M.B. Mulhall's Blog, page 24

Do books start trends?

All you need to do is turn on one of those entertainment news TV shows or browse celebrity news websites to see how actors and musicians are starting and setting trends. Fashion magazines will show you how to dress like your favorite celebs and what products they use, what they’re eating, etc. Music and movies (and television) are important parts of trend setting, but what about books? Do they start trends? You bet your bippy they do!

Let’s look at some examples:

Hunger Games: inspired fashion trends and a nail polish line (while yes this is a movie, many people read the books as well). Also it inspired some kind of new workout at gyms.

Harry Potter: Perhaps not a trend (short of maybe scarf wearing?) but a “real” sport (real depending on who you ask I suppose) came out of the books as people have made and play their own versions of Quidditch, which is really pretty freakin’ cool when you think about it.

Twilight: I’m not sure how popular it is here in the states but I have heard that the book series, along with several other popular vampire based books have started a tooth sharpening trend with people asking to have their teeth filed to look like fangs or they get caps that  can be permanent or removable. Can’t say it’s a trend I want to take part in, but to each their own.   Also, there’s a horrible trend of bad Twilight tattoos…

Comic books have long been causing trends from tattoos to Halloween costumes to cosplay (check out these awesome cosplayers!)

I’m sure there are other instances and I think as people read more, we’ll see more things popping up. Heck, maybe we’ll see a trend of BDSM clubs opening thanks to Fifty Shades of Grey…although, those things are kind of kept on the down-low, so who really knows if the non-goers will notice such a thing? Heh.

What other trends have you spotted coming from books? What do you think we might see in the future, thanks to best sellers?

A winner am I!

So the month of April has flown by and there was much procrastination, but I have prevailed and pulled up my bootstraps for the final push today (well, yesterday by the time this posts) to hit 100 pages of my script, Resolution.  Let me tell you, it was not easy to get into a screenplay mind frame. I had to make sure I stayed away from those pesky inner monologues and had to be sure to describe the scenes and what everyone was wearing. I know I didn’t do as well describing things as I should have. When the story is finally done (it’s just about there, hitting the climax/resolution now and then the wrap up stuff) I know I will have to go back and do a lot of adding so that the reader really sees the picture the shot would paint. I wanted to say Oooh just leave it up to the set dresser (HA! As if it’ll ever be made into a real film) but I guess they need some guidelines to go by.

Script Frenzy was a different animal than NaNoWriMo. While there was definitely a community, it just wasn’t as hyped as NaNo and I didn’t feel like I wanted to get as involved. No write-ins (physical anyhow), no really local folks to meet with it seemed. I don’t know if it’s just because I was new to the Frenzy or if I just felt like doing things on my own. Maybe it was lack of others doing it with me (next year you join me, Mike and Sasha! ).

Now that I’ve got one screenplay under my belt (well, almost), will I be doing more? I just don’t know. It was definitely an interesting exercise that I think will help my writing in the long run. I may give it another run next year depending on where other projects are (there’s always something simmering in some stage of completion).

All and all, it was fun to try and I certainly don’t regret it and am happy to have given it a try. I’m interested enough to want to finish it and pass it along to see if it is any good or compete garbage! Heh

Congratulations to all other winning participants! Those who didn’t make it, there’s always next year!

 

The Physical Book is NOT Dead

Whenever a new piece of technology pops up in the mainstream world, people get all up in arms about what it means for the prior piece of “technology”, for the previous way of doing things. When CD players came around it was all “OMG! What will happen to my cassette tapes?!” and then MP3 players came on the scene and it was all “OMG! What will happen to all my CDs?!” and so on. We won’t even go back as far as the record (which people still collect) and 8-tracks.  Do some things become obsolete?  Kind of. It’s true I do know someone who’s still listening to tapes in his car, but he’s a rarity.

So of course when

World Book Night 2012

Yesterday, April 23rd marked the first US World Book Night. What is World Book Night? It’s an event to help promote reading in teens and adults by giving away free books. Volunteers had 30 different books to choose from (we made a first, second and third choice in case they couldn’t get their first choice).  The books were special printed and the authors of the books gave up royalties for the copies given out.

I decided I would give my twenty copies of Sherman Alexie‘s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian away at my local Starbucks and the plaza where I hang out the most and do my writing.  Problem being? I’m super shy! I was able to give a couple away, but thankfully one of my closest friends was bribed by a free coffee to come help me. Thank God for her!

People were surprised but receptive. Free is free! The biggest surprise was probably from the guys in the Game Stop. Some of them totally didn’t want it but we pushed it on them. One of them, who said he reads on occasion, read a little aloud for everyone!  He was quite into it. He just happened along the part of the story where the main character talks about his love of books and how it gives him a boner . They were sold after that. Heh boys can be predictable! Haha!  There was one person who totally refused. Which made me sad. Who doesn’t want a free book? I figure she totally wasn’t a reader and that’s the kind of person this night is supposed to help the most. Shame.

I also contacted a couple friends of mine who are middle school teachers to see if they wanted a copy or two for their classroom or  to give away to special students in their classes. I love the idea that the book can be kept in the room for students to read or given away as a special prize for a hardworking student who could get a lot out of that particular book.

With the books, they gave us a  book giver pin, some stickers and bookmarks. Sadly, I only received seven bookmarks so I used some of my own promoting my book and some postcards promoting  The Spirit Keeper written by my author friend Melissa Luznicky Garrett.  Nice to be able to cross promote!

Even though I had to get help handing them out, I was still happy to be a part of the whole experience and look forward to doing it again next year. I’ll just have to work on my public speaking skills before then!

Here are some great articles on the program:

Millions of Books to be Donated Monday in Worldwide Charity Effort

World Book Night Celebrates Reading with Paperback Handouts

Did anyone else participate? I’d love to hear about your experiences!

Reader Survey Results

As promised on Tuesday, today’s post is all about the results of the reader survey I posted. It was only up for a couple of days so the amount of people polled isn’t huge, but enough to give  an idea of what readers out there are thinking.

# of people who took the survey: 53

# of questions: 10

1. Do you own an e-reader?





Yes
No





62.3% – yes
37.7% – no




2. How often do you buy books?






Once a month
Two – four times a month
Five + times a month




Other (please specify)





Once a month was the most popular response at 46.5%
There were a couple of “other” responses such as “when things come out” and “only once a year but I by several at the same time”




3. How often do you download free books?






Once a month
Two – four times a month
Five + times a month
Never, I don’t own an ereader




Other (please specify)






There was a two way tie on this questions 26% for both once a month and never and 24% for 2-4 times and 5+ times a month
This actually surprised me. I thought more people would take advantage of the freebies. Perhaps they don’t know of sites like Pixels of Ink or they think because something is free it must not be any good?




4. Do you read books by indie (self-published) authors?






Yes
No






I was super happy to see that yes won out at 84% for this question. Thanks for giving us a chance!




5. What is the most you’re willing to pay for an indie published book?






$0.99
$1.99
$2.99
$3.99
$4.99
$5.99
$9.99




Other (please specify)






$2.99 won out with 22% but it was very closely followed by $4.99 & $5.99 both at 20%. Surprisingly, the third highest was $9.99 at 14%.  A popular “other” answer was that it depends on the book.




6. How do you choose the books you read?






By the cover
By the back cover blurb/synopsis
Based on recommendations
Based on reviews
Based on enjoyment of prior books by the same author




Other (please specify)





The two most popular responses were “based on recommendations” (73.6%) and a tie  with “by the back cover blurb/synopsis” and “based on enjoyment of prior books by same author” both at 60.4%. That means, authors, get people talking about your books, get more than one out there and work HARD on that blurb!




7. What is your biggest pet peeve about traditionally published books?

There were many answers for this, by PRICE by far was the most popular closely followed by the amount of time between books in a series and the flood of genres.

8. What is your biggest pet peeve about indie published books?




*sigh* I knew what the response to this question was going to be and yet it still hurts to see it.  The biggest pet peeve in indie book is LACK OF EDITING.  I think readers should keep in mind that nothing’s perfect, BUT they do deserve the best product an author can put out.  Yes you can find mistakes in traditionally published books (in fact, it seems more common then it used to be), but they are minimal comparatively. Don’t skimp on the editing indie authors!


There were also a couple complaints of the lack of ease at finding print versions of indie books.




9. Do you prefer to read series or stand alone books?






Series
Stand alone
Don’t care






People don’t seem to care if what they read is part of a series or a stand alone book  (67.9%)




10. Do you rate or review books when you’re done?






Yes
No
Sometimes





People only rate and review books sometimes (47.2%). Hey readers, it would totally help us authors if you were able to do that more regularly. We won’t push, but more reviews often equals more sales which equals more money we have in our pockets to put towards future book covers and editing! 






All in all I find the results to be quite interesting. Some of them were expected but there were a few here and there that surprised me (like the person who said they’ve paid up to $14.99 for an indie book!).  I hope other indie authors find this information helpful in their pricing and other aspects of their writing and promoting!

High or Low? How should you price your e-book?

If you’ve been following the DOJ lawsuit against Apple and several big publishing companies, it may have gotten you thinking about the pricing of your own e-books.

If some of the major publishing houses are allegedly trying to raise their e-book prices, should you raise yours as well? Would they sell? What are people willing to pay for an indie published book?  Should I lower my price to be more appealing to those who are disgusted by what Apple and other publishing houses are accused of doing?

These are all questions you have to answer for yourself, but take the time to do some research and ask around. In fact, come back to this blog on Thursday and I’ll have some data for you (help take part in adding to that data by answering this quick 10 question survey)!

Some opinions of mine:

- No full length novel should have a permanent price of $0.99.  I *KNOW* the kind of work that goes into writing and editing and formatting a novel. Your work is worth so much more than barely a dollar. I think it’s perfectly acceptable for a short story or as a short term sale price.  Don’t sell yourself short.  For some extra insight, read this article about the DOJ lawsuit paying special attention to the last two paragraphs.

- Don’t be afraid to put things on sale or change your price permanently. Things are changing and people are willing to pay more than you might think for an indie published book.

- If you’re working on a series, there’s nothing wrong with pricing the books differently. Perhaps you make the first book cheaper to entice and hook the reader and then raise the price on the following books. I often find subsequent books in a series are longer as well so that’s another reason to consider raising the price.

- Keep an eye on other books in your genre. See what the pricing trend is and consider following it. Remember if someone buys one “vampire” book for $4.99 then they’re likely to be willing to spend the same amount on other “vampire” books.

What’s the deal with Triberr?

For those that don’t know, Triberr is site that helps bloggers spread their posts to a larger audience. You join tribes (for a certain amount of bones which is their “currency”) and then you help the other members of your tribe by retweeting their posts to your Twitter followers and they (should) do the same for you.

Joining more tribes helps expand your reach (mine is currently around 107,400 people). Sounds nice right? I may be reaching over 100,000 people, but there’s no promise that  so many people will see the Tweet or click on it.  I guess it does up your chances though.

I belong to three separate tribes: Writers and Writing, Indie Ebooks and a specific author’s tribe.  Belonging to several tribes ups my reach, but that also means there are more posts for me to retweet. Not everyone blogs everyday but there are a couple of folks in each tribe that do. God forbid I miss a day of tweeting, I get all backlogged and have tons to do at once. Which annoys me to no end.

When I have so many posts to retweet I do admit it feels a bit like spamming.  One good thing Triberr does is spaces out your tweets. I’m not sure of the time between each one, but you could retweet twenty posts and they will go out every so often in a space of five hours or so, which is less spammy to me.

I also find issue with some of the posts and won’t always push them through.  If they don’t apply enough to writing or books or things I’d normally tweet about, I may give it a thumbs up but choose not to tweet it. I know others who won’t tweet any posts about erotica. To each their own.  Ideally, I’d love to be able to read every post before tweeting, but by having so many, it’s just not possible. I do get to several though and have learned some things and found some great free books through it.

I think the idea behind Triberr is a good one, but I’m not really sure how big of a help it’s been for my blog. I get a pretty steady amount of hits daily, but not a crazy amount and not so many from the retweets. I do think it has upped my Twitter followers though, which is nice.  I don’t think it’s a bad thing for people to try to broaden their readership, BUT scour the Tribes and be sure to pick ones that best go with the topics you discuss and like to share.  Try not to get involved in too many Tribes at once or you’ll be forever reposting.

If anyone else has anything to share about their own Triberr experiences, please feel free to share!

What's the deal with Triberr?

For those that don't know, Triberr is site that helps bloggers spread their posts to a larger audience. You join tribes (for a certain amount of bones which is their "currency") and then you help the other members of your tribe by retweeting their posts to your Twitter followers and they (should) do the same for you.

Joining more tribes helps expand your reach (mine is currently around 107,400 people). Sounds nice right? I may be reaching over 100,000 people, but there's no promise that  so many people will see the Tweet or click on it.  I guess it does up your chances though.

I belong to three separate tribes: Writers and Writing, Indie Ebooks and a specific author's tribe.  Belonging to several tribes ups my reach, but that also means there are more posts for me to retweet. Not everyone blogs everyday but there are a couple of folks in each tribe that do. God forbid I miss a day of tweeting, I get all backlogged and have tons to do at once. Which annoys me to no end.

When I have so many posts to retweet I do admit it feels a bit like spamming.  One good thing Triberr does is spaces out your tweets. I'm not sure of the time between each one, but you could retweet twenty posts and they will go out every so often in a space of five hours or so, which is less spammy to me.

I also find issue with some of the posts and won't always push them through.  If they don't apply enough to writing or books or things I'd normally tweet about, I may give it a thumbs up but choose not to tweet it. I know others who won't tweet any posts about erotica. To each their own.  Ideally, I'd love to be able to read every post before tweeting, but by having so many, it's just not possible. I do get to several though and have learned some things and found some great free books through it.

I think the idea behind Triberr is a good one, but I'm not really sure how big of a help it's been for my blog. I get a pretty steady amount of hits daily, but not a crazy amount and not so many from the retweets. I do think it has upped my Twitter followers though, which is nice.  I don't think it's a bad thing for people to try to broaden their readership, BUT scour the Tribes and be sure to pick ones that best go with the topics you discuss and like to share.  Try not to get involved in too many Tribes at once or you'll be forever reposting.

If anyone else has anything to share about their own Triberr experiences, please feel free to share!

KDP Free Days -2nd month 2nd run

I thought I'd do a little follow up for those who are wondering about Amazon's KDP program after the initial free days.

So you guys know, I'm into my second month of being a part of the KDP program.  When I first did my free days, I did two days together over a weekend and gave away over 4,500 books. In the four weeks following the free days, I had pretty decent sales (and quite a few returns). We're not talking crazy numbers, but more than I had ever sold in a month and almost more  than my total amount sold ever. So that was pretty exciting!

I noticed by the end of the month, my ranking had been slipping and the sales were further and further apart. With three free days left, I decided I wanted to space them out throughout the rest of my days with the KDP program.  This time around, I picked one day during the week, a Thursday actually because I felt like people get paid on Fridays and after the book got noticed for the free day, people might be more willing to buy. No science or stats behind that, just an idea I had. In that one free day, I gave away another 1,720 books or so.  That is in the US. Another 20 or so in total with the other European Amazon sites. Not too shabby.

I was excited to see there were still people out there with interest but I wasn't sure how it was going to sell. Thankfully, people wanted to buy! In one week since my (technically) third free day, I've sold as many books as I did in the whole month after my weekend giveaway and have had very few returns so far. Yippie!

Seeing what has happened and knowing I have two days left, I will definitely look to spread them out and use the last of them when things start slowing down again. Don't be scared to change up the days of the week to see how many different people you hit and don't forget to advertise your free days on places like Pixels of Ink and Authors on the Cheap and  Ereader News Today. They are essential in helping you spread the word without spamming your Twitter or Facebook followers.  That's not to say you can't use Twitter and Facebook, but use it sparingly if you are featured on one of the other sites.

Everyone won't have the same kind of experience, but hopefully seeing mine will help you make the decision on whether or not the KDP program is right for you.  When my 90 day contract is up, I will follow up a final time and let you all know what my final thoughts on the program are.

Changing it up

It's now day five of Script Frenzy (or at least it will be when this posts) and…it's slow going! Writing a script is proving to be a much different beast than writing a novel.

There's a major difference in the way things are described and dialog is a major focus in order to keep the viewer interested. I have to be sure to stay away from things like inner monologues and adding back story that doesn't really matter in the big scheme of things.  Luckily, I have a friend who is a part of Lunch Break Films who was willing to look over my first couple of pages and give some advice. Score for me! I don't know that writing for screen or stage will be something I'll ever end up doing again, but it's nice to have someone tell me I don't completely suck at it! Heh.

While I'm not even a week into this project, I can tell how much it's going to help my writing on a whole. Sometimes we need to step out of our comfort zone and try new things. Maybe switching from novels to screenplays is a bit of a stretch for you, but start small. Try to write something in a different genre. If your main characters are always female, trying writing something with a leading male instead. If 3rd person POV is your thing, switch it up to 1st.

Like anything else, you're not going to know if you like it or if you're good at it until you try. Don't be afraid to branch out. The worst that can happen is that you find it's not for you.

Just as an FYI, blog posts will probably be a bit on the short side for a couple of weeks. I've got this screenplay to finish by the end of the month!