Originally posted on Nicholas C. Rossis:
Figuring out where to advertise your book is worse than standing in a betting shop, five minutes before a race. You have money in your pocket, but a limited amount of time in which to select a guaranteed winner, and the odds are not in your favor. I have…
Marketing Your Indie Book – A Rough Nautical Map In A Sea Of Advertising Options
So you’ve published your book! Congratulations! All your hard work is now… beginning. That’s right, folks: it’s now time to sell your book. So roll back your sleeves, grab a sweatband, pull on the waders and let’s go into the murky waters of indie book advertising. I got some lovely data from fantasy author and blogmate Nicholas C. Rossis, author…
The XYZ of Blogging, Or What It All Boils Down To In The End
Why do people blog? What’s the point? Isn’t it just about students putting their diaries up online, as a kind of extension of Facebook? Isn’t it just for those with far too much to say and nobody nearby to listen? * No candle jokes, please. the sheep are a bit sensitive about title of this post. I have to admit,…
Benchmarking Book Reviews, Or How To Untwist One’s Knickers
For a blogger, there’s nothing quite as sweet as gaggles of people getting their knickers in a twist over something. (Those of you who don’t blog yourselves probably don’t know that the blogging equivalent of Natural Law is a list, called “Things That People Get Very Angry About On The Internet”. Whenever we’re stuck for an idea of…
7 Suitable Jobs For Writers
Writers don’t make any money, let alone a living. This has once again become a hot topic. A writer behind a newspaper article in this country just a short time ago was praised for bravery for saying exactly this, but those of us who live half of our existences online could have told you this a good two centuries ago.…
2014 Bestseller Book Data To Sink Your Teeth Into
Anyone for a mouth-watering chart or a graphic gourmand’s idea of gluttony? You are? Excellent. Let’s aim to answer some of life’s great questions, then. Who were the winners and losers in the bestseller world in 2014? Who ate all the pie (charts)? And who walked away with all your pocket money? Time to look back…
Taking Stock, Or The Electrical Side Of Blogging
Very shortly, I have some graphs coming which are so delicious they make me regret breakfast. I’m not promising you’ll like them as much as I do, but sometimes, when I look at them, I am beset by a moistness of the eyes, much the same as occurs if I watch a video of a…
The Thin Skin of Self-Publishing
I usually spend January looking for new trends in the book world (or making them up, which is more fun), and I’m seeing an increase in pronouncements about self-publishing online. It’s probably a seasonal thing, as people sketch out their writing goals. But a lot of what I’m seeing lately has been negative, particularly below the line. Last year,…
Tark And Mara Tackle Global Inequality
All was quiet in Tark and Mara’s penthouse (in the most ruinously expensive borough of Dublin city) save a seductive hum of contentment. Mara was reclining on her brand-new 16th century fainting couch following her weekly meal, languorously turning the pages of a glossy magazine. Tark had been miming at the baby grand piano for twenty minutes. Nobody could…
How To Torture A Beloved Story To Death (And Ruin Children)
An Irish school textbook for 8-year-olds shows us how, in teaching our children how to read, we can also teach them how women are deceitful, shallow, and only good for making tea.
Tara Sparling writes 