When I reported yesterday morning that Shaken was available for immediate purchase and download, I suggested that the new Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels detective thriller by Joe Konrath would shake up the publishing world by moving “soon” into the top 50 among Kindle Store bestsellers.

Silly me. Shaken debuted at #143, broke into the top #100 by noon and into the top 50 by 10 p.m. This morning it sits at #15!

Shaken is published by Amazon’s publishing imprint, AmazonEncore, and yesterday Joe mentioned on his blog that “the real reason I’m working with Amazon, ego and pleasantries aside, is because of their marketing muscle.”

Indeed. When I went directly to the Kindle Store this morning, here’s what I saw at the top of the page:

Now that’s muscle. Nice. #14 or #15 may not be the limit….

Thanks to editor Tom Dulaney at our sister blog, Planet iPad, for letting us share in this bit of fun concerning an individual who, as the authorities might say, is “known to us” here at Kindle Nation. And if you have an iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch and use any of them to read ebooks, you’ll want to check out Planet iPad on a regular basis!

UPDATE: We now have photographic evidence of a B&E; caper in which Konrath and his ebook broke into the Kindle Store top 100 at #97 at noon Tuesday.

RAP SHEET: J.A. KONRATH, TIME TWISTER

SUBJECT: J.A. Konrath, AKA Jack Kilborn, AKA Joe Kimball

KNOWN ASSOCIATES: Planet iPad, Kindle Nation Daily, Amazon.com, Detective Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels of the Chicago PD, numerous other authors of a similar bent

BACKGROUND: Subject born 1970 in Skokie, IL. Occupation: Writer

WANTED FOR QUESTIONING: In connection with the whereabouts of and recent investigations being conducted by Chicago Police Department Detective Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels. Department records indicate Daniels is currently in hot pursuit of the serial killer known as Mr. K. 

Konrath by his own admission in print was seen with Det. Daniels at the time of her disappearance.

(Investigator’s note: Daniels appears to have taken the capture of Mr. K as a personal crusade following her initial encounter with the killer twenty one years ago.) Konrath has six priors, novels based on his relationship with Det. Daniels.

Konrath, an outspoken commentator on the publishing industry, is a maverick. His outbursts about publishers and advertisers are well known.

His statements, writings and his blog for writers — especially new writers or, perhaps, African-American writers — seem to advocate the overthrow of traditional publishing practices. His most recent activity is the innovative release of a book called Shaken.  Evidence indicates links between Konrath and corporate giant Amazon.com.  He also has ties to two net-based publications:  bestselling blog Kindle Nation Daily and, more recently, the blog Planet iPad.

These conspirators this week released the third installment of a “pre-quel” or serialization of massive segments of the book.  Expressing no remorse, they vow to make good on their threat to publish a fourth segment on Monday.

Sources report the entire book will be released from an undisclosed location inside Amazon.com computers to police and the general public on October 26 as an “ebook” or “ee-boucke.” Printed copies are being held until on February 22, 2011. Such a scheme, according to our unpaid informants, is sometimes known on the street as “reverse windowing.”

Unfortunately, the ploy appears to be working to the extent that Shaken is already poised to break and enter the top 100 listings in the Kindle Store, a kind of “Most Wanted” list maintained by Konrath’s co-conspirator Amazon. It is not known whether there will still be readers of so-called “Dead Tree Books” come February when the co-conspirators have threatened the publication of a print edition. Also not known: how many trees Konrath may murder, single-handedly, if he carries out that threat. What is very clear, however, is that sufficient numbers of individuals are purchasing and “downloading” the electronic edition of Shaken that Konrath is likely to be encouraged to further serial activity.

Below find a Planet iPad report of the perpetrators’ unconventional publishing scheme.

Konrath should be considered armed with computers and tools of the writer’s trade, as well as a vivid imagination, and is widely considered as dangerous to traditional writing and publishing methods.

Under his alias of Jack Kilborn the subject has associated with psychotic killers (see the book Afraid.)  Konrath/Kilborn’s own extensive preoccupation, in book form, suggests an unbreakable fascination with horror as well as his fascination with crime.

Be advised Konrath may be difficult to apprehend, as he has somehow managed to slip into the future, 2054 to be specific, where under the alias Joe Kimball he claims to accompany Det. Daniel’s grandson. These reports can only be classified as science fiction at this time.

From report published on Planet iPad:

By Tom Dulaney

In Shaken maverick author J.A. Konrath violates most of the rules of literature that writing professors warn about when it comes to “flashbacks”– jumping back in time in a novel. “Flashbacks” are generally viewed by the profs as dangerous ploys, a technique that has generally gone out of date. Young writers in classes and conferences are nearly uniformly warned to stay well clear of flashbacks.

In Shaken, Konrath jumps into flashbacks and flash-forwards with leaps to and from three major time-space points: 21 years ago, 3 years ago, current time. The “Bonus Content” included with Shaken irons out the dizzying flashes, putting the story in chronological order for those who like their literary time travel at a more orderly, sedate pace.

Consider the dangers of such a daring architecture for a novel. The book, plot and characters must track sensibly in the helter-skelter flash-arounds spanning two decades.  You cannot know something in, say, chapter 5 that you will not learn until chapter 7.

Now scramble the chapters back into chronological order, and apply the same rule.

Does the dare of toying so roughly with time work?

Yes, says bestselling author and Konrath fellow traveler Tess Gerritsen in her “5 very enthusiastic stars out of 5” review, which appears suspiciously right on the book’s Amazon page:

J.A. Konrath achieves the stupendous feat of blending both a prequel and a sequel in this timeline-hopping thriller, expertly making the pieces click together like an intricate Swiss watch.

Over the course of her decades-long career, Detective Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels has pursued her own great white whale: a sickeningly twisted serial killer named Mr. K. Years ago, Jack came heartbreakingly close to catching him, but he managed to slip away. 

Now Mr. K is back from her nightmares, and she’s his captive, in a secret place where she’s beyond rescue. Bound and gagged, the clock ticking down till zero, Jack faces a death more excruciating than anyone’s worst imaginings. She has seen Mr. K.’s other victims, so she knows how terrible her end will be.

In flashback, we see just how Jack ended up at this moment in her life. From her first exposure as a rookie to Mr. K’s handiwork, through her career-long pursuit of her nemesis, we watch Jack grow as a cop, as a woman, and as a friend to her two eccentric colleagues, Harry and Herb. That journey is both terrifying and wildly hilarious, a wacky combination that only a writer as good as Konrath can pull off. Throw in a deeply moving denouement, and you have a story that hits every single mark.

The pace is frantic, the horrors truly horrifying, and the dialogue will have you laughing out loud even as you’re gripping the pages in terror. Konrath is so good, he makes other novelists jealous–and count me as one of them.

‘5 Very Enthusiastic Stars Out of 5’–Tess Gerritsen

Last (in our time stream at least) is the printed version of the book, being published under the AmazonEncore imprint. Pre-order it today, get it next year on February 22.

Konrath, Shaken and Amazon have even upended the apparent flow of time with the “Shaken project.”

They give us an “encore” on paper from imprint AmazonEncore that you can order before you could get the teaser, which was published a few months ago, or the next several teasers released earlier this month. Or the next teaser, coming yesterday only on Planet iPad and Kindle Nation Daily.

Related posts:

• Exclusive: Amazon and Author Joe Konrath Select Kindle Nation for Pre-Publication Showcase of the Next 40,000 Words of Shaken 
• Bestselling Kindle Nation Featured Author J.A. Konrath Jumps Traditional Publisher’s Ship to Bring His Next Novel Directly to Kindle Through AmazonEncore
• Bookmark this Post for Updated Links to Each Free Installment of Joe Konrath’s Shaken

Joe Konrath’s Shaken debuted this morning at #143 in the Kindle Store overall bestseller list and has already climbed to #136 and #134 in the past two hours, and is #10 on the Kindle Movers and Shakers list despite launching on the same day as new books by John Grisham, Keith Richards, and Jennifer Cruise.

UPDATE: We now have photographic evidence of a B&E; caper in which Konrath and his ebook broke into the Kindle Store top 100 at #97 at noon Tuesday.

Here’s a screen shot showing recent Kindle Store rankings of some of the books we are tracking here at Kindle Nation:

Joe Konrath’s novel Shaken, the seventh book in his Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels detective series, arrived quietly on thousands of Kindles overnight, but I’m guessing the book’s effect on the publishing world will be anything but quiet. After publishing the first six books with traditional publishers, Konrath jumped their sinking ship and swam for shore via AmazonEncore, which has just released the direct-to-Kindle version with bonus chapters and will bring Shaken out in paperback in February.

Kindle Nation was honored to play a small role in the launch of Shaken with free installments of the first 75 percent of the book (still available here!), and we will be watching with great interest to see where it debuts on the Kindle Store bestseller list later today! I will be very surprised if I don’t see it among the top 50 bestselling Kindle books very soon. And, as we learned from Amazon’s press release earlier this week, if you are in the top 50 Kindle books, that probably means you are in the top 50, period.

Amazon has posted a 5-star review by author Tess Gerritsen on the Kindle page for Shaken, and we faithfully reproduce it here:

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Exclusive: Tess Gerritsen Reviews Shaken

Tess Gerritsen is a physician and an internationally bestselling author. She gained nationwide acclaim for her first novel of medical suspense, the New York Times bestseller Harvest. She is also the author of the bestsellers Ice Cold, The Keepsake, The Bone Garden, The Mephisto Club, and more. Read her exclusive guest review of J.A. Konrath‘s Shaken:

J.A. Konrath achieves the stupendous feat of blending both a prequel and a sequel in this timeline-hopping thriller, expertly making the pieces click together like an intricate Swiss watch.

Over the course of her decades-long career, Detective Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels has pursued her own great white whale: a sickeningly twisted serial killer named Mr. K. Years ago, Jack came heartbreakingly close to catching him, but he managed to slip away. Now Mr. K is back from her nightmares, and she’s his captive, in a secret place where she’s beyond rescue. Bound and gagged, the clock ticking down till zero, Jack faces a death more excruciating than anyone’s worst imaginings. She has seen Mr. K.’s other victims, so she knows how terrible her end will be.

In flashback, we see just how Jack ended up at this moment in her life. From her first exposure as a rookie to Mr. K’s handiwork, through her career-long pursuit of her nemesis, we watch Jack grow as a cop, as a woman, and as a friend to her two eccentric colleagues, Harry and Herb. That journey is both terrifying and wildly hilarious, a wacky combination that only a writer as good as Konrath can pull off. Throw in a deeply moving denouement, and you have a story that hits every single mark.

The pace is frantic, the horrors truly horrifying, and the dialogue will have you laughing out loud even as you’re gripping the pages in terror. Konrath is so good, he makes other novelists jealous–and count me as one of them.

Five very enthusiastic stars out of five. –Tess Gerritsen