Howard Sherman, Implementor

Back on December 23rd, 2011 I made a blog post talking about the Chapter 7 Bankruptcy of my former publicist BookPros (AKA Phenix & Phenix) and questioned the viable existence of book publicists on a going forward basis.  In case you missed it, review it here before you plunge ahead with reading this book review.

Crush It! tells you everything you need to know to sell any product or service in the 21st century.  Be you accountant, author or aerospace engineer, absorbing and applying everything Gary Vaynerchuk shares in Crush It! will lead to your inevitable success.

The straight-from-the-heart honesty of Crush It! flies in the face of all the “make money while you sleep” sales pitches we’re all bombarded with as Gary tells you very early on that you need to work your face off to make money on the Internet.

Amen, brother.

It doesn’t matter if you want to launch a new business or find your next job, Crush It! will put you in the fast lane to achieve your goals with unparalleled honesty and straight-from-the-heart truth that Gary himself acquired through years of battlefield experience on the plane of social media marketing.

The smarter book publicists will already have received the cue to exit stage left on any chance of a serious future in book promotion. 

That’s because Gary Vaynerchuk tells you everything you need to know to effectively promote you, your product or your service in Crush It! as you pocket thousands of dollars in savings thanks to all the money you won’t be paying to advertisers or promoters.

Order it now - Crush It!: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion

Father and son, two of just a tiny fraction of survivors in a post-apocalyptic world like none I’ve ever seen before, try to make their way south in search of the closest thing to paradise as anyone can ever hope to find in Cormac McCarthy’s depiction of hell on earth.

Mankind is virtually extinct.  But so is nearly everything else.  The trees are all dead, the oceans are not teeming with life.  Birds don’t chirp and woodchucks don’t chuck wood.  That’s because they’re all dead. 

Everything is dead.  Everything.

Everything except small packs of survivors, most of which bear no resemblance to human beings except in the purely scientific sense.  A passerby tries to steal a worn pair of shoes, the doting dad is shot by an arrow from a window as he and his son make their way down a deserted street in an empty town.  A baby is killed and eaten, cooked on a spit like a bastard’s barbecue. 

And that’s just the tiniest of glimpses into the darkness of this book.

But there are also glimmers of light and hope; father and son have morals.  The young boy wants to give a starving old man a can of food so the poor, withered soul can enjoy just one more meal.  Another young boy follows behind them for a while before disappearing in the woods in fear.  The son cries, wishing they could have helped the boy and hope he’s OK.  Soon after the boy is hiding for his life as a gang of gun-toting survivors try to hunt down father and son to kill them and plunder their meager possessions.

With high notes of happiness at the discovery of the simplest things we all take for granted and low notes over sometimes simple things, The Road is a book that would move the heart of a cold rock.

The ending is bittersweet.  All at once tragic and triumphant.  Father and son simultaneously fail and succeed.  I’m not going to ruin it for you past that.

I have just the tiniest of complaints; there’s absolutely no back story.  Why is virtually everything dead? Dead grass? No birds? Gnarled trees? Piles of rotted fish on the beach? Not even cockroaches survived in any great number, it seems. 

Why? Nuclear holocaust? Chemical warfare? A new strain of the bubonic plague? The answer to this question doesn’t take away from my enjoyment of The Road but I do wish Cormac McCarthy had devoted even a paragraph to explain how nearly all life on earth was wiped out.

The Road is a truly amazing book that takes the reader on a journey across the emotional spectrum exploring the full range of human emotion while breathing new life into the tired, overused post-apocalyptic theme. Don’t pass this book by.

Own The Road by Cormac McCarthy

Yesterday was an interesting day for Barnes & Noble; it’s stock lost 20 % of its value as it projected steep losses for 2012 with only a single silver lining; The Nook.

Long story short; E-Books and digital media are the only bright spot for this bricks-and-mortar bookstore.

So what sent the stock plummeting? Not just the long-term negative view on earnings but scuttlebutt about spinning off The Nook as a separate company.

That would be a huge mistake.  Probably a fatal one.

The Nook is keeping Barnes and Noble afloat in an ocean of eBooks as pBooks (printed books) became less popular and, by extension, increasingly irrelevant.

If you follow me on Twitter or checked out my other official website you already know I see eBooks as the future.  That’s not to say I don’t love the printed word; I do.

Stephen King said it so well (the way he so often does) in a recent interview: The printed book will soon become as much a novelty as a TV set with a turn-the-knob-to-change-the-channel analog TV tuner.

Further evidence of this is in a story that the Associated Press broke the day before yesterday; James Patterson’s eBook sales have topped 5 million copies.

The future of Barnes & Noble is bright with The Nook in the picture.  Amazon will remain king of the hill for the foreseeable future.  There’s no shame in Barnes & Noble being a distinguished second place winner in the bookseller realm.

Creating The Nook was the smartest move Barnes & Noble has made in years.  Spinning off The Nook would certainly be the dumbest.

This is the first non-fiction book I’ve read in a long while that didn’t come from the how-to or self improvement category.  What a refreshing change of pace!

I scored a free copy of the audio book at the Blackstone Audio booth at Book Expo America earlier this year and it sat on my TBR pile for months.  Then last week I said “Why not?”

I dropped the CDs into the CD player of my battle wagon of my car (She’s a 2000 Lincoln Continental and despite dropping some $4000 on repairs and maintenance on her this year alone I’m never giving her up!) and played track of track day by day and relished every minute of it.

I had to stop myself from making petty excuses to hop in the car to score a fix for more.  “We only have half a carton of milk, I better go run to the store for more…” “Gosh, did I leave my water bottle at the gym, I better swing by and pick it up…” because I couldn’t wait until my next spin to the gym, drive to the store or milk run to the bank to listen to more.

The story is as amazing as it is true.  Narrator/reader Ray Porter made it even more interesting.  I first experienced Ray Porter’s work with another non-fiction favorite I covered just two weeks ago - The Four Hour Work Week. Ray Porter has been a favorite of mine ever since.

From Howard Wasdin’s humble origins in the deep south straight through BUDS training to admittance to the uber elite SEAL Team Six to his re-entry to the civilian world before finding his muse, this book pulls no punches.

You get action, drama, adventure, romance and raw, pure feeling.  These fine literary elements are hard enough to find in fiction books.  Every one of them, and many more, are all present and accounted for making SEAL Team Six an unforgettable story.

If there’s any possible demerits I could give this book, it would be Wasdin’s wanderings to Richard Marcinko, SEAL Team Six founder.  Marcinko’s a SEAL legend and Wasdin’s intentional attempt to assassinate the Rogue Warrior’s character was something I did not like.

I still like the book.  A lot.  And you will too.  We all know there’s no such thing as perfect in anything in this world, but SEAL Team Six comes as close as a non-fiction book can.

Own SEAL Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy SEAL Sniper in Hardcover

Download the Kindle edition of SEAL Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy SEAL Sniper

Phenix & Phenix AKA Bookpro - Rest in Peace

I’ve been getting bankruptcy notices from the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Texas pertaining to the Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing of Phenix & Phenix (AKA BookPros, etc.)

Why?

Because I hired Phenix & Phenix to do a media blitz launching my first interactive fiction horror title The First Mile back in 2005.

I met up with Rusty Shelton, the #1 sales guy for Phenix & Phenix at Book Expo in America in Chicago back in 2004.

I just shuddered when I realized that was nearly eight years ago.  Yes, time really does fly. 

On a shuttle bus that ran us from BEA back to our hotel, I was talking with my sales director about a book publicist that stopped by the Malinche booth to talk to us about publicity for my work.

An (innocent?) bystander sitting near us overheard our conversation and chimed in.  “Phenix & Phenix?” he squawked.  “I wouldn’t think of launching a title without them!”

And so I was sold.  Right there on the bus.

I flew down to Austin, Texas to check them out.  We had meetings.  We had lunch.  They stroked my ego.  I rose to the occasion.

Upon my arrival back in New Jersey I signed the $25,000 check to fund The First Mile book launch and FedExed it off to Phenix & Phenix.

Then some interesting things happened.

I got on TV.  And on radio shows.  And in newspapers large and small across the country.  Pick up was as large as USA Today to medium sized regional newspapers to tiny small town rags.  I was on 100,000 watt radio stations and WABC TV in New York City.  Yessiree the explosive success of Malinche was inevitable, right?

WRONG!

An asswipe at the Boston Globe took a swipe.  I wanted to rebutt his silly-assed feedback but Phenix & Phenix forbid it.  “You can’t assault the vaunted fourth branch of government!” they said aghast.

Fine.  I went on a tirade against the Boston Globe itself.  It would be years before I learned the asswipe in question at the Boston Globe lost his job.  I can’t gloat but I can salute justice.

A consulting client I came to know (and love) through my IT company told me all about Phenix & Phenix.  Donna Gould of Phoenix Media in Matawan (irony at the name of her firm and it’s location — the same town as Malinche itself, was not lost on me) set me straight about Phenix & Phenix; They’ll take your money, look really really busy but produce nothing.

How right she was.  Where was Donna Gould back in 2005? If only she stopped me from handing that FedEx envelope over to the FedEx guy…

During the Phenix & Phenix meetings in Austin I thought out loud about ramping up production in response to media-fueled demand, even rattling off sales projections numbers.

Two of the ladies sat in on the meeting and exchanged glances I would later be able to translate as: “He’s fucking dreaming, right?”

They didn’t say it.  But they thought it.  Thanks, girls.  Thanks for keeping your own counsel.

Hiring Phenix & Phenix and being immersed in the media in every venue was a rush.  In front of rolling TV cameras and live radio microphones I extolled the virtues of interactive fiction to millions among the masses.

Mission accomplished on that score but an abysmal failure on the sales front.

The First Mile did end up being my very bestselling title to date but not because of media buzz.

It was because of social media buzz and the fervent desire of horror fans to be scared silly in a whole new way.

In my opinion that’s why Phenix & Phenix ultimately failed; they were long on giving hope for the fulfillment of goals and dreams and short on delivering actual results.

It would be several more years before I learned from New York Times bestselling author Tim Ferriss that he had a nearly identical experience with book publicists.

He did much better with book sales all on his own and so have I.

Thank you Tim Ferrisss (and Gary Vaynerchuck!) and farewell Phenix & Phenix.

Book publicists the world over — are you aware that you are on notice?

It hasn’t happened in a while so I feel it’s high time to ride off the rails with a review of a DVD.

Get Lamp is a two disc documentary of text adventure games (and its more literary subset - interactive fiction) from inception in the 1970s to present day.

My passion for interactive fiction (first reading/playing and later Implementing) started in 1982.  I’ve covered my torrid 30 year love affair amply enough on my official interactive fiction website so I’ll jump right in to the review

For someone that was there nearly from the beginning, Get Lamp was like stepping into a time machine transporting me back not only in time but to place; behind the scenes of the biggest publishers of text adventure games and interactive fiction as I learned secret after secret from undisputed masters of their craft. To listen to Scott Adams describe how he filled his first big order from Radio Shack to how Infocom Implementors ran Infocom before Cornestone, a single product, ran the company into the ground.

For the rest of the population (that would be 99.999999% of earth’s population) this documentary will send you on a journey of discovery as you follow the path of a nearly lost form of fiction from its dawn to present day.

Order your copy of Get Lamp.

Keeping with the Spirit of Giving this season, what book do you think EVERYONE should read and if you could, you would buy it for all of your family and friends?

I own three copies of this book and I’m thinking of buying a fourth.

I’ve given away a half dozen copies of this book to associates and I continue to give away copies of this book to everyone I think could benefit from it.

This book, more than any other book I’ve ever read in my entire life, has changed me forever in profound ways.

I’ve read both copies of the Kindle edition I own (the original edition and the expanded edition) and I’ve listened to the audio book version of the first edition over a dozen times.  Especially the first half.  I finished my last listening just this week.

Why all the repetition? Because the messages, methods and mindset modifications contained in The Four Hour Workweek are counter-intuitive to almost everything I (and 99.99% of the population) have learned during the course of my life.

Therefore I still need to reprogram my brain to overwrite some 40 years of accumulated notions and assumptions with fresh thinking and outlooks that changes — literally — everything.

Here’s what this book will teach you:

• How to get more done than ever before in a fraction of the time.
• How to increase your income - be you employee or entrepreneur.
• How to live like a millionaire without having a million dollars.
• What’s the underlying message that makes all this possible?
• Stop managing minutia so you can focus on the important — the TRULY important.

What has The Four Hour Workweek  (and Tim’s Four Hour Blog) done for me?

• Make more money than I’ve made in my entire life while giving me more leisure time than ever before - on my own terms.
• Lose 50 pounds (I was borderline obese), lower my blood pressure (I was borderline hypertensive), reduce my cholesterol while increasing my fitness and physical strength putting me in the best shape of my life.  That’s quite a statement coming from a 42 year old.
• Living more, experiencing more and having more fun than ever — even factoring in my teenage years.

I’m greatly summarizing here because I don’t want to keep you on my book blog all afternoon reading tale after magical tale of how my life has become a near fairy tale after years of mind-numbing minutia and back-breaking hard work.

If you apply just 25 % of what this book contains to your own life I promise you changes that will astonish you.

Even if you want to make just a little more money in just a little less time so you can read more books or spend time with your family, or do whatever you WANT to do in that new free time, this is the book for you.

If you really want to live like the rich and famous you can apply substantially everything in this book and see the world, live life on your own terms, eat like a foodie while maintaining the body of a photo model AND party like a rockstar — on a pretty ordinary income.

How is that possible? Read the book and see for yourself. With the new year on the horizon why not make 2012 your best year ever?

Own The Four Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss

Own The Four Hour Workweek (Kindle edition)

What is your biggest pet peeve when it comes to books? Maybe you don’t like love triangles or thin plots? Tell us about it!

I’m an easy-going reader so I can’t think of any pet peeves that come to mind except the most obvious one - bad writing.  For the most part I’m very open-minded when it comes to the books I read.  I trust the author to tell their story in their own fashion.  All I ask is that the writing not suck. 

If there’s any pet peeve I can think of, it could be the author’s repetitive use of the same phrase.  This normally doesn’t come out in any one book.  It takes reading a few books in a series to pick up on some of the favorite sayings and figures of speech an author may rely on a bit too much.  It’s very minor and it doesn’t take the story down the wrong road insofar as I’m concerned.  Sometimes it’s even a little reassuring to see the writer’s familiar style in familiar phrases.  But there are times they’re overused and then I could say it bugs me.

I always enjoy the Thankfully Reading event! It forces me to put reading top of mind overriding everything else on my “to do” list.

Yesterday we celebrated Thanksgiving the traditional way; everyone cooked, everyone ate and I took a righteous nap thanks to my turkey-induced coma.

Today I am going to finish a book I started back in June — Seize the Day by Richard Marcinko.  This book is a lot of fun and is a great read, so please don’t think I’m going slow because I’m toughing it out.  Ten other books got in the way as well as the occasional curve balls life throws our way.

But not this time.  This is hitting the “done” pile this weekend.

THEN AND ONLY THEN will I start on Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, a classic science fiction novel I’ve had my eye on for years.

All the Daniel Craig movie trailers I’ve been seeing for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo movie has motivated to read Stieg Larsson’s novel right after Lord of Light.

Today’s an early day so I can see knocking off the 130 some odd pages in Seize the Day and wrapping that up.  Lord of Light is not a terribly long novel so polishing that off tomorrow is very likely.

I can see putting a good dent in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on Sunday but I’ve got a lot of work to do so I can’t hope for much more than that.

Are you participating in Thankfully Reading? If so, share your plans with me.  If not, why not? It’s a long holiday weekend and the best time to get some serious reading in!