Help for my wife.

Hi all, not a regular poster, more of a daily lurker, but after a favour.

My wife has written a free book, available on Kindle, for teenagers called The Cursed Sword, knocked up on her daily commute. She has figured out how to make it available for free for a few days and is enjoying the excitement of seeing how far up the various Amazon Kindle charts it can get. She’s currently at 1,205 in the main chart but at number three in the Teen and young adult Action and Adventure.

If any of you have early teens who enjoy Percy Jackson this could be a good read for them, or any of you who fancy a bit of easy reading escapism, she’d be very grateful if you could download it. Go on make her happy and by extension my life too.

So, The Cursed Sword by Debbie Champion is the book and author. Also prepare to be amazed at the cover my twelve year old daughter knocked up for her.

Mods, hope I havent broken any rules by posting this shameful wife promotion, but it is free. I promise to contribute more, lurk less and not get involved in any of the arguing that usually goes on, if that helps.

Thanks noshki, I’ve sent to my littlun’s kindle hopefully post a favourable review too.

done

🙁 Don’t have a kindle 🙁
Good luck!

AlexSimon

You don’t need a Kindle device. Download the app. Smartphone, tablet, PC. It even works on Apple.

😀

EDIT: Downloaded. Boy2 will enjoy it.

downloading right now 🙂

Many thanks.
My cunning plan is for her to see the increased number of downloads, convince her she has a future as the next JK Rowling and get a new bike ordered before she realises I have been shamelessly promoting her on here.
Will update if her downloads result in her moving up through the charts or if I’m the proud owner of a new bike.

Done – Should be a nice surprise for my daughter!

OP thanks for posting, mine are in their 20’s so can’t help but good luck with it

Je suis en vacance, a link would be useful.

Done, I’ll start reading it tonight.
Thanks.
🙂

Linky.

Downloaded!

Hats off on the cover too, looks pretty cool!

Done. Bought, but not yet downloaded – well, not until I turn the wireless on, on the Kindle.

So is it “cursed” or “curs’ed” ?

DOne cheers should keep the boy happy

Downloaded this last night for my 11 year old boy and he loves it. I’ll post a review on Amazon once he’s finished it. Well done Mrs C.

For those of you who downloaded book 1, book 2 is now available for free download from Amazon. Both books are also available as paperbacks for which she makes the grand sum of 4p a book. She won’t be managing JK Rowlings level of financial success anytime soon… My wife is loving writing the books and is already writing the last in this trilogy and has started planning a new standalone novel which sounds like it could be a very strong story.

If you haven’t already downloaded book 1, it will be available again for free in the next couple of weeks. Amazon only allow a certain amount of free time, so download the second and I will post when book 1 is free again. It’s quite satisfying watching it climb the kindle charts, so download and see how high your download pushes it.

Cursed Sword Book 2

Thanks once again to those of you above who have downloaded and commented above. I will ensure you get the VIP treatment if there’s ever a film premiere. Hey, dream big.

My 9yo will be super happy. He’s read the first about a billion times. I must get him to put a review on for the first book.

I think this counts as advertising now.

So what? It’s more interesting and relevant than the inane bullshit that makes up 97%* of the usual content.

*figure may vary

I missed the original thread and I’m slightly older than a teenager. However I have downloaded the 2nd book on something called a Kindle App on my phone where I think I read a book once 😉

Good luck to your wife. JK Rowling had to start somewhere.

the paperback costs £5.80 but she only makes 4p out of that?? 😯

Wtf Molgrips? Have you reported the post? Suppose it could be moved in to the for sale section to keep you happy? 🙄

the paperback costs £5.80 but she only makes 4p out of that??

The Kindle version is 99p (unless I’ve got it completely wrong – which I probably have) so how much does she make from that?

I’m only asking as my dad is planning on self publishing on Kindle.

Downloaded. Best of luck to your wife OP.

Downloaded. …… I have a mid life change of lifestyle looming and plan a book myself so interested to know about Kindle

Have you reported the post?

No. But the forum rules say you’re not supposed to advertise. Because if he can do it, everyone can do it, and that would ruin the entire forum.

Yep, you’re right, giving away something she’s spent many days of her life on for free is disgraceful.

Anyway, to the OP, my lads halfway through already!

Sammy C, thanks for your comment, you have made her evening, totally why she is writing the books.

Sadexpunk, I know kinda funny isn’t it, but I believe every book has to be individually printed and is delivered the following day, I don’t even pretend to know how Amazon manage that. We had a proof copy which came from the US but it would appear the copies available on Amazon UK are perhaps printed for delivery.

The Amazon self publishing model appears to be a very slick operation and for a wannabe author seems to be an ideal way to dip your toe. She tried the route of sending manuscripts to agents but out of the submissions made she only had the one response to say it wasn’t even a genre they were currently interested in, so self publishing seemed the way to go.

Not 100% on the commission that is payable, but think it is around 60pence on a 99pence sale, the lowest Amazon will let you sell it at. For Debbie it is more about the satisfaction of writing the books and knowing that people (mainly children, her target) are reading them. Sure she’d love to give up her job and write for a living but just knowing people are reading them is satisfaction enough. Hence why she’s happy to publicise when freely available.

Self publishing does appear to have quite large potential and there is quite a large community around it, although not one we have explored too much. Many people manage to write and successfully market their books and enjoy in some cases quite lucrative earnings all won’t side the traditional publishing model.

Having said that, I, slightly biased, think this book is an improvement on the previous one and, as alluded to earlier, am interested to see whether future books could enjoy more success. I might yet get that dream bike….

Hi Molgrips, sorry, I know it’s a bit cheeky to promote her book, but it is being offered as a free download, hence why I thought it scraped inside forum rules. As a number of people had commented to say they had downloaded the first book for their children I figured an update would be appreciated on the second book. The original post coincided with a large boost of free downloads. Amazon only allow a short window when your book can be free, the rest of the time 99p is the minimum price.

Quick post and post resurrection to say that the wife has now completed and posted the third and final book which is available for free download, but I think only until Monday when she has to start charging for it. So those of you with kids following the series will need to be quick.

Ragnarok (The Nine Worlds Trilogy Book 3) Debbie Champion

For those of you who want to be impressed that’s three books written and published in about fifteen months, mainly on her daily commute. This one she has been informed, by her first readers (at this stage mainly family and friends), is the best written so far.

Her next book is already into the planning stage and we have been discussing it over a glass or two over the last couple of weeks. This book will again have a distinctly Norse mythology background set in the modern day, but will probably be pitched with a slightly older target in mind. Interestingly, although the current series was written with an early teen audience in mind we had feedback from a teacher that it had been well received by a class of eight year olds who have been enjoying the books as part of their class reading.

I am still riding the same bikes I was riding a year ago and based on her current royalty returns will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Steven Speilberg has also yet to contact us about the film rights…