How it works.

Generally speaking a work in progress  available at Smashwords and ineligible for the premium catalogue will be free to download. Once the text is complete and proofed it will be submitted and a price attached.

What You Ask For passed the  premium catalogue selection and is now in the ebook retailers supplied by smashwords (until 2 March 2015 What You Ask For has a 50% discount code at smashwords enter AY63P at the checkout - the code isn't case sensitive).

Feedback on any story is welcome.  Drop me a line through the contact page.

Currently The Obedience of Fools and Gone to Earth are listed as works in progress, free to download at smashwords. Drop in and help yourself.

Iceline the first Grange novel is available at smashwords and through all the distribution channels as a permanent free download.

Chase your ebook down through the links from cheekyseagull.co.uk/iceline.

Who wrote that one?

Couple of weeks ago before I got stuck into NaNoWriMo I was doing the rounds checking the links from cheekyseagull to Apple and the other distributors. Basically checking which ones had the new covers for Control Escape and What You Ask For in place.

I dropped on to the Apple page for Control Escape and then clicked the links for other books by the same author.

Racked up across the page were a line of books all by Martyn Taylor, but half of them were written by my namesake. Another Martyn Taylor, (same spelling) his titles were local history around Bury St Edmunds in East Anglia. He works through a publisher. I publish independently and at the moment work exclusively in digital formats. I have plans to move into POD some time in the new year, again working independently.

I queried the situation with Smashwords who checked it out and reported back. Apparently there are no individual author pages on the Apple website and all publications by authors with the same name are listed together.

Christmas Treats - offer extended

A couple of weeks to go and you're thinking about that satisfying read, the one that helps the dinner go down and keeps you turning the page. What You Ask For is now out on the premium channels, 

and at Smashwords, and to make the adjustment between a free work in progress and a paid download, there is a discount code for smashwords, when you get to the checkout enter the code AY63P (valid to 2 March 15) and get 50% off

Get 

50% off this Christmas

at 

Easter bonus

Time to chill during the Easter holidays? Slide across to smashwords and grab a copy of Control Escape and input the code QS72V at the checkout (use it before the 1st of May). Download a copy of the seond Grange novel with a hearty 100% discount. The first novel in the series, Iceline, is free at smashwords and through distribution channels (Apple iTunes, Kobo, Flipkart, Nook).
Two good reads for the price of none!

Who or what is Cheekyseagull?

Maybe the question should be where does the name come from? A comment from a fellow Commonwealther to this blog said the name piqued her curiosity and she re tweeted the post of the 9th February - Just to let you know, so there's a small piece on the home page at cheekyseagull  a touch less of the book plugging, but not entirely free - unlike Iceline which is now free on all the distribution channels on the left hand column. There will be more to come, the piece on the home page is just a part of it...

Just to let you know

Check out http://www.cheekyseagull.co.uk/ for the latest news about Iceline, the first of the Grange novels. Now available free at Apple. Barnes and Noble, Smashwords and Kobo. Pull yourself a download and enjoy!

Area 51?

Area 51 - that got your attention; no, not the place that officially unofficially exists or doesn't somewhere in Nevada, although Google Earth seems convinced it knows where it is, but the 51st area for Apple's iBookstore - Japan. Now open for business

I admit there are certain oriental mysteries about the culture and people of the Japanese islands that have always intrigued me, and a favourite James Bond novel, You Only Live Twice, is set there. The book has a much more exotic element regarding poisons and volcanic vents than the film, but it catches something of the strangeness of the culture.

The news yesterday morning carried a link to the press release announcing the opening and tucked away inside it was a fascinating factoid, a conversational elephant stopper, 130 million iBook apps have been downloaded to iPads, iPhones etc.; now wind it back and run it again. That is a staggering figure, and imagine all that space waiting to be filled with books, 130 million iBook apps, we're already half way through Read an Ebook Week and time to go bobbing in Apple's barrel.

If you haven't had your fill yet, help yourself, my two books Iceline and Control Escape are part of the action this week and the notification emails have never been busier. The discount code until Saturday is RW100, don't keep it to yourself.
A week is said to be a long time in politics, not so when your working through the pages of a book, a week may put ten or fifteen thousand words on the story, more if you're working at it full time - a delightful luxury I'm not in a position to enjoy at the moment, but hey, I can dream.

Be part of it, spread the word.

130 million opportunities for an Indie Author like myself to connect with the reading public: you,  to entertain you, to share the adventures of my characters and hang in there with them through thrills, mystery and danger until  way off in the distance there is a hint of a large lady singing.

Whatever and wherever you're reading, enjoy.

I mentioned this one earlier - new book out

Last November amid all the excitement of Nanowrimo 2012 I talked about a work in progress by an Indie Author I know - a writing buddy as they're known at Nanorwrimo, the book is now finished and published at Smashwords.com - Not Without my Cat (when fish is not enough) in the author's own words

Sam is a detective, who along with his smart but troublesome cat Camille, uncovers an impossible crime. With the scene of the unusual event too close to home for a man already harassed with a Mad Ex and difficult new clients, this proves to be the challenge that he needs to overcome his deepest fears, find out what electric tin openers are really used for; and save a Lady from mortal peril.

A Science Fiction Adventure with Alternate Realities, Well Made Cocktails, a missing scientist or two, and Cheese and tomato sandwiches. And Let us not forget the Glow in the dark, dimension jumping Cat....

Nip across to Anne's Blog for a discount code valid at Smashwords and enjoy the book, tell your friends; the book is currently passing through the review system at Smashwords and will soon be on its way through the distribution channels to major ebook distributors, Apple itunes, Sony, Kobo, et al!

Feedback - say that again - please!

Putting a novel out has its moments of sublime delight and mild frustration, working out how to get the word out, wandering through the labyrinth of the Internet, a whole host of things and then suddenly when you least expect it - music to your ears!

Excellent, couldn't put it down - simple words that writers dream of hearing. I heard them this week; Control Escape - the second Grange novel - was holiday reading for a friend of mine and the text after touchdown was "Control Escape Excellent" an honest unsolicited opinion. So here's the rub, don't take my word for it or his; check it out for yourself - a page turner you can't put down for the price of a decent cup of coffee, in fact try both of them Iceline and Control Escape for two cups of coffee.

If you're in the mood for something raw and closer to the typeface, where the words are being mined, try What You Ask For... - it started with Nanowrimo last November and the work progresses - it's a freebie download - while the construction work continues.

Bring your own coffee, or slide them from the Internet onto your favourite reader via the WiFi at your favourite coffee shop. Traditional British Thrillers with the flavours of John Buchan and Jack Higgins, a touch of crime and mystery stirred into a brew you will enjoy as much as your coffee, available from Smashwords, Apple iTunes, Diesel, B&N, Kobo, Sony.

Control: Escape - take a look inside

Control: Escape is the follow up to Iceline, with more about life at the Grange, Bill Jardine, Don Steel, Josie Burke and introducing a few more characters.

Steve Arkwright is the guy who fooled around nipping over firewalls to see what was on the other side, until the men in suits made him and offer. A well paid job with security is just another form of prison, with ever shifting bars, until a way out becomes available.  Try this for starters, and read on...

Chapter One


Malcolm Baker touched a finger to his lips and slid it across his throat as he sat down and lobbed his cap on the desk. Bill Jardine reached under the desk and flicked a switch. “Sound is off.”
“Thanks.” He unclipped his tie and unbuttoned the collar of his shirt.
Jardine leaned forward and pressed call on the intercom. “Josie, coffee for two, large Thermos, and if anyone asks I'm not”
“OK Boss.” The speaker crackled and he released the button.
“I’m imagining all this?”
“Very lucid dream,” Baker grinned and sat in the buttoned leather chair. Jardine closed the file on his desk and creased the spine with his thumb before he put it away in a drawer. “Out with it then, what’s the problem?
“Not certain you can help. That’s why I'm doing this quietly.”
“Seven thirty and in uniform, wouldn't call that quietly.”
“Uniform makes me invisible, so who cares about the time.”
Josie came in with the coffee on a tray. Two heavy mugs and a two litre pump action Thermos flask; milk and sugar. Jardine pumped the coffee into the mugs, spooned two heavy teaspoons of sugar into one and handed it to Baker who stirred it well.
“Go on,” Jardine waited until Josie had left the room, “what’s happening.”
“I have a problem with your old firm, Hoplite; I’m working with special branch on their latest project because we think it may have policing possibilities.”
“Why not take it up with Michael Spear?”
Baker scratched the side of his head. “That is the problem; he may be implicated. There’s a security breach somewhere in the company and I can’t find it yet, I have my suspicions but nothing more at the moment.”
“And you want me to spy on my best mate?” For a moment Jardine’s voice carried the accent of his childhood in the north east. “That’s asking a lot.”
Baker drank a mouthful of coffee and gave himself time to think. “No, I don’t want you to spy on him, look, I want to help. I can’t really believe that he is tangled up in whatever is going off, but I have to be sure, and for that I need to know more than I do at the present.”
“Alright, but how can I help?”
“It may not amount to anything, but if Michael Spear drops in can you talk to him, see what you can prise out of him and persuade him to talk to me at least?”

Find out more on my author page at Smashwords.com and www.cheekyseagull.co.uk for links to major ebook suppliers, available through Apple, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Sony Readerstore and Diesel ebookstore. Discount coupns are available at Smashwords, via cheeky seagull until the 6th of January.

Through the mill

The waiting. Books have gone through to the premium catalogue. Now they're filtering down the distribution channels out to the bookstores and the itch to keep checking how they are doing and where they are in the pipe is one I want to scratch all the time. Patience is a virtue, one that is never in a hurry...they're on their way through the Apple ibookstore process now.
Keep watching and waiting...