Luke Smitherd.com
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Hello everyone, and as we’re not quite at the halfway mark of January I feel like it’s still okay to say happy new year. I hope you had a great December, and now it’s time to turn my/our/the filthy, lecherous Smithereen nation gaze towards the future.

So what is next? Well… that’s kind of up to you, or at least the audiobook listeners among you.

That’s because I’m planning on going back to the early days of my career and writing some shorter fiction. That’s happening in ebook format; I’ve already started work on one, in fact. But what I’m unsure about is whether to record that as an audiobook, and I’d like your feedback, if I may? 

You see, understandably, when Audible members get their one credit per month, they want to spend it on an audiobook that’s going to get them the most quality hours of listening they can get. The novellas I intend on writing would only be between about 2-5 hours of audio; perhaps not quite long enough to justify spending a credit. 

Unlike when I release the text version of a book, I don’t set the price. Audible do, and they base it mostly on audio length. Here are their rates:

1 to 3 hours: ~£4.89–£6.29
3 to 5 hours: ~£6.99–£9.79

So my question to the people whose ears I have hungrily entered in the past is: would you pay these prices if I went into the studio to narrate a novella? Again, I don’t set them, but I’m curious as to what you think. I’d appreciate it it you replied to this email and let me know if you would or wouldn’t.

‘Cos I’m making plans. This year is looking to be a major turning point for me in several ways, and I’m trying to figure out how to best navigate it all. I’m looking forward to getting stuck into some fun shorter fiction that doesn’t have the weight of 10+ years of continuity behind it (on that note, it sounds like March of the Stone Men has been the conclusion to the saga that people—and myself—hoped it would be, and that is a relief I can’t really put into words. Check it out at the links below if you haven’t yet, and yes, it comes with a recap of all three prior books at the start) but I don’t wanna go the trouble of producing the audio if people (understandably) don’t wanna use a credit on that, but also don’t wanna potentially pay nearly the equivalent of one month’s Audible membership on a book that’s three hours long, even one by their Second Favourite Author. Let me know! 🙂

 MARCH OF THE STONE MEN is available now at these links:

March of the Stone Men Universal Amazon Link

Audible UK Order Page

Audible USA Order Page

It’s here! The wait is over! Check out this gorgeous cover by Mike Godwin and peep the blurb below!

The return of the Stone Men reaches its dramatic conclusion…

The internationally bestselling Stone Man series returns! The five battered survivors of the Fifth Arrival have reached the Isle of Skye, only to face an impossible mission: destroy the Barrier that has trapped the country and stop the ever-growing army of Stone Men. The survival of humanity itself hangs in the balance, and though they’ve been given their greatest weapon yet, our heroes must first learn how to wield it… before time runs out.

But these are ordinary, frightened, and exhausted people. Their journey will take them from the rugged coast of Scotland to the heart of England, crossing the land on foot. As secrets come to light and tensions rise, conflicting personal objectives threaten the fragile balance essential for harnessing their powers as a unit. To stand a chance, our heroes must master their unity or face annihilation.

The March of the Stone Men has begun.

Concluding the epic arc that began in The Empty Men and continued through The Stone Giant, the fourth installment of The Stone Man series promises to thrill, terrify, and captivate readers once more—twelve years in the making.

Head over to Amazon HERE, Audible USA HERE and Audible UK HERE to get your copy!

How would you like to not only read an entirely new edit of The Stone Man, but also have a new foreword, afterword, and over 120 pages of bonus content and deleted scenes from Books 1-3? What’s that? Sounds good? Well how about a cracking new set of covers for the set so far… as the countdown to March of the Stone Men continues? Check out the beautiful new artwork below, and click HERE to get your copy of The Stone Man – 10th Anniversary Special Edition. Wait, it’s been 10 bloody years?!

Hi folks. I’ve been quiet online for a while, as you’ll notice from the empty social feeds on the right hand side of the page. So quiet, in fact, that I released two novels and, while I listed them in the Books page, I didn’t actually make a post about them on the main feed of the website… so the home page still shows The Empty Men! There’s going to be a lot of activity coming between around November to April, and as a precursor to that, here at least are the two books I’ve released since my last post: The Stone Giant – The Stone Man, Book Three, and You See the Monster. I’m extremely proud of both of these so if you’ve been following the Stone Man series or just fancy a what I consider to be a modern horror novel then these two bad boys are the books for you. Universal Amazon links below, and my apologies for the radio silence. Exciting news coming soon (for real), so watch this space; in fact don’t watch this space, sign up to the Luke Smitherd Spam-Free Book Release Newsletter. That thing is the shit, I tell you, and you’ll miss nothing. Don’t be a ring piece, get yourself signed up. Your brain and loins will thank you.

Luke

X

… is finally here.

THE EMPTY MEN on Amazon 

THE EMPTY MEN on Audible USA

THE EMPTY MEN on Audible UK

The long-awaited sequel to the number one Amazon and Audible best seller The Stone Man, shortlisted for Audible Book of the Year 2015.

On a quiet seafront in the middle of the afternoon the sun sets, the clouds part and something like a pale, elongated human figure appears on the horizon. 

For Maria, watching from the beach, it’s proof that she should never have dared to return. Five years earlier, her life shattered by the arrival of the Stone Man, she’d fled the country. But now she can’t escape: suddenly, there are news reports of ‘Empty Men’ materialising all around the coast, and the roads are gridlocked. The Empty Men are killers, and they’re heading inland. 

A hundred miles from the sea, lonely, grieving Eric obsessively keeps watch in the ruins of Coventry, never straying far from Ground Zero, the site of the Stone Man’s first appearance. For five years, Eric has known there was a massive government cover-up of the circumstances surrounding the Stone Man and its disappearance, and he’s determined to find the truth. 

As Maria battles the Empty Men in a desperate chase for survival and Eric is caught in a terrifying transformation of Ground Zero, both find themselves on a path leading straight to the heart of the Stone Man mystery.

Chilling, fast-paced and full of stunning twists, this is the highly anticipated second book in Luke Smitherd’s Stone Man series.

Go get it!

I spent all day editing this video. Hey, I’ve been writing a lot, I gotta take a break sometimes… ps Americans, I don’t think you’ll get this. But I love you.

This just in: my new Audible ONLY release, Tales of the Unusual, is out NOW! Not pre-order, but actually out and available right now. It’s only available on Audible because this book collects the stories in He Waits (He Waits and Keep Your Children Close) Do Anything (Closure and Your Name Is In The Book) as well as an audiobook exclusive publication of The Jesus Loophole. I didn’t want to release these as a collected edition in print or ebook form as I didn’t want to affect sales of the individual versions of those books, but wanted to give audiobook ‘readers’ a chance to hear these stories too.

Five more stories from Luke Smitherd to keep you intrigued, shocked, and asking what you would do…

“He Waits”: Quite literally, no escape. Because he’s always with you. And in the real world – the world of you, the listener – “He Waits” will stay in your mind in a way that you won’t expect…

“Keep Your Children Close”: A campsite. A family holiday. A broken down car. And an approaching breakdown truck that is just the start of Shelley’s nightmare. By the time the sun sets, someone in that field will be dead, and Shelley must somehow make sure it isn’t one of her children.

“The Jesus Loophole”: Published here for the first time, in any format. Obsession, revenge, and a very big question: can God’s system of sin and redemption be played to your own advantage?

“Closure”: A winter walk in the woods seemed like a great idea to Gary and his wife, Carla. But when another version of himself appears and kidnaps Gary’s wife before his very eyes, Gary must decide whether or not to use the strange mechanical devices his duplicate has left him…and then live with the choice.

“Your Name Is In The Book”: When 11-year-old John Diner comes home to find an immense, mysterious book lying on his bed – its cover torn off, every page an endless list of names, some of which even belong to people he knows – he assumes its some kind of phone directory. It has to be, right? Even when the only numbers inside are single digits; solitary and curious scores printed next to each person listed. A puzzle, for sure…and a warning. A desperate message from an unseen stranger, a man trying to explain a terrible truth. John will find himself uncovering a darker reality than he can ever imagine, and the beginning of his road towards an impossible choice.

Audible UK link – http://adbl.co/2ilyOxz
Audible USA link – http://adbl.co/2ilA6sB

Hello everyone. A lot of you will have read my fourth (technically fifth) novel, A Head Full Of Knives. It has nearly 200 reviews on each side of the Atlantic, with scores of 4.7 (UK) and 4.5 (USA). That’s pretty respectable, both in terms of review numbers and overall score. So what’s the problem?
It doesn’t sell.
To put it into context: at the time of writing, my top four bestselling books are The Stone Man, In The Darkness, How To Be A Vigilante, and Kill Someone. The order changes a lot (although Cementum himself is pretty much always at the top, as much as Charlie and Minnie knock him off the top spot more and more these days… ) but generally that’s it. The Physics of the Dead will sneak in there too sometimes, as does Weird. Dark.
But Knives? Never.
I’ve tried three different covers, and all sorts of optimisation tricks in the book’s setup (trust me, I’ve tried them all), and two completely different blurbs. I think a fourth cover is in order, and a huge part of the problem is with the book’s title (it just doesn’t appeal the way the others do.) It’s too late to do anything about that… but the cover can be changed. As can the blurb.
And that’s what I want you to help me with.
The blurbs of my books are always… troublesome, and there’s a good reason why, one that has become especially clear with the healthy early sales of Vigilante and Kill Someone (hands down, by a country mile, my most successful launches.) Here’s the difference:
With Vigilante and Kill Someone, I can tell you what the book is all about, and it doesn’t ruin the story.
How come? Think about it. If you’ve read those books, try and sum the setup of the story as if you were explaining the scenario of the book to someone else. Done it? Ok. Now, ask yourself this question:
Have you given away any major parts of the plot, or spoiled any of the fun or intrigue of the book?
The answer, I would think, would be no. Therefore I can say in those books’ blurb exactly what they’re about, sell the story to the reader, and kill none of the fun.
Now take a story like The Man On Table Ten. A story where, until about halfway through the book, you have no idea what the guy’s big secret is… and that’s what has kept you reading the story. Once that secret is revealed, the story becomes all about how not only the Man himself handles that secret, but the waitress’ response to it. Now imagine reading that story when you already know what the secret is. It would still be good (I hope) but you’ve taken a huge amount of the book’s hook away.
Now multiply that driven-by-the-mystery angle by about five, and you have A Head Full Of Knives. The book is literally mystery-reveal, mystery-reveal, mystery-reveal for the entire plot.
Now try and sum up what that story is about without giving anything important away, and still make it sound appealing to the average reader.
You can see my first effort on the book’s Amazon page, and if you have an early paperback copy you’ll have the original blurb too. Think you can do better? Good.
Guess what? We’re going to have a competition.
Come up with your own blurb for A Head Full Of Knives and send it to me by January 1st, and I’ll not only pick the best one and use it on the book’s Amazon page, Audible page and on the paperback version’s back cover, but I’ll send you a signed paperback copy of the book with the new cover and your blurb on it, thanking you for coming up with that blurb.
Important: if I don’t think any of the entries are quite right, I’ll be honest, they won’t be used, but I’ll still pick my favourite out of those and send the winner their copy of the new version of the book. Believe me, though; I really hope someone does produce a belter here because I would be very happy if they did.
Get thinking, get writing, and have a happy festive period.
Stay Hungry folks.
Luke
PS if you’ve read the book but never put your review up on Amazon UK and USA… well… ah, do I really even need to say it these days?

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER ‘THE STONE MAN’, SHORTLISTED FOR AUDIBLE UK’S BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD 2015
In the late 1990s, a laptop was found in a service station just outside of Manchester. It contained a digital journal entitled ‘TO THE FINDER: OPEN NOW TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE!’ Now, for the first time, that infamous diary is being published in its entirety.
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