London, Ontario – 20 December, 2021 London author, R. Bruce Stock, has come up with an unorthodox marketing innovation for his self-published novels, PROMISE KEPT and SWITCH PITCHER. He’s made baseball caps of each title to increase public awareness of their availability. Asked what motivated him to introduce such an unusual approach, Stock replied, “A self-published author in Canada vs. the publishing industry is like trying to climb a mountain on crutches, so I was hoping to find something different that would generate attention for my two new stories. When I thought about who’s really successful in promoting a brand, it hit me: pro sports do it every day! So the idea of a baseball hat as an advertising platform for a novel suddenly had a lot of logic, because the cap also delivers a memorable likeness of the work’s title.”
A first-of-a-kind novel, Vol I of PROMISE KEPT, is the story of how Canadian Veterans, realizing the only way they can ever make a difference, is to organize their own political party, choose an Algonquin woman and ex-fighter pilot as their new CANADA NOW party president in 2023.
Former Commanding Officer of the 1st Hussars, LCol (Ret’d) Joe Murray notes, “To me, it’s an intriguing concept because no one has ever written about whether the military camaraderie amongst the ex-military of our navy, army and air force can ever be politicized.”
SWITCH PITCHER is the entertaining tale of how a totally ambidextrous pitcher, who also happens to be gifted with four-times-better-than-normal eyesight, enters
the Bigs and the batters can’t hit him. In a word, he turns baseball upside down, while trying to survive threats to his life, in a plot that has more turns and twists than a bag of
ballpark pretzels.
During the baseball strike, at a time when owners and players are at full voice leaving the fans, the sport’s other essential partners seemingly forgotten, the sparkling SWITCH PITCHER, is giving fans a new lease on life.
A McMaster grad, R. Bruce Stock is a retired Major and, as a young officer with Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, was a personal assistant to Governor General Vanier. Later, he was asked to re-enlist and joined our Peacekeepers as a public affairs officer in Bosnia. In civilian life, after decades as a public affairs and media relations advisor, he is a Fellow of the Canadian Public Relations Society’s College of Fellows. A member of Vimy Branch #145 of the Royal Canadian Legion, he resides in London, Ontario. His website is brucestock.ca where readers are invited to download the first 50 pages of either title at no cost.