My new novel, Russian Roulette, finally arrives!

Friends, I am very happy and proud to announce my newest mystery thriller, Russian Roulette . It won’t be in any bookstores until June 13th, but you can already order it at Amazon.com. And if you are one of the technorati and own a Kindle, you can download now and start reading it today!

Russian Roulette is the fifth novel in my mystery series about Hannibal Jones, the African American private detective working in Washington DC. In this book, Hannibal is forced to take a case for a Russian assassin. He must investigate Gana, the wealthy Algerian who has stolen Viktoriya, the woman his new client loves. Evidence connects Gana to Russian mob money and the apparent suicide of Viktoriya’s father. More deaths follow, closing in on Viktoriya. To save the Russian beauty, Hannibal must unravel a complex tangle of clues and survive a dramatic shootout on Roosevelt Island, side-by-side with his murderous client.

That much is the plot, the storyline upon which I hang the mystery. But the heart of the book, and what drove me to it, is the reason Hannibal must take the case. You see Aleksandr, the murderous client, has killers watching Hannibal’s beloved Cindy. If Hannibal fails to do Aleksandr’s bidding, Cindy will die. I wanted to explore how my hero would react to his woman being in jeopardy. I also wanted to see how he works when he’s truly alone.

In past novels, Hannibal has relied on a team of supporters as diverse and talented as Doc Savage’s men. Plus, he has always been able to rely on Cindy’s legal acumen. In this book I purposely cut him off from the support team he’s used to, and there are some surprises. Even more, time shows us the many similarities between Hannibal Jones and Aleksandr (as an assassin assigned to eliminate disloyal and untrustworthy members of the Russian Mafiya, he too is a “troubleshooter” of sorts.)

To pull this one off I had to research the Russian community in Washington DC where Hannibal works, and I think that immersion affected my prose. Toward the end, as the story veers toward an outdoor winter shootout in the dark and confrontations between respected enemies, I think I was able to give my book the atmosphere of one of the old Russian novels. It ain’t Dostoyevsky by any means, but there is a grim, fatalistic feel in the Russian culture that drives this story deeper into noir than I’ve gone before. At least I think so.

Anyway, I got some very kind advance comments from friends and reviewers , including a couple whose names you may recognize:

“Russian Roulette delivers a whipsaw of a plot with more layers than a Vidalia onion.... Solid storytelling and compelling characters. Don't miss it!”

Libby Fischer Hellmann, Author of the Ellie Foreman mystery/suspense series

“Troubleshooter Hannibal Jones is the most engaging character to come upon the mystery scene since Patterson's Alex Cross.”

JoAnn Ross, NY Times Bestselling Author of the High Risk Series

“Hannibal Jones is no John Shaft wannabe. He stands on his own as a welcome addition to the ranks of the fictional private eye.”

Robert J. Randisi, Founder of the Private Eye Writers of America

“Russian Roulette has everything: a terrific story with great characters in vivid settings. Clear time on your calendar for this one."

John Gilstrap, author of No Mercy

“Russian Roulette starts with a revving engine and picks up speed till racing across the finish line. If I was in trouble I’d want Hannibal Jones on my speed dial.”

Jon Jordan, Editor, Crimespree Magazine

“Camacho employs his usual rich layers of plot; fascinating characters; and plenty of action to keep the reader mesmerized in his latest Hannibal Jones installment.”

Shelley Glodowski, Midwest Book Review

“Austin is one helluva writer. What Austin shows off in his novel is not just the ability to forge a sentence or a paragraph, but how to create an interesting story with a steady pace that keeps you hooked for hours at a time.”

Hugh Howey, CrimeCritics.com

“I may have to add Austin S. Camacho to my list of authors to follow and catch up on after reading his latest novel, Russian Roulette. I received the book for review before I left on vacation, and I would have been perfectly happy to have all of the Hannibal Jones series with me to read.”

Thomas Duff, an Amazon.com Top 25 Reviewer

And I hope some of you can even share my good news with me in person.

IN MARYLAND - Borders Waldorf will host a book release event for Russian Roulette on Saturday, June 13th. I’ll sign copies of my new novel starting at 1 pm in the store at 3304-A Crain Highway, Waldorf, Md. They’ll also have my previous Hannibal Jones novels - The Troubleshooter, Collateral Damage, Damaged Goods and Blood and Bone – available for me to sign.

All the details are on my web site - http://www.hannibaljonesmysteries.com/ – along with the video trailer and promo and lots of other cool stuff. But even if I can't meet you in person, thank you all for sharing my happy news! I already feel as if the Acme Author Link readership is like family to me. Of course, that goes quadruple for my fellow bloggers. I can’t wait to hear from some of you after you’ve read Russian Roulette. In the meantime if you have any questions about the book, or my characters, please post a comment or two and I’ll respond pretty quickly.

Austin

MEET AUSTIN S. CAMACHO, THIS WEEK'S MAN OF MYSTERY AND MARKETING - and see him again This Coming Sunday & Monday!

Acme Authors Link Extends a Warm Welcome to

this week's guest, Austin Camacho, the author of four detective novels in the Hannibal Jones series -

Blood and Bone, Collateral Damage, The Troubleshooter, and Damaged Goods, plus two action thrillers, The Payback Assignment and The Orion Assignment. Active in several writers’ organizations, Camacho is a past president of the Maryland Writers Association, and teaches writing at Anne Arundel Community College. After a career as a military news reporter on the American Forces Network, Camacho is now a public affairs specialist for the Defense Department.

Austin has sold thousands of his novels as a Print-On-Demand author, a self published author, and as a writer published by a small press. He also wants you to succeed as an author, and he shares everything he has learned in a decade of self-promotion in his new book, “Successfully Marketing Your Novel in the 21st Century.”

PURCHASE LINK:

http://www.ascamacho.com/sfmyn.htm

And now...Some words from Austin About Marketing....

Basic Principles for Book Marketing

My latest book, “Successfully Marketing Your Novel in the 21st Century” is filled with the specific details of what has worked or not worked for me since I first published a Print on Demand mystery in 1999. I’d love to share it all with you here, but that would take me 240 pages. So instead, I decided to share three basic principles I use to guide my marketing decisions.


Planning

Step one: decide what tools and techniques you’ll use for promotion and write a marketing plan. Map out the timing of your marketing strategy. Study what the big publishers do. For example, why do they say the release date is in November when they have books to sell in June? It’s because reviewers want the Advance Readers Copies that far in advance. If your book looks like an ARC and they get it that far out, reviewers might mistake it for a big publisher’s book and review it. That’s how my Collateral Damage ended up in Library Journal. My book contains a sample marketing plan to help get you started.

Camouflage

First, your book needs to look like the others in your genre. Big publishers ensure this as a matter of course, and small presses usually do pretty well too. Their experienced book designers, artists and marketing teams create the standard look and feel. But if you’re self-published or a POD author, it’s up to you.

Why must your book look, feel, and smell like everyone else’s? Because readers decide to buy based on a large number of subconscious signals a book sends them. They’ve been trained by publishers to expect certain things. They’ve also been conditioned by those same publishers to believe that any book worth reading will be published by them. We know that’s not true, of course, but a book that says “self-published” to the consumer also says “amateur.” The same applies to booksellers. Your focus should be to make your book look as professional as possible, from the layout of the words inside to the cover art you choose.

And of course the author needs to look, sound, and act like a professional writer too, but that should not be camouflage. That’s what you are, right? So solicit blurbs and reviews the way the pros do. Approach speaking and signing engagements like the pros do. For example, I don’t think James Patterson makes those calls for himself, so I don’t either.

Evidence-based Marketing

Put simply – Don’t spend money on any marketing technique unless someone can show you proof that somebody has made money doing it. There are a lot of predators out there hawking radio interviews, blog tours, web site advertising, and who knows what else. But unless you can speak to a satisfied customer don’t plunk down your dollars. Besides, there isn’t much some publicist can do for you that you can’t do yourself.

Book trailers are the hot new thing, but I don’t know anyone who has told me they saw a spike in sales when they put on out on the internet. I won’t pay to have one produced until I do. However I was able to barter some writing work and exposure to get a tech-savvy friend to video tape me introducing one of my books. Then I posted it on about 30 web sites - for free. If you e-mail me thru my web site - http://www.ascamacho.com/ - I’ll send you the list.

Those basic concepts will take you a long way in marketing your fiction. If you have specific questions, about book signings, readings, internet marketing or anything else, leave me a comment and I’ll be happy to respond to them in a later blog.

Thanks, Austin.

READERS ARE ENCOURAGED TO RESPOND WITH QUESTIONS FOR AUSTIN. HE'LL BE HAPPY TO COME BACK ON SUNDAY AND ON MONDAY TO ANSWER THEM.