CONTINUED: Madeline Becomes A Star by Peggy Wheeler-Cribb

Written from Madeline’s puppy point of view, readers are able to gain insight into Madeline’s thoughts and feelings, as well as the facts surrounding her adventure.

If you are blessed to have a youngster in your life, this is one book that I highly recommend. I have no doubt that it will become a top favorite of your little loved one!

Book Description

Madeline the dachshund thought the best thing that ever happened to her was being adopted by her pet parents from a dog rescue, but that was before she became famous! Madeline was content living the life of a normal everyday dog. Then one day Madeline became a star after a video of her playing with her friend, the ghost crab, went viral! Join Madeline, the rescue dog, on her rise to fame and her adventure to New York City!

About Author Peggy Wheeler-Cribb

Peggy Wheeler-Cribb grew up in Earles, SC. She lives with her husband C.L. in Pawleys Island, SC. Peggy has two children, Diane and Darwin, and two grandsons, Jason and Nathan. She also has two step-children, Valerie and Brian, and four more grandchildren through them: Kaitlyn, Pressley, Chance and Peyton. 

Peggy is an award winning educator, as well as a community leader and presenter. She owned and directed Happy Time Preschool for 33 years. She is the founder and director of Grace Church Ministries for Special Needs Children at First Baptist Church in Georgetown, SC.  Peggy and her family volunteer in the ministry every week and are supporters of local animal rescues. Peggy delights in all children and strives to live by Colossians 3:23: Whatever you do, work heartily as for the Lord and not for men. 

About Illustrator April Bensch

April Bensch

April Bensch grew up in Tampa, Florida, where she developed a
deep appreciation for the visual and performing arts. She has enjoyed calling Pawleys Island her home for the past 15 years, where she has become an award winning artist, illustrator and mother of 3 beautiful daughters. April has taught art to children of all ages and delights in bringing color, personality and life to the characters she illustrates, bringing joy to readers both young and old. You can view her artwork at www.aprilbensch.com or view her last illustrated book, “Twas the Night Before Jesus” at www.ontheedgeproductions.org.

Visit the following sites for more about Madeline Becomes a Star!

Amazon link:   http://amzn.to/1a2KbzU

Website: http://www.wonderfulwienerdog.com

CONTINUED: Monk In The Cellar

What goes on in the minds of men and women who have chosen to forgo the fulfillment of marriage and procreation? Do they forever wonder what they are missing, or is their dedication to God’s service so all- consuming that this is never a concern? It prompted me to consider the many material items that I regularly take for granted such as my home, car, golf clubs, computer, tablets, television in every room, my iPhone. And how about those intangibles such as complete freedom to schedule my time, food, clothing and accessories choices, the free will that we have been given to make our own decisions? What does a monk know or even care about these things?


This is no boring tale. It is a story of deception, the existence of guardian angels (which I personally believe have been sent to my rescue on numerous occasions), a man’s two encounters with near death experiences and his desire to do the right thing for the welfare of others.
The story contains several golden nuggets of wisdom such as, “Evil is so easy. That’s because it usually starts off with something small.”

Dave Griffin’s writing style brings the reader steadfastly into the scene with his vivid descriptions that present a movie-like reading experience. The question is raised in my mind: Is Brother Jesse a monk who toils at scholarly endeavors to serve the Almighty or because he chooses to live a safe, uncomplicated existence? How will he react when extenuating circumstances thrust him into an unexpected leadership role?

Not only is this a fascinating book, but it originated and continues as a blog--complete with photos and accompanying music from YouTube! Visitors access the site at http://www.monkinthecellar.blogspot.com. According to the author, “Monk In The Cellar was originally published serially in a blog that has accumulated thousands of hits. The author occasionally has to respond to emails and explain the blog is fiction and that Jesse is not an apostate or a heretic. Nor is he a real person. Jesse is anyone who at times doubts the purpose of the universe, but continues to search for his path anyway.”

I was simply mesmerized by this selection. I know that a story is good when certain aspects of it continue to pop back into my mind once the final page has been read and I have moved on to another book. I also recognize that a story is good when you know you should be doing a million other things, but the heart of the tale is drawing you back to continue reading, and you just can't stop yourself. Everything else must wait.
Writers are always told to write based on what we know--what is familiar to us. I could easily detect that at least a portion of this story involved a road that David has personally traveled. He’ll have to be the one to tell you where the fiction ends and the fact begins. David Griffin isn’t just another person who tells a captivating story. He is truly a talented artist who paints a canvas with words.

Book Description

Monk In The Cellar is the story of eleven monks who live in a decrepit Catskill Mountains Resort they converted into a monastery. Brother Jesse and his little band will be evicted from his home of forty years when Irish overseers decide to sell the monastery to pay off the Order's  debts. Jesse hides in the cellar print shop and ruminates most days.  When he's given a laptop and later finds an open Wi-Fi signal in the air, the aging monk posts a tell-all blog, a narrative of his order's deceit and his own disappointment. Along the way, he falls in love with his guardian angel, who later becomes his real estate agent. Monk In The Cellar is a beautifully funny account of a man who is afraid of getting old, of a life examined and found wanting.

What Prompted David Griffin to Write this Particular Book?
“I just write what comes into my head and I do it constantly, although not as much as in prior years. I have a story list of 170 stories I've written since I began writing creatively in 2007. I have over 200 ‘Starts’ and other stuff I'm working on.

I don't know why I wrote Monk, but I remember its genesis. At a writing group meeting in Woodstock in 2010, I suggested to someone they write a blog. The woman answered she wouldn't have anything to write about and I replied, ‘Make it up.’

On the way home that day, it occurred to me I could do the same, and from somewhere came the idea of writing as monk in a monastery that I placed about three miles up the road from my house.

I learned how to use Blogger and started it up. I was posting 4 or 5, sometimes 6 times each day the first month. A few people wrote to me and even asked advice. I had to reply that the blog was a spoof, and no one seemed truly upset by it. It then occurred to me I could probably turn it into a book.”

About David Griffin

David Griffin is retired from a career in corporate education and  communications. His essays and short stories have appeared in online journals as well as print magazines. He is a member of the South Carolina Writers Workshop and other writing groups. David publishes his essays at www.windsweptpress.com and self-publishes a book of stories each year that is well received by those who love him. He seldom hears from those who don’t. Griffin writes the popular blog Monk In The Cellar, and at readings plays the main character Brother Jesse with some degree of authenticity. The blog is now a novel by the same name. 
After 35 years at the foot of the mountains near Woodstock, NY, David now writes from coastal South Carolina , where he lives with his wife and her dog.

Amazon link:
http://amzn.to/19e21eQ

Website:
http://www.windsweptpress.com

Blog:
http://monkinthecellar.blogspot.com

Automated Tweeting Experiment

CONTINUED from main page of the blog.

by David Griffin
 

I constructed the tweets (I've sent him 8 or ten) and here's one as an example:

What’s a monk do for fun? Find out
@MonkInTheCellar bit.ly/18fTGp3


In each tweet is a bitly link back to the web page Indie Promotor created for me.  It's a simple page with my bio and links to Kindle and Amazon so you can buy my books.  If you want to check his page for me it's here:

http://indiepromotor.com/david-griffin/

Although Indie Promotor (his name is David Weeks) specializes in Kindle and other epubs, he agreed to also list my print editions on Amazon.

Multiplying 3 tweets per day times 30 days times the same 76,000 followers of Indie Promotor we can state that on 6,840,000 occasions, someone ... often the same person, of course ... saw a tweet pop up in their mail about Monk In The Cellar.  At the end of three months that figure will be 20 million.  And that does not take into account the re-tweets, some by people who also have thousands of followers.  I've seen numbers like 1800 and I remember a retweet by a fellow who had over 21,000 followers.

Sounds impressive.  Surely some of those tweets resulted in the sale of even my two dollar novelettes.  Not so, but in a moment I'll get to the results for the first thirty days.

Here's why the results won't be very impressive.  First, we know nothing about the 76,000 followers.  Second, some ... maybe a high number ... may be annoyed with their reader filling up with tweets, and are not in a mood to buy anything I might write.  Although almost all the retweets I've seen have been simply a replay of the original without any comment, I did see one where the retweeter answered the question, "What's a monk do for fun?" by commenting "Probably not send out the same tweets endlessly."

There are other reasons, but I don't want to make this a scholarly paper.  Here's a more quantitative report of the first month's results.  I've seen a very, very slight uptick on hits to my Monk In The Cellar Blog and my main web page for Windswept Press.  I would not swear in court that the reason for this tiny increase in hits is due to Indie Promotor's Tweets.  My sales on Amazon and Kindle have increased by exactly zero.  That's right, I haven't sold a book in the last thirty days.  I didn't sell a book in the thirty days before, either, but clearly over 7 million tweets and retweets have not lifted my book off the launch pad.

I will wait  for the end of the  3 month period to make a final judgement.  Who knows?  Maybe something will take off.  But  I'm forming the opinion, despite  the success with  Twitter by others, that it's not working for me.

I consider the $55 a very good investment.  It is always good to try something and if it costs money it is usually money well spent.  If in fact tweeting (at least in this manner) doesn't prove to be beneficial to me after two more months, I will be happy to have spent $55 to find out rather than waste a lot of time tweeting in the future.

Now would be a good time for any of you to use the Comment facility on this blog to give me your thoughts.  I'm sure someone wants to comment about my using the same tweets over and over.

-  Dave Griffin