Random chit-chat

[Amy]

Changed my cover for Iridessian Haunts. Just because. I can't compete with the naked male torsos, so I bring you naked skull.

[Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger)]

WOW!! Awesome cover, Amy! Great job!! Hugs

[Amy]

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "WOW!! Awesome cover, Amy! Great job!! Hugs"

Thanks. I'm really proud of that one. The background I nicked from a free graphics site, but the skull is a picture I took of a money box I have. I had to do some dentistry in Photoshop.

And thank you for your wonderful review of Modified too. Been meaning to thank you for that.

[Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger)]

Amy wrote: "...And thank you for your wonderful review of Modified too. Been meaning to thank you for that..."

You're very welcome! Hugs

[Amy]

Thanks Alex, I am trying to be blatantly obvious to get into the Halloween collection.

[Amy]

Thanks Denise. I have a small collection of skulls. Most of the people deserved it...

[Erica]

Haha! (In response to your skull Collection comment). Very nice cover, Amy!

[Amy]

Thank you.

[Carole]

I've tried to review at least one book of everybody who participates in our discussions- If I have missed yours- please PM me.

[Chrys]

CeDany--congrats, but what is 'payhip' please?

[Amy]

That's two books submitted to two upcoming Radish Fiction Collections. Mystery Month for Missing Remnants and Remnants and Iridessian Haunts for the Radish Exclusives collection. We'll see if my blurbs are enough to entice them to feature me this time. (Taps fingers impatiently.)

[Carole]

fingers crossed!

[Amy]

Yep.

BTW my daughter has just got a conditional offer for her first choice uni next year and another unconditional offer for her second choice uni. Absolutely thrilled. The applications only reached the universities yesterday. The first choice posted the offer online yesterday afternoon. The other one this morning. Some of the students haven't even finalised their applications yet.

[Carole]

Congrats!

[Erica]

That is great news, Amy!

[Amy]

Thanks. Massive relief.

[Prakash]

Hi all!
A very scary article on paid promo

https://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/2...

[Amy]

That’s a worry. If you can’t pay for promotion because Amazon will sanction you, what are you supposed to do?

[Chrys]

It is very scary. I haven't gone wide because most of my royalties come from KU pages read.

[Amy]

I went wide but I wasn’t getting much anyway. Mainly my colleagues who are self employed and understand the importance of supporting small businesses were curious. But once I’d exhausted them that was the end of selling books. I didn’t have any money for promotion last year. This year I was just starting to contemplate it. Although I have to admit I never expect it to work...

[Chrys]

I paid around US100 dollars on various email marketing companies over the summer, and I sold around 300 books and had 120,000 pages read on KU across my range of books. It's having a series and a back catalogue that seemed to work.

[Amy]

By the time I get around to proper promotion I’ll be on my third and fourth books. They’ll be a sci-fi murder mystery and a sci-fi paranormal. They’ll be closely released because I’m writing them simultaneously. That should surely help more than just having two books that are erotic and therefore have limited promo avenues.

[Chrys]

I waited until I had three books in my 'Penny White' series before doing any marketing. And Alex is right, people go on to read the others.

[Chrys]

Hi CeDany

I use Amazon Createspace for my paperbacks--Print on Demand. I sell 10 x more books as ebooks than a paperback.

Chrys Cymri

[Dale]

CeDany wrote: "Hiya!

Couple of questions, I'd love some answers to, if you please?

1) What is Authorsdb dot com? -- https://www.authorsdb.com/index.php
Somehow, no one who say they've registered on it, will exp..."

AuthorsDb is sort of a social media site for authors and readers. It allows authors to create a profile, add their books, and then do various kinds of promotions. They have an annual cover contest, for example (I've entered one of my books in it) and you can announce special promo prices. To be honest, I haven't gotten too deeply into it yet because of lack of time. I also don't much like their web interface. I find it a bit confusing. It looks like it has some Facebook-like features (such as status updates, following, etc.). I have no idea how many people are actually using the thing, though, or how much exposure it really gives you. I don't see any downsides to being there, but like most things it isn't going to give instant results. You probably have to put time into making it work for you.

[Julia]

Would anyone be kind enough to vote for my book If Birds Fly Low in Author Shout-Cover Wars? I hate asking for votes as I think it's a silly way of finding a 'winner'. I suppose it all depends on how many friends you have.

But I would be so grateful for your vote.

http://authorshout.com/cover-wars/

Thank you so much.

[Carole]

Voted!

[Dale]

Voted! I hate these popularity contests, too, but really that's all that online voting systems ever seem to be. Only a properly judged contest will have results based on quality. In this case, though, all the covers seem to me to be high quality, so you deserve to win at least as much as anyone else. ;-)

[Amy]

Finally I got enough internet to vote! My wifi is rubbish today.

[Erica]

Voted!

[Julia]

Thank you, Carole, Dale, Amy and Erica for casting your vote in the Author Shout-Cover Wars for my supernatural romance IF BIRDS FLY LOW.
To tell you the truth, I was stunned and had tears in my eyes when I saw you had voted. I really didn't think anyone would have the time or be interested. I only entered cos it looked fun, but at the time I didn't realise I needed to get folk to vote.
Thank you again.

http://authorshout.com/cover-wars/

[Amy]

We do what we can when we can because it’s tough for everyone out there. You’re very welcome.

[Dale]

Julia wrote: "Thank you, Carole, Dale, Amy and Erica for casting your vote in the Author Shout-Cover Wars for my supernatural romance IF BIRDS FLY LOW.
To tell you the truth, I was stunned and had tears in my ey..."

You're quite welcome!

[Amy]

One of the downsides of writing on a weekly basis for the Radish app is that no sooner am I ahead, I'm behind. This week the kids are off school. We've done a couple of days out and I've also been working. Usually by this time I've got next week's episodes uploaded and ready for release and I'm working on the following week's.

Needless to say I've only just penned 2k of paranormal for next Wednesday and I've still got 2k of mystery to go for next Thursday.

The upside is I'll have two new books ready before Christmas at this rate. And to quote me "they're not crap."

[Carole]

It' keeps you writing on a schedule. I think it's a good thing.

[Amy]

It is. And I’ve caught up now. Just typing up and editing to do.

[Justin]

Hello Everyone! I have returned to the fold! I've been lacking in my Goodreads group participation but am going to start getting back in the swing of things starting with this group!

[Carole]

HI Justin- How are you??

[Justin]

I'm good. Getting ready for Halloween!

[Amy]

Hi Justin. I love Halloween. We visited the haunted houses at a local farm on Tuesday. Lots of screaming (mainly with laughter).

OK, I have caught up and uploaded next week's episodes of Missing Remnants and Iridessian Haunts to Radish. They are, of course awesome lol.

[Prakash]

Hi everyone there!
Hope you are doing great. May I help you by any means?
Actually, I was busy in my book release and promo. Missed you all!

[Amy]

Hi Prakash, hope it's going well. I'm also promoting.

With that in mind-when it comes to twitter what do people think about retweeting? Does it help to retweet every single tweet that has you or your book mentioned in it? I'm doing that, but I have no idea if that's the right thing to do.

[Amy]

Things I'm contemplating at the moment:

With the two books I'm working on (sci-fi mystery and sci-fi paranormal), do I publish them under my real name and distance myself from the erotic sci-fi I published under the Amy pen name? It's not like I built up a following with the first two books. Some people who know me have not been convinced the first two books were mine because they didn't have my real name on them, and I had to explain what a pen name was. Some people were put off because they were erotic. I wonder if those same people would dismiss anything I write under the Amy name because the first two books were erotica and therefore to be looked down on.

Anyone got any thoughts?

[Amy]

Even he had a pen name, although I have never read the Bachman books and only a few of the books he wrote after that.

Ugh, I don't know. I can't help thinking writing erotica was a mistake. It's a huge genre that many people read, but the promo is a nightmare. I have no idea how you market the genre successfully.

[Amy]

I thought he wrote them before he was a name and that they were early works. I wouldn't know. I've only read a few King (Christine, It, Misery and possibly Dolores Claiborne). I much preferred James Herbert, I've read all of his.

Still unsure. On the one hand having all genres under one name would show my versatility as an author. On the other hand I have had face to face conversations with people who forgot I was in the room when they physically turned their noses up at my first two books because I said they were erotica.

[Carole]

They say if you change genres, you should use another name- YOu can keep one part of the name the same- like Amy with a different last name.

[Amy]

I'd change the whole lot if I was using a different name.

I'd have to decide whether to use DJ Cooper or Debz Cooper. It probably complicates the hell out of Goodreads, Amazon and everything else.

[Dale]

Amy wrote: "I'd change the whole lot if I was using a different name."

There are plenty of successful authors who have written cross-genre under their own names. I'm not planning on changing my name for my SF/humor novel even though so far I've only published mysteries. However, I can see the point of doing it in some cases. It may make sense for you. Then again, if your original novels didn't get much traction, it might not matter too much. Short version: I dunno . . .

[Amy]

Dale wrote: "Amy wrote: "I'd change the whole lot if I was using a different name."

There are plenty of successful authors who have written cross-genre under their own names. I'm not planning on changing my na..."

lol. Nope, neither do I.

[Amy]

I've been reading conflicting things online. Some people say you shouldn't bother with multiple pen names because keeping track of them and promoting the different brands is a nightmare. They also say that in today's digital market no-one can hide online so what's the point of a pen name in the first place ? I already use my real name for another business, which is one of the reasons I used a pen name. Facebook doesn't like you using anything other than your real name on an account and whereas I know other people get away with that, history indicates I am not as lucky as other people.

Some people talk about changing your name so you can appear near popular authors on the book shelves in the shops. Excuse me? Bookshops? I hardly think I'll accomplish that.

The other issue may or may not still be a problem. Sci-fi written by a woman. There are plenty of books in the sci-fi genre written by a woman (OK I've not heard of many of them, but they exist). And the sci-fi genre doesn't just have to be about things set in space. As a modern woman I had no idea until recently that it was indeed a thing to turn your nose up at a sci-fi book just because the author didn't possess a penis. To which I say, what century are we in, people? Grow up.

Yeah, dunno. The easiest thing to do is to just say "sod it" and carry on using Amy J Hamilton with the assumption that nobody will read it anyway so why bother changing.