LibraryThing – Ever Heard Of It?

Neither had I, until a fellow author friend asked me if I "was going to put "Flesh Wound" on there to get some reviews".  So I went to the site sswww.librarything.com (and don't forget the 'ss' before the 'www' or you won't get anywhere) and discovered that it is a well-established social networking site for people who love books.  They have over 1,000,000 members, and once you've joined you can enter all the books in your personal library, reviews of them, and join groups to talk about them, much like Facebook or MySpace.

The site specifically caters to readers (rather than editors or publishers, which is a welcome and interesting development in how readers are able to connect with authors – suddenly, there is no behemoth corporate middle man), and if you are a published author you can register on the site as such.  This entitles you to a shiny yellow symbol on your home page with "LT Author" emblazoned across it, as well as two very interesting opportunities.

The first is setting up author chats.  You set up a two-week window of time where you, as the author, vow to check in to LibraryThing daily (at least) and answer questions via blog or live chat that are posed by any other members of LibraryThing.  It's like doing a virtual reading, or having a virtual book club.  Current and prospective readers get answers right from the author.  I will be signing up for this as soon as I have taken advantage of the other opportunity for authors on LibraryThing, which is…

… member giveaways.  Here, an author provides free copies of their book for LibraryThing members to review.  Here's how it works.  As the author, I register for a Member Giveaway on the site and specify how many copies of my book I want to give away.  I've chosen 15.  Then, LibraryThing members have two weeks to read a short blurb about the book, an even shorter message from me, and decide that yes, they would like a free copy of my book.  In return, they promise to post a review of the book, either on LibraryThing or on amazon.com, where the book is available.  If more than 15 members say they want a free review copy of Flesh Wound, there is a random drawing held by LibraryThing and 15 members are chosen to receive the book.  Those names and addresses are forwarded to me, and I am responsible for mailing them a copy of Flesh Wound.

I signed up Flesh Wound for this member giveaway on 9/8, and so far 92 members have said they want a copy!  After looking at the other books in the giveaway, the ratio of 15 books offered to 92 requested, with nine days left for members to request the book, is pretty good!  So I'll be curious to see how many have requested the book by the time 9/22 rolls around, the date the giveaway request period for FW ends.

After some of the reviews on FW start rolling in, I'll sign up for an author chat.  That will be fascinating – I can't wait to see what people who I don't know at all have to say/ask about Flesh Wound.

Have a terrific week!  I'm going back to revising "All the Creatures Were Stirring", which ought to be done by the end of this week.  In the meantime, read something today that makes you forget where you are!  -Jon