I’m on a precipice with my writing goals this year. All good things to consider. I purposefully left my goals open in 2018 to allow changes. I wanted to back off on the Amazon Kindle World commitments I made, to allow more time to write full novels and start a new series. So far, I’m on target with my goals and it’s exciting.
MY BACK LIST – I loved Laura Benedict’s post yesterday On the Matter of Backlists. I will soon have my YA back list titles returned to me and I’m excited to expand my inventory of books that are under my control. As I have the time, I will reissue them with new covers and have the ability to control pricing and subsidiary rights.
QUESTION – For those of you who have had rights reverted back to you – Have you every considered adding additional scenes or content? Change an ending? Or even continue a series (at least one more book) to conclude a story line? I’d love to hear about that.
RADISH – I also was approved to become a writer for Radish– serialized fiction available on an app for your phone. The approval didn’t take long, after I submitted a project for their consideration. I’ve set up my author profile and financial info for payment, and have my first story (Mr January) split into episodes with cliffhanger endings to entice readers to buy the next installment. It’s been fun to rethink the story as in episodes and adhere to their guidelines on length of ep offerings and marketing suggestions.
Radish is not a publisher. They are only offering a platform to expose your writing to new readers. If you sharpen your skills to create enticing teasers and can break apart your book into serialized fiction episodes that appeal to the reader/subscribers, this is more of a promotional tool. Larger publishing houses are trying out this platform by selecting certain authors in their house to participate.
I’ll report back when I have anything new, but so far, it’s been relatively easy. No special formatting. No cover design. They only want 1-2 images for the book, without text (since they insert font over the image when you upload). They in turn send out email promos to their subscribers that feature your story/series under their guidelines as new episodes are launched. This is free advertising for your work.
NEW PROJECT – I always love it when a new project starts to take hold in my brain. I’ve been inspired by certain well-written TV shows that have a rhythm to the plotting turning points (beats) with key pivots that turn the plot on its ear. I’ve used my “W” plotting method with success, as far as developing proposals and outlines for new books. For someone who started out as a complete “pantser,” I have evolved. My last completed project – The Curse She Wore – hit every beat, turning point, black moment, and mirror. But I am now eager to get back after another project and will start on that this month. Every project is a new opportunity to learn and flex my wings.
PERSONAL GOALS/HEALTH – My regular medical check-ups have me visiting various doctors for different reasons – mostly prevention. I’m taking a healthier approach to my eating and exercise – and am allowing more time with family and friends. It feels really good. For me to control my deadlines is a real bonus.
QUESTION – Do any of you have challenges in balancing your health goals with your writing time?
FOR DISCUSSION
1.) What new things are you doing with your writing? If you’re excited about a project, please share what you can. We love good news at TKZ.
2.) For those of you who have had rights reverted back to you – Have you every considered adding additional scenes or content? Change an ending? Or even continue a series (at least one more book) to conclude a story line? I’d love to hear about that.
3.) Do any of you have challenges in balancing your health goals with your writing time?
I’m 75% finished with my latest novel and I can’t stop dreaming about it. It’s keeping me up. I hope that’s a good thing. I’ve never had this happen before. Have any of you?
My novel is something very far from my comfort zone. For a large section of the story, my characters time travel (in an odd way) to Victorian London where they hunt Jack the Ripper. They have their reasons and the clock is ticking.
Whenever I add paranormal elements to any of my stories, I want the premise to almost seem plausible. You know how most people get scared when sitting around a campfire, telling ghost stories? That’s the visceral feeling I hope readers will get when they come along for a ride to the streets of White Chapel 1888.
I not only had to research the many resources on the Jack the Ripper case and take a view on what I think might’ve happened for the sake of my plot, I also had to research the time period to recreate a setting that will come alive on the page. In 1888, London was not the progressive modern city it is today. This was before proper sanitation, plumbing, and before police investigative methods were improved.
Tenement slum houses held large families of immigrants contained in small rooms rented by the day. Disease ran rampant with poor options for drinking water. Within close proximity to these slums lived wealthier Londoners who attended the opera and dined in fine restaurants. A newspaper called The Star had started in 1888, the year Jack had been born to evil. It had originally provided a voice for the common folk on injustice, but anything on the White Chapel murders turned a profit for the newspaper and became the driving story of the day.
A challenge has been to add enough details for history buffs yet recreate this world for readers who might be more interested in the peril of the characters. There’s always a balance and a consideration for good pacing.
My story is seen through the eyes of a young woman in present day who is desperate to find justice for a murdered friend in New Orleans. She’s obsessed with the Ripper case because she thinks it is related to the death of her friend. She steals a vintage necklace off a body and brings it to a mysterious yet reclusive psychic, only to find that she is correct that the jewelry is linked to her friend’s investigation. When held in his hand, the necklace catapults the psychic to two horrific murders. The vintage piece is the key to locating Jack the Ripper on the night he kills his 5th victim, Mary Kelly. I can’t give too much away, but I hope you’ll see the many moving parts of this story.
In order to recreate time travel, the hunters (led by the psychic) must be willing to suspend their bodies in a near death coma. Similar to how dreams work, a willing mind can share the common existence of a shared dream. My twin sisters often shared the same dreams. For most that would be scary, but it was normal for them. It’s been said that if you dream of your own death, you die in the dream. How many of you believe that is possible? Does it make you think twice before imagining it?
While my characters hunt the Ripper in spirit form, they are invisible to everyone except their one spirit guide (someone from 1888 that they must find in order to remain tethered to their world). As you can imagine, there are challenges to not having a physical body, yet they must be presentable in period clothing to the one guide (their citizen of heaven) who is capable of seeing the traveler.
Another challenge was to create believable dialogue during the time travel segment. What my modern woman hears from the people she meets must sound authentic. That involved a lot of historical research as well. It helped that my narrator was a modern young woman. For most of the historical part of the plot, her voice dominated, but I made sure she overheard the locals to make sure the color would be there.
But things are not what they seem in the netherworld between life and death. Evil and Fate combine to change history in ways my team of hunters will never foresee. Their worst fears are exposed and they must face their worst nightmares. As a writer, it’s my job to make my characters pay for the daring things they do to become a star in their story.
Thinking through all the ramifications of affecting history or interfering with fate–while doing it in a way to create mysterious twists in the plot–has been another fun challenge. Every time I think I know where the story is going, it changes course again, in a good way. I’ve surprised myself in ways I couldn’t have foreseen. The plot had to develop and the characters’ dilemmas had to rise to the top in order for me to see different outcomes and motivations. I’ve added layers to my story that I never would’ve seen coming. That’s a good feeling.
This is the first book in a new Trinity LeDoux series for me. The working title is – The Curse She Wore. Trinity is a 24-year-old wannabe bounty hunter, trying to get her license in New Orleans. At the start of the story she is homeless, but everything changes after my hermit psychic sees something brave yet vulnerable in her.
The first time I visited New Orleans, I sensed the layers of richness to the setting and understood why so many writers find the location completely captivating. I’ve waited to write a story set in New Orleans. This is it. I’m bringing in a Cuban influence, the Santeria faith (used for the concept of an ancestral spirit guide or citizen of heaven), a discreet Voo Doo shop for true believers, and a reclusive psychic from an old wealthy family who lives on an historic plantation. He’s got secrets of his own.
My tag line for this story is – “They had Death in Common.”
For Discussion: 1.) Tell me about the challenges of your current WIP. Anything interesting to research?
2.) Have you ever worked in the details of a real murder into your work of fiction? How did that work for you?
If you’re on Instagram, please find and follow me at thisLINK.
By Usien – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22220725
I will be traveling today for a bit of sun and fun. I’ll try to pop back when I can…IF I CAN. For my post, I offer the work of a gutsy anonymous submitter for a first page critique. I’ll have my feedback below. Please add to the conversation with your constructive comments so we can help this author with suggestions for him or her to consider.
The submitter added this insight into their work:
This is a murder mystery set in the early 1990s that digs into the dark, unseemly corners of academia where moral corruption and the abuse of power hide.
***
Club Orleans, Sayreville, NJ
As Megan completed her sinuous corkscrew down the pole she saw him—Professor D.B., the last person she ever hoped to encounter here.
Holy. Fricking. Hell. She released the pole and strutted across the stage away from him, forced on her most seductive stage face, and hoped it hid the rush of fear that filled her stomach to overflowing. She managed to resist covering her all-but-naked breasts.
Her mind flooded with the image of the Psych Department chair dressing her down before sliding the letter across his pompous desk, the letter that would explain that she’d been kicked out of the grad program, and that she might as well pack up her apartment and move back to Gump-ville, Indiana, to the welcoming jeers of everyone who’d ever warned that she was too big for her britches. But it was the thought that followed that made her shudder—the thought of what good old D.B. might propose to keep his silence.
He couldn’t have recognized me. When she started dancing again, she’d gone to great lengths to morph her appearance—heavy make-up, huge eighties hair, costuming—and to transform her persona from Miss Quiet-Studious. Considering she only worked at clubs at least a half-hour from campus (and avoided the elite establishments altogether), she was certain she’d never see anyone from the program. Her transformation was good insurance nonetheless.
As she latched onto the life-preserver thought that D.B. couldn’t have recognized her, the fear dissipated. But what was he doing here? Look, make a last round and call it a night. Stay in persona and treat him like any other customer.
She worked her way around the rectangular bar that surrounded the stage, her nerves increasing proportionally as the number of bills in the elastic of her G-string grew. The whole time, she felt D.B.’s eyes crawling over her body. She suppressed another shudder.
And then she was facing him. “I hope you enjoyed my show.” She tried to keep the right level of sultry in her voice.
“Oh, it was . . . eye-opening, despite how much I missed.” D.B.’s eyes bored into her as he dangled a ten.” Miss . . . ?”
And in those eyes was the damning truth—he recognized her.
FEEDBACK
There is definitely a disturbance happening for Megan. Nothing like an unexpected visitor to your place of employment to rattle you, especially when you are half-naked and plying your best moves on a stripper pole. It’s hard to imagine why a graduate student would be stripping. The money must be good or she must be desperate for funds.
To have a professor be the one to find her is a solid set up. I don’t know why Megan calls him Professor D.B. by his initials for the reader. Why not just say his name since she’s in her head? I had to reread to see if DB is the chair of the Psych department and assumed DB wasn’t the big kahuna. I liked that the author didn’t drift into back story and stay there until the face off when Megan sees in his eyes that he recognizes her, but there is enough back story and “slow the pace” explanations that divert the reader’s attention from Megan’s mortifying moment of being recognized by someone from her graduate program.
This is definitely a page turner, but I would like to offer a few tidbits for the author to consider, to add layers to this intro. The writing is a little sparse and more can be woven into this intro to give a feel for how much Megan has at stake.
GENRE – If I only had this intro as a peek at the genre, I would’ve thought it to be a Harlequin Romance. There’s a hint of humor to Megan as a feisty heroine working her way through her graduate program. Is DB a soon-to-be love interest or a dastardly villain will to blackmail her into his sexual demands? What conflict would they have to sustain a whole novel? From this set up, I don’t know.
From the set up the anonymous author sent with the submission, we see that this is a murder mystery set in the 1990s and it’s about moral corruption and abuse of power in the academic world, but that’s not the feel of this intro. If Megan will be blackmailed by DB to keep her secret in exchange for sexual favors that will grow into a murder, then I would suggest the author layer in more mystery and the threat of coercion to this piece. The reader needs to see Megan’s fear and vulnerability at getting caught and her willingness to do anything to keep her secret. Beyond this short intro, the reader would need to feel her shame if her mother found out, or how her career plans would be dashed.
Words like “Gump-ville Indiana” and “too big for her britches” and “eighties hair” are meant for cliched humor. If this is not the intention with the rest of the story line, then why begin the book with implied humor?
SETTING – I like the world building of a good setting. It doesn’t have to be drawn out or slow the pace, but an effective setting can add to the emotional aspects of the scene. In this intro, I wonder if the setting can be an element of mystery to draw the reader into the scene, where it’s not completely clear where Megan is. The phrase “sinuous corkscrew down the pole” is a dead giveaway where she is and what she’s doing, but what if the description is vague and develops into something more as a tease. (The sample rewrite below was written hastily by me to illustrate the point of focusing on Megan, avoiding back story and adding more of a threat from DB. I’m sure the anonymous author could do better.)
SAMPLE REWRITE WITH MORE SETTING AND LESS BACK STORY
Through the blinding lights of the small stage, Megan caught a familiar silhouette—a tall man standing in the shadows apart from the rest. Something triggered a memory and made her think of him, but he vanished as soon as his face came into her mind. Spirals of smoke clouded the air as she moved and the music built to a crescendo. Her big finish would be next. Her fake eyelashes made it harder to search the crowd for the last person she expected to see.
Please…it can’t be him.
She strayed from her usual routine to stay in the murky corners near the velvet curtain and worked the edge of the stage until she felt the heat off the horde of faceless patrons and heard the low grumbles from her regulars. Megan couldn’t avoid her big finale. She had a reputation to uphold, but as she strutted across the stage and into the spotlight toward the shiny brass stripper pole, she sensed the laser heat off his eyes—Professor D.B. from her Psych department graduate program.
He’d stepped closer to the stage—and her.
After she turned her back on him and reached for the brass pole, she hoisted her body into her signature spiral that had the men hollering for more. With every turn and every impossible stretch of her limber body, she searched the shadows and hoped the professor hadn’t recognized her. She had troweled on enough makeup where her own sweet mother wouldn’t recognize her.
Her future, everything she had worked for, would be riding on whether she had only imagined Professor D. B. in the front row. Adrenaline raged through her body as heat flushed to her cheeks. Oh, God, please no.
OPEN-ENDED QUESTIONS THAT MIGHT ENHANCE INTRO – Here are a few questions that came to my mind that may keep the focus on Megan and the tension, rather than dipping a toe into back story. The back story is sparingly used, but it’s there. It starts in the 3rd paragraph and is threaded through as Megan thinks of the ramifications of getting caught because D.B. might recognize her.
With open-ended, the author can put his or her take on the answers that might make it into a rewrite, to put their own spin on the story. I’ve found that by offering open-ended questions, the author usually comes back with something far better than my rewrite. It’s their story and their characters.
1.) When Megan spots D.B., is she upside down or spinning on a pole with stage lights? This would make it harder for her to see him clearly. She’d have to change her routine to peer through the silhouettes of men and hands touching her costume. It could add to the tension if she catches a glimpse of him, but he disappears–or build up her stress as she sees a familiar face without letting the reader know who she spots until the last minute.
2.) Does she change her routine because she’s afraid of taking off everything if it’s him? Or maybe she does awkward poses to get a better look at the crowd, like looking between her legs upside down. How do patrons of the club react as she changes her routine?
3.) What does the club look like, smell like? Setting might add to her stress if it’s the same “grind” – pardon the pun.
HOUSEKEEPING
In the sentences below, there are words to clean up. I’m not trying to offer different writing. I’d like to use the author’s words to start and clean up from there. I don’t begin sentences with “And,” don’t embed dialogue lines within a paragraph, and try to build stronger sentences and delete uses of “was.”
BEFORE
And then she was facing him. “I hope you enjoyed my show.” She tried to keep the right level of sultry in her voice.
“Oh, it was . . . eye-opening, despite how much I missed.” D.B.’s eyes bored into her as he dangled a ten.” Miss . . . ?”
And in those eyes was the damning truth—he recognized her.
AFTER
“I hope you enjoyed the show.” She fought to sound sultry as she came face-to-face with him.
“Oh, it was…eye opening, despite how much I missed.” DB’s eyes drilled into her as he dangled a ten. “Miss…?”
In his eyes were the damning truth. He recognized her.
Thanks to the author for their submission. I wish you luck on your project. For discussion, please comment with your feedback. Thank you.
1.) Is this a page turning submission for you?
2.) What suggestions would you make for this author?
We have an anonymous submission of the first 400 words to a work entitled “NELF.” Please read and give your constructive criticism in your comments. I will provide feedback below. Our gratitude to the anonymous author for their submission. Enjoy.
***
Geraldine jogged around seaweed and broken shells deposited along the low-tide line by last night’s rainstorms. Turning from the gusting wind, she faced the horizon as the sun broke through a grey cloudbank. The tail of the storm had moved out to sea. She might have customers today after all. She’d better pick up her pace if she wanted a shower before opening the beach shop.
She searched the ocean for her half-way marker, the Hyde Channel buoy. As Geraldine hurdled over piles of seaweed and shells sweat rolled down her spine. Without slowing, she pulled off her sweatshirt, cinched it around her waist, and ran closer to the surf.
When she was parallel to the channel marker, she turned around. Wind pushed against her back and she sprinted all the way to the path leading to Beach Road.
While bringing her heartrate down, Geraldine trotted in place and faced the roaring Atlantic. A red object bobbed in the ocean. Too small for a boat or surfboard. The object disappeared behind cresting waves. Shielding her eyes, Geraldine focused on the whitecaps and waited for the object to reappear.
A small arm stuck up from the waves. A flash of red hair and white face. A child!
Geraldine dashed forward, her pulse racing, and stopped short at the surf line. The child bobbed up and down. The ocean was rough. Dangerous. She couldn’t go in without a boat or a boogie board or they might both drown. She sprinted toward the lifeguard hut. Any floatation device inside would do. She pulled the handle and the door rattled. Locked!
She glanced back at the rolling surf, but didn’t spot the child. Her stomach tightened. Had the child gone under? She shifted her gaze down surf. A flailing arm, and then a head broke through the foam. Thank God. The child was still afloat.
She scanned the beach for someone to alert.
The beach was deserted, but the child needed saving now.
She yanked off her sneakers and ran until she was a half-bay ahead of the child. Geraldine took a deep breath and dove into the surf. She torpedoed under the water.
Geraldine exploded to the surface and swam at an angle to reach the child quicker. Please stay afloat just a little longer.
***
FEEDBACK
This introduction sets up a classic and eerie story. I envision a bleak seashore on the morning after a turbulent storm that has disrupted an unwavering sea. How frightening to see the body of a child adrift in the current with YOU as the only one there to save a life. The premise is a good one that would normally get me turning the page to read more.
The writing is relatively clean and easy to get through without a lot of hiccups, but I wanted more. Let’s talk about setting first in a general overview.
SETTING – Setting can really contribute to setting up a story if it’s entwined with the character or contributes to the atmosphere or mood to the plot. When I think of great examples of settings that ARE an integral part of the story, I think of movies like the Jesse Stone stories from Robert B Parker, starring Tom Selleck. The Maine town of Paradise is mysterious, breathtakingly beautiful and scary at the same time. Another example of a setting that becomes the story is the crime show Wallander (from Swedish novelist Henning Mankell), starring Kenneth Branagh in the role of Kurt Wallander. The isolated setting in Wallander is haunting and also says a lot about the character who is content living alone and isolated.
Tips on Setting
1.) Decide what role you want for setting to play in your plot. In J K Rowling’s Harry Potter series, Hogwarts IS a character, a very enchanting and unforgettable one. Not every story needs to have the setting so prominently described, but a great setting can enhance the plot or give insight into the character(s).
2.) Settings can contribute to the mood or add tension or a mysterious sense of foreboding. I’ll never forget the effective use of setting in Tami Hoag’s book NIGHT SINS where children go missing as the extremely chilling winter nights continue to drop in temperature, dead of winter in Minnesota. The tag lines were a constant reminder that the child could die from exposure and the clock would be ticking for the police. I was a nervous wreck as I turned the pages and stayed up way too late to finish the book.
3.) Use the senses of the reader to convey setting. It’s easy to describe a visual setting, but it can add layers of nuance if the reader’s senses are engaged. In this example (NELF), what does the sea smell like after a turbulent storm? Does it affect her breathing as she runs? Does the grit on the shore cling to her damp clothes? How does the salty sea air affect her breathing as a runner (salt through her nostrils or the taste of it on her tongue).
4.) Setting can reflect something of the character and mirror mood or be symbolic of something in the character’s life. The example I gave before about Wallander and his remote home is a solid visual example of the isolated way he lives his life. He’s content, but trouble comes to his door like a personal affront, threatening his comfort zone.
5.) Setting can be described through the character’s POV by giving the character an opinion or by accentuating the character’s body and mind through setting. In the case of NELF, the lone woman runner describes her body as she runs. Rather than focusing so much on a simple task that most people know about (ie running), why not have the mist off the crashing waves mix with the dripping sweat of her body or have the chilly wind fight the heat of her churning blood as she ramps up her pace. I’ve run in the rain before and it’s exhilarating yet very soggy on the clothes and hair.
Examples of interesting settings reflected through the characters:
Catcher in the Rye – J D Salinger (on NYC) “I live in New York, and I was thinking about the lagoon in Central Park, down near Central Park South. I was wondering if it would be frozen over when I got home, and if it was, where did the ducks go? I was wondering where the ducks went when the lagoon got all icy and frozen over. I wondered if some guy came in a truck and took them away to a zoo or something. Or if they just flew away.”
The Goldfinch – Donna Tartt (about Las Vegas) “Though we’d been driving a while, there were no landmarks, and it was impossible to say where we were going or in which direction. The skyline was monotonous and unchanging and I was fearful that we might drive through the pastel houses altogether and out into the alkali waste beyond, into some sun-beaten trailer park from the movies.”
To the Lighthouse – Virginia Wolff (about the Isle of Skye – Scotland) “So fine was the morning except for a streak of wind here and there that the sea and sky looked all one fabric, as if sails were stuck high up in the sky, or the clouds had dropped down into the sea.”
Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte (about the Yorkshire moors, England) “My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.”
NELF Thoughts
TIME OF DAY – I didn’t get a sense of the time of day. I presumed it to be morning since the woman is thinking about opening her beach shop and references a storm from last night, but time of day could contribute to the mood. I would recommend this to be clearer.
REPEAT DESCRIPTION – In the first sentence, seaweed and broken shells are mentioned. The same is described in the very next paragraph (ie “piles of seaweed and shells). With such a moody setting, surely there is more to describe.
MAKE THE INTRO STAND OUT MORE – The description of the woman running is bland and forgettable. The setting is also bland, considering that this eerie shoreline could contribute to the foreboding aspects of finding a body adrift in the waves.
CAN THE SETTING ENHANCE THE INTRO? The author does not dwell too much on the setting before he or she gets into the mystery, but the set up could be more effective if the author decides how much the setting can enhance the intro. Review the tips on setting above to see if there is anything that would fit and enhance this mystery opener. An author would know the mind of the character and what would work best, but I would recommend the setting be enhanced to weave it into the mystery more.
WEAVE IN MYSTERY SOONER – The setting description and the woman running covers the first four paragraphs, then the story switches to “a small arm” and the mystery begins. There’s virtually no lead up to the moment she sees the arm. Fear and foreboding should be enhanced to draw emotions from the reader. What if she’s running and sees the red color on the water and keeps her eye on it. Any setting can be enhanced by the mystery element of what that red thing is that’s floating. This would give her something to do, rather than staying in her head and focusing on her running. Weave the mystery in sooner and let it unfold as the sense of foreboding ramps up.
NEEDS MORE TENSION AND EMOTION – As far as tension, the author has described the woman and her reaction, but it’s more in the sense of a clinical description of what she does. The emotional component is lacking for me as a reader. I can easily imagine what this might feel like to be alone on a beach run and see something horrifying, forced into action. Imagine that after she tries breaking into the lifeguard station, she dives into the ocean. On the same level as the rolling waves, she would easily lose sight of the body. Think of how that body might look as the waves undulate and lift that pale form into the sky. How would that body look in the crest of a wave?
If she thinks the child is still alive, the clock would be ticking and she’d be in a panic to get to the kid. How does that affect her breathing? Does she tread water to search the waves? Is the body floating on the back or on the face? Now imagine coming up on the body too fast and being faced with it as it brushes up against you. Cold skin. Icy water. Bloated face of the child? This opening scene could be much more emotional and I can picture how anyone would be drawn into the mystery of this child’s death.
DISCUSSION
What feedback can you give our brave author, TKZers?
2.) How do you work setting into your stories? Have you ever enhanced your story with setting? Describe how it worked.
I heard some disappointing news from Amazon Kindle Worlds (KW) yesterday. They are changing the program and not offering a bonus to help defray production cost. The money wasn’t much. It was $500 and went down to $250, but that money took care of the cover design and formatting. It wasn’t considered an “advance.’
Amazon is keep the program the same (including promised bonuses) for any approved launches already set up for the rest of 2018. They are working with the host authors on who is signed up as a writer, etc.
The host authors who have kindle worlds are continuing with their host duties, but in 2019, Amazon will not be involved in scheduling the releases (the host authors would do that). Nothing much will change for the host authors. They will have the same revenue sharing and agreements in place. It’s too soon to tell whether the lack of bonus money will lessen the enthusiasm for authors to sign up. Initial discussions are mixed, but I would imagine Amazon’s gamble will pay off, that many authors will still see a benefit in a group launch and the host authors organizing things. They will probably like getting their work exposed to a larger reader base shared by the other authors and the host writer.
Amazon never did much promo for the launches, but the fact that they have and maintain the platform is a benefit that would be hard to replicate. Amazon is banking on authors not caring if they get the bonus and hope they get to retain the same enthusiasm for writing stories but pay nothing for the copyright retention.
But Amazon KW does nothing with those copyrights. The fact that KW doesn’t take advantage of subrights like audio, film, or foreign rights makes me have second thoughts about continuing with them. For many of the worlds, authors retain rights to their original characters (but not all worlds do this, so read the fine print). If the author has a unique setting that hasn’t already been established in another series from that author (before it’s crossed over with the host author’s world), then Amazon could get copyrights to that setting. Another drawback at present is that Amazon Kindle World does not have a worldwide distribution. It’s something they want to achieve, but KW is only a division of Amazon and does not share the same distribution channels.
RADISH FICTION
But after reading about the changes to Amazon Kindle Worlds, authors were talking about another new start up company that has found a niche in serialized fiction. Have you heard of RadishFiction.com ? Radish is a new app for serialized fiction, geared for the mobile generation to bring novels to smart phones. It’s open to a global market (really big in eastern Asia (Korea and China) where the enthusiasm started) and Radish can be used as a different source of income or to create buzz for an upcoming book that hasn’t gotten published yet.
Could this replace Netgalley? The expense to place an ARC on Netgalley is pricey, even if an author joins a group or service to help defray the cost. Radish wouldn’t specifically earn an author early reviews, but the writer would score money for fiction sold. Netgalley doesn’t do that.
Plus there apparently isn’t any copyrights sold. Although I haven’t seen a confirmation of this, I believe the author retains copyright and is only making their content available for sale.
Radish is recruiting authors who have written for Canada’s WattPad and Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing or other similar type opportunities.The idea is to write serialized shorter fiction with cliffhangers to hook a readership. Generally this is 2,000 word chapters of original short genre fiction with cliffhangers that hook the reader to keep reading and keep buying.
So with the changes to Amazon Kindle Worlds, writing that is similar to fanfiction.net, Radish could be a good opportunity to find a different income source with fewer hassles. Authors are paid in “micropayments” with authors receiving a range of $3,000-13,000/month, similar to how game platforms work.
Radish has an impressive list of investors and plans to hire editors, developers, and designers. They have about 700 writers creating serialized fiction for 300,000 readers.
The initial genre that has been big with Radish is YA romance, science fiction and fantasy. It’s geared for a younger audience that is comfortable reading off smartphones, but I would imagine there is room for growth into other genres. Radish is also looking for traditionally published authors who want to bring original content to them.
Authors must submit to write for Radish and there is a review team to screen applicants. HERE is the link to get started and fill out the application. Read the various press releases on their site. You’ll get more insight into what they are doing.
So what Amazon Kindle World takes away, Radish delivers something new that could be very exciting.
Discussion:
1.) What other out of the box outlets have you seen for authors to bring original content?
2.) Are you a smart phone reader? Do you see potential in what Radish is offering?
The Phoenix Agency hires a mysterious woman psychic from the ancient and mythical Lotus Circle to break down the mental barriers of Braxton Valentine—a black ops Psi agent with a death wish and a hunger for revenge.
For your reading pleasure, we have an anonymous submission of the first 400 words to a story titled – Rabya. I give my feedback below, but I also wanted to share this tidbit that the author shared on the inspiration for the story. In my own writing, headlines often inspire my novels and I love blending my research into fiction to add gravitas and authenticity.
FROM THE ANONYMOUS AUTHOR – Based on a true situation, RABYA is the story of how an American software engineer lands on the Terror Watch List because his live-in girlfriend, Rayba Salik, is Turkish. Does she have a secret?
***
Two minutes before take-off, Justin Karns twists side-to-side, trying to carve out room for his shoulders. The tall guy to his left has already commandeered the armrest. His manspread invades Justin’s space. The thought of rubbing knees with him across the Atlantic Ocean is creepy. If Justin doesn’t resolve this problem soon, he’ll be a mess for his big interview.
A few rows ahead, three seats sit empty. Though it’s verboten to move during takeoff, the seat should still be available in five minutes if everyone follows the rules. Yet, when the plane levels off—with the seat belt sign still lit—a man darts into the empty row. Justin pushes his call button.
“May I help you?” The flight attendant asks.
“Yes, please.” He glances at her name tag. “Kirsten, this row is way too crowded for three tall men. I’m six-foot and cramped. Imagine how these guys feel.” He flips his thumb to the left. “There was an empty row ahead, but someone just took the middle seat.”
She glances over her shoulder and then back without a word.
“Would you mind asking that guy to take the window seat so we could both be comfortable up there. Then my friend here,” Wilt the Stilt, “will have a place to stow his legs.”
“I’m sorry,” Kirsten says. “That is not possible.”
“Seriously? I fly international all the time. People always change seats.”
“There are new rules. Sorry.” She walks away.
When Justin can’t settle in, he calls her back. He considers name dropping his interview with Cruise Talon, the famous international consulting firm, but he’d sound like a braggart. He could hyperbolize his agony, but he’d sound like a wimp. Instead, he resorts to the truth. “I really need to change seats. My future depends on being rested.”
Her blue eyes turn icy. “I am sorry. Enjoy the flight.”
Perfect. Flight attendant on a power trip.
Justin stands up, stretches his body, and watches Kirsten return to the galley. A man on the aisle with a cop’s buzz cut smirks at him and reaches into his jacket, for what—a citation pad? He wouldn’t be so judgmental if he were stuffed into a row with daddy long legs.
Desperate to relax, Justin tilts back and waits for a chance to steal a piece of the armrest.
So, I’m the only one on this flight who can’t change seats.
FEEDBACK
TO LIKE OR NOT TO LIKE JUSTIN – My overall impression is that I’m not sure I want to be in Justin’s head for an entire book. If I were a reader picking up a book and reading the first page or so, how important is it for me to like him?
Some authors can pull off complex characters, where it’s not necessary for the reader to instantly like them. If the reader can be won over by the deeds of a complicated character, you have a major bond and great writing.
But in this short sample, Justin comes across as self-involved, arrogant, cynical to a fault, and inconsiderate. If this is a story inspired by real events, I would recommend shining a more sympathetic light on Justin. The author would be better off making this guy relatable from page one. Even if Justin is irascible, if the reader sees him in an uncomfortable situation that they have been through, the focus wouldn’t be on Justin’s worst traits.
HELP THE READER RELATE TO THE SITUATION INSTEAD – If the author plans on Justin being a challenging character with a prickly nature, I would recommend the author divert the reader’s attention from his unsavory personality to focus on his situation.
Who hasn’t endured a terrible flight where everything seems to go wrong? I would concentrate on the things that many readers would have experienced, then show Justin navigating those waters to see how he deals with things.
1.) Cramped seats
2.) A crying baby or two
3.) Recirculating air that doesn’t work
4.) Seat that doesn’t recline
5.) The interior of the plane feels like a sweltering oven
6.) Someone knocks his elbow on the aisle and hits the raw nerve of his funny bone
7.) Or a plane too small for good overhead bin space and he has to cram his carry on under the seat in front of him, leaving him no leg room.
(Can you tell I’ve had my share of really awful flights? I traveled on business when I was with the energy industry. Now my commute is from my bedroom to my home office. Sweet.)
If the author is going for the kind of characters featured in GONE GIRL – as seen through the eyes of a failed and bitter marriage of a husband and wife where both of them look guilty – then the voice attempted in this opener would pose a challenge to a reader who might like to relate to a main character. It’s a fine line to have an arrogant character still be likeable enough that a reader might want to eventually root for him. Finding the right balance in a character like that takes a deft hand.
A book that resonated with me and I highly recommend is PARANOIA by Joe Finder. This novel was made into a movie. Read the book. It’s a MUCH BETTER story. As you can see from the synopsis below (embellished by me), the author has borderline criminal, Adam, start his downhill spiral by doing a favor for a friend, a buddy of his who works in the warehouse. After he gets caught in a crime by his employer, Adam is given a chance to rectify his situation and do the right thing, but instead he takes the corporate ultimatum/blackmail and breaks the law to spy on another company. It’s a story of David versus Goliath.
In Paranoia, Adam Cassidy is twenty-six and a low level employee at a high-tech corporation who hates his job. He’s a real slacker with hustler, street smarts. When he manipulates the system to do something nice for a friend, he finds himself charged with a crime and corporate security gives him a choice: prison – or become a spy in the headquarters of the company’s chief competitor.
PRESENT TENSE – I didn’t see the point to writing this story in present tense, since more readers dislike it. Present tense is more likely to appear in YA where teen readers don’t have the bias of living most of their lives reading 3rd person, past tense books.
PLAUSIBILITY ISSUES – I found several issues wrong with this intro, just from a factual standpoint.
Call Button – Before Justin presses the call button, he makes a point to notice the seat belt sign was still lit. Yet once he presses his call button, the flight attendant pops up at the ready to serve. Things happen too fast in sequence for them to sound realistic.
Rules on Changing Seats – I took issue with Justin expecting the flight attendant to settle his seating problems. Any flight attendant is there for safety reasons first, but pushy Justin expects her to fight his battles by intervening. But to compound the issue, he argues that he flies international “all the time” and people change seats. (Why he argues only about international flights and not domestic too, I have no clue.) The attendant tells him there are new rules and changing seats is not permitted, yet the whole incident that started this argument was that a guy changed seats and was allowed to stay. That’s a logic problem that readers would see, like I did, and not take the story seriously. The whole argument comes off silly. Justin is being belligerent and the attendant is being overly mean. (Most flight attendants are very accommodating.)
Justin has options – Justin has the option of asking the man who has the row to himself if he can share the seating with him. When he chooses to force the attendant to intervene, he comes across as weak and a whiner. If the objective is to give a voice to Justin that sets the stage for the entire book, I would recommend the author take a harder look at how Justin should appear in his debut moment of first appearing on the page. Is he a victim or is a jerk who’s asking for it? Does he have poor judgment or is the Cosmos teaching him a lesson in humility? The author could go anyway with this. I suggested drawing the reader in by putting Justin in a situation where the reader can relate to a terrible flight and a seriously bad day, but there are other ways for the author to go. We simply don’t what the author has in mind. As a reader, I would put this book down, however. Justin hasn’t won me over to turn the page or buy the book.
As an author, you have control of ANYTHING in the story, but the fictional world should be consistent or must seem real to the reader, in order for them to suspend disbelief and read along.
NITPICKS – Word choices and pop culture references are important and should fit the character if the story is from his or her POV.
1.) Do guys really use the word “creepy” to describe man-spreading and knocking knees with a guy sitting too close? That sounds like the word choice of a victim or a word that a woman would use. Similarly, the line below makes Justin sound childish and unwilling to even try to rectify his own problem. Not a very mature response for a guy traveling across the Atlantic for an international job with an elite employer. Anyone in this position would be assertive, a negotiator, and a charmer.
So, I’m the only one on this flight who can’t change seats.
2.) How many readers would get the reference, “Wilt the Stilt”? Wilt Chamberlain played from 1959 to 1973. Justin strikes me as a younger guy who might reference an NBA player currently playing. Another example of a description that stands out as odd to me is – Daddy Long Legs. My parents would use this. Pretty ancient reach back.
3.) By calling attention to Justin’s internal thoughts on his options (see below), the reader gets unfavorable thoughts planted about Justin that the author may not intend. By his actions, he’s already an acquired taste. Why add fuel to stoke the fire?
He considers name dropping his interview with Cruise Talon, the famous international consulting firm, but he’d sound like a braggart. He could hyperbolize his agony, but he’d sound like a wimp.
TITLE – Rabya may be a working title, but it wouldn’t make a good published title in my opinion. Using the woman’s name might also limit the cover design to feature the woman, when the story is truly about Justin and the calamity of his life. When I don’t “feel” the title right away, I start writing down alternatives and make a long list before I settle on one. Get feedback from beta readers.
DISCUSSION 1.) What do you think of books written in present tense, TKZ? Am I the only one without my 3-D glasses?
2.) What feedback would you add for this courageous author?
Since P J Parrish had to throw down the guantlet by adding music to the end of her post this week, I’ve included this link & dedicate the song to the character in this submission. Justin is having a very bad day. #TKZMusicChallenge
John Gilstrap had an excellent post yesterday on Internal Monologue that resonated with me. He gave great examples of what works and what may not, with explanations on his sage reasoning. He certainly gave me things to think about in my own writing.
I tend to write in deep POV and very tight, with sparse narratives. This is especially true when I write my novella length stories for Kindle World, which is a great exercise in writing a tight plot and keeping the pace up.
In my full novels, I reign in my internal monologue and make it focused, with the character having a journey from beginning to end of the book, as well as a journey even within each scene, so I don’t repeat the deep POV thoughts.
On the FOR WRITERS resource on my website, I have a post titled – START WITH A BANG. If you scroll down to the “Ever thought about building an onion from the inside out?” sub-heading, you’ll find a section on how I let dialogue be the starting framework and how I layer in elements to fill out a scene. Internal monologue is vital to establishing my character’s journey and emotional growth and it’s something I focus on a great deal – even when I do my final draft read – but it’s the last thing I add to any scene, because I want to control it and isolate the journey to avoid pitfalls.
Despite my own methods, I greatly admire writers like Michael Connelly (particularly his Bosch series) where his mastery of his character’s internal views feel so authentic of an experienced war weary cop. He effortlessly brings in Bosch’s personal relationships and his workload to give a 360 view of this man’s life. That’s not an easy thing to do. It requires an intense knowledge of his character Bosch.
No matter how a writer learns how to craft internal monologue, it is easily one of the areas an author can veer off course and overuse…or under use, for that matter. Have you ever read a book that is all action, devoid of emotion or insight into the character’s internal battle and conflict? This is definitely a balancing game to get internal monologue to enhance your writing and make your stories memorable for readers.
Key Points to Finding the Right Balance for Internal Monologue:
1.) DIALOGUE – If you see your narrative paragraphs stretching out onto the page in weighty clumps, look for ways to make your internal monologue lean and mean by use of dialogue. This is something I have to pay attention to, even with my sparse style. Clever dialogue is a challenge, but it can be so much fun to write.
Plus, effective dialogue can help you pace your novel and tease the reader with red herrings or mystery elements, and not a plot dump of internal thoughts.
2.) LESS IS MORE – It’s easy to get carried away with every aspect of a character’s POV. The reader doesn’t need to know every logical argument for their action or inaction. People don’t think like this, especially in the heat of the moment in an action scene.
Have patience to let the story unfold. Too much internal thought can dry up pace and bore readers. The reader doesn’t need to know everything, especially all at once in a dump.
Also be careful NOT to repeat the same thought over and over. Repeating internal strife does not constitute a journey. It only reminds the reader that the author is searching for different ways to describe the same thing. Oy.
3.) TIMING – pick your spots when internal monologue makes the most sense. James Scott Bell wrote a great post on What’s the Deal on Dreams in Fiction where he talks about starting a novel with a character in thought, no action or disturbance. Resist the urge to bury your reader in internal monologue right out of the gate.
In addition, if your character is in the middle of a shoot out, that would not be the most opportune time to share his feelings on getting dumped by his girlfriend, not even if she is the one shooting at him. (Although I would love to read a scene like that.) To make the danger seem real, stick with the action and minimize the internal strife until it’s logical for the character to ponder what happened after.
Plus, if you spill the exposition too early, the reader won’t retain it as well as if you had waited for the right timing, when the reveal would be most effective.
4.) SHOW DON’T TELL – Once you get into the quagmire of telling a character’s POV, it’s too easy to get carried away with the rest of your book. If you can SHOW what a character is feeling, and let the reader take what they will from the scene, you will leave an image nugget that will stick with them. TELLING doesn’t have the same impact.
5.) ACTION & DIALOGUE DEFINE CHARACTER – These are the two areas where readers will most remember a book. Unless you’re into author craft and can appreciate the internal monologue finesse of John Gilstrap and Michael Connelly and many other author favorites, you probably may not remember how effectively the author used internal monologue. It’s like the color black. It goes with everything in such a subtle way that you may not notice it.
FOR DISCUSSION:
1.) What tips do you have to share on how you handle internal monologue in your own writing?
2.) With the key points I listed above, do any of them pose a particular challenge for you?
3.) Name a recent book you read where you noticed the author’s deft handling of internal monologue. (I would love to expand my TBR pile.)
Happy 2018, TKZers! (Sorry for the exclamation point, John. I had to poke you after your great post on Note to Copy Editor.)
Has anyone made any new year’s resolutions for your writing?
I love the start of a new year, especially after I finished December 2017 with time off to replenish the creative well without a deadline to race against. I wanted to spend quality time with family and friends. Mission accomplished.
I have a deadline looming mid-February 2018, so I’m hunkered down with my daily word count, but the time off has done wonders for my enthusiasm.
My 5 Writing Resolutions for 2018
1.) Read Better Books – One of my 2018 resolutions is to read more books from some of my favorite authors. Well-crafted books inspire and challenge me. I love learning new things.
In 2017, I thought that since I read so much, that I should mitigate the hit to my budget by reading free e-books. I DID find some new authors I liked, but they were few and far between. For the most part, I had to stop reading many, many books (which I hate to do), due to the poor quality of the writing.
Some of the chronic problems I saw were novels with excessive passive voice, typos, missing words, rambling internal monologues, back story dumps, chatty dialogue without focus, bland characterizations, misuse of first person POV, characters I didn’t care about, and plots without structure or pace. My version of throwing the book against the wall was to delete/purge the free books off my e-reader.
To kickoff 2018, I’m reading Michael Connelly’s latest – Two Kinds of Truth – & I scored it when it was on sale. Win-Win.
2.) Dare to Try New Things – I have a partially written novel that I will finish in 2018. It involves an aspect of historical writing. It scares me to death. I’ve never taken on such an endeavor, something so daunting for me.
I’ve done my research on Victorian England (countless searches on the Internet and purchasing several research books) and need to infuse my prose with the right time period setting and dialect, without going overboard to slow the pace. It’s been a challenge on layering what I need into every scene, but so far it’s working. I’ve made a resolution to jump back on it after my Feb deadline.
3.) Stay Better Connected with my Family and Friends – This is a personal goal, but it contributes a great deal to my writing inspirations and my positive frame of mind. My close circle gives me the elixir of joy that I need to push myself to new accomplishments. The bigger challenge might be to find face time during the year, in between my deadlines, but this is important to me. It needs to happen.
4.) Add Depth to my Character Voices & Back Story – In my 2018 challenge novel, the one that will have historical elements, I have a unique character that makes me work hard to get her right. I struggle for every word out of her mouth, to make her distinctive. This has not been an easy feat.
As I write, I have my Thesaurus open and often must go back over what I had jotted down in haste, to fine tune her voice and truly listen to her as I edit. One of my pet peeves is to read a book that starts out with great care, but it gets sloppy on the character portrayal in the middle and toward the end. That feels like a cheat to me, so I am putting effort into every scene all the way through.
5.) Find a Better Balance with my Deadlines – I want to find a better balance between writing Amazon Kindle World novellas along with my full novels this year. Kindle World deadlines are totally up to me on how many I agree to write and what those deadlines might be. I will commit to fewer KWs this year (to write in more selected worlds), in order to find time for my full length novels and proposals.
Those are my top five resolutions. They should probably be called GOALS. In my mind they are very achievable and I’m determined to check them off my list as I get them done.
For Discussion:
What about you, TKZers? Have you made any writer resolutions for 2018?
Do you have any rituals for goal setting? How do you celebrate your achievements?
Below is my next cover for a book I haven’t started yet. I have a general idea on the plot and had a broad outline, but after playing with the cover, I’m now inspired to launch into the story. I even changed the title to make it fit.
Cover Design by: Fiona Jayde Media
Valentine & the Lotus Circle
(Novella 2 of 2)
Coming Feb, 2018
Love made him vulnerable…once
Driven by guilt and revenge over a tragic death, Braxton Valentine is coerced into being the latest recruit to the Phoenix Agency as a covert operator and a powerful psychic, but he is not a team player. To confront his rogue ways, the Agency hires a mysterious woman psychic from the ancient and mythical Lotus Circle–and she takes no prisoners.
For your reading pleasure, I have an anonymous submission entitled DRESSED TO KILL from a brave author. I’ll have my feedback below, but please feel free to provide yours in the comments. Let’s help this gutsy author with constructive criticism.
Dressed to Kill
We’d been driving for ten minutes when Mark broke the silence.
“Do you think he killed her?”
“This is my baby brother we’re talking about.”
“Megan, you do realize she was a first class slut?” I looked at my husband. What would he know about it? He’d barely said two words to Annabel since she’d married Ted. In fact, at Thanksgiving, every time Annabel walked into the room, he’d found an excuse to leave. Although I had to admit, his characterization of my sister-in-law was, not to be morbid, dead on.
“Good. Then there’ll be a long line-up of suspects the police can focus on,” I replied.
“Should we let your Dad know?”
No way. Wendell Jenkins was an opinionated, blustery man, just as likely to tell you to go to hell as to take your side. He raised me to think I could be anyone I wanted and I loved him to distraction. But right now, my brother needed understanding and compassion. Not traits in abundant supply in my father’s arsenal.
“I’ll handle this for now. We can always involve them later.”
“Do you think they’ll arrest him?”
“They’ll have to deal with that pesky little thing called motive.” It didn’t seem to matter how badly Annabel treated him, he always came back for more. I always assumed it was love.
“It’s usually the husband.”
“Not this time.”
In our family, Ted had been the kid who collected stray animals like charms on a bracelet—not only the obligatory cats and dogs but iguanas, rabbits, even a snake he kept in a jar by his bed. He read voraciously—books with animals that talked, and went on adventures, and tolerated their human owners with a droll sense of humor and a wink. And God save you if he caught you fiddling with the microscope he used to analyze the fur and feather samples he gathered in the woods behind our house. So none of us batted an eye when he enrolled in vet school. Fait accompli, as they say in France. Not that I’d ever been to France, but you get my point. My brother was the modern-day equivalent of Dr. Doolittle.
So no way did he tie his wife to the swing-set in their backyard, stuff her panties in her mouth, and slit her throat.
FEEDBACK
APPEALING VOICE – I really liked the voice of the character and the author’s ability to write clean, flowing narrative with dark (tongue in cheek) humor. The talent of the author is definitely present, but this opener is mostly dialogue with a sparse set up of the one line – ‘We’d been driving for ten minutes when Mark broke the silence.’
TENSION DRAINER – If this was MY brother, I’d be more frantic and not so calm. The distance of this dialogue, coupled with the calmness and the humor, drains the emotional stress from the intro.
ALTERNATIVE INTRO – I would’ve preferred this woman and her husband be screeching to a halt outside her brother’s home while the police are still there. The chaos of a crime scene, mixed with a doubting brother-in-law and a concerned sister and her distraught brother in handcuffs would make a more interesting start.
LESS TELL, MORE SHOW – The way it reads now, this is a way to have characters “tell” what is happening, rather than “show” it. The inner monologue of the sister (even as engaging as it is) covers for a back story dump of the brother’s past. If the intention is to have these characters provide witty, dark-humored banter, they would still need more action, such as a crime scene, to draw the reader in more.
TO BE, OR NOT TO BE…FUNNY – This line veers the intro toward dark humor – ‘Fait accompli, as they say in France. Not that I’d ever been to France, but you get my point. My brother was the modern-day equivalent of Dr. Doolittle.’ But this left me confused with whether this is a cozy mystery with grim humor, after I read the last line, revealing the murder.
MISPLACED GORE OR SHOCKER WITH INTENTION? – The ending of this brief submission shocked me with its gruesomeness, coming off a calm discussion. It’s not enough to make the reader turn the page and keep going if the tension is diffused by humor in the midst of graphic violence. I’m confused on what type of book this is. If the characters aren’t taking this seriously, than how can I as a reader, unless the author fully embraces humor with more, over-the-top situations.
COZY THRILLER? – I’ve read about a new genre called cozy thriller, but I haven’t read any books with this genre bender.
The set up in this opener should be better, in my opinion. Clearly, the author can write, but I would prefer a better place to start. Less telling, more showing.
BETTER START IDEAS:
1.) Have the brother be the opener. Does he wake up from an unexplained stupor to find his wife dead in a gruesome state?
2.) Does a neighbor accidentally stumble upon the sight of the dead wife in the backyard, glimpse the husband on the scene, and assume the worst to call 911?
3.) If this is supposed to be filled with dark humor, have the sister and other ladies show up for a game of cards or a murder mystery book club, only to find her brother covered in blood with no explanation. Some of the ladies could applaud the dead body and the performance of the brother if they thought this was a murder mystery put on for their benefit. The sister could be frantic, trying to stop the ladies from trampling the crime scene, while she struggles for the truth from her brother.
CONCLUSION – Bottom line, there is much to like about the writing of this author, but the set up needs work. I also want to have a better feel for what genre this is supposed to be.
DISCUSSION:
1.) What feedback would you give this author, TKZers?
2.) What genre do you think this is?
3.) Have you ever read a “cozy thriller”? What would make a cozy thriller in your opinion?
I wanted to share my latest foray into a major promotion run. I’d heard good things about BookBub, had researched it before, but never submitted a book until last week. This promo option isn’t cheap. It’s a real leap of faith that you’ll sell more than the feature costs. I made sure that I ticked off the boxes I knew about, to make my submission more appealing to the stringent requirements to qualify.
Founded in 2012, BookBub has been featured in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, showcasing their huge outreach to avid readers with their daily deal emails to millions of subscribers. This is a free service to readers, vetted by an expert editorial team with handpicked recommendations. It doesn’t sell books directly, but offers books from authors that are available through major ebook retailers and devices. It also focuses your feature to readers interested in YOUR genre.
If you’re a published author, you can claim your books and create a profile to grow your followers on a forum for readers that an author can cultivate directly. I had never “claimed” my author profile and didn’t realize I had followers. Plus not all of my most recent books were listed, so I had to update my profile after they authorize me as the author.
BookBub scrutinizes the books it selects, so I knew I had to adhere to recommendations other authors had shared online about their experiences. HERE is the list of requirements from BookBub, but there are other websites and blog posts with more help, too.
The book I submitted is The Last Victim (published 2015) and here are details on what I had to do.
I had a professionally designed cover that I knew would be acceptable from my experience. BookBub scrutinizes submissions for a well-formatted book, free of typos and grammatical errors. They also want books that have accumulated enough good reviews without sharing how many that is. This can be intimidating. The Last Victim has 26 reviews for an average of 4.4 out of 5. I really didn’t know if they were looking for 50+ but I went for it. Don’t let one deficiency in a selection criteria force you to back down. If you don’t succeed, keep learning and try again.
I had great cover blurbs/praises to pitch on my book and across my branding platforms (website & social media) from well-known authors, magazines, and critical reviews from professional editorial sources. (Don’t let this tip scare you. I accumulated mine over time. You can too.)
The Last Victim is a full novel that has never been discounted. It normally sells for $3.99, but I submitted it to BookBub for a special, limited offer of $0.99 across all retailer platforms that I listed in my submission.
My novel is widely available on all the retailers BookBub features and then some: Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Google, and iBooks. Since it was published by my publishing arm, Cosas Finas Publishing, I had world rights, which I knew would appeal to BookBub.
My BookBub feature will be Nov 5 – 12. They prefer limited offers of free or discounted by at least 50%, rather than books that are perma-free.
I also submitted with a flexible promotion date, but when they came back with “Can you do by Nov 5th?” – I found out how much I didn’t have prepared for this type of exposure. This is why I wanted to post my article on the experience. It’s a good problem to have, but very nerve-wracking when I am in the middle of releasing two back-to-back novellas on Oct 31 & Nov 7th. Of course, I had to go for it, even if it only becomes a “what not to do” experience. Below are some of the things I have done to prepare and I’m sure there will be much more as the BookBub feature draws nearer.
MY STRATEGY SCRAMBLE
1.) Since The Last Victim was a 2015 release, I had to update the back material to include my updated Biblio, author bio, and add promo links for my new website mailing list and ads for my upcoming releases, as any traditional publisher would do. I went through my layout formatter to save me time. I use Wizards in Publishing.
2.) I created a spreadsheet of target promotion opportunities, both free and paid for, to expand my reach beyond my mailing list and track costs against estimated revenue. BookBub gives you its estimate for likely sales, but it is up to you to get the word out and set higher goals. I plan to set up my estimates, then compare them to what actually happened afterwards, to create a learning tool that I can refine. Bottom line – It takes a lot of eyeballs for sales to result. I used subscriber numbers, but estimated sales at a fraction of 1% to be conservative. It’s all “pie in the sky” stuff until the dust settles and sales are determined. At that time, I’ll need to do an autopsy to see what clearly worked.
3.) What are the best ways (& sites) to pay for promotion? Good question. Since I needed boosted sales across several retailers, I chose to look at ads at Kobo, Amazon, and the other retailers. These aren’t cheap so I had to make decisions. The bargain books websites that are popular and most effective aren’t cheap either, because they can add up. They also don’t take just any ad that you pay for. Some sites require you to submit your book for their consideration & it could take up to 7 days to hear back. (I won’t know about some until my feature is about to start or has started.) These promo sites’ loyalty is first to their subscribers, so that means you have to allow enough lead time or make due with what you can get.
4.) I submitted to EreaderNewsToday and needed approval. BargainBooksy, KindleNationDaily (& their multiple platforms), EBookLister, and AwesomeGang didn’t require approval and charged only a minimal amount. There are countless sites where they will list your book for free. Some allow you to post once and they will cross post, but since I don’t know how effective this would be for my limited time, I chose certain sites for maximum exposure.
5.) I created an Amazon Marketing Services (AMS) Ad Campaign (access I already had as a vendor through my publishing company) to run during the time of the feature and will up the cost per click but limit the dollar daily total to gain the likelihood the ad will be competitive for placement and exposure. Since this ad will run for a specific time (to parallel my BookBub Feature Deal), I could get aggressive on my budget.
6.) I haven’t considered a Facebook Ad because I don’t know how effective they are in relation to real sales. AMS give you direct access to analytics on clicks and traffic compared to actual sales. If I’m going to spend money, I prefer Amazon where the most of my sales would come from and can be traced and translated into sales.
7.) What could I do to promo without cost? I had access as a contributing author to several fan groups under various Amazon Kindle Worlds. To the credit of the authors who created these groups, they generously allow their authors to promo other books, and we try to give exclusive giveaways back to their readers in return. So the groups that I had cultivated by writing for these Kindle Worlds, I have access to for a post and the reader fans are so much fun and generous with their support. That has value.
8.) I have my mailing list and had just updated my website to WordPress format. This allows me to update quickly and post when I need to. Updating came at a very good time. Even though it was time consuming to transfer content, it was well-worth the effort.
As of this post, I’ll still be prepping for the feature and up to my eyeballs in two releases – Valentine:Steel Heart (Available Now) and Fiona’s Salvation (Nov 7). This BookBub feature for The Last Victim is from Nov 5-12, so the overlap is stressful, but it can help with exposure. At least, that’s what I’m telling myself.
Other Resources
I found these additional links that could be helpful. Here is a link to “Reasons Why Books are Rejected as BookBub Feature Deals.” I don’t normally like to focus on negatives, but there are good points made in this article that could help you succeed.
After a tragic killing on an Amtrak train, the Phoenix Agency use a mysterious covert operative, Braxton Valentine, as bait to lure a deadly cartel boss from hiding, but grief-stricken Valentine becomes their worst nightmare—a rogue operator with a death wish.
(Valentine: In the Cross Hairs – Book 2 of 2 coming Feb 2018)
