We made 105% of our goal – with 64 backers!  The project is already underway, and the book rewards are being sent out to those of you who graciously donated to the effort – you are awesome!

As you can see from the graph – hey, we’re all geeks here – it was an heroic effort in the last hours by Norman.  More than a few frantic phone calls later, some big donors pushed us over the top. Sounds like the plot to a good book.

We are hoping to have the enhanced ebook version of Nanomagica out by September, and we’ll keep you posted here on the site as to how we are doing.  Again, a hard-fought victory – put another one in the win column for the team!

All 50 winners have been sent books – and we are hoping they are enjoying the journey into Todd Newton’s epic fantasy world. If we get a reasonable number of winner reviews, we’ll run more contests soon!

What is Goodreads?  Goodreads is a social cataloging website that allows you to sign up and register books to create your own library catalogs and reading lists.  More importantly, it allows you to share suggestions and participate in discussions with readers who have similar tastes in literature.  What’s better than a friend’s recommendation?  With 10 million members and 330 million titles everybody will find something to read!

On to the review.

Today’s app review came to my iphone at the recommendation of a reader. If you would like an app reviewed, there’s a tab for that. Look in the menu bar on our site and you will see it.

 So, on to the app. The App is called Cyberkill and is available for free on the App store. Warning though, there is an ad on the bottom, and like all smartphone ads, that means it will use data. Anyways, the concept is pretty cool. The app is an enhanced e-reader for a single book. Unlike ibooks, and other popular reading apps, this one allows you to tap on character’s names in the text, and get a photo, and biography of the character. I found this fantastic, because knowing the characters creates a more immersive reading experience. The app had all of the standard features of an e-reader, including a dictionary, highlighting, and navigation. My only real issue is that the app is only a single book. This app merges some innovative concepts which I am excited to see more in the future. Check out Cyberkill on the ios App store now, for free.

Free apps are winning over paid downloads.  In 2011, 96% of smartphone apps were downloaded for free. A recent report states:

Today’s smartphone users are increasingly unenthusiastic about paying for mobile applications. Consumers are closing their wallets at app stores, preferring free app downloads instead.

As revenue goes, that’s the bad news for today’s apps.

Now the good news.

IHS Screen Digest suggests in-app purchases will become the new standard for mobile app revenues. The freemium model, proven successful by gaming companies that charge users for accessing new tiers of content, involves consumers downloading an app for free, then being drawn to make purchases within the app. IHS projects that in-app purchases will account for 64% of total smartphone app revenue in 2015, up from 39% in 2011.

But Trapdoor Technologies goes one step better.

Trapdoor Technologies has embraced this ‘freemium’ model with their first entry in this market with my techno-thriller Cyberkill. The download of the full version advertising supported enhanced ebook app is entirely free.  All enhance content is included. Nothing is left out.

The reader can turn off the ads in the ebook at any time by doing an in-app purchase.

Pretty cool, huh?

One scene in Cyberkill, describes an AMTRAC train being deliberately sabotaged by hackers hacking into the AMTRAC system leading to hundreds of death. I won’t spoil it here by describing the scene. You’ll have to read the book to find out.

At any rate, just the other day hackers, possibly from abroad, executed an attack on a Northwest rail company’s computers that disrupted railway signals for two days in December, according to the TSA.

On Dec. 1, train service on the unnamed railroad “was slowed for a short while” and rail schedules were delayed about 15 minutes after the interference, stated a Transportation Security Administration summary of a Dec. 20 meeting about the episode obtained by Nextgov. The following day, shortly before rush hour, a “second event occurred” that did not affect schedules, TSA officials added.

“Amtrak and the freight rails needed to have context regarding their information technical centers,” the memo stated. “Cyberattacks were not a major concern to most rail operators” at the time, adding, “the conclusion that rail was affect [sic] by a cyberattack is very serious.”

Grab a copy of CyberKill (print, digital, enhanced ebook app) and see what other possibilities speculated in my book are on the horizon.

I ran across an article in Wired Magazine that disproves that ‘reality’. It seems some very noted authors of some very popular books have proven otherwise.

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in less than a week. He burned the first draft when his ego was bruised by his wife’s critique.

When Ray Bradbury wrote Fahrenheit 451, he had to rent a typewriter at the UCLA library at 10 cents a minute. The ticking meter spurred him to write this classic in nine frantic days.

Georges Simenon churned out each of his 75 Inspector Maigret novels in less than two weeks.

And Anthony Burgess, author of A Clockwork Orange, wrote the popular droog novel in less than three weeks.

Oh, and if you think such feats are performed by only the well-known classic authors, think again. Sara Gruen, inspired by the National Novel Writing Month, pounded out 50,000 words in 30 days. Gruen produced a first draft of her novel in just four weeks.

That book? Water for Elephants, a number-one best seller that became a hit movie.

So hit those keys and pound out the next best seller. It should only take a few weeks.

Right now, the e-book market is growing at over 10% per year. Meanwhile, the sale of paperbacks and hardcovers is dropping disproportionately. In fact, sales last month on hardcover books were down more than 40% from just the month before!
Now, there are reasons for this. Part of the problem has to do with the collapse of the Borders bookstore chain here in America. That might account for a drop of 25%. Another drop of 10% might be claimed because of the rise in sales of e-readers that people got for Christmas. But that means that there is still a substantial drop that doesn’t make sense—another 8%, more or less. What’s going on? I think that there may be people who are delaying hardback purchases in anticipation of buying e-readers. After all, why pay $25 for a hardcover when I plan to buy a Kindle and then get the electronic copy for $15 on Mother’s Day?

He may be right.