Excellent news!

Having received no direct response from Nakido to the DMCA Notice which we filed on 25 August, we have just been checking their website and discover that they have now removed the three titles of ours which had been available for free download there.

Obviously we will have to keep an eye on them in the future - and unfortunately there are plenty of similar sites out there - but this does seem like a (very) small victory!

Year Two Week Seventeen

A quiet week again, with no direct sales from the website - although one arrived after the cut-off point so it will be included next week. We're not too concerned - the summer months were rather quiet last year, too, and we've certainly done better than we did then! On the whole, in fact, thanks to Rainbow and AllRomance, August 2011 has been one of the most successful months we've ever had.

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We'd like to draw your attention to some wonderful comments made about RAVAGES by a reader named Jennifer on the GoodReads website. As both GoodReads and the very similar ManicReaders operate on informal reviews - and as there can therefore be rather a lot of them - our general policy is not to include comments from them on our own site (which is being redesigned even as we speak!) but we felt we should draw your attention to them in this particular case.

Amongst other things, Jennifer makes this observation:

After awhile you realize that it doesn't matter if these two are gay or heterosexual because these are real people, not caricatures of people, gay or otherwise.

This, we feel, sums up very nicely not only the great strength of RAVAGES as a novel but also the entire ethos of Manifold Press; we're not really in the business of producing male-male porn (although we certainly don't object to it!) but satisfying and hopefully realistic fiction about people who just happen to be gay.

And in the great scheme of things - although we'd obviously like more sales - there's a huge amount of pleasure to be gained from just knowing that we're reaching readers who really understand what we're about. It would be fair to say, in fact, that Jennifer's lovely review has completely made our week!

Takedown request

We've just had to file another takedown request with Nakido to try to get 'Dear Mr. President' (sic), 'Aloes', and 'Fool's Errand' removed from their site. Since this is the second time we've had to do this for Adam's book - and one of the most aggravating aspects is the way they've mangled its name - we are not unduly hopeful, but we'll do our best.

We double-checked our other authors and titles, but only these three seem to be involved. Clearly, however, we will have to keep an eye on Nakido in the future.

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We had intended to post a plaintive lament about the lack of reviews today, but the foregoing has taken the wind out of our sales*** a bit. Not only that, but when we realise how overcrowded the eBook romance market is - whether gay or straight - we're astonished that anything ever gets reviewed at all. We were very lucky early in our publishing career, we got a lot of attention from reviewers. Now this has fallen off steeply, but we're assured that it's the same for everyone. It's disappointing, of course, and we wish there was a solution.

However it makes us grateful for the reviews we do get, and even more so for the faithful customers who return time and time again to buy our books. We thought it was probably about time we mentioned that again!


*** sails! That's just embarrassing!

Year Two Week Sixteen

It's becoming apparent that our recent reorganisation is not going to allow us to update statistics on Saturday mornings any more, so we are going to start doing so on Sundays as from next weekend. Although we doubt that anybody really pays a lot of attention to this information we still feel it is worth recording, and will continue to do it in the absence of a compelling reason not to.

Anyway, our leading seller has been RAVAGES again this week, with an average response time of eight hour and seven minutes.

Another interview with R. A. Padmos

Following the highly complimentary review of RAVAGES that they posted recently, the good people at Miz Love and Crew Loves Books have interviewed R. A. Padmos, which makes excellent reading and which we would heartily recommend.

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Apologies, we thought we'd posted this last night. It seems we may have accidentally deleted it instead. Whoops!

Year Two Week Fifteen

Our highest-seller again this week was RAVAGES, which seems to be creating something of a stir; we eagerly await new reviews both for that and for our other new title, SOLEMN CONTRACT.

Average response time, after the hiccups of last week, is looking a whole lot more settled now at two hours 13 minutes.

Beyond that, and the fact that covers for the next four books have recently been prepared, there is little to report this week except a steady trickle of sales through our partners on ARe and the excellent progress being made by the proof-readers with our two November titles. We feel we are ticking over rather nicely at the moment, in fact, although we could always use a few more reviews!!!

First review of RAVAGES

Congratulations to R. A. Padmos for a stunning review at Miz Love and Crew Loves Books which concludes with this ringing endorsement:

Ravages is a wonderful story (but not for the faint of heart) that deals with love to the highest degree, and everything else in between. It’s an emotional roller coaster, I won’t lie and say it isn’t, but it’s a book well worth reading if you want to be amazed by just how strong the power of love can be. If you like your romance with a heavy dose of reality, please read this book. I think it will change you in some way, just as it did me.

Interview with R. A. Padmos

Over on Chris Quinton's blog there's a fascinating interview with R. A. Padmos, the author of RAVAGES.

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We now also have a 'Publisher Page' on Manic Readers which may help us to reach the notice of a few more reviewers.

Year Two Week Fourteen

And that, dear friends, is what we mean by a steep learning curve! Our new order-filling person had a little bit of a rough time getting to grips with the system but by mid-week had it all sorted out and ended up being much more comfortable with everything.

Teething troubles aside, however, it's been a very successful week, with RAVAGES easily our best-seller of the week, and an average response time which settled down in the end to exactly eight hours.

We can also report that one of the books scheduled for publication on 1 February 2012 has gone off to its proof-reader already - so all in all we think we might be excused if, just for a little while, we're feeling rather smug!

First sales via ARe

We take back what we said about ARe's website being big and confusing; obviously somebody has been able to find our books - at least two 'somebodies', in fact!  Our 'real time report', which yesterday was empty, is today populated with fascinating details.  This is a very promising start!

We've also ticked the box to allow them to review our titles, which is supposed to happen within the first month.  We don't suppose they'll do all of them but we hope they choose some - and will be very interested to see their response!

Two new titles now available from MANIFOLD PRESS

At last, it's August 1st - and we're delighted to announce that our two most recent titles have now gone live!  So hurry on over to our website/online shop and you will be able to order:

RAVAGES by R.A. Padmos

Steve Gavan and Daniël Borghart are professional soccer players for Kinbridge Town - and also secret lovers.  All that changes, however, when Steve innocently wanders into a city park and falls victim to a vicious gang of queer-bashers who beat him within an inch of his life.  After that there are no secrets any more - and it's a very long road back, for both of them, from there...

and/or

SOLEMN CONTRACT by Morgan Cheshire

Connecticut, 1720:  In an attempt to give his family financial security, school master Jem Bradley hires himself out as an indentured servant - and thus begins an odyssey which will take him to the small settlement of Kennet and a burgeoning friendship with enigmatic blacksmith Will Middleton.  Trouble is never far away, however, and when Jem is accused of committing a bloody murder his future begins to look very bleak indeed...

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While we're at it, we should say that we've redesigned the online shop module for a smarter, more modern look.  We're wondering now why on Earth we ever chose that 'book page' layout in the first place, and indeed why we stayed with it as long as we did, but we hope you'll agree with us that the new look is a considerable improvement.

Oh and we redesigned the LJ too ...