Author: Joe Flood

Joe Flood is a writer, photographer and web person from Washington, DC. The author of several novels, Joe won the City Paper Fiction Competition in 2020. In his free time, he enjoys wandering about the city taking photos.

Cheating at Golf Published in Story Bleed Magazine

The Great Recession has changed the lives of millions. Jobs have been lost, people have been kicked out of their homes, retirement nest eggs have disappeared. Worse than the economic damage, however, has been the loss of hope in the future. Optimism has been replaced by worry and fear.

Which is what my short story, Cheating at Golf, is all about. Published in Story Bleed Magazine, an online literary journal, this is a dark tale set in sunny Florida. In it, an escape to a golf course brings no relief to a man’s troubles.

 

New Article: How Do You Measure PR?

The Public Relations Society of America defines public relations thusly:

“Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other.”

Which is just an awful definition, reeking of the stale conference room and whiteboards crowded with b-school jargon. Merriam-Webster has a slightly better explanation:

the business of inducing the public to have understanding for and goodwill toward a person, firm, or institution

PR is about getting the word out about your product, cause or service. I’d consider myself a semi-professional PR practitioner, busy trying to “induce” the public to do something increasingly unknown in 21st century America: read a book. And not just any book. My book, fiction, of all things, by an unknown author.

So, I’m always interested in new ways of “inducing” (why not just say “persuading”?) the public. I attended a session on movie marketing put on by the DC Film Salon. A pair of PR stars gave a presentation on how they got the word out about indie films, including some creative tactics like having screenings for “tastemakers.”

But the room was filled with cash-poor independent filmmakers. How could they afford these PR services? And, moreover, would this be a good use of their limited funds? I asked if there was any way to connect the parties and screenings to the most important metric of all – ticket sales. But there’s no way to accurately measure the impact of PR.

Which is what inspired me to write How Do You Measure PR? It’s on the blog FlackRabbit, published by my friend Margie Newman, who is perhaps the smartest PR person I know. We’ll see what answers her readers come up with.

Murder in Ocean Hall – Now in Germany

 

Murder in Ocean Hall in GermanyMy book Murder in Ocean Hall can now be found in the Kindle online store in Germany. For less than a euro, readers in Berlin, Cologne, Hamburg or elsewhere in the country can download this DC mystery.

What did I have to do to publish my work in Germany? Nothing. I had already published my book in the USA with Kindle Direct Publishing. Amazon did the rest, creating a new Kindle store for German users.

If a few years ago you had told me that I would write a mystery, publish it electronically, and that people would actually read books on e-readers, and that my book would be available in Europe…. That sentence involves so many improbabilities, but all of these things are now true. Makes you really hopeful about what comes next.

Friday Photo: The Polaroid Retrospective II

The Polaroid Retrospective II

Think the Polaroid is dead?

New media doesn’t replace old media; it complements it. While millions of people are snapping photos with iPhones, a select few carry on with the cameras your grandparents once employed.

The results can be seen at The Polaroid Retrospective II show at the Lamont Gallery. Running until the end of April, this is a fascinating exhibit that demonstrates the artistic possibilities of low-fi cameras. The little square photos which line the brick walls of this gallery aren’t perfect, their not crisp, they don’t have the slick sheen of digital photography – and that makes them all the more charming and personal.

Update: check out my article on this great show.

Murder in Ocean Hall – Now on the Nook!

My book, Murder in Ocean Hall, is now available on the Nook. Owners of the Barnes and Noble Nook and the Nook Color can pick up a copy of this novel for just $2.99.

In my book, the world’s most famous ocean explorer is killed at the Smithsonian. It’s up to a cynical DC detective to solve this high-profile case.

Murder in Ocean Hall takes place in a Washington “beyond the monuments”, in the real neighborhoods of the city that most tourists don’t see. Set during the summer before the 2008 presidential election, we follow Detective Thomas across the city as he encounters the powerful and the powerless in his quest to solve this case. He’s grown bitter from decades of investigating bloody mayhem on city streets. Despite the new condos and gentrification, has the city really changed? Or is it doomed to dysfunction?

A reviewer wrote about Murder in Ocean Hall that it:

will take you behind the scenes of places you’ve been and tell you how they function then give you insights into people in power and how they fail to function.

Murder in Ocean Hall is available on the Nook thanks to Barnes and Noble’s PubIt, an online service that allows authors to easily publish e-books.

Powerful tools like PubIt, Kindle Direct Publishing and CreateSpace allow independent authors like myself to connect with readers worldwide. They’ve enabled me to publish Murder in Ocean Hall in print, Kindle and Nook editions.

Boom and Bust Published in SPLIT

split logoMy short story Boom and Bust has been published in the online literary journal SPLIT. Boom and Bust is a satire, told from the perspective of a self-deluded marketing consultant. Obsessed by money and status, my narrator represents all that’s wrong with America these days. In my story, he’s helping an evil CEO escape the wrath of shareholders.

SPLIT is a new online magazine designed to showcase emerging talent in the art of storytelling. “Spill” is the theme of the second issue of the magazine. SPLIT features poetry, photography, a novel excerpt and even a short film.

Boom and Bust is part of a novel that I’ve been working on. Check out the further adventures of my consulting friend in the short story, Don’t Mess Up My Block.

Novelist in Our Midst: Me

Check out the interview with me at Borderstan, a news web site that covers the Dupont-Logan area in DC. Or, rather, the border between the two areas. At one time the neighborhood was called Dupont East. Now, most people call it Logan Circle. Though less funky than it used to be, it’s still a fascinating cityscape, filled with beautiful townhomes, hip bars, art galleries and pretty much anything else a city person could need.

I like the area so much that I set much of my novel Murder in Ocean Hall here. I have the detective protagonist of the book living on the 1400 block of T Street while the murder victim lives in one of the new condos by Whole Foods. My books asks where DC has really changed for the better, from the bad old days of Marion Barry. On a beautiful spring day like today, that’s an easy question to answer.