'Tis The Season for Shameless Commerce And Self Promotion

Please forgive your Bloguero some seasonal commercialism and some self promotion. If it's one thing your Bloguero now understands, it's that the Internet isn't just, as they sing in Avenue Q, for pron. No. It's as much about other forms of commerce. In this environment, what's a small, literary blog with just a few viewers, dwindling posts and a lazy blogger/writer to do? Your Bloguero knows: run a commercial in which he pumps/pimps his own product. Oh, here it comes now.

Two really wonderful stocking stuffers are your Bloguero's two novellas, Tulum and The Dream Antilles. You can get them in paperback and in all eBook formats. And you can get them at Amazon (Tulum and The Dream Antilles) and B&N (Tulum and The Dream Antilles). You can take your Bloguero's word for it, they are a great gift and the recipients will really enjoy reading them.

If you order soon, and send them to your Bloguero, he will autograph them, inscribe them however you would like, and return them to you (please provide well stamped envelope).

Is that a deal, or what?

Gifts For The Holiday Season

With Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, Solstice and the other many holidays of the Season less than a month away, this is a good time to order soft cover copies of Tulum and The Dream Antilles as gifts. You can get them online at Amazon (soft cover Dream Antilles and soft cover Tulum and Barnes & Noble (Dream Antilles and Tulum. But do it now and avoid the rush!

The author (your faithful Bloguero) will happily dedicate and sign the book. There's enough time so that you can mail him the book with a SASE and he'll sign, dedicate, and return it to you in time for the holiday of your choice. Email address is in the Perfil. Voila!!

Tell me, am I lying? Is that a great deal or what?

Fake Reviews

The mind boggles. Well, not really, it doesn't. A well known author (no I’m not giving links) writes fake reviews of his books and posts them on Amazon. He gets caught. Not to be undone, other authors (again, no links) hire a company to write fake reviews and post them all across the Internet. The New York Times reveals this. The fake reviews are no doubt still available. Still other authors get their friends to write reviews and post them. Most of the reviews gush about how wonderful the book is. In fact, I’ve read one these books recently and in two words, it was not good. And that’s being charitable.

A hotel hires a PR firm to file fake reviews on TripAdvisor (again, no links). Not to be undone, a hotel offers a free drink to any guest who posts a favorable review on TripAdvisor from the hotel. Surprise, surprise, the hotel has many 5 star reviews. None of them says how expensive and awful the food in the restaurant is. Or that the review was paid for. With a drink. I hope the guests enjoyed their “free” drinks.

None of this should by now be surprising. This is business. This is the everyday world of the Internet. Everybody ought by now to know that this goes on. The story is so familiar and disappointing that it cannot even provoke real anger. It’s just some more dishonest, misleading marketing. Just more shilling. Just more commerce.

But it does present a real problem for consumers, for readers. And for writers and those who run vacation businesses.

How do you know that the reviews of my two books, Tulum and The Dream Antilles, are real?

How do you know that the posted guest reviews of our vacation rental, Nah Yaxche in Bahia Soliman near Tulum, Mexico, are real?

I can tell you this: They are real. Nobody got paid anything for writing them. Nobody was solicited to write them. Nobody received anything in exchange for them.

But forget about me. The important question here is this: can you tell that these reviews are real just from reading them? I hope you can. But I wouldn't be surprised if you couldn't. After all, the sole intent of the fake reviews was to fool you and make you think they were real. So real reviews and fake ones look surprisingly alike.

Reality Imitates Art

Huene Island in the Pacific

Realty:

With their boundless vistas of turquoise water framed by swaying coconut palms, the Carteret Islands northeast of the Papua New Guinea mainland might seem the idyllic spot to be a castaway.

But sea levels have risen so much that during the annual king tide season, November to March, the roiling ocean blocks the view from one island to the next, and residents stash their possessions in fishing nets strung between the palm trees.

“It gives you the scary feeling that you don’t know what is going to happen to you, that any minute you will be floating,” Ursula Rakova, the head of a program to relocate residents, said by telephone. The small chain could well be uninhabitable by 2015, locals believe, but two previous attempts to abandon it ended badly, when residents were chased back after clashing with their new neighbors on larger islands.

Art:

There is a question whether desde Desdemona is an intermittent island or a sandbar with trees, or both, or neither. One thing is certain: twice a day at high tide the sea covers everything except the two large rocks that mark the ends of the reef, and the trees, which hold the tree houses and catwalks that make up desde Desdemona's villages. At low tide, the villages are joined by a very broad, very flat white sand beach.

An Away Message

My plan for the next couple weeks is to step away from the computer and to spend some time sitting in one of these nice chairs overlooking the turquoise Caribe. I might read. I might take a nap. I might stare into space. I might daydream. Who knows what I'll be doing?

Anyway, that's why nothing new is being posted here at The Dream Antilles. But don't worry. I'll be back. And I'll have some new essays. In the meanwhile, you can browse the site and, of course, leave a message.

Reading In The Airport

The Airport, San Juan, Puerto Rico

This as the travel season begins:

Marley is frustrated. He's read all the soccer magazines in English, Spanish and German and most of the newspapers in the San Juan airport, and he is thinking about starting to drink pina coladas to make the time pass. He can't find any books that he might like. He has had a waiting room nap, and his neck now aches. He and Bardo have been waiting at the gate for three hours. It has gone far beyond the jokes about BWIA meaning "But Will It Arrive." ... The gate area is filled with the two extremes of Caribbean travel: rich tourists, with fluorescent pallor when arriving and tanned or sun burnt when leaving, and the poor of color, leaving and coming home, carrying boxes taped shut with duct tape, crates, and battered suitcases. The tourists are vibrating with apparent anger at the delay that has been imposed. The locals are implacably resigned to the wait and to show grace no matter what.

The Dream Antilles

Yes, the travel season to "warm places" is upon us. It's hard to get to desde Desdemona, as you already know, especially if you haven't been invited. But there are other lovely spots in the Caribbean. With spectacular beaches. Of course, there will be delays for weather in the US and for equipment. But don't despair. Just remember to bring lots of reading material. And breathe deeply.

A Wonderful Review of The Dream Antilles

Wow. A special thanks goes out to cfk for this excellent review of The Dream Antilles, that appeared on daily Kos on September 26, 2007.

It is a special treat for me when people read my book and enjoy it. I'm delighted when my book pleases, and I'm especially happy when readers and reviewers say nice things about it.

Did I mention that you should buy The Dream Antilles?