Ruth Nestvold's Blog, page 50

Finally branching out: Kobo and Pubit

This week, I finally got a big item off my to-do list: I set up accounts for myself on Kobo’s Writing Life and Barnes and Noble’s Pubit platforms and uploaded my first two books on each site. But while B&N had my books available in less than a day, much like Amazon, my books on Kobo are still “publishing.” Oh well.

The good news is, it was easy enough to sign up, redo the books without the Amazon links, and upload, but as with all things, it just takes time. These are systems I haven’t used b...

Books on Fire!

As I mentioned briefly a couple of days back, I’m participating in a new group promo, Books on Fire, a contest giving away a Kindle Fire and lots of ebooks.

The Books on Fire contest, which runs through the end of December, is giving away a new Kindle Fire HD loaded with 13 books of science fiction, fantasy, and historical fiction. Sponsored by authors Judson Roberts, Luc Reid, William Hertling, Annie Bellet, Del Law, and me, Ruth Nestvold, Books on Fire can be found on the Web at www.kindle...

Mea Culpa (maybe): Freebie flub-up with The Future, Imperfect

I have a confession to make: I (maybe) screwed up. I thought I had a freebie for my dystopian short story collection, The Future, Imperfect, scheduled for today, but when I checked my sales numbers, the book had not been downloaded a single time. Went to Amazon, saw it wasn’t free. Went to KDP bookshelf, and sure enough, there was no promotion for Dec. 3-5 listed for the book. I am 99% sure that I entered the promotion for the book on my bookshelf several weeks back when I also entered the mo...

The challenge of becoming visible as an indie — and an interview

As anyone knows who’s stuck their toes in the self-publishing waters, one of the biggest challenges facing indie authors is getting noticed. So that beautiful tree you cultivated fell with a satisfying crash? But if no one is there to hear it … you get the idea.

It’s the same thing when you throw your brilliant work of staggering genius out into the pond of all the other newly-minted indie authors — and the pond is so full, it doesn’t make a ripple, since there’s no water left.

When I first p...

Experimenting with Fast Draft — and another free ebook

Since my progress this month during Nanowrimo has been less than stellar, when I heard that Candace Havens was doing her Fast Draft and Revision Hell course again (this time entitled “The Book in a Month Club”), I jumped at the chance. I’ve read about this course on other folks’ blogs before, and I’ve really wanted to give it a shot, but it seemed that every time it was offered, I had conflicts. I have conflicts this time too, but I decided to go for it anyway.

The basic idea is to send the i...

Latest free run for Yseult and some thoughts on KDP Select

My sales this month have been pretty pathetic, and that after awesome months in August, September and October. Partly it might be due to the fact that I was gone for over two weeks, plus frazzled before and jetlagged after. My online presence diminished to near-invisibility, and I can’t help but think that played a role in my diminishing sales.

Another thing that’s hurting me (and others) is that free runs are becoming increasingly ineffective for boosting sales. There have been a number of d...

Getting back into the swing of things

I’ve been back from the States for just over a week now, and I’m slowly recovering from jetlag while I try to get back into my normal routines again. My attempt to jump into Nano a few days late has been pretty pathetic until now — Ygerna (my prequel to Yseult and Shadow of Stone) is presently coming in at a little over 6500 words. But I’m not going to beat myself up over it too much. The last couple of days, my word counts have been increasing to near-Nano requirements, and if this keeps up,...

A little writing progress and lots of free Halloween fiction

As I predicted last week, I haven’t exactly gotten a lot of writing done while I’ve been visiting family. I have been doing some brainstorming for Ygerna, though — and I’m loving it. Brainstorming is one of my favorite parts of the writing process. When you’re playing with ideas, it’s like being on a journey of discovery, for me at least. Every time a new twist or (supposedly) perfect detail pops into my mind, I’m like all “ooh, cool, that will be so great!” Because at this wonderfully innoce...

The Next Big Thing: Musing on my time travel with Aphra Behn

I was tagged by Renata Barcelos to explain why my novel is going to be the Next Big Thing. *g* But seriously, the blog hop is more about stopping by different blogs to discover new writers, or maybe a great read down the road somewhere. A lot of us are talking about books that have yet to be finished, but maybe our WIPs will make people curious about the books we’ve already published!

On to the questions:

What is the working title of your latest book?

Chameleon in a Mirror

Where did the idea...

“The Next Big Thing,” upcoming freebies, and hiatus announcement

I was tagged today in a blog hop, “The Next Big Thing”:

This particular blog hop was started as an opportunity to learn about the work of independent authors, one blog at a time. If you would like the chance to promote your book in this way, please let me know in the comments! I need to tag five other writers next week when it’s my turn (assuming I even get around to posting, but more on that later.) You can see the questions on Renata Barcelos’s blog, the writing buddy who tagged me. Thanks,...