Amazon currently has my “SR-71” bookazine for thirteen bucks, plus shipping. Woo. Get a few copies now, before Christmas comes and you fall short and you have to live in eternal shame that you did not have enough copies to gift to all your friends, family, co-workers, arch-enemies and random people on the street.
Currently going for fourteen bucks and change (the ad below says $23, but the page it links to shows $14). Christmas is coming. Stock up!
Half off the price of their books, plus free shipping. Woo! So if you have any money left over after you buy suspiciously large numbers of copies of “SR-71” and “B-47/B-52,” go get you some books about ships and such.
And if you end up saving some cash on a haul of books, why not show your boundless appreciation…
Because of course I did, I’ve googled my own book to see where it might be available in the US for reasonable prices. I’ve not purchased from these sources, so YMMV. The prices and availability are as I type this, so they might vary.
Casemate Publishers: $12.99, but currently out of stock.
Book Despository: $17.01, free delivery worldwide.
World of Books: $14.39, but currently out of stock.
Books A Million: $16.84 (one copy)
You might have noticed that the price of my SR-71 book on Amazon is highly variable. It was originally something like $13 direct from Amazon; it’s now something like $27 from secondary sellers on Amazon. This is due to Amazons supply having sold out. I’ve been informed that another shipment has been sent to Amazons supplier, so the direct Amazon price should return to normal in three weeks or so. Just in time for Christmas, so when that price returns to normal don’t waste a second and promptly order a few hundred copies.
It remains available direct from the publisher for £8.99 which is about the price it should be on Amazon… but shipping from Britain to the US is kinda steep.
https://www.classicmagazines.co.uk/product/5603/bookazine-lockheed-sr-71-blackbird-origins-evolution
If you contributed to my SAC Museum SR-71 photographic trip, you should by now have access to the relevant Dropbox folders with the photos. For those who contributed $10, this includes the “Best of” folder with 94 photos at 1.15 gigabytes. If you contributed at $30 or more for “All The Photos,” you should have access to:
ALCM: 47 photos, 546 megabytes
B-36: 159, 1.99Gigabytes
B-45: 85, 1.05 Gb
B-47: 168, 2.09 Gb
B-52: 179, 2.22 Gb
B-57E: 79, 1.00 Gb
B-58: 283, 3.48 Gb
Misc: 191, 2.36 Gb
SR-71: 280, 2.44 Gb
XF-85: 22, 282 Mb
You should have received a notification from Dropbox of your access to these folders. If you have just the regular personal account or no Dropbox account at all, most of these are too large for them to be allowed to sit on *your* Dropbox account… but you will still be allowed to download the photos, either individually or as a complete folder ZIP file. The description Dropbox gives is a little vague in that regards.
Also, because why not, I’ve added some “bonus” folders including photos taken during previous visits. For those who contributed $50 or more, you should have:
B-47: 75 photos, 89 megabytes
B-52: 53, 204 meg
And for those who contributes $100, you should have:
B-36: 60, 315 meg
B-58: 78, 304 meg
If you’re interested in the photos, or helping me pay for this trip (which included not only car repair/preparations, but also cat food, because *everything* includes cat food), or to help me work on the next couple of books and projects that this trip was in aid of, you can still sign on:
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Note: Amazon still has my SR-71 book, but, jeez, it’s a bit pricey just now at $39. Did it sell out? Dunno. I *guess* that’s a good sign?
Some time during the next month or so I plan on taking a trip to the Strategic Air Command and Aerospace Museum near Ashland, Nebraska. I have visited that museum many times over the years, but always while traveling back and forth, thus never able to spend more than an hour or so. I wanted to get there during the work on the SR-71 book so I could properly over-photograph their SR-71, but schedule, cost and a little thing called a “global pandemic” kept me home.
I still want to excessively photograph their SR-71 in order to perfect the large format print diagrams. And additionally, a potential future book (in discussion with Mortons, but nothing certain yet) would be aided by excessively over-photographing another aircraft in the SAC museum collection. I plan on taking a *lot* of photos (likely in the thousands) covering several aircraft in painful detail.
I had hoped that the release of “SR-71” would bring in increased business (the APR Patreon/Monthly Historical Documents Program, USBP’s, etc), but as has been all too common, business has actually *dropped* since the book came out. One of these days I swear I’ll figure out how every time I try my hand at advertising business actually collapses. I suspect that the truth of it will help open doorways into research in practical time travel, faster than light travel and popularity with women.
So, once again, I’m grubbing for funds to support this trip. If interested in helping out, just below there’s a drop-down menu of PayPal options, from “moral support” to “large sums.” The “Best Of” option will get those who chose it, as the title suggests, a selection of the best photos, probably over a hundred. The “All the Photos” option gives the funder just what it says, all the photos taken at the museum, including any panoramic shots I stitch together. The photos will be provided by way of a Dropbox folder or a ZIP file with all the photos.
I *may* extend the trip another day down the road to Denver to hit up the Wings Over The Rockies Museum for the same purpose, but only if there’s enough “investment.” If that happens, those who go for the full set of photos will also get the full set of photos from the WOTR Museum as well.
UPDATE: I’ve updated the draw-down PayPal menu. It didn’t have the prices on there initially.
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I have fifteen five three zero remaining copies from the original fifty. They are all signed and dated and numbered, and come with two 18X24 poster-sized prints. Yours for a flat $25, shipped via Media Mail within the US. If you are non-US, the price is sadly rather a lot higher… an extra $20, even if you are just a few feet across the Canadian border because the price of international postage really is that high these days.
When they’re gone, they’re gone.
Update: they’re gone.
This is of course still available on Amazon. Currently nine reviews, all five-star!
Well, let’s see how this works. The blog will *probably* start looking like it used to, a year-ish or so ago, with more aerospace stuff and longer-form rants and such. This is due to transitioning away from the book projects, at least for a while, and getting back to the pre-book way of life. There are good chances of more books/bookazines in the future (one is already under discussion), but nothing is confirmed yet.
I also plan on taking a photographic research trip (in support for a proposed book a little further down the line) in the near-ish future. It could be of two stages… a day trip that I am almost definitely going to take, and a multi-day trip requiring motels and such that I *may* take. Because such things aren’t cheap, I’m considering pre-selling the full sets of photos that I’ll take. The number of sets I sell will determine whether it’s the short trip or the long one.
Or someone could just send me a million dollars, and I’ll take the grand tour of aerospace museums and archives…
Because why not: my SR-71 book currently has seven reviews on Amazon, all of which are five-star. So… huzzah! Now… to sell a million copies. For starters. If people will buy books about sparkly mopey vampires, why shouldn’t books about the evolution of the SR-71 sell like hotcakes? Anyway, Christmas is coming up. Make sure to stock up on copies of the book before the forthcoming collapse in the world transportation infrastructure leaves you flatfooted. “Sorry, little Timmy, but the PlayBoxStation 12 is still stuck in China. But here’s the best book ever written!”
Also: if you click on the Amazon link below (or use the Amazon search box up and to the right) and then continue on to search for and buy other stuff, I get a pittance. Woo.
If you’ve purchased a copy through Amazon, feel free to leave a review for the book there. The more reviews, the more it’ll likely be seen, and the more it’ll likely sell… and the greater likelihood of more books like this down the line. Maybe even a greatly expanded second edition.