New Review From Boys and Literacy Blog

Boys and Literacy is a great site to find books for boys. They posted a review last week of SZJMB and I forgot to post it.

Here's a quote:

"For the reader who likes zombie books, MJA Ware's Super Zombie Juice, has action without too much gore, but enough to keep it creepy."

You can check out the site and read the entire review here.

If you are an Amazon reviewer, or have a blog feel free to contact me about a review copy.

Kindle Fire - First Impressions

I've probably played with my Kindle Fire for 2 hours or so. By far my biggest complaint is lack of apps. For example, I couldn't find Google Sky Map in the App store. This is a killer app and I'll be tempted to return if I can't get it.

But that's not the only app that's lacking. I had terrible time finding free apps for my daughter, even just trial versions. Amazon needs to quickly beef-up their app store.


Here's what I've found so far:

Good:
-Screen is nice and bright.
-My eBooks automatically showed up.
-Easy to use.

-No lag so far (others have reported sluggish performance).

-Multitasking! On my iPod and iPhone when I exit Pandora, the music stops. On the Fire, I can read, surf, etc and still listen to music.

-Feels well constructed.

Bad
-Not many apps to chose from.
-Hard to configure. For example, I can't figure out how to require the password for app purchases (to keep my daughter from buying apps.)
-Lots of fingerprints on the glass.
-Music purchases over 90 days old can't be auto loaded.

-Unlike my K3 Kindle, I can't condense text (which means more page turns).

-No mic, camera or SD slot. You can't even run Amazon's own price-checking app.--No cable to connect to your PC, you have to purchase a micro-USB cable separately.

Neutral:
-Battery seemed to run down fast, but after a recharge, it seems better.
-Heavier than I thought. Might be too heavy to read in bed for long periods.

-Speakers aren't really loud. Couldn't listen in a car or in public.

I need some more time to play with it before I can decide if it's a keeper.

Update: I was able to load Google Sky Map, doing something called "sideloading," but it only works in manual mode (no digital compass). Oh well.

Update 2: Made some more observations in bold.

More Reviews for SZJMB

Gothical posted a 5-star review of Super Zombie Juice Mega Bomb (SZJMB) on her blog. Here's a quote:

"...SUPER ZOMBIE JUICE MEGA BOMB was a fun, fast pace, unique read that I look forward to reading more from the author and MUST have a sequel I would sell a blue smurf for a sequel to this book."

Which leads to my only question about this review: I thought all smurfs were blue?

I also had two great kid reviews over on Goodreads. One by an eight-year-old and another by a fourteen-year-old. I was a little surprised that the younger boy seemed to enjoy SZJMB more and his review has to be my favorite so far:

"Nate & Misty are bestfriends. They decide to run away after they get grounded for sneaking out. When they come home they see the town is full of zombies. They are really smart and move in to a Walmart. By accident they find out that zombies can be killed with lemons and different things that have acid in them. They meet a genius named Kali that help them kill the zombies with a really cool firetruck.

Awesome book." 5-Stars

There's nothing like a review from a target reader to make your day!

If you haven't picked up your copy of SZJMB yet, the ebook is on sale now for 99¢ at Amazon and on my website (in 3 formats).

Happy Release Day -- My Royal Pain Quest

I wanted to let everyone know that my good friend, Laura Lond, has just released her latest MG/YA book: My Royal Pain Quest.

I had the pleasure of beta'ing not only this title, but the previous book in this series, My Sparkling Misfortune.

Besides having awesome covers, both titles are great reads that, I think, will appeal to both young fantasy enthusiasts as well as reluctant readers.

And the Winner is...

The Second Zombie Survival Kit Winner is:
Aeicha M.

Thanks to everyone who helped promote the contest; we had well over 100 people enter, most with multiple entries.

If you didn't win, don't despair, you can still win a print copy of Super Zombie Juice Mega Bomb over at Great Minds Think Aloud. Plus I have a couple more contest in the works.

Zombie Survival Kit Winner Announced Tomorrow

Just a quick note to let everyone know I'm running behind on drawing the winner. I'm just now finishing up work and my brain is a little (maybe a lot) fuzzy. I want to make sure everyone gets the correct number of entries, so I'm going to figure them out and draw the winner tomorrow.

Next time, I think I'm going to try a different contest system to make the number of entries easier to calculate.

Sorry for the delay!