A read for a read.

Independent authors are looking for more and more ways to support each other at the moment. We're in a market where the many readers out there for whom each of our books seems just right, aren't able to discover them. The places where readers go to find new recommended reads will only offer them the work of a handful of authors writing in a small number of genres tightly defined by tropes and trends. Those same books, the chosen few to receive significant marketing budgets, are also the ones promoted by independent book marketers; online influencers who unfortunately have learnt, the hard way or otherwise, that if they don't push those same books as their fellow professionals, they won't remain influential for very long.

Influencers are now just influence brokers, stuck in the middle. Their incentives come from both ends. The ARCs and freebies and exclusive interviews will only keep coming to them if they continue to devote their finite reading and production time covering those big titles, but also their audiences won't continue to take them seriously as influences if they aren't covering those same big popular titles.

Many readers read the books and then want to hear the opinions of reviewers afterwards, when spoilers aren't a problem for them. I will admit I do this with film reviews. I have a cinema membership so I'll go and see all sorts of things, and then compare my opinions with those of critics whose opinions I find entertaining and/or insightful afterwards when spoilers do not pose a threat to me.

So where else do indie authors turn? Professional marketing people? They're out there certainly, but there's a problem. First of all you need to find promoters who will genuinely throw everything they have at getting the right kind of attention for your book, who understand what makes your book different from others, and how to make other people interested in it, rather than just take a fee and then apply the same by the numbers process to the book irrespective of what the book is and how it differs from any other.

In fact there are even worse scenarios of people who would take your money and then just disappear rather than deliver even a poor or token service, but fortunately those are far easier to spot. An important example of this is any platform that claims to offer promotion on their own dedicated site. You visit their website, look at what they have to offer, check out their fees and feel that it's the right arrangement for you and your budget. But then you notice that there doesn't seem to be any way for you to sign up as a reader. No reader's section of the website. No link to a Facebook group to join, not even an email list to subscribe to. Nothing but listings of books that authors have submitted for promotion. Those books are prominently displayed on the website just as promised. They look impressive. Service delivered. Except who's seeing them? Only other authors looking for places to promote their books.

Anything else? Social media? Sort of. It's a thing. It's available to us all. Posting is simple. We can craft the post, get the wording right, meet the character limit, make sure to include the right links and images, and if you still believe in them, hashtags too. And then sigh as no-one sees them apart from the few people who interact with you regularly. You soon realise all you're doing is making people who like you eventually very bored of seeing you try to promote your work in the same way, until they mute you for their own sanity. In principle you should be able to build an audience just by being yourself and producing regular, interesting and varied output, hoping people will find their way to that link on your profile or the invitation to buy on your pinned post, but it doesn't really work out.

Anything left? Yes. One thing. As I mentioned at the start, Indie authors do have each other for support. We can buy each other's books, read and review them, and hope to give a small boost to their presence in spaces where a few extra sales and reviews make a difference. Mutual reviews by authors of each others' books are frowned upon for obvious valid reasons. But general support and even mutual purchasing causes no such problems. Individuals have created websites such as www.thefotia.com and www.indiosyncrasy.com where you can learn about a wide variety of indie books and their authors. The hope is very slowly to get the kind of readers looking for something a bit different, either because their interests aren't covered by those popular heavily marketed genres, or because they get excited about being the ones to introduce their friends to new things, will grow to recognise these places as their go-to for hidden gems.

I have recently bought a few indie books, read and reviewed them, and today I have decided to turn it from a whim to something more formal.

So from the date and time of this blog entry, for every copy sold of The Weapon and the Fruit: Four and Twenty Blackboards, and for every new sign-up to review a FREE Advance Reader Copy of The Weapon and the Fruit: Any Body Can Murder (yours to keep, in your hands ahead of its publication date, in exchange for an honest review), I shall purchase an indie book. And if I know it was you who made the purchase or filled in the form, I shall look for your book first.

I might not be able to share reviews of your books on platforms where you have reviewed my books, but I can still mention them here on this blog, and recommend them personally to anyone I feel with enjoy them.

If you would like to read either of my books and trigger more purchases of other books this way, please visit www.aneurysmcupcake.com where you'll find details of both books, and of how to buy one now, and sign up to read the other very soon.

I am committed to continuing making purchases in this way at least until the 31st May 2025, which is the deadline for joining the ARC team.

Alternatively you can cut me, the middle man, right out, and just go to an indie author site such as the ones I mentioned above and buy something directly for yourself. We all thank you for your support!