Extras! What other content should I add to my book?

[Patti (baconater)]

I know we've discussed this in many places in the group but I thought it'd be a good idea to consolidate our thoughts in one thread for easy reference.

I'll step back for the moment and let you authors get on with it. :)

[Michael]

I always include a couple of articles from my website at the end.

Mind you, given that my current WIP is set during the Holocaust I'm not sure if I'll do it this time around...!

[David]

One thing that annoys and irritates me - and I don't really know why - is extracts, for example the first chapter or two, from a forthcoming book (perhaps the next in the series).

But then I get really irritated by TV and film trailers too.

So that is something I would never do.

[Victoria]

I put in an "also by this author" page, but only included the blurb rather than an extract or review quotes.
The most annoying thing about the first chapter of the next book is when you can't get hold of the next book. I have been waiting to read Shadows Of The Workhouse for ages!

[Patti (baconater)]

The group consensus seems to be that we all REALLY dislike extracts or samples or whatever at the end of a book.

Especially if it means a book ends at say 80% or whatever.

None of us seem to mind book links and a contact email though.

No more than will fit on a couple pages, though. If we have access to Internet on our kindle, we don't even really NEED book links. We can go to the book description through amazon and get all the info we require from there.

I really like to see interactive contents pages.

Oh and please don't give me pages of reviews about your book. I've already bought it!

[Elle]

I hate extras. Even links. If I like an author I can find them myself -.-

[David]

Victoria wrote: [....]The most annoying thing about the first chapter of the next book is when you can't get hold of the next book...."

I think that is part of my problem with it. Also - and I think this is why I dislike trailers - is that it somehow spoils the experience when you settle down with the book to have already read those first pages. After all, we are told that the first chapter is vital for grabbing the reader, it seems like that impact is diminished much as a lot of TV programmes are spoilt by the trailers that have already shown you the good bits, so you sit there waiting for the bit from the trailer, knowing what is coming....

[Victoria]

And with TV and Film trailers you know the bit you've seen a billion times is probably the best bit of the whole thing :~/

[Tim]

Acknowledgements (I prefer them to be "back matter" rather than "front matter", that way they don't get in the way of the online sample. There's nothing worse than a look inside sample that's full of front matter (title page, contents pages etc) and bugger all actual content. Especially with shorter books. I can't remember what book it was, but the sample did not contain a single word (seriously!) of actual content. Naturally I didn't buy it.

Where was I?

Oh yes, acknowledgements, and about the author page, maybe some social media/mailing list links & short reviews/blurbs for other books. But that's about it. Under no circumstances add a sample chapter for the next book. I hate that with a passion. All it does is make me feel short changed when the *book I bought* stops at 85%.

[Patti (baconater)]

Oh Shaun Jeffery did a really nifty thing at the end of his latest book. Added a link to online puzzles. It continued on the story in a very cool way.

I liked that a lot.

[Kath]

This is a real bone of contention with me. I am just about to review a novella by Karin Slaughter. I've read most of her full length novels and I really get stuck into them. This story - a great example of her style, ended at 61%. Really! a third of what I thought was the book I had paid for, turned out to be chapters from something else. Not only will that not tempt me to buy that book - I don't even read back matter - I will now not buy another of her 'straight to ebook' novellas, to avoid similar disappointment and annoyance.

Give me what I've paid for and a link to each of your other books is the only other thing I need.

[Patti (baconater)]

Oh grrrrrr.

Please tell us the title so I can avoid it.

[Elle]

Was that one of her short stories? I had the same happen to me as well when I read my *first* Karin Slaughter piece and it was an entire chapter at the end of the next book *grr*

[Kath]

Busted.Busted (Novella) Yes. I suspect her short ebooks are all going to be the same.

[Elle]

Thorn in My Side was the same

[Patti (baconater)]

Let's boycott her.

[Jim]

With mine, the last pages are the front covers of the other books. So far two of them
I suppose by the time I publish the 50th then people might be getting a bit hacked off

[Elle]

You know, covers are something I actually like to see :o

[Patti (baconater)]

Yeah. That's cool Jim.

[Jim]

It's nothing, just like the crack dealer leaving his mobile number written on the packet so you know where to go for more :-)

[Lance]

Sorry I'm late to the discussion -- my forum digests stopped three weeks ago.

As a reader, I don't mind getting an excerpt at the back of whatever book I'm reading. It saves me from having to download the excerpt later on, and I can decide right then whether I want to pick up that book.

As a writer, I understand that the best way to get a reader to buy my next book is to provide him/her with a sample immediately after that reader has read (and presumably enjoyed) my current book. After all, this person bought my current book and she made it to the end, so by definition she's my target audience. Every extra step she has to take to find out what other books I've published, then find those books, then download the sample, then decide whether to buy it, is a step where the interest-to-purchase chain can break. Most people don't want to work that hard, and there's no need for them to do so.

I'm not sure I understand the angst about the back matter throwing off the Kindle's percent-done counter. Do you think the author made his/her story shorter to fit in the back matter? In a word -- no. You got the story you paid for; the rest is gravy. Besides, the only time I pay much attention to the counter is if I'm not really into the story to begin with.

[Kath]

I have to disagree Lance. I don't want anything else even if it's free. I really hate it when a book finishes well before the end. Being given a 'free' chapter doesn't make me read it and decide to buy the book. I simply don't read it. I see that I'm not alone in this. The rest may be, in your terms, gravy, but I don't want a meal to be 40% gravy - and that does happen.

[Joo]

I use my percentage counter to know where I am in the story. At 60% it should be getting into the nitty gritty, the threads are coming together. At 80% we should be heading into the build up to the climactic finale. Within the 90s it is all about the final scenes.
So if a book finishes at 70%, I'm really thrown.
If your book is good enough and enjoyable enough, I'll get more. If I'm pissed off at not getting a big percentage, I'll remember that, rather than how much I enjoyed the previous percentages.
I've even stated I've dropped a star rating for a short book on Amazon.
I'd rather have not so many locations and just the last 5% max on telling me that this is not your only book. don't tell me about anybody else's books and don't give me something I can get for free (as a sample).

The Ignoo has spoken :)

[Katy]

Like many, I HATE extra chapters for other books at the end of the book I'm reading. I use the percentage counter to know how much of a book I've got left, so if I'm too busy to finish it straight away, I'll look and see 'oh, I have 45% left, too much to finish now, I'll go to bed and read it in the morning'. If I then get up and decide to finish the book, to find I had 5% left and the rest was promo, I get very frustrated. I never read the promo bits.

I don't mind links, but like covers. I also really don't like quotes from reviews at the front or back of the story, they really put me off.

Like Patti, I loved Shaun's games at the end of his book

[Patti (baconater)]

i got caught out by another last night. it was a fairly rubbish book so i skipped ahead several pages to see if it got interesting.
it didn't.
ended at 60%
won't be reading anything else by that author.
won't say who as its an indie.
hopefully they won't publish anything else until they get a proofreader sorted out or spend more time proofing and editing for themself. shame as the story could be rather good. not earthshattering but a decent story. not as it is though.

[Joo]

The book I just finished had a one page author bio and pic. That is acceptable.
Another book had about a 3 page interview with the author about the book. That is acceptable.
A list of other books and the address of the author's website. That is acceptable.

Sample chapters is not acceptable. Sample chapters of other authors' books is SO NOT acceptable.

So says me :)

[Simon (Highwayman)]

I don't like sample chapters either. I like my percent to mean something. Beer tokens would be acceptable at the end though

[D.D. Chant]

I have the blurbs for my other books at the end of my stories, but I think that when I bring the next books in the series out I'll only include the 2nd books blurb or it will start to get confusing.

My pet peeve with the kindle is that when you download a book, but don't read it at once, you're left with a title and no idea what the book is about because there is no synopsis. Drives me nutty!!! So I always put the synopsis at the beginning of my books.

[Kath]

You can go to Book Description - as long as your wifi's on. Then it takes you tot he Amazon blurb.

[D.D. Chant]

Ignite wrote: "You can go to Book Description - as long as your wifi's on. Then it takes you tot he Amazon blurb."

The thing is I always turn my wifi off to save the battery, I only turn it on to actually download books because I buy 'em when I'm on my computer.

And yes, I know that means it's my own fault!!! ;-P

[Robert]

I don't like sample chapters and I don't include them in my books. I've started putting a page in at the end that encourages the reader to leave a comment and provides a link to my Amazon author page where they can see my other books, and a link to my blog. With my short story collection I included author's notes at the end, which are just my thoughts on each story and what I intended with them, how well I thought I executed the ideas etc. I'm never really interested in reading about the author but I do like reading about the thoughts that went into the story.

[Kath]

D.D. wrote: "Ignite wrote: "You can go to Book Description - as long as your wifi's on. Then it takes you tot he Amazon blurb."

The thing is I always turn my wifi off to save the battery, I only turn it on to..."

I don't leave the wifi on DD. I turn it on to find out what books are about though. Only takes a second. I've also got myself out of the habit of downloading anything I don't intend to read in the next couple of weeks!

[Cornelius]

I like to include pictures of rabbits wearing 1970s cream coloured flapping Farah trousers at the end of my books. It amuses me.

[Gingerlily - The Full Wild]

Well your readers all know that you are weird Cornelius. For you thats disappointingly normal!

[Kath]

I must have the earlier versions of your books C. Mine have hamsters in tuxedos. :(

[Patti (baconater)]

Robert, I'd say you've got it sussed.
beer tokens would be ideal tho.
Corny. good grief.

[Patti (baconater)]

oh yeah the blurb thing.
Ignite, if you spent as much time away from wifi as I do, you'd be singing a different tune.
fetgawdsakes YES please put a blurb on the first page authors!

[Joo]

Just finished a book and it's perfect. It finishes on 99%, there's a page describing the reason for the cover (this page could be anything), a page listing the author's other books and saying they are in a series, then the author's websites. Tidy :)