The 2025 Indie Author Holiday Book Catalog

No doubt you've already received your catalog from Amazon and a thousand other retailers for your holiday shopping. Well, we didn't have your address, so we decided to post our recommendations for seasonal book-buying for those readers on your list (or yourself!). All these titles are from regular or new contributors here on the blog. 

Thanks for supporting our contributors.

Enjoy the books!

Tales of Silvertide, Volumes 1&2; Collections of short stories that cover a wide selection of characters who are just starting their journeys as heroes.

Fantasy, imagine if The Ranger's Apprentice met the Dragonlance books.

To purchase and for more information: https://tinyurl.com/27fp2s8s

It's 1932, and America is preparing for the LA Olympics. But in the midst of one of the stormiest winters on record, the rain is murder--literally. Men are dropping dead of the storm and the city is panicking. A former Great War airman is dragged into a plot to terrifying America to staying neutral in the next World War. Along with a small group of determined allies, he will take the battle from the streets of Hollywood to the forests of the Amazon. There they will find their destiny--those who survive... No. 1 in a series.

To purchase and for more information: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00T44SLHC

Cemirowl is gifted, and cursed. She sees the spirits of the dead, and sees the future in her basket of bones; her sight is cryptic, lacking, and mostly useless. In her tiny village, she is a priestess, but still an object of curiosity and an outcast.

A chance meeting brings one of the king’s caballiers to her door for a reading, for nothing more than some entertainment. He is well-entertained indeed by her predictions of his lady loves… and far less so when she foretells a coming death. He leaves, dismissing her. But for all that her power is mysterious and often confusing, it is never, ever wrong.

When Queen Tidyri is murdered, the caballiers return for Cemirowl. She is brought unwillingly into the palace and into a web of intrigue and lies, where King Larthor rages in his grief. He demands that Cemirowl now use her gifts to find the one who killed his beloved wife.

Cemirowl must draw on all her abilities – her powers, no matter how unreliable; her intuition for reading people; her knowledge; and her wits – to discover the murderer, lay the spirits of the dead to rest, and help the living to grieve and find peace. And, perhaps, she will finally find a place where she belongs.

THE BONE READER is a fantastical murder mystery set in the rich world of Ihyel, where the hard-won peace between two kingdoms rests on the shoulders of one determined, compassionate priestess.

To purchase and for more information: https://books2read.com/u/4DBxag

From Darkness Comes Peace…

Raised in the caves of his father’s people–the brutal and warlike Oni–a half-breed boy knows only a world of darkness and pain. Life here offers one cruel lesson: fight or die.

But he dreams of a world of light and beauty, the world of his human mother, an Oni slave. His only solace, she implores him not to give in to the hate and evil of the Oni, to reject their Dark God, Grund. “Be at peace,” she advises, and from this, he gleans both hope and a name.

As his mother wished, Peace escapes the caves, but he encounters a world of humans that he doesn’t understand. A token from his mother earns him a place at the Sky Temple of Eos the Maker, where his mother trained in her youth. Here, he, too, can become a warrior for the Gods of Light. Struggling against his upbringing, he earns a home, a family.

But the Dark Gods have dark plans, and they have planted their seeds within the promising young disciples of the Sky Temples. To thwart them, Peace must return to the Oni, submit to the machinations of a centuries-old creature, and offer himself to Grund.

To save his world and those he loves, he must sacrifice his soul.

To purchase and for more information: https://www.amazon.com/Man-Peace-Seeds-Darkness-Trilogy/dp/1939837375

Magical children, American legends, and the nation's first lady detective come together in this thrilling fantasy for fans of The Wild, Wild West and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Kate Warne shattered the glass ceiling and helped save a President as the first female Pinkerton detective. Now she's learning a new role in life - ghost detective. Coming back from beyond the Veil to continue her work, Kate and her partner Shadow are tasked with finding a missing girl somehow linked to the famous Wizard of Menlo Park, Thomas Edison.

But all is not as it seems with the strange inventor, and Kate begins to suspect that his strange assistant may be much more than he appears to be. What she learns is that Edison, the girl, and all her strange siblings are involved in something much deeper and far darker than she ever imagined.

Now Kate and Shadow must join forces with a traveling snake-oil salesman, a semi-retired combat airship pilot, Edison's most famous rival, and a legendary river boat captain and itinerant scribbler of tales to keep Edison and his mysterious cohort from calling forth an ancient power and possibly the end of life as we know it.

To purchase or for more information: https://www.amazon.com/Children-Menlo-Park-Jessica-Nettles/dp/1645541215

Are you ready for an island adventure? An old enemy stalks Abraham Snow through the streets of Hawaii. Get ready for vengeance in paradise in author Bobby Nash's SNOW ISLAND, the 8th book in the award-winning Snow series from BEN Books. Get ready for a #SnowDay at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FVSX9WZX

Written by Author Bobby Nash.

Cover by Plasmafire Graphics’ Jeffrey Hayes.

Edited by Michael Gordon.

Published by BEN Books.

Audio narrated by Stuart Gauffi. Coming soon.

Read it free with Kindle Unlimited. .

Learn more about Snow at www.abrahamsnow.com

Check out Snow’s complete adventures at www.amazon.com/dp/B07G3K7S46

Teel James Glenn’s mystery horror mash-up Not Born of Woman is a fresh, approachable, and engaging take on what a sequel to Mary Shelley’s classic 1818 novel Frankenstein could be. Smart, self-educated, caring and mystified by humanity, the creature, now self-named as Adam Paradise, has spent several decades in Arctic isolation living on an ice-bound ship filled with an impressively stocked library and gold treasure, is back among alleged civilization, namely 1930’s New York City, attempting to understand humanity and his place in the world by using his size, power, sophisticated mind, and an impressively empathetic heart to help those in need. The result is an addictive read that mixes classic mystery, private eye, and horror tropes with a wealth of philosophical and literary references, a rich cast of fully formed New Yorkers that includes cops, gangsters, store owners, a trans neighbor, gypsies, and Nazis. 

To create a quick read that builds on a classic, is fueled by essential thoughts, is paced like a thriller, and offers a way to love a long beloved character in a new way is an impressive accomplishment indeed. Teel James Glenn delivers all this as a page-turner of a ripping fun read.

Most highly recommended. -- Chris Ryan

To purchase and for more information: https://www.amazon.com/Walking-Shadow-Paradise-Investigations/dp/163789337X/ref

A demon’s plot.

A deadly assassin.

Four unlikely allies against the forces of Hell.

Amid relentless monsters, fey alliances, and explosive magical battles, Jake Foster—a man tormented by his past and his own powers—must choose between surrendering to chaos or leading a desperate quest to reclaim his soul.

With the help of a Homeland Security agent, a professor of magic, and a scared half-demon kid, will Jake conquer the darkness, or be devoured by it?

Demon's Call is the pulse-pounding debut of The Nevermore Casefiles, a series set in a world where the veil between the mundane and the monstrous is alarmingly thin.

To purchase and for more information: https://books2read.com/nevermore1lrs

Farahnaz Rahnema has spent her life in the shadows of Emari’s grand Citadel, serving the powerful queen, theMashyana, as her most loyal Hand. With the Talent of metallurgy, Farah can bend and control metal, making her a skilled thief and assassin, tasked with retrieving ancient relics of unimaginable power for the queen. She believes in the queen’s vision for a restored kingdom, one relic at a time. When a mysterious girl named Pari, the Voice of the gods, insists that Farah must join forces with Yasher—a charming, reckless card shark who thrives on luck—Farah’s world starts to unravel.

Yasher has always relied on his quick wits and strange luck to survive, avoiding deep ties to anyone or anything. But when he crosses paths with Farah, he’s thrust into a perilous mission to recover relics that could reshape Emari’s future.  As they navigate a kingdom filled with hidden truths, ancient secrets, and ever-shifting alliances, Farah begins to question the queen she serves and the kingdom’s growing corruption.

With her loyalty tested and Yasher’s own hidden motives in play, Farah must decide: is Mashyana truly Emari’s savior, or is something darker at play? In The Hand of Mashyana, power, betrayal, and ancient relics collide, with a kingdom’s fate hanging in the balance.

Perfect for fans of epic fantasy, thrilling heists, and slow-burn romance, The Hand of Mashyana is the first book in the sweeping saga where destiny, power, and loyalty collide.

To purchase and for more information: https://amberhansford.com/books/the-hand-of-mashyana/

Pursued by a warlord atop a dragon, a Viking on a vengeance quest and a half-elf freedom fighter must find the sword of a god to protect their homes and decide the fate of a nation.

To purchase and for more information: 

https://a.co/d/h0C8QOT} and https://hfdaywrites.com/product/a-tale-of-scorched-ash-and-elm/

Dime-Store Detective vol. 1 is on Kickstarter! Published by Source Point Press! This 130 pages covers issues 1-5 in this new graphic novel. Detective Mackinder must uncover the connection

To purchase and for more information: https://t.co/klU83cOpaI

THESE MEN ARE APES... ON FILM!

From the moment they met—it was movies! They’ve reviewed new releases of vintage cinema and television of all subject matter on disc, finding gems and letting you know the skinny on what to avoid. At Apes on Film, their aim is to uncover the best in retro film. As they dig for artifacts, they’ll do their best not to bury their reputations.

What will they find out here? Their destiny.

Welcome to CINEFILMANIA! This book exists to scratch your retro-film-in-high-definition itch.

HORROR • DRAMA • CRIME • SCIENCE FICTION • COMEDY • ACTION • ADVENTURE • ROMANCE — Name your genre, they’ve got opinions on it! Blu-ray, 4K, UK, Anyway, Anywhere, Don’t Care. If it’s film or television from the past on high definition physical media, they’ve watched it, considered it, critiqued it, and reloaded their players for the next one.

Train them! Excite them! Arm them!...Then turn them loose on the movies! Each one of them is a watching machine, slowly circling their prey until CLICK! The Disc is IN! They were four... but they watched movies like they were FOUR HUNDRED! If you only see one movie this year... you need to sit on your couch and watch films more often!

Films with titles like...

GOOD GUYS WEAR BLACK • DRACULA • DRESSED TO KILL • PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK • HARDCORE • MOTHRA • VIVA • THE GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE • PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES • EYE OF THE DEVIL • THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123 • BABYDOLL • PUMP UP THE VOLUME • THE KILLING • DEATH LAID AN EGG • NEEDFUL THINGS • SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES • MESSIAH OF EVIL • COOL LAKES OF DEATH • TERROR CIRCUS • THE QUESTOR TAPES • ONE FALSE MOVE • SLEEPWALKERS • THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI • MADAME CLAUDE • MISTER ROBERTS • SCREAM, PRETTY PEGGY • THE VICTIM • MALLRATS • SAMSON AND THE 7 MIRACLES OF THE WORLD • MILLION DOLLAR MERMAID • FEAR IS THE KEY • WEIRD SCIENCE • RED SUN • THE UFO INCIDENT • NIGHT GALLERY • 52 PICK-UP • THE SUNDAY WOMAN • FLYING LEATHERNECKS • AFTER HOURS • HUGO

...AND SO MANY MORE! Pick a favorite, pop it in, and sit back and enjoy along with the APES ON FILM!

FEATURING A FOREWORD BY ACADEMY AWARD™ WINNER CHRIS WALAS (THE FLY, GREMLINS, ENEMY MINE)

Apes On Film is the popular syndicated, online retro film on high definition media review column created by Anthony Taylor, featuring work by Lucas Hardwick, Chris Herzog, and John Michlig.

To purchase and for more information: https://www.amazon.com/Cinefilmania-Adventures-Retro-Hi-Def-Forbidden/dp/B0FTVSQ9Q7

[Link] Why Facebook Cannot Help You Sell Books

By Michael Alvear

As an author, book marketer and social media specialist, I cannot think of a single more wasteful thing an author can do for book sales than to market on Facebook. Put simply, there is no evidence that Facebook can sell books, unless you’re a celebrity with a mass following. There is, however, plenty of evidence that Facebook is both a waste of time and money if you’re an unknown or midlist author.

To understand why Facebook is so demonstrably bad at selling books, you have to understand two key concepts that agents, publishers and marketing experts fail to mention whenever they encourage (and sometimes force) authors to build their “platforms:”

1. You Need at Least 20,000 Facebook Followers to Move Product

No, that’s not an official figure, but based on my experience and that of my clients, 20,000 followers seems to be the minimum amount you’d need to make any real headway. The average person, though, has just 338 friends. So let’s be practical: how on earth are you going to get to 20,000 “friends” or fans as an unknown or midlist author? What can you possibly post on a regular basis that would be so compelling, entertaining or informative that people would flock to “like” your page or become a friend? I hosted a TV show on HBO and England’s Channel Four. I’m well known in my niche market and after five years I have 5,000 Facebook followers. What nobody tells you is how extraordinarily difficult it is to establish and grow a fan base on Facebook. It is so difficult that even small companies outsource the job to experts.

Read the full article: http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2015/why-facebook-cannot-help-you-sell-books/

Still Swimming Like a Shark ( or "I Wish I'd Known This Before I Started")

By Percival Constantine

Ever since the age of 10, I knew I wanted to be a writer. Every aspiring writer has a medium they aspire to—for me, it was comic books. But getting published was a different story. Since 10, I continued to write just about every single day. Before my family got a computer, it would be stories scribbled in notebooks and then later typed up on an old typewriter. Throughout high school and college, I would devote most of my energy to writing comic book fan fiction and also comic scripts for my own original ideas.

While in college, I first heard about National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). And under the advice of my friend Derrick Ferguson, I decided to try my hand at writing a novel. The first attempt went nowhere. As did the second. The third time I actually managed to meet the 50,000-word goal with a few days to spare.

The next step was trying to see if I could get it published. I revised the manuscript and then handed it over to a friend for editing before doing further revisions. And then I began querying agents, following their submission guidelines to the letter. Of the fifty or so agents I queried, I received about twenty responses. Of those twenty responses, around three were more than form letter rejections. And those three all basically said the same thing—a good start, but I’m not sure how I’d sell this in today’s market.

This was in late 2006, so it was long before the self-publishing revolution Amazon kick-started with the advent of the KDP platform. Ebooks were very much in their infancy at this point—there was no Kindle and an ebook was essentially a PDF you read on your computer or PDA (anyone remember those?). Self-publishing did exist, but it was virtually indistinguishable from vanity publishing.

Derrick had published his first book, Dillon and the Voice of Odin, through iUniverse (now a subsidiary of the very shady Author Solutions) a few years before this. So I consulted him for advice. He told me about his experiences with iUniverse and I looked them up. And I have never been so happy to be a broke college student, because the prices were so far out of my range that there was no way I could have afforded their services. I almost got suckered by the PublishAmerica scam, but fortunately I had done my research and found out what a predatory company they were.

Derrick recommended I speak to Joel Jenkins, who told me about Lulu. Unlike many of the other services out there, Lulu’s print on demand service didn’t charge any upfront fees. You had to purchase a proof copy of your book and there was a fee for expanded distribution to get an ISBN and have your book available for purchase on websites like Amazon (and it could be requested at bookstores), but altogether, that brought the total cost to less than $50, definitely within my range.

Of course, Lulu offered other services for book layout and cover design, but these were optional, not mandatory. I had some knowledge of Photoshop and InDesign, so I made the cover and formatted the book myself in those programs (which required a massive learning curve). After approving the proof, my first novel, Fallen, was available.

My marketing consisted of telling friends. I started a Facebook group called “Help make my book a bestseller” and included the link to Amazon and how people could find the book. Despite virtually everyone on my friends list joining the group, only a small fraction of them bought the book. I published in March of 2007 and in that first year, I sold a grand total of 28 copies.

When I talk about my first publishing experience, I actually consider the first seven years of my writing career to be my first publishing experience, because I really didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t discover the ebook revolution until around 2011 or 2012 and my efforts at that point consisted of relying solely on Smashwords. Up until that point, I was only doing paperbacks. I didn’t know anything about the Kindle. I didn’t know about the self-publishing success stories like Hugh Howey or Amanda Hocking. I completely missed the Kindle gold rush and the glory days when KDP Select actually helped you sell books. I didn’t know a thing about mailing lists or series branding or anything like that.

By the time I did learn about all these things, I had a much steeper climb, one that I’ve only started to make. It’s been said that a shark has to keep swimming or else it dies and the same is true of authors.

I’d advise everyone to learn from the mistake I made and do your research on the market. Even if you think you know everything, keep researching. And learn about marketing because there are so many titles out there that you have to figure out a way to get the word out that isn’t spammy or just asking your friends. The world of publishing is in such a state of flux these days that things are changing every day. The current market is very different from the market in 2007 or even the market just a year ago.

Percival Constantine is a pulp action author responsible for several series, including The Myth Hunter, Vanguard, and Luther Cross. Visit PercivalConstantine.com for more information on him and to find out how to get free books and stories.

The Writer Will Take Your Questions Now #308 -- Arting and Selling

Is there a difference between writing for art and writing to sell? What is it (or what are they)?

I believe this is a vast difference, but I also believe the two intersect as well.

What do I mean by that? Well, I'll give you two examples, each an inverse of the other.

Example #1: When I take a writing gig for a publisher who is paying for a story, such as for the Zombies vs. Robots story I did for IDW, I have to write to the specification that the publishers gives me, regardless of what my art dictates. If the publisher wants 7000 words and I feel the "true" story needs 11,000 words, then I have to save that "true" story for something else and come up with a new 7000 word story instead. The same goes for other criteria too. In fact, I have a publisher who despises first person accounts, so that artistic tool is taken out of my toolbox when I work for that publisher. However, within the constraints of that 7000 word story, my goal is to write the most artistic story I'm capable of creating.

Example #2: For my short story collection Show Me A Hero, I entered the stories fairly unhindered. Almost everything was up to my artistic discretion. Story length, experimental formats, POV, tense, etc. I had a full and ready artistic toolbox from which to choose my colors and brushes (so to speak). However, I also had a little voice of reason in the back of my head telling me that in order for a collection of literary-focused super hero stories to sell to the public, I'd better make the decision to reign in some of the more "out there" ideas and put colors and brushes away for this project. I had to self-limit my art in order to make the finished canvas more likely to be successful.

So yes, writing for art's sake can be freeing, and writing for sale's sake can be limiting, but the two can comfortably co-exist within a writer who strives to write the best stories within the parameters the market has officially or unofficially set.

I'll leave it with this analogy: If I want to write a Shakespearean sonnet, then I can't write a 20-line poem without rhyme. If I do, it ceases to be a sonnet. However, within those 14 lines, I can write the best rhyming poem with ending couplets that I can create.

And that, my friends, it the art of selling fiction (or perhaps the knack of selling art -- take your choice).

[Link] Your Book Landing Page—Can’t-Miss Headline Writing Secrets (and Mistakes to Avoid)

by Casey Demchak

When I was a kid there were word games where you could read a simple letter—and if you circled every fifth word you would get a secret message of some kind.

It was neat. So neat in fact that I developed a similar strategy that works wonders on website landing pages that are designed to sell books.

The strategy is built around the fact that before anyone reads your website sales page, they will almost always skim your headlines first. If all a visitor does is skim your sales page headlines and subheads, they should receive a concise selling message and a confident call to action.

This “secret” message will often entice them to go back and read all the copy between your headlines to learn more details about your book.

Here is an example of how this headline sequence technique can look on a web sales page promoting a business book.

Continue reading: http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2014/12/your-book-landing-page-cant-miss-headline-writing-secrets-and-mistakes-to-avoid/

[Link] How to Sell More at Comic Cons

Me at Alabama Phoenix Festival last year.

by Phil Hampton

Last week I read a tweet from someone who was berating the fact that he’d taken 100 copies of his comic to sell on his table and only managed to sell one copy.  It’s unfortunately a very common occurrence, but these 5 strategies will help you ensure that you leave the hall smiling and with a much lighter load!

1. Grab attention

This sounds obvious but it’s amazing how many comic creators try to leave their table do the talking, and that table only displays one or two items.  If you’re sitting in Artists Alley, surrounded by competition, it’s easy to be ignored by the hoards of passers-by.

There are a number of ways to grab people’s attention – either through your actions, or your props.

Continue reading: http://thecomicacademy.com/marketing-2/sell-comic-cons/