Jo Robinson's Blog, page 44

Tomatoes

I originally planted a couple of heirloom tomatoes because I wanted a photo of one for the cover of Echoes of Narcissus. I ordered seeds for three varieties online, as well as seeds for tomatillos because I’ve never tasted one. It’s covered in flowers now, so – exciting times.

I also bought a couple of varieties of chillies – including one that’s guaranteed to blow steam out of your ears. I like it hot. They took a long time to grow, although I did use a photo of one of the heirloom seedlings on my cover, so mission accomplished. Now that the bushes are finally starting to bear, I’m even more chuffed because I can get some fabulous photos of the fruit themselves, and also use them in recipes for Princess Sithole’s Africolonial recipe book that I’ll publish later this year after my Shadow People books for 2015. When I have enough chillies, I’ll share my secret chilli sauce recipe here too. It’ll knock your socks off – probably more than your socks.

I really miss having all my veggies home grown. The stuff you buy from supermarkets doesn’t taste right to me, so I’m planning on planting quite a few more things this autumn too, and hoping to make purple tomato sauce and dayglo tomato soup for the recipe book. This writing lark really rocks my boat in all sorts of cool ways. Amazing how wanting a little element for a cover can make life so much more interesting.

Traditional Publishing Opportunity

Originally posted on :

One thing I don���t understand is why writers firstly seek out small publishers, or worse still ��� vanity press. You���ve written a book ��� you think it���s fantastic. You���ve edited it and made sure that it���s the best that it can be. Why then would you send it to a publisher with three books on their list and sign your submission to them ���from an aspiring writer���. If you���re writing, you���re not aspiring to write ��� you���re writing ��� you���re a writer dude! You don���t need a certificate to call yourself a writer. If you write you���re a writer. Yes. I���ve loved my self publishing trip. It���s been really hard work though, and there is no way I would ever submit any book that I���ve written to any agent or publisher that I thought wasn���t anything less than awesome.

If you���re going to be rejected, then get rejected by the���

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Five Star Treatment – The Healer by Christoph Fischer

Originally posted on Smorgasbord - Variety is the spice of life:

The Five Star Treatment today is the second for author Christoph Fischer and is for his latest release The Healer. If you would like to feature your books over the coming weeks in the series then please do take a look at the very straightforward submission guidelines in the link at the end of the post.. Please feel free to reblog and share this exceptional author���s work..

About the Book
When advertising executive Erica Whittaker is diagnosed with terminal cancer, western medicine fails her. The only hope left for her to survive is controversial healer Arpan. She locates the man whose touch could heal her but finds he has retired from the limelight and refuses to treat her. Erica, consumed by stage four pancreatic cancer, is desperate and desperate people are no longer logical nor are they willing to take no for an answer. Arpan has retired for good reasons���

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Take the 3-Question Ad Results Survey

Originally posted on Nicholas C. Rossis:

Figuring out where to advertise your book is worse than standing in a betting shop, five minutes before a race. You have money in your pocket, but a limited amount of time in which to select a guaranteed winner, and the odds are not in your favor.

I have already posted��my ad results online.��But I��need more information. So,��please send me your precious data. Where did you advertise, how much did it cost you and how many books did you sell as a result?

I will use this data to inform you of the best ways to invest your precious, limited advertising budgets. Also, I promise to share my own sales and ad results with you. With your help, we can reach thousands more ��� just share, reblog and share some more. Let���s help each other navigate these treacherous waters and make sure we don���t spend another dime in���

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What’s your opinion of book reviews? Should authors review? Please readers, don’t be shy!

Originally posted on Just Olga:

Hi all:

I���ve read and heard a variety of arguments on the subject or reviews. Much advice to authors focuses on the need to obtain reviews, on how important they are, on professional reviews (yes, because scandals apart, there are places, Kirkus reviews to name one of the best known, for example, that provide reviews for money, but we���re talking about honest, unbiased reviews, so as an author you might be in the weird situation of paying to get something bad said about you���hey, one can get that for free!), on bloggers who provide reviews, on methods to try and get reviews even before the book is finished (the famous ARC or ���advance review copy���) as sales seem somehow linked to reviews. (It���s a bit of a catch 22 situations. Like trying to get a job on something you���ve never worked on before. Employers want experience and recommendations but���

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Dying Man, 24, Leaves an Awesome Message That Everyone Should Read:

Originally posted on Kindness Blog:

Soon I Will be Gone Forever, but That���s Okay as Long as Someone Reads This.



I am only 24 years old, yet I have actually already chosen my last tie. It���s the one that I will wear on my funeral (above) a few months from now. It may not match my suit, but I think it���s perfect for the occasion.

The cancer diagnosis came too late to give me at least a tenuous hope for a long life, but I realized that the most important thing about death is to ensure that you leave this world a little better than it was before you existed with your contributions . The way I���ve lived my life so far, my existence or more precisely the loss of it, will not matter because I have lived without doing anything impactful.

Before, there were so many things that occupied my mind. When I learned���

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The Stanton Effect: Invoking Wonder

Originally posted on El Space--The Blog of L. Marie:

Thank you to L. Marie for asking me to be a part of this guest post series. My name is Charles E. Yallowitz. I run the Legends of Windemere blog and publish books under the same title. I think that covers the ���My Name is��� requirement.

�� ��

This is about one of the points on Andrew Stanton���s TED Talk. I chose to write about invoking wonder in the reader. As a fantasy author, this is a very important goal whether I focus on it or not. I have to draw readers into a world that doesn���t exist outside of the page, so there is more that I have to say. For example, I can say, ���They drive to New York City,��� and people will immediately visualize the city with familiar landmarks. You may have to describe some of the area, but people have a pre-existing notion of what���

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WRITING AND PROMOTING A SERIES: Series authors, Nicholas C. Rossis and Charles Yallowitz

Originally posted on Sally Ember, Ed.D.:

WRITING AND PROMOTING A SERIES:

by series authors, Nicholas C. Rossis, Pearseus series, and

Charles Yallowitz, Legends of Windemere series

Guest bloggers and former guests on CHANGES conversations between authors

(Episodes 7 and 9), http://www.sallyember.com

PEARSEUS: VIGIL NOW AVAILABLE ON AMAZON

This joint post was made possible by the invitation of Sally Ember, who has been gracious enough to allow us to speak on her blog. She has done this knowing that Mr. Rossis and Mr. Yallowitz have a history of crazy antics. Indeed, some of these antics occurred on Sally���s very own LIVE video show *CHANGES* conversations between authors, which you can find online. Thank you to Sally Ember and we hope everyone enjoys this post on writing a series.

Check out Nicholas���s newest release, Pearseus: Vigil, by clicking on the above cover art and

prepare for a March/April debut of Charles���s next book, Legends���

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Guest Post. Handy hints on developing a villain over a series.

Originally posted on M T McGuire Authorholic:

I am delighted to welcome my cyber buddy Charles Yallowitz, author of the long running fantasy series, Legends of Windemere, to talk about villains. Legends of Windemere is a seriously epic series ��� 9 books and counting. But as well as writing lots of excellent books Charles runs a great blog; plenty of thought provoking posts, interesting news and lots of chat in the comments. I thoroughly recommend you have a look at it, here. But do read the article first won���t you? Which reminds me��� over to you Mr Yallowitz.

The Lich by Jason Pedersen

First, thanks to M T McGuire for allowing me to write a guest post. The question posed was about character development over the course of a series. Legends of Windemere, my fantasy adventure series, has six books out with a seventh on the way. So I get asked about this area a lot���

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Cook from Scratch Update – an article that makes me look tame..

Originally posted on Smorgasbord - Variety is the spice of life:

I know that I bang on and on about ���cooking from scratch���. Preparing meals with all natural ingredients including sauces and breads.�� But, this article is deeply depressing.. Not only because of the ingredients that could in no way be considered ���fresh���, but also the numbers of these meals that are being bought and consumed simply for their convenience.

I have spent the best part of 20 years as a nutritional therapist and writer with one aim to get a message out there that our bodies are worth more than this.�� Including those of the children and other adults we might be responsible for cooking for.

An occasional fast food meal or prepared Pizza is not going to cause much damage but for some families, the industrialised food aisle in the supermarket is it. Economic, not really as you can prepare equally inexpensive but much healthier meals from start and���

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