Usurper! 🙂

I’m hard at work promoting the new Human Legion release, though I’ve taken time to look through the casting options for the forthcoming audiobook editions, which is great fun. When the Human Legion was at the very top of the military sf charts on amazon.com (#1 and #2) the book that knocked me off the top slot was Warship by Joshua Dalzelle. Not one to take a grudge, I read Joshua’s book and loved it. It felt good to give way to another book at least as good as mine. Some of the early reviewers likened it to Christopher Nuttall’s Ark Royal books, even calling it a copy. Well, I don’t agree. There are some surface similarities, but then the two books go their own separate ways. People said the same about Marine Cadet copying Forging Zero, despite my having written the book before Sara King’s book was launched, and… well and that the two books are completely different.

not the same book as the one on the left!

Reminds me of an excellent author I publish at Greyhart Press called Bob Atkinson. A former soldier himself (Royal Highland Fusiliers, I think) he wrote a pair of novels set in the Highland rebellion the led to the Battle of Culloden. One irate reviewer on Amazon got pretty hot in his comments because Bob was ‘obviously’ a woman writing as a man. I still can’t let Bob forget that one! [This is Bob looking very ladylike in his moustache]

Anyway, I’ve heard Joshua Dalzelle talking about his marketing, which comes down to (1) write very good book (2) make sure it has a good cover and (3) mention on askdavid.com (4) then write the next book.

It seems I was missing part 3 (you might think I’m missing some of the other points too!)

So I’ve listed the books on askdavid.com and begun to do all the Twitter things the site says you should do. You can leave reviews there too. So if anyone has a few moments to spare and would like to spread the word about the Legion, I would be very grateful. Thanks, it all helps!