I have to tell them the specific changes that have been made. So, for each change, I have to give them a “location number” (which I think might be a paragraph, but I’m not sure) as well as the nature of the change… location 5476, changed word ‘ot’ to ‘to’ or some similar.

Well… I didn’t record all of that, and it is VERY difficult to go back and figure it out, so I have had to scour my books (I have done Planning Vengeance, Dig Two Graves, You Don’t Know Jack, Who What When Why?, and Grafton. I’m in the midst of Unknown Caller, then will be doing Triple Cross and finally Lies and Omissions. That is all eight of my books. Feel free to get a few of them.

If you already have a copy, you can go into your Amazon account and look for content and devices. Then, under content, search out the book titles (I order them by author… it’s easier because they are grouped together). Under the ones that have been updated, there is an “Update Available” tag. Click it and the new update will be sent to your app or device.

A word of caution… if you have notes, they might not survive the update. I think that has to do with the changes in location that can happen as words move. This is especially true if you have a much older version of the book.

None of the changes are truly significant. I’m not changing plot points, characters, structure or action. These are changes to words or (in a few cases) formatting. Typos, wrong words (I have a couple of hanger instead of hangar that I’ve found) and similar things. They are annoyances… especially to me. The most significant changes were VERY early in Triple Cross. Right after I published it I realized I had some of the timeline mixed up. I had changed some things BEFORE publishing and didn’t catch all of the related changes. I fixed it within a few days. But… if you are the other person that downloaded it then, you might have the old version.

Do I need to say that this doesn’t work with the print versions of the books? That is one of the reasons I don’t do the print versions right away… Readers spot mistakes and tell me, and I correct them.

The common thing I see on the webs is that if I wanted there to be no mistakes, I would hire an editor… and yet, reading BIG NAME authors, I often spot multiple mistakes, especially in first editions. They have a phalanx of editors and others that go through their books with a fine-toothed comb, and there are STILL errors. It happens.

I’m just trying to fix mine.

If you ever find an error, please let me know. If it is an old edition, there is a good chance I’ve found it, but if not, I will fix it for future editions. Because of the way Amazon does it, there have to be a bunch of changes to trigger an update, though.

It was only about ninety miles from Oscoda to Onaway by air… but he wasn’t flying.  He’d toyed with the idea of finding someone to drop him from a plane and parachuting home but rejected the idea.  It was a fun thought, though.  Instead, he tried to hitch a ride on a plane up to Alpena, but couldn’t find a way there, either.  At noon he ended up on the road outside the base with a pack on his back, wearing his uniform and holding his thumb out. 

His first ride was from a guy about his age that was driving from Oscoda west, over to Mio.  It wasn’t exactly the way he planned on going, but it was in the general direction, and would put him on M-33, which went right into Onaway.  They spent a little while talking as they rode together.  Bill found out that the guy was a fisherman on a boat in Oscoda but had grown up in Mio.  The fisherman had been excited to hear that Bill had gone through paratrooper training and asked what it was like to jump out of an airplane. 

In Mio, he stopped into a place called the Kountry Kitchen for lunch.  Finding out that he was active duty, the owner, a World War Two vet, wouldn’t let him pay for his meal.  And it was really good chicken noodle soup, too.  The staff had been exceedingly friendly toward him.  After the soup, he had a slice of apple pie and then hit the road with his sign looking for a ride to Onaway. 

His next ride of the day came from a beer truck.  They joked about cracking open a couple of cold ones from the back while they drove up to Atlanta… and Bill joked that he’d gone the wrong way, since that morning he’d started out in Georgia, not that far from another Atlanta.  But his ride ended when they got to Atlanta, Michigan.  The driver had deliveries to make and then he was headed to Alpena, which was now the wrong way. 

After getting an ice cream cone in Atlanta at a little stand along the road, and buying one for his beer truck driving friend, he set out north again on M-33 with his sign in hand. 

As he hiked along the country road north of Atlanta, he enjoyed the surrounding forest, occasionally interrupted by a house.  He’d been walking quite a while when he passed by the Montmorency County Fairgrounds.  He’d barely seen any cars, and he was wondering if he was going to be walking the rest of the way to Onaway. 

Just after the fairgrounds, a new looking 1960 Impala convertible rolled to a stop just ahead.  The woman in the driver’s seat waved him over.  He jogged along with the big bag on his back to catch up to where the car had stopped. 

“Where ya headed, Soldier?” she asked.

“Onaway, ma’am.”

“Hop in and let’s get you there.”

He tossed his bag in the back seat and hopped in the front.  The top was down, and it was a beautiful day.  He took off his beret so it wouldn’t blow away in the wind and sat back for the ride.  It was probably only another fifteen miles but riding in the nice car with a pretty woman sure beat walking. 

“What’s your name, Soldier?” she asked.

“Corporal Bill Prince, ma’am.”

“Nice to meet you, Bill.  I’m Betty.”

“Thank you for the ride, ma’am.”

“Please, call me Betty… every time you say ma’am, I age five years.”

“Ok, Betty.  Sorry… It’s a habit.”

“It’s ok, Bill.  So, what takes you to Onaway?”

“I have leave for a few weeks and I’m going to visit family and my girl.”

Betty pouted a little at him, then laughed, “That’s nice.  Too bad you already have a girl; I would have liked a shot.  But that’s ok.”  She gave him a quick wink as she looked at him out of the corner of her eye.

“Sorry, Betty,” Bill said with a smile.  “What about you, where are you headed?”

“I’m meeting some girlfriends at Black Lake.  We have a cottage for the week.”

“Sounds like fun.  Where are you staying, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Bloom’s.  Have you heard of them?”

“Absolutely, Wes and Mary Bloom are great folks.  I’ve known them for half my life.”

“So, you know where it is?”

“Sure… need directions?”

“Tell ya what.  Can you lead me there and then I’ll drive you back into town?”

“Yes, ma’am… I mean Betty.  I can do that.  I haven’t seen Wes and Mary for quite a while.  It’ll be nice to visit.”

“Fair enough.”

Betty and Bill drove the rest of the way to Black Lake, driving through Onaway.  When they got there, Betty was greeted by three other pretty women, all in their early twenties.  They had been busy getting settled into their cottage. 

As he and Betty pulled up, they streamed out and started giving her a hard time about bringing her own man… it was supposed to be a girl’s week.  She laughed and told them he’d been hitchhiking and that she couldn’t follow the directions they’d given her, but since he was a local, he’d offered to show her the way.  The other girls were joking that she had all the luck, finding a nice-looking guy discarded along the side of the road. 

Bill excused himself to go see Wes and Mary.  He’d last seen them before joining up in the Army.  A few days before he’d left, he had come out to close-up Nettie’s cottage next door, making sure everything was set for the winter.  While they were talking, he asked Wes if it had been opened yet.  He didn’t think it had, so he went over to check it out and take care of it if she hadn’t been up to the yet.  After about half an hour, Betty knocked on the door of Nettie’s cottage to see if he was ready to go. 

“Are you our neighbor, too?” she asked. 

“No,” he answered, smiling, “I took care of this place for a few years for the owner, and she hasn’t made it up so far this year, so I figured I’d just get everything ready for her.  She usually comes up for the fourth of July.”

“Too bad… again.  Are you ready to head into town, Bill?”

“Yes, ma’am.  Let’s go,” he said, earning a good-natured ribbing from Betty.

As he got ready to get into the car, the other girls decided to join.  He ended up in the back seat between two of the girls.  Not a bad place to be, but he hoped he didn’t run into Christina.  It would become a lot less comfortable then. 

As the car pulled up in front of his house in Onaway, his brother happened to be walking out the front door.  Bill waved to him. 

“Howdy, Walter!”

“Bill!  Is that you?”

“Oh my, they must grow good-looking fellas on trees up here,” one of the girls in the car said, laughing, as Betty pulled to a stop. 

Bill hopped out of the back seat and retrieved his bag from the trunk, where it had been stowed when the other girls had started piling in.  As he turned to thank Betty, she appeared behind him, shook his hand and thanked him for the directions.

“And Bill, we will have a bonfire every night until July ninth, unless it rains.  Why don’t you bring that girl of yours out to say hi?  I think a couple of my friends would like it if you brought your brother out, too.  You know where to find us.”

She blew Walter a kiss and stepped back into her car and drove away as the other girls waved. 

“What was that about, Bill?”

“Oh, nothing, she just invited you to go out for a bonfire.”

Bill started walking toward the door with his pack on his back.

“Don’t leave a fella hangin’, Bill?  Where at?  I’m game!”

His parents were excited to see him.  They hadn’t expected him.  Despite writing every week, he hadn’t mentioned that he had leave coming up.  He was peppered the with questions about how things were going and if he knew where he was to be posted yet, as well as how he’d managed to get there.  They spent a little while talking, but what he really wanted was to go see Christina. 

“She’s at work, Bill.  She gets off in about an hour,” Walter told him as he walked back in the door.

“Huh?” Bill replied.

“Christina.  I know that’s who you want to see.  I mean, you like the rest of us and all, but you didn’t do whatever to get halfway across the country to stare at me.  She’s at work for a little longer.”

“Mind if I take my car?”

“No problem… are you going to tell me where that bonfire is with all those pretty girls?”

“Bloom’s place.”

Walter laughed.  “I guess that’s ok.  I can’t do anything stupid, or Wes will kick my butt.  But at least I can go see how friendly they are.  Maybe I can borrow Dad’s car.”

“Good luck.  We might come out there later.  It depends on what Christina wants to do.”

Bill dropped his bag in his old room and headed out to the car.  As expected, the keys were dangling from the ignition switch in the dash.  The market was only a few minutes away.  He hadn’t known that Christina was working there but thought it might be fun to surprise her by showing up.  Before he went to the store, he stopped by Mrs. Whitmer’s house.  She ran the florist, and he thought he might be able to get some roses from her.   

Mrs. Whitmer was very accommodating.  Since she lived almost next door to her florist shop, he was able to run over and get the roses quickly.  Living in a small town where everyone knows each other has benefits.  She’d handed him the keys to her shop and told him to go grab a dozen, drop the keys back by and they could take care of payment on Monday. 

At five minutes to five, he walked in the front door of the grocery store.  The cashiers were off to his left, and Christina had her back to him, ringing up a customer’s purchase.  He was able to sneak around to her line without her seeing him. 

As she finished up the customer in front of him, she hadn’t even looked up at him.  She looked up to greet him and recognition immediately flooded her.  She was over the counter in a flash, her arms wrapping around his neck.  “Oh my goodness, Bill, I didn’t know you were coming.  When did you get here?  How long will you be here?” she said between kisses.

“Miss Griffen!” a manager said loudly walking toward them.

“Sorry, Mr. Pendergrass.  This is Bill, my boyfriend.  I haven’t seen him since he went back on New Year’s Day.  I’m sorry, I’ll bring my till to the office, I think my shift is over.”

Mr. Pendergrass, still not looking very happy, walked over to the couple as Christina moved back to the other side of the cashier station to close down her register.

“Sorry, Mr. Pendergrass.  I’m Bill Prince.  Sir, it’s my fault.  I didn’t tell Miss Griffen I was coming back into town.  I wanted to surprise her.  Please don’t hold my actions against her.”

“Well, I guess it’s ok, with you being in the service and all.  At least it’s closing time and it didn’t disrupt the store too much.  Perhaps next time you should warn her before you surprise her.”

“Yes, sir,” Bill said, wondering how it would work to warn her before surprising her.

A few minutes later Christina emerged from the office, her register having been counted and her timecard punched.  She ran back over to Bill to hug him again.  She knew that she’d missed him a lot over the last six months, but she hadn’t realized how much she missed him until she saw him again. 

“Any plans tonight, Chrissy?”

“Well, I had a date, but…  you know…” she said back jokingly. 

“Oh, well, never mind.  There are some girls out at the lake that invited me to a bonfire.” He joked back. 

“Don’t you dare!” she said to him.  “You’re mine.  Forever, mister.  Don’t you forget it.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“That’s better.  Now what are we going to do?”

“Well, I’m famished.  Can I take you to dinner?”

“I guess, Mr. Prince.  Can you drive me home to change, or might you pass out soon?”

“I guess we can swing by your house.”

They walked out to the parking lot and hopped into the Model A to drive to Tower.  Chrissy wanted to hear all about Bill’s school and everything else in his life.  Even though he’d written almost every day, and told her all those things in letters, she wanted to hear him talk about his adventures, challenges and triumphs. 

Her parents were glad to see him and greeted him warmly when Christina brought him into the house.  Her mother made a fuss over him and made him a quick snack while he waited for Chrissy to get dressed to head out for dinner. 

Chrissy still had to work, but aside from that she spent almost every moment she could with Bill over the next couple of weeks.  On one of the nights, they actually did go out to Bloom’s Cabins for the bonfire with the girls.  Chrissy had been a little nervous about doing that, but Bill had told her that the girls were friendly, and she’d like them. 

One of the things that happened when she was at the bonfire was her conversation with Betty.  Betty had told her that she had netted quite the man.  He had told her all about Christina as they drove from Atlanta up to the lake.  And he’d been nothing but a gentleman.  He was the kind of guy that they were all looking for.

Another surprising thing that happened was that Bill ended up in the parade on the Independence Day.  They had a spot open on the Veterans Float and asked him to take the spot.  Chrissy was to be the local Beauty Queen that was to sit next to him.  She was actually supposed to sit next to someone else but convinced the other girl to swap. 

In fact, I have 6 different books in various stages of development. Only one of them doesn’t have crossover characters. (all titles are working titles and may or may not reflect actual titles):

Skater – This one is set before Planning Vengeance, and has cameos by Jack Dixon, Nicole Dixon, Sherry Cross and Terry Gates. Terry and Nicole are the ones that figure the most prominently of the cameos.

Grafton – This is after You Don’t Know Jack, and obviously revolves around Gunny. Most of the good guy crew is involved, and we are introduced to several new characters, including Mali. She’ll kind of be a surprise.

Jenny’s Death Star – This is also after YDKJ, and has a couple of cameos so far… Gunny and Melody Grafton. Dirk Bryce is most involved in the story as well. Not just a cameo, but a supporting player.

New Life – This one is still pretty early in its development, but Bill Prince and Dirk Bryce will be prominently featured. It is also of the newer generation, after YDKJ.

The Call – This one is contemporary. Jack and Amy have a son, and Nicole and Rolf have a son and a daughter. Jack and Amy’s son is center stage on this one. It looks like Nicole and Rolf’s son might be prominent, too. Jack and Amy are certainly around, and we have mentions of Dirk, Jenny and Ellen (from Triple Cross)

The one that doesn’t have any of the core Dixon-Prince characters is called The Cruise.

Planning Vengeance is a story about secrets. Secret crushes. Secret lives. Secrets of the past and present. Jack has been in love with Amy since the moment they met. Paul managed to get in the way and peel her from everyone around her. When he makes a mistake and Jack gets an opening, Paul’s revenge unleashes secrets in the pasts of all three families… Jacks, Amy’s and Paul’s.

Dig Two Graves is the culmination of the revenge that started in Planning Revenge. Death, near death, betrayal and conspiracy all come together for the conclusion. We also are introduced to a few new series characters and locations. Gunny and his merry band come into prominence, as well as Agent Sky, who is an enigma.

You Don’t Know Jack is a few years later. Jack and Amy have embarked on their lives and are making their way in the world when Jack finds himself kidnapped by a drug cartel kingpin. As we can assume, Jack and Amy’s fathers get Gunny involved and a rescue underway. But the rescue changes everything for Jack, Amy and everyone they know.

Who, What, When, Why? is a collection of shorter stories from the Dixon-Prince universe. Characters that have floated into, around and out of minor roles in the mainline stories star in these vignettes. Jack’s friends Terry and Cy both have stories. We find out how Jack and Amy finally got married, as well as when happened to Rolf, a little more about Agent Sky, and finally, the story of Anna… Paul’s mother.

Triple Cross is my newest title. JD Ross gets the boot from the military and nobody knows why, except perhaps his former girlfriend, Christi. When JD shows up at home in GA, she’s there to meet him and help him get back to civilian life. But soon, JD is suspected in a crime, and Christi is too busy keeping secrets. JD has to count of his friends to save him. Relationships change and appear, and JD’s life is forever altered.