Kindle and AmazonEncore News

 A new press release from Amazon announced that Amazon will be launching library lending for Kindle books. As a fan of libraries and Kindle, and as an AmazonEncore author, this makes me very happy.

To mark the release of my two young adult novels at the beginning of this month, copies of Favorite and Life On Hold were sent out to reviewers. I've been the lucky recipient of many terrific reviews and I don't take any of them for granted. The most recent, at BookRoom Reviews, includes reviews of both books, and an interview with me, written by writer and poet, Christina Zawadiwsky.

Christina asked a lot of thoughtful questions including this one:
CZ: You’re obviously interested in the family, as each novel has had families with missing components and its characters have to grapple with those losses. Do you think that the root of this is sociological – that nowadays there are far more families that have lost various members (through divorce, illness, or tragedy)?

Whoa! I'd been hoping no one would notice all the missing parents in my fiction, but you can't get anything past Christina. To see how I answered that question (and more), visit BookRoom Reviews.

Yesterday The Denver Post had an article titled, The new way we read: 10 ways digital books are changing our literary lives. Years ago, when I was first trying to break into print, The Denver Post published one of my humorous essays, so I was tickled to see my name included in this piece. I was listed as being one of the "authors as famous for their aggressive self-promotion as for their books." Far be it for me to question the The Denver Post, but just between us blog friends? I'm not all that aggressive. Sometimes when I'm at the deli counter waiting for my half pound of ham and they give me a pound by mistake, I just take it rather than start something.

And saving the best news for last--I found out earlier in the month that AmazonEncore sold the trade paperback rights to my two adult novels, Easily Amused and A Scattered Life, to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. They will be released as Houghton Mifflin Harcourt titles later this year.

At first when my editor told me this news, I didn't quite get it. I felt like my parents had called me into the living room and said--start packing, you're getting a new family! But then my editor explained that this is a very good thing for everyone involved.

To put it in perspective, Jeff Belle,  v-p, Amazon Publishing, said that the deal with HMH will extend the reach of its authors’ works. “Houghton has a great team and we’re thrilled to be working with them to bring our authors to a larger print audience,” Belle said. “Our goal is to maximize opportunities for all of our authors.”

I'm excited to become a part of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, a venerable publishing house with an impressive list of authors and books.

Nothing stays the same in publishing anymore, does it? I've given up trying to predict what's going to happen next.

Later,

Karen