Payback can be hell. In this case it's just $7.99

In the four years I've maintained this blog I've offered free advice; answered questions online, with personal emails, and over the phone; and generally tried to help the next generation navigate the minefield known as the broadcasting business.

This site has always been free. In return I've never asked for anything.

Until now.

Oh, don't worry, I'm not going to ask you to pay a subscription for access to this blog or stick checks in the mail. But I am going to ask for a small amount of help with a personal project.

While television has been my career, fiction has been my passion. Over the years Pocket Books has published some of my Star Trek stories, and you can find a bunch of my sci-fi tales on Amazon. So it is with great pride that I announce the publication of my first novel, Rom-Com. In case you haven't figured it out, it's a romantic comedy. The tag line is: The News Never Sleeps When The Women Run The Network.

Even if you're a guy, it's one you'll enjoy, since it is about a television news network. The bottom line plot: four women take over a television network and turn things upside down, reversing the traditional co-anchor pairing of older-man-younger-woman by creating anchor teams with an older woman and a younger man. (Why this doesn't happen in real life is beyond me.) It is, of course, written with the same brand of sarcasm and warped humor that permeates this blog, so the television industry takes more than a few shots along the way. It's published under my pen name, N.J. Harlow. (The Sci-Fi stuff is under my own name.)

In any event, I'm asking for your help with both sales and marketing of the book. It's available in both print in electronic versions at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, the iPhone bookstore, and is downloadable to any iPhone, Blackberry, Android or iPad. Prices start at just $2.99 for the electronic version and $7.99 for the paperback. I hope you'll buy one (or a bunch as Christmas gifts) and help send it up the charts.

With that in mind, I'm also asking you to help take this viral. You'll find links to the book at the bottom of this post. I would appreciate it if you could send them to those in your email address book. Post it to whatever social networking services you use, and ask those you're connected with to send it on to their contacts. That won't cost you anything but time, something I've give a lot of to this blog.

There will be another novel released in the coming months. Also about the television news industry. Only that one is a thriller.

So, here's the deal. Buy the book. If you want an ebook but don't have an e-reader, you can download a Kindle or Nook application to your computer or most devices for free.

But there's more to this than just asking for your help. You get a reward for doing so. (And I may live to regret this.) And, if you order now…(operators are standing by) I'll critique one package or an anchor segment for you free of charge. Send me proof that you've bought the book… a receipt, whatever. And then upload something you'd like critiqued. How's that for a rebate?

To purchase on Amazon, either in paperback or for Kindle, click on the cover:




Link to the electronic version at Barnes & Noble for the Nook e-reader:

Barnes & Noble


Link to the electronic version for iPad, iPhone or iPod:

Apple

Thanks in advance for your help.

TVNEWSGRAPEVINE, copyright 2011 © Randy Tatano

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