IT'S OCTOBER -- TIME FOR A GHOST MAN MAKEOVER!

It's October, which means that Hallowe'en is right around the corner. Time for tricks, treats and scary stories.

With that in mind, we've given The Ghost Man, my first novel, a little face lift in the spirit of the season.

As you can see, we've changed the cover to a new image, courtesy of LoweStock/Thinkstock. The revamped design brings the look and feel of the novel somewhat more in line with my other publications.

The story itself remains entirely unchanged, with only front and back matter adjusted to reflect the new image credit and an updated list of my other novels. (The paperback edition will migrate to the new cover in the near future.)

It's still scary, still thrilling, and still a real good Hallowe'en read!

The Ghost Man is available for Amazon Kindle HERE.
Also available from Kobo, Barnes and Noble for Nook, and iTunes.

GOODREADS GIVEAWAY FOR PERSISTENT GUILT

For the next month, PERSISTENT GUILT, the third March and Walker Crime Novel, is being featured as a special giveaway through Goodreads, the world's largest online site for readers and book recommendations.

An unbelievable 100 Kindle copies of the novel are available to residents of the USA who follow the link below to enter the giveaway.

Don't miss your chance to read outstanding Canadian crime fiction for free! And remember, if you're one of the lucky recipients and you enjoy reading PERSISTENT GUILT, please leave a review to encourage others to try the March and Walker series as well.

Best of luck to everyone who enters!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Persistent Guilt

by Michael J. McCann

Giveaway ends September 19, 2018.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

LAUNCH DAY FOR PERSISTENT GUILT!

On behalf of the Plaid Raccoon Press I'm very pleased to announce that PERSISTENT GUILT, the third March and Walker Crime Novel, is now available for purchase.

As Detective Constable Kevin Walker and the Leeds County Crime Unit investigate the murder of a young woman whose body was found on the picturesque Thousand Islands Parkway, Detective Inspector Ellie March takes up the investigation of the mayor of a nearby city who's accused of criminal wrongdoing. When the cases threaten to intersect, March and Walker must decide which path will ultimately lead them to the truth.

PERSISTENT GUILT follows the Ontario Provincial Police homicide investigators first featured in SORROW LAKE, a finalist for the 2015 Hammett Prize for best crime novel in North America, and BURN COUNTRY, the second novel in the series.

PERSISTENT GUILT may be ordered in paperback through your local independent bookstore from the worldwide Ingram Book catalog. We encourage you to support your local bookstore.

It may also be ordered in paperback online from Amazon:

US: https://www.amazon.com/Persistent-Guilt-March-Walker-Crime/dp/1927884136/
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Persistent-Guilt-March-Walker-Crime/dp/1927884136/
Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/Persistent-Guilt-March-Walker-Crime/dp/1927884136/

In eBook format, it's available from:

Amazon for Kindle:   https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07G8L623Z/
or from Kobo for ePub devices*: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/persistent-guilt

Please remember, if you enjoy PERSISTENT GUILT, leave a review where you bought the novel so that other readers may be encouraged to give it a try as well. Thanks for your support!


Here's a helpful post on buying ePub books for your Apple device, including the iPad, iPhone, etc.: https://www.kobo.com/help/en-US/article/1962/buying-kobo-ebooks-and-magazines-on-your-apple-device?products=apple. Note that ePub book files may also be read on the Nook, the Sony reader, and Android devices.

PERSISTENT GUILT NOW IN PRODUCTION

I'm very pleased to be able to announce that PERSISTENT GUILT, the third installment in the March and Walker Crime Novel series, is now in production. The scheduled release date is August 3, 2018.

PERSISTENT GUILT is a police procedural featuring homicide investigators of the Ontario Provincial Police. The series is set in Leeds County, Ontario, which is located on the St. Lawrence Seaway corridor between Toronto and Montreal.

On a cold morning in late April, a man and his dog discover the nude body of a young woman in the ditch alongside the picturesque Thousand Islands Parkway in Leeds County. The woman was stabbed repeatedly before being dumped.

Detective Constable Kevin Walker of the Ontario Provincial Police discovers that the victim worked for a high school acquaintance of his. Kyle Baldwin now runs a charity that raises funds for mobile medical clinics in Kenya, but he had a brief affair with the victim several years ago that ended badly.

At the same time, Detective Inspector Ellie March is investigating the mayor of the nearby city of Brockville for alleged criminal wrongdoing. With two cases to manage, she and Kevin Walker must determine if the mayor is somehow connected to a wider circle of crime or if Kevin's acquaintance murdered his ex-lover in a fit of jealous rage.

Write it down in your notebook, folks. Ellie March and Kevin Walker are back!

THE DONAGHUE AND STAINER BOX SET

Many readers know my work through the March and Walker Crime Novel series, thanks in part to SORROW LAKE and its nomination for the 2015 Hammett Prize, and the second novel in the series, BURN COUNTRY.

Some of you may not have had a chance to read the police procedural series that preceded March and Walker. With that in mind, I'm offering THE DONAGHUE AND STAINER BOX SET this weekend at a ridiculously special price of only 99 cents.

The Donaghue and Stainer series, set in Maryland and Virginia, includes four novels to date: BLOOD PASSAGE, MARCIE'S MURDER, THE FREGOLI DELUSION, and THE RAINY DAY KILLER. The fourth in the series, RDK, was a semi-finalist for the 2014 Arthur Ellis Award for best crime novel in Canada.

Want to see where it all began? You can find the box set in eBook format for your Amazon Kindle here: https://www.amazon.com/Donaghue-Stainer-Four-Novel-Crime-Novel-ebook/dp/B00V0WCPGO/

If your e-reader uses ePub files (iPad, iPhone, Kobo, Sony, Nook etc.) you can purchase the box set from Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/donaghue-and-stainer

Homicide Lieutenant Hank Donaghue and Detective Karen Stainer are special characters I know you'll enjoy. At this price, you can't go wrong if you love crime fiction!

DOING THE DELTA MAPLE SYRUP FESTIVAL

This weekend Lynn and I signed books at the Delta Maple Syrup Festival, an event we've never appeared at before. It was a fun two-day celebration of a delicious Canadian product, and I can still smell the aroma of pancakes and sausages on the griddle.

Delta is a small village on County Road 42 in Leeds County, part of the municipality of Rideau Lakes, Ontario. It's close to Lyndhurst, where I've signed books at the annual Turkey Fair for the past several Septembers. Once you've done a few events in an area, people become more familiar with your face and your wares. They nod as they pass the table, but don't stop.

On Saturday, one very nice woman did stop, and when I asked if she liked mysteries, she told me she'd read all of mine. When would the next one be coming out?

This is always a welcome question, because it's reassuring to know that people like your stuff and look forward to more.

But she went on to astonish me by saying that she and a friend had gone on a "Sorrow Lake" day trip last fall. Using the novel (and Burn Country as well, I think) as a travelogue guide map, they drove around Front of Yonge Township and the surrounding area finding all the places I'd mentioned. Ballycanoe Road, Athens, the Wiltsetown Road, Delta. Only the lake baffled them. They'd ruled out Charleston Lake, and when I told her that location-wise it was based on Graham Lake, she nodded knowingly.

"We thought it might be," she said.

Dear reader, you might not realize how important this kind of thing is to an author's self-confidence, but let me assure you, this was much-needed encouragement for me. That this person and her friend thought enough of my stories to jump in the car and head off to find the places where the action took place, really meant a lot.

Thanks so much, ma'am. And get ready for a tour along the Thousand Islands Parkway sometime this fall!

FLIPPING THE SWITCH ON INSTAGRAM

Some time ago I created an Instagram account to explore its possibilities but never actually got around to using it. A few days ago, I decided it was time to flip the switch on this powerful social medium and see what I could do with it.

Instagram currently has more than 800 million users, with more than 500 million using it every day.* While Facebook still has over a billion daily users, despite its troubles, Instagram is obviously a medium on the rise.

How do Instagram's users profile out, compared to the guy pictured above? Last year, 59% were 18 to 29 years old. (Snapchat's key demographic, on the other hand, falls into the 12- to 17-year-old range.)** As well, a majority of Instagram users are female.

Admittedly, my primary interest in using Instagram is to promote my books. Given these numbers, it seems like it might not be a perfect fit. Females under the age of 29 tend not to be avid readers of crime fiction.

However, we must remember that Instagram's growing like a weed, particularly among older users (ahem), and that females in general are consistently the largest audience for crime fiction. So, the numbers need not daunt.

Here's the thing, though. Instagram is an image- and video-driven medium. No long posts (like this one), for example. How to draw attention to my work, then, in a visually creative way?

Instagram strikes me as an effective medium to promote the author, above and beyond the books. As I add to my posts, expect to see photos and short videos related to the office in which I write, the little island on the Rideau Canal where it's situated, shots of me reading the latest book slated for review in the New York Journal of Books, and pics that relate to what I'm currently writing about in the March and Walker Crime Novel series.

Stuff that will give you a daily glimpse of the author at work, his highs and lows, and the world in which he diligently travails, perfecting his craft (!).

If this sounds even vaguely interesting, follow me on Instagram at michaelj.mccann2149 and let me know what you think!


*Source: Instagram
** Source: Smart Insights