Peggy Jaeger's Blog, page 52

#mondaymusings On reviews, the good and the bad ways to write them

I did a TIKTOK the other day while I was spending the day in bed, trying to get rid of my sciatica pain, about a review I’d received. It was a 5 star, so yay for that, but the charming reviewer went ahead and listed every single spoiler there was in the review while she explained and detailed the plot.

I was gobsmacked.

In the back of my mind I figured, why would anyone want to read this book now that they know every thing that happens in it? I alternated between being thrilled with the review and heartbroken at the spoilers, so I decided to do what I always do when faced with an issue: blog about it.

As a reviewer myself, I know that there are certain things you should always put in a book review, and things you should never put in one, and spoilers are the biggest one not to include. And if your review does contain spoilers, there needs to be a statement at the beginning of the review telling people that so they can make the decision not to read the review and just read the book through by themselves and learn everything organically through the read.

Reviewers – and again, I’m a reviewer, too – the main thing I always want to keep front and center in my mind when I start to write a review, especially if it’s a book that wasn’t exactly my favorite thing ever, is that somebody wrote this. Somebody put their blood, sweat, tears, emotions, and time on the line to write this story. Just like you would never ( I hope) say someone’s baby or child is evil or butt-ugly, or wasn’t worth being born, because you know how those words are going to devastate the parent, saying mean, horrible, and nasty things about a book – and worse: putting them in print in the guise of a review- is just as mean, horrible, nasty and, I’ll add, hurtful. So please, always put yourself in the seat of the author when you start to pen a review and keep it civil. My mother used to say if you can’t say something nice, shut up. I kinda agree. Criticism doesn’t have to be delivered negatively. It can be tempered. Saying something like this book wasn’t for me, although I know that’s just my opinion is way better than saying this book sucked and the author should be stoned in a public square.

Okay, enough preaching.

Here are a few things you must include: The author’s name, and the name of the book. Sounds simple, right? But you would be surprised how many people leave either of those two out.

If you are starring the book, the number of stars you are giving is a must. And I know star ratings can be interpreted as subjective, but I would think everyone knows a 5 star rating means the book has some merit.

It’s okay to give a very brief rehash of the blurb, maybe in your own words or with your own spin.

You can explain about the h/h and why you liked them. Or didn’t – just do it nicely.

You can explain your favorite tropes in the book or why you decided to read it. Would you recommend it? I’ve had reviewers read one of my books, never having read me before, and then state they were now going to read the rest of my catalog. Manna from Heaven to an author’s ears.

A review can simply be, “I enjoyed this book and recommend it.” It doesn’t have to be fifteen pages long, and detail chapter by chapter.

If you do review a book, it’s always nice to post it to places where it could mean an increase in exposure to the author, like Amazon, BookBub, TikTok, Instagram, your blog, Facebook. All those places have engagement traction for authors built in, so every review help

I’m going to do a #fridayfive this week about 5 things NOT to include in a review – and yes – it includes spoilers. But there are a few others you want to stay away from, too that I’ll list.

Tomorrow I’ll tackle what the role of an author is concerning reviews. You’d be surprised at some of the things writers have done when they haven’t like or agreed with a reviewer’s take on their book – things that are career killers!

Tune in tomorrow, kids.

A new #bookthrone #giveaway ENEMIES-2-LOVERS

I’m excited my newest NYC Socialites series book, INFLUENCE, is part of Bookthrone’s newest giveaway – ENEMIES TO LOVERS.

Clink on the landing page to enter and check out the other great stories in this promotion and enter for a chance to win a $100.00 Amazon GC! : E2L

Good Luck!!

Brand influencer, Lizzy Cray, is killing it.

She’s got a list of high profile clients who pay her handsomely to help their products explode on social media. Everything from cameras to cashmere, shoes to smoothies. One picture of her with a product and the money practically prints itself.

Why does this trust fund-baby need to work so hard to rake in the cash? That’s a question journalist Dominick Templeton wants an answer to, because Lizzy Cray used to be known in the gossip pages as socialite and wild-child Mackenzie Craymore.

Mackenzie disappeared from the public’s eye twelve years ago, right after her fiancé, hotel-heir, Lucky Blumenthal, died in a fiery car crash rumored to be fueled by drugs and alcohol. But now she’s back, still hauntingly beautiful, rebranded, and from everything Dominick’s researched about her, a much different person. When she ignores all his attempts at an interview, Dominick tries a different tactic and soon becomes embroiled in a world he never imagined…with a woman he’s rapidly falling for.

#fridayfive

Today’s friday five is all about an indie book release – mine!

Influence released on monday 8.14.2023, and, like every other time I’ve released a new book on my own – the definition of indie, lol – I’ve learned a few things and done a few new things. Here’s my list for this week, with this upload.

Make sure you upload the correct files. The ones that have been edited to your satisfaction and that are correctly formated.Make sure all your links are clear. If you use Bitly or Books2Read, please ensure the clean links you send people in your email or newsletter or in your marketing are correct. There’s nothing worse than sending a reader to the wrong spot – or book!Change all your banners on your social sites to reflect your book cover.order author copies BEFORE release day(this one is conceited, but I do it anyway) Check your sales in KDp hourly and your ranking in NEW RELEASES in your category on amazon just as much. Yes, I am conceited.

5 months…

I’ve been remembering the weirdest stuff lately.

Most of it has to do with how my mother’s mental status was tenuous during my teen years and my early twenties.

I don’t remember her as being angry or lashing out so much before I hit my teens, which coincided with her starting perimenopause. I understand the correlation now between off-the-charts emotional swings and her acting out behaviors. At thirteen I didn’t have a clue what was going on with her, I just knew she was craycray-to-the-max.

There was the time she got so mad at me over something I have no memory of doing or saying that she threw a hot slice of pizza she was holding at me. Hot, like just out of the oven hot. And, yes, the same infamous oven of the Easter ham-on-fire incident. Luckily, her aim was awful and the slice barely grazed me in the chest, which was covered with clothing. If she’d aimed higher, it would have landed across my face and the resulting burn would have been awful.

Decades later, while I was giving her a shower, I happened to mention how menopause-induced-insomnia was kicking my butt. I asked if she had any problems during her menopause (I already knew the answer!) and she said no. For whatever reason, call me a masochist, I brought up the pizza-tossing incident. I truly couldn’t remember what I’d said or done to make her throw it at me.

My mother’s entire face changed. Now, remember: she was naked as the day she was born, sitting on the shower chair, with shampoo in her hair. She looked up at me, lips pulled into a thin, hard line, eyes narrowing, elongating the wrinkles at her temples even more. In a pissed-off tone I remembered well from my teen years, she said, “You were such a little shit.”

“Such a shit that you needed to throw a slice of pizza at me?”

Without any remorse – not even the hint of it – she replied, “It was either that or throw you outta the house. Pack you off to your bastard of a father.”

That shut me up pretty quick. I was still underage at the time of the pizza toss, so this was a potential threat she could have made good on because I wasn’t old enough to be on my own, out in the world yet. Having to go live with my father was something I never, ever wanted to do.

Not that he would have taken me in, mind you, because he wouldn’t have. There was no way on God’s green earth he was going to do something that would cramp the lifestyle he’d carved out for himself and his second wife, and having a moody, overweight teenager thrown at him wasn’t in his playbook for living the high life.

It hadn’t been when I was a baby, either, evidenced by the fact he’d so easily walked away from his parental, fatherly responsibilities.

But still, the threat was a valid one at that time in my life and she threw it out at me often. I recognize now it was her inadequate-parenting-skills attempt to get me to behave.

Has any child ever really behaved when threats are aimed their way?

Here’s the thing, though. Decades after that incident, my mother still had such a visceral memory of me making her do something as egregious as throw hot food at me. I can’t even imagine doing something like that to my daughter, no matter what the cause or reason for my anger.

The woman’s memory was long. And she rarely forgot when someone slighted her – whether they had or hadn’t.

I stopped talking about the incident right then because I could see her memories were getting her agitated. I knew if I pushed she’d be yelling and overly emotional before long, so I switched topics to my grandson.

She brightened up immediately, the bad memory relegated to the back corners and recesses of her aging mind.

Wish I’d had that insight into manipulating negative behaviors when I was a teen. Those years might have gone a little better.

Alas…

#wednesdaywisdom 8.16.2023

#TeaserTuesday INFLUENCE (The New York Socialites) #slowburn #enemiestolovers #tuesdaytease

So today’s TT comes right from yesterday’s release of INFLUENCE ( DUH! LOL) You knew I was gonna hawk this book to the max, right? Heehee

I wrote a quick text to my driver and was about to hit the send button when I heard my name called from behind me. The voice was eerily familiar and the all the hair on the back of my neck stood straight up at attention.

I spun around and – yup, just like I thought – Dominick Templeton was dangerously close to me.

I didn’t even think. I simply bolted like a rambunctious puppy let off a leash.

Weaving around the partiers packed in wall-to-wall, I shoved and pushed my way around people so rudely if my mother had borne witness to my behavior she would have had heart palpitations.

With my phone clutched tightly in one hand, my bag in the other, I had to elbow people to get passed them.

Templeton continued to call my name from behind me as he peppered it with excuse mes and out of my ways.

I was almost at the door that swung into the kitchen when a hand snaked around the back of my arm, halting me. I would have pitched forward from the sudden stop if Templeton hadn’t wound his free hand around my waist.

I spun around like a mad dervish and shoved him in the chest. “Get your hands off me,” I shouted. I don’t think anyone but him could even hear me because the noise level was at supersonic now.

I think he said, “Please, Mackenzie, stop. I need to talk to you,” but I wasn’t sure. I’m not adept at reading lips.

He slid his hand around my arm again and despite all my movements to shove him off, was able to propel me through the swing doors.

The decibels, thankfully, dropped, but the long kitchen was jam packed with servers, cooks and sous chefs. No one stopped to stare at us as we all but fell through the doors.

Templeton glanced right and then left and with his hand still holding my arm, guiding me toward a back door.

“Get your hands off me,” I said again, trying to pull away from him with all my strength.

The guy had a grip like a steelworker’s vise.

“I will the moment you agree to talk to me,” he said. He pushed through the door, which found us in the back alley of the club. A smelly dumpster and about a hundred empty boxes surrounded us.

Templeton finally let go of me.

“How dare you,” I spat, pushing against his chest again with all my strength. He didn’t even budge.

“Look, I’m sorry for the Neanderthal tactics, but I knew you weren’t going to come willingly with me—”

“You got that right.”

“—and I really need to speak to you.”

“You have nothing to say I want to hear.” I started walking away from him.

“Mackenzie, please. I know you’re mad—”

“Mad doesn’t even come close to what I feel.”

“Please. Hear me out. Let me explain.”

I spun around. “Why should I? You’ve lied to me already. Everything about you is a lie. What’s to prevent you from doing to so again?”

“I never lied to you.”

“You told me your name was Nick Churchill.”

“No I didn’t, Mackenzie. I never told you my last name. You assumed it was Churchill.”

“With just cause. And you didn’t correct that assumption!”

My voice echoed around the empty space. I couldn’t believe I was standing in a smelly, filthy alleyway, screeching like a banshee at this guy. Forget heart palpitations. My mother would need to be admitted to a coronary care unit if she saw this little scene.

Templeton slid his hands into his trouser pockets, his shoulders dropping down a bit as he folded in on himself. Even in the subdued lighting I could tell his cheeks had darkened. “You’re right, I didn’t correct your assumption. That’s on me, and I regret it. But there’s a good reason I didn’t.”

“Of course there is.” My nasty flag was flying full sail. “You want an interview and just like the sleazy gossip rag reporter you are, you used unscrupulous tactics to get it. Showing up and getting introduced to me by someone I knew. Dancing with me, taking me to lunch. Kissing me.” I gagged on that one. “Making me believe you were a good guy, a guy who—”

I stopped myself in time. I’d been about to embarrass myself fully by admitting how much I liked him and wanted to see him again. How much his simple kiss had wrecked me.

Good God.

I dragged in a breath and dug deep down to my toes for some semblance of my mother’s calm demeanor.

“Well, too bad for you, because you failed.” Better. My voice was decidedly stronger. “Horribly. I wouldn’t talk to you if you were the last person on earth.”

I turned around again and too late realized I faced the wrong way to exit the alley because the brick wall of the opposing building was right in front of me. I had to go in the opposite direction in order to do so, which meant skirting around him.

“It’s not a normal interview,” he said when I began walking past him. “Mackenzie, please. Stop. Please.”

I could tell myself a dozen different reasons why I did later. But the truth was something in his voice, something so raw and so real, made me stop, short.

I’ve never intentionally hurt another person in my life. Not that I knew of, anyway. That’s what I heard in Templeton’s tone – a stab of hurt that sliced through my anger.

Suddenly, all the fight left me. I wanted to go home, fall into bed and forget this day ever happened.

Templeton took a step toward me, his hands out at his sides and lifted as if in surrender.

When I didn’t spring away from him or hit him again, I guess he took it as a sign I was going to listen.

Was I?

I didn’t want to. Nothing he could say would ever allow me to trust him.

“Please,” he said one more time while he lowered his hands. “Give me a few minutes to explain everything. That’s all I’m asking.”

“That’s asking a lot. More than you deserve.”

“Five minutes,” he said.

Why did I agree to hear him out? Damned if I know.

INTRIGUED? let me make this easy – aim and shoot your cell phone camera at the following image and you can get your copy. It’s available in kindle and print, and on KU.

Release day for INFLUENCE (The New York Socialites Series) #slowburn #NYCromance

Well, you all knew this day (and blog post) was coming. If you’ve been following me for the past few weeks, I’ve been writing up a storm about my newest New York Socialites book, INFLUENCE.

This story was so much fun to write and research. I had to delve deeply into the influencing sphere and it was eye opening, I have to tell ya. For all the time we as writers have to spend on social media hawking our books, influencers and brand ambassadors have to be on 24/7. That’s exhausting just thinking about. And not everyone can make the kind of money Lizzy Cray makes as an influencer, either. The top tier is small and anyone can be pitched off their perch when a newer, better brand ambassador comes around. Too stressful for me, LOL!

Brand influencer, Lizzy Cray, is killing it.

She’s got a list of high profile clients who pay her handsomely to help their products explode on social media. Everything from cameras to cashmere, shoes to smoothies. One picture of her with a product and the money practically prints itself.

Why does this trust fund-baby need to work so hard to rake in the cash? That’s a question journalist Dominick Templeton wants an answer to, because Lizzy Cray used to be known in the gossip pages as socialite and wild-child Mackenzie Craymore.

Mackenzie disappeared from the public’s eye twelve years ago, right after her fiancé, hotel-heir, Lucky Blumenthal, died in a fiery car crash rumored to be fueled by drugs and alcohol. But now she’s back, still hauntingly beautiful, rebranded, and from everything Dominick’s researched about her, a much different person. When she ignores all his attempts at an interview, Dominick tries a different tactic and soon becomes embroiled in a world he never imagined…with a woman he’s rapidly falling for.

I spotted a lone guy in a tux at one end, leaning an elbow on the counter and facing the room, a tumbler in his hand. I couldn’t make out his face clearly from this distance but he was tall, trim, had a mass of wavy dark hair and a neatly trimmed goatee.

And he was staring straight at me while he lifted his glass to his lips and drank.

His attention never wavered from me while he sipped. There was something so…erotic about that. For a moment I didn’t think he was looking at me, but maybe lost in thought, you know? Looking toward me but not really seeing me? When his lids dropped down to half-mast and he stopped sipping, he held the glass up in a subtle salute aimed right at me, and one side of his mouth lifted.

Every nerve ending in my spine fired and I shuddered like I’d stepped into an ice-cold bath.

But I wasn’t. Cold, that is. Nope, I was about as far from cold as a person could get on a temperature scale.

Hot didn’t even come close to what my insides were experiencing. If you happened to step into a roaring volcano and come in contact with all that molten lava spewing from it, then maybe – maybe – you’d know how I felt with this guy’s piercing gaze glued to mine.

Mesmerized, I couldn’t pull away from it.

You ever have the notion your life is about to change, something big is about to happen, and you can’t figure out what it is but you’re powerless to alter the course? That’s what it felt like with this guy’s focus zeroed in on me.

Excited anticipation zipped through me.

You can get your copy here: INFLUENCE

Read the reviews:
Goodreads (And add it to your WANT TO READ list)

Bookbub

#fridayfive

Something a little different today…5 things I’ve learned since I because a published author.

No everyone will think your book is 5 star worthy. Haters gotta hate and everyone’s a critic. Grow some thick skin or get outta the game.You will not get independently rich overnight. Or ever. Be happy if you break even most years when tax time rolls around.Every book has typos. Even professionally/traditionally pubbed books.Self marketing is a must and a crapshoot at the same time. Don’t spend thousands of unnecessary dollars on ads that get you no ROIs.I am happiest when I am writing. Not editing. Not promoting. Not meeting people at book signing events. Just writing.

5 things about Lucky Blumenthal from INFLUENCE

Surprisingly, this model’s name is LUCKY. LOL. I sure can pick’em.

Although you never meet Lucky Blumenthal in person in INFLUENCE (The New York Socialites series) he is a vital character in the book and the object of Mackenzie’s motivation.

Here are 5 important things to know about Lucky:

He was an only child and heir to a real estate empireHe was addicted to drugs and alcohol.Mackenzie was a calming, sobering influence on him.He refused to wear the color black in anything from clothes, to shoes, to accessories like belts and hats.He wanted to make a community where homeless people were given places to live, rent free.

#wednesdaywisdom