Alva’s on a Role; Drum Machine Due; McNally Interview Soon

Last Friday Alva gave Chelsea and me another heads up. She says spring is in the air and she is feeling more hopeful–especially since Congress extended long-term unemployment benefits and provided a 2 percent per paycheck tax cut for 160 million workers. She says that’s about a $1,000 savings per worker per year. Except just as Chelsea and I were catching the spirit, at the height of her enthusiasm Alva blurted out something about better weather being a real plus for the Occupy movement.

So I guess if we are not likely to get much out of Alva the Indie here in the office over the next month or two, so we might as well get what we can now–before she packs her backpack and fades silently out into the 99%!

As for Chelsea and the love of her life are off to Walt Disney World for the week–promising to bring back pictures for possible use on a book that should be out sometime later this year but currently in its final rewrite/editing stage. Nonetheless she has said she will distribute the ALVA Press Newsletter remotely from WDW. Meantime, however, who knows what Alva will be doing? Luckily her PR work hours remain flexible and I keep her on because she is simply great with people!

As for me, I’m on pins and needles waiting for the release of Kristen Henderson’s long awaited book of poetry, Drum Machine, at http://alvapressinc.com. We think it will be ready next week–as soon as Kristen and I have a chance to peruse it and approve it in final form–in both ePub (Nook) and ePDF (Kindle). However if you’re one among us who still prefers the feel of paper and the chance for an author-autographed copy, ALVA is also planning the release of Drum Machine in book form, probably paperback, in the near future.

Norothian Cycle Author Michael Edward McNally

Meantime, do watch for my interview with Michael Edward McNally, the in demand author of the Norothian Cycle and Eddie’s Shorts at

The Sable City by M. Edward McNally http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004PLNNLS http://sablecity.wordpress.com/

Roberta in Po-Town, Cookin’

Jolt: a rural noir Midwest Book Review’s Mystery/Suspense Shelf

         Roberta M Roy is the internationally recognized award winning author of
Jolt: a rural noir,the passionate love story of Natalie and Thaw as they struggle
for survival in a tiny mountainside village in an imaginary part of the Northern
USA overrun by forced emigrants fleeing terrorism and a nuclear meltdown, year 2020.

Roy blogs at:   http://alvapressinc.com,    http://alvapressinc.com/robertamroy,  and
http://alvapressinc.com/robertamroyonnuclearsurvival.

Roy is the recipient of a 2011 Jenkins Living Now Award for Inspirational Fiction.

Alva Celebrates Distributors and Roy-McNally Interview

Alva the Indie celebrated the regularization of the weekly distribution of 2000 copies of the ALVA newsletter by email by charting how many Opens there were for each media type. Turned out that old friends and magazines were 5% ahead of Radio, TV, Broadcast, and Print. Alva decided that was because magazines are more interested in the little press (little guy) human interest side of the news. Yeah, I suppose Alva’s guess is as good as mine and she was unwilling to accept my suggestion that the difference may have been due to probability and chance.

But I am so glad Alva is back! (at least for the winter).

Last week Alva brought in a great big sheet cake she had made and decorated with B&N, Apple, Sony, Kobol, Borders, and Diesel to celebrate Alva Press’ agreement to facilitate the distribution of its eBooks on more than seventy wholesaler distribution sites. She called it our ‘Go Get’em Now’ party.

BTW: Alva thinks Chelsea’s reliability and skill in getting out the newsletter is simply awesome! As for Alva, she’d rather deliver newspapers door to door than do, as she calls it, all that computer stuff.

Do you ever wonder why ALVA keeps Alva employed here? Well, I’ll tell you why. First of all, when Alva is here she is wonderful with the phone–any opportunity to talk is a plus for her. And not to forget how (as long as we can keep her on the premises) we are assured of at least one sheet cake a week–if not to raise our consciences for a cause, then to fete our own advancements and successes like when earlier in the month Alva arrived with black masks we had to don for the party and a cake that read, “The Lone Ranger Rides Again.”

It seems Alva found out that back in November 2011 the MidWest Book Review Small Press Bookshelf had given Jolt: a rural noir a rave review on its Mystery and Suspense Shelf. Called it a ‘page-turning thriller.’ And Alva just wanted to be sure that everybody knew that despite the image of the conflagration on Jolt’s cover, Roberta really was one of the good guys! http://www.midwestbookreview.com/sbw/nov_11.htm#Mystery/Suspense

And then when Michael Edward McNally provided Roberta M Roy with that really great interview the cake read “We Love MEdMcNally!” http://sablecity.com/2012/01/31/tag-line-tuesday-with-roberta-m-roy

So I hate to think of the noise level of the place when Alva arrives prepared to celebrate Kristen Henderson‘s book, Drum Machine, to be released as an eBook, possibly by the end of February. Do check back on that and if you have not done so already, sign up for the newsletter which will for the first 30 days will offer a 10% discount on copies of the eBook of Drum Machine ordered through the ALVA Press, Inc., website.

Roberta in Po-Town, Lookin’ up!