Week 3 of the Virtual Book Tour, with an Appreciative Note
Before I get started with the blog roll, I just have to say—there was a time when I was devising and paying for all my own publicity. I was doing my own book covers, with a little help from family and people online. This was fun, but it took a lot of time and you could tell it wasn’t done by a professional.
I was using a not-very-helpful prefab design from GoDaddy for my website. I was finding out by expensive trial and error which social media platforms are best for selling (YouTube was the worst, Facebook was slightly better, Twitter’s analytics were so bad I couldn’t even tell) at my own expense. I was paying a little over $10 for every print copy that I published—which I needed to do, because a lot of the people I was selling to weren’t into e-books. It all turned writing and publishing from an expensive hobby into a very expensive hobby that I’m not sure I could’ve afforded for this long, and the end results (in terms of design) were okay but not great.
Some days advertising my book still feels like screaming into the void, but at least I’ve got Secant Publishing screaming by my side now and putting a lot of effort and money into it. My books and website are all professionally designed and being advertised on sites that I could never have clued in to my existence.
Thank you, Ron.
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This week on the Virtual Book Tour (which includes a $50 gift card for the winner—again, thanks, Ron):
September 19: Bibliomanaic Aza
September 19: fundinmental
September 20: Kit 'N Kabookle
September 21: Eye-Rolling Demigod's Book Blog
September 21: Books+Coffee=Happiness
September 22: The Pen and Muse Book Reviews
September 23: Sybrina's Book Blog
September 23: Novels Alive
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In Dead Skunk news, John March has escaped from slavery and “Wild Joe” Baldy is still at large, King Carol of Moldavia and Wallachia is at war with himself, and Wellington has come out of retirement to join the war in Louisiana. (In the immortal words of Bruce Banner in Avengers: Infinity War, “You guys are so screwed now!” Check it out.)
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That complaint I mentioned about The Rings of Power? It isn't getting any better as the story progresses. Put two Orcs in a room with three donuts, and they'll fight to the death over one of them. I get that. But if you put two of these Elves, Men or Dwarves in a room with three donuts, they'll find stupid reasons to butt heads with each other and never even notice the donuts. Arrrgh.
I know conflict is supposed to be the essence of good storytelling, but I would rather watch people eat lunch than argue over nothing.
