books
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Promoting Your Book with BookBub: A Case Study
My first novel, Blest, was published last year in March. It wasn’t traditionally published, but it wasn’t traditionally self-published, either. I worked with Alloy Entertainment to outline and write the book. It’s been an interesting process, because we’re also working with the Powered by Amazon team. Powered by Amazon takes book marketing to a new level.…
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The Big Bad Discovery Problem: How Is Anyone Going to Find Your Book?
At #FutureBook16, a conference based in London, authors, agents, publishers, and others converged to discuss the future of the book. Or, really, the future of publishing. Spoiler: the industry doesn’t think it’s that bright. In his keynote, Tim Healy Hutchinson Hachette UK said that the book market is in “secular decline.” The entire industry is…
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Luxury Coops, Chapters 3 & 4
3.1 Pure Strength is more dungeon than gym: wet floors, murky puddles, tiny mushrooms, soggy ceilings. Manny washes his face and peers at the red rims of his eyes, seeing the the bright fuzz of his youth in Mexico City, buttercups of houses in favelas full of diesel and sun. He hears his daughter’s name.
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Blest is now available on Amazon!
I’m happy to announce that my book, Blest, is now available on Amazon. If you’re into young adult, fantasy, or romance, I’m sure you’ll love it. Blest is a novel about what defines us as people and whether we let the world define us or whether we get to define ourselves. When sixteen year-old Jim Blest…
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Luxury Coops, Chapter 1
1.1 Everything knows what death looks like. Even chickens.
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Yes, The Goldfinch is Overrated… But Why?
I’m not really qualified to decide what does and doesn’t deserve a Pulitzer. But I’m of the somewhat strong opinion that “The Goldfinch” by Donna Tartt shouldn’t have made the cut. Let me break down this epic journey in rambling, poorly plotted, erratically written, Pulitzer-worthy material. And then let me explain why it spells trouble…
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Hachette v. Amazon: Whose Fault Is It, Anyway?
If you’ve paid any attention to the book industry, you’ll know by now that Hachette and Amazon are locked in some kind of pricing battle. The details aren’t that well known, but the strategy is: Amazon disabled the pre-order option for Hachette books, discounts have vanished and some authors have gone completely unlisted. Meanwhile, Hachette…
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3 Ways to Measure Your Book’s Online Marketing Campaign
When it comes to online marketing, independent authors like to think they’re ahead of the curve. Social savvy, internet savvy, and savvy in other miscellaneous ways. But just because you made a Facebook Page and have a Twitter account doesn’t mean that they’re helping sell your eBook. Online marketing is a mysterious mix of luck…
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Innovation & Stagnation in the Traditonal Publishing Industry
The Tribune Company did something that surprised me the other day: it released a new product. An app, to be specific. Newsbeat converts newspapers into audio, so people can listen to them in the car, on their iPhone and in various other Mobile scenarios. Aside from Tribune newspapers like The Los Angeles Times, Newsbeat will…
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Net Neutrality’s Meaning for Bloggers, Writers, and Musicians
Last week, the FCC struck down something called “net neutrality.” You might have seen headlines and decided it was boring. Maybe, for a little while, you were curious about the ruling’s meaning. No one really knows how things are going to work in a post net-neutrality world. But there are a lot of alarm bells…