My favorite books of 2014

I tried to read as many of the 2014 must-read books I could… but of course I couldn’t get to them all. It was a busy year for me. Writing one big book, editing three others, plus a little thing called Life. I read the books I could and the ones I missed will have to wait for next year… or the year after… or the year after that. You know how it goes. Anyway, here are my Top 10 favorites released in 2014.

1) The Martian by Andy Weir – My number one favorite book of the year. The story of an astronaut left behind on Mars sounds like a grim thriller but it’s actually hilarious thanks to Weir’s humor and a wonderful main character. I loved this book and would recommend it to basically everyone. I’ll be reading this one again someday. Read my full review at Goodreads.

2) All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr – Historical fiction isn’t usually my thing, but I was drawn in by all the reviews. And hey, the critics got it right with this one. It’s not wrong to call this a coming-of-age story set during WWII, but leaving it at that really doesn’t do the book any justice. This is a wonderful novel. Beautiful prose, strong characters, and a compelling plot – this book has it all. It’s also… don’t tell anybody this… the only book on this list that managed to make me cry. Just a little, you understand. Not a lot. Not very much at all! But yes, there were tears, it’s true. Read my full review at Goodreads.

3) Bird Box by Josh Malerman – Tense thriller that plays with horror ideas in an interesting way. Basically, the world’s come to an end thanks to the arrival of these creatures. What do they look like? Nobody’s sure. If you see one of them you go insane and promptly kill yourself. Now, this book is going to bother some people who want (need?) to know what monsters lurk in the shadows. Because of the very nature of the creatures you are largely denied any hard information on what exactly is going on beyond the blindfold. Personally, I really liked this approach. I’ve always been more scared by the horror that’s just out of sight and Bird Box tapped into that fear extraordinarily well. Read my full review at Goodreads.

4) The Troop by Nick Cutter – Holy shit this was disgusting and awful and awesome and holy shit oh my GOD it’s just so fucking YEUUWHY… Hmm. Yes. That describes my feelings for this book quite well, actually. The Troop is a good, tough horror story. Unputdownable. I doubt I will ever read The Troop again—it’s just so nasty—but I can’t wait for Nick Cutter’s The Deep in 2015 and whatever else he’s cooking up for the future. Read my full review at Goodreads.

5) Othella by Therin Knite –Despite being an ‘indie author’ I really don’t read as much self-published fiction as I should. Sorry, guys. Still, from the 2014 indie fiction I have read, I think Therin Knite’s sci-fi novel Othella was the best of the best – and, if you want to make a thing out of it, yeah it was a whole lot better than most the traditionally published books I read this year. It’s a sci-fi thriller about a world on the brink, a technological society of geniuses who are tasked with bringing civilization back from the edge, and the dark secrets that threaten to bring it all down. It’s just really cool. I look forward to the sequel. Read my full review at Goodreads.

6) The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey – The book’s description doesn't want you to know what the book is really about. I’m gonna SPOIL it for you... It’s about zombies. Yeah, I know. I’m tired of them, too. They’re everywhere and I fail to understand why. But I gotta give it up for an author who manages to do something fresh and new with the tired genre. The Girl with All the Gifts is both horrific and sweet, featuring my favorite zombie girl in all of book & film. The book made this bored “fan” of the genre very happy. Read my full review at Goodreads.

7) The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell – A book that I found I admired more than I actually enjoyed. But still, the book succeeded in taking me deep into its epic story. I don’t agree with all of its choices – particularly leaving most of the world building for page 500 – but there’s a lot to like about the book. It’s hugely ambitious, and among other things it presents us with perhaps the most believable and depressing vision of the near future I’ve ever read. Read my full review at Goodreads.

8) Landline by Rainbow Rowell – This isn’t my typical kind of book. It’s a dialogue driven bittersweet romantic comedy with a Magic Fucking Phone that talks to the past. Yep. Landline was so far from being on my radar that I hadn’t heard of it until Goodreads voters named it one of their favorite books of the year. I also confess I don’t really know who Rainbow Rowell is (I had heard of her book Fangirl, though). So yeah, I am pretty far from the intended audience for this book. But I wanted to give it a go based on all the craze praise… and it’s really, really good. Rowell writes fantastic dialogue. Landline made me laugh out loud, which is rare. She’s a great writer. I do think the book overstayed its welcome just a bit. The concept started to tire sometime before the end. But still, it’s a book well deserving of praise. And hey, sometimes it’s cool to read something outside of your typical genre/comfort zone. I’m glad I gave Landline a try. Read my full review at Goodreads.

9) Revival by Stephen King – Despite the hype that this is ‘vintage King’, I really don’t see Revival as a horror novel. It’s a dark saga of two men intertwined by tragedy and curiosity. Their curiosity brings them face-to-face with some horrific stuff along the way, but should the novel be considered horror? Ehh, I don’t know. So, I kind of went into Revival with certain expectations. Once I got past the fact that the book wasn’t what I expected I began to enjoy it a lot more. King’s fantastic writing makes it one of my favorite books of the year. ALSO: I quite liked King’s Mr. Mercedes. Read my full review at Goodreads.

10) Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami – I’m relatively new to Murakami’s work, but I think I’m getting a pretty good idea of what to expect from his books. When I first read Colorless Tsukuru I was rather disappointed (as shown in my review). I thought the book started off brilliantly but slowly became repetitive before coming to a completely anticlimactic ending. But in the months since reading it, I’ve found that my feelings towards the book have softened. More than that, I’m surprised by how much the book has stuck with me. I think on Colorless Tsukuru more than I think of many other books I read this year. Read my full review at Goodreads.

One of my other favorite reads of the year was Joe Hill's Locke & Key comic book series. I feel pretty good calling Locke & Key one of the greatest comics of all time.

The 2014 books I’m most disappointed I missed (and most looking forward to catching up with) are Pierce Brown’s Red Rising, Jesse Ball’s Silence Once Begun, Hugh Howey’s Sand, Stuart Keane’s All or Nothing, James Ellroy’s Perfidia, Jeff VanderMeer’s Annihilation, and Ksenia Anske’s Rosehead. Of course those books must compete with the classics that I gotta read and the new 2015 books that are coming out. I can’t wait to read Nick Cutter’s The Deep and Joe Hill’s The Fireman.

How about you? What are some of your favorite books from 2014?

What are some of the books you’re most looking forward to in 2015?

Death's Good Intentions FREE for Kindle today only!

Today only you can download my book Death’s Good Intentions FREE for Kindle. CLICK HERE.

Tomorrow it goes back to its already low price of $2.99. I don't know if it'll ever be available for free again, so if you've been waiting to download cheaper than cheap, then here's your chance!

Thank you to all those who download the book today, tomorrow, a year from now, etc! I hope you enjoy.

The Man with the Devil's Tongue is now FREE for Kindle

The Man with the Devil’s Tongue is now FREE for Kindle at: http://www.amazon.com/Devils-Tongue-World-Other-Things-ebook/dp/B00MFBVLR8/ref=pd_sim_sbs_kstore_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=18361KMBDHFCAHHZSRXK

Thanks to all those who helped with the price matching. I appreciate it!

As of right now, the Kindle ebook is free only at Amazon.com and not Amazon.co.uk and other branches of the site. If you want, you can try the price matching tool on Amazon.co.uk and tell them about Amazon.com’s price. That should speed up the process of making it free across the pond.

Death's Good Intentions & Kindle Unlimited

I have decided to give Kindle Unlimited a try for my latest book. If you’re a subscriber, you can now read Death’s Good Intentions for free on your Kindle device.

Why this is cool: Kindle Unlimited is sort of like a Netflix service for ebooks. If you’re a subscriber, you can read as many books as you want, and now Death’s Good Intentions is part of the catalog. I’ll also have some promotional tools at my control, like the Countdown deals, which I’ll put to use later.

Why it’s admittedly not so cool: For an indie author to have their ebook eligible for Kindle Unlimited, it means the ebook must be taken down from other sites. This means that Death’s Good Intentions is no longer available for Nook, iBooks, Kobo, or Smashwords. That sucks. I wish it were another way, but it ain’t.

So why did I decide to make my book an Amazon exclusive? Well, I wanted the goods they were offering… and to be perfectly honest, sales have always been pretty poor on the other sites. For the moment, it doesn’t feel like such a bad trade. However, I don’t expect Death’s Good Intentions to be an Amazon exclusive forever. If and when things change, I’ll let you know.

For now, allow me to direct you to the book’s Kindle listing. Amazon US & Amazon UK.

And don’t forget the book is also available in paperback.

Help make The Man with the Devil's Tongue FREE on Amazon

Hello everybody! I was wondering if I could ask you for a moment of your time…

My novella The Man with the Devil’s Tongue is free everywhere except for Amazon. I want to change that. Amazon does not give authors a FREE option when choosing their book’s price. The only way to get Amazon to make a book permanently free is to ask Amazon to price match another site. The more people who submit the cheaper prices found elsewhere, the quicker Amazon will price match.

This is what must be done!

1—If you’re an Amazon user, please sign in.

2— Copy any or all of these links of the ebook from other sites like Barnes & Noble, iTunes, and Kobo:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-man-with-the-devils-tongue-kyle-warner/1120076951?ean=2940046095951&itm=1&usri=the+man+with+the+devil%27s+tongue

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/man-devils-tongue-end-world/id908400140?mt=11

http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/the-man-with-the-devil-s-tongue-the-end-of-the-world-and-some-other-things

3— Go to the Amazon listing for The Man with the Devil’s Tongue: http://www.amazon.com/Devils-Tongue-World-Other-Things-ebook/dp/B00MFBVLR8/ref=la_B00FSZON2I_1_4_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411852601&sr=1-4

4—On Amazon’s page for The Man with the Devil’s Tongue, scroll down to the link that says ‘tell us about a lower price?’ (It’s right above the customer reviews) Click that link, select Website, and then paste in the Barnes & Noble link and mark the price and shipping as 0.00. You can complete this process over again with the iTunes and Kobo links if you like. The more competitive prices presented to Amazon, the faster they should respond.

Thanks to all those who help out! Your assistance is much appreciated.

New website design

New website. Same url.

http://www.kyle-warner.com/

Personally, I was never pleased with my old website. The new site design is very much a work in progress, but I like it more already.

I am also able to have a blog on my new site. Depending on how I like it, I may close up shop here on Blogger and post exclusively at the new blog. We shall see! I'll let ya know.

Anyway, check out the new digs and let me know what you think!

DEATH'S GOOD INTENTIONS now available

Release day! My new book DEATH’S GOOD INTENTIONS is now available for sale. 

 You can find the ebook for $2.99 at Amazon.com and £1.85 at Amazon.co.uk.

Death’s Good Intentions is Book 1 of the dark, urban fantasy series The End of the World and Some Other Things. The series is about the man chosen to become Death, the Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse. Death rejects his role in the coming Apocalypse, making himself an enemy of both Heaven and Hell. While he hunts down his Four Horsemen brethren, Death is unaware that he is also being hunted. A secret order called the Gatekeepers believes Death must be destroyed. However, the woman leading the hunt is conflicted, believing that Death could become a formidable ally...

Amazon US: http://www.amazon.com/Deaths-Intentions-World-Other-Things-ebook/dp/B00N47LH08/ref=la_B00FSZON2I_1_4_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1410294217&sr=1-4

Amazon UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Deaths-Intentions-World-Other-Things-ebook/dp/B00N47LH08/ref=la_B00FSZON2I_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1410294235&sr=1-4

Thanks for your time! I hope you enjoy!

-- Kyle

P.S. -- I expect the paperback to be available before the day is done. Also coming soon, ebooks for iTunes, Kobo, Nook, and Smashwords. Stay tuned!