About a year ago, I received an email from a college-going complete stranger on MySpace who had been recommended my first book, The Other Side of What, because a friend of his thought the storyline of the lead character sounded a bit too much like his own life. We corresponded very briefly, and while I was flattered, I hopefully convinced him that the book was not based on any events in his life because (1) I had never met this person and (2) We established I wrote the majority of the book before those certain events in his life had even taken place. I think he was disappointed.
To the uninitiated, writing books for children is easy. You put a few words on the page and add some pictures. How hard can that be?
Despite it just reaching 98 degrees this week here in St. Louis, stores everywhere are going to start thinking about “End of Summer” sales and start stocking the shelves with single subject notebooks and No. 2 Pencils. Students do still use those things, right? But as July comes to an end, and August arrives and school bells ring, it’ll still be a hot one here in Missouri. The weather doesn’t really start cooling down until pumpkins grow faces. So as we transition into the next season, here’s what is in store for The Lulu Book Review.
Eve Paludan is a busy woman: writer, photographer, editor, web designer, and artist. Just check out her CV on her MySpace page. It’s a hefty list of accomplishments of which anyone should be proud of. She should also be quite proud of a lil Ebook she’s written and made available through Lulu called Letters from David.
I can’t resist a good short story anthology. I love being able to sit down with a collection and read two or three stories, and be able to walk away from it for a few days if I choose and not feel like I’m missing out on something. I’ve got closure in a matter of a few pages.
Due to the lack of interest in the Success Stories feature I had created last month, and at an attempt to keep things fresh and interesting here at the LLBR site, I have replaced that tab with something I’m calling the POD Diary.
Mark, a Lulu engineer, has been making the rounds, recently commenting on my previous post and also commenting on Veinglory’s recent remarks concerning Lulu over at Podpeep.
As March draws to a close, I’d like to thank the 1,000+ visitors who have visited the site during its first month. I’d like to thank the four authors who’ve been reviewed thus far: thank you for producing, writing, composing, and editing such great work that beats the POD stigma. And thanks to those who’ve asked to be reviewed. I’ll be getting to more of you come April, I promise.
What draws us to the personal diaries of others? Remember reading Anne Frank’s back in high school? While recently on vacation, I picked up a brochure type stapled printing of a Civil War diary a woman had self-published and made available in a local gift shop. I was immediately drawn into it on page one. Having just finished Ann Pino’s superb Lulu book, My New-Found Land, I yearned for more of the personal and intimate writings of others.
The Populist Publisher recently did a survey, of which I was a part of, concerning what POD authors thought of their publishing experience. Although only 62 authors filled out the online survey, the results were posted today and were very interesting.
Do you love to read?
Do you support the POD community?
Can you be critical, yet positive?
Do you like to review books?
If so, we'd love to hear from you. LLBR is looking to add a few more reviewers to its team. Email us at llbookreview@gmail.com for details.
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