I know it’s been 2016 for a while but I wanted to share this anyway. Jillian Bergsma Manning reminds us of things we as writers should think about (and hopefully implement) in the new year.
What’s on your writer’s to do list for 2016?
I know one thing I would like to improve on. I would like to plan out my book events a bit more in advance, if I can. It will make me feel better and will be less stressful to boot!
Source: Independent Publisher: THE Voice of the Independent Publishing Industry
I’m not sure who amassed this large alphabetical list of interesting words (I couldn’t find a citation on the post) but as writers, I thought you’d like to see the list. I’m always looking for interesting words. But be careful – don’t use too many in one piece. Everything in moderation, people. 🙂
Source: Sesquipedaedalus: Prettiest Words: A Work in Progress
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Some good marketing information from Nicolas C. Rossis via J.A. Stinger’s blog.
As promised at the end of my post, My Facebook Ads Experience and 3 Marketing Rules, here are two alternative ways you can use Facebook ads to gain subscribers and to promote a giveaway.
Click to open in Mailchimp
During December, I teamed up with authors Autumn Birt and P.H. Solomon to run Facebook ads in order to gain subscribers.
The way we did this was by giving away one book each, and sharing the subscribers among ourselves.
Autumn set everything up, and she did a wonderful job. We spent $1 daily each, and ended up with 85 new subscribers at a cost of $30. This means that each subscriber cost us just $0.35.
The only drawback with this model is that there is no tripwire page. Which means there’s not even the possibility of you recouping the money spent on the ads.
Incidentally, we…
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It’s retinal, people, retinal!
Dave Chesson is guest posting on the Book Designer and he has some good reminders about keyword use on Amazon.
If you haven’t checked your key words since you first put up your book, it might be good to give them a second look 🙂
Source: The Importance of Keywords to Ranking Your Book on Amazon – The Book Designer
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Where Publishing Dreams Become Reality
And I’d add a 6th sense – what does something “feel” like, the emotional sense, so to speak. A most important addition in my book.
The more we can evoke emotions as a writer, the more we’re going to touch the reader, and isn’t that what we’re all about? 🙂
Welcome back to my mini-series on the five senses. This time we’re working with Smell. I hope today’s post doesn’t turn out to be a stinker. (Okay… sorry. You know I can’t resist a play on words.)
I meant for this installment to be extremely lighthearted, and a scene from Copper, the Alchemist, & the Woman in Trousers quickly came to mind. Descriptive as it may be, it doesn’t really exemplify the point I wanted to make, but for fun, here’s the tidbit from Episode 20 anyway. In this snippet, Felicity, the woman in trousers, is tipsy from the physical reaction Absinthe (the Green Fairy) had when he was abruptly frightened.
Absinthe, the Green Fairy
It was no accident, I thought to myself, that the Green Fairy looked like a tiny green skunk, albeit one with gossamer wings. Much like a frightened…
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Everyone who reads likes Free books, right?
If you like Alan Bradley’s Flavia de Luce, you’ll like Agnes Kelly. She’s the 1960s American version of Flavia with a love for looking things up.
This is the first in the Agnes Kelly Mystery Series.
And for you teachers out there, it comes with a big list of teacher support materials! Just contact me if you’d like a look-see 🙂
Sign up for my readers group and I’ll also give you your choice of any of my books in an electronic format absolutely FREE!
To connect with my Readers Group, just go to my book site christinekelenybooks.com.
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Chris McMullen has delved into the Amazon ebook mistakes issue for us, so if you want to know more, check out the link below. I’m wondering if they will flag bad grammar or problems with tense or POV. They are going off readers comments, so who knows.
Though I can’t believe they care that much about “the readers experience” to really police people’s writing that much. It would only make sense if it affected their bottom line somehow, and I can’t imagine keeping a poorly edited book up on their site that might not have that many sales can’t really be an issue for them. It hurts the author, but that is a whole different topic!
Source: Warning Messages for Errors in Amazon Kindle e-Books | chrismcmullen
Robin Rivera on writeonsisters discusses something that many authors are not even aware of – Style Sheets. Read her post and learn about something that can save you money and your editor time. In addition, it will make sure your story turns out the way you want it.
When I create a style sheet, I use excel. I have columns that list the various things I want the proofer or editor to know (depending on why I’m creating a style sheet): character names (in order of appearance), odd spellings and location names are a few of the typical things I note. I also note the style guide I am using to answer basic questions of comma usage and how to handle titles of things (books, movies, articles…). If I plan on going against a particular style guide rule, then I’ll note that as well, to save me a lot of time back what an editor might want to naturally correct. It is easy for me to cut and paste information from anything I am editing or writing into this document. And if I’m passing an edited manuscript onto a proofer, it saves a lot of time and headache for them and the author, as well.
They take a little time, but they are well worth it!
**Please read the Amazon notice in this post. It’s important information for every author publishing on kdp.Amazon!
3 Reasons Authors Need Style Sheets » WriteOnSisters.com
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Where Publishing Dreams Become Reality
High school student, Anais Mohr has some wonderful insights for those writing middle grade fiction. I think she’s hit it right on the mark. Nice post, Anais!
Independent Publisher: THE Voice of the Independent Publishing Industry
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