An Apology – 3 Hours of Unavailable Details

Sorry. So very sorry. This is why you don’t write code early in the morning without a good night’s rest.

From 8am MDT till 11am MDT on April 6, 2010, book details pages were unavailable, generating an error message instead. Early this morning, I was fixing a bug to allow for a book I saw come into NovelRank that was only available on Amazon.co.jp. It was something I had never expected would occur, and thus there were a few tweaks that needed to be made so that: a) the book could be added, b) the book detail page could be viewed.

In the process, I didn’t check to ensure I didn’t make any mistakes… or rather, check everywhere, namely the book details page. The bug was fixed because NovelRank user’s sent me an email that I unfortunately did not see till lunchtime at my full time job, so I was unable to correct it till then.

Once again, I’m very sorry, as this affects the reputation of myself and of NovelRank. Thanks for understanding.

Sincerely,
Mario Lurig
Creator, NovelRank.com

Book Giveaway April 2010 – Haynes Saxophone Manual & The Sister Pact

The response has been overwhelming, so the giveaways are being stepped up! Two books per month, and you can enter to win either or both books! A big thank you to all the authors who have shared their labors of love and the publishers who have shared their collections. This month’s books: “The Sister Pact” and “Haynes Saxophone Manual“.

Haynes Saxophone Manual

It’s not a work of fiction, but an amazing resource for current and budding musicians. The “Haynes Saxophone Manual” by UK sax expert Stephen Howard is the first giveaway book for April 2010. Read about all that is offered by, “The owners manual for the saxophone”:

The Haynes Saxophone Manual is the first ever handbook devoted solely to care and maintenance of the saxophone and sets a new standard in its content, approach and presentation. It covers a wide range of subjects including choosing and buying an instrument, basic care, cleaning and lubrication, checking for leaks and wear – and goes on to explain how the instrument works and how it can be regulated, adjusted and tweaked for performance without having to buy expensive specialist tools. Advanced chapters include replacing pads and springs.

If you would like your chance of winning this book, add your email address to the form below. You’ll be notified by email if you are the winner, and you will also be opting into a follow-up email to let you know when the next book in the giveaway becomes available.

This giveaway is closed. Check out the current giveaway.

Share the Book Giveaway with Others:
Share or or http://www.novelrank.com/book-giveaway (will always be current)

The Sister Pact

Cami Checketts has also been a fan of NovelRank since the beginning, and her thrilling fictional novel “The Sister Pact” is the second giveaway for April 2010. Grab some Cold Stone Creamery ice cream and curl up with this action packed story:

“Author Cami Checketts knows how to put her characters in danger – and how to get them out of it. It’s the journey from one to the other that hooks the reader… The bond of sisterhood is of course a major theme in this book.”
– Janet K. Jensen

This giveaway is closed. Check out the current giveaway.

Share the Book Giveaway with Others:
Share or or http://www.novelrank.com/book-giveaway (will always be current)

The Rules
Any email address that is not valid will not be accepted. Any email to a temporary mailbox service (e.g. mailinator.com) will be disqualified and may be publicly mocked. Unless otherwise stated, only one book can be won by any single email address. Multiple entries for a single book will not be accepted (you can enter to win each book if different books are offered in a given month). The winner will be randomly drawn no later than the 3rd of the following month and contacted via email to receive shipping information. Winners who fail to respond to the email within 72 hours will forfeit their win to another random winner.

For Authors: Getting Involved
For more information about donating your book to the book giveaway, check out this introductory announcement post on the book giveaway idea.

User Accounts – Multiple Books on Personal User Page

NovelRank announces the results of 30 hours of development time: User Pages. What are User Pages you ask? They are pages that are created by you, allowing you to track multiple books on a single personal user page you define. This User Page can be accessed, like the rest of NovelRank, by anyone with the link to the page. However, unlike dedicated book details pages, NovelRank will not share the user pages with search engines. You are welcome to share them on your website or to your fans, but NovelRank will not have a ‘list’ available.

The best part of the new feature is that you do not need to make an account with NovelRank. You can actually create your account by logging in through Facebook, Twitter, OpenID, Yahoo!, Windows Live ID, or Google. This is all powered by the technology of RPXnow, which I have integrated into NovelRank. Here are the three easy steps:

Login through your favorite service

Create your account in less than 60 seconds and continue to your User Admininstration page

Add any books you already have added for Amazon Sales Rank tracking by searching for them. Once all the books are added, you can List Books or go right to your User Page

Feel free to bookmark/favorite your user page and from there you can view some vital information or access each book’s detail page directly. The page includes:

Book Title
Book Author(s)
Status (if inactive)
Format (Paperback, Kindle Edition, etc.)
Sales Estimates for current and previous month
Sales Rank and Average Sales Rank

Furthermore, while you can choose your default domain, you can switch domains easily and temporarily on the User Pages, displaying only books you are tracking that are available on that Amazon domain.

What are you waiting for? Create your account now and enjoy the benefits!

Best Content for February 2010 – Voted by DreamHost Members

February 12, 2010. I’m proud to announce that Dreamhost members have voted NovelRank as the best website CONTENT for the month of February, 2010 with a rating of 7.75. From their February newsletter:

5. DHSOTMs
That is not a typo. That lower-case S is intentional! The February
2010 DreamHost Site Of The Month contest has FOUR winners, one each from four different categories! As judged by our customers, these are they:

#1 site for CONTENT with a score of 7.75:
“NovelRank – Amazon Sales Rank Tracking for Books”
http://www.novelrank.com/

#1 site for DESIGN with a score of 8.0:
“SOS Profissões – Helping young people to define their future”
(en Español)
http://www.blog.sosprofissoes.com/

#1 site for STRUCTURE with a score of 8.0:
“Sproutie.com – Realtime search across twitter, blogs, news, pictures
and videos”
http://www.sproutie.com/

#1 site for ORIGINALITY with a score of 8.5:
“A programmer that isn’t serious about Career”
http://www.mrjansen.com/

Dreamhost Promo Code and Discount

Dreamhost is the web-hosting service that hosts NovelRank, and I strongly recommend their services. If you are looking for hosting, whether for small projects or larger communities like NovelRank who require a Virtual Private Server (including Virtual Private MySQL Server), I would recommend them. Consider using one of the following Dreamhost promo codes to save $50, such as FOOL50 (that is the capital word ‘FOOL’ and the number ’50’).

Thanks to the thousands of Dreamhost customers who have taken a look at NovelRank, and for those of you who are new, make sure you get in on the completely free Book Giveaway!