Ripples on the Lake, out June 15
Fellow blogger and novelist Dawn Rotarangi has a book coming out, Ripples on the Lake, and I’d like to see it come up in the Google index, instead of restaurants in Toronto and Sydney. She writes very well on her blog, and her novel will be even more fab. So here’s a link for you, Dawn, to the highest-placed site mentioning your book so far (Real Groovy). Available June 15, and here’s a synopsis taken directly from the Real Groovy site:
A taut, tightly-written paranormal thriller about what happens when a Pakeha family unwittingly invoke an ancient tohunga’s curse. When an out-of-it Billy Delaney steals coins from a sacred rock on the shores of Lake Taupo to buy a hamburger late one night, he has no idea what he is about to unleash upon himself and his immediate family. But then Billy has always been trouble, and when the oldest of Lucy Delaney’s children, Saffron, steps in to try and take care of him yet again, trouble swarms over the Delaneys like bees on a honey pot. First Saffron and Billy’s young niece suffers an horrific traffic accident, leaving her in a coma, balanced between life and death. Then the Delaneys begin to die horribly, one by one. It is left to a disbelieving Saffron and an unlikely ally, Nick—the burnt out war photographer trying to piece his life back together in a country backwater—to try to appease the wrath of the ancient tohunga Tama Ariki, whose quest for utu for his slain mokopuna echoes down the years. Set in and around Lake Taupo, the author creates a subtle web of superstition and the supernatural, bringing together both Maori and Celtic imagery to create a paranormal adventure that is pure Aotearoa.
Comments
Was Rotorua quite haunted? I ask as I am pretty sure I had a tribe from there “visit” me once, but it was a friendly tribe. Being Chinese, I tend to believe in the afterlife and ghost stories. But I, too, had a “problem” with Rotorua when I was younger.
On a search for the book's title, your input has stuck a bomb under Yahoo, Jack! Overnight I've jumped 35 placings and my website which wasn't even showing in the top 100 is now at 29. Blog is listed 48 and several other mentions out in the 50's. Yesterday at this time, my top listing with Yahoo (for the book title) was my Blogger profile at 64. It's nice to know that people don't have to remember how to spell my surname - if they can remember the book title, they'll find me!
Would you consider cross-posting into Vox? There are some groups here for creative professionals and writers, and it could increase your mentions online.
I think Real Groovy might be your best bet, but once you add shipping, I don’t think the price will be very palatable …
You're quite right, Jack, at this point Ripples on the Lake will not be on sale in the States. The postage is a bit of a killer but I know a number of my American cyberfriends are going on bread and water for a week so as to indulge themselves!
I'm totally biased, Maureen, but it is exciting!
Publishers always do PDFs of books and magazines now (we have to as well, because that’s what they now use for the plates). They should retail that as an ebook—I know there’s no substitute for print, but it could be a way to get it to a wider audience.