An Open Book

Hello Dear Readers!

This has been a astounding week of good news and I got tons accomplished. First off let me thank you all for your continued support of my writing and other projects. The Parsec Nomination Submission is complete. It made it to them on Monday. Here you go.

While Podioracket is on a short break we are still turning out blogs and having BTR-PR Interviews. July is totally booked and August is almost full! I can’t believe how successful this endeavor has become and in such a short period of time. We went live in mid March and at the end of June we are hearing nothing but praise from everyone who is listening to the show. Please feel free to take 2 minutes and leave a comment or review on the site or on Itunes. It will help us receive more notice and Heather Roulo and I completely appreciate it. Oh there is also a voice recorder on the site so please leave us a voice message.

Tomorrow on the BTR-PR Show I will be interviewing Jason M. Kays author of Virtual Vice at 2:30 pm PST. Here is a link so you can join us live on the show.

The call in Number is (347) 996-3319

During the interview I will be playing Jason’s kindly sent reading and his promo. We will talk about what inspired this story and how a lawyer turns novelist!

The Mark of a Druid is about to hit 60,000 downloads

When I first decided to release The Mark of a Druid as a free serialized podcast I had no idea what I was doing. But I grabbed the boot straps and called the many me’s together and jumped in with both feet. I have learned so much since starting the publishing and podcasting of this project. There have been highs and lows but over all I think I am not doing too bad. It hit Amazon officially in February as the podcast simotaniously completed. I never thought in a million years I would have 60,000 downloads.
So what does 60,000 downloads mean??? I asked myself the same thing. Lets look at it in simple mathematical terms. There are 34 Episodes in the book. 60,000 divided by 34 is 1764 listeners. But if you look at the more in depth numbers provided by the host for the podiobooks.com version Episdoe 1 has been downloaded 3861 times. I see that as 3861 potential people who could like what I am doing, leave a comments, rate and review the book. But more importantly that is almost 4000 listeners who could tell their friends! Not bad for a first time novelist. Even if I do say so myself. And I owe that success to all you listeners spreading the word, buying books and downloading. I am not a rich person, but I do want to give back to the listeners and readers. The best way I can think of to do that at this point is to have contests and keep releasing more content as soon as available. If you haven’t Kidnapped the Trailer what are you waiting for. This is the biggest prize yet int he 2009 Contest series. Click here to find out how easy it is to play and win.

The Mark of a Druid is now also available on www.tailcast.com.  I am so pleased that they got the audio upload function working on their site. It is a wonderful place for writers and artist to show off their work and make friends.

Last thing: I huge thank you to Cyrus A. Webb for the glowing 5 star amazon review on the book. It means the world to me. Cyrus is an advocate for literacy and the creator of the new Television show “The Write Stuff” Which begins airing June 27! He is also a long time radio host of Conversations Live and has asked to interview me about the book. This interview is Scheduled for 7-23-09 at 5:00pm Pst and will last 30 minutes. When it gets closer I will post it here. Find out the about the show at www.thewritestufftv.com.

Here is what he said:

THE MARK OF A DRUID is the Best of Both Worlds for the Reader, June 27, 2009

By	C. A. Webb “Conversations Book Club” (Jackson, MS) – See all my reviews

Rhonda Carpenter gives hungry readers exactly what they expect from a tightly woven storyline: a book you can not only lose yourself in but find a part of yourself after you are finished. Why do we believe the way we do? Who truly influences the way we evaluate our lives and those of others past? Just because we can’t wrap our minds around something does that make it any less real?

These are all discussions that any book club or group of friends will have fun dissecting and debating as they maneuver from chapter to chapter.

Carpenter has truly left her “Mark” with this one, and the literary world is a better place because of it.

On to another busy week Stay tuned for more.

Keep Writing, I know I will,

Rhonda R Carpenter

Welcome Readers,

I am very happy to announce “The Mark of a Druid” has been nominated for a Parsec Award for 2009 Best Speculative Fiction Story (Novel Form). The emails started going out on Thursday from www.parsecawards.com. I along with many of the podiobooks.com authors, as well as podcasters have a big thank you to say to our fans.

The Parsec awards are fan nominated. So thank you for nominating The Mark of a Druid. And you like me maybe asking what happens now? Well, the way I understand it the nominees need to provide a submission to the committee. That mean I need to pick between 1 and 6 samples for the podcasted book. This submission can be no longer than 60 minutes including a new 30 second intro. The drop dead date on this submission is next Sunday.

From these submissions they will choose 5 nominees from each category. The competition is stiff in all of the categories. While I don’t expect to win I am truly honored to be nominated by the fans. From the five selected by the committee one will win. The awards will be announced on September at Dragon Con 2009. Best of luck to everyone.

Now how to choose what to submit? Since I have never done anything like this before I am clues as to how to choose an hour if sections under 6 to give the judges an idea of what the book is about. I mean really with 5 plot lines and 2 time frames in the book I am having a bit of a time picking sections to include in the submission.

Also Podioracket was nominated for an infotainment awards. But Heather and I don’t believe we meet the criteria since Podioracket is not yet 6 months old. So maybe next year but we totally appreciate the nomination.

Best of luck to all the nominees in this years Parsec Awards.

Kidnap the Trailer contest is under way. Grab the trailer today and put it on your face book, myspace, or blog. Tweet or Plurk the link and then let me know on the book website under contest number 9, in the contest section.

Matthew Wayne Selznick on BTR June 25

Mathew Wayne Selznick, one of the spearheads of the DIY podcasting world, will be joining the Podioracket Blog Talk Radio program on June 25 at 2:30 PM Pacific/5:30 PM Eastern. You will not want to miss this one. He is going to tell us all about Hazy Days and Cloudy Nights and what’s new for Brave Men Run.

Keep Writing, I Know I Will!

Rhonda R. Carpenter

Welcome Readers,

This was one of the most exciting weeks! I started the week off with an interview on Author Autobahn on Blog talk. The interview with Kelly was great and I can’t wait to interview them about their new services for promoting authors on July 13. Podioracket declaring it J.C. Hutchins week and I have to say this guy is an unstoppable marketer. Just in case you didn’t hear all the hoopla, Dark Art Personal Effects hit the bookstores and Amazon and other on-line booksellers with resounding success. I personally can’t wait to receive my copy. There were two killer interviews with J.C. and he is so gracious!

Podioracket, that is Heather Roulo author of Fractured Horizon and I have added a Blog Talk Radio Show to our Podioracket.com endeavor. I am still experimenting with the show times while not over doing it so that I can continue to write. Right now the calendar is booked out July 13th. I invite you to come and join us in chat and on the phone lines with all of our special guests. Last weeks show with J.C. Hutchins live we gave away two autographed copies of his book and there were 100 live listeners 56 in chat and 19 callers with 23 eligible questions and 16 people emailed for a prize. SnowMedic and Cobalt both won and I want to congratulate them. There have already been over 2000 archive listeners to the show! I am ecstatic! Now that is building a buzz.

I also release a video for Thewritestufftv.com and it is available at YouTube on their stream. A vlog went out on the Mark of a Druid Feed for the new contest and we released our first video trailer for the book. That makes contest #9! Can you kidnap the trailer? I hope so. As most of you know I am not a rich person so free advertising for my book has to be creative. If there is one thing I am it is enthusiastic about my fans. So I truly want to give back. This contest will have 3 winners each receiving a singed copy of the paperback, in a canvas promo bag full of The Mark of a Druid Promo items. So what are you waiting for go kidnap the promo and enter the contest! Details available here. At over 56,000 downloads and climbing every day I am thrilled with the success of The Mark of a Druid. I couldn’t do it without the Readers! This is completely your success as well as mine. I am humbled by all of the positive comments, ratings and reviews. Keep them coming! The more people who spread the word the more notice this novel will get and that is what I want. I want to spread the word far and wide.

I know allot of you have been emailing about the next book, When Ethers Descend, so here is an update: I have canned another chapter that makes 8 and am consistently moving forward. I believe I am on target for a winter podcast schedule but we will see how it goes.

This is another jam packed week coming up Monday at 2:30 pm PST I will be interviewing J.D. Sawyer Live on BTR-PR, (BlogTalkRadio.com/Podioracekt) Dan is the author of Predestination and other games of chance as well as being known as a hell of a guy in the pod-o-sphere. He has graciously agreed to do a live reading. You won’t want to miss this. Oh heck, I don’t want to miss it. His cover and links are over on the right side, it is the one with hot chick on the purple sheet. Smoken’ cover! There will be a new Podioracket episode released this week. Stacey Cochran and J.P. Moore with contests and news, new releases and completed works on Podiobooks.com. I can’t talk this site up enough! I think it is brilliant and I am so looking forward to 2.0 to be rolled out.

Huge thank you to all the new subscribers to the new book site. www.themarkofadruid.com. If you haven’t subscribed it is really easy and quick. I hope you will join now. Until next time, take care.

Keep Writing, I Know I Will!

Rhonda R. Carpenter

Welcome Readers!

This is a revealing week for Podioracket, J.C. Hutchins, Cyrus A Webb, Stacey Cochran and for myself.

Monday we at Podioracket.com kick off “Support J.C. Hutchins Week.”  Swing by Podioracket and join us in the fun and make some noise about the print release of Dark Art Personal Effects on June 9th, commit yourself to the Brink, subscribe to Personal Effects Sword of Blood and leave a message on the new voice recorder on the front page of the site and tell us how you supported J.C. Hutchins.

Tuesday 10:00 Am PST I’ll be interviewed on BRT-Author Autobahn and during this interview I’ll be announcing the new contest for The Mark of a Druid.  If you miss the interview check out the contest section of www.themarkofadruid.com on Tuesday after noon. This one is going to be fun!

It is Dark Art Personal Effects release day. If you don’t want to wait go pre-order your copy now! 

Wednesday Podioracket.com drops a new episode featuring J.C. Hutchins. This is a great interview. He is a totaly blast to talk to and makes me look like I never push my work. Fanny shaking lessons taken to heart J.C. Can you feel the earth moving?

Thursday is a double header for BTR-PR. We have two killer live interviews. First I will be interviewing Cyrus A Webb 2:30 pm PST. Find out all about his good works with literacy and his new creation The Write Stuff Reality TV Show that starts airing this month across the country.

Then at 6:00 PM PST J.C. Hutchins joins BRT Podioracket where we will be awarding two callers autographed copies of  Dark Art Personal Effects. The Call in number is  (347) 996-3319 ! Call in during the show and asked J.C.  a question and you could win his book.

Friday Podioracket has a guest blogger! Stacey Cochran the author of Claws will be talking marketing for his new print release. We are proud to bring a Claws sighting to Podioracket.

The Mark of a Druid has been nominated for a parsec award. I don’t expect to win one but it is so cool that people nominated the audio. I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who has rated, reviewed and commented on the first book in this series. I wish I could see the reviews in other countries on amazon and Itunes. If anyone has a fix for this I would love to hear it.

The next book is coming along not as quickly as I would like but I am working on When Eithers Descend steadily. There will soon be a horror short coming out on www.horroraddicts.net in the Wicked Woman Writers Contest when it hits I will let you all know so you can go vote. I am so excited for the new season of HA that I can’t wait for tomorrow.

Another one of my favorite podcasts had its first contest announcement. Have you ever wanted to learn another language? I have always wanted to speak Gaelic. So you can bet I enter the contest already. Get the details in the Celtic Myth Podshows Episode 27.

Well if this isn’t enough news tell me what else you would like to hear about.

Keep writing! I know I will!

Rhonda R Carpenter

Contest 8 has a winner!
Photo by Henry Diltz

Welcome Readers!

Contest #8 closed last night at 12:01 Am PST!

The Winner is Cyndi30107! Your Prize will be shipped on June 1, 2009. Congrats you will be receiving a singed copy of The Mark of a Druid!

I so enjoyed answering the questions for the Meet the Characters Contest and we will be doing this one again in the next few months. As always if you want to ask a question of the characters please just go the meet the characters section of www.themarkofadruid.com and click on any character and ask your question. The next time we run a meet the characters contest you will be automatically entered to win if you shoot me an email and tell me that you asked a question. Send those emails to infor@themarkofadruid.com.

I am so thankful for my listener-ship I truly want to give back and have been tossing around some ideas for extra Mark of a Druid material that I can proved while you are so patiently waiting for the next book, When Eithers Descend. If you have ideas about what would hold you over and keep you interested just let me know and I will see what I can do. Email me at info@themarkofadruid.com.

The next contest will be announced in just a little while and it is all about ratings! I hope you will join in the fun and enter this contest!

Announcement

Heather Roulo and I will be interviewed tonight on Behind the Mike with Joel M http://www.blogtalkradio.com/BehindTheMike/2009/06/01/Relay-For-LikePodioracket  Go there now or listen in archive!

Keep Writing! I Know I Will!

Rhonda R. Carpenter

Welcome Readers,

We already have one winner in the Meet the Characters Contest #8 and there is still a week to go. On May 31, this contest will end and on June 1, 2009 the Winners will be announced.

The section Meet the Characters will still be under development. Don’t be surprised even after the contest ends if your name is selected for a bonus prize because you talked to the characters. This will be a random

I have received several new reviews and comments on the book. So I would like to thank those on Itunes because there is no way to reply to them.

Thank you for Reviewing and rating The Mark of a Druid! It means the world to me

Tracey Tay, Cassiopia, Jedanatc, Finisp, Artnerd, Obedientfollower, DannyCat, PollyP, Geoggrrr…4, Jacksongril1998, Suuu. You all rock! Thank you so much for taking the time to leave a review and rate the book. Please feel free to post the review on Amazon too and help spread the word.

Coming soon will be a new trailer for the book. I am currently knocking out about 1000 word ever two days on the sequel, When Either Descend. At the same time I am working on, Truth Slithers.

The next contest will start on June 1, 2009.

Huge thank you to all the new subscribers to the new book site. www.themarkofadruid.com. If you haven’t subscribed it is really easy and quick. I hope you will join now. Until next time, take care.

Keep Writing, I Know I Will!

Rhonda R. Carpenter

Welcome Readers and Fans.

This week like many of the recent weeks has been really busy. Podioracket is taking off and we are releasing an episode a week in May on top of last weeks mini episode for Nina Kimberley the Merciless by Christiana Ellis I have been swamped. But having a lot of fun helping Christiana with her push to sell her novel at its release. This unfortuanaily has run into a snag. So please keep checking back get it as soon as you can and until then it is also available as a FREE, COMPLETE pdf version, which you can download here: Nina Kimberly the Merciless PDF. Tell a Freind! Oh heck, Tell two friends. 

www.podioracket.com

Get your news up dates at www.podioracket.com!

This week is also busy. Join me for a special http://www.blogtalkradio.com/PodioRacket show about Podiobooks.com 2.0 up coming changes fetureing Chris Miller the guy behind the sceens at www.podiobooks.com. 

Then Emerian Rich the author of Night’s Knights and  Sweet Dreams, Mistress of the dark and founder of  HorrorAddicts.net  is going to join me to close the show. She is a fascinating author and is about to publish Night’s Knight in print. The show will start at 8:00 pm PST May 18, 2009. Call-in Number: (347) 996-3319 call in and ask Emerian questions about her work.

 Wednesday we release a new episode in which I interview Mark Eller author of Traitor, Book 1 of The Turner Chronicles and James D. Priest author of the Family friendly release on Podiobooks.com of Kirins The Spell of No’an. Make sure to get the new release at www.podioracket.com.

The rest of the week I will be getting some word on pages for When Eithers Descend and booking some more interviews for both podioracket and blogtalk episodes.

Remember that there are a couple of weeks left in the May contest on www.Themarkofadruid.com  Go on over and Meet the Characters and click participate on contest number 8.

Talk next week!

Rhonda R Carpenter

PodioRacket’s next Blog Talk Radio Show will air Thursday May 14^th 2:30 pm PST. Two great interviews David Hitt and Mike Luoma, contest, podiobooks.com news and a tip on networking from David Lee Summers with a special guest helping us wrap up the show; Jack Hosley the master mind behind Wander Radio 109.9 Almost on your Radio Dial will join us live to talk about podcasting and well, anything else that comes up. His show always makes me laugh and I am truly thrilled he agreed to come on the show. So tune in and join us on Blog Talk Radio this Thursday.  

I was also the guest on Behind the Mike Last week follow the link to hear almost an hour with Joel and Sharron on past life regression. Interesting stuff!

More Next Week! 

Rhonda

Welcome Readers,

I was shocked when I looked at the stats this week. Pleasantly shocked! Overall downloads had hit 50,000. I never thought when I put the book out in this manner that I would ever have so many downloads. Thank You, to all the Readers for downloading, commenting and Rating and Reviewing. Please keep telling your friends and spreading the word.

This has been a super busy week with Podioracket.com. Have you heard that one of the characters from my book was nominated for the position of Champion for Podioracket against the Nina Kimberley and her barbarian horde?

What is this all about?

Christiana Ellis the Author of Nina Kimberley the Merciless  is about to go to print with Dragon Moon Press and her character, Nina Kimberly the Merciless has decided that all in the pod-o-sphere shall surrender to her. Podioracket among others are now in the resistance and is seeking a champion. Vote for King Brian Boru! Take the survey and declare your loyalty!

Website update! The new site is growing like crazy. Thank you to all the new members and I will be announcing the winners of the sing up contest # 7 very soon.

When Ethers Descend: the second book of The Mark of a Druid series is coming along.

Got Insight Blog over at Lifefirst.com Will be posting a new free session. It is It is completely free for download. Gain Self Esteem, Increase Focus and receive the gift of answers from your infinite wisdom!

Until next time, take care!

Keep Writing, I Know I Will!

Rhonda R. Carpenter