Through the years, PJ would contact me and ask for advice on things. When we first corresponded, she was over the moon because someone thought her “little scribblings” had value. Then as time went on, she became frustrated because sales weren’t happening. Her frustration didn’t stem from the lack of monetary gain, but because she simply wanted to get her books into the hands of readers. She suffered a huge disappointment when she tried to give her books to schools and they wouldn’t accept them. So I asked, if she was willing to give them away, why she didn’t give them to shelters?

When she said she didn’t know where to start, I put her in contact with another friend, Linda Welch, author of the successful paranormal mystery Whisperings series, who was able to get her started and give her some pointers on how to proceed. She was ecstatic and the children loved her stories. But the next time I heard from PJ, she was distraught. Her husband had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and PJ herself has a degenerative eye condition which is causing her to go blind. She thought she’d have to give up her writing altogether, which saddened her, but her husband had to be her first priority.

Shortly after, I was delighted to hear that she decided she needed the creative outlet and she wanted to give away as many books as she could before she completely lost her vision. She proceeded to build up her list of shelters for donations to twenty. To assist her sight, she bought a 40-inch monitor and uses a magnifying glass to help her see, and hired an assistant to help with some of the things she cannot do.

Shortly before the holidays, I received an email from PJ — and she had been on my mind, isn’t that usually how things work? The email was to advise me that her husband’s condition was worsening at a rapid rate, and she needed to give him her attention and love. And her eyesight was also failing at a more rapid rate, and she would now have to give up writing. She was going to send a last batch of books to the shelters on her list, and would be moving to assisted living to ensure appropriate care for both her and her husband. Her one regret? To not be able to give more book donations.

And that’s when it hit me … this is somewhere I can help… and so can you. I’d like to issue a challenge to all: Purchase one or two of PJ’s books and send them to a women’s shelter or a children’s shelter. Give the gift of books to children without, and make an author, who can no longer follow her passion, happy. Let’s carry on PJ’s legacy… It’s not about the money — it’s about the children.

If you’re interested in reading my reviews of PJ’s work, they are:

• Michael O’Brien and the Magic Hat
• Tilbee Toadlet’s Trip to Town
• Giggle Grump Gurgle

The delightful illustrations are done based on PJ’s concept by Mike Motz.

PS – My niece and nephew LOVE PJ’s books and David’s favorite books right now are the dragons because he gets to Rawr!

1. For today’s prize of a paperback copy of Misfit McCabe along with Mayan December by Brenda Cooper AND an ARC of Tattered, simply comment on this post.
2. To get a free ebook copy of Misfit McCabe:
• Put together the puzzle and write down the code. Each day will give another part of the coupon code. Please note at the top whether it is for eBook or Print.
• Once you have collected the entire code, go to Smashwords and purchase Misfit McCabe input the code and download whichever ebook version you need for free.
3. To get 50% off the print version of Misfit McCabe:
• Put together the puzzle and write down the code. Each day will give another part of the coupon code. Please note at the top whether it is for eBook or Print.
• Once you have collected the entire code, go to Griffie World Store and purchase Misfit McCabe input the code and receive 50% off the purchase price.
4. To win the KINDLE FIRE
• Support this tour by commenting on each of the daily stops — It’s only 11 days, not even as long as the 12 days of Christmas.
• And either Tweet the following exactly: YA ALERT! Check out @lkgg’s new release #TATTERED at @LLBR’s site http://bit.ly/uQLiIN and your chance to win a #KINDLE!
• OR on Facebook post exactly: YA Alert! Win a Kindle! Check out LK Gardner-Griffie’s new release Tattered! Today’s clue is on the LL Book Review http://bit.ly/uQLiIN
• And if you’re under 18 and would like to enter, but don’t have Facebook or Twitter, etc. if you have a friend comment on the posts saying that you sent them, we’ll consider that your entry for the Grand Prize. One friend for each stop (and they can enter too and bring all of their friends to the party).

Tattered is the third novel in the heartwarming young adult series, Misfit McCabe. A little about the book:

What do Sunday afternoon court proceedings, cheerleader tryouts, and a book burning have in common? Katie McCabe is back in action.

After her nemesis Harvey is found guilty and sentenced to community service, Katie wants to believe her troubles are over, but Harvey won’t rest until he gets revenge. When blackmail rears its ugly head, she’s caught between friends and enemies putting her growing relationship with Tom at stake. Books go up in flames and Katie’s world rains down in tatters.

I know what you’re thinking… you’re thinking that I’m going to say that I got involved with LLBR through Twitter. Wrong. In August of 2008, Shannon Yarbrough, the founder of LLBR, reviewed Misfit McCabe, then by October I had come onboard as the second reviewer. I don’t get to review as many these days as I’d like to, but LLBR has grown and now has several people to help get the reviews out there. And it was LLBR who introduced me to Twitter (you knew I had to bring Twitter into it somehow). Now I’ll turn things over to Katie McCabe, the fourteen-year-old main character of Tattered.

Katie: Hi LLBR peeps! Thanks for having me today. Today I get to talk about two of my cousins, Uncle Charley’s sons, Matt and Mark. Matt is the oldest, then Mark, then Sarah, then Tim and me. Before I moved to town, I’d never met my cousins, or at least I didn’t think I had. When Matt picked me up at the bus stop I was floored. When he stepped on the bus and called my name it was like looking at an old picture of Daddy come to life. Tall, Blonde, and those clear blue eyes. In some ways it makes me feel better just to look at Matt, but then sometimes looking at him makes me miss Daddy more. Matt’s kinda quiet and he works hard. In fact, lately I hardly ever see him because he’s been working on building a house so when his girlfriend (who I haven’t met) comes back from her trip, he can propose to her.

Mark on the other hand, is noisy. He bursts through the door, his boots clomping on the floor. He has dark hair and eyes like Uncle Charley and a wickedly mischievous grin. Sarah warned me about how overprotective he can be, but I didn’t listen very well. She said that he won’t think any guy is good enough for me, so that’s one of the reasons I don’t talk about Tom being my boyfriend at home. Well, that and Uncle Charley won’t let me date. And Mark calls me Kit-Kat instead of Katie and has since the very first day after I arrived. It had something to do with the fit I threw during supper the first night…Mark thought it was funny. It was embarrassing.

LK: Put the puzzle below together for part of the code to receive a free Misfit McCabe ebook. And make sure you visit Carolina Valdez Miller on tomorrow’s stop on the tour. And for all details on the tour, the prizes, and the stops, please visit Griffie World.

If the puzzle does not load correctly, please refresh your browser and it should display correctly. And if for some reason it still does not display correctly, click this link to open the puzzle in a new browser window.

Pavarti K. Tyler has created a world that is similar to others in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy realm, but is distinctive in many ways.  The introduction of the strange land is immediately enticing, as a we meet a water creature that has been captured by those of the land.  It is clear that there is going to be much to learn about this land at war.  Although we do not learn it all in Vol. 1, it surely sets everything up quite well.

Serafay is a genetic anomaly.  She is half sea-sweller (Sualwet) and half land-dweller (Erdlander), and accepted by no one except her mother.  That is, until she meets Torkek, a mysterious Erdlander that draws her in and piques her curiosity.  Serafay instantly feels a connection to Tor, even if she can not quite explain why.

Though, at first, Serafay seeks out the company of Tor to discover more about her world and to ease her loneliness, she quickly finds that his company is integral to her survival.  She must learn to trust Tor with her life, as an unexpected trauma threatens to shatter her world.  It is through this journey of trust and exploring the unknown that Serafay begins to learn what her place in her world really means.

As she discovers who Tor really is, she also begins to better understand who she is and what their existence may mean to both the Sualwets and the Erdlanders.  As their quest for survival begins, the first installation in this serial novel quickly draws the reader in to Serafay’s world that may be full of more danger than beauty.  After reading Two Moons of Sera, one is left with anticipation for the next chapter, due out January 2012.

  Please check out the other tour stops listed on theauthor’s webpage. Or sign up for the free give away!

 This book can be purchased at Amazon.com, Smashwords, as well as your local independent bookseller.

Want LLBR to host your blog tour? Email us for details!

 Like Shannon, I spent many years working in the retail business – at the customer end as well as the backroom logistic end of music retailing – and marrying those years of experience together with several years spent in band management and promotion helped me greatly when I decided to self-publish. A lot has happened for me since those years of self-publishing, and I’ve now had the experience of being self-published through Lulu, setting up my own imprint, and being published by mainstream publishers with both fiction and non-fiction books.

 Whatever path your book finds to publication; the challenges for authors – whether self-published, through a small independent press, even large publishing houses – are becoming quite common. Where self-publishing presents more flexibility and freedom; commercial publishing is no longer a refuge for the reclusive writer who simply wants to write and shun all participation in the promotional process. Unless you’re selling books by the hundreds of thousands – publishing life for the modern writer just doesn’t work that way anymore.  

 One of the biggest challenges facing authors is finding a suitable channel or platform to present their work to potential readers. For self-published authors, the challenge is even greater without the support of a marketing engine and sales distributor that comes with a commercial publisher. While self-publishing still has its stigmas and detractors, digitalization in the print and publishing industries, together with a growing community of savvy and entrepreneurial authors like JA Konrath and Zoe Winters; it has announced its arrival in the wider publishing world. There is a great onus on the self-publishing community – authors and author solutions services alike – to ensure that self-publishing does not remain on the fringes of the publishing world, but instead, becomes a serious, viable and alternative path to publication. That can only come about by developing a strong community of successful writers and maintaining high standards no matter how humble the beginnings of each writer.

 “Selling my books from a table on the street was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done in my life, but it taught me some very important lessons about what it takes to turn a book browser into a book buyer and how to get word out about your book.”

Penelope Thompson, Author of ‘How to Sell Thousands of Your Self-Published Book‘

What is clear to me, and I’m sure many others, is that self-publishers will serve each other best if they work as a community within the sphere of publishing, rather than on the margins, continually being goaded into sneering and giving the two fingers to our traditional cousins. By all means, let us celebrate self-publishing successes when they happen, and they do, more often than our traditional cousins would like to admit. JA Konrath pulled no punches when he has written about his ebook sales figures.

 “Some people seem to be really pissed off that I’m making decent money without relying on the gatekeepers. They call me an outlier, an anomaly, an exception. They deride self-published ebooks, low ebook prices, and anything not endorsed by Big NY Publishing. They don’t like what’s happening with Kindle, and don’t like me talking about how much money I’m making, and are bemoaning a future where other authors will do what I’m doing.”

 Konrath’s point is that many authors and publishers still believe without the endorsement of a gatekeeper, self-publishing successes will remain the exception rather than the rule, but the real implication is that if a book is published by a commercial publisher, and it is panned by the literary critics, then it is still a better book because of its brand than a self-published book of literary merit within a smaller reading community. There is a twisted logic operating at the top of the publishing world since the explosion of the mass paperback during the 1950′s – a kind of ‘mommy knows best, dear. Take you medicine and read this nice book.’

 I am not against gatekeepers, be they editors, reviewers or literary agents, just as long as they are author and reader centric. And I do not believe this is true of many large publishing houses or newspapers – most are rigidly structured and focused on the pursuit of the dollar and the replication of what is successful rather than the promotion of what deserves to be successful. With production turnaround times of nine to eighteen months in publishing, and hours in the daily print media, frankly, commercial publishers who follow social trends and try to replicate success by creating template formulas for bestsellers cannot afford to be so rigid. While success might be easier and more frequent to come by with a large publisher, I would suggest that if you believe self-publishing successes are the exception rather than the rule, then, consider the obvious possibility that most bestsellers are accidental rather than deliberate. The trick of the publisher’s marketing and sales departments is to convince us that literary merit and a good story is seen the instant it hits the editor’s desk. If that were true, no great writer would ever remain unpublished, and the general reading public would not be as nearly unpredictable as they are. It would be a utopian boom for publishers. Imagine publishing one great book every week and getting it right fifty-two times every year. Nope…neither can I, nor can a publisher or author for that matter.

 The two great elements missing from the hierarchy of publishing today is Community and The Reader. The most important person in book publishing today – just as it has always been – is The Reader, because word of mouth is what sells books and the publisher must create a community for its readers, not just its authors. That is why Amazon and Google may sooner than we think become the largest publishers in the world. The Reader is also the most discerning editor in the world, and in the life of a book, they cast the final deciding vote – to purchase or not to purchase – to read or not to read.

 What self-published authors must do is find, engage and nurture their community of readers while maintaining a kinship with their fellow authors – traditionally published as well as self-published. Right now, publishing is changing drastically and faces supreme challenges it has never before faced. From where I stand, self-published authors are doing a better job of dealing with those changes and embracing and using the tools of change than some large publishing machines of the industry. I do not want to see the largest publishing houses collapse into the dust, but they must now acknowledge that the time is fast approaching when they will need self-publishing and all it has embraced more than self-published authors need them. I will gladly help with that change, having witnessed it from both sides of the fence, but only if the publishing industry have the humility to acknowledge self-publishing and ask for its help.

 Mick Rooney is an author, editor and publishing consultant from the Republic of Ireland. He has published eight books since 1990, through his own imprint, using author solutions services, and he has also published through mainstream publishers. Several years ago he began researching the publishing industry, and in particular Independent, POD (print-on-demand) and subsidy/self-publishers. Many of the findings of his research can be found at his site, The Independent Publishing Magazine together with his own experiences in the world of writing and publishing. He is the author of To Self-Publish or Not to Self-Publish? A Seriously Useful Author’s Guide. He is also a contributor to many magazines and online resources including, Writers’ Forum, Publishing Basics Magazine, Publetariat, Carnival of the Indies, selfpublishingreview.com, Irish Publishing News, as well as many writing and publishing forums.

 In September 2011, he published his latest novel with Book Republic, The Memory of Trees, available in hardback and ebook.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

 Would you like for LLBR to host one of your virutal book tour dates?  Contact us at llbookreview@gmail.com.

Since then, R. J. and I have become great online friends through Facebook, Twitter, and other blogs.  I have a lot of respect for her as a writer.  So, when her book was acquired by Amazon Encore last year I asked R.J. for an interview.  She gladly accepted.  But to make things fun and interesting for us and for our readers, we decided to do the interview via Twitter.  So, our questions and her answers had to be 142 characters or less.  Enjoy!

LLBR: Let me start by congratulating you on the Amazon Encore acquisition of W.S. What are you exited about the most with the upcoming release?

RJK: Knowing that it has the potential to reach a bigger audience. I try to write stuff that connects with people…the more people the better.

LLBR: Did Amazon Encore request any changes, other than the cover, to be made to Waiting for Spring?

RJK: It got a very thorough (and very welcome) copy edit. I’m happy to say there were no major cuts. Plot-wise, there’s only one minor change.

LLBR: Tell us where this story came from when you first wrote it. What inspired you to write this book? Is it personal?

RJK: It’s personal, but not autobiographical. I wanted to explore the dichotomy between what we say out loud as opposed to what we think & feel.

LLBR: Tell us who you were as a writer BEFORE you wrote this book.

RJK: In terms of style I’m the same kind of writer now as then. I do outline a LOT more now, though. I didn’t outline at all for WFS.

LLBR: Are there any well known or famous writers (living or dead) that have influenced your style? If so, how?

RJK: Australian author/poet Luke Davies. His prose is gorgeous, but his stories are gritty as hell. He made me realize that blend was possible.

LLBR: Who (or what) else are you reading these days?

RJK: Three most recent: 33 AD – David McAfee. Pictures of You – Caroline Leavitt. Harry Potter series. I like a little bit of everything.

LLBR: What’s the one book, or Great American Novel, you wish you’d written?

RJK: Honestly, The Princess Bride. It might be the most perfect book I’ve ever read. It’s entertaining and funny, but it’s smart, too.

LLBR: What are you working on now? Will you self-publish it or are you seeking representation?

RJK: Currently working on The Wendy House, a follow up to WFS (not exactly a sequel). Encore has first dibs and I see no reason to go elsewhere.

LLBR: On being a writer or author, what’s the best advice you’ve ever been given? And who gave it?

RJK: ‘If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.’ – Toni Morrison

LLBR: What advice would you give for new authors considering self-publishing?

RJK: Have your book well edited. Research ALL your publishing options. Be patient. Overnight success is rare. Success takes lots of hard work.

Thanks, R.J.!

To learn more about R.J. visit her online!

Upcoming Events for R.J.:

*A book release party on Saturday May 14 1pm – 3pm at the Stewart Free Library in Corinna Maine
*In NYC for BookExpo America from Monday May 23 – Wednesday May 25
*Speaking at a publishing panel hosted by Carol Hoenig at The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen library (20 West 44th Street, btwn 5th & 6th) at 6 PM on May 24th (during BEA, but not part of it). It’s being sponsored by The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen and The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

The Amazon Encore edition of Waiting for Spring is due out May 10th. Click on the book cover to pre-order your copy today or you can enter to win an advanced reader’s copy from LLBR. Just leave a comment with your email address (so we can contact the winner) below.  We will pick a winner at random.  The winner will be announced May 7th. U.S. and Canadian residents only please!

LLBR: Hi Judy. Thanks for talking with LLBR today. First, tell us a little about yourself and how you came to write the book, The Therapist’s New Clothes.

JS: I didn’t so much choose to write the book as the book demanded to be written. Years back, as an author at an impasse, I decided to become a therapist. The rational reason was that this way I’d have steady income when I was between projects. However, the truth was that therapy had become my life and framed how I saw the world. After I went through the rabbit hole and came out the other side, I could see the huge ironies in what had happened to me, truths that I knew I would best understand through the process of writing out the story.

The book is only 144 pages long. How long did it take you to write and edit it?

The first draft came very quickly: I wrote it in about six weeks. That 90 or so pages had the basic story, structure, etc. But then I kept going back to it, adding scenes and filling in gaps, kind of a process of layering. Editing-wise, a writer friend and my agent offered suggestions. But mostly it grew over time, as I looked back at the manuscript and saw ways to make it better.

Did you explore other avenues of publishing before ultimately deciding on the use of the Espresso Book Machine?

Goodness, yes! I had a top New York literary agent who strongly believed in the book, and she sent it around. It came excruciatingly close. At one house it went all the way up to the founding editor who finally turned it down, saying he feared it would fall into the “small book syndrome”. I could second-guess this till I made myself crazy, but for whatever reason or no reason it didn’t get placed. Then I started reading analyses of problems in the publishing industry, and it started to dawn on me: hey, if this system is such a mess, why am I letting it determine my fate as a writer? I was mulling this over when I started hearing about the Espresso Book Machine and learned that the only bookstore in the world that had it (at the time) was…my bookstore, the Northshire in Manchester, Vermont.

Now, tell us about the EBM. How did you hear about it? How long was the process from beginning to publication? How much of the formatting did you have to do yourself?

It took a couple of months, but that was because I spent time working with a designer on the cover and, well, getting my bearings. After doing books with traditional publishing it would have felt weird, even disorienting, to have a book come out within days! I mean, I needed a bit of time to get geared up. start my blog, etc.  The folks at the Northshire helped me with the formatting, but because the shifting between formats kicks up some odd tabs and spacing, it took a few rounds of proofing to get it right.

How long does it take to print one copy of the book? Is the Vermont bookstore also handling distribution for you?

It takes minutes—maybe three or four minutes. The Northshire is getting the newer version of the machine (2.0 rather than the 1.5 prototype) this month, which means it will pop out even faster. The bookstore essentially acts as my publisher, selling the book through their website and dealing with Amazon orders. (I had to pay a small fee for them to put it on Amazon.) They also worked with me to have it available via Lightning Source, Ingram’s print-on-demand program. This way someone can order it through any bookstore that uses Ingram as a distributor. I’m not sure if the Northshire does this regularly, or whether I was their guinea pig for this. I’ve also made the book available as an ebook through Smashwords. Just a year ago, when I brought the book out, it seemed you had to choose between doing a print book or an electronic version. No more.

How is the book doing? Where have you gained the most amount of sales?

The book is doing well enough, considered its limited distribution, no marketing, etc.. Most of the sales have come from word-of-mouth, and a few events I’ve done, including one at the Northshire and a signing at a library opening in a town where I knew no one – except the librarian! A few blogposts in the mental health area have also sparked interest (not that I compulsively check my sales stats or anything….)

What kind of feedback are you getting?

The feedback from readers has been amazing – people coming up to me on the street or at concerts and thanking me for writing it, saying that they’ve told everyone they know to buy it. Several readers have blamed me for keeping them up late because they couldn’t stop reading it. Often it’s the people I least expect who respond the most powerfully. I casually mentioned to one woman I interviewed for an article that I had written a book. She liked it so much she bought a copy for everyone on her holiday list!

What’s next for you?

I lead something of a double life. On the one hand, I do my own writing, The Therapist’s New Clothes and a novel I’ve finished that’s a love triangle in Freud’s Vienna (based on my grandmother’s psychoanalyst who was a member of Freud’s inner circle). I’ve also started a second novel, also inspired by my grandmother, who was an artist in Greenwich Village in the 1910s. Then, improbably, I’ve been writing about “new economics”, basically the nexus of economics and the environment. I think my experience with publishing left me primed to question assumptions about we live and do business. When the financial downturn hit in late 2008, I started asking things like “what is money?” and found myself in some pretty fascinating, dynamic terrain. My pieces are published in Time, Miller-McCune, Christian Science Monitor, etc.

Any hobbies outside of writing and publishing? What are you reading these days?

We live a mile up a mountain on a nice stretch of forest/meadow and do a lot outdoors—swimming, walking, biking, gardening. I spend a lot of time with my son (within the bounds of what would be cool for a 15-year-old, of course) and love listening to his music; he writes his own rock songs and sings and plays guitar. As for reading, I just read, and loved, Billy Bathgate, and can recommend Jack London’s “John Barleycorn”, which I would call the ultimate addiction memoir with some surprising insights. And since you raised the subject…please indulge me a shameless plug for my husband, Tony Eprile’s, novel The Persistence of Memory, a beautiful and funny book about South Africa in the waning years of apartheid.

Any advice for our authors and readers who may be considering the EBM or self-publishing in general?

Go in with your eyes open. This is an extremely tough time in the book business and there’s a lot of confusion, frustration, and heartbreak out there. Some of us are killer promoters and some of us aren’t, so don’t go into it thinking you’re going to suddenly change. Better to work with your own style. When I decided to self-publish, the smartest thing I did was to make a deal with myself: I would go ahead and do this if I made it fun for myself. So when I start getting stressed or obsessing about numbers I stop myself and remember that it’s only worth it if it’s fun.

Thanks Judith!

LLBR: Hi Nick!  First, congratulations on the success of your two books, Strings Attached and Double Bound.  Can you start by telling us how you came to write this story and eventually self-publish it?

NN: Thanks, Shannon. It’s been a wild ride. Quite simply, I self-published ‘Strings Attached’ because I couldn’t get anyone else interested in publishing it. And I’d gone through the required process: re-re-writing my queries; looking online for agents and publishers; rummaging through Jeff Herman’s book on agents—the works. I even took a class at UCLA Writer’s Workshop on query writing. But it still took me over a year before I accepted the fact that if you’re an unpublished niche author, your chances of nabbing a traditional publishing deal are very, very slim—that is, unless you are VERY close to someone who’s been successful in that industry.

What made you decide upon BookSurge as a publisher?

I had a ‘chance’ meeting—arranged by the fates, I’m certain—with author Kathleen McGowan. She had successfully self-published The Expected One with BookSurge (now CreateSpace), and after hearing my woeful tale she encouraged me to do the same. Eventually, her novel was picked up by Simon & Schuster, and became a NY Times Bestseller—as have her subsequent books. And although the experience with BookSurge was far from seamless, looking back I’m very happy I followed Kathleen’s advice. BookSurge/CreateSpace produces a quality project and handles the Amazon order fulfillment. It’s not like I ever had to drive around to bookstores with a carton of my novels rotting in the back of my SUV.

How were sales while the books were with BookSurge?  Did you have a marketing plan or any assistance?

The sales of ‘Strings Attached’ (2006) and ‘Double Bound’ (2008) went far beyond my expectations: 5200 copies for the former and 1500 for the latter before both were picked up last year by AmazonEncore. As for marketing plans, I had none. But I worked every day on marketing: press releases, blog articles, Amazon page descriptions, literary competitions, website development, press reviews, reader’s emails, and placement in bookstores—which was mostly unsuccessful, with the exception of A Different Light in WeHo (sniff!). But these tasks were never ‘work’ for me; it’s something I love. Oh, and the greatest assistance I received was from lesbian author DC Elmore—who also writes a terrific vampire series under the name Drew Silver. She was generous and gracious with her direction; by the time I dipped my toe into the self-published waters, she was already a champion swimmer.

How and when did AmazonEncore get involved?

In June 2009, just as AmazonEncore was forming, their senior acquisitions editor, Terry Goodman, contacted me after reading Strings Attached—perhaps he was drawn to the story because of the volume of my sales or the positive reviews I’d accrued on Amazon. Since signing with them, their unwavering commitment to making these ‘niche’ and ‘unmarketable’ stories successful has been jaw dropping: Strings Attached has been the #1 bestselling LGBT title on Amazon for the past 5 weeks—that includes bios, fiction, etc. Needless to say, I’ve been delighted by what AmazonEncore has done to publish and promote my unapologetically gay, sexy novels.

The new book covers definitely give the series a new look and feel, and completely change the tone the books convey. Are you happy with them? Besides the book covers, what other changes did AmazonEncore make?

AmazonEncore commissioned artist Silja Goetz to create the new covers, and I love them. They positively leap out from the listing queues on Amazon, and they convey both the sensuality and the fairy tale qualities my stories have. But I loved those old covers as well; my partner Jaime—he’s an exceptionally gifted graphic designer—put together those for me. Besides the look of the books, AmazonEncore and Melcher Media meticulously copyedited the stories, and they’ve assembled a terrific marketing team. And am I happy with them? I feel like the luckiest guy in the world.

Does AmazonEncore provide distribution of your book through traditional channels such as physical bookstores, or just on the web?

Yes, my books can now be found in some bookstores in the major US metropolitan areas, but the focus and muscle feels like it’s concentrated on Amazon—especially with the Kindle reading device. Each month I’m stunned by how many more books are zapped to Kindles versus how many paperbacks are actually shipped. It’s a new world.

What was the first immediate change you noticed once the books were released with AmazonEncore?  Increase in sales?  Emails from readers?

The increase in both sales and reader’s feedback has been incredible. And the reviews are both touching and entertaining: for one week last month Amazon gave away free Kindle copies of Strings Attached to bolster the coming launch of Double Bound; this giveaway skyrocketed SA into the #2 position for all ‘free Kindle’ contemporary fiction titles—and then the scathing reviews starting coming in. If you want some entertainment, take a look at the reviews from those who downloaded Strings Attached and were shocked by the content. Several who gave the book 1-star ratings actually liked the story, but decried the book as ‘gay porn’…which is ironic for a 320 page novel with only 5 pages of anything explicit. But the really positive aspect of this giveaway is the glowing feedback I continue to receive from readers who would’ve probably never read my books. Strings Attached is opening eyes, and that’s priceless.

Have you gotten any interest from agents or traditional publishers?

I now have two agents; Kevan Lyon for domestic rights and Taryn Fagerness for foreign rights. They’ve been terrific, and they’ve given me some invaluable feedback on book #3. As for other publishers, at this time I have no interest in cheating on AmazonEncore! We are happily married.

AmazonEncore seems to be quite exclusive, meaning not just anyone can query them direct.  So, what advice would you offer for someone considering self-publishing since you started out there?

Write a good story and keep working on it until it’s great—and then work on it some more. The best (and worst!) part about writing a book is it can always be improved. And if your story doesn’t beg reading, it doesn’t matter if you’ve signed with the biggest publisher in the world, or if you’ve self-published and have a very clever marketing plan. If people don’t recommend your stories to friends, you’re not going to sell books to strangers.

What’s next for you?  Another book?  Is it also being released through AE?

Book #3 is nearly finished, and I’m very excited by the story. I find myself working long into the night sometimes, because I can’t wait to find out what the muses have in store for my characters. As for who will release it, I don’t know yet—but I will say that I’m trying my best to have the story meet AmazonEncore’s standards.

Tell us something we don’t already know about you?  Besides a writer, who would you say Nick Nolan is?

I strive to be a nice guy, a considerate man. And I’m very curious about ‘non-traditional’ ideas regarding spirituality; I drive Jaime crazy with my theories and research about life after death, and about those invisible forces in our lives that push people together and make miracles. And the longer I live, the more I’m convinced that creativity and work and appreciating people and animals are all that matter in this life. Those things, and love. Yes, love is the most important thing.

Visit Nick at Amazon.com!

LLBR: First, tell us who you are and why you decided to create NovelRank.

ML: I’m Mario Lurig and I published my first (and currently only book) over a year and a half ago, “PHP Reference: Beginner to Intermediate PHP5“. I did some of my own marketing on the book, but checking Amazon.com all the time to see if my sales rank was lower (and thus a sale) was just not a good use of my free time. I looked around to see what sales rank tracking sites were out there and I just wasn’t thrilled with any single one (I tested most of them). So for my own benefit I started to track my book and had it email me on a sale, because in the end it’s not the rank but the sales info that you really want. Eventually, I decided to make NovelRank a site for other authors and committed 180+ hours of time in 2009 designing, researching, and creating the site so that other self-publishing authors could get more real-time information about how well their book is selling and how well their marketing is working.

LLBR: What is NovelRank and how does it work?

ML: It’s a pretty simple concept: You add your book to NovelRank by providing the link to your book on Amazon, and it tracks your sales rank on Amazon every hour. It also uses that information to determine if your sales rank has changed in a way that means a book (or more than one) has been sold. It then reflects that data on the site. You can track by visiting the site directly, grabbing the widget for displaying your book’s sales rank on your own website, or grabbing the RSS feed so you can put it into your favorite RSS reader. The best part, and mind you I’m biased, is that you don’t have to create a login, and you can share your book’s link with your readers or friends by just sharing the link.

ML: I couldn’t charge a fee, because I know how it is to sell a handful of books a month ( I average 15 a month), and that was the exact audience I wanted to help, so the site is completely free. Yes, that means that my hourly rate for building and improving NovelRank is currently around $0.01/hour, but if an author is selling a 1000 books or more a month just on Amazon, you probably care a lot less about the details, just the fat check. I want to help the independents, even the authors who market their books but get limited information from their publishing company so they have no idea what works and what doesn’t.

LLBR: So how does NovelRank make money and stay online?

ML: Currently, the hosting for the site is paid for by the income my book generates, barely. However, if you click through to an Amazon domain from your book’s page and end up buying something on that visit to Amazon, I get a small percentage of that item’s price as a kickback from Amazon (around 5%) through their affiliate program. Costs you nothing. I also may run some NPR style ‘support NovelRank’ pledge drives once or twice a year, but this is a while away, if ever. I never intend to put ads on the site or charge. Clean design, useful information, and a supportive community has always been my top priorities.

ML: RSS feeds, spreadsheet downloads of data, twitter searches, sales rank widget, average sales rank for common time periods, some statistical info (best rank, worst rank, etc), and how long it’s been since you made a sale. Oh, and pretty charts as a visual aid for your sales rank (soon I’ll be adding charting for actually sales as well). This is just the beginning, what I considered the basics needed. In 2010 I have a whole list of new goals, including optional user accounts that you can use to track multiple books on one page (and still share that page with others). The complete chart of features is available on NovelRank.com.

ML: The lists are updated hourly, just like the sales rank. I thought of a few criteria that were interesting and tossed them all into a Top 10 Lists page, which feeds the frontpage of NovelRank with 3 lists, the 3 lists randomly changing hourly. I’m personally addicted to the ‘Recently Added’ list for obvious reasons. In the future I may add a few more lists, but I think there are enough for now: Top sellers, recently added, top Lulu.com books, and diamonds in the rough, a category of books that sold a copy recently, but it’s been a few days and they deserve some reader attention.

ML: Hourly, as long as Amazon actually updates. Sometimes an Amazon domain doesn’t provide new sales rank data, so nothing is updated on NovelRank’s site either. At one point I saw that Amazon.com and Amazon.ca were not updating a third of the day, over 8 out of 24 hours! Usually, this won’t effect much, unless your book has a sales rank below 400 where hourly changes make a difference in calculating the number sold. Of course, if your sales rank hangs out below 400, I’m insanely jealous.

ML: Every Amazon domain. I built it with Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk in mind, but I was a little too prepared so switching on Canada, Germany, France, and Japan was actually really simple. I figured there was no harm in offering more information for authors, and it may prove interesting data to analyze later.

ML: Barnes & Noble is tracked by a few other tracking sites, but frankly I don’t see the benefit. Barnes & Noble isn’t as diligent in updating their sales rank, making the final results (estimating sales) difficult to make useful. They also don’t provide a convenient way to get at the data, and I just don’t think it benefits authors enough to warrant putting it above other features I’d like to add. I’d actually like to add back in the ability to track Kindle Edition books, since these are really huge sellers now, but Amazon removed the ability to get their information through the API (how I get the data), thus making it much harder for me get the hourly rankings. I want to resolve this, because it’s a market that is only growing each year.

ML: Sleep. I worked really hard for a few months to get it where it is now, and currently I’d give it a 7 on its usefulness for as many authors as possible. It can be better, and I want to get there, but I have to make time for it between my full-time job and the articles I post to the NovelRank blog that I think add some fresh information for authors. I really want to build an iPhone application that will make your phone ‘cha-ching’ whenever a sale is made; that idea alone motivated me a lot, and I don’t even have an iPhone. That will be late 2010 I’m sure, though other features will arrive sooner, such as the previously mentioned user ‘accounts’.
The other issue is that I’m a bit over halfway through my next book, a work of fiction about a sentient man trapped in his zombie body. Trust me, it’s awesome. I’m trying to finish that, revise it 2 or 3 times with some help, then get it self-published and in the public eye. I’m intending to donate 50% of the proceeds of that book to Child’s Play Charity, and use the other half to take a handful of friends living around the country on a group trip that none of us would or could do alone. I’ll need a bit of luck and a ton of sales, but I’m hoping the book and marketing will be good enough. Till then, I want to tell as many authors as possible about NovelRank; It’s nothing without them.

LKG-G: How did the idea come about to turn Minnie into a stage play?

AL: I’ve always been a fan of Steel Magnolias and had on hand the script I bought from Amazon, which I read from time to time. Then it hit me a couple months back that Minnie could be translated to a play like Steel Magnolias. They’re both about real life situations and real reactions, and people always like to be entertained by things they can relate to. I sometimes read the script aloud to myself and edit it that way, to make it as real-sounding as possible. It’s very exciting to see Minnie evolve the way it has been.

LKG-G: What were some of the challenges you faced with writing the play versus the manuscript?

AL: Since plays are mostly dialogue, I had to change a lot of the intrapersonal segments into outward dialogue and remove some of the characters. For example, in the book, Minnie has an angry, paranoid daughter named Marcia and she is softened by Sadey, but in the play, to keep it simple, Marcia is only talked of. Sadey’s toddler sister, Cora, is one of Sadey’s reasons for living in the book, but in the play, she is also only talked of. It was hard to eliminate the positions for actors, but I didn’t want a complicated script. I’m very tidy and linear in everything I do, so I wanted the play to be something I could look at and not wince. I was able to keep a lot of the back story, which the characters discuss (Minnie’s abusive marriage, Sadey’s unfit mother, Gabe’s hand in an abortion).

Note by LKG-G: I’m very sorry to hear that Marcia will not be a part of the stage play. When I first heard you were working on the stage play for Minnie, my mind immediately visualized the off-beat Marcia, and it would be a great part for a character actor.

LKG-G: As a script what do you see as the potential for Minnie?

AL: I see Minnie becoming fairly popular as a play, simply because it’s based on something believable. I’m not trying to sound conceited, but history shows that audiences like things that can sweep them away: Steel Magnolias of course, Titanic, The Sound of Music, Pride & Prejudice, and countless other plays like them. Once Minnie is on stage, I feel that it will slowly but surely gain popularity like it did when it was first published.

LKG-G: When do you anticipate Minnie to be in production?

AL: That’s the funny part. Right now I’m in the middle of turning Minnie into a play for a scriptwriting contest that Loves Street Playhouse is having and I feel that it will be my turn to do something great and to see my characters that I’ve known for a few years to finally take tangible breaths and to live out what has been a vision for so long. As for a timeline, if my script wins the contest, Loves Street Playhouse will have the rights to my script for the 2009-2011 seasons and will be produced once or several times. Worst case scenario, if I do not win the contest, I want to put on my own production of Minnie with friends and community members and work my way up from there!

Thanks to author Ashley Lane for sharing her next steps with Minnie with us.

Concerning the interview, if you read it you’ll learn of some changes we are making here at LLBR.  But again, if you are reading this post then you are probably already aware of them.  We are indeed adding more publishers to our review list in an attempt to help even more authors out there who are searching for the spotlight.  As we approach June 1st, our official launch date of the new site, you’ll also see some changes to our review policy and to the reviews themselves in an attempt to improve our services for authors and readers.

Read the full interview and visit Publetariat here!