Blogging on the Run

Patricia Bowmer maintains an active and engaging blog featuring almost essay length posts. The posts are contemplative and blend humour and observations on life and running with some well-chosen images. They are very much in keeping with her book Akilina, which she also promotes on the blog and an earlier memoir, In Pursuit of Joy. So the blog functions in at least three ways — to promote Patricia's books, to provide her existing readers and potential readers with additional content and maintain an ongoing link with them, and as a motivational tool to continue writing and thinking about issues important to her. An excellent model for authors wanting to build their own community and 'brand'.

Lions and Lillies

A well-written and tightly plotted historical drama, Lions and Lillies: Book 1 covers affairs of state and love during the Hundred Year War between England and France. We were tasked to design a cover that created a sense of the intensity of the story, and combined military and personal aspects. In other words, the entry to "a world of passion and intrigue". The authors have created an informative website to accompany the publication of their book.

Good Cover, Bad Cover

Science Fiction covers often provoke amusement amongst those who don't read Sci Fi. For those of us who do, we treasure the remarkable variety of cover art — from melodramatic pulp novels to high concept fiction and everything in between. The covers could be formulaic, but were often wildly inventive and even avant garde. After all, if you are writing about the future, you're not automatically bound by the constraints of the past. This website explores the often hilariously literal and overblown art of the less refined end of the genre, while this one catalogues Penguin's consistently high quality and restrained covers (mirroring the often high polish of the contents).

Still More Author promotional ideas

Richard Stamp, author of As the Sparks Fly Upwards has been very active and creative with the promotion of his book. He descibes some of his ideas below:

1. I attend a local church which arsonists burned down three years ago. I have been selling books at $25 each and letting folk in the parish know that $5 for each book will go back into the rebuilding fund for all copies sold by them and within the parish. That way I get $20 a book back and the community benefits ....and buys more.  The suggestion therefore is that authors find a local cause which they can support and which then recruits more sellers and acts as a vehicle for selling more books.
2. I have designed a simple poster. I have emailed it to a hundred folk or so around the world asking them to get them put up on community, club and church notice boards etc.  Eg There’s a town in Colorado in the USA which now has these flyers at the local gym, at the community hall and at the church. It all helps. I put the RRP on the ones for Australian use ... but left it off those sent to other countries where the cost would be differently expressed.
3. I have used some of the old galley copies in this way; I have asked local places where people have to wait for a while if I can put a copy in their waiting room.
4. I have  put a stick-on label on the front cover which says. This book has been lent by the author to ease your waiting time. Please do not remove it. Copies of this book may be purchased from Collins ABC shops also at Dymocks and also at Bookmark on High Street. [all local bookshops] or direct from the author on ph 54353576  
   Since each chapter of my book is a story in itself this is ideal for folk to read one story or two while they wait. Thus their appetite might be sharpened and a desire to buy the book and finish reading it be engendered. Books are now at the local Foot Clinic, at a large local medical practice and also at the new lounge and waiting area at a local garage complex where people wait while work is done on their vehicle.  More venues are planned.

These are additional measures to the usual personal give/away cards with the book’s details, interviews and reviews on radio and in local newspapers. Also I have visited various bookshops in the region [Bendigo and central Macedon ranges towns]  and 7 bookshops now have it in stock.

Selling Your Books Face to Face

Barry Wilks, author of Come in Spinner has this to say about selling his own book:

1. I have found selling Come in Spinner at local markets successful
2. I have sold 300 books in 3 months door to door in Armidale - cold canvas - and when I receive copies of Dolores I shall be making similar arrangements. I find personal contact with the customer at the door more successful than any other outlet.
3. The postcard idea was unsuccessful — a complete loss. I didn't get one sale or even an enquiry. I sent out over 200.

Self-Publishing Author hints: Part 1

Self publishing or small press publishing does not have to be a royal road to obscurity and crates of unsold books. Active, savvy authors can drive healthy book sales. Here are a couple of tips from a multi-thousand selling Australian author:

Jacqueline Dinan, author of "A Woman's War", a work of fiction dealing with World War One, has focussed on giving talks about her book to interested groups. She says that:

• The book came about because I married a history buff and realised that other than watching ‘The Sullivans’, my knowledge of Australia’s war history, was very limited. So, we set out to write a book for women like me.
• Writing the book was the history lesson that I never received at either girls’ school that I attended.
• I present to groups – Rotary, Probus, View, U3A, Legacy, War Widows, Educational, Shrine, RACV Club (they are all keen for speakers)
• The power point presentation is about the research I did into Women on the Home Front & Men on The Western Front

In addition, Jacqueline was very active in soliciting reviews for her book prior to print publication. Reviewers included the Herald Sun, the Weekly Times and Dame Elisabeth Murdoch.

Stay tuned for further practical tips for authors.