A new release of my novel Oxygen is finally out in both e-book form and in paper!
My coauthor (John Olson) and I wanted to write a space adventure novel with a strong female lead character and with a fast-paced storyline packed with suspense, humor, and romance.
As I write this blog, Oxygen has the following rankings on various lists on Amazon:
- #141 on the main list for All Kindle Books.
- #3 on the Science Fiction Adventure list.
- #1 in Futuristic Romance.
About OXYGEN:
Valkerie Jansen is tough, beautiful, and has an uncanny knack for survival. But that doesn’t explain why NASA picks her to be part of a two man, two woman crew to Mars — or does it?
Bob Kaganovski, the ship’s chief engineer, is paid to be paranoid — and he’s good at it. After a teeth-rattling launch, Bob realizes that his paranoia hasn’t prepared him for this trip. He can deal with a banged-up ship, but how’s he going to survive the next five months with HER just a flimsy partition away?
Halfway to the Red Planet, an explosion leaves the crew with only enough oxygen for one. All evidence points to sabotage — and Valkerie and Bob are the obvious suspects.
Oxygen is a witty, multi-award-winning roller coaster ride, with a plot that moves at the speed of light.
The authors had hoped to work in some cool controversy on science, faith, the meaning of life, the existence of God, and possibly even the Coke versus Pepsi debate, but they were having so much fun writing the story that they forgot to offend anyone.
About the Authors:
John and Randy have been collaborating on one crazy project after another for the past fifteen years.
Not only are they novelists, Ph.D. scientists, and entrepreneurs who’ve founded four different corporations between them, but rumor has it that they prowl the night wearing steampunk battle gear to rid the streets of vampires, werewolves, and ducks that poop on your front lawn after it rains.
John and Randy deny all such tales as “vicious exaggeration.”
Extra Goodies for Novelists
What’s in it for you, besides a fast-paced story? John and I worked hard to add in some extra goodies that you, my Loyal Blog Readers, will love. We created four appendices totaling more than 21,000 words:
- How We Sold Oxygen In Only 7 Weeks — Without an Agent
- The Proposal for Oxygen
- Randy’s #1 Secret For Writing Fiction, those pesky Motivation-Reaction Units, applied to the entire first scene (which John wrote)
- John Strikes Back — his analysis of the entire second scene (which Randy wrote)
Oh yeah, and there’s an Eternal Coupon in the book, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s good for selected writing products on this site. It’s reusable. It never expires. The discount is 50%. Yes really.
99 Cents? Are We Crazy?
We normally would sell what’s in those appendices for at least $15. But in an e-book, we get incredible economies of scale, so we can include them at no extra cost, right along with the novel.
The everyday cost of Oxygen is $2.99. But for this week, now through midnight on Saturday, October 8, 2011, the price of the e-book is only 99 cents.
Caveats: Amazon may charge a higher price to some customers outside the US, and they may not offer the e-book for sale in all countries. It appears that Barnes & Noble only sells e-books to customers in the US and Canada. We gave both retailers full worldwide distribution rights and we set the price as low as we could, but that’s no guarantee that they’ll sell the e-book everywhere at the same price. This problem is above our pay grade.
Where to Get Oxygen
Grab your e-book copy of Oxygen here on Amazon for 99 cents.
Grab your e-book copy of Oxygen here on Barnes & Noble for 99 cents.
If you don’t have an e-reader, you can get free apps for Macs, PCs, iPads, and most smart phones on both Amazon and Barnes & Noble’s web sites.
If you prefer paper and you live in the US, you can order a paper copy here at Marcher Lord Press for $16.99.
The paper edition has a different cover than the e-book, but it’s the same content with one difference. The paper edition has an Eternal Coupon worth a 60% discount.
I’m curious why you decided to go with two different covers for the rerelease. At first glance, the e-cover looks like a comic book version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, until you realize that isn’t a stake she’s holding. But I bought a copy anyhow. 🙂 Even though I do have the original book, bought at a used bookstore before I’d ever heard of the Snowflake Method or MRUs. It was autographed by both of you too. I couldn’t believe someone had gotten rid of it and snapped it up immediately – kind of like I did with this 99 cent ebook.
Randy sez: The reason for two different covers is that there are two different publishers involved. We are publishing the e-book version of Oxygen under our own publishing company, DitDat, Inc., which is owned by me and John.
We decided who our target audience is–people who like fast-paced action novels with a strong female lead character. Then we looked at the covers of current books targeted to that audience. Then we created a concept and hired graphic artists to make the cover. It didn’t turn out exactly the way we imagined, but it was close. We don’t believe the cover will appeal to everybody. We only need it to appeal to our target audience. John and I are both in our target audience, and we “eat our own dog food” — we both like the cover.
Why two publishers? We have no skill in creating paper editions, but Jeff Gerke, publisher at Marcher Lord Press does, and he jumped at the chance to do the paper version of Oxygen. Jeff hired his own graphic designer to create a cover targeted to his target audience for the book.
Different publishers; different covers. This is common in publishing. However, the content is the same, with the minor exceptions noted above.
Hi Randy – that Amazon link takes me to a page where it says $2.99 although the B&N one is 99 cents. Would you have a look please?
Many thanks.
Randy sez: Hi Shirls, as I recall, you live in South Africa. As I noted above in the blog post, Amazon doesn’t price the book the same for all international customers.
I’ve heard from many readers around the world, and most are getting it for 99 cents. A few are seeing a price of $2.99, and we’re sorry about that, but it’s not something we can change. A very few are not able to buy it at all, and we’re extremely sorry about that, but again, that problem is above our pay grade.
No doubt there are good reasons for these pricing anomalies, but we don’t know what they are. We hope that in a few years, all these international commerce issues will be resolved. That day is not yet, however. What is amazing is how broad the worldwide distribution capabliities of Amazon and B&N actually are. An author with a laptop can write a novel today, upload it tomorrow, and in a couple of days, somebody on the other side of the world can buy it. Amazing. Even with the occasional glitches, amazing.
Hey Randy,
Just bought the book yesterday and am steaming through it. Great stuff!! And I might add that the cover is great (no offense Katie). I should mention that I think it’s interesting that it’s categorized as futuristic fiction, as much of the book takes place in 2012… :). Anyway, congrats on the success, I can only pray for similar results (without the fan base it might be tough).
-Dave
Randy sez: Glad you like it, Dave! We originally wrote the book in 1999/2000, when 2012 seemed a LONG way off. Unfortunately, a real trip to Mars still is a LONG way off, although we didn’t know that at the time. After we published Oxygen, 9/11 happened, and military spending went way up. That dashed any possibility of a Mars mission.
I would really like to buy this but I don’t have a Kindle and B&N doesn’t accept Paypal. Looks like I’m toast, which is a shame because I was really looking forward to reading this story + all the bonus features.
Randy,
I don’t read sci-fi … but I read this book a while ago. And the next one, Fifth Man. And all of your other titles. Hmmm. Pretty interesting for someone who doesn’t read sci-fi. What was that your teaser said about action, humor, and romance? They held me, the non-sci-fi reader, because of the writing, storyworld, voice, characterization, MRUs and all the other stuff you talk about. It was all there; I couldn’t help but read. And then … I bought the 99-cent version, too, because, 1. I wanted all that author dissection you referred to, and 2. I wanted a Nook version.
I’m buying it. You make a good case for doing just that, and I love reading on my Kindle! Looking forward to it.
Hey Randy,
I got your “special offer” email in my inbox yesterday and purchased your book 30 seconds later. You’ve got a knack for the power of advertising! I’ve already started perusing the appendixes and, no joke, they’re chock full of everything you said they’d be. Plus the coupon, very cool.
Your talk on “high concepts” is now making me revisit my current work-in-progress to see if it’s got enough impact.
Thanks for making such an incredibly awesome offer open to your blog readers.
P.S. Hopefully from your sales you’ve seen that I’ll buy just about anything you’ve got on your site. Please let me know when Fiction 301 and Fiction 401 are available! Congrats on #1 in Futuristic Romance!
Hi Randy – okay I get it about the international price. It’s still a fabulous deal and I have bought it. But oh dear, you don’t know what you’ve started with me now. I never realized I could get Kindle editions on my PC. As fast as a blink. I’m excited to read the novel – just up my street. Thanks so much!
Randy sez: Hey Shirls, have fun! Once you start reading e-books, you may never go back to paper. Since I started reading on my iPad, I’ve bought far more e-books than I normally would have in paper. I’ve hardly bought any paper since then, and it’s great to have this growing library in my iPad that I can take with me anywhere. Have fun!
Hi Randy, could you make it available through Smashwords please? Unfortunately Kindle ebooks are not available here in the Middle East.
Thanks and more power!
I’m also interested to buy your book. I am so happy to have come across your blog.I was really looking forward to reading it.Keep up such good work in future too.
I just want to say that I adore your website. I’ve been coming back here every night for a week studying up on how to create the perfect scene. I am trying to make the transition from wannabe writer to published Kindle author, but I’m not the kind to publish garbage. I’m a decent prose writer, but I get bogged down trying to structure an entire piece of fiction. Thank you so much for your witty, engaging, and very understandable description of how to structure scenes. Your examples are great, too. I purchased Oxygen today and will be diving in tonight. You are providing real value here for the writing community. Keep it up!