dish Magazine

Check out the latest issue of dish Magazine.  Their Lifestyle section contains a review of The Claret Murders in Rachel Gladstone’s segment All Booked UP.

By the way, I will be signing copies of The Claret Murders and previous Mark Rollins adventure mysteries at the Vanderbilt Barnes and Noble on June 22nd  ... more details to follow.  June 7th I will be in Fort Lauderdale at the BIG Breakfast event discussing the in-process book on Business Management and Leadership.  The title is still up in the air, but I’m leaning toward Business Journey or Managing @ the Speed of Sight! Input is welcome.

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Mysteries by Tom Collins include Mark Rollins’ New Career, Mark Rollins and the Rainmaker, Mark Rollins and the Puppeteer and the newest, The Claret Murders. For signed copies go to http://store.markrollinsadventures.com. Print and ebook editions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other online bookstores. The ebook edition for the iPad is available through Apple iTunes' iBookstore.

Emmy Lou Harris is reading The Claret Murders

Emmy Lou Harris is a favorite. She is a 12-time Grammy Award winner for her expressive singing  and in the last ten of her forty year career she has gained admiration for her eloquently straightforward songwriting as well. So it is real thrill for me to learn that she is taking my latest book, The Claret Murders, with her as reading material on her new tour that will take her through out the US and Europe. For my about Emmy Lou Harris go to http://www.emmylouharris.com.

I lookward to her comments about this new Mark Rollins mystery that take place during the great Nashville flood.

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Mysteries by Tom Collins include Mark Rollins’ New Career, Mark Rollins and the Rainmaker, Mark Rollins and the Puppeteer and the newest, The Claret Murders. For signed copies go to http://store.markrollinsadventures.com. Print and ebook editions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other online bookstores. The ebook edition for the iPad is available through Apple iTunes' iBookstore.

Amazon and Goodreads

Did you hear?  Amazon is purchasing Goodreads!

The president of the Authors Guild referred to the acquisition as a ". . . truly devastating act of vertical integration . . . a textbook example of how modern Internet monopolies can be built."  The Atlantic looks at it from Amazon's perspective, "The simple reason why Goodreads is so valuable to Amazon is that a small fraction of Americans buy the vast majority of books in this county.  Goodreads gives Jeff Bezos & Co. [Amazon] a direct line into their thoughts and habits."

The real question is what will Amazon do with this new property.  Are they just heading off the completion competition or do they have a vision that will add new value to readers and authors?
Keep in mind that the purpose of the legacy-publishing model was to bring readers and authors together.  Something they lost sight of during the transition to digital and print-on-demand.  Amazon and Goodreads stepped into the void, each from a different starting place.

If you are a traditional old-school bookstore, agent, publisher, or wholesaler, this is another threat to your future prospects.  If you are a reader, it is probably good news.  For authors it is probably a mixed bag.  Only time will tell.

The book business depends on word of mouth—one reader recommending a book or author to another.  That is what Goodreads is all about.  Amazon is about access—making it easy for authors and readers to get together.  Our books are readily available and easy for the reader to purchase.

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Mysteries by Tom Collins include Mark Rollins’ New Career, Mark Rollins and the Rainmaker, Mark Rollins and the Puppeteer and the newest, The Claret Murders. For signed copies go to http://store.markrollinsadventures.com. Print and ebook editions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other online bookstores. The ebook edition for the iPad is available through Apple iTunes' iBookstore.

Time is running out.  Make your reservation today to join me for High Tea at the extraordinary Belmont Mansion.  I will be reading from my latest book, The Claret Murders. You will also enjoy the music of Hal Stevens and Chris Walters plus a tour of this elegant historic early Nashville home--music, tea, catered meal, tour and an autographed copy of The Claret Murders, all for just $30.00. Join me by calling the Belmont Mansion at 615-460-5459. Chick for more information. 

America’s Mayor

My son Stephen spent a couple of hours discussing leadership with America's Mayor the other day. It was a thrill for me and would have been even more so had I been there—one author to another.

Rudolph Giuliani knows a thing about leadership, especially leadership under crisis. If you want to learn from an icon, get his book Leadership. It is on Amazon in hardcover, paperback, and audio editions.

I suppose this extraordinary man will deservedly be remembered most for his post-9/11 role—the role that earned him the moniker of America's Mayor. Few people remember New York as it was when Giuliani took on the job of mayor. I do. I remember walking in Times Square and being propositioned by prostitutes and drug dealers. I remember the storefronts and show marquees marked proudly advertising their unsavory "adult-only" content with oversized "XXX" symbols. I remember the hordes of panhandlers in midtown. I remember the dark and dangerous side streets.

Rudy Giuliani understood that if you paid attention to the small things, the big things would follow. You cannot ignore the small things and expect people to honor the important ones.

I'm working on my own book dealing with leadership. I think I'm a pretty good leader, but the skills that I have come from observing and learning from people like Giuliani. The other day someone asked me what business leader I admired most. I answered with the name of someone from the business arena, but, if that question had been "What leader do you admire most?” my answer would have been Rudy Giuliani.

On June 7, I will preview my currently in-process book in Fort Lauderdale at the BIG Breakfast where business owners come each month to see how Books Inspire Growth (BIG). Click here to register for the BIG Breakfast event.

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Mysteries by Tom Collins include Mark Rollins’ New Career, Mark Rollins and the Rainmaker, Mark Rollins and the Puppeteer and the newest, The Claret Murders. For signed copies go to http://store.markrollinsadventures.com. Print and ebook editions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other online bookstores. The ebook edition for the iPad is available through Apple iTunes' iBookstore.

High Tea at Belmont Mansion-April 9th

Join me for High Tea at the extraordinary Belmont Mansion.  I will be reading from my latest book, The Claret Murders. You will also enjoy the music of Hal Stevens and Chris Walters plus a tour of this elegant historic early Nashville home--music, tea, catered meal, tour and an autographed copy of The Claret Murders, all for just $30.00. Join me by calling the Belmont Mansion at 615-460-5459.

Living with Apple

I am hanging in there—trying my best to rewire this old PC brain for Apple-speak. Contrary to all reports, it is not easy.

I am continuing to use Microsoft’s Outlook suite of software—the Apple version of course. It is not the same animal I’m used to on the PC. I felt insecure with its Spelling and Grammar check features so I purchased Grammarian, a plug-in software product, and so far I’m happy with it.

Grammarian keeps a close watch on passive sentence structure and that is improving my writing on the fly. I also enjoy its automatic scoring feature that lets me know such things as the reading level of the document I am about to save. It is interesting that I appear to be writing at the 5th- and 6th-grade levels in my novels and at the 11th-grade level in my blog posts. One is light entertainment with lots of dialog while the other is educational and uses uncommon words and phrases.

However, I probably should strive to lower the level for the blog and increase the level in my novels. What do you think?

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A beautiful Nashville lawyer, an inheritance at risk, a devastating storm and wine to kill for—The Claret Murders, a new Mark Rollins adventure.

Mysteries by Tom Collins include Mark Rollins’ New Career, Mark Rollins and the Rainmaker, andMark Rollins and the Puppeteer and the newest, The  Claret Murders.   For signed copies go tohttp://store.markrollinsadventures.com. Print and ebook editions are available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other online bookstores. The ebook edition for the iPad is available through Apple iTunes' iBookstore.