The Kindness of Strangers (and Friends)

I'm depending lately, on the kindness of so many people. And they're coming through!

Since publishing my short story collection on a whim, as an ebook (A PATCHWORK OF STORIES), I decided to do some publicity on it. I'm sort of using my ebook as a test run for when my trade paperback novel, CHOKE, comes out in May from Mainly Murder Press. It might be good, I figured, to try out different marketing tools on the ebook and see if I have phenomenal success with any one thing. Or more than one.

I added my book to my signature line. For the first few weeks I put links to the purchase sites on Smashwords and Amazon. Then I thought that might be annoying and took those off. The links are front and center on my webpage, though.

Let me back up a sec, though. First, I had started publicizing my novel and put it in my signature line. Things I've done to get the word on on it (although it doesn't come out until May 2011):

*make sure I post on the lists I belong to so my signature line gets seen (not a problem, since I'm always posting anyway);

*get a new author photo and put together a preliminary press kit, and put it on my webpage;

*start consciously acquiring new Facebook and Twitter followers (20/day was recommended to me, but I haven't hit that yet);

*put up an author page on Facebook;

*start collecting emails of people I think might want to know about--and buy--the novel;

*register for a couple of big conferences next year, try to get onto panels, donate a silent auction basket at one, buy a group ad at another;

*and, lastly, get myself onto other people's blogs as a guest once a month until my pub date.

Here's where the friends and strangers came through, on that last one. And, in the midst of this, I put out the ebook and sort of switched my efforts over to it. So, the blogs are more about the short stories now, with just a mention of the coming novel.

I'm overwhelmed by people who have spontaneously blogged about me, and those who have offered me spots and interviews. Since August, I've averaged more than one every month.

Take a look at all the great publicity!

August:

Carole Morden at Dry Bones

My blogmates at Dialog For Murder

September:

A two-part in depth interview at Writers Who Kill, by E.B. Davis

Part One

Part Two

October:

A nice essay from KB Inglee

November:

A review of the short story book by Judy Alter

And an interview by David Wisehart, who promotes Kindle authors

I will have a guest blog at Lelia Taylor's Buried Under Books blog Saturday!

photo from http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p86/rodgj/vivienmarlon.jpg

December and January are mapped out with one each so far, and several are lined up for May. I can NOT thank these folks enough for all of this!

Since putting the ebook on Amazon, I also created an Author Page for them. I guess I can add the new book in May to that. I have no idea who looks at those.

What works? What doesn't? That's what I'll try to decide as I go through the process for both books. Maybe some things work better for ebooks and some work better for print books. So far, with the only one for sale, A PATCHWORK OF STORIES, there's been a steady trickle of one or two sold every day or every other day. I'm kind of amazed at this. And anxious to see if anyone will buy the print version when it becomes available later this month (I hope). Right now it's at Smashwords and Kindle (hint, hint).

Motivation

At the same time that I celebrate my own hard-won publishing contract, I feel bad for the many, many excellent writers I know who are struggling to get published traditionally, as I did for eight long years. And I'm at a loss as to why good writers have such a hard time.

Is it that agents don't recognize good writing? I'm sure that's a possibility. After all, there are no credentials needed for becoming an agent; all you have to do is say you're an agent and put up a webpage. How do you tell an agent is even qualified?

More likely than not recognizing good writing, it that the agents don't have good enough contacts and are at a loss as to how to sell good books. I've heard over and over that agents only have narrow, specific contacts and only know how to sell certain types of books. I wonder why that is and why the contacts can't be expanded, but that's a field I know nothing about, obviously. Lots of bestsellers don't fit neatly into slots, in spite of agents and editors seeming to prefer that.

Maybe the editors at the publishing houses are to blame for not recognizing what they can sell. I KNOW they can all sell mysteries if they want to. When I tell people I'm a writer and they ask what I write, and I tell them "Mysteries," I have never once--never once!--not gotten the response, "I love to read mysteries." They often go on to lament that there aren't more being published.

There's been a lot written lately about the financial trouble that major, traditional, old-fashioned publishing houses are in, due to their failure to change their business model and keep up with the times. It's not my purpose to discuss that, but I'm sure things will only continue to change rapidly.

On a recent visit to Barnes and Noble, I found they had reduced the mystery section to one shelf, and shoved it off to the side! Other mystery readers were milling about the one shelf, lamenting with me that Barnes and Noble is no longer interested in selling mysteries. I have no idea what this is a sign of. Barnes and Noble being out of touch with mystery fans? There seem to be no lack of them. Is everyone out of touch with the readers?

Which brings me, at long last, to my topic:

Motivation.

What keeps all the good, as yet unpublished, writers motivated to keep writing, to keep seeking publication, against enormous odds? Is it the example of the few who are tapped by the major houses? Is it the encouragement of new business models taking off and succeeding? Does every writer have inspirational quotes taped to the monitor, tacked on the bulletin board, scattered on the desk, like I do?

What keeps you going?