exterior. Someone who was snarling at her. Ready to pounce. To smash her face, again and again, against the table if she didn't give him what he wanted. Or worse.
However, it was nothing more than a glimpse that she saw out the corner of her eye, and when she looked back it was gone. It was just Hugh sitting there, smiling and laughing as he always did. She put it down to nerves, and the fact that she was in an unfamiliar place with a man she had only met the other day; the wine was also clouding her judgement.
After a while, she felt completely at ease in his company.
Later on, they went to another venue that had a dance floor. He whispered in her ear that he also found the absence of her brassiere very liberating. She laughed, and playfully slapped his hands away.
They walked back to his apartment, sliding across one or two car bonnets on the way. It was late and dark when they got to the complex, so there was no-one hanging around outside, but Hugh didn't even notice. He was too busy giving Abigail a piggy back to care about anything else. As they took the lift up to his floor, in the mirror's reflection Abigail thought she saw that sinister look on Hugh's face once more. Yet when she looked back, it was gone.
The lift doors opened and when they stepped out, Abigail saw some straws lying on the floor of the corridor. She yelped in delight, and kicked at two that were lying right next to each other. One of them shot off across the floor, whilst the other one looped up into the air and hit her on the forehead. She screamed with laughter. Hugh couldn't help, but smile.
"Where the bloody hell did they come from?" she asked.
REVIEWS: Amazon
Underneath
"After finishing this book, I had to sit for a while and think about how I really felt about the story presented. It does take you to another level of thinking and wondering...What does the person you are in contact with at this moment really think underneath the exterior?" K Meador
"The narration is split into two parts where you observe the main character of Hugh alongside two police officers, until ultimately the connecting segments join together in the most dramatic climax of an astonishing ending. I found the character of Hugh extremely fascinating and intriguing, as his dual personality was one that mesmerized and made me want to read on to find out more." Lucinda
"This story is cleverly written, it's rare that you can follow a character, get inside their head, dislike them intensely and then be completely surprised by a revelation that completely explains why they are the way they are. Hats off to Michael for his clever character portrayals." Joanna Barker
GUEST BLOG
Ebook piracy, and why authors should embrace it, rather than fight it
Literature is something of a latecomer to the digital revolution. In some ways, this is quite surprising, as it predates other forms of entertainment like computer games, film, and TV by several thousand years. Mind you, the older generations are often the slowest to get to grips with anything new. After all, when was the last time you heard your granddad talk about getting an Xbox?
Some of the growing pains for ebooks, have been the same ones that other forms of digital media have gone through, and still are going through. Piracy is one such pain.
The mere mention of the word 'piracy' generates quite an angry response from many people, whether they are a writer, or a reader.
To those people, I say you should perhaps step back, and rethink things a bit. I'm an indie author, and I know for a fact that my work is available to download from torrent/pirate websites. I know this to be a fact, as it was me who put them there in the first place.
Before I go any further, I'll just mention a few things, to provide some context. Firstly, you won't see me on any bestseller lists anywhere, not unless that list is based on an otherwise empty shelf. Yes, woe is me, get out the violin and all that.
Secondly, years ago, I used to be something of a profligate pirate myself. My hard drive was chock full of computer games, applications, films, and TV shows. I knew lots of other people who did the same thing as well.
Lastly, I have no formal legal education, or training. This puts me at around about the same level as that bloke in the pub, who insists that it's perfectly legal to shoot a Welshman with a crossbow, so long as you do it outside the city walls, on a Wednesday afternoon.
Just to be clear, I have no intention of getting involved with the tedious, semantic differences between copyright infringement, and theft. I'm also mainly talking about the financial impact of piracy, rather than the copyright side of things.
So then: why did I upload my own work to some torrent sites? Well, "Why not?", is my response. At the moment, practically no-one knows about me. My ability to market myself is largely limited to blogs, Twitter, and pinning posters up on the trees along my road. Now that my work is available by torrents, I have added one more avenue for readers to find me. I created threads on the torrent site forums, informing them all of what I did. I got a few replies from people thanking me, and wishing me luck. In the few days following on from this, I had an increase in the number of hits to my blog, from people searching for terms like "Michael Cargill author" on Google. Prior to doing this, that had never happened before.
Of course, the usual retort to this is "You don't get money from pirates!", to which I say is a load of poppycock.
As I mentioned earlier, I was once a profligate pirate myself. Yet, despite the fact that my hard drives were heaving with illegally downloaded material, my shelves were also teeming with legally purchased material as well.
And the same goes for many people who pirate things. There are numerous studies that show that the people who illegally download the most music, are also some of the biggest purchasers of music. This won't be true for all of them, of course, but it is a fact that cannot be ignored.
It's also important to recognise that just because someone illegally downloads a book, or a film, or a song, it doesn't necessarily mean that the copyright owner has lost a sale. For a start, pirates will often download stuff that they have no intention of ever using. They'll often do it, just because they can. I mean, who wouldn't want to download the latest version of AutoCAD if the opportunity is there...?
A quick search on a torrent site reveals that I can download the entire works of Stephen King, in about fifteen minutes. That's everything that he has ever published, about sixty five books in total, right there on the Internet. Ebooks are small in size, so they take no time at all to pirate. However, to say that anyone who downloads them all has denied Mr King of sixty five books worth of royalty fees, is wrong.
First of all, very few people will ever go out and purchase that many books at once. Secondly, that pirate simply isn't going to read all sixty five of those books either. He or she may read one of them, and enjoy it. However, they aren't that likely to immediately read another Stephen King book. They are more likely to read something from someone else, whether it's pirated, or legally bought.
The reading habits of a pirate are exactly the same as those of a 'normal' reader. They will talk about it to their friends, and family. They will join in with the discussions about it on Goodreads. They leave reviews on Amazon, Goodreads, and their blog. After illegally sampling an author's work, they may go on and purchase legitimate copies of their work. This is something I did when I was a pirate. It's what I witnessed other people who pirated media do, as well. It's what some of the studies into piracy have shown, as well.
Of course, you don't have to just take this indie's word for it. Bestselling author Neil Garman has taken a similar stance to ebook piracy. He even made a video on YouTube about it, that is still available to watch, though he is someone who made his name (and fortune) long before ebooks ever existed.
It's also worth bearing in mind that you can't actually fight piracy, either. For every anti-piracy method that is put in place, it is easily defeated. Companies can spend thousands implementing an anti-piracy scheme, only to see it cracked within hours of its release.
An author could spend a huge amount of time, scouring all corners of the Internet, trying to hunt down those elusive illegal links to their work. Yet, all that time is wasted. It took me less than five minutes for me to put my own work up on a torrent site, but it might take days for a furious copyright owner to get something removed from a website.
Many people will say "if everyone pirated books, then authors would starve!" Now, whilst that might be true, it's also true that if everyone flushed their toilets at once, the sewer system would collapse. The fact is, that not everyone will pirate books. At least part of this is down to the fact that it requires a certain level of technical knowledge to pirate, that many people struggle to get over. Some Kindle owners simply don't know how to manually copy ebooks onto their device.
To be honest, I probably have more sympathy for the readers, than I do the authors. They can be understandably annoyed when they see someone stealing books, and getting them for free, rather than paying for them. In writing this short article, I'm not expecting to drastically change anyone's mind. However, the piracy debate has been raging for a long time now, and it really needs a more level-headed approach. None of the heavy-handed antics employed so far have put so much as a dent in it.
I think we should embrace it, rather than hate it.
Study: Piracy Does Not Deter the Production of Music, Films, Books
Study Shows That BitTorrent Piracy Doesn't Affect U.S. Box Office Profits
Neil Garman video
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael works in IT by day, and has heard the words "Yuck, I hate computers" more times than he cares to count.
Although generally a fan of thriller-suspense stories, he is also something a WWII enthusiast. By this, he means that he likes reading about WWII; he has no desire to travel back in time, and actually be a WWII soldier. Everything was black and white back in those days, so telling the difference between a blood stain, and a coffee stain is almost impossible.
Michael is a new author, and he published his first story in mid-2011. Underneath is his debut novel, and he cites Stephen King, John Grisham, and James Herbert as influences.
Michael is as much a humorist as he is a novelist, and his website is chock full of hilariously irreverent and sarcastic articles.
Anyone looking to sample his work, should check out Shelter from Thunder. It is short, and available for free on Amazon, Smashwords, and Barnes and Noble.
Interestingly, he thinks that authors should be more willing to embrace piracy. He uploaded his own work to numerous torrent sites, and links to them are available on his website.
LINKS AND STUFF
Be sure and check out all the other stops on the tour.
TOUR SCHEDULE
Nov. 21 - Terri - (excerpt)
Nov. 22 - Think - (guest post/giveaway)
Nov. 23 - Midu - (book promo)
Nov. 24 - Flora - (Guest post or Excerpt post and Giveaway)
Nov. 25 - Nancy - The Avid Reader (Guest Post/Excerpt)
Nov. 26 - Sheri
Nov. 27 - Alana - Review/interview
Nov. 28 - Laurynne - (Review & )
Nov. 29 - Pragya @ Reviewing Shelf - (review & Giveaway)
Nov. 30 - Tana
2 comments:
That's the second time in three days that I've been startled by my own photo. I'm not sure if these blog tours are good for my health...!
Thanks for hosting me, Nancy. You are very kind.
Hey Michael, I am very glad that I got the chance. Thanks for visiting The Avid Reader today.
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