For book/ebook authors, publishers, & self-publishers
Novel Authors and Publishers
Information
If you are a novelist, novel publisher, or novel reader, here's a group where you can share more info, discuss strategies, and create partnerships.
Members: 680
Latest Activity: Dec 27, 2023
51 Ways to Blog as a Novelist
We all know that blogging is one of the best ways to get attention in today's Internet world. A blog is a godsend to your website, bringing it traffic, fans, and more. But you have to post regularly.
Stuck for what to blog about? Here are some tips for novelists, but the same tips can apply to writers of nonfiction, memoirs, children's books, business books, and more.
- Review other novels, especially from other lesser-known novelists.
- Write a blog post using the voice of one of your main characters.
- Have that main character tell some side stories not included in the novel.
- Write about the setting - time and/or place. Use some of the research you did to ensure that your novel was accurate.
- Invite your readers to review your book. Feature their testimonials on your blog.
- Interview some of your readers: via Q&A text or via an Internet radio show or via a teleseminar.
- Podcast your book, one section at a time.
- Write about trends in your genre.
- Write about your favorite novelists, especially those that write in your genre. Include their photos and a sampling of their books.
For the rest of the 51 ways, see: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/06/45-ways-to-blog-as-novelist-tips-for.html
If you like this list, help me add more. Email: johnkremer@bookmarket.com.
Comment Wall
Comment
-
Comment by Shawn Lamb on April 20, 2011 at 12:27pm
-
Check out my latest interview - http://bit.ly/emoqZj
-
-
Comment by Neil Ostroff on April 15, 2011 at 12:40pm
-
Looking for feedback on my intro chapters--Thanks.
AFTER
By
Neil Ostroff
Chapter 1
I’m not breathing!
I can’t feel my arms or legs!
I can’t move!
“Time of death,” said a tall man dressed in surgical attire. He had cotton-colored hair, a snowy white moustache, and a long beard. “1:17 P.M.”
“This doesn’t make sense,” a female doctor replied, shaking her head.
She leaned over to examine me. Penlight illuminated my right eye and then my left. A stethoscope pressed against my chest. The female doctor turned around to look at the heart monitor. Hastily, the tall man withdrew a golf ball-size crystal from his front pocket and circled it above my chest. Blue light flashed from its center before he stashed it away.
Despite being in a bright, sterile room, snake-like bands of black shadow burst from the walls and dropped to the floor. The female doctor didn’t notice as the bands whipped up my body and into my ears, nose, and mouth.
My vision dimmed.
Scenes of my life appeared in front of me as if I were standing on the sidelines observing. Everything I’d ever done played like a movie in fast-forward: standing in my crib, learning to walk, to ride my bike, my first day at Whitmore Elementary School, fishing with dad at the pier, my freshman prom with Sarah, getting my learner’s permit last month. The visions ended with me collapsing on the lawn earlier today and Sarah running toward me with a look of horror on her face.
Suddenly, I’m back on the hospital gurney. I lifted toward the ceiling; an exact copy of my physical made of cloud. I looked down at my body. My mortal eyes were glazed and half-lidded. My face was a sick, milky color. A luminous cord the width of a shoelace stretched from my human head into the back of my spirit head.
Something popped inside my skull. The connecting cord turned to sparkle.
“I’ll notify those in the waiting room that the patient passed away,” the tall man said. “The mother, and I believe, the patient’s girlfriend, are in there.”
The doctor’s face looked almost as pale as mine on the gurney.
“This should not have happened,” she said, as she peeled off a latex glove. “This boy should not be dead!”
Sound disappeared. I propelled upward through a spinning vortex of stars. I stopped and suddenly my world was bright and filled with pain, as if my skin had caught fire. I was standing on the front porch of my house. Shafts of sunlight beat down from the clear blue sky. I grabbed at the doorknob and my momentum carried me forward through the wood and into the foyer. Sunlight beamed from the windows like lasers.
I ran across the hallway through the closed basement door and down the steps into the dark, cool cellar; and relief. Filamentous illumination drifted off my spirit body. I scratched my arm and my fingertips raked along what felt like real skin. I patted my chest and thighs, they were solid. All my memories, dreams, and hopes were intact. I was an identical blueprint of my former self.
I went back up the steps and pushed my head through the closed door. The sun had set and the house was dark, except for the kitchen. The wall clock showed 8:45 P.M. Hours had passed in what I perceived as seconds.
I stepped all the way through the door, looked for my reflection in the windows, and saw none.
I headed into the kitchen. Glow cast by the overhead fluorescents heated my spirit flesh, but the discomfort was bearable. Ma sat at the table in her ratty blue robe. Her face looked chalky and devastated. Bone-white fingers gripped her coffee mug.
“Ma,” I said.
She didn’t respond, just stared ahead in a stupor.
“Ma!”
Her lips contorted with grief.
“My husband and my son,” she muttered to the air. “Both gone on the same day. Why? Why has this happened?”
She started to sob.
I stood in absolute shock. It had been two years since a stroke had left my father in a coma at Pine Brook Nursing Home. Ma and I did our best to keep him cared for and comfortable. I even got a before-school job at Pine Brook cooking breakfast three mornings a week so I could spend time with him, arriving early and talking to him before my shift started, hoping by some miracle that he’d respond. Say something. Anything. He never did.
Ma dabbed at her eyes, raised the mug, sipped, and then set it, hands trembling, back onto the table. I reached around to hug her, but my arms passed through her body.
“I’ll be right back,” I said into her ear.
I turned and walked through the drywall, through the insulation and vinyl siding, and into the night. Crickets chirped. Moths fluttered dizzyingly and bumped the back porch light. A car droned down the street. The world was as it should be.
When I stepped back through the wall, 10:30 P.M. beamed from the stove’s clock and Ma’s sobs emanated from upstairs.
“You’re coming with me,” said a gravelly voice. “Your time on the Earthlevel is complete.”
Chapter 2
I spun around. A cloudy essence of purple ectoplasm materialized in front of me. The shape fluctuated and then solidified into a gargoyle-like creature about the size of a man, with pointed ears, two horns on its head and one on its chin, and a wild mop of dirt and bug infested black hair. Hawk-like talons replaced hands and feet, and a long, serpentine tail coiled around one of its two antelope-like legs. Leathery wings were folded against its back. It wore a green tunic.
I backpedaled in bewilderment, stumbled over my own feather-light feet, and fell through the linoleum floor. I caught between the levels of the house and when I pushed down to get unstuck, my hands passed through leaving me dangling from the basement ceiling like a person clamped in a stockade. Currents of prickly energy fizzled through my muscles.
The creature grabbed the back of my neck and lifted me up. The tingling feeling increased. My extremities numbed.
“What’s happening to me?”
“Your soul exists at a certain frequency which allows you to bond with a flesh-and-blood mechanism. Death is no more than a changing of that frequency, a shifting to a higher wavelength, one that no longer adheres to mortality. The rapid playback of your life was to imprint your identity upon your consciousness, to etch your human experiences into your reasoning so you won’t enter the Realmlevels in a state of confusion. The full realization of being what mortals call being dead can shock a soul into nothingness.”
My thoughts turned somersaults. “Who are you?”
“I am Methusula, your guide into the Realmlevels.”
The tingling faded. I turned to look up the stairs toward Ma’s bedroom.
“Unfortunately, human emotions and attachments don’t die along with the body,” he said. “A grieving loved one often makes it difficult to move on. The transition into the Realmlevels will be easier if you give yourself emotional permission to leave.”
I looked briefly at a framed photograph of Dad standing at the end of pier 16 and pulling against a strained fishing rod. Memories of that trip bobbed into my mind. It had been a perfect day; perfect weather. The fishing was great. It was also the first time I ever saw Sarah and fell immediately and hopelessly in love with her.
Methusula clamped my arm, flapped his wings, and pulled me up through the ceiling, passed my bedroom on the second floor, and onto the roof. Moonshine silvered the neighborhood like newly fallen snow.
“We must transition before the sun rises,” Methusula said, gazing toward the eastern horizon. “Earthlevel light interacts harshly with the soul.”
He faced me and his sight roved up and down. “The soul possesses the ability to create accessories it desires for the body.”
I looked down. I hadn’t even realized I was naked.
For some reason, my first thought was my blue school gym shorts and white t-shirt. They immediately materialized on me. Then I thought about my gray sweat suit. That materialized. Then I thought about blue jeans and my tie-dye T-shirt. They appeared. I decided to stay with that.
“Prepare yourself,” Methusula said, and raised his arms. “Your eternal journey begins now!”
-
-
On a winter night in 2009, Niles Goodman risked his life to try and save a woman and her newborn infant from a terrible car accident, seriously burning his hands in the attempt. The injuries left him unable to work and the financial strain is taking a heavy toll on his marriage. Enter Cody Larson and the promise of 1.5 million dollars if Niles chauffeurs him to Seattle to retrieve a dead drug dealer’s buried cash and narcotics. What entails is a weeklong trip into madness as Cody kills indiscriminately, and then after each murder explains his philosophy behind the slaughter. He calls it the frostproof. He believes he is the antichrist and will soon rule the world; until their hellish journey takes an unexpected turn.
Amazon link:
http://www.amazon.com/FROSTPROOF-N-D-Ostroff/dp/1450251439/ref%3Dsr...
Official website of Author Neil D. Ostroff
-
-
Comment by Amanda Stephan on April 12, 2011 at 10:02am
-
Here's your chance to win an eBook or autographed copy of my Christian romance/suspense novel, The Price of Trust! Tell your friends!
-
Comment by d e bartley on April 12, 2011 at 8:10am
-
I have an ongoing blog scifi sunday's with the hipriestess/blog you can read some flash fiction every sunday, check out my page thank you
d e bartley
-
-
-
Comment by Angelika Devlyn on April 9, 2011 at 2:52pm
-
Hi, there!
Have you got a bookish success you'd like to share?
Does a reviewer love your book?
Have you just landed a new contract and want to share your blog post?
C0me and join in with our SUCCESS SATURDAY and leave your link for all to see!
http://tjbook-list.blogspot.com/2011/04/success-saturday-share-your...Do drop by and share your success!
Whilst your there, check out the other free ways to promote yourself - click on the stickers in sidebar :)
Angel
Book Marketing Bestsellers
About
Recommended Website
Music
© 2024 Created by John Kremer.
Powered by
You need to be a member of Novel Authors and Publishers to add comments!