Welcome to the Book Marketing Network. Join in some discussions, post a blog or video, schedule an event, make some friends. I think you'll enjoy it here.

John Kremer, book marketing expert
http://www.bookmarket.com

Welcome, Carolyn! Glad you could join us.

The Journey and AnnaBelle's Spirt sound like marvelous books. What a wonderful way to celebrate your ancestors. I like your use of poetry and pictures in your books, too.

Ann B. Keller
Author of Crenellations and The Devil's Crescent

I am SO proud of you! Way to go! I hope that your manuscript is accepted.

I love the photos you posted, too. What a great snapshot in time. I wish you all of the luck in the world, my dear.

Ann B. Keller

Hi, Small world, I know people in Huntington and I also lived in St Pete and taught in Tampa where I retired with a full carpet bag and moved back north. Nice to meet you. I will write more later about the fun we have in self publishing, but I don't think you need to pay anyone to sell your book, they won't do a better job than you do.

Hi, Carolyn, I think I forgot to give you the name of my friend in your town. When you call, if you get this in time, the lady is Ann or some call her Shirley and her husband is Keith.

Great, I am glad you had the nerve to call Ann and Keith. She and I went to the first grade together almost seventy years ago and then at the end of that year, I moved away. I didn't see her again until we were in H S and then by chance I saw her in a marching band of the Collinsville IL H S band at a football game. No words were spoken and then I did not see her again until around 1970 about thirty years after the first grade. He father had died, now keep in mind, we lived a thousand miles apart and I had not seen her since that time she walked by in the band about 1951 or 2. But, I was married, three kids and living in St Pete FL and as my mind often does, I had a flash back of a memory which showed me two street signs. The funny thing about the street signs in my memory, is they were not black and white like they were when I saw them as a kid, they were green and reflective like they were in 1970. The street signs brought to me thoughts of her in distress.
I had no idea where she lived or who she might be married to, but my intuition told me to send a letter addressed to her maiden name and the corner of those two streets, (Marie and Keebler). I never heard anything back for a couple months, but one day I got a phone call (she hates writing letters) from her in a state of shock from my letter. The letter had been carried past the street corner by the local mailman who saw there was no house near by and remembered he had seen that last name before, but it was way across town. He readdressed the envelope and sent it to the only name in town that he thought might know the person to which it was addressed. It happened to be her brother, the only living relative left in Collinsville, everyone else had moved away. Back to the phone call. She told me that the letter came at a time when she had been very depressed over the loss of one of her parents. As a six year old I had seen both her parents, her Polish father, would sit on the front steps in the evening, after a long day in the coal mines and drink beer from one of those double container, food and drink miner's pail. Since that time, our families have visited a few times back and forth, but she still doesn't write and we are as close as a brother and sister can be. Both Anne and her husband are nice people, He calls her Shirley and I call her Anne and her school friends called her Anna Banana, she is highly energetic, her husband highly laid back. They had three kids of their own and three they adopted. She likes to take in strays.

But, that is a little curious history of our past and how we have stayed friends for so long.

Speaking of memories, I can remember getting my baths at a few weeks old, yes, I didn't like it.

Now, to your book selling efforts. There are a lot of things to help with the marketing. One, I make appointments to set up a table at the nearby colleges, the college kids love my books for some reason. I guess my writing is so non-threatening, they get some relaxation from it. (others might call in boring) The sedond thing is that if you like, you can put information about your book on my Facebook page, which is not big, but three or four of my readers are there as well as my family and my readers love reading self-published. I have two pages, one is under Dr Robert E McGinnis Sr and the other is under Dr Robert E McGinnis author of the Paradise Series. You are welcome to comment on both and tell about your books. I do a lot of social networking, but ninety percent of my sales come from one particular site and to mention it here on a public page would be to give up a great audience.

Good luck, the world is a better place since self-publishing came into view.

You asked why I didn't talk to her that day. Good question. I was in the stands and she was in the field, the closest I got was when the band disbursed and they went under the stadium. I stood at the ramp hoping she might see me. I don't remember if she did or not, but maybe we said a word or two, but that I can't say for sure. I am heading over to FB to confirm your (our) friendship. See ya there.

Carolyn. I just sent you an email through my book email service, I just wanted to reinforce what I was telling you about getting the word out. Take a look at my icon here, avatar or ID as I like to call it and this will give you an idea of what I was talking about. First, we have to get people commenting and talking. Eventually, they will track you down, find your books and realize they have a treasure with your site. I have made tons of friends in the reading public, once they have read my book, found my email, they become volunteer partners in selling my book. Each successful and content book reader who likes your work, will become a marketing sales person for you. I have made new and good friends from California to New Jersey and of course on in Huntington, who have come to my side in promoting my books. If they like what they read, they will want all of their friends and family to read it too.
Good luck, Dr Robert E McGinnis, author of the Paradise Series. (see what I was talking about?)

Did you ever find writing contests for self-published authors? I was researching them last week. I think most of the ones I narrowed down are open to anyone, although each seems to have its own charge. I blogged about it here: http://freelancewriterblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/submitting-to-book-awards.html

I think what you're going through is pretty normal. As a young youth minister, I ran into problems using contemporary music with my youth. So I did some research and writing on the subject. I thought about pursuing putting it into book form and sent a copy of my writing to three people I respected. Not hearing anything back, I assumed that either I wasn't saying anything important, or I wasn't communicating it well. So, I dropped it. Then, years later, one of the people, a college president, wrote me to say he'd lost the paper and wanted to know if I'd send him another copy. He said that the college was in turmoil about the music issue and my paper was the best thing he'd seen written on it!

Well, that encouraged me to go ahead and write the book, which was eventually published in 1993 and is still selling well today. Scary to think that I took their not writing back about the manuscript as a sign that it wasn't any good.

That's all to say that it's hard for us to judge our own work. I suppose that's why Solomon said that there was safety in "many counselors", not just a few. I recommend people to get their chapters out to as many people as they can - friends, an English teacher, members of a writing group, etc. Ask them for honest input. If some don't like it much, that's okay. Not everybody's going to like your style. But get their specific input anyway - "What would make it better?" Use your own wisdom to separate the personal opinion from great insights.

Typically, I think that the only way we knew if our writing is good is by getting it into the hands of a lot of people and getting a lot of specific feedback. When enough people honestly say, "That's really good!" then we have good evidence that we're on the right track.

And by the way, I've found that people are honored to let them look over my stuff. Makes them feel smart and needed. Don't hesitate to ask people.

Does that make sense?

I got a friend's invitation from Anelina Roberts but declined because I couldn't find much information on her activities. Then I say you my friend and said, I better say hello. Your real friend.

Work to me is play. I am laying a tile floor and I just pretend the tile are toy blocks and it is fun. I usually get in just after dark each day and then begin writing. Speaking about writing, are you trying to develope a fan club outside of the Internet. These can be very halpful and I don't mind if you contact some of my fans on Facebook. If you look around there you might figure out who likes my books.