Published Bestsellers

Entitled 'The Wichenford Court Murder,' the story is written in the classic tradition of British detective fiction. As the story unfold, the novel's narrator shares with the reader all the information available to the investigating detectives. Readers can race against the detectives to figure out 'whodunit.' "My novels are mostly set in the county of Worchester, which provides just the sort of rural environment suitable for intellectual games in the mould of the classics of British crime fiction: country houses, quaint villages, gentle hills, calm rivers,  tranquil country lanes, views across farm-speckled valleys, and plentiful woodland ringing with the sound of bird-song. In a way my novels attempt to capture a more gracious age than our own, when the countryside was inhabited by farm-workers, when the roads were not so noisy and before the age of mass entertainment," said Julius Falconer.

How do you write good back blurb? "Back cover copy is like the packaging on a box of food or the cover of a magazine at the supermarket checkout counter. The vendor has only a few seconds to stop you in your tracks, attract your attention and compel you to make a purchase. You can also consider back cover copy to be similar to a movie trailer or preview: just two minutes that give you the plot line. Based on the trailer, you will decide whether to see the movie, or not. The same holds with your book. Your design/layout, graphics AND verbiage must entice readers and make them hungry for more." Read full article: How to Craft Back Cover Copy that Sells Books by the Boatload - The Savvy Book Marketer

Bringing you exclusive interviews with authors featured in the Book Savvy Newsletter. Our Guest is Ron Palmer* Enjoy the interview. Q1) Can you tell us a little about yourself and your book 'To Boldly Go'? I retired early from a career of thirty-five years at sea as a Navigating Officer and eventually as Captain of VLCCs (Very Large Crude Carriers) to the west coast of Canada, which incidentally was still close to the marine environment. A natural progression one would agree for a retired naval person. In the fullness of time, I built my own boat and cruised the waters of British Columbia, since the urge to return to sea didn't just evaporate. Prior to this I had never given much thought to writing but, as it happened, on completing the building of a boat I felt the endeavour should be repeated. This feeling was resolved by writing about the experience rather than the expense of actually repeating the performance. To Boldly Go is a daring adventure of my att

A review of by Lubna Sengul* 20 May 2011 Alice Turner a social outcast finds solace from the bullying in a cafe called OTOLI and befriends the mysterious waitress Jenny, only to find that she has her own agenda. OTOLI takes the reader on a very rapid and quick journey of bullying and potential consequences for the bully and the victim. I was able to get into Alice Turner's world of being a victim of bully and understand how she felt. OTOLI is an excellent brief insight into how much hurt a victimised child feels and that name calling can unfortunately in some instance have devastating results. This book should be bought by all schools and provided to pupils in the hope that this will reach a bully and allow them to asses their behaviour towards the bullied and the 'less social' students and allow them to change the way they behave. I do however feel the ending was perhaps rushed and feel disappointed with how things turned out for Alice and Jenny. Apart from this, a good r

See the video here: You Gotta Read Videos: February 2011 Entry #11 In All Probability: Title: "In All Probability" Author: Steve Morris Trailer Creator: Eloquent Enraptures In All Probability features Thirty short stories based on some bizarrely backfiring scenarios. Each story is short enough to fit neatly into your coffee break or into the bus ride home. "The themes of destiny, chance and kismet are fascinating ones..."  (Country and Border Life Book Club) "A succinct precise style" (The Truth About Books) "perfect for a quick read on a coffee break..." - - - "something to entertain even the most ardent of critics..." ( MMU Success magazine ) "readers will be beguiled by Morris's version of an everyday world where probabilities turn out to be different from the ones expected" (The Short Review) Find out more about the book. .

By C. Patrick Schulze, August 23rd, 2010 If you’re unfamiliar with the idea of a blog, the term comes from the contraction of the phrase, “web log.” A blog is simply a way to post whatever you wish to the Internet. Many think of it as a free, simple, easy-to-maintain website and others consider it an open journal. A blog, as with every part of your marketing, has but one main purpose. It’s to raise awareness of you and your books and novels. However, it also serves a number of other purposes. Your blog: helps establish your credibility as an author allows others to learn of your books and novels sells and pre-sell your books, 24/7 allows you to have a two-way conversation with your potential customers serves to promote your existing and upcoming books and novels allows you to communicate about things that are of importance to you can put you in touch with other authors for collaborate, not competitive, efforts can even help you develop the habit of writing on a regular

It’s Not About the Technology, It’s About the Customers Date: 18/8/10 When I started working with authors on their publicity campaigns, the landscape was reasonably simple. Arranging phone interviews on talk radio shows, appearances on TV and getting reviews in major newspapers and magazines drove consumer interest. Everyone bought their books in bookstores and the only people interested in the Internet were some computer geeks. Boy, have things changed. Today 44 percent of ALL books sold in North America are sold online at Amazon.com. What’s more, e-books now account for nearly 30 percent of all of Amazon’s sales. I want to underscore the importance of this information, because one of the most difficult things to do in the mass consumer marketplace is to figure out where your customers might be. For the book market, it’s no mystery – nearly half of your customers are researching and buying online. They live there, so that’s where you need to be. Moreover, the e-book is growing i

Authors have to do their own marketing, that is the reality of the publishing industry whether you get a publishing deal or you self-publish. These days anyone can market globally using just a computer and their time. It may take effort, but it doesn’t need to cost you anything – and you might even enjoy it! Many thanks to the 'The Creative Penn' for compiling these comprehensive lists of articles, audios and inspiration for marketing your books. Topic covered include. * The Basics: Author Branding and the Author Platform * Social Networking * Podcasting * Video * Speaking * Other Book Marketing Strategies Access all these and more by clicking on this link: Be sure to come back and share some feedback. . .

Thursday, July 15, 2010 Here are some great sites that you might find valuable to you with regards to marketing your books, from Christian Author Promotions & Book Marketing Vis ta Print - Offers free products, free designing and lots of additional products from post cards, to letterhead, to business cards and other great advertising and marketing tools. www.visitaprint.com PhotoBucket - A great place to host pictures, videos and create photo albums. It's free and lots of fun. www.photobucket.com Go Daddy - Go Daddy is the premier hosting company for web sites, From domains to hosting to you name it and they have it. www.godaddy.com The Blog Catalog - If you have a authors blog this is a great community to join and share your authors blog. They have some intense traffic. www.blogcatalog.com Christian Top 1000 - Join the Christian Top 1000 and add your authors web site or blog. www.christiantop1000.com The Authors Club - Don't forget to join the Authors C

By Stefanie Guzikowski July 01, 2010 2:00 AM " Many people think that when they're finished writing their book, the hard work is over, but the truth is, marketing is critical to an author's success. Marketing campaigns do more than drive sales. They generate awareness and excitement about a book, create a sense of urgency, demonstrate the author's expertise and build a community of fans and supporters, who can also serve as "ambassadors" for the book and the author. While marketing does take time, energy and money, today's authors can't afford not to implement a marketing campaign. Authors work hard to stand out as creative, talented writers, and they must tap into that creativity once again to develop an engaging, powerful marketing campaign. It takes considerable effort and time to successfully promote and market a book prior to, during, and after a book launch. In fact, promotion should begin three to six months prior to printing and continue

July 2nd, 2010 Guest Expert: Teresa Morrow You have taking on the endeavor of writing a book. In order to sell your book, you will need to tell people about it. You will need to communicate the message about your book so those readers who resonate with your book will want to know more about you and the book. And how you communicate this message can either bring in more sales or possibly drive people away from wishing to know more about your book. 1. Communication is give and take – Any meaningful conversation consists of listening and speaking. You are excited to share the message of your book with people, but don’t allow this enthusiasm hinder you listening to the questions, comments and suggestions others may communicate with you during a conversation. You do not want to dominate the conversation by talking about you and your book and not allowing others to share their part of the conversation. By listening to others in a conversation, you will open yourself up to meeting new p

Stephen V. Masse was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He wrote his first novelat age 13, handwritten into a school composition book. Educated at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, he studied creative writing, and was author of a weekly newspaper column, “Out of Control.” His first novel for children, Shadow Stealer, was published by Dillon Press in 1988. Short Circus is his second novel for children. In addition to children’s books, Masse has written A Jolly Good Fellow, winner of the Silver Medal in the 2008 Independent Publisher Book Awards, as well as honorable mention in the 2008 New England Book Festival for best books of the holiday season. Stephen’s latest Book is Short Circus. Welcome to Book Marketing Buzz, Stephen. Can we begin by having you tell us a little about your book? Short Circus is twelve-year-old Jem Lockwood’s own story about his remarkable adventures with his Big Brother Jesse Standish, and a host of neighbors and friends. When Jem discovers that

" I sat in the audience at the James River Writers’ Conference last year where a panel of three well-known authors spoke on book marketing. They offered what I consider the secret to marketing your book. After the authors held their discussion, they opened the floor for Q & A. An aspiring author asked a question which I’ll paraphrase. She asked, how much time did the authors spend on marketing their books and how much on their physical writing. The authors covered their microphones and whispered among themselves. They then nodded in unison. One of them leaned into his microphone and said, “seventy-five percent on marketing and twenty-five percent on writing.” The other two nodded their agreement. A sudden hush fell over the audience. However, a hubbub soon rumbled around the room. I think everyone in attendance had the same question I did. “Really?” The authors then went on to explain their collective comment, but each one agreed on the formula offered. " . Read Ful

In today's guest post, mystery writer Elizabeth Craig shares book promotion tips for authors who are shy about selling. My children are both in Scouts. It’s been a great experience for them—they get to try new things and build self-confidence and self-reliance. The only thing I dislike about it? The selling Read Full article at: Book Promotion Tips for Skittish Sellers - The Savvy Book Marketer . .

To promote your book successfully, it’s important to budget funds for book marketing. While it’s certainly possible to do online book promotion on a shoestring budget, you will still need to invest in promoting your book. The amount you should budget depends on your book marketing plan. Here are some expense categories to consider and some money-saving tips: Blog/Website: Website design and hosting fees. If you use a blog-based website, you’ll minimize costs for online book promotion. Graphics: Design of website header and graphics, design of printed materials, purchase of stock images for blog/website, and a photo shoot for your author photo. Services such as Killer Covers and eCoverBee can provide lower cost website graphics. Printing: Business cards, bookmarks, postcards, flyers, and posters for personal appearances. In addition to local printers, check prices for online printers such as Printing for Less. Copywriting and Editing: You may want to hire a professional co

Posted by Teresa, Friday Jun 11, 2010 Some may say gone are the days of the traditional press kit where you have a two pocket folder with your press release on one side and the sheet of endorsements or reviews on the other. Even though these may still be relevant, there is something that is more vital than ever for authors to have and that is an online media (or press) kit. Like the traditional press kit, you will want to include a recent press release and a list of reviews in your online press kit, however, a few more things will help round out the online press kit such as: 1) Book Cover Image – In a jpeg file format and in a few different sizes to help facilitate placement on websites and print. Read Full article:   Online Promotion Tip: 7 Must Haves for Author Online Press Kit . .

Most authors achieve a lifelong goal when they write and publish a book. But it’s not long before the stark light of reality hits when they realize that they now have to put on the hat of marketer. For many, they have no desire to engage in book marketing, or sales activities, and yet the success of finding new readers for their book will depend on it. One principle I learned early on is that you can achieve a lot more success with people behind you than you can achieve if you try to go at this alone. And not just in getting people to read your book and asking them to tell others about it. I’m talking about ways to get your name in front of many people. By default, then, your book will ride on the coattails of your exposure. So, how can you accomplish this? Consider these ideas: Read full article at: Book Marketing Mondays: Don’t Go At It Alone The Official BookBuzzr Blog . .

Bookstores are the traditional place to sell books, but sales opportunities abound with gift shops and specialty retailers. Potential retail markets for books include national chain stores, regional chains, thousands of small independently owned gift and specialty shops, and specialty online stores. One advantage of marketing a book to gift and specialty stores is that there is usually little competition from other books. And retailers have the opportunity to cross-promote your book with related items. Look for retailers that are a good fit for your particular book and don't be afraid to think outside the box. Here are a few examples of places to market a book: Cookbooks in kitchen shops, gift shops, specialty food stores, and upscale grocery stores Children's books in toy stores and the gift shops of children's and science museums Gardening books at gardening centers, gift shops, and botanical gardens Chic lit and gift books in clothing boutiques Travel guides and

In all Probability by Steve Morris 5 Stars In all probablity...a very good read!, March 2, 2010 By Robert (Henderson, Nevada) "This is a collection of various short stories about very different characters, with very different lives. A very good read as each story is usually only a short three pages or so. A lot of these stories left me wanting for more! A couple left me simply confused, such as "Three Strikes and you're out." It was about a woman who is denied entry into a dating service after she had supposedly used up her "Three times of true love." She's sadly turned away, and the story ends. Others, such at "Let the Good Times Roll" had me laughing out loud, as the world finds a way to make everyone happy. Things begin to go very wrong from there, and this story might have actually made a very good novel if it could have been extended another 200 pages! The author shows an amazing imagination in all of these stories, and I would rea

Source: Bookhitch.com ...Author’s blogs are almost a medium unto themselves. They meld the journal of the personal author as well as the corporate message of a business. The combination of the two is certainly a challenge for many authors, because you have to be personable while selling yourself at the same time. You need to let the reader into your life, but only so much. So how do you tell where that fine line is? How do you begin? First, make your entries personal. Think about what you want to write ahead of time. Don’t necessarily write about your book and only your book. For example, say your book was a critique of modern parenting. Instead of plugging the book every chance you get (which is just outright selling something and no one will read it), continue where your book left off. Talk about things you would have liked to include, current events, etc. The more you expand your scope, the more readers will be drawn back to your site and the more likely they are to recommend it