Passing this on from Martha Jette  

Authors Please Take Note!

Yesterday, I learned that Download Genius has every single one of my books and ebooks listed for free download.

Every author needs to be aware of this site and to check to see that their books are not being offered for free there.

Authors work very hard writing their books and even harder to ensure that they are perfect. We do not deserve to be ripped off in this way.

I have contacted Amazon.com, which handles many of my works to let them know that they are losing money because of this site. They make much more than I do off of them so you would think they would take action.

As of this morning, I received a response from Amazon saying they did not authorize these books on Download Genius and are having their respective departments look into this matter further.

I don't know at this point if anything will be resolved here. I received an email from Download Genius this morning saying they took down one of my books but when I checked, it was still listed.

Make sure you go to the site as soon as possible. Then inform your publisher, Amazon or other affected site that this has happened to you too. Hopefully, it has not.

I will attempt to stay on top of this until this site gets my books off their list and will keep you posted. If you see that this has happened to you, please let me know. There is strength in numbers, so this is very important.

Baby don't cha' take it, don't cha' take it away…

"Caroline"   by Nathan Juju

How about a rockin tune to get your blood pumpin? 

Caroline by Nathan Juju; The band that lives in the books...

https://soundcloud.com/nathan_juju/caroline-1

EKKO Mysteries Trilogy has hit the streets. 

Thanks to Apple's new Interactive iPad features, we've taken the EKKO story up a notch, by jumping in the studio and creating some musical recordings. As opposed to background music, these lyrics have been structured to fit the story, as have the song styles, matching a band that has, fictionally, been touring for over twenty years.

As CJ tours with the rock band, Nathan Juju, there are now live music snippets in the books that follow the paranormal stage adventures. The recordings place the reader in the front row of the concert, in the moment, making the reading experience much more fun. 

We've also added some awesome pics, an opening video, and a glossary for those technical terms, to all three books.

There were many great artists, engineers, and vocalists involved in the Nathan Juju CD, and we're honored to have them on board. For information on Nathan Juju, the band that lives in the books, please visit  www.NathanJuju.com

All in the name of fun...

EKKO Mysteries has long admired hard working authors, which is why we started the EKKO Mysteries Author Spotlight Series, focusing on emerging authors and their stories.

This time we bring you

Margo Bond Collins, author of,

Waking Up Dead

Was there a moment or specific event that made you commit to writing?

I’ve always known that I wanted to be a writer, for as long as I can remember. The first story I remember actually writing down was basically fan-fiction of The Wizard of Oz. I wrote it in long-hand in a yellow legal pad. I’ve been writing ever since.

What is the working title of your book?

Waking Up Dead

Where did the idea come from for the book? What genre does your book fall under?

I wrote Waking Up Dead, a paranormal mystery, when I lived in Alabama for a few years. I remember driving to work one morning and seeing just a wisp of fog move across the statue in the middle of the town square. The statue was of some Civil War figure, and thought that it looked oddly ghostly. In between teaching classes that day (I’m a college professor in my other life), I started writing Callie’s story.

How would you describe the pace of the story?

It’s a fast-paced murder mystery. Callie, the ghostly protagonist of the novel, witnesses a murder, and everything takes off from there.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Callie: Jennifer Lawrence

Ashara: Kat Graham

Maw-Maw: Ruby Dee

Stephen: Chris Hemsworth

Clifford Howard: Adoni Maropis

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

When Callie Taylor died, she expected heaven or hell; she got Alabama.

Is your book self-published, published or represented by an agency?

It is published by Solstice Shadows Publishing.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

Six weeks—the first novel I ever wrote was during National Novel Writing Month (www.nanowrimo.org) and I’ve used that method ever since!

How have your friends and family influenced or helped you in the writing process?

Absolutely! The feisty grandmother Maw-Maw in Waking Up Dead is actually largely based on a combination of my own grandmother and great-grandmother--the only real difference is that they were white and from Texas rather than black and from Alabama. Otherwise, she talks like them and acts like them. It's my great-grandmother's voice I hear in my head when I write her dialogue, my grandmother's movements I see when I picture her walking around. Physically, I imagine her looking a bit like Ruby Dee in the television movie version of The Stand. But her attitude? That's straight from my own family!

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

That’s a tough one. The narrator is pretty snarky, especially when she’s out of her depth, so it’s kind of like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum mysteries—except there’s a paranormal element. It’s got a paranormal element that is perhaps reminiscent of Laurell K. Hamilton’s early Anita Blake novels—except it’s only one ghost and (as far as Callie knows) there are no vampires or shapeshifters or other monsters. Ultimately, I think I drew on a lot of the mysteries and urban fantasies I’ve read and mashed them all together in one book!

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I read tons of urban fantasy and love just about any kind of fiction with a paranormal element; there was never any doubt that what I wrote would have a supernatural slant. But I didn’t know that Waking Up Dead was going to be a mystery until I had written the first few chapters—I tend to start with a character and then see what happens. Once I knew I was writing about a ghost, I knew I wanted to see the world from her point of view. And what she saw when she watched Molly die made her need to take action.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

Here’s the book blurb: In Waking Up Dead, when Dallas resident Callie Taylor died young, she expected to go to Heaven, or maybe Hell. Instead, when she met her fate early thanks to a creep with a knife and a mommy complex, she ended up in Alabama. Now she's witnessed another murder, and she's not about to let this one go. She's determined to help solve it before an innocent man goes to prison. And to answer the biggest question of all: why the hell did she wake up in Alabama?

What is your favorite response from a reader?

I love it when readers contact me to tell me they started the book and then couldn’t put it down. One of my favorite Amazon reviews says “I crawled into bed last night intending to just read the first few chapters before bed, and ended up, well after midnight, bleary-eyed but satisfied at a ripping good read! I really couldn't stop till I finished and found out how it all ended.”

Great interview! Kudos to Margo for her hard work!

Where can readers find your work?

Buy Waking Up Dead on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Waking-Up-Dead-ebook/dp/B00FOXWLM8/

Connect with Margo

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/author/margobondcollins

Email: mailto:MargoBondCollins@gmail.com

Website: http://www.MargoBondCollins.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MargoBondCollin @MargoBondCollin

Google+: https://plus.google.com/116484555448104519902

Goodreads Author Page: http://www.goodreads.com/vampirarchy