Using Pinterest -- An Anytime Writing Tip

 

To Pin or Not to Pin. 

That hasn't been much of a question for me. 

The place confuses the heck out of me ,.. more so than GoodReads, even. 

Social Media confuses me because I can't figure how to make it work for me, like encouraging people to buy my stories. My sales tell me I'm a failure every  time I look at my stats. And, no. That fact that others are doing worse, doesn't make me feel better.

But back to Pinterest. I've got a minimal presence on there, mostly book covers. But my brain just got illuminated on how to use Pinterest to promote books from Jody Hedland's blog -- that I understood, finally. It's such a wonderful explanation of a promotion plan I just had to share it with anyone that stops by. 

So click 4 Ways Authors Can Reach Readers on Pinterest.

I'm hoping it'll help me make more sales.
If you read the 15 July 14 blog, you might be able to too.

It may be a while before I get anywhere with her ideas, but for the record, you can visit my Pinterest ???? here. I at least follow back when someone follows me. First indication I found some pictures to post will be the picture of the blooming Christmas cactus showing up on my pages. Yeah, that's a bookshelf underneath it. Our place is littered with the things. Not cactus. Over-stuffed bookshelves. 

Or, I might just post it because it's been a long time since I've put something new up.

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Crossings has finally gone to my content editor. Thought it would never get there. Am proud It's come in close to 17,000 words.

I'll probably be promoting it more than I have my other stories...if I can find the time. I've got a short about Dumdee's [The Ghost in the Closet] childhood in the words I want to put up as a free story in August. I hope to get Crossings to my copy-editor before we go visit our kids in NYC.

Anyone care to review the story? I'll send you a free PDF pre-pub copy if you leave your email in the comment section.

I should have a PDF file sometime in the middle of August.The story's dark fantasy about an old geezer who's never had a spit of magic but manages to revenge a friend's death against some Frogtrolls with a little help from Fu-type Guardians. The friend in question is Granny Nan/Nance who's only remembered in There Be Demons by her great-grandaughter, Britt. [TBD is in long delayed copyedits, but the editor assures me she's making progress now that she's feeling better.]

Yeah. I started Crossings at the beginning of the year sometime. Frankly, I feel embarrassed that it's taken me this long to get it written.

One more thing and I'll shut up. I'm going to take sort of a social media holiday to clean out of the stuff I've saved from my various emails. Mostly promotion things. I've got to devise a better way to use my social media time.

Keeping One's Ducks [aka #Writing Projects] in a Row

Whooops. 

The blog that was supposed to run today. I ran last week -- Curtiss Robinson's Worst Writing Fear -- Losing His Writing. You can access it here. If you didn't read it last week, you should take a look. I know I found it interesting. Sounds like Robinson is making good

use of personal experience to write fantasy. If my fresh reading pile didn't have ten books in it, it would have dipped into the series. [We won't talk about the two stale TBR ones.]

Must confess I've made other mistakes doing the guest blogs, all relatively minor, thankfully. But I won't be doing any more formal blog tours even though I managed to get close to 200 or more views for all of them. 

The offer for individual guest posts still stands though. My topic is "Your Worst Writing Fear". You can contact me at mkkaytheod-at-yahoo-com if you want some free promo for your book. You'll get an author bio, book blurb with buy links, and a short excerpt.

At the same time, I'll be using blog tours for my own promo. I got some wonderful reviews for The Ghost in the Closet from the review tour I did with Reading Addiction Virtual Book Tours. I was also very impressed with Goddess Fish's professionalism. If you're thinking of checking out a blog tour for your book, I would ask around among your writer friends and check at their reputations at  Absolute Write Water Cooler before you part with any money.

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I've already mentioned this on other social media -- Facebook and Google+ -- but I must say I puzzle over some of the reviews I've gotten on the eight stories I have self-published while trying to build a writer's platform. Just got a spotlight from Book Viral that opened the floodgates on my confusion. Granted there are reviews that make me wonder if they read the book. Then, there are others, the ones that offer considered critiques with completely different takes on the same story.

Check out the Book Viral Spotlight 
for The Ghost in the Closet

What confuses me? Book Viral said The Ghost in the Closet was "A heart-warming tale of hope and ghostly apparitions". Other have said it's a spooky horror story and chilling. I don't know if there is enough in the sample for you to make up your own opinion. For the record, I call it "dark fantasy". Samples can be found for Amazon, Nook, Smashwords, and KOBO. [For the record, Smashwords gives you a variety of e-formats to choose from.]

Any writers out there who care to comment
 on their feelings about their own reviews?

When a Great Idea Misses the Mark - Book Review of Ghostseer by Robin D. Owens

One of the premises for this blog: I review books that I discover on book shelves -- new book stores, used book stores, and supermarkets. In this case, I found Robin D. Owens' Ghost Seer.

Why did I decide to buy it? First was a nice cover with a picture of Denver in the background. [My eyes latched onto Denver's iconic Quest building in the circle. You can barely see it in the cover I lifted from Barnes & Noble, but I thought I saw it.] Second, Owens is a RITA Award-Winning Author -- who I had never heard of. Third, Ghost Seer is the first in a new series.

After Clare Cermak's eccentric, but very rich, great-aunt dies, Clare inherits more than her money -- her great-aunt's obligation to help ghosts leave this plane for the next comes to plague her. Accountant-minded Cermak finds the transition from normalcy to seer difficult. But all isn't bad. She finds her hunk [aka love interest], a former cop suffering from a similar problem -- trying to deny a supernatural gift of his own, plus he must seek a new career because he was disabled during an arrest-gone-bad. The two are thrown together as they help the shade of Jack Slade, a notorious local character, find the severed ears he wrongly removed, so he can pass on to the arms of his waiting wife.

Promising premise. I settled in, looking forward to a comfortable read ... even though I knew a happy-ever-after loomed in my future. The promise of ghosts causing trouble made me willing to take the ride. Owens does build a well defined plot based on the premise that ghosts sometimes need a living, helping hand to make restitution before they can pass onto the next world.

But the gremlins soon appeared. While I don't visit Denver often now, we used to travel there every month to buy ethnic foods we couldn't get in the small town we moved to. The lightly sketched for Denver had me wondering: What the heck? 

One example. The public library and Denver Art Museum are two of the most distinctive buildings in Denver. Even though Owens has Cermak helping a ghost pass on in the plaza between the two buildings, the she creates no sense of a unique place. Just gives a generic description of a paved area. Being told that Cermak is eating lunch in the plaza which could be one of the spaces in New York City or a hundred other US towns or cities. Virgina Dale, which is a real place on the Colorado-Wyoming border, didn't fare any better.

The characters didn't escape the sterotypes either. While I realize the romance formulas generated a huge following, I want a more complex read. I want my characters to be unique people. Oh, both Cermak and the hunk are pleasant enough. Sadly, I'd met Owens' characters before.

The only character that escaped its stereotypical confines, was Enzo, a ghostly labrador housing something Other who acts as a spirit guide on Cermack's journey to accept her new talents.

A competently written book which held my interest with only one interruption, but offers no special wonder besides the idea of ghostly restitution. I give it three ***.

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When I proofed this blog, I realized my age is showing like the proverbial slip below my hem. I basically read print ... and mostly mass paperback. Yet all my stories are e-published, mainly because I can't see any economic sense in publishing a short novella in print.

As far as I can tell, everyone e-publishes now ... even the humongous five. But I'm wondering what people read. I know I make most of my sales on Nook. But what do you read? Care to share a comment anyone? I'm curious.

.

~~#~~

  What have I been doing this week? ... I know I did something...if only because I sit in the chair in front of my laptop so many hours without getting bored. [If I played Mah Jong all the time, I would of given up and gone elsewhere.] 
 
Basically, I've been reorganizing the files on my desktop in the lull between waiting for comments on Crossings from my critique group and waiting for the copy edits on The Ignoble Nobel Prize Winner.

My critique group slammed me up the side of the head again -- for being stupid. What I thought was the ending of the novella is now the end of the middle turning point. I still have another third of the story to write.

Did get book trailers -- in my case story trailers -- up on You Tube. The only good I can see so far is that I have two channels and can't figure 

out how to merge them into one. Need to go to my video-smart daughter for some hand holding. Anyway, I would appreciate you taking a look at them so the numbers aren't so pitifully small: The Ghost in the Closet and Noticing Jamilla.

Might I make a promotion tip ... if you are a writer working to publicize a book? You might look at the various gigs on Fiverr. Not only did I find someone to do my videos

under marketing but Fiverr people did the above book covers too. The covers are cheap enough that you can even have two or three people do covers for you, and you can then pick the best one. Then, there's the promo posting help. I won't mention you can hire reviews too.

Oh, did I say something I shouldn't? Of course, writers pay for reviews. What do you think a blog tour is?
 

Dateline April: My Writing Life, Good and Bad

The Endless Working the the Social Media,
the Pain of My Existence.

This time it's Guest Blogs.

Another Thursday ... without a guest blog. Sometimes I feel there aren't any indie writers out there wanting a little publicity. But I guess it's not too bad; the rest of May is booked with some interesting books ... though there are a couple dates in June open. Anybody interested?

It's even a form of free book marketing ... even if I am a pip-squeak.

The Bad News

 

Britt's Eyes by Ellorien

For all those wondering -- okay, maybe the three of you -- about the publication date of There Be Demons, it has been delayed due to the illness of the editor/publisher. No new date has been set yet. Watch my Facebook page or here to learn when the project goes active again.

Some Good News

Someone finally reviewed The Ghost in the Closet -- “a fresh approach to the classic ghost story, with a touch of urban fantasy” 

The review was only three stars [on Smashwords], but someone who understood the story wrote it. -- What didn't they like? They wanted it to include more of Dumdie's life. [The parts I deleted because my critique group thought slowed the story down.] As a friend consoled, "you can't please everyone."

Anyway, I love the review, maybe, especially because I was afraid to publish the story. I feared it was a cliche. Didn't think there was anything new to write about ghosts.

The bad news? When I loaded it onto Amazon, two copies of the cover appeared. Went back to my formatter to get it fixed, but it'll take a while. So, I'll sit here with egg-on-my-face ... not that I worry about that. It's just another "fire" to put out.

And there is,

Ta-da,

Progress on the 

The Ignoble Nobel Prize Winner

I'll be doing final edits this weekend.
Even have sort of a blurb for it. 

Whatcha think?

 

Down on his luck reporter, Grant Highgrim, stumbles over the story of his life when his publisher bets him he can’t interview the oldest man alive, a reclusive Nobel prize winner. Highgrim’s chance to become a real reporter again is on the line.

Only the assignment isn’t as simple as interviewing a cranky old man for his secrets to a long life. Highgrim arrives at the nursing home on the day a legion of beetle-demons come to claim the soul of Dr. Henry Allsdipp’s, a Nobel Prize winner in economics. Highgrim must overcome his horror of creepy-crawlies if he’s to save both his interview and his interviewee.

Thinking Good Writing's a Blending of Craft Skills

Lot's of people who talk to me think revising is the number #1 writing tip. I don't think so. That's a little like having a donkey push the cart. Yeah, writers need to finish writing something first to revise, but that isn't all. Writing is a blend of craft skills that takes practice and more practice. Yeah, I think writers are jugglers ... that's why we drop so many balls when we first start creating.

Oh, I think revising is the linch-pin of getting your writing published. You gotta get the words in some semblance of order, but once you have the story line down, you need to create images in your reader's mind and a hundred other different things.

That's where revising comes in. Writer's Digest, that helpful trade journal, posted a guest blog by Brian Kelms on tightening the screws on your readers in the first 50 pages of your work. This is important, because agents seldom read more than 50 pages in their first reaction to your query. More important, the excerpts given online aren't that long either. You've got to hook your reader early ... and show your competence.

Another thing. You have to carve out the time out of your life to write and revise. I struggle with this as much as most other writers. Then, I came across a tweet on how you only need to blog once a week on Twitter. Music to mine ears. Mohana Rajakumor's blog on Pro-blogger is a must read if you want to make a big splash in the blogging sphere. For most of us, writing and worrying about writing one blog a week gives us more time to work on our current manuscript.

Me? I think I was looking at the once a week excuse, but I think blogging too much can rob your creative juices unless you are mainly reporting on happenings.

So, how are my writing craft skills going? I'm having a hard time hitting my target of adding to Hag Stone Magic [500 words] this morning. If you also have a similar problem of meeting your priorities, check out Kristen Lamb's blog on Setting Priorities. It's about how social media overwhelms you. 

Hey it's only the 31st of January and I think I have my first blog for February almost done. *smiles*.

Haitus

Yeah ... It's the middle of February ... Ash Wednesday to be exact, if you follow such stuff. Still, it's a good time to reflect on how insignificant we are in the scheme of things. 

Still, the above advice is still pertinent, and I'd like to add another tip of my own. If you read this blog even semi-regularly, you've read me complaining that I'm a slooooow writer. Was it the dreaded writer's block. No. My mind was building a growing chapter outline. [very loosely structured]. But after a running start of over 500 words a day ... word production slowed down more and more as new questions rose about Mac's world.

Why? I kept have to explain things plus adding the notations in the "bible". Yeah, the dreaded clumps of back story kept clogging up  the flow of the story line. The solution didn't pop into my mind until I explained why magic existed in my post-apocalyptic world to my critique group. I was trying to write book two first. So, Hag Stone Magic has been relegated to a file of it's own. I'm still world-building but it's from the boonies-point-of-view rather than an administrative center. -- Did I just steal that from Suzanne Collins?

My tip? If you're suffering from "writer's block", maybe you aren't starting your story in the right place.

Oh, Dean K. Miller, a fellow Northern Colorado Writer, did a blog featuring my author website. Why don't you click the link and see what he has to say.

Author Kay Theodoratus http://wp.me/p1pN8h-uW

And, it's Valentine's Day.
I should proof read this again, but you're getting this typos and all.
It's been festering in my computer too long.

Time Management: Do You Dream of Squeezing More Words Out of Your Computer Time?

Time management. What a wonderful concept! Everyone would love to write a publishable novel in a month of sitting. Most people take longer. Some because they hop around from one web site to another. Others because they are just plain slooow. Actually thousands of reasons keep writers from pounding out as many words as they want each day. Probably as many reasons as there are writers.

But really. Do you dream of squeezing the most production out of your time on the computer? I don't. I accept I'm a snail writer ... It seems I spend hours staring at my computer screen with little production to show for it because I'm always going back to correct or add things to what I've written before. [Yeah, I know about getting the ending on your story and then revising. But it doesn't work for me. It's too much work trying to find all the pieces ... and I might not even find them all.]

Got so annoyed at my feeble writing results, I did a time analysis to answer just what I was doing. What were the culprits slowing down my word production?

The easy target is social media. At least I read a lot of other writers and authors complaining about procrastination interfering with their writing. For me, it's LinkedIn that's both one of the most useful and the most time-consuming networking site I visit. ... every day. I made the mistake of keeping the little green check in the "I want the comments emailed" box. It was taking me a half hour to delete them all and I just joined a few writer groups.

Most writers I know personally complain about wasting time of Twitter the most. Alan Kealey at  Indie Author News offers some solutions: Twitter Tips for Authors. He offers some valuable suggestions on getting the most out of your Twitter time. -- Kealey reinforced one thing I've been moving towards -- not doing the "buy my book bit" over and over again. You turn people off, he says.

[Of course, I'd love it if you did buy my books, but ... you don't want to hear another writer begging.] My decision is to promote my two Facebook fan pages, one for the Far Isle Half-Elven and the other's my author page. ... Of course, there are my two websites too. ... And my blog. By the time I retweet and follow on Twitter my social media time is up. ... Oh. I forgot I gotta blog too. -- Did someone say a writer's work is never done?

Then, there are the promo sites that you join and don't do anything with. Goodreads is probably the one I should spend more time on, but I really haven't figured it out. ... More important. I run out of social media time before I get there.  --  The sneaky writing elf behind my ear says: "You don't want to spend the time to figure it out."

So ... you're still here reading this long post? Well, check the time. Chances are you've already spent more time visiting social media sites than you have time for. Yeah. The best way to get the most word production from your time at the computer is write first and play later. It's called setting priorities.

===

Just wanted to let you know I did get something done during my winter doldrums. The Pig Wars has been sent to an e-publisher to be rejected. -- No. I don't have an optimistic bone in my body. The same goes for all the agents I'm querying Bad Luck Emma to. [You can read an excerpt of Emma at my author blog.]

 

Thoughts on Things I Read

A question raised by Susan Adrian has popped up in several places I visit: What to do When You're Waiting? You know that time when you sell your book and it's going through the publishing process. [Self- Publishers don't have to worry. Their book's already e-available.  Usually, too soon.]

I saw Adrian's question, and my mind immediately jumped to the words: write something new. Adrian of course doesn't have such a simple answer. She even goes into what you shouldn't do while you are waiting. Take a look at her blog. I've been reading her for years, and Adrian offers lots of sensible advice.

That's the positive. On the negative side, what's with all these people putting "50 Shades ..." in their title. Yeah, I know the books are best sellers. I've even skimmed through some pages and thought it was boooorrrriiiinnnngg. -- Guess its my anthropological bias again. You know, "participant observation"? -- That's a joke people.

Felt good when I found Writer Beware riding one of my favorite hobby horses: learn your craft if you want to be a writer. The Watchdog blog had a guest posting by Marcia Yudkin, a major author with credentials even.  Yudkin takes on those "get rich quick" promoters of self-publishing in "In Praise of Ripening".

Also found myself in sympathy with Marcella Burnard over at Word Whores. She blogged about "Shouting in the Windstorm" on how the media awkward can be seen/heard in the babble. I'm as guilty as the next in creating babble in the social media as I try to promote on Twitter ... not very effectively. Guess, I spit into the windstorm.

 Finally, you might check the New York Times Book Review section for 28 July 2012. They have some good how-to articles on writing well. If I was dedicated, I'd go down and get the section ... but I don't want to make my hip whine more than it is. I still want to start revising my Pig Prequel tonight.

Oh. Cross your toes for me. I'm still waiting on the critique of  For the Price of a Pig -- my Half-Elven novella in progress -- so I can revise it. I hope to self-publish it before Christmas.

Think I'll be using Book Baby rather than chasing around on the web. 1) I have no idea for a cover. 2) I never seem to have enough time to do everything. ... Maybe when the family get together is over. ... Ha.