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You May Now Buy the Best of Boles Blogs, Volume 4 (2013)

It’s that time of year again for 2013 reflection and to get set for racing into 2014 and the New Year, and that means we are pleased to announce the — Best of Boles Blogs, Volume 4 (2013) — now for sale on Amazon!

BUY NOW!

Over the years, many of you have asked for a way to promote the ongoing publication of Boles Blogs and to also have a way to read some of our best writing when you’re offline.  The solution has been a “Best of” series of books published by Boles Books Writing & Publishing that we sell on Amazon for your reading pleasure.

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Advertising Explicit Bodily Functions in People Magazine

Growing up in the 70’s, subliminal advertising was everywhere, and it was always a fun challenge to look at the modern advertising of the day and try to divine the nocturnal missions hidden therein.

“Sex” was a big seller in every way — the most famous evidence of such being the strategically placed curls in Farrah’s hair on her infamous poster.  The “S” in “Sex” is found on her right shoulder, the “e” swirls in the curls above her breasts, and the “x” is found dangling on the inside of her opposite shoulder.

Young men pinned that image to their walls and found great thrills in that lightning rod smile, that hair, and those absolutely hard, and forbidden, nipples!  Yes, Charlie’s Angels on TV was all about erect nipples showing through skimpy bathing suit tops and sweaters.

On today’s television, female nipples are verboten and often blurred by self-censoring series producers.  All the visceral, sexual, fun has been blurred out of current media mainstream.  I’m so glad we have the Universal channel on cable TV where early-morning Charlie’s Angels reruns often appear, uncensored, and still in their full-nipple fury to satisfy the immature little boy left behind in most of us.

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Self-Publish and Prosper or Mainstream Publish and Perish?

Getting your writing published in book form has long been the penultimate goal of authors across the world.  I’ve made my fair share of money in the publishing marketplace and one thing I can confirm is how much the industry has changed over the last 20 years.

Fifteen years or so ago, you could easily get a $15,000.00USD book royalty advance from a major computer book publisher.  You knew going into the job that, at the end of 90 days, you’d be fifteen large richer.  It was a great way to earn a quick living.  Once you had a book or two, the major computer magazine publishers would come calling, and you could write a 10,000 word essay and make $5,000.00USD for that weekend effort.  It was a rich and rewarding life, but then the chain came off the sprocket with the rise of the interwebs, the internets, the web.  Many book publishers were consolidated with other houses, or entirely demolished in bankruptcy, and all the great computer magazines are as dead now as the tree pulp they were printed on.

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New from Boles Books Writing and Publishing: Hardcore ASL Textbook for Levels 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7

As the New Year springs us forward into perpetuity, Janna and I are delighted to share the news with you that we have finally taken the advice of our Hardcore ASL students and instructors who have wanted to have all seven levels — all the teaching — in a single reference book.  Introducing, from Boles Books Writing and Publishing — Hardcore ASL Textbook for Levels 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 — available right now from Kindle Direct Publishing:

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How the Kindle Brought Back the Popularity of Short Stories

I love a good short story. When you are standing on the train and there is a man staring you down and you want to do something until you get to your station yet don’t want to only read part of a novel or work of non-fiction, a good short story that takes you from Kew Gardens Union Turnpike to Lexington Avenue 63rd street (that’s twenty five minutes on a good day) and fills you with a sense of accomplishment that really hits the spot. The problem has long been where to get new short stories. There are, of course, anthologies and literary magazines that that bring you fantastic short stories, but there are also many of them. When you spend twenty-five dollars on an anthology and go story by story only to find five interesting stories, you have effectively spent five dollars per interesting story.

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Kindle Cloud Reader in Google Chrome for Mac

I have been a big fan of the Kindle in the past.  I have also been disappointed in some of the developmental decisions Amazon made in supporting the Kindle.  I haven’t upgraded my Kindle hardware for several years because I was not impressed with the evolution of the product.  Now, with the release of an HTML 5 Kindle Cloud Reader for your web browser, I’m back on the Kindle bandwagon!  I recently purchased the Kindle version of Ron Hansen‘s excellent novel, Mariette in Ecstasy, and in seconds I was reading it on the web!

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Amazon Sells Stolen Gutenberg Books

I remember when I first read about the Gutenberg Project and the many free books that they were giving away. People volunteer for tasks ranging from recording audio versions of the public domain books, entering the text from scans of the books as well as proofreading the books.

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