First Five Star Review Is In

The first five star review is in for Diamonds For Death as well as another glowing four star review. I am thrilled. Sales are brisk, but Sharon wants more readers and friends. So order yours today, either paper of ebook from Amazon. And she is also available through Smashwords. Have a great weekend.

Review: Five Stars

Best friends Kevin and Sharon landed lucrative gigs that would see them cross several borders to fulfil their clients' needs. Sharon was contracted to retrieve the family of a Cuban baseball player who had escaped the watchful eyes of his handlers 10 years ago and defected to America, leaving behind his mother, wife and son. In an attempt to force him to go back to Cuba, the government had taken his family hostage, and they were now living on an isolated farm under tight security. Kevin, on the other hand, was hired by an insurance company to fly to London and review security protocols and give advice on how to close any gaps in anticipation of a large shipment of diamonds from South Africa that was susceptible to a heist. As the two friends set off in opposite directions to embark on their respective assignments, little did they know that they were going against a common enemy.

Diamonds for Death by Gregory C. Randall is a fiction tale set against the background of post revolution Cuba and how Fidel Castro's efforts to keep resources and talent at home frustrated some of his people and were at times undermined by his own people, with some of them using their government positions for their own gain. The story had an exciting plot that entwines two stories from different parts of the world and blends them into one captivating novel. It was simply amazing how Gregory C. Randall linked the two assignments, highlighting each part without taking the shine away from the other. Diamonds for Death is truly a page-turner that will take you on an amazing ride across several borders.

Reviewed By Faridah Nassozi for Readers’ Favorite

Review - Four Stars

Diamonds For Death: Sharon O'Mara Book Five is the continuation of the dynamic team of Lieutenant Sharon O'Mara and Kevin Bryan. O'Mara is now financially successful after a series of lucky breaks and decisions, but her life is still action packed with high profile, dangerous jobs. She is enlisted to help the great Cuban baseball player for the San Francisco Giants, Toribio Rodriquez, get his mother, his wife, and son out of Cuba. When he defected to the United States after being recruited by a popular Cuban baseball player, Eduardo Mendez, his family were taken away and hidden for nearly a decade. Bryan, in turn, has been offered a job in London in a case involving millions of dollars of jewelry. In a weird twist of fate, both their cases are intertwined with Marta De La Vega, who works with the Cuban baseball teams to help stop Cubans from escaping their team. De La Vega is involved in the high stacks trafficking of Cuban tobacco, the movement of arms, and diamonds. With the help of some past allies and buddies, O'Mara sets off to Cuba to free Rodriguez's family from De La Vega's work camp.

Author Gregory C. Randall writes his O'Mara series with a lot of rapport and camaraderie between the protagonist/heroine Sharon O'Mara and her partner in crime, Kevin Bryan - along with past friends Bobby Gillis and others. This is an action packed series that has an unlikely heroine with a military past with two tours in the Middle East to lead the action. This series is very entertaining, combining baseball with intrigue and suspense. I recommend this series to both men and women!

Reviewed By Christine Nguyen for Readers’ Favorite

More Later . . . . . . .

Diamonds For Death - First Review In

Four Big Stars out of Five

Diamonds For Death: Sharon O'Mara Book Five is an international thriller written by Gregory C. Randall. While this is book 5 in the series, the author gives enough background for this novel to be read on its own. Sharon is independently wealthy now, thanks to the bequest of her friend and former client, Alain Dumont, but she's still intrigued by the story of Eddy Mendez, a baseball scout and close friend of Toribio Rodriquez. Mendez had been instrumental in Rodriquez' defection from Cuba, but his promise he made to the baseball player about getting his family out of Cuba had been impossible to fulfill. When Toro defected, his wife, mother and young son were secretly removed from their lodgings, and they became the unwilling guests at a coffee plantation owned by a corrupt Cuban official. It's been ten years now since the family was together, and Sharon agrees to help get them reunited.

Gregory C. Randall's international thriller, Diamonds For Death: Sharon O'Mara Book Five, is an exciting and fast-paced story that follows Sharon and her friend, ex-cop Kevin, as they embark on different projects which turn out to have threads in common. I enjoyed both Kevin's travels in England and his efforts to protect the diamond shipment and Sharon's Cuban adventure, but the real stars of this book for me were the baseball players. Randall's descriptions of Toro at bat are superb -- one really gets the feeling of being there in the stadium. The Iraq flashback sequences were also vivid and moving. Diamonds For Death: Sharon O'Mara Book Five is recommended reading for thriller fans.

Completed on:	01/12/2015
Review Rating:	4 stars.
Reviewed By Jack Magnus for Readers’ Favorite

DIAMONDS FOR DEATH NOW AVAILABLE

NOW AVAILABLE AT 

AMAZON BOOKS

SHARON O'MARA'S

NEWEST THRILLER AND ADVENTURE

Diamonds For Death

Sharon O’Mara’s newest client doesn’t need her help for what he’s done, but rather for what he left behind. When baseball great, Toro Rodriquez, defected he had to leave his wife and child in Cuba. 

Now a ruthless government agent whose allegiance isn’t to Castro, but only to herself, holds them prisoner. Since O’Mara’s friend, Kevin Bryan, is off on a security gig in London to prevent the theft of diamonds worth a quarter of billion euros, she turns to old friends and comrade-in-arms to help rescue Toro’s family. Her team’s failure may mean vanishing into a Cuban prison or . . . worse.

O’Mara and Bryan have no idea their client’s paths will not only merge but crash bloodily into each other on the night of baseball’s All-Star Game in San Francisco.

Who is Sharon O'Mara?

Red haired, athletic, bold and brash, Sharon O’Mara is the woman every girl wants to be and every man’s fantasy. Honor and loyalty are the sharp edges of her nature, yet there is a passion about her that warms even the coldest heart. Independent to a fault yet steadfast with her friends, she takes on only those jobs that can and will make a difference. She is a tough rebel with a caring soul.

This book is available through Amazon in ebook formats for Kindle and in trade paperback.

AVAILABLE HERE!

Or paste this into your browser:

http://www.amazon.com/Diamonds-For-Death-Sharon-Chronicles/dp/0965651061

A VERY SPECIAL OFFER

MERRY CHRISTMAS
AND

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

A VERY SPECIAL OFFER

Today through January 6th, all

the Sharon O'Mara ebooks will be available through 

Amazon Kindle for

$0.99

CLICK THE TITLE:

LAND SWAP FOR DEATH

CONTAINERS FOR DEATH

TOULOUSE FOR DEATH

12TH MAN FOR DEATH

We are celebrating the January 6 release of the New O'Mara book:

Diamonds For Death

Look here for more information and the chance to win a free copy of Sharon's latest adventure in:
CUBA!

Posting Your Books On IngramSpark – A Primer

An author needs their books everywhere: online, ebooks, blogs, Amazon, and in bookstores. The urban legend is that independent bookstores won’t carry books from Amazon (though I have heard that, like many legends, this one is not totally true or is changing). The belief is that Amazon was/is/will be, the evil empire, and as such indie-bookstores won’t buy their product (actually your product is from their subsidiary CreateSpace), is changing.

With some help from the bookstore industry and the need to access the growing world of self-publishing, Ingram Content Group (and owns Lightning Source printing) decided to see what they could do to help get our books onto the shelves of bookstores and libraries. They created IngramSpark, a division that gets your book into the world’s largest distribution chain. While paper books aren’t a great moneymaker for me (CreateSpace) at the moment, I decided to grow a bit and give IngramSpark a chance.

Ingram is very similar to CreateSpace in that it takes YOUR cover and content files and then builds a book to your specs. So remember the responsibility for a great looking book is YOURS – not Ingrams. All aspects are under your control from cover art, cover finish, text formatting, and price. Ingram is just a distributor that gets your book into its huge distribution chain.

Go here to understand what Ingram Content is.

Here is what you need to do to get your books into Ingram:

Step 1

Sign up at IngramSpark HERE:

Be ready with your completed files for cover art and interior text. They request PDF formats in the PDF/X-1a:2001 format. Like many of the various PDF formats I haven’t a clue as to why this one, just make sure your files are saved in this Standard. If you don’t, you will be prompted to update and replace.

Step 2

Open your Dashboard and click on Add a New Title.

This is a six-step process that walks you through placing your book into their system. Be prepared before you start to know ALL the aspects of your book: size, publisher, matte or gloss cover, descriptive text, interior paper type (white or cream), etc. They also do e-books from your files – I don’t know how this works, I keep my ebooks on Amazon. So I open by only selecting Print Only in the first box at the top. Then the imprint input (your choice but you need to have one – now is the time to step up and become your own publisher), then the title, subtitle and language.

Step 3

Post contributor – that’s normally you as the author. Then subjects, this is like the keywords in Amazon, please put a lot of thinking into this. This is where your book will be searched in Ingram’s huge database. Their’s is a tough search system, start with FICTION in the search and grow from there – there are only 78 pages of potential Subject Code selections. Then post Description – critical information here.
This is what they suggest (and a minimum of 200 words):

This brief description of the book will be communicated to distribution partners who wish to describe and market the book on their website(s) and to their customers.

IngramSpark recommends that you provide a book description for all new books, to assist booksellers in presenting your books to their customers.

The book description should be at least 200 characters, but should not exceed 4,000 characters including spaces. In addition, no HTML tagging, bullets, or other special formatting should be embedded.

See, I told you to be prepared before you start.

Step 4

Trim Size is obvious (especially if you are moving over from CreateSpace or other POD), select the size. Interior color options are white and crème. I have not printed anything in color yet but there are options here if that’s your book. Select binding, then cover finish. Lastly for this step is page count – remember to include front and back pages, table of contents, index’s, appendix, etc. The need here is to compute the thickness of your book (which of course you know down to the hundredth of an inch). If not, go to their template page and information site under HELP and review the File Creation Guide and Checklists – very helpful.

Step 5

Load ISBNs here. Critical Note:

I create a DIFFERENT ISBN number for the books I load onto IngramSpark. Obviously every version of your book (ebook, paper, etc.) needs its own and different ISBN number – yes, really it does! So I load at Bowkers, in my ISBN schedule, a new number for the Ingram version. This is to reduce confusion when a bookstore or library orders the book – it goes directly to Ingram and is not confused with CreateSpace or other distribution channel.

Now add your price for the book, publication dates (past or future as required).

Step 6

Here is where you drop your files for the interior and cover. Straight forward.

Subsequent steps:

Proceed on through the various pages as directed. Here you have opportunities to be listed in their monthly catalog release of new/old books as well as other promotional opportunities. No rush here, but keep this in mind as a way to market your titles in the future.

It will take a day or three for Ingram to review your files for compatibility, if a problem they will notify you through your email. It will also be posted at the top of your dashboard if there is a message. There are various buttons to push that will help explain any issues, they are in the specific title that you submitted. Their phone help is great, sometime there is a wait, but they do know what they are doing and do help.

Costs:

You cannot beat CreateSpace – most everything except ordering physical books is free. Ingram charges $49.00 for placing every title in their system (paper and ebook for the same price), this will be billed to the ‘on file’ credit card you placed when you set up your account (this also includes info on transferring funds, tax info, etc. Be prepared when you start). Marketing and catalog placements start at $60.00 each.

There are many reasons for getting you books onto Ingram, the most important being access to their distribution system. The costs are not great considering what it cost to get your book to the point of being sold (cover artwork, editing, formatting, etc.)

I will keep you posted as to what my ongoing experience is with IngramSpark over the next year.

More Later . . . . . . . .