Colin Harvey – author

A quick trawl around Amazon shows that the four novels (out of five, as Neal Stephenson’s Anathem isn’t included) retail at about £25, while each of the non-fiction books costs close to that each.

So all told, the material available on Amazon has a retail price of £70 -over one hundred dollars- while much of the short fiction isn’t available there at all. 

That’s not a bad little bonus for my fifty dollar fee. And if the WSFS (World Science Fiction Society) repeat the deal next year, it’ll be even better as I’ll still be eligible for that one as well.

I‘ll still buy some of those books, especially the Hugo winners, because a downloaded pdf –even if it’s printed out—just isn’t the same as a proper book.

But it’s still a heck of a deal, and kudos to the WSFS for arranging it.

We’ve got songs about soldiers and coal miners, newsmen and even people who work in video stores–but are there any songs out there about writers? I haven’t found one yet, but when I heard Trace Adkins singing, "Songs about Me," which is about country singers, I realized I could make this song about me.

’cause they’re stories ’bout me
and who I could be

So I offered him a novel
I said you’ll see what I mean
if you read that tonight
he said I doubt you’ll change my opinion
I’ll be kind of busy, but hey, I just might

Then later on as my signing went on
with books and talks and thanks-a-lots
I saw him, he was standing there
in front of my table
and he said
hey, you were right
it was like you wrote those

stories about me
and who I could be
songs about truth and right living
and friendships and giving and heroes and God
yeah they’re all just
stories about me
stories about me

So I’ll just keep on writing
until I whole world’s reading all those

stories about me
and who I’d be
stories about magic and high-tech
and friends who’ll risk their necks and heroes and God
yeah they’re all just
stories about me
stories about me