Posts Tagged ‘free books’

If I’m honest when I write, I don’t have to fear what’s been published. Especially if I’m writing passionately about moods and emotions which can change like the winds. The cool thing is that the internet is permanent, as in forever, not going anywhere, and it is conceivable that this blog will exist for my grandchildren or even further out. How cool is that? Immortality, but probably hidden into obscurity with all the other immortals. Haha, that is fine, I’m ok with that. I am special, just like everybody else. 🙂

It would be awesome to be able to read my grandfathers blog, who was a Colonel in the USAF, or even further back. Listen to their daily struggles and challenges. I would especially love to know if there were other alcoholics or OCD’s that learned how to either defeat the disease or manage their OCD, I mean that shit would have been invaluable.

We lost a kid in the rooms around north Atlanta yesterday. In and out for years, it’s pretty standard, par for the course, nobody I’ve ever met dies without first being introduced to AA, being shown the light, told the truth, and then making their own decision. It is with no amount of casualness they say, ” There are those who will not completely give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves” for this is the MOST COMMON THEME OF THOSE THAT DIE. They couldn’t fucking be honest with anyone around them. And if you can’t be honest with those around you, you most certainly can’t be honest with yourself.

This blog, went from an average of 100 hits or so a day up to 1435 or so on the day after the Osama blog, with the Mark Twain misquote, and then I introduced all the eff bombs, and as fate would have it, the blog traffic, nosedived to roughly 20 or so a day. I think the eff bombs takes it off the wordpress search results or something. So fucking what. I really don’t care. I don’t write this for traffic, or even to sell books so much, as I do to record my history, get down in written format what I’m honestly struggling with as I get through year 4 of sobriety. Having overcome some serious challenges this year, I am glad  I have a written, honest and thorough description of it, recorded for my own posterity, and if I’m lucky, my bloodlines later on down the road. God willing they don’t all get into Pro Wrestling and at least one of them decides they like to read and hell maybe even write. And if not, at least I’ll have it all for my own records in 10-20 -50 years, whatever, I’m only 33, a lot can happen between now and death. And unlike that poor kid Bryan who drank himself to death in his twenties behind the same movie theatre my best friend Shane Oleander from my book had his heart attack in and later died from, I will God willing live a long and fruitful life, not marred by delusional thinking, but clear, concise, and when I die, people will be able to say, he lived most of his life honestly. Even if it was humiliating or emberressing, he was honest, and therefore able to work on those things that were skewed in his life.

Honesty is the ace, the trump card in this program, it makes all things possible. It is the first principle of the first step. Everyone I know who is dead from this disease from my Dad to the latest victim Bryan T. , whose family was so tired of his antics they weren’t even going to have a funeral but instead were just cremating the body, cause that’s how drunks die, ALL SHARED AN INABILITY TO BE HONEST. If you want to ever get sober, or HELL JUST NOT DIE, start being honest. Or prepare for the worst. You aren’t special, nobody escapes the inevitability of this disease, you will die, quick or slow, if you continue  being dishonest, lying, cheating, stealing, getting fucked up and giving the finger to the creator who has showed you a way out, that window will close.

If you are in the dark, I pray you find light. It’s never too late to come back to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous.

-Jared Bryan Smith

Wow, even my stepdad was impressed I was able to get on newstalk1160 this Saturday and Sunday from noon to one. Too bad my stats show that the only blog of mine being read is the one about Anthony Kiedis and Johnny Delirious, haha, or perhaps I’d be doing a little better job of promoting it. It’s all good though, it’s just a good first start, hopefully Gus Cawley will let me back on Technology Cafe to explain the Free Books on books4free.com idea in a little more detail, as well as go into length about the subject matter and unique story of Hippopotamus Sea: My Viral Sobriety. No matter what, even though I feel like I bombed the beginning of the interview, it’s still free publicity, and that is just free advertising.

So if you read the saga/blog of yesterday, you may find it even more humorous, that after all of that adventure, I found myself back at Phipps Plaza yesterday afternoon, repurchasing, on my now third visit to Tiffany’s, the silver locket with the number 6 on it, so that I could give to the girl I’m madly in love with… I told her friend I was a moron as I was walking back into the store, and she eloquently put it “No you’re not, you’re just in love. It’s crazy.” Yes it is. For someone with less than a year sober, and going through a tough divorce, my girls friend has really got a good head on her shoulders, and I owe her a big thanks for the gift advice, but also in just all her kind words as me and the blond have gone up and down, up and down. She could have crucified me, and instead told her friend nice things, and I’m grateful she is in both  my girls life and mine. So yeah, I couldn’t even get home before I’d texted her the picture of the Tiffany’s box. she first played like she was upset I got her something, and then admitted she’d gotten me something too. Haha.

Here’s the thing though, it wasn’t for Christmas as we’d discussed. I got hers for her six months, and she got mine for my 4 years. The thing is, she got me a little model of a sailboat with the inscription on the sails “We can’t change the wind, but we can adjust the sails.” It’s quite literally the most  thoughtful gift anyone has ever gotten me in my memory. Nobody in my mind has ever taken the time to know what I like,  or get something for my office where I spend so much time. It was really amazing. I’m humbled and grateful to God she was put in my life. Even if the whole thing goes south tomorrow, I’ll be grateful just for having met her. It was an awesome gift, and exchanging them with her was more fun than I can remember in recent memory.

So yeah, today, the 24th, is my technical and actual 4 year anniversery of picking up a white chip. I’ve already picked up  a candle and a chip though, I just couldn’t wait. I used to be superstitous about it but at 4 years I feel pretty confident I won’t relapse by having picked it up early. I think I’m going to pick it up early and often from now on, eff being shy, I’ve earned it!

So yeah, tune in tomorrow on http://www.newstalk1160.com/shows/weekend-hosts under Gus Cawley’s show “Technology Cafe” where I plug books4free.com. I didn’t get a word in edge wise about Hippopotamus Sea but I at least mentioned the website books4free.com twice. Maybe that’ll spike a few book sales, we shall see!

Merry Christmas everyone, and thank you all my AA family, I could never have done any of this without you!

-JB Smith

We’ll sneak em in wherever we can get em I suppose. 99% of the interview is regarding the new awesome product the publisher is representing PlumReward, I was able to sneak in a word or two about books4free.com, and get a very brief overview of the book in there. With 50,000 listeners to that radio show, hopefully, God willing, that will sell one or two curious books, I mean cmon, 50000 people right! Of course it is on Christmas and the day after at noon for an hour, which probably isn’t the best time on Earth to air a two second plug of a book, but still, a writer can dream.

Regardless, it was cool that Gus Cawley allowed us on the show and then further allowed him to even mention books4free.com when the nuts and bolts of the entire show was PlumReward, the brain child of Jonathan Goodyear, or the “Angry Coder”, Maverick renegade coder of Microsoft with MVP status who has bled sweat and poured his heart in PlumReward now for the last few years, and has an amazing product. It was more than good of Gus to let us pimp books4free.com for even just a second. Hopefully it will lead to more media as well.

I’m so exhausted, I had so much to blog about today, but after hearing about the radio show, picking up a 4 year candle, and hustling all over Atlanta today, I’m exhausted.

Happy Holidays if I forget to get back to it though!

Jared Bryan Smith

Seriously, if there was any room in that coffin I’m sure she’d be turning in it. We were very much strategically brought up in the southern manor of giving off the appearance of normalcy, even if child abuse, domestic violence, and alcoholism was the prevailing wind inside the house, you’d better had a good cover story when you left the home front. Today, I am an open book, and proud of it. But boy would mama be upset that I’d made it to the top of the list of all Hep C book listed on Amazon. What a dreadful shame. I can literally hear her southern drawl “But JB why would you want people to know that about you.” Haha, because mom, I’m cured of it, and hopefully somebody somewhere will find solace and comfort in that fact. She would have had a hard time arguing that, as she was a good and decent christian woman, just a little preoccupied with social status and the appearance of the status quo. Ultimately the conversation would have ended with “Well, at least you had the good sense to use a pen name.”  haha….

That wasn’t my good sense, I would have much rather written it under my actual name, but through years of trial and error in following my own counsel I decided to allow my sponsor and attorney have their way with that one. The 11th tradition states of course that we must be anonymous in press, radio and films, and therefore I am, regardless of how many Glenn Blecks and the like out there aren’t. It’s difficult though, promoting a book under a pen name.

That being said, we are still well under the 100 books sold goal. Hovering around 50. I had hoped the funny ass cartoons about AA relationships would make people curious about the book but that too hasn’t generated too many book sales. Oh well, I am pretty happy with the new ranking under Hepatitis.

Thanks again for all the grassroots support people, making the number one slot on the Hepatitis C list on Amazon is a big deal even if it’s only taken 50 books to get there! Hope we stay at the top of the list for a while!

Thanks again and I hope everyone enjoys their Christmas!

-Jared Bryan Smith

Although I keep having to explain to people to press the downloads button to get the kindle version on http://www.smashwords.com instead of on amazon.com, Mark Coker’s smashwords format is a MUCH better alternative than the kindle monopoly at Amazon, period the end, so even if I lose a few ebook sales from people who can’t find the downloads button on books4free.com or who keep going directly to the Amazon page, I believe long term smashwords will be the recognized distributor of most ebooks, so I’m sticking with Mark Coker.

Here is his latest blog, about ebook publishing, definitely worth the read.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-coker/the-seven-secrets-to-eboo_b_751743.html

-Jared Bryan Smith

Wow, the print on demand arrangement still being pondered, as I wonder why they would claim on my splash page on Amazon that there are only 3 copies left, and to order soon, they throw fuel on the fire with yet another jaw dropper. The book is now for sale, not at the 24.95 I set the price at months ago, but for 17.96.

This is well below their wholesale cost on the entire book, and though I get it, would have been nice to have received an email from the publisher, Books4free.com, but I’m sure he’s too busy golfing, fishing or dating bipoloar women to keep me posted… He swears he received nothing, but who knows.

The point is that Amazon owns his ass and they can set the price wherever they like, whenever they like, and do not have any need to keep him or the author informed. Fortunately books4free.com assures us that it’s actually a good thing for our customers, that the price is down, and though it eats into Amazon costs, we will receive the same pay out per book even though its below cost.

That is where I call bullshit. What lightning source should tell have told us is that most likely Amazon has bought a bulk of the book, since it’s selling well, and hence, gotten that bulk for a cheaper cost, probably saving something like 7 or 8 bucks per book. Which basically means Lightning Source is overcharging books4free.com and myself, something in the neighborhood of 10 bucks a book as there has only been about 20 or so sold, and I bet that’s the cut off for Amazon to actually stock some books. I bet at 100 there is another bulk pricing break.

It would really be nice to be privy to all this information going in, but alas, we are not, and learning these ropes as we go along.

In the meantime, I guess we should just be grateful that the cost is done to 17.96 per book, 7 dollars cheaper than the list price we set, and go ahead and advertise on Facebook and wherever that it’s on sale! Better than a 7 dollar increase I suppose.

Now if said publisher would just stop dating crazy women, maybe he would have the time to get me on some radio and television shows like a proper publisher! Some habits die harder than others I suppose.

-Jared Bryan Smith

What the hell… I seriously thought this was Print on Demand. How strange. Also, how in the hell do you change a subtitle in Amazon to reflect that the book is about Hepatitis C. Grrr… When you search Hepatitis C books, mine is nowhere to be found, because I used an artsy title instead of a factual one…. so I tried to change the subtitle with more than a few keywords, and they freaking rejected it.

So, I, the author, don’t have authority to change my own subtitle. Maddening.

Not that I liked the title, the most unartistic, mangled drivel ever, written soley for the purposes of Amazon’s search engine… still I was proud of the amount of keywords I crammed into 200 characters…alas it was rejected:

“Current value: Hippopotamus Sea
Your suggestion: Hippopotamus Sea: My Viral Sobriety, or How I Beat Hepatitis C, Addiction, Alcoholism, & Interferon by Working the 12 Steps of AA, Alcoholics Anonymous, & Recovery Stories of Drinking, LSD, & Cocaine”

* Please do not add descriptions to the title. The title should be as it appears on the book.

Well ya know what Amazon, how about you stop trying to sell Hungry Hungry Hippo to my NOT INTERESTED IN HIPPOPOTAMUS customers, you over digitized, zealous, taking the art out of writing demons!!! But I digress… I shall return in a better mood later.

At least we’re back in top 100 recovery books again… introducing another problem, how do I get classified under Hepatitis C Books?

-Jared Bryan Smith

So the momentum is beginning to slow down as the facebook crowd who were awaiting books, are now reading rather than ordering I suppose. At the peak the book was in the Top 100 Alcohol and Recovery books, ranking at #67, but unfortunately I don’t know how many books that is in that given hour. On the overall ranking it’s maxed out at 32,000, which isn’t bad considering there are millions of books on Amazon, but now that it’s back in the 100-200k range, I’m scared to see where it will be in a week. Moving forward reviews, word of mouth, emails, and networking will be more influential than facebook. Guess I need to start sending to reviewers.

The book chronicles being born into alcoholic family, rebelling, dosing LSD/Acid very young, and raising hell through his teenage years, stealing, running away, wrecking cars you name it, until he finally settles down however briefly to have a son, and play family for a few years, however poorly the execution. After divorce at 22 he picks up where he left off, raising cane again, and really doesn’t even begin to slow down as his mom lies dying of cancer. After she’s gone his drinking takes on new sincerity and the challenge I really took on is towards the end of the book where I do my best to explain madness and insanity, delusions, and paranoid schizophrenia to the normal, “earth” person as we recovered alcoholics refer to the unafflicted. It’s hard to explain the color red though to a blind man, and I wonder if anyone will understand the enormity of my massive, intricate, detailed derangement. All I could do was try and explain how lost I’d gotten, how lost I stayed for so long, and how far I’d come back. It’s not a short journey, but given the number of people, just in our class of 1996, that are now dead to alcoholism, addiction  or something related, it’s a story worth reading, and worth understanding, as the solution, the 12 Steps of AA, can work on really any spiritual malady, but most especially addiction.

If the AA 12 Steps could work on me, who went to the edge of the abyss, looked in and had the abyss stare back in, invade and pay rent for years, it can seriously work on anyone. I really wrote the book I wish I’d read when I went to pick up a Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I wanted some hope, I wanted a story as dark as mine, detailed and honest, and messy with guts and humiliation, and something bigger than myself. When I lived that firsthand, I felt it was worth writing, and though a little long, as I’m beginning to hear back, it’s worth the read. If you think it’s long reading, thank God you didn’t live it!

-Jared Bryan Smith


Well the book launched yesterday! I was very excited as I didn’t realize it was basically automatic from the acceptance of the proof with Lightning Source. I was putting pressure on my graphics designer/web designer who was basically stalling and putting it right back on me, which drove me a little batty. So I was thinking books4free was going to have to call LSI, which is always a pain in the ass, and find out how to connect LSI and Amazon together. Thankfully it was all done automatically.

Hippopotamus Sea; My Viral Sobriety, written by me, Jared Bryan Smith, 2.5 years in the making, and it finally launches on 10-10-10, a sheer coincidence. Chronicling a 17 year drug and drinking binge, sobriety,  the 12 Steps of AA in their modern workings, haha, as well as, of course, the contraction of Hepatitis C, the insane costs of the treatment without insurance, the charity given by Roche, and the grueling Interferon treatment itself, it’s certainly a book anyone in recovery would appreciate.

It doesn’t sugar coat much, and cuss words are modern, and used liberally. Anyone who has Hep C, isn’t going to be offended I suspect, but it may not penetrate the staunch religious aspects of AA as some are very averse to cursing. My God doesn’t speak English exclusively so he could care less how many times I drop the F bomb. I didn’t cross the GD line though, haha. It’s a good book, regardless of anyone’s delicate sensitivities. I couldn’t write honestly and not cuss a little.

So as of yesterday my best ranking was in the top 32000 on Amazon, but today, Monday, we’ve drifted back to about 75k, so my brother just bought 3 copies to test this theory, see what happens. Very strange as a publisher books4free can’t just go and look up exactly how many copies they’ve sold, but I guess they probably just haven’t figured that out yet. I suppose books4free should call LSI regardless just to see how to do that.

I’m glad the book is up though. I used a technical editor, and in all honesty it wouldn’t shock me if later on down the road I ended up getting an editor specifically attuned to working on autobiographies, to get rid of some of the name dropping, probably crop some pages, but at this stage, it’s the very best I could do with the tools, resources, and time I had at hand. Especially the money. I would have saved thousands going through Lulu.com or any Vanity Publishing Press out there, but we wanted to use my book to launch books4free.com. We’ll see how that all plays out moving forward  I suppose.

So go take a look please, if you haven’t already!

http://www.books4free.com

-Jared Bryan Smith

Just put down the Fortune magazine in which I saw that Blurb.com is doing 45 million in revenues already. Good for them, that definitely shows this small publishing market continues to grow and thrive. God willing Books4free.com will enjoy just a bit of that success, as it launches with my first title, Hippopotamus Sea.

The cover is done, the editing is done, and the publisher I understand now awaits the Proof book from LightningSource.com to prove that they are actually capable of printing and shipping an actual hard copy book.

After much research, the decision to use smashwords to distribute all the digital formatting of the book seems to be the wisest. They take the book, and after formatting for Mark Coker’s meatgrinder software, which I had to send off the word document to rid it of all spaces, tabs, and page numbers, we will upload to smashwords, which will then, theoritiacally make it available on ipad, epub, nook, kindle, and the like, which is a good deal for me the writer, the publisher, and hopefully the consumer…

I saw on the smashwords website the ability to give away the book 4 free to soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, so in the spirit of books4free.com, we will definitely be participating in that venture.

The journey feels like it’s getting closer to completion, but of course, the marketing and selling of the book will just be the next step. The writing, editing and bringing to market though, is hopefully almost done. Once books4free.com is complete and their is a book for sale, for read for free, and digitally, I’ll be excited… right now I’m just feeling a little overwhlemed by it all.

-JB Smith