I’m a sucker for a good book cover. It’s really hard to do well. Serviceable covers there are plenty, and now that indie publishing is a thing, there’s plenty of places where you can get them for cheap. Which makes me think that the bar is higher for a cover that’ll stop you. For that, […]
Does a writer need publicity? We’ll never know for sure. There are indie writers who are successful without performing what we think of as publicity. They write books that readers want. They provide them in a series, so that readers who like Book #1 will buy Book #2 and so on. If the books become […]
Reviews and awards can be an effective tool in spreading the word about your book. Readers can encounter them on your web site, Amazon Author’s page, and your Twitter, Facebook, and other social media feeds. But buying book reviews has risks as well as rewards. They come in two flavors: reviews and blurbs. A blurb […]
There is nothing quite as wonderful as money. — Monty Python Money makes the world go round. — Cabaret The scary thing about owing your own business is the yawning gap between what you can control and what you can’t. And that fear is doubled when it comes to money. For example, you can’t control […]
It’s said that pressure makes diamonds. It also can make something unexpected. The Winter Arts Show was this past weekend. It was our third appearance at the show. We have done more than a dozen of these, and each time we try to learn something. At the York Book Expo, it was “always do what […]
Next weekend (Nov. 5), we’ll be at the Winter Arts and Crafts Show at Hershey High School. We’ve talked about preparing for book festivals, art shows, conventions, and other special appearances. We’ve talked about whether you should do book signings. We suggested ways to put on a great display and a list of ingredients to […]
Another way of promoting your book locally is by buying table space at shows and festivals and selling your book directly to the public. Many authors have a natural resistance to marketing their book. They may feel it’s too much work. There might also be an element of desperation in occupying the same space as […]
(I swear this is not going to turn into another how-to book on writing. But I do have a couple technical points about revision that I want to say.) Writers have a blind spot when it comes to revision. It’s difficult to learn, because it’s a different skill set from writing. Writing is creation. It […]
Back before computers appeared on every desktop, I wrote a fantasy story. I tapped it out on a manual typewriter during a Carolina summer. I was renting a room in a house whose family couldn’t afford air conditioning, so as I tap tap tap each page, it would be dotted with sweat. I spent all […]
As regular readers know, “The Career Indie Author” is being written in parts. The section below on book promotions belongs in Section V, “The Life Cycle of a Story.” This takes the reader through the process of writing a book, from deciding what to write, calculating a profit/loss statement, researching titles, what tools are useful […]