 My name is Elaine Gallant and I'm your host of Books, Books, Books, a live streaming series through Think Tech, Hawaii, where we'll be discussing the reading of books, writing of books, and everything in between and beyond. Today's discussion is with Rita Forsythe, my hope cohort in crime literally, because she and I have authored crime novels. Rita will also be hosting the show on an alternating basis beginning January the 4th, so be sure to mark your calendars. Right now, however, we'll be interviewing one another about Amazon's newest reading experience, Bella. We're going to delve into its culture as well as its benefits for readers and authors alike. Rita, my friend, welcome. Thank you. Thanks for having me tonight. Oh, it's my pleasure. You've published two novels so far on Bella. So first, can you tell us a little bit about your novels? Sure, I'd be happy to. My first novel is Under the Monkey Pot Tree, and that is a fictional work based on the legends of the Hawaiian mo'o and the la'ie pan here in Kihe. So I was inspired to write this to bring attention to the cultural and environmental significance of the wetlands. Elaine, I don't know what your weather has been like over the past couple of days, but we've been getting rain and mud. And I tell you what, if it wasn't for our healthy wetlands, things would be a lot worse for us here in Kihe. I agree with that. Even on the Lahaina side, the dry side, I agree. So. Oh, sorry. Now go ahead. You were going to tell me about Paper Dolls, I think. Yeah, well, let me tell you a little speck about Monkey Pot. In that novel, a woman arrives on the island of Maui to claim an unexpected inheritance. Don't we wish? And she soon realizes there's a dark side to paradise. So on to the second novel, Paper Dolls. That's a psychological thriller about identical triplet women. And of course, this is fiction. And they live in a remote farmhouse in Colorado. Paper Dolls is a cringe worthy mix of crime and comedy. So both books, Elaine, are available on Vella and they will be fingers crossed available on ebook and print next year, 2022. That is great, Rita. And I've read both your novels. Well, I'll say I read the first one into the Monkey Pot tree, but I'm working on the second one. Thanks. Love that. So Elaine, you've been published. What's your experience publishing The Fifth Sea and where the lilacs bloom? Well, The Fifth Sea was a paperback novel and an ebook. So and that was during Create Space Time. And that's about a rookie CIA officer who's left for dead after his first assignment only be taken deep into the CIA to help solve an illicit diamond operation. So that experience was slightly different from my experience on Vella with where lilacs bloom. Now, that novel is where God asked a grieving young woman to be an instrument of peace. But her promise proves harder to uphold once the devil gets involved. But both novels were easy for me to pose as an author. But Vella turned out to be even more so. I think it's more reader friendly as well. I really do. So let's talk about Vella in particular. What's been your experience at Vella? Because you started it. You got me involved. You're the groundbreaker. Tell readers what is Vella and what it means for them. Good questions. So everything that I say today, you need to know that it could change tomorrow. Our platforms are changing as we speak. But I think Vella is here to stay. So I can tell you my story. I can tell you my experiences. Please do. Yeah, I completed The Monkey Pot Tree. And about six months later, I was kind of trying to figure out how to best bring this book to my readers. And I was hacking through the jungle of the publishing world. And that's no fun. I'd rather just write, you know. Yeah. So I heard about this Vella program on Amazon. And they were saying it would be to offer readers stories told one short episode at a time. So that picked my interest. Well, but what is Vella? I mean, can you give us a more understanding of what it means for readers? Sure, sure. It is serialized fiction. And that's nothing new. Charles Dickens, Stephen King, Margaret Atwood, wrote in serialized versions. And, you know, we watch TV, we watch Netflix, some of us. And we're used to short chapter-like episodes. So now with Amazon, they have brought us that in book form. And it's just like watching a 20-minute episode on TV. Yeah, like L.A. Law or something. But now in reader format. So for some writers, they like to write and then pop the episode on right away immediately, like that very day. I don't do that. I haven't been brave enough to do that quite yet because I do a lot of editing before I want it to be public. So I complete my manuscript all the way through before I put the episodes on. And then I feather on the episodes a couple of day until the whole manuscript is on there. Yeah, I think you've got to be kind of brave to write on the fly like that. I'm like you, Rita, where I have to write and rewrite and write and rewrite until I finally get it to where I'm really happy. So I'm like you, where I wanted to put everything out. And I think you took your time in putting your episodes out. I think you put one episode out and then waited a week. And then you put another episode out and then you waited a week. And then for the next one, you're doing it a little differently, I think. I know what I did is I put the whole thing out in episodes. I hope put the whole novel of where Lilacs bloom out. Yeah, I put one out like every day, every two days as quickly as I did my last final double check before I sent it out into the world. Yes, would you agree that Vella is sort of like a shortened novella? Yeah, I think that's probably where it got its name, don't you? I think so, too. What did Amazon start, Vella? It's a really new program. It started this July, you know, six months ago. And I was one of the early adopters. I jumped in right before the launch. And since then, and that was with Monkey Pottery. And then since then I have finished paper dolls and got that on there. So it's a brand new program. Fantastic. Can you tell us where you found it and how you found it? I mean, I had never heard about it. You brought it to me and I've been writing for a little while. Well, I started seeing it on Facebook and I also have some other author friends who had heard about it and they hadn't done it yet. They hadn't put any work on there yet, but they had heard about it. So I thought, hmm, might be interesting. So I did some research and your listeners might be interested to know to know where they can find it. Go to Amazon.com on your browser. Apple users can find it on their Kindle app. Android users, unfortunately, not yet. Soon, I think it's cost. And it's only available at this time in the United States. But soon we'll be coming to Canada. Our dearest neighbor and friend and other countries in Europe. And so we're really excited for launching worldwide. How do readers read Vella? How does that process work? Let's say I want to read. I mean, I know how it works because I've read your your novels. But let's say someone new is coming in and they want to read some episodes. How do they go about that? So if you are an Apple user, then you can read it on your browser or on your Kindle app. If you are an Android user, you can find it on your browser. That's it right now. And how do they pay for it? I mean, you know, when you buy a novel, you pay a price. And when you buy an ebook, you pay a price. So how do you pay for Vella? How do you do that? Really different. That's a really good question, Elaine. Each episode amazingly just costs pennies. And by the time you are finished with the entire novel, it's really a lot cheaper than if you bought the paperback book full price or the ebook. And so you purchase tokens on Amazon.com. And these tokens give you access to installments of between six hundred and five thousand words. And you can pick any book in any of the there's about ten thousand or more books on already in the past six months. And you can use these tokens to read multiple books at a time. You can switch back and forth. The cool thing is the first three episodes are always free on every novel. And at least at this point, they are. And the nice thing about that, I think, is because you can check that book out and see if you really like it for free before you pay your tokens to start reading. And right, your investment is very could be zero if you're not enjoying a book, which sometimes happens, right? But if you're enjoying it, then you get the first three chapters for free. And then then you start paying the tokens, right? And they can even stop that at any time if they get into chapter ten and want to move to another book, right? Yes, yes. And then they go back to that book and buy. More episodes if they want to. Yes, it's very possible. So what are some of the other pros to Vella and also what are some of the cons? Let's see. So I think for pros, you know, we've talked about the low cost and the ease of access, but also readers can give thumbs up and they can fave, you know, their favorite stories. And kind of one cool thing for me as an author is I can write in authors' notes some of my thinking. So, for instance, when I was doing The Monkey Pottery, I did research on Hawaiian cultural points of interest on the pond, on the moos. And I would put my references down there, even though it was a fiction book. I would put my references in the author's notes. Authors can also, you know, write about what they're thinking at the time when they wrote it and why they wrote the words they did. So it's another form of interaction between the reader and the writer. So that's some of the pros, so cons. Well, one thing I was thinking, and you probably have some ideas to Elaine, but I was thinking that a lot of us are on the computer all day and working digitally and with eye fatigue. Sometimes people just want to relax at night with a paperback book in their hand, you know, and so that would be one of the cons for more digital access. What do you think? Is there is there anything else to add to that, Elaine? Well, I can think of a few cons. One, it's hard for the writer to give an autograph on an e-book or a Vella book. You can't really wrap it up for Christmas either, can you? You can't gift wrap it. And an e-books and Vella books have no heft, aside from the device you're reading them from, where a book has heft. And that's that that has some warmth to it, right? Living a page and, you know, but everything's become so digitally. But I can think of a thousand pros as well, like, for instance, with the digital books, you can highlight, you can take notes, you can look up definitions right away, just touch it. You can. And then after, after you've marked it all up and you've and you've done all your research, you can actually clean it up and put it back into its pristine state. You can't do a hardback or a paperback, right? You've marked it up. E-books don't take up any shelf space. Neither do you, neither do the Vella books. You, they don't need to be dusted. And here's the good thing. When you travel, you can take your entire library with you, right? So there are some real benefits to digital and to Vella books that paperbacks and hardbacks don't offer. That's true. Sorry, I have a little cold going on. It's okay. I have a question for you, though. Sure. You've published both in traditional and Vella format. Can you discuss the evolution of the original hardback novels into episodic serials? Yeah, it's kind of interesting because, you know, things started with the hardback, going to paperback and hardbacks are tomes almost. You know, people built libraries around them and stored them forever and they are collectible items. And same with paperback, but then the pocketbook came around. And I don't know if people know about the pocketbook. The pocketbook was small enough to fit in your pocket or in your pocketbook, in your purse. And you could just pull it out and read a few chapters or whatever. After that came novellas and now episodic serials. And I would do want to mention that the first paperback came out around 1935 by Penguin Books. And then again in 1938 by pocketbooks with Pearl Bucks, The Good Earth. And then the first digital, look again, my notes here, 1997 with the rocketbook. And these two men, Eberhardt and Tarpening, were lifelong voracious readers. And they saw a future where everyone would be reading digital books. And that's from Google. I got that source from Google. So it's quite interesting, the evolution of things. And now, you know, it's almost like we've gone from these giant tomes down to episodes that are even smaller than novellas. And that's how we're reading now, that we can read instantly 20 seconds or 20 minutes or whatever we have. And not lose pace with what's happening in a novel. And that's where that's where Bella's pretty incredible. Yeah. And you know, I know my attention span is getting shorter and shorter. It's quite good for that. Oh, I just thought of another pro of books versus ebooks and Bella, and that is books pay bigger royalties. Because they're more expensive, right? So for writers, we, we earn a little bit more, but you don't have that interaction with the reader like you do with Bella, where they can give you a high five or a thumbs up or a thumbs down. And then as you're writing, you know, you can actually change the course of the novel based on the emotions that you're getting from readers at the time. Right. On a book or on a paperback, you have to wait for the reviews to come out and then it's kind of late. Right. The job is done. No one must rewrite that thing. Do you have any other pros and cons of print versus digital for the writer? Yes. It's, it's the higher royalties, number one. And, but both get your, get both get your book out into the world. Both offer the highlighting and note taking and a quick flip back and forth to mark pages and sharing between family members, except what digital all happens with a touch of a button, you know. So, and we've already talked about the other benefits. So let's see. Is there any benefits to the author to publish on Bella that you haven't talked about yet? Well, there are, you know, we have identifiers for a book. So let's say you're looking for a mystery or a thriller or suspense or something. Those are identifiers. And with Bella, you can change them almost daily. Let's say the trend is thrillers and your book has all of the elements of a thriller and a mystery and a suspense. So your first one is thriller and you can change that daily, you know, depending on what's going on. And I already said you can correct your novel as you go along. If you, if you're putting it on in episodes and, and that's how you're posting it to the system. And then the interaction with the reader. I mean, that's priceless to be able to put notes in as an author to the reader that, that says, you know, this building exists in France. And I visited it in 1997 and, you know, or I went into this tomb and this and this happened, you know, that's priceless for readers because they get that little bit of insight and authenticity to the book that authors put that authors give. So that's wonderful. For the beginning writer, Bella is extremely author friendly. Very, very author friendly. It's not scary at all. And it's not neighbor intensive as it is for traditional publishing. It is so simple. We can all do it. We really can all do it. If I can do it, anybody can do it. Well, what, what, what can you tell me about reader? What's your experience been in the benefits for you as a writer with Bella? I know that they right now are giving out bonuses to authors because it's a new program. And I know that will disappear eventually. So right now we're all earning a little bit more, maybe a little closer to a novel that that's in print. So what else have you seen? That's, that's been wonderful for the author or even the beginning author because, you know, you started with under the monkey pod tree. So in that sense, how did you navigate? What fears did Bella put aside for you as an author to put your book on Bella versus going right to Kindle or to print? Well, I first tried traditional publishers and you have to go through an agent and query multiple agents and wait multiple months for a response or not. And that's discouraging for the, the new author. It is the rumor that the saying is wallpaper your wall with the rejection letters and have a good laugh. Yeah, so I was really frightened about that because I've never done it before. And I also was worried about the permanence of like, what if I made a mistake and what if I said something that wasn't quite right or in, you know, something incorrect. And so I had a lot of fears, but with Bella, it's just you push a button and it's live. It's, it's on there and the formatting is done for you. It's just so incredibly simple that it just, it was really fun and it's exciting to watch your readership grow. And you have a little dashboard where you can see who, you know, how many people are reading each episode. And it's just very motivating to keep going, keep going. And so we need writers out there to not be afraid to publish. There's so many people I have talked to that say, Oh, I've always wanted to write a book or I have an idea for a book. And I think this is going to open up the floodgates of some amazing talent out there. What do you think? I agree with that. I would like to know though, Rita, what are some of the reader comments that you've been getting? I think you've had some interactions. You know, it's, they can't really comment on the device itself, but they can, you know, if you provide your email or Instagram, Facebook, that kind of thing, you can get a lot of comments from people. People are saying, where's the next book? You know, I've stayed up all night reading the book. Where's the second book of the monkey pot tree? It's just great to hit to hear how people, this one person said that she related so much to one of my characters and she said, that's just the way my daughter was acting. It just brings a lot of joy to a new author. Yeah, I had one reader say about where lilacs bloom. She says, I've always worried about this happening. You know, God coming to her and asking her to do something and then the devil getting involved and messing it all up for her. So, you know, it was quite fun to, it's fun to interact with readers, wouldn't you agree? Oh yeah. Yeah, it's another dimension. It's kind of that third dimension, you know, you read, you write, but then to interact between the reader and writer, it's something that I've never experienced before. It's really a kick. I agree. Outside of sitting at an author's table, right, where you're actually have the reader in front of you, which we've all done as well. Will you continue to write for Vella or will you eventually take your books off and put them into print? Well, if I can keep them on both platforms, I'm going to do that. If I can't, if it just goes to print, I'll just move them into print after a while. But once I start on my third novel, I plan on doing the same process. I think it's a great way to get started and to kind of try out your materials also. Yes. And do you have a title for your third novel? Is it a sequel to either under the Monkey Pod Tree or Paper Dolls? It's a sequel to under the Monkey Pod Tree. And I'm thinking it'll be under the Eucalyptus Tree. So we'll see. And then you need to do one under the Lay Tree. Maybe. A little Plumeria Tree. Or maybe Happy Bush. There you go. It's funny as authors. We always have other books going on, right? So we have one called Bird's Nipucca. And the other one is called Tentra Hooks that I'm working on. So that's quite, quite fun to be thinking ahead on all these things and planning what direction we're going to take our novels, right? Yes. What are you reading right now, Rita? Well, I'm reading your book where Lilax Bloom on Vela. And on my Kindle, I'm reading a fellow Hawaiian author, Toby Neal. I'm sure a lot of our viewers know Toby Neal. Yes, I'll be interviewing her on January the 18th. Oh, yeah. I'm reading her blood orchids book. How about you? What's on your bedside table? Well, of course I read your Monkey Pod Tree book and I'm going through paper DOS now, but I'm also reading Amor Tolls, The Lincoln Highway. And then I also have The Liars Dictionary by Ellie Williams. And then I'll be interviewing Alan Brennert in February, so I'm reading Daughters of Malakai. So that's all, all good reading right now. Rita, thank you for joining me today. It's, it's in our discussion of books, books, books and Amazon's newest reader experience in Vela. It's been my pleasure. I hope it's been your pleasure. We give thanks to Think Tech Hawaii, because in general, for the technicians, the staff, the production crew, and in particular the executive producer, Jay Fadal. We also, gracefully thank our viewers and all of you who've donated funds or provided financial grants in keeping Think Tech Hawaii streaming for over 20 years with the promise of going forward. So thank you very much for that. We simply can't do it without you. In closing, Rita and I wish you excellent reading. Watch me to show January the 4th on your books, books, books. And mine on January 18th with Toby Neal. Thank you. Mahalo and good.