Blood Will Stream introduction video - up now on YouTube!

So, since launching the cover and details for the fourth Hobson & Choi book the other day, I've been kicking around the idea of doing some YouTube videos to promote it - since the book is about a YouTuber being killed, it didn't seem like the worst idea.

With time running down before the all-important 4th October launch date, I've decided to get stuck in and do an intro video to explain what the book's about and what the big differences are between this one and the previous three. Hopefully if you're on this website, you might be just the target audience for such a thing.

And yes, I also nervously fidget with my hands a lot. I know.

Anyway, here it is:

Hope you enjoyed that. If it's enticed you to pre-order the book, I've added all the available pre-order options to the main Hobson & Choi page! (Not print, I know. They won't let me offer pre-orders for print. Sorry.)

It was somewhat fun to do. I have plans for at least one more, which should be with you within the next week, and then... I don't know, ideas welcome. Tweet me at @NickMB with things to talk about! Or ask random questions and I'll do a Q&A maybe!

Hobson & Choi quiz! Poem! Guest posts a go-go!

Hi!

After producing a slightly loose post last week, I was perhaps considering writing a real one this time, but I became unexpectedly busy and the remaining time had to be given over to the important tasks of actually writing and watching TV shows based on comics.

But as luck would have it, I've written some proper structured Hobson & Choi related bits for other blogs that have gone up this week, so at least I can link to those.

They're a little more esoteric than some of the guest posts I've done in my time, as there's only so much I can say about my Amazing Writing Process.

Firstly, there's the "Which Hobson & Choi Character Are You?" quiz, which is perhaps the most important personality test of our generation. Yes, even though it contains an arguable factual error re: whether Breaking Bad is a "current" TV show. Ahem.

Thanks to the always-excellent Chelley of Tales of Yesterday for hosting that one, including doing all the actual set-up for the quiz - I just sent over a set of questions and answers. Much obliged.

Second, and even more in-jokey than the first one, it's Gentrificapocalypse Now, a poem by Sad Receptionist. This is an actual creative work by a character from the H&C books, who you can follow on Twitter if you want. His backstory is (partially) unveiled in the second book, but the actual Twitter account is just stupid rhyming jokes really. More details in the actual blog post, kindly hosted by Andrew of The Pewter Wolf.

And that is it for now. Next week, if I'm not unexpectedly busy, maybe a real blog post here?

Hobson & Choi Blog Tour - WEEK TWO

It's all over! Emotions were high, the pace was frantic, but the H&C Blog Tour is at an end. After two weeks of relentless H&C content written by myself and others, the whole damn enterprise is finally at an end. I thought I'd get the retrospective post out there, rather than squeezing it out in a few days, just so you can all feel like it's really over and move on.

So, what posts did come in our second week? Could there have been... a change in media format?

Hobson & Choi Blog Tour - Book Two Blurb + Launch Plans

It appears the launch of Rush Jobs, the second Hobson & Choi book, needs preparation. You can see an exclusive 100% real not-fake not-a-joke preview of the Case Two cover just to the right of these words. Enjoy!

But yeah, if you're someone who dislikes making Christmas plans in mid-November, best duck and cover, because we're about to talk late January 2015.

After The Girl Who Tweeted Wolf's relatively soft launch, we at H&C HQ are going bigger this time. Yes, it's a blog tour. This means that if you, the reader, run a blog about books (or something else you can easily relate back to H&C), you can host a post around the time of the Rush Jobs launch. This could be your own review of the book or a piece I've written or some combination of the two. We can work something out.

However, if you wish to be involved at all, you should register your interest by filling in the form here, which does include checkboxes to determine what kind of post you might want to feature.

Get ye applying. Your blogs won't tour themselves (because I will be doing that).

In order to get everything in order for this blog tour, we've also put the new book on Goodreads, so if you want to announce your formal intention to read it, you can do that too.

Oh, and to make the Goodreads page look less skeletal, I've released the blurb for Rush Jobs, which goes like this:

“Sometimes #crime feels like the Matrix. Or the #patriarchy or #porn. It's everywhere, even in people you trusted, and there's so MUCH of it.”
Angelina Choi returns for her second and final week of work experience at John Hobson’s detective agency, ready for anything after their first successful murder solve.
After all that online buzz, they’re in phenomenal demand. Can Hobson & Choi solve a kidnapping, play chicken with corporate crime, beat back gentrification, save a dog from drug dealers and head off violent backlash from their last case?
Or will grim revelations about Hobson’s past leave them floundering in the chaos?
Rush Jobs collects the second major storyline in the Hobson & Choi saga, #1 on Jukepop Serials and #2 in Dark Comedy on Amazon, adding brand new chapters and scenes to the case.
Also included: bonus story Infernal Accounting, exclusive to this book. An unfortunate accountant is terrified of his first day working for Rush Recruitment - but they’re only a temp agency, right? How bad can it be?

So there we go. The countdown has officially begun. Apply now to be a tour stop! And yes, the real new cover, from the creators of the first one, will be unveiled at some point. Exciting times.

New Hobson & Choi story! Free to mailing list subscribers!

Want more Hobson & Choi? Fancy seeing the pair solve a whole unfaithful spouse case in a mere two thousand words?

Well, you're in luck, as I've just written Current Affair Commentary, a new short story in which that exact thing happens. And you can read it right now simply by subscribing to my mailing list and nowhere else. Just fill in the form below and you'll be sent the download link once you've confirmed your email.

If the form below isn't appearing for whatever technical reason, click on this link here to be taken to an unfailing full-page version.

Regardless, hope you enjoy the story. I think it's a nice little work, it's been a while since I did a short done-in-one and it was good to return.

Becoming An Internet Author - Week One

The slow but determined march towards Hobson & Choi self-publication continues. A few days ago, I blogged a little about receiving professional edits on the text and my feelings on same. I think I reached equilibrium by the end, and I'm relatively okay with the direction it's going.

However, there is obviously another side to the whole thing. If I'm self-publishing (or author-publishing or hybrid-authoring or whatever), I obviously have to do all my own promotion. Well, I'm hoping some good reviews will do a bit of the work for me, but I still have to get the book to some reviewers.

All of which means doing some tweeting, some blogging, some awkward-for-me self-advertising. Talking about myself. Becoming an Internet Author. Never mind my damn edits, how do I feel about that?

Join the mailing list! Stuff will happen!

So, the other day I started a mailing list, but somewhat buried its announcement in my Hobson & Choi #50 retrospective blog. So, here's a post of its very own.

There is now a mailing list. The form to sign up can be found in the left sidebar of this blog, or I'll embed it at the bottom of this post. Mailings will be infrequent, once a month at the absolute most, and I'll only use it when something of substance happens/is about to happen. You will not get an inane message every week announcing when H&C goes up, don't worry.

In fact, if all goes well, there will be some news/preview material regarding an upcoming "thing" out there on the list in the next few weeks. So yeah, totally sign up. If the embed form below isn't working for you, you can also click here to get to another one. Ta very much.