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AR Horvath's Birth Pangs Spero book 2 tolkien potter lewis AR Horvath's Fidelis Book 1 One of Birth Pangs Series Role Playing Game RPG Stage of Game After the Desolations

Read an Excerpt of Spero

"Spero is an imaginative fantasy that subtly instructs, entertains, and intellectually provokes the reader. It is fascinating reading. I'm definitely hooked on this series." Jean Heimann at Catholic Fire.

"...intelligent as well as inspiring..." Terry Barga at whattodoabout.com.

Please visit www.birthpangs.com/cart to buy Spero

(and Fidelis) from the author or to buy from Amazon.com

Fidelis, my first book, is Latin for faithfulness. The second book, Spero, is Latin for hope. Spero is an exploration of what hope is and why we need it. It is an exploration of what things are good to put our hope in and what things are bad to put our hope in. In the fictionalized America of the future portrayed in the Birth Pangs series, all of the things that people have traditionally put their hope in have been brought low. There are no government agencies, no schools, and not even churches. In the face of daily perils, people have to figure out how where they are going to place their hope.

It is interesting to me that the political candidate running on 'hope' is also running on 'change.' I think this illustrates the root of the problem. The best place to put your 'hope' is where it won't shift beneath your feet. Also, we need to be clear about what things we hope to overcome. Nearly all of our systems and institutions are geared to address certain day to day realities that are important but not, I'm afraid, ultimate. There is one problem that surpasses them all: death.

Spero is about people- even good people- putting their hope in lesser means to tackle lesser problems and being confronted with the consequences of that approach. Spero is about being confronted with our chief problem and challenged to consider what possible solutions there might be to that problem... and whether any of these are within our control, or obtainable by our own effort.

How should I buy- Amazon, BN, direct? What best helps you?

July 17, 2007 in General | No comments

Updated: Amazon.com no longer gives a significant discount. 

I have been asked this question by a number of people. The question is- what puts the most money into my hands, or what in general helps the cause of Birth Pangs the most. It is an interesting question. There is something to be said about having my book’s rank on Amazon.com be higher, but when they’re selling it for only $10 you can guess that my cut is not so much. And just because BN charges more for the book, don’t think my cut is any higher- it isn’t. It’s exactly the same. Naturally, if you buy it from me for full price, from a purely financial point of view, I get a larger cut.

Let’s keep in mind that if you buy from me direct, your copy is signed, whereas obviously the major distributors can’t do that.

Having heard this so often now and having spent a little time thinking about it, if you want to try to help out in both ways- Amazon’s ’status’ measure and my bottom line, you can buy from Amazon and send me a paypal payment to make up the difference. So, if you buy the book from Amazon for $10.50, simply subtract $10.50 from $15.95 and send me a paypal payment for $5.45. Now my rank goes up on Amazon, but I’m not shorted on the profit.

Now, I completely understand you may just want to grab the book cheap and check it out. That’s just fine by me. I’m not trying to guilt anyone here. I’m just responding to a question that keeps coming up. And of course, if you want to send more then the difference, I won’t stop you. :) I have plenty other expenses, like marketing and advertising and web hosting expenses.

Just a note- if you buy more than one copy via Amazon, it won’t increase the ranking. It increases on a ‘per order’ basis. So, just keep in mind that buying 10 copies on Amazon won’t help in that regards more than buying 1.

Without further ado, here is the Paypal donation form: