Garnering ebook eReviews fr0m Joe/Jane Q. Public

Originally posted on April 15, 2011, but this may be of help to some of you!

Using Twitter and Facebook effectively can gain reviews for your ebook. While such prestigious outlets as Publisher's Weekly and even the New York Times have announced (finally) that ebooks will be reviewed by them, the number of slots for such reviews are miniscule at best, and I suspect most such reviews will go to the authors who least need the extra toot to their horns. I mean does Dean R. Koontz need another place to be reviewed? Evanovich? Now, you and I and many another upstart Indie author or midlist author with an ebook -- we are the ones who need a review outlet.  There is Mysterical-e and a handful of others reviewing online but for ebooks and kindle books, the place where you will most likely be seen if you do garner a review is on Amazon.com.

But then how do you get people to review your book on Amazon?  I recently put up new books for sale from the Kindle shelf, and to entice eReaders to review my books, I announced on Facebook and Twitter that I would gift a copy of a book to anyone interested in then reviewing -- FREE copy of Children of Salem or Titanic 2012  and the eReader need only review it in some venue, preferably Amazon.com.

I recently received on April 14, 2011 -- the 99th year of Titanic's launch and demise -- another review of my T2012. The reviewer, a Chris Gibson, eReader, Joe Q. Public, remarked on how chills went through him when he realized he had placed up the review on April 14th--the exact night 99 years ago when Titanic sank.  Next year at this time it will be the 100th year of Titanic. One of the reasons I tackled the manuscript which posed huge challenges.

The reviews I have recieved from this process have been terrific and detailed for the most part. in which I said I would prefer an ugly, nasty, bad or tepid review to NO review but that I would take my chances as I believed strongly in the novel. They also inform me that I was on the right track with these two titles and offer some strong vindication as both books were repeatedly shunned by brick and mortar publishers, but in the case of querying myself as Independent Publisher for Instinct InK, I sorta knew I was not going to get a rejection slip or a pleasant 'no thank you'--HA!


It is rather nice to know your book is accepted by the publisher even before you have completed the thing. Independent authorship/publising with Amazon.com/Kindle. Nice to know you will be all-in on the cover art, the script/lettering, and no one to fight you on your title. All copy writing in my hands, so the description is precisely as I want it to be. Marketing director, PR person, responsible for it all, and oddly enough it frees me up from a myriad of problems faced when dealing with brick and mortar publishers, includinng no confusion on earnings and no delays on earnings. No more waiting six months or a year to learn of the progress or lack thereof of the book. Instead of royalty statements, I have unit sales reports. Instead of an agent and a publisher, I have a partner in crime who allows me to take 70% off the top to his 30%.

It is all so remarkable that even after placing up 46 booklength works on the Kindle shelf, I am still flabergasted that I am realizing a childhood dream--to be able to afford to publish myself so I don't have to cow-tow to anyone or wait on others I consider far, far too slow as I write too fast for brick and mortar stores but never too fast for the Kindle Store.

People looking for advice on practical methods for selling ebooks/kindle titles, find me on Kindle Community Forums. Hope to see you there.

Robert W. Walker
Killer Instinct, Cutting Edge, and Thrice Told Tales

Catch 22s in Publishing

This is the CATCH 22 of being a published author; years ago, I felt no one could possibly understand the problems and bumps in the road a PUBLISHED author must face. What's HE got to complain about, after all he has one loaf of bread under his arm, and yet he is complaining he has no bread. Who wants to hear it?


With more and more authors now being published with indie publishing and the advent of the Kindle platform, more authors who are published are experiencding such round robins as --"You gotta get out there and market your books" but you can't be so foolish as to get out there and say anything positive about your own work."

This is the crucible. You are responsible for any and all that goes wrong with the book in traditional publishing, but you HAD no control over all the most important decisions from cover art concept to title to ad copy, PR, marketing, etc. But if and when the book TANKS, guess whose ""WRITING" is the problem? The 'true' cause of the failure to 'communicate'?

Then you go Indoe Author and YOU are responsible for all those same decisions, and the book TANKS -- guess who is all out willing to take the responsibility for the causes of the "tanking"? With the freedom of Indie Authorship comes responsibility and accountability. Down to editing, rewriting, all of it.

At the same time, there is a PERVASIVE view that unlike a carpenter or archetect or painter or sculptor, a WRITER has NO BUSINESS liking his own work out lout and in public, that for some damn reason we have to keep it under our beds, this idea that we actually love what we have spent years crafting...what our hands and minds have wrought. That we should have no opinion on our own works anymore than a Hollywood actor ought have a political view, that 'How Dare We be so presumptous! O r that we dare love our 'children' and show any PDA (public display of affection). Or that we dare pound home the fact that we had a BALL writing this last one, or that we dare think it is our BEST work, or that we extremely DARE call it our most literary attempt. Our greatest most ambitious work.  Our most challenging work.

Actors are asked how they feel about a role they played and it is OK for Matt Damon to say that while the Bourne Identiy earned him more recognition and money than did Good Will Hunting, that the part he played in the film he co-wrote is his best work. It is OK for a cosmotologist to go on and on about what a fantastic job she did on someone's hair or nails, but GOD FORBID (for a pervasive number of idgits) that an author dare have a single word of praise for his own work, his own efforts, his blood, sweat, tears, and years of honing his or her skills in a culture that heaps praise and huge amounts of money on silly, insipid celebrity books.

I wrote and rewrote Children of Salem so many times it was rejected by every major publisher in New York twice and thrice in various drafts. I kid you not. I was so devoted to this story that I rewrote it countless times over a 30 year period, but I can get stoned at any time should I say, "This is, of all my books, my most literary work, my most amitious work, one that challenges the reader on every page." No good, BSP, but nowadays it is Kosher to lay out fifty bucks to have the same book reviewed by ten people on Amazon? It is OK to hear it from a paid lacky reviewer but not OK if I believe this aloud?

When I do get attacked, being a Scorpio, I generally sting back. I got into it with one group for a long time because I dared describe some readers, some reviewers, and even some editors as "hack readers" citing the fact that so many are so ready with the phrase "hack writers". Man did I catch hell. More recently, I used the term 'short-sighted readers' who just do not GET what I am doing and man, you'd think I was plotting the demise of the Pope. But when we pay reviewers to review our books, what does that make of the reviewer? Hack writers were called that because they wrote FAST in order to get paid per word fast. If that practice made writers 'hacks' then what does this new practice make of reviewers?

In short, so many goofy people online you have to ignore and just plow the rows you are cultivating, and to hell with short-sighted people and hacks or TROLLS of any sort. Like the sort who take exception to what you choose to place on YOUR facebook wall, for example. Exasperating to run into anyone with such temerity in the real world much less online. Then you have the trolls who devalue your writing based on the price you are willing to sell it for! The same book at 25 bucks is the same book at 99c.

Rob Walker
Children of Salem, Titanic 2012, Dead On, Dead on Writing
http://www.robertwalkerbooks.com/

The Hungry, Hungry Indie Author/Publisher - What Sells Kindle Titles?

Since Feb. 1st of this year, I've been monitoring a thread on KDP which I put up as "What Mioves Kindle Bks. off Shelves" and the staggering numbers of views, comments, and pages has surprised me, but perhaps I shouldn't be surprised at I understand 20,000 new Kindle titles by new authors are being put up daily now.  I didn't verify that number but it would not surprise me either. But my thread numbers blow me away.

Recently, another person on the thread asked, "Rob, what do I make of the growth in this thread?"  And he listed the dates showing huge bumps in numbers.

The thread is a monster now, as big as the White Whale as it is now 24,200 plus views, 760 plus comments, 52 pages. But the question was, what do I make of it?  Aside from being totally and completely FLABERGASTED, Astonished, Amazed, left wanting to shout like the King of Siam, "Is a Wonderment!" -- I dunno!  How should I know what is stoking this? Perhaps it is due the fact the thread became a recommended Amazon.com/Kindle 101 class but frankly, I think it was going up and up and spiraling up long before it was given this great recommendation.  Something else is afoot here, I suspect, Mr. Watson.


I certainly can't explain it except to say that apparently people are starved for authentic, tried and true, proven advice on the subject of "iMoves" - a term that came of my error in the Title of the Thread, misspellx of Moves, which means moving books on the iNet (iMoves).


And we ain't charging anything for admission to the "writers conference" and no one has stolen the mic or gone off the deep end. I keep waiting for the shoe to fall and it still hasn't.

My only fear is that I will run out of rabbits to pull outta me hat, but if I do, I can count on hundreds if not thousands of smart other authors experimenting and learning their way; that  others can, will, and without reservation leap into the breach!

One thing I stress in the thread is to not get hung up on efforts that bear no fruit or such little fruit as to be a waste of time, energy, money, or all of the above. Currently, I am not going to waste a lot of time on the newly opened Germany Kindle Store. Why?  Because I tried and failed there, so 'iMove on' since I have sold NADA, ZIP, NINE in Germany Kindle Store, and I do not mean 9 but NINE as in nothing!!! Ugh and urrrrrrgh! I am going to keep my focus and concentration on Kindle US thank you where I am on at least two top ten Kindle lists if not more.

I just reviewed that first post I put up on this now humongous thread, and it is very simple and straightforward steps to take, tips to put to use. It certain touched a chord in ebook and kindle Indie authors and publishers. Here is where you can find the thread  on Kindle Community Forums:  https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/dashboard

Should you wish to look in on the thread, let me know! And please leave a comment here.

Rob Walker
http://www.robertwalkerbooks.com/

PS - iMove from #20 to #6 in Kindle Store Historical Fiction - Children of Salem!!!! Yah-Rah!! Witchcraft, the geography of it, the land grab, the prejudice that leads neighbor to hang neighbor. It is Gunsmoke in 1692 with Jere Wakely as Matt Dillon. A commercial retelling of the Salem Witchcraft episode. A lifelong project rejected by every publisher and agent I submitted to, yet soon to be #1.

And perhaps it is time YOUse GUYse give out with a few well-chosen sentences here about your books in our comments section. You have a huge audience here! Never miss an opportunity to talk premise and platform.