Let's book bomb the hell out of John Brown

As many of you know, last year I did a book tour with fantasy author John Brown.  He wrote Servant of a Dark God.  I’ve reviewed this book before, and to summarize it is great. Really great. And it is the beginning of a series and the others are supposed to be even better. John is a good friend, and a really sharp writer. He’s actually helped me get better by helping me understand the things that I do, right or wrong, and to put them into words. He’s way more analytical than I am. I basically make sure something explodes every 40 pages and call it good. John actually understands the craft of writing.

That said, SoaDG originally came out in hard cover, and hard covers are expensive. Especially when it is from a first time writer that you haven’t heard of. I’m actually glad I came out in paperback first because it gave me a chance to build an audience. A $7.99 impulse buy is a lot easier than a $25.00 impulse buy. So John hasn’t gotten nearly the exposure he should have considering how talented he is.

Well, SoaDG is finally coming out in paperback November 2nd. And I would like to help John get some more exposure. One good way to do that is to bump up your Amazon scores until you start showing up on various lists. So now you only need to drop a measly $8 to see if I’m telling you the truth. 

Amazon works on some sort of bizzarre, indecipherable rolling-average algorythm. It is voodoo. But basically it changes hourly based on how many books were sold compared to everybody else in some unknowable time frame. I want to knock John’s number way up there, and the best way to do that is to buy a bunch of them at approximately the same time.

http://www.amazon.com/Servant-Dark-God-John-Brown/dp/0765362309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1287502096&sr=8-1

There’s the link. Go buy a book. Trust me, it is good. If you don’t like epic fantasy that doesn’t involve contractors shooting monsters in the face, then buy one now anyway, and then give it as a Christmas present to whoever you know that does like fantasy. What I want to do is to see if the Monster Hunter Nation can bump up the stats of somebody other than me.  Think of this as a telethon for making a good writer more famous. I’m going to update the stats here throughout the day to see what we can do.  Right now John is at:

  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #220,997 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • One note on SoaDG, because I got the behind the scenes; It starts out slower than it should have, and makes it seem like a different kind of fantasy novel, which throws some reviewers.  In reality, the first action chapter (which is like #4 if I recall correctly) was originally the beginning, but John’s editor made him change it. See, that’s why I love my editor. So far she’s only told me where I’ve done stupid things and told me to make them not suck. 🙂

    And here is a link to John’s webpage. http://johndbrown.com/ He’s got free samples on there too.

    EDIT: Trending upward, big time. 🙂

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #19,383 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 2: Not too shabby.

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #15,055 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 3: HA HA! Now we’re talking!

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #5,686 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 4: BAM!  Top 100 in epic fantasy baby!  And now beating MHI which is at #91!  The Monster Hunter Nation is rocking the charts.

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #4,455 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 5: Super Author John Brown moves up a page in Epic Fantasy!

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #3,791 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 6: This is now higher than John got when his hard cover came out.  Congrats, Monter Hunter Nation. You are more effective than Tor’s marketing department. 🙂

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #3,631 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    EDIT 7: A new record

    Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #3,068 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

    I think this sums it up pretty well
    My geeky hobbies

    22 thoughts on “Let's book bomb the hell out of John Brown”

    1. If this one had had a reasonably priced ebook edition I’d have bought it already. Note to any publishers lurking – you lose sales when you price the ebook over $10, most of us won’t buy them for that, and you generally have to spend more money advertising when the price does drop to get me to notice the book again and remember to buy it. And since publishers seldom do that, without friends like Larry reminding us, those lost sales are just that, lost forever.

    2. I actually bought the book back when you mentioned it a while back. Unfortunately I have yet to get around to reading it, my “too-read” pile is massive.

    3. I’ve read it, Servant of a Dark God is awesome. I checked the hard cover out at the library. I liked it enough it’s worth having a paperback copy.

      Oh and Larry I wouldn’t even really call it Epic fantasy, it’s more like the fantasy that beats up the epic fantasies for their lunch money.

      I posted a review on my blog so hopefully all three of my readers will go out a purchase it. I’ll buy it here shortly.

    4. Ok, so I’ve been waiting for it to come out in paperback…

      I usually don’t pre-order, but I did this time.

      Thanks for making me spend $39, Larry… (I had to get the next John Cleaver book, and those other two Glenn Cook books so I could get the free shipping…)

    5. John is not a friend of mine and I in no way benefit from saying anything one way or the other. So it is with complete honesty that I say (aside from the slow start) that this is probably my favorite fantasy book to come out in very a long while. (MHI and Hard Magic excluded. I mean fantasy like “not based on Earth as I know it” fantasy). I read it because of Larry’s recommendation and- once it got rolling- I was hooked. I can’t wait for the sequel. I highly, highly recommend this book. (While I’m sure they’re very good at their job, I think John’s editor should’ve had a little more faith in the man’s obvious talent…)

    6. I had never read fantasy before Servant but I can’t even tell you how much I LOVED this book. 4 short chapters doesn’t seem like too much to invest to get into a book but maybe in the world of fantasy it is. Who knows all I know is it is a must read. I read it right when the hardcover came out about a year ago and I still think about it all the time. I am dying to see what happens in book 2 and 3

      1. 🙂 I’m glad my recommendation is worth something.

        To all those about to read Servant of a Dark God, enjoy but let me warn you it will swallow all your free time for quite a while. 😉

        It’s kinda like a literary Cthulhu.

        But since you’ve all read MHI and MHV you should be no strangers to the time sucking effects of awesome escapist fantasy.

        One last thing, for you aspiring writers out there,John D Brown’s Website is FULL of good stuff to help you out.

    7. Been away from your blog for two days, return and I find this call to book bomb John Brown. Well, after reading MHI and MHV, if it is endorsed by Larry I’ll buy it. So, my pre-order is on the list as well to boost the sales some more.

    8. Having shelled out the $25 for the hardcover, and loving the hell out of it, spending $8 for a copy I can loan to friends is not a bad thing.
      Mine is signed, so I don’t feel like passing it off to guys I barely know.

      All the signed copies of MHI that I have bought from Larry are all gone to never be seen again. I’m still waiting on the leather bound limited edition that will NEVER leave my house.
      I am cool with throwing away $8 to get MHI out there and read. I still wish I had held on to the signed first edition I had, but I know that it is out there getting Larry’s name burned into the social consciousness. Can I do any less for John?
      No! You can not borrow my signed hardcover first edition, but once I have a paperback, not a problem.

    9. Hell Larry, when my book comes out in print, I’ll just grovel at your feet to get the Monster Hunter Marketing Dept. on my side… LOL

    10. Being one of the few who have had a preview of Book 2 in the series, I can safely tell you it blows book 1 out of the water. By that I mean like one of those guns on a naval destroyer shooting a toy rubber duck in a bath tub. Yeah. Book 1 is great. Buy it now. Book 2 is amazing, look forward to it.

    11. Hey, Larry, you should really point John Brown towards the great guys over at Baen. If his book was available on Webscription.net, I’d buy it in a heartbeat! I don’t care for paper books any more (too heavy and bulky, don’t work in the dark, etc.), and don’t like Amazon’s approach to e-books. Based on your recommendation I may have to grit my teeth and buy the Amazon e-book — when the price drops! $13 is too much for an e-book.

    12. Well I ordered a paperback copy. I’ll read this version and pass it around to friends and keep the hardcover for the shelf. Couldn’t miss out on all the book bombing fun. My bank account hates you Mr. Correia, so very very much.

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