I.H. Laking's Blog, page 8
March 25, 2015
Getting Technical: SEO Optimisation & Other Tactics.
It’s all about tactics.
As a self-published author, I rely on my own marketing and communication skills to get my work out there – no one else is writing a strategy for me. With this in mind, I’ve been trying a few different tactics of late to increase the downloads of my eBooks from Amazon. Here are a few of the things that have worked for me:
- Getting a great book cover: I let my original eBooks loose on the world with self-made covers. Once I started to get decent covers designed, more downloads started flowing. You can still see one of my original designs here on Qan’s Adventure (it’s a fantasy short story set in the Empire. Feel free to check it out!). The new covers are infinitely more engaging.
- Working on my book descriptions: I researched what makes an engaging description, and adjusted my book descriptions to fit these parameters. Again, this led to a small bump in downloads.
- Building an effective social media presence: Having a great Amazon page for your book isn’t enough – you need to get people to that page. I recently passed 10K followers on Twitter (yay!) and have found this to be a great channel to drive downloads and sales. I don’t push my work relentlessly, but I do remind people that I write, and tweet about writing regularly.
The thing is, I’ve recently seen a plateau in my free eBook downloads and sales of The Vanishing Villa. I had a minor breakthrough while listening to a podcast where another self-published author suggested using keyword phrases rather than individual keywords in the Amazon KDP keyword section. So, I dutifully changed up a few of my words to be sentences. The verdict? Well, so far it appears to be working – I’ve seen about a 25% jump in downloads, especially on Amazon.co.uk. I’ll be adjusting words and phrases over the next few weeks, and will report back on my success!
March 20, 2015
Novel Writing 2: Halfway Through.
Halfway.
It’s a bit crazy, but halfway is where I’ve found myself on the journey towards writing my first full-length novel. Over the past few weeks, I’ve pumped out over 35,000 words, and my writing is still ramping up.
As I mentioned in my previous post, my planning has really come in handy as I know where I’m heading with my storyline and character development. What I’m finding though, is that some of my story planning in principle isn’t going to work in practice. As a result I’ve combined some chapters, split a few others, and generally had to freestyle a bit. I’ve found that you can’t easily ‘bend’ a conversation to go where you want it to if it isn’t natural – the same with scenes.
But in general, the story is heading exactly where I want it to. So that’s a huge relief. At the moment I’m at a critical story juncture, so I’ve stopped to assess how my main character is going to deal with everything that’s going down. Then I’ll be pressing on into the second half of this manuscript.
Wish me luck
P.S. The Vanishing Villa, one of my Inspector Ambrose stories, is free this weekend. Grab a copy if you’re keen!
The Vanishing Villa: Free all Weekend!
As part of the lead up to the launch of The Murder at Mansfield Manor, The Vanishing Villa is free all weekend! This means that you can get the first two Inspector Ambrose mysteries free if you move fast!
Grab your copy today, and enjoy. :)
March 15, 2015
Strong Female Characters: The Gap in my Writing.
Finding a plot hole is a tough thing.
As a writer, I’m as close to my work as anyone could possibly get. I mean… I wrote it. When you’re really close to something, it’s often hard to see problems with it.
The recent advent of International Women’s Day got me thinking about what I write about, and more specifically who I write about. And I discovered a distressing thing as I reflected on my writing: In the three short stories and novellas I’ve released so far, there has hardly been a female character in sight. That’s a damning indictment from the perspective of gender representation.
The reason this really bugs me is that in recent years, I’ve been working with young people who are passionate about issues around female empowerment, especially in developing countries. Yet when I began to write, I defaulted to characters that I knew all too well – white, male, and privileged. I’m not the only writer to make this mistake, either.
Recently I reread the classing fantasy book Magician and discovered a similar lack of diversity. The story (admittedly Raymond E. Feist’s first work) was almost entirely male-based, with only cursory female characters looking doe-eyed at the male protagonists before they burst into tears. The lack of female characters began to bug me as I moved through the book – females were essentially bit players in the grand scheme of Feist’s original epic fantasy.
Reading Harry Potter recently, I’ve been reminded of how easy it is to keep diversity present in writing. It shouldn’t be a chore – it should be something that all writers do to reflect the world in which we live. But as I mentioned, sometimes it takes something special to let writers see a gap in their work.
So what am I doing about my lack of diversity? Well, I’ve started my response by incorporating stronger female characters into The Murder at Mansfield Manor, which comes out soon. This is only halfway towards where I want to go, though. In light of that, I’ve already written over a quarter of my first novel with diversity in mind – I believe I have a well-rounded set of characters so far.
Today, I’m also making a commitment – one which you can keep me to. I’m committing to writing strong, prominent female characters into the novel that I’m currently working on. Further to that, I’ll continue to keep diversity central to my work as I progress. I want to do my part in supporting the ongoing need for more diversity in the world’s great library of fiction.
It may not be much in the scheme of things, but I’m going to do my part.
Novel Writing 1: The Sprint.
25,000.
That’s not a number I thought I’d be seeing anytime soon. But as I near the end of my second week of novel writing proper, I’ve found myself racing along, and my first draft is coming along at speed.
The main reason for this rate of progress comes back to planning. I’ve been able to use the backstory and synopsis I wrote over the summer to give myself a basic idea of where things are headed. This has made it a lot easier when I’ve been uncertain as to where to go next. I also wrote a couple of key scenes from the story over the summer, so with some minor tweaking I’ve joined these into what I’ve written in the past days.
The goal for this first draft is to finish around 80,000 words all up, before moving into a first edit and proofreading phase. I’m happy with my progress!
In other news, The Murder at Mansfield Manor is doing really well in pre-sales (by my standards, anyway), so thank you for all your support – it means a lot!
Now it’s back to writing for me!
March 12, 2015
The Murder at Mansfield Manor is Available for Pre-Order!
I’m excited to announce that pre-orders are now open for The Murder at Mansfield Manor!
There are a number of reasons why I’m pumped about this release:
This novella marks a turning point for my writing. Previously I was focused on writing for older children. This novella is my first attempt at a purely Young Adult audience.
This is my most complex and in-depth piece yet. At 28,000 words, Mansfield Manor is twice as long as my original short story, What Went Wrong With Mrs Milliard’s Mech?, and a full 25% longer than The Vanishing Villa. Mansfield Manor’s plot is also more in-depth, with several plot threads going along at once.
I’ve worked on actively incorporating strong, articulate female characters. I realised that (to my great shame) my first three stories have been very much male-centric. I’ve started correcting that in this story.
Mansfield Manor sets the scene for my first full-length novel. Each of my stories so far has laid out pieces for my first novel. In Mansfield Manor, I’ve stepped this up a gear. Of course, all of this will only make sense once the novel is complete…
I honestly believe this is my best piece of writing yet. I’m sure people often say this – but I truly believe this novella is my best work. I’m really proud to be putting it out in front of you. I re-read this story after a number of weeks away from it, and I was pumped with how it flowed.
Well, that’s it. I’d love for you to check The Murder at Mansfield Manor out! Click here to pre-order your copy. If you’re on Twitter, Insta, or Facebook, you can also help me by sharing the Amazon link to my novella: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UEAYGYC
Thanks to everyone who regularly reads this blog and has downloaded my work in the part. You make it worthwhile.
Bring on the next chapter!
March 8, 2015
The Murder at Mansfield Manor: Cover Design Reveal!
The release date for The Murder at Mansfield Manor is fast approaching! I’m super excited about my latest Inspector Ambrose mystery, which I believe is my most well-crafted mystery so far. As part of the build up to the eBook release, I’m revealing the cover. Check it out!
The cover for The Murder at Mansfield Manor features the discover of a body at Mansfield Manor. It’s a pivotal moment in the book, and I love the striking colours used for both Inspector Ambrose and his sister, Felicity. This is the third cover I’ve organised through Artcorgi and as always they were responsive, professional, and excellent to work with.
I wanted to go for an older feel with this story – it’s targeted at Young Adults, and I believe the style of this piece conveys that. Blacksmiley‘s style is simple but effective – she captures the drama of the shocking moment of discovery well.
I’d also recommend checking out my other collaborations with Artcorgi on Mrs Milliard’s Mech and The Vanishing Villa.
Pre-order for The Murder at Mansfield Manor begins soon – keep your eyes out!
March 3, 2015
Today: The day I Start Writing my First Novel.
So that’s it, then.
As I sit here at my writing station, I’ve realised that the time has come. For the past few months, I’ve written outlines, created back stories, drawn maps, and developed character and story arcs. I’ve considered how a story might flow across a series of novels, and found ways to set the scene for this in the Inspector Ambrose series and Qan’s Adventure.
With all this preparation work done, I am officially starting the journey of writing my first novel. 240 days ago, I published my first Inspector Ambrose story, and in four weeks, I’ll release my third detective novella. It’s been an incredible journey with many challenging moments, but I’m excited to finally begin work on this manuscript.
Wish me luck.
March 2, 2015
Mansfield Manor: Cover Under Construction!
The cover design for The Murder at Mansfield Manor is now well underway, with a comprehensive brief in at Artcorgi, and the artist hard at work. I’ve had a different artist for each cover in the Inspector Ambrose series, and for this cover, I’ve chosen to work with Blacksmiley. I love the artist’s clean, simple style. I’ve included a sneak peek of the draft cover here:
Having a great cover is super important, and I’m sure this cover will be outstanding, just like the previous two covers I’ve commissioned through Artcorgi (Mrs Milliard’s Mech & The Vanishing Villa). The full cover reveal will be in two weeks, so keep your eyes peeled!
In other news, I finished a full edit and proofread of the manuscript last week, which has left the story as polished as it can be. Re-reading the story in its entirety after a long break has left me quietly confident – I honestly believe this is my best work yet, in terms of both style and plot. The wait is almost over, and I’ll get to find out if you all agree!
February 20, 2015
The Murder at Mansfield Manor: Release Date & More!
Today I’m very excited to confirm that the release date for The Murder at Mansfield Manor will be on April 1 this year!
No jokes.
I’m very excited to be releasing this story out to the world, as I honestly believe it’s the best Inspector Ambrose story yet. Artwork is now underway for the cover, and I’ll be starting a pre-release page on Amazon soon. I’m currently running over the story for its final edit, alongside planning for my novel set in the Empire.
Set at Mansfield Manor, a place Ambrose remembers well from his childhood, this novella will place Inspector Ambrose directly in the path of a significant plot by the Assassin’s Guild. It’s one of the most complex plots I’ve written, and will also be longest of the three Inspector Ambrose stories, coming in at 26,000 words – longer than The Vanishing Villa, and double the length of Mrs Milliard’s Mech.
The best part about The Murder at Mansfield Manor is that it completes the original Inspector Ambrose trilogy, and sets things up nicely for the events of the novel I’ll be writing over the next wee while.
Be on the lookout for more details soon!
