Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

The free sample is a tried-and-true marketing device, and it is essential for online book selling. To give away a book’s content may seem counterproductive to selling the book, but as charities like to say, there are many levels of giving. Online book marketing does not mean standing on the street corner passing out bound copies, but it definitely should include a free download of a book excerpt or sometimes even the whole book.

The public and publishers have been reportedly underwhelmed by ebooks, but the fact is that people do look at ebooks and sometimes even buy them. A free digital version of a book excerpt at an author’s or publisher’s website can draw readers in and convert some of them to buyers.

Let’s forget the internet for a moment and look at the traditional ways people are motivated to buy a book.

1. A person has had a book recommended by a relative or acquaintance.
2. A person has heard about a book in a media report or author interview and decided it was interesting.
3. A person enters a bookstore and looks at a book, scanning the table of contents, reading the first chapter, and skimming other chapters.

The first two points above can easily apply to an online book marketing website. A person has been motivated to visit the book’s website by word-of-mouth or marketing. However, if the website does not offer an ebook excerpt, then the experience of entering the bookstore and actually looking at the book cannot be replicated.

Science fiction writer Cory Doctorow has become well known for giving away his novels as free ebooks and thereby generating more print sales. Doctorow reports that the free ebooks let readers get interested in his stories and then they often decide to buy the print format. This happens because most people prefer to read book-length works as books.

Another example of successful book marketing with free ebooks is Baen Books, a science fiction publisher. Baen Books has included its free library at its website for years. Because many of its publications are fiction series, free ebook downloads of selected titles have helped spur sales and keep the Baen backlist going. Once again the principle has been to focus on letting a potential customer look at the book instead of fretting over piracy.

Even nonfiction titles benefit from offering an online digital portion of the book. Unlike fiction, which does not seem to be hurt by offering the entire book as a free ebook, only an excerpt of a nonfiction book would be appropriate. Giving away every bit of an author’s valuable research and experience could be harmful because nonfiction readers are often just looking for a few important facts and may not even need to read the whole book. For nonfiction, a meaty excerpt that is illustrative of the book’s quality is appropriate online as a free sample. It will allow the reader to judge the book and then perhaps purchase it. Exceptions to only providing an excerpt of a nonfiction book would be a memoir or biography. Those kinds of books are meant to be read in their entireties and a free ebook could generate interest and drive print sales.

As an online book marketer, you should not have a knee-jerk reaction against using a free ebook as a marketing strategy. At a minimum, an online excerpt is necessary and there is no evidence of harm. Most visitors to a book’s online sales page are book buyers and their reasonable desire to have a look at the product needs to be satisfied. Many software vendors have been giving out free trials for years and the software industry has not collapsed.

An example of a website with a free ebook is at Brave Luck Books. You can see how author Tracy Falbe set up her free fantasy ebook marketing. Tracy Falbe is the author of the well-reviewed fantasy fiction series The Rys Chronicles.

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Science-fiction novels are generally based on imagined or actual scientific discoveries. The creation of self-aware robots, space travel, the discovery of other intelligent beings in space are some the common subjects for science fiction. English novelist Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) is often considered as one of the precursors to science-fiction novels. The novel is the story of a doctor who constructs an artificial man making use of body parts.

Influence on the Science Fiction:

H. G. Wells, in the late 1800s, served as a great influence on science fiction. He gave thrilling novels like The Time Machine (1895), a tale about a man who travels forward in time; The Invisible Man (1897), a story about a man who invisible; and The War of the Worlds (1898), about a Martian invasion of Earth.

In the early 20th century, the best science fiction was written and published in magazines. In mid-century, some authors revived the genre in the novel form. They were Stanislaw Lem (Solaris, 1961; translated 1970) and Isaac Asimov (The Foundation Trilogy, 1951-1953), and Ursula K. Le Guin (The Left Hand of Darkness, 1969).

Cyberpunk Authors:

In the early 21st century, one movement in science-fiction novels came on the surface called cyberpunk. The authors of cyberpunk constructed action-oriented plots and featured hardcore scientific technology in their novels. Some of the major cyberpunk writers were Pat Cadigan, John Shirley, William Gibson, and Bruce Sterling.

Humanist Writers:

There are some science-fiction novelists, also known as so-called humanist writers. They focus on characterization and pay little attention to scientific developments. These humanist writers are Orson Scott Card, Ian Watson, and Vonda McIntyre. Other science-fiction novelists like Terry Brooks, Brian Aldiss, Arthur C. Clarke, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Michael Moorcock are also the influential writres.

Rakesh Patel is an aspiring poet, freelance writer, self-published author and teacher. Read his blog http://typesofpoetry99.blogspot.com

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January 1985 marks the beginning of America’s love affair with Ender Wiggin. It was that month that Ender’s Game was published, becoming an instant blockbuster, and “probably the most popular science fiction novel published in the last twenty years” (John Kessel). The child prodigy and ultimate savior of the earth, Ender Wiggin, had appeared seven years earlier in a short story published in the science fiction magazine Analog. Writer Orson Scott Card had spent much of his young life working in print, but had only set to writing science fiction when his meager salary as copy editor at a small press failed to pay a debt incurred from a failed business attempt. His magazine article won instant attention, and Orson Scott Card won the 1978 John C. Campbell Award for best new writer at the World Science Fiction Convention. But little Ender was destined for bigger things.

Orson Scott Card saw potential in his young protagonist and instantly set to work developing the short fiction into a longer work. Already he had two novels in mind, Ender’s Game and its sequel Speaker for the Dead, published the following year in 1986. Card made history by winning both the prestigious Nebula and Hugo Awards in both consecutive years. No other author has managed this feat to date (2006.) Since that time, Ender’s Game has been translated into sixteen languages, and spawned two series.

The first series includes Ender’s Game (1985), Speaker for the Dead (1986), Xenocide (1991), Children of the Mind (1996), and First Meetings (2002). The saga follows Ender as he grows into adulthood and deals with the moral and ethical issues presented in his childhood.

The second series starts with a parallel telling of the original Ender’s Game, but from the eyes of Bean. Titled Ender’s Shadow (1999), it is the first of the Shadow Series, followed by Shadow of the Hegemon (2001), Shadow Puppets (2002), and Shadow of the Giant (2005).

Ender’s Game has been called “the science fiction novel for people who don’t think they like science fiction.” Truly it appeals to a vast audience. It is on the list of top books for college-bound students, and has been adopted as required reading in numerous secondary schools and university classes. Card explains that the focus on the human story as it unravels, rather than the science fiction elements, is what gives the novel power among its readers. Essentially, Card says, readers must relate and care deeply about the characters. Beyond that, he admits that the use of computer networks and the “mind game” are features in the book that appeal to many readers.

Ender claimed the spotlight again in the late 1990s when rumor caught wind that a film was slated. Indeed, Warner Brothers announced in 2002 its plans to produce the film. Director Wolfgang Peterson, known for his most recent films Poseidon, Troy and The Perfect Storm, is joined by screenwriter David Benieff (Troy). The movie is expected to hit the theaters in 2008. After winning the top prizes offered in science fiction literature, one wonders what is still in store for Ender Wiggen.

About the Author:

About the Author
Francesca Black has always enjoyed Science Fiction and she manages the content at: Science Fiction Corner http://www.science-fiction-corner.com

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com – The Ender Saga: a Noteworthy Science Fiction Series

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Fiction is a very popular genre in books. It is very common to see fiction books and novels in book stores around the world. Even here in India, fiction books invoke a lot of interest and have a deep and passionate following. Novels form the core of fiction books and be it any genre, say thrillers, adventure, romance, comedy, or others, they give the readers the ultimate chance to enhance their imaginative skills.

Writing and Imagination

Writing needs a lot of imagination and those who are into the writing industry know that their fiction needs to be without blemish. Hence the plots are woven into complex subplots and themes that unwind into a climax and which finally leads to a suitable ending. The market is abuzz with top fiction writers such as Sydney Sheldon, John Grisham, Agatha Christie, Paul Coehlo, Dan Brown and many others. Only recently, the hit Harry Potter Series by author J. K. Rowling has proved that good fiction with limitless imagination indeed sells. Fiction is one variety where there is no limit to imagination.

Fiction Authors: the God of their characters

Characters live and die in the author’s mind. Just as we have one God above all of us, the God of the characters is the author himself. The author introduces the characters in the plot, removes them at specific times, and reintroduces them again. He may make the characters live till the very end of the story, or kill them off as he or she desires. In this way, readers can also take their imagination to new heights. Most readers avidly follow plot and theme lines thus admiring the writer’s prowess and skills or criticizing weaknesses in the plot or story construction.

How about Residing in the author’s mind?

Fiction is something that is born in the author’s mind. The author takes full credit for the fiction that flows out of his or her mind and forms words from the pen onto the paper. The ultimate product is the fiction which then is the final marketable product in the books market. Buying one of the fiction books and reading it can be fun if the final product is really a good one. Besides increasing imaginative skills, many readers also find they increase their inspirational skills too, since they feel inspired to write a novel or a piece of fiction themselves.

Onto Newer Worlds

Therefore, once a reader has read enough fiction, he or she feels inspired to write a piece of fiction himself or herself and try out and see if what they turn out is as imaginative as the original piece himself. Therefore, fiction books not only help us to appreciate great fiction of contemporary authors today, but also act to inspire us to greater heights of inspiration and literary prowess.

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