Where do the month's fly? ALVA Press, Inc., gradually takes over my life. It consumes my weekends, my evenings, my holidays. President's week I must have put in eighty hours. Have I lost it completely? I think not. Only beginning to understand the wonderful but somewhat brutal world of publishing.Witness the knock-down drag-out debate about Amazon.com freebies and willingness to undersell anyone, even at a loss to the company as meantime it buys up all the best selling authors.

Meantime, authors feel caught the frey. But better some stars than no stars we figure. No we will not all make it as writers--try though as we may. However, oddly on first take, Amazon.com has come round--thanks to a major confrontation with the industry. Yes, back a bit Steve Jobs, in his imitatable way, came up with the answer. Yes, Amazon would go with the agency model in which the publisher sets the price and Amazon.com gets the traditional 30%, and agrees to no longer undersell the publisher. Whew! Well, whew for the minute at least.

What then is Amazon.com's next logical move? You guessed it. It goes into the publishing bursiness. Witness now the list of free books it offers--because it can--as it launches out on a new path to gobble up smaller publishing companies through its tactic of feeding the hungry masses free eBook after free eBook and by so doing it would seem, probably immediately--although probably not eventually--diminishing the demand for eBooks at reasonable prices--except at Amazon.com. 

What then can be my small contribution on behalf of writers? Truly only miniscule: other than for review and author interview and book advertising purposes, I do not solicit free eBooks. Nonetheless, as I launch the eBooks of other writers the question of to free-eBook-it or not remains.

So by the first week of March ALVA Press will make available its  first eBook written by someone other than myself. It is Kristen Henderson's marvelous book of passionate lyric poetry, Drum Machine. Tell me, should ALVA or should ALVA not distribute Drum Machine as an eBook free?

BTW: If you have not noticed, there is a small comment button below your link and any views on how I might handle the tricky to-free-eBook-or-not question would be most appreciated!

 As to my personal life, given the press of time spent on the company I find that more and more it revolves primarily around my son, his family, and those who share an interest in what I am doing and how I am progressing. 

But spring is coming and it is my plan to make a run to Saturday's opening at the Cherry Branch Gallery in Cherry Valley, NY; to participate in the Hudson Valley Sciontist's May 27 gathering at the Vassar College Alumni House for lunch and some delightful discussion with other lovers of Sherlock Holmes and words and literature in general; and to, hopefully, make a run north to Port Henry, NY, to visit with some very missed friends. And, to my delight, there are of course: my niece's sixteenth birthday bash; my grandson's participation in the New York State Music Festival, and the engagement shower for my nephew's bride-to-be. 

And this while all around and within our lives we celebrate the passing of a winter that for us here in the Hudson Valley has been kind and offers promise of a gentle fading into the warmer weather.

Roberta in Po-Town, Feelin' light