Author's e-books available for free

Every year Smashwords runs the promotion for e-books and authors can discount their books or give them away free.

John Orton’s first book –The Five Stone Steps – was published in 2014 and is a fictional retelling of the memoirs of Tom ‘Jock’ Gordon, who was a Station Sergeant in the South Shields Police Force in the 1920s.

The book has won a prestigious independent book publishing award, the BRAG indie medallion, and has proved popular in South Shields where it sold out in the library book shop and is in constant demand from the Word Library.

His latest book, Blitz PAMs, published in November 2016, tells the story of the Blitz on Shields through the eyes of a young grocery delivery lad, Mossie Hamed.

‘Not ower clever but not daft’, he volunteers to become a police auxiliary messenger – a PAM of the book’s title.

Both books, which are illustrated with photos from the South Tyneside Historic Images website, are published by UK Book Publishing of Whitley Bay.

John said: “When I was told by Smashwords that they would like me to participate in their ‘Read an e-book week’, I jumped at the chance.

“It is now virtually impossible for an aspiring author to get published and independently published printed books and e-books are the future. I just want folk to read about the history of my home town and I have tried to make my books as readable as possible.”

To try one of the books, Google ‘Smashwords’. The promotion concludes on Saturday.