So I have fairly large news for today: I am officially an Amazon Connect author. Amazon Connect is a really cool program designed to put authors in direct touch with their readers. I can post news and information on a blog on Amazon.com. Readers can become my friend on Amazon. It’s very much like MySpace, except in Amazon’s case, the majority of users are, in fact, literate.

I will be using Amazon Connect to update readers on news regarding Being Good, my novel that I published in late 2004, as well as Barry’s Cherries, my new novel which I am editing and preparing for release this year.

Amazon has some pretty strict guidelines for what constitues a good post and a bad post. The one I most fear is this one listed under What Doesn’t Work: “Boring content.” Shit. Also frowned upon is “Profane or offensive language.”

I’ll tell you the best part is that in the directory of authors, I’m the first listed thanks to my nom de plume. That whole indexing benefit never occurred to me when I chose to publish under that name–it was simply the nickname I gave myself to distinguish me from my bandmate Todd K when I was in the Carter Administration. Sometime over Christmas, I was in a bookstore and I realized that whenever my novels appear in bricks and mortar bookstores, they’ll be easy to find.

Anyway, you can click on my name in the author directory and find my profile which is just so fascinating. If you’re feeling bold, you may want to check out a Listmania list I created to show some of the high and low brow culture that appears in Being Good. And if you’ve got an Amazon profile, add me as a friend.

If you’re curious about Being Good, you can read an excerpt here.

And of course, if you’ve read Being Good, I’d really appreciate a review on Amazon.