Friday, July 07, 2023

IMPORTANT UPDATE

UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE:

We will no longer be able to fill orders received from outside the USA. 

Also, for the moment, we are not filling orders of any kind.

I am trying to solve the problem of how to update and downsize this website as is manageable without Donna or other workers. Nine months since her passing, I am still trying to sort out the identity of our web host to open a dialogue with them. I have tried working with a company that supposedly solves such problems, but we are still faced with problems they told me were resolved. 

The only reason I want to keep this website going, frankly, is to keep Donna's digital products legacy alive and in the hands of our customers. I'm told by various customers that they cannot access their digital goods as things are now, so it's only right that I commit to receiving no further outside income from this site until our technical issues can be resolved. 

Thank you for your kind patience.

Tim / VW



Friday, April 28, 2023

GOOD NEWS! VIDEO WATCHDOG DIGITAL SALES WORKING AGAIN

Since Donna's untimely passing last October, this website has been stumbling along in disabled order. I've been able to continue fulfilling physical orders, however - for reasons unknown - customers purchasing our digital goods were unable to open them.

A couple of months ago, I hired a service to identify and repair the problem - which required me to identify various affiliates I didn't know we had and the various usernames and passwords that Donna used to interface with them. This has taken an eternity to do. 

Today I was notified today that all of our known issues have finally been resolved.

To the best of my knowledge, I've refunded every PayPal order that reported inability to access and make use our digital products. Please let me know if you're still having any problems with the present set-up. I can be reached at tim@videowatchdog.com.


Monday, April 17, 2023

THE BOOK OF RENFIELD Returns... in a Newly Revised Edition


If that new RENFIELD comedy from Universal has left you pining for a more serious treatment of Bram Stoker's classic character, my 2005 novel THE BOOK OF RENFIELD: A GOSPEL OF DRACULA - which incorporates material from Stoker's DRACULA, making it technically the first-ever "mash-up" novel - is finally back in print, but in a form its readers have never before enjoyed.
Though the novel has always enjoyed a very high readers' rating at both Amazon and Goodreads, I've returned to the original text and corrected a number of things that didn't sit right with me, revising not only wording and language, but rearranging some content and also adding some passages I had deleted from the first edition. It's now a longer, smoother and, in my opinion, more satisfying telling of this terrifying and heart-wrenching story of how and why R. M. Renfield was chosen by Dracula to serve as his vanguard at Carfax Asylum.
In addition, I've written a lengthy Afterword that tells the story behind this book, and I'm proud to note that my friend STEPHEN R. BISSETTE has also contributed a most wonderful Foreword to the package.
This new edition is published by Riverdale Avenue Books, and as such it represents my reunion with publisher-editor LORI PERKINS, who was my literary agent for both this novel and my first, THROAT SPROCKETS. She tells me that the book's first-ever HARDCOVER printing will be available for ordering very shortly; however, the DIGITAL edition is available NOW through Amazon! (Here's the link.) An AUDIO BOOK edition, another first, is also forthcoming...


Saturday, February 04, 2023

2023 UPDATE - PLEASE READ

Hi, folks. It's me again, popping back with a brief status report.

It's now a week shy of four months since I lost Donna. I've been able to step up and fill some of the sizable gaps she left behind - but not all. She used to say "I'm little, but I'm mighty!" and boy, she wasn't kidding. She was the office manager for GENII Magazine; she ran the VW web site (filling all the orders by hand, the day they came in); she had Amazon and eBay stores; she made my dinners; and she also found time to be a good friend to a good many people. She also maintained water distillers and room humidifiers and dehumidifiers throughout the house, which were beneficial to us and our cat Janie. I've tried but have found out that it's simply impossible to do all this AND my own work, so I've had to design (so to speak) my own plan for living, which has sadly had to admit defeat where some of these daily tasks are concerned. Wrestling with water for an hour a day is simply not for me, and her Amazon and eBay stores are now kaput, largely because Amazon and eBay refused to accept her death as a reason for tardy service or the impact of her loss on my ability to keep filling orders. Just as I was finally mastering this source of additional income, they decreed I hadn't moved fast enough to suit them and dismantled both stores.

But it's WATCHDOG business I need to discuss now.

I've never claimed to be even half the computer genius that Donna was, and I'm having a problem at the moment with sales of our digital wares, the books and back issues. Customers are telling me that they place their order, their money is taken, but their passwords are not working - so they cannot access the product they've bought. Resetting their passwords doesn't help. Obviously, this is unacceptable but the problem has defeated every attempt that I and a couple of others have made to try to correct it.

Donna's digital innovations with VW's back issues and especially the BAVA Book were her pride and joy. It's my wish and intention to preserve these, her legacy. 

Next week I plan to open discussions with a respected web hosting service to upgrade our service and make the site easier for me to maintain in the future. For the moment, I would advise everyone to NOT order our digital products until things are back in working order. I hope this won't take long. 

I am able to fill orders for physical copies of the magazine, my books and the MONSTER KID HOME MOVIES DVD, but the availability of back issues may be phased out as the inventory is taking up room in the attic I'd like to clear. 

Stay tuned for updates and the return of Video WatchBlog.

Tim Lucas