All the work for the audiobook of Princelings book 1 is complete and loaded onto ACX. I’m just waiting for technical approval, after which I’ll be able to give you some links and also some FREE COPY CODES.
Free Audiobook Codes
Obviously there are reasons for giving free codes: to get reviews! So please watch this space to get a code and be able to review in three parts: the story, the narration and the technical bit.
Third Edition
The third edition has had some minor tidying up and smoothing of some of the wording. This makes it in synch with the audiobook, which means that if you like to listen and read at the same time, you will be able to do so using Amazon’s Whispersynch technology.
The third edition will also be going to Apple Books (and Kobo, Nook and Smashwords), so if you prefer to read on your iPad, you can also get the audiobook to listen along.
The ebook remains free on Apple iTunes, Kobo, Nook and of course Smashwords.
You may be charged 99 c/p if it’s the first time you’ve bought it from Amazon, but if you already own it, you can get the upgrade via your kindle account.
Audiobooks – the coming thing. With the growing popularity of smart speakers, it seemed the time to get the Princelings books onto audio. I mean, if someone is going to ask the admittedly unlikely question “Alexa, find me a fantasy book where guinea pigs are kings” I want them to find mine!
The procedure for indie publishing audiobooks is well documented elsewhere. The two main sources I’ve found for uploading audio files for publication are ACX (Amazon’s connection with Audible), and Findaway Voices, which recently made arrangements with Smashwords. Both have very good and helpful instructions for asking for auditions, and choosing your narrator. There are also the business things like payment and contracts, and technical aspect of quality, length and uploads.
Naturally I started from a different position.
Princelings audiobook cover
I was lazing on the sofa one Saturday, watching the auditions for The Voice UK. The next one up was a guy from Norfolk (where I live) who did audiobooks as one of his activities. When I heard him reading, I sat up and said “that’s Fred!” I had found my Fred and George, as far as I was concerned.
Scroll forward to this year, and I decided I’d better get these audiobooks started, with the Princelings of the East as priority. I tracked down my Voice, first through the tv show website, then to his Facebook page. He did some audition tapes – a five minutes extract and a fifteen minute one, and after some more discussions, he got going on them.
Christopher Preece is delightful to work with, comes up with just want I want (sometimes without guidance) for the voices, and surprises me with some of the side characters sometimes. Who knew that Baden has a Sheffield accent? Fred, George, Hugo, Victor, Lupin and Nimrod are just as I hoped. I’ll hear his Lord Smallweed for the first time later today, as that chapter just went up on our working site. The brief: a nasty piece of work, who will become more evil as the series progresses.
The words need to match the kindle ebook exactly, in order to comply with Amazon’s specifications for Whispersynch. So, having given Chris a slightly updated version of book 1, I’m now tweaking bits where word flow is better in the audio version than the reading one.
There’ll be a new edition of Book 1 published before the audio is released. You can update your Kindle, iPad, Nook or Kobo from your purchase site, or get it free from Smashwords as usual, if Amazon isn’t pricematching.
I expect to get the audiobook online in January or February. You’ll probably be the first to know.
And after we finish The Princelings of the East, Chris will be starting on Princelings and the Pirates, followed by Princelings and the Lost City. It’ll depend on sales of those whether we do any more. Chris is excellent value for money, but it gets pricey when you have a ten book series!
And a quick ‘thank you’ to Dani English, who rustled up a revised Princelings cover even though she was packed with pre-Christmas commissions.
Note: I’ve set up a page for the audiobooks, but be warned – there’s a link to Chris’s stupendous rendition of Prince Ali on it!
The paperback version of Chronicles of Marsh is now available through Ingram’s distribution network.
You may have to order it, in which case use the ISBN number: 978-0-46-445403-8. It should show up on Amazon and B&N sites shortly. [Update 2020: the second edition ISBN is 978-1-71572540-2]
Today we launch the first box set of ebooks 1 to 3 of the Princelings series. This volume combines the existing three ebooks of the trilogy into one humungous download – three books for the price of one and two-thirds. You can still get the Princelings of the East itself permafree on Smashwords, and some, but not all the Amazon stores respect that; others charge 99c equivalent. The second and third books individually are $2.99, so all three at $4.99 is a bargain, and I don’t guarantee it will stay that way. I hope people will enjoy them enough to buy the rest of thee series, Traveler in Black and White, and then Talent Seekers, and on through the rest of the series.
On the other hand, I am thinking about bringing out a second box set, of books 4 – 6 in the spring, just in case it encourages more people to get further through the series as book 7, Willoughby the Narrator comes out.
The Blurb
A time tunnel, a pirate king, a lost city. In three separate adventures, Princelings Fred and George set out to solve trifling problems, and uncover dangerous and sometimes desperate foes, each with his or her own agenda, threatening the peace of the Realms.
The Princelings of the East: the saga starts with Fred and George leaving their cosy Castle in the Marsh. They encounter the mysterious cola vendor Hugo, the playboy Prince Lupin, and the over-worked innkeeper Victor, and have to use their own wits to decide who to trust, and how to prevent their ordered society descending into chaos.
The Princelings and the Pirates sees our heroes setting out to discover what has gone wrong at Castle Dimerie – a simple errand that ends in kidnap, shipwreck, and a battle in which no quarter is given.
The Princelings and the Lost City introduces George to the delights of flying, and Fred to the tortures of true love. Their inventions and experiments take a back seat as the puzzle of the Lost City and its all-female society lead to questions that may be too difficult to solve.
And having experienced a time paradox in the first adventure, George is under pressure to achieve a new method of providing the world with energy from strawberry juice. It’s a project that, for all the benefits it brings, creates far-reaching changes in their ordered society.
