Lizzy Ford's Blog, page 51

Winner of the Spring Into Books Blog Hop (from Lizzy's site)

I'm a bit late to announce, but the winners of the Spring Into Books Blog Hop (which ended on 31 March) are:

Gabby Warner

Kate Tilton

The winners will receive an autographed, limited edition of "The Rhyn Trilogy."

Thanks to everyone who participated!

Book Feature: The New Adventure Series by Nicola Palmer

Please welcome Nicola Palmer to Lizzyland! She's written a wonderful fantasy children's adventure series that's perfect for children of all ages. Below are featured the first two books in her New Adventure Series

Thirteen-year-old Alice Parker knows something isn't right; mysterious aches and pains, a craving for sugar that's out of control. Suddenly she is top of the class in every subject.

Baffled by what is happening to her and feeling at odds with the world, Alice can't take much more. Only when she collapses and experiences a life-changing transformation does she discover why she is different.

But this new, incredible identity brings its own challenges and Alice isn't convinced she can rise to them. She just wants to be normal!

The fact is she's anything but…

Purchase from Amazon or Amazon UK

Alice Parker has adapted well to her extraordinary new identity and abilities; she is even beginning to enjoy them.

But mysterious things are happening all around her.

People are behaving very strangely. Something or someone is controlling them – but how? Alice confronts a ruthless, relentless villain, and soon discovers his astonishing power. Where is it coming from? What makes him so different?

Disturbingly, the answers to these questions reveal as much about Alice as her sinister enemy.

Nothing, it seems, is coincidence…

Purchase from Amazon or Amazon UK

About the author:

Nicola Palmer is a children's writer from Warwickshire, England. She has studied several subjects, including Modern Languages at Oxford University, bilingual administration and landscape design. After winning several awards as a garden designer, she now feels ready to follow her long-term dream of writing full-time. She is currently working on Book 3 in the Alice Parker Series.

Connect with Nicola:

Blog: nicolapalmerwriter.blogspot.com

facebook.com/AliceParkersAdventures

twitter.com/nicolalpalmer

Book Feature: "Night Stalker" by Carol Davis Luce

Please welcome Carol Davis Luce to Lizzyland!  Carol's books are romantic suspense at its finest, and her Night series went platinum at Amazon with tens of thousands of copies sold.  I'm happy to feature her first novel in the series, Night Stalker.

Night Stalker is available from Amazon and Amazon UK.

Things were looking up for Alexandra Carlson. With her divorce behind her and the mysterious death of her father fading in her memory, she was moving on. She lived in a wonderful secluded house on a mountainside in Reno, her paintings were beginning to sell, and there was even a hint of romance on the horizon. Then things began to happen. Little things. Anonymous phone calls full of heavy breathing. A broken tree branch outside her bedroom window. Her cat, Winnie–gone without a trace. A moving shadow above the skylight. Surely it was all her imagination…

Then one day she picked up the phone and there was someboby–somebody who knew her childhood nickname. In the background she could hear a scratchy record–an old song that brought dark memories out of the shadows.

That night something woke Alexandra out of a sound sleep. This time, the heavy breathing wasn't coming from the telephone. Someone was in house with her. And she was at his mercy.

About Carol

Carol Davis Luce's first novel, Night Stalker, was also her first sale. "A dandy read," wrote author Tony Hillerman. It went into three printings and became the flagship for the sub-genre "Woman in Jeopardy" at Kensington Publishers–strong heroines pitted against evil opponents. Reviewers have said of her villains: [Night Prey] "Luce's portrayal of a psychopathic mountain man is chilling…" [Night Game] "The villain is evil personified."

In addition to five published novels, Carol's short story "Shattered Crystal" appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Magazine and Treadmill Tales (audio). E-reads Publications reprinted Night Passage in e-book format and POD. Nonfiction publications include two articles for Writer's Digest. One article, "Writing Suspense That'll Kill Your Readers," was reprinted (second edition) in THE COMPLETE HANDBOOK OF NOVEL WRITING (Writer's Digest Books)2010.

*In The Complete Handbook of Novel Writing 2010, Carol Davis Luce defines tension as "the act of building or prolonging a crisis." She goes on to give some examples and ends the chapter with this: "How you build that suspense can make the difference between your readers chucking your book for a good night's sleep or nudging their spouse to say, 'the suspense is killing me.'"

Visit Carol at her website, Twitter or Facebook!

Book Features: "He Loves Me Not" and "Don't Look Back" by Christine Kersey

Welcome back to Lizzyland, Christine!  Today, I'm featuring Christine's book, He Loves Me Not, the first book in the romantic suspense series, Lily's Story, and the sequel, Don't Look Back.

He Loves Me Not is available from Amazon and Amazon UK.  Don't Look Back is available from Amazon and Amazon UK.

Stay away from him. When college student Lily Jamison receives the ominous note, she convinces herself it's a mistake. After all, she's barely met the two men it could be referring to. But as she begins to fall for the man with the striking blue eyes, the disturbing messages increase.

Refusing to believe warnings from an anonymous sender and trusting her own heart, Lily presses forward with her relationship, eventually coming to understand the meaning behind the messages as she fears for her life.

He Loves Me Not does not contain any profanity, but does contain mild sensuality (kissing). It is 83,000 words, which is approximately 300 pages.

Hiding from her estranged husband Trevor, Lily Jamison has changed her name and settled in a small town in the California Central Valley. Though she continues to receive emails from Trevor that range from threats to professions of love, she tries to move on with her life.

To hide her identity she's had to lie to all those around her. To further protect herself she gets a dog and takes self-defense classes, but she lives in constant fear that all of her efforts will not keep her husband from tracking her down. Eventually she comes to realize that to truly put her past behind her, she needs to divorce Trevor. However, he has some demands of his own, including being involved in the life of the child Lily is carrying in her womb.

Don't Look Back does not contain any profanity or sexual content. It is 75,000 words, which is approximately 275 pages.

About Christine

"I have always loved to read, but in 1997 I decided to try my hand at writing. It's a lot of work, but I enjoy creating situations and having my characters get out of them. When I first started writing I didn't tell anyone I was trying to write a novel – I wanted to see if I could do it first. I completed one novel, Suspicions, which is now available in eBook format. After that one was finished, I decided to try it again. The result was No Way Out, which was published by Covenant Communications. It is out of print now, but can be purchased as an eBook.

"I've been married since 1984 and my husband and I have four children and one grandson. I grew up in San Jose, California and then moved to the California Central Valley with my husband when our oldest child was a toddler. We lived there for twelve years before moving to Utah in 1999. I love it here and especially love the four distinctive seasons.

"When my youngest child started first grade I decided to go back to school. I received my Bachelor's degree in Information Technology in 2004. I currently work in the software industry. "

Contact Christine through her website, Twitter or Facebook!

 

"Rhyn's Redemption" & Trilogy set (finally!) on Barnes and Noble

Ok, "Rhyn's Redemption" and "The Rhyn Trilogy" set finally made it to Barnes and Noble.  Goodness … waiting on Apple now.

Rhyn's Redemption is here [URL: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/rhyns-redemption-lizzy-ford/1109708345?ean=2940014266901]

The Rhyn Trilogy set is here. [http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-rhyn-trilogy-lizzy-ford/1109708348?ean=2940014266956]

Yay!

USA Today features review of "Damian's Oracle"

IndieReader.com did a review of "Damian's Oracle," and it was chosen to submit to USA Today's indie book review section!  And you know what? IT'S IN USA TODAY'S BOOK REVIEW SECTION!

Check out the review here.

And now, I'll commence freaking out.  I'm so excited right now!!

 

Winner of the iPad3 giveaway, sponsored by Lizzy Ford and Julia Crane

We're thrilled to announce the winner of the iPad3 giveaway, sponsored by Lizzy Fod and Julia Crane.

Lisa Krissman Lodter from California

Congrats, Lisa!  Thank you everyone for participating!

Stay tuned for more giveaway opportunities!

Book Review: "Woodrose Mountain" by RaeAnne Thayne is a charming, sweet read

I rarely do book reviews, mainly because I'm too busy writing my own - ha!  But when RaeAnne Thayne's publicist approached me about reviewint an ARC, I checked out the blurb and thought – this sounds pretty cool. Woodrose Mountain is a contemporary romance, available from Amazon (Kindle), Amazon UK (paperback), and Barnes and Noble (Nook).

Woodrose Mountain is the story about Evie and Brodie, who are brought together by a horrific accident that leaves Brodie's teenage daughter, Taryn, in a wheelchair.  Evie was once a physical therapist but left that world after her own tragedy – the loss of her adopted daughter, who was also severely disabled and who Evie ultimately couldn't save.  Evie moved away from her rush-rush life in L.A. to an idyllic little town in the mountains of Colorado, where she took up beading.

Brodie, on the other hand, is the self-made wealthy man in town who often puts the locals on edge because he owns half the town and caters land developments more towards tourists than the people of Hope's Crossing.  He's got his own issues, from trying to manage his empire and teenage daughter, to his own learning disability and ADD, which have made him a rather rigid perfectionist.

The story is very much like the setting: charming and sweet.  Evie and Brodie slowly learn to tolerate each other as they take care of Taryn. Respect turns to love over several weeks, as Brodie sees Evie's selfless dedication to his daughter, and Evie realizes there is a caring, warm father in the man most believe to be a distant dictator.  They start to work together and realize – hey, Evie/Brodie's not that bad!

I could also relate to both characters: Evie, because I, too, left behind the big city to find peace, and Brodie, because I'm right there with him trying to grapple with the mental chaos of ADD.  Brodie's daughter, Taryn, is well-portrayed as the injured teen with a secret.  I loved the character of Charles, who was willing to take the responsibility for the accident, even when it wasn't entirely his fault.

All in all, this is a perfect book for Saturday afternoon reading.  RaeAnne's writing is descriptive and perfectly paced, and her characters are all thoughtfully created.  I loved the descriptions of Hope's Crossing, too, and the food.  She makes me want to visit for myself for some blackberry pie.

2012 Appearances: Book Expo America, Phoenix Comicon, Southern Festival of Books

One of my goals this year is to leave my house and start to meet both readers and others in the publishing industry.  I've lined up three major events so far where I'll have an exhibitor's booth and will keep everyone updated as to more events as I find them!  If you know of a book festival or expo near you, post a comment, and I'll see what I can do!

As I line up more events, I'll add them under the "Events" tab I added today to our website!  At the events, I'll be autographing books, handing out tons of cool freebies and Tweeting/Facebooking live!

May 24-27

Phoenix Comic Convention in Phoenix

 

June 04 – 08

Book Expo America in New York. Authors Rachel Short and Julia Crane will be joining me here! Booth: 4577, by the Author's Stage!

 

October 12-14

Southern Festival of Books in Nashville.  Authors Julia Crane and Heather Marie Adkins will be joining me here!

Why we Chose E-junkie.com for our Online Store

Eagle eyed followers of this blog might have noticed that yesterday marked two special occasions for Guerrilla Wordfare. The first was obviously the launch of the much anticipated book three in the Rhyn Trilogy "Rhyn's Redemption". The second event had much less fanfare but was still significant; we launched our online store on this site.

Since day one a big part of our strategy has been to make Lizzy's books available to readers across the world including places where Amazon doesn't reach. India has been and likely always will be one of our biggest reader bases. Several of Lizzy's readers have requested alternate methods of buying her books and now we have those in place. The system we use also enables Lizzy to start doing something she's been mulling over for quite a while, an affiliate program. For these reasons and many more Lizzy has been on me to turn our site into an e-commerce site for some time but between my day job and nighttime SEO/webmaster duties it's always been pushed down on my to-do list. We finally decided to get it out this weekend for the launch of "Rhyn's Redemption and I'm glad we did.

I wanted a system in place that requires zero effort once setup. I want someone to click a button, buy a book, receive their book and the only notification I want is an email letting me know it happened. I started off by examining several of the different shopping cart options or other methods that we could use to deliver digital content instantly. I did quite a bit of reading and testing and ended up choosing a provider that I felt very comfortable with, E-junkie.com. In addition to low prices, the best options of any provider I found and ease of use, E-junkie.com also comes with the peace of mind of being one of the biggest providers out there. Their Alexa rank is around 3,000 and when I Googled "digital content providers" they came back as the top organic result. I don't automatically use the biggest provider of a service (otherwise I would use Aweber instead of MailChimp for our mailing list) but it's nice to know that your cart provider has the scalability and reliability that comes with size. We haven't had the shop open for 24 hours yet but it's already handled 235 transactions like a champ. I've been programming computers for most of my life but when it comes to keeping payment information secure, I'll go ahead and use a professional.

There were a few things that I really wanted to make sure that the option we picked had. We're looking at shopping cart options is not just a matter of of something will work or not it's a matter of finding something that the buyer will feel comfortable with. There's been several times in my life that I've started to buy something online but really didn't like the look of the payment system didn't feel comfortable giving them my info and so I ended up canceling the purchase. There's also been a few times when I started to buy something and couldn't complete the checkout process due to a slow loading or buggy payment system. Due to these factors I wanted a cart that kept the visitor on our page as long as possible. Several of the bigger providers like getdpd.com take you offsite every time you check your cart. Neither I nor Lizzy liked that. If you haven't already take a second to check out our shop and try it out (it's the "shop" option at the end of the row at the top of this site). You don't even have to buy anything. When you add an item to the cart it doesn't take you to an entirely new site, it just shows you what's in your cart. Only when you go to checkout does it take you to PayPal. There are a lot of other payment options like Google checkout that we haven't configured yet.

The second feature that I will wasn't willing to budge on was that the card had to accept PayPal. I know not everyone loves PayPal but nearly everyone uses it. I love it because it acts as a trustworthy middle man between my payment details and the site where I'm shopping. If I'm looking at two sites to purchase something I will always choose the site which has PayPal as an option. I looked at one site (gumroad.com) that had no monthly fees, but also no options and no PayPal option. I would much rather pay a few dollars a month for a system I like than try to work with one that will frustrate me and likely cost us sales.

I only had one previous experience with E-junkie.com, which was when I purchased my Facebook ad coupon several months ago. The process was quick and painless. The more I started to dig into all of the options that becoming an E-junkie.com seller provided, the more I fell in love. Every option I could think of (discount codes with every imaginable option, affiliate programs, link expiration dates etc.) was in there. Adding items to our store was quick and easy but there is one caveat that I mentioned in the video that I must mention here.

A lot of our readers download our content on their mobile devices instead of a computer. Unless you want frustrated buyers (who usually don't become repeat buyers) then you need to provide downloads for actual .pdf, .mobi and .epub files, not just all three combined into one .zip file. We learned this lesson the hard way. Most providers offer their content delivery services in a monthly fee which entitles you to sell a certain number of products. I originally thought I would go with getdpd.com so I emailed their tech support and asked them if I could associate three files with one product. They replied back the next day and said that I could not and had to use a workout of creating each file type as one product, and then have a fourth product which was a bundle of those three other products. Easy enough to do, but when you realize that the $16 a month 30 product plan will only handle 7 books, it becomes less attractive. As I started to look around I realized that this was a common issue and E-junkie.com is no different. So when you look at the $5 a month 10 product plan, that will only be 2 books if you use the 4 product bundle method. The good news is that the plans on E-junkie.com stay cheap. You can get a 20 product plan for $10 a month or a 40 product plan for $15 a month. I've included a YouTube video where I demonstrate how to create a product for each file type and then create a bundle combining all three.

I'm sure that every digital content delivery option system has their pros and cons, but E-junkie.com was a perfect fit for us and I honestly can't think of anything I would change about it (outside of the 4 product bundle thing common to a lot of providers). I rarely place affiliate links on this site because whenever I go to a "review" site with affiliate links, you always have to question if the reviewer had an undeservedly favorable opinion. For this reason I only place affiliate links to sites that I have no problems with and recommend to my friends. I recommend hostgator.com to someone at work at least once a week. If you have had a good or bad experience with any digital content delivery system please post them here.