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Back when I published the Storm Seekers novels, I made book trailers for FUNNEL VISION and ZAP BANG – but not for TORNADO PINBALL. And I LOVE this book. I was crazy busy, time went by, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it, in spite of the challenges involved in teasing to a book that plays like a big-budget movie in my mind.

Well, while I don’t have a special-effects budget, I have lots of tornado footage! And while I’d love to see this book made into a film someday – because we need more good movies about storm chasers – the books and their trailers will have to suffice.

Without further ado, here is the debut of the book trailer for Book 2, TORNADO PINBALL.

About the book

Just when TV shows about storm chasing can’t get any more extreme, along comes a production company with the ultimate exploit: the Bubble, a manned tornado probe. As the reluctant consultant, expert storm chaser Jack Andreas must get the show’s nervous star, failed tour operator Brad Treat, into a twister. But Jack is losing his customary cool as a comedy of errors unfolds. Distracting him is co-star Saffire, a Hollywood actress who is more than she seems, and producer Wynda, who will do anything to make her documentary succeed. The daring star of another show pursues them, desperate for a shot with his own flying machine. As the disasters mount, will Jack be able to launch their device into a tornado?

The sequel to FUNNEL VISION, a Storm Seekers novel, TORNADO PINBALL delivers an unforgettable adventure with action, humor, romance and stunning storms. Learn more on the books page.

Once upon a time, I created book covers for my storm-chasing adventures, the Storm Seekers Series. I was striving to capture their cross-genre nature — they include adventure, romance, drama and humor — and I thought it might be cool to be a little different. I’ve learned a lot since then, and one thing that’s clear is that cross-genre covers are just confusing to readers. Another lesson is that “different” isn’t necessarily good. And the third, obvious lesson to anyone selling books these days is that books have to look great at thumbnail size, too, because the majority of sales of ebooks and print books happen online.

I’ve been designing covers for other authors and decided it was time to give some attention to my original trilogy. Using photos I took while chasing storms and a couple of smaller licensed elements, as well as the magic of Photoshop, I created illustrations for the covers that I hope will convey the excitement I still feel when I think about these stories.

I like romance in my adventures and interesting characters who grow (it takes Jack three books to complete the journey from cad to hero). I love action and, of course, the thrill of seeing a supercell come together and produce a tornado. Add elements of a science thriller and some kick-ass women as heroines, and you have the Storm Seekers Series. The first three books are also available in a virtual boxed set.  I say “the first three” because I am contemplating more. In the meantime, I’ve been writing romances under a pen name. More on those later.

The new covers are percolating through the online bookstores.

Want to chase some storms? Check out the books on Amazon or learn more and get links to other stores here.

It’s time. My Storm Seekers Trilogy is now available in a digital boxed set and is on sale for $5.99.

What’s a digital boxed set? It’s all three novels of my storm-chasing adventures, Funnel Vision, Tornado Pinball and Zap Bang, in one e-book volume. Ready for a binge-read? You can get it for Kindle and the free Kindle app (it’s easy to give on Amazon, too), as well as iBooks, Nook and Kobo. Get all the links on the books page.

The first three books each can stand alone, but they also work together as a trilogy. I intend to continue the series at some point. For the past year, I’ve been quietly writing a romance series, but new Storm Seekers stories are brewing in my brain. Thanks so much to everyone who has read and reviewed the books!

I’d like to thank all the lovely people who shared and Tweeted the launch of my novel “Zap Bang” this past week – so many great friends and indie authors on Facebook and Twitter. I’ve also appreciated the coverage from Florida Today, Florida Book News and Authors and Book Buzz, and the fun interview in Jaimie M. Engle’s writing blog.

It’s hard to make oneself heard in the noisy world of publishing these days, but I heard the buzz this week! Now I hope more folks will discover the Storm Seekers trilogy over time and get into these storm-chasing adventures the way I have. To that end, “Funnel Vision,” book one, is still on sale this week on Kindle and Nook for 99 cents. You can learn more or buy any of the books via the links on this page.

And – there’s still time to win stuff!  The giveaway of the big Storm Seekers Prize Pack ends late Monday evening. Check it out here and enter!

In addition, you can win a paperback of “Zap Bang” on Goodreads. The giveaway ends Sept. 30.

It’s launch day for Zap Bang!  That means the third novel in the Storm Seekers trilogy is officially for sale, and I hope you’ll check it out!  Here’s what you need to know:

Giveaway: The Storm Seekers Prize Pack Giveaway is under way through Sept. 22. Enter here or on Facebook. The goodies include signed paperbacks, a very cool captured lightning sculpture, a storm T-shirt and more. Via the giveaway, you can Tweet every day to stack up your entries, too.

Funnel Vision sale: If you haven’t read the books, now’s a good time to grab the Kindle or Nook editions of Book 1 – Funnel Vision – on sale for 99 cents for a limited time.

Goodreads giveaway: Go to this page on Goodreads to register to win an autographed paperback copy of Zap Bang. The entry period ends Sept. 30.

All about Zap Bang: The sequel to Funnel Vision and Tornado Pinball, Zap Bang concludes the Storm Seekers trilogy with action, drama, humor and romance. Here’s the setup:

For tornado chaser Jack Andreas, an invitation to a lightning study means double the danger. As he sees it, what’s not to love? He’s intrigued by the job and fascinated by pilot Maribeth Lisbon, who must fly a research plane into the zap zone. Maribeth suspects he’s trouble, especially when his charms set off all her alarms. In their way are scheming TV chaser Brad Treat and down-on-his-luck adventurer Aurelius Zane, intent on filming a wedding in front of a twister. The eccentric billionaire who funds the study has a secret agenda. And a mystic with a food truck tests them all. As fearsome storms put them in mortal peril, Jack and Maribeth find their toughest challenge may lie within.

Catch some of the adrenaline in the book trailer:

You might also like to read about the playlist I created as inspiration while I was writing the book. For more details about the books and free sample chapters, visit the books page.

To make it easy, here are links where you can buy Zap Bang:
Amazon: Paperback | Kindle
Barnes & Noble: Paperback | Nook
Also at: iBooks/iTunes | Kobo

So there you go. Zap Bang is in the wild, and a wild, lightning-laced adventure it is. I’ll dearly miss writing about these characters, but I hope you’ll enjoy living in their world as much as I have. Happy chasing!

Zap Bang, the third novel in the Storm Seekers trilogy of storm-chasing adventures by Chris Kridler, will be published Sept. 16, and to celebrate, Sky Diary Productions is offering a giveaway! The goodies include:

• Signed copies of the paperbacks of FUNNEL VISION, TORNADO PINBALL and ZAP BANG
• Matching bookmarks
• Captured lightning disc – a 2″ Lichtenberg figure created inside a piece of clear acrylic by a 5-million-volt particle accelerator! (with velvet bag)
• Three 1″ Storm chaser/Funnel Vision pins
• Flashing/thundering lightning bolt keychain
• Storm chaser T-shirt from the Sky Diary Storm Stuff Store (choice of colors)
• Storm chaser decal

The captured lightning is completely cool, and you’ll read about it in Zap Bang. The giveaway ends on Sept. 22, so get in your entries now!

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This is not a book-review blog, as a rule, but when the folks at Simon & Schuster asked if I’d like to take a peek at Michael Farris Smith’s novel of meteorological calamity, “Rivers,” I couldn’t resist. I’m sure they didn’t ask me because of my brilliant literary insights. I’d guess it’s because I’m a storm chaser and weather geek. But before I talk about the weather, I have to address the story — especially because the storms are really secondary to the characters.

“Rivers” follows in the steps of Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road,” if incrementally less grim and less spare. In a near future when the United States government has written off the Gulf Coast as a hurricane-blasted wasteland, Cohen is a builder who’s decided to stay behind among the survivalists, the desperate, and the treasure hunters digging for troves of cash they think were buried by the fleeing casinos. We soon find out why: He’s still dealing with a storm-precipitated personal tragedy, and his home is the last vestige of his happy life.

Cohen lives an isolated existence made less lonely by a stray dog and horse and punctuated only by supply runs. But what’s left below The Line is certainly no Walden Pond, no place for quiet contemplation as nature reclaims the land. It’s more like the zombie apocalypse without the zombies. It’s a place of redneck primitivism, woman-enslaving cults and mercenaries who shoot first and ask questions later as one devastating storm after another rakes the tattered lowlands. When a generous impulse jeopardizes Cohen’s bulwarks against the chaos, he’s forced to confront the worst elements of this world and his own demons, choose alliances and try to find his way out.

Smith’s sentences stretch out like Cohen’s dreary days, in a loping, run-on, hypnotic rhythm. The author shifts point of view between characters with a sometimes irritating fluidity. His flashbacks feel more conventional, with more orderly paragraphs that reflect Cohen’s then-contented days at home and on an enchanting vacation in Venice with his wife among the “rivers” there.

Smith writes of one of Cohen’s moments of despair:

He felt as if he were sitting at the end of the world, in a place that the light had long ago abandoned and undiscovered creatures moved about in the black using their instincts to feed off one another. Somewhere unknown to man and unsafe for man and forgotten by the one who had created it. He was going to die in this place and it wrecked his spirit at first but then this became an apathetic notion. He didn’t know what there was to live for. And he didn’t know what there was to die for. Only that he would die in this forgotten place and be a part of its unaccounted history.

The water ran down his head and face and arms and legs. Under his skin. In his bones.

The “rivers” on the Gulf Coast seem ever-expanding in this apparent global-warming-caused disaster, though climate change is merely implied by the fact of the storms. The storms themselves seem to be, technically speaking, hurricanes that come every few days, though their behavior is at times unusual for tropical systems (pardon me while the weather geek has her say). Warm-core tropical systems rarely leave people cold or bombard them with massive hailstones. But maybe this crazy weather is beyond our ken as we try to foresee a future that eludes even the climate scientists.

What’s more important in the confines of the novel is that the untamed and relentless storms are reflected in the ragtag, ruthless humans living in their domain, and it will take an extraordinary person to rise above the madness. The plot is almost as unruly as the weather, but in the last fifty pages it presses the accelerator and drives hard to the end.

Will you like “Rivers”? “Like” isn’t really the term one applies to apocalyptic novels, but readers drawn to desperate, poignant survival literature may admire it. If you’re looking for a story about meteorological carnage, “Rivers” is a lot more, and a lot less in the weather department, as the storms only set the stage for the human drama. This isn’t storm porn. And on a personal note, I never like seeing animals in peril, even in a “literary” novel.

That said, I found the novel interesting and ultimately compelling, particularly in its forceful climax. I appreciated that, like the weather, it kept me guessing. Like a brutal storm, “Rivers” will test you — and it might make you think twice about buying waterfront property.