September Giveaway (Newsletter Builder)

September is coming . . . and really should hurry up!

We’re doing another newsletter builder, giveaway in September.

This will include another $20 gift card and a four-volume eBook prize pack.

Of course, you can always just sign up for the newsletter, where giveaways happen every month, and you get the latest news on my various projects, appearances, and whatnots.

But if you want to wait for this particular newsletter sign up, it will start Sunday, September 1st and run through the end of the month.  There are some great writers being offered, including a little known steampunk novel.

If you’ve already signed up, or after you’ve signed up, please share with everyone you think might be interested!

2019 The Numbers - Revised

If this is wrong, I don't wanna be right!

This time it wasn’t me who was wrong.

Really, it wasn’t anyone.  It was just an oversight in the reporting.

A few days ago, I provided you an update on the sales for THE CLOCKWORK DETECTIVE. The numbers were good.  Very, very good.

Turns out, the numbers were even better than that. I’m still not in Stephen King/JK Rowling territory. I’m not even in S. Andrew Swann territory, but over the past six years I’ve seen some real improvement in the number of sales from quarter-to-quarter.

So, it’s sweeter than sweet to report the revised sales numbers for the first three months of release:

Quarter	Books Sold	Running Total
2 Quarter 2019	115	115

Eleven books isn’t that much more, but it will pay for some new D&D dice I’ve been eyeing recently! It is also as close to double the sales I saw in the first year for TEARS OF HEAVEN. I will always love my first book, just like any parent loves their children, but it's nice to see my steampunk novel doing so well.

If you’re still reading this, thank you. You’re very much the reason that all my books do any business whatsoever.

Company of the Damned by the Numbers

Wrong again, Hero!

As usual, I was wrong.

Also, thank you for proving me wrong.

The quarterly report for THE CLOCKWORK DETECTIVE arrived, and I was completely thrilled. The numbers were good. They’re never as good as an indie-author hopes. These aren’t Stephen King or even Hugh Howey numbers. You always hope that they report will show a couple of hundred sales. Really, any sales are reason enough for celebration.

That said, I’d thought I’d managed to sell at least 100 copies of TEARS OF HEAVEN the first year it released.  Nope.

The number was: 62.

A little better than half the goal I’d hoped for. Not bad for a brand new author writing in a niche of a sub-genre. HELL BECOMES HER performed well out of the gate, and sold 71 copies in its first quarter.

Things got a big murky after that release, and I’m too lazy to chase down the numbers for the first year of the sequel’s publication. That all said, I’ve seen some real success—as I would define it—from THE CLOCKWORK DETECTIVE.  The book released May 7^th, 2019, and here are the results:

Quarter	Books Sold	Running Total
2 Quarter 2019	104	104

Yep!  The goal that I’d hoped to reach in the first year for my first book was achieved in the first quarter of release for my fourth book. Here's hoping I see some similar numbers of COMPANY OF THE DAMNED!

In the mean time, eat those edibles if you’ve got 'em!

Carol G. Gives COMPANY OF THE DAMNED Five Stars!

If you want something done right, get Del.

A beautifully written, and wonderfully on point review of COMPANY OF THE DAMNED:

If you like epic stories of good versus evil, with some innovative takes on the battle, this book is for you.

If you like complex characters with human flaws combined with imaginative powers, this book is for you.

If you like badass babes, this book is for you.

This is not a same-old, same-old story. Company of the Damned builds bridges between myths and fables, introducing the gods and creatures of old to the heavenly host in a unique take on what it might mean to fight for “good.” There is love and friendship, failure and victory, simple joy and beyond-human agony woven together in a fabulous story that was ALMOST worth the wait….OK, well worth the wait. I think the first two volumes help set the stage and bring the characters to life, but this book would also stand on its own, and honestly, I cannot rate it highly enough.

I WISH this was a paid testimonial, but nope. I just like the book.

Buy Company of the Damned Here!

MidWest Book Review of The Clockwork Detective

If ever we needed Aubrey Hartmann!

Hahaha! I received the following email this morning from the Midwest Book Review:

Dear Robert McCandless:

I'm very pleased to announce that the August 2019 issue of our online book review magazine "Reviewer's Bookwatch" features a review of "TheClockwork Detective (Constable of Aqualinne Book 1)".

Reviewer's Bookwatch: August 2019

James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief

Midwest Book Review

278 Orchard Drive, Oregon, WI 53575

Yeah, I don’t mind if MWB called me “Robert”. It’s a great name! Here’s the teaser for the review:

If ever we needed an Aubrey Hartmann, it's now. Because the sexually fluid, painkiller-addicted, clockwork-legged, fast-drinking, hard-talking (or maybe the other way round) constable who strides across McCandless' dizzying new world like a limping cross between Ripley and one of the later-model Terminators, is, quite simply, magnificent.

She takes shit from exactly NO men. Or women. Or weird supernatural beings, and is extremely unhealthy to be around. Fun, but lethal.

Did I mention steampunk? Not yet? Well, that's intentional.

Read the Rest At MidWest Book Review

Buy The Clockwork Detective here!

Company of the Damned - Available Today!

Ever have one of those days?

It’s good.  It’s better than good. It feels absolutely great to have my first trilogy on the books. COMPANY OF THE DAMNED released last Friday, and the Kindle version is now available.

The print version will be along directly.

The audio version of TEARS OF HEAVEN is coming along nicely. The voice actor is doing an impressive job, and I can’t wait to see/hear the final version.

I’ve started work on a new Aubrey Hartmann steampunk book, but one of the characters from Del’s world keeps showing up in my head with story ideas.  I’d heard other authors complain about this kind of thing, and I handwaved it off, and yet, here I am. If only an entire manuscript would come along with it.

In other news, I’m feeling better. I’ll have to post up about the camping trip with the Scouts last weekend. That was a . . . interesting.

Airships, Docking, and The Haenlein

Fits like a glove!

This thing is SOOOO gorgeous. This is something that should be framed and put on a wall. The diagram was part of the basis for the dirigible docking that takes place in the first chapter of THE CLOCKWORK DETECTIVE:

The Haenlein’s twin Jupiter engines screamed into a higher pitch that shook the entire airship. The rattle ran across the open deck of the command gondola, over the sparse crew and up through Constable Aubrey Hartmann’s teeth. The vibrations in the floor made her left knee throb. She didn’t need another reminder that the Imperial field hospital had cut her leg off below the knee to save her life. Nor that she stood on a clockwork replacement of iron, steel and bronze that had to be wound twice a day.  But the cannonball sent courtesy of the Glorious Republic of Hamill had insisted. When it rained, or when it got too cold, or when it got too hot, or when an airship powered up its engines for docking, she could feel it grind up through her hip.

The crew of The Haenlein, with goggles in place over their eyes, rode the vibrations of the powerful engines without notice. The voyage, to that point, had been as smooth as a dream. At the captain’s invitation, Aubrey has chosen to stand on the command deck, above the cargo and passenger decks. She was at the side of the open gondola to watch The Haenlein maneuver the last thousand yards into the Aqualinne docks.  The air whipped around her from all sides. Tears formed at the corners of her eyes. She hadn’t thought to ask the crew for a pair of their cumbersome goggles but refused to look away.

Contrary to popular opinion, The Haenlein is NOT named after scifi author Robert Heinlein, but rather for German engineer Paul Haenlein, the first to create a dirigible airship that was powered by an internal combustion engine.

Buy The Clockwork Detective and Read the Rest!