As seductivepeach.com nears it’s first anniversary, I am struck by how wide its readership has become. The blog is now being read in 45 countries, a fact I find quite surprising considering its left-of-center, highly secular orientation and eclectic approach to subject matter. That some of my readers live in places such as China, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Indonesia and other countries not exactly known for their openness and/or access to liberal ideas has been eye-opening and extremely gratifying for me. So to all of you, thanks, and I hope you’ll keep reading as, in mid-January, the blog will be entering its second year of life.

Another event is also approaching. Late January will see the one year mark since publication of Zendoscopy. I was rather abruptly reminded of this when I received notice from my publisher in the form of a bill. Yes, a bill. Two, in fact. Apparently, I’m being charged for keeping the book on the publisher’s active list. One bill was for the hard copy and the other for Kindle.

Now, none of this makes much sense to me. First of all, the hard copy (trade paperback, actually), is set up for print on demand. This means that they have no actual stock and, therefore, no cost for storage of inventory. They get an order; they print and take their cut of the buyer’s payment. In other words, my book exists only as a file on a computer. So why should it cost $60 per year to keep it in their “active” catalog? Beats me, but I’m stuck paying it.

That leaves the question of the Kindle edition, which is even more puzzling. The Kindle edition resides on Amazon.com as a computer-based file. All the publisher gets is a cut from the sales. And yet, they’re charging $10 to keep it on their “active” list. As the guy on Saturday Night Live says, “What’s up with that?”

FYI, I paid both bills.

There’s a good lesson in this, and I’ve certainly learned it. My next book, which I’m currently trying to bleed out into my word processor, will be e-published by me and not by a publisher on my behalf. I did with Spacebraid and Other Tales of a Dystopian Universe, and it has worked out well. I will consider working with a publisher for hard copy, although I may handle that on my own, too, since the benefits of dealing with an on-demand publisher seem to be marginal at best. Perhaps the greatest advantage of working with the publisher of Zendoscopy was expert cover design, but that’s about it, since most of what the publisher offers in terms of marketing services can be done myself at half the cost.

Things have been so busy here that I haven’t had time to set up a Festivus pole. Maybe next year…Still, although we don’t have much seasonal change here in southern California, we do have subtle weather variations. And we’ve had a bit of a let-up in our long drought, with quite a bit of rain in the last week or two. This morning, we even had some lightning and thunder. Good weather for staying indoors and writing. So, as this blog entry comes to a close, it’s back to working on my next novel, subject to be announced…eventually.

After a one week break, seductivepeach.com is back. We hope all of our readers who celebrate Thanksgiving had a wonderful holiday. We certainly did. Among other things, we noted a distinct uptick in sales of Zendoscopy, always a welcome finding. It’s also been tremendously gratifying to see the steadily increasing number of visitors to the blog, which seems to have persisted despite our taking the Thanksgiving week off.

And while we’re on the subject of upticks, I’d also like to acknowledge the increasing reach of seductivepeach.com. We’re now read in 45 countries around the world. Of particular note is that we’re being read in places like Saudi Arabia and Egypt, countries that would not necessarily be expected to have readers checking into a blog with an openly secular orientation.

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In this season of crass commercialism, the ads keep rolling in. My computer is being deluged with unwanted ads from vendors, many of whom are sending multiple ads each day. And the television ads are out in full force, especially the automobile ads. Folks who say they disapprove of all this holiday shilling seem to forget their reservations and flock to the supposed bargains proffered from every direction. What’s really remarkable about this is the simple fact that the majority of deals aren’t all that great. Things get much better after the holidays, but people don’t want to wait and don’t give a hoot over the fact that so many people who have to work on Thanksgiving are truly angry and resentful over it. Particularly obnoxious and cynical is this year’s backing up of “Black Friday” into “Gray Thursday”. I’m sure RadioShack employees just loved going to work at 8 AM on Thanksgiving morning, getting four hours off in the afternoon “to be with their families”, and then having to report back to work at 5 PM. And all this for a company that’s been showing losses for ten straight quarters. Wonder how much business they did on Thanksgiving…

Got a spam e-mail from a local retailer announcing that their “Cyber Monday” was underway “today”. That was last Sunday. Then, on Monday, they announced “Cyber Monday” was being extended. Go figure.

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It came out last weekend that the current change in weather patterns has not altered deniers’ disbelief in human-accelerated climate change. Apparently, people are sticking to their desired, erroneous beliefs despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, and without regard for what current trends portend for generations to come. If the 1960’s are sometimes thought of as the peak period of “me generation” behavior, one only needs to look at what’s going on now to realize that human selfishness and willful ignorance have progressed far beyond what anyone saw back in the days of turn on, tune in, and drop out. Besides, at least in the ’60s the behavior was understandable in the light of disillusionment over the Vietnam War and assassinations of JFK, RFK, MLK, and Malcolm X.

Much of my book, Zendoscopy, is set during the 1960’s, but it doesn’t address the “me” stuff or, in fact, the politics of the time. It’s about those of us who came of age awkwardly in a world of rapidly changing realities and were, in some ways, seeking an out from a figurative parallel universe. On a personal level, maybe one day I’ll write about the aroma of marijuana that permeated my college days, although it’d have to be from the outside since I was pretty much an observer rather than a participant. When it came to sex, drugs, and rock and roll, I seemed back then to hit on only one of them: rock and roll. That, however, is another story for another time.

I’ve mentioned it previously in the blog and on my Facebook page, but here is a reminder to mark your calendar for the 25^th of January, when I’ll be doing a reading from Zendoscopy and signing copies at Vroman’s bookstore in Pasadena. If you’ve already bought the book, bring it to the store and I’ll sign it anyway. Should be a lot of fun.