I have recently finished listening to my first audio book or, as the author likes to call it, my first podcast novel. EarthCore itself is pretty much your usual off-the-shelf B-sci-fi novel (think airport book store), and provides easy entertainment complete with mature situations, language and violence.

What is interesting, though, is that it illustrates how authors, artists and other content creators that have been ignored by traditional media outlets can use the Internet to bypass those outlets and directly reach their audiences. It seems to involve quite a bit of self-promotion, but at least for Sigler it has paid off: EarthCore has originally been published by AOL/TimeWarner as an eBook in 2001 in an effort to generate interest in a paperback release that never happened. Sigler regained the rights to his book in 2003, but has been unable to find another publisher. So he took it upon himself to get the word out, and created an audiobook, performed by himself, which he makes available as a podcast (for free). The podcast has been quite popular and he has been able to find a publisher for the paperback now.

I am now looking for the next podcast novel. It will most likely be either Sigler's next one (Ancestor) or Mark Jeffrey's The Pocket and The Pendant (which is already available as a book, thanks to another exciting new distribution channel, Lulu). I am also trying to find radio plays (which feature multiple actors and sound effects, the lack of which, by the way, surprisingly does not detract much from an audio book), and my best bet at the moment is Spaceship Radio.