Attention Seeking

There was a painter, I forget which one, who once said, “When critics get together they talk about art. When artists get together they talk about where to buy the cheapest turpentine.” The same thing is true of writers except these days they all seem to be talking about the same thing — how do I get people to know about my books?

I have been participating in the Amazon Discussion forums a lot lately and in every discussion category there seems to be at least one discussion populated by authors who are trying to shill our books. Self-published authors are totally on their own with very little but their own ingenuity. Those of us who work with small presses haven’t got much more — only the advantage of belonging to some professional groups such as IPNE (Independent Publishers of New England) which gets us into some book fairs. But even though who have published with large presses are depressed about the lack of publicity and promotion they have gotten from their publishers. One member of the group published with Knopf and says she is pretty much on her own when it comes to promotion.

The truth is, compared to promoting, writing your book is the easy part. Promoting it is a non-stop task. And that includes promoting oneself which is very difficult for a lot of us to do. It is a thing I am struggling with myself. When Mark’s book came out I worked like crazy to promote his book and it had good results. Now, on my own with my novel, it is quite another matter. I don’t know how people do it. You have to have tremendous self-confidence, energy, money and time.

There are a lot of innovative things you can try. Writing a blog has helped. Participating in Amazon discussion groups has been helpful, too, but with each passing day the ranks are swelling. The ease of publishing today has created more and more writers.

Readers are also becoming wary of books that come from unknown presses. There are just too many books out there from “My Spare Bedroom Publishing Co.” that are just plain awful. I am asked to review books all the time and I am reluctant to do so because, if they really are dreadful, I don’t want to have to tell the person. Now I know why Kirkus and Publisher’s Weekly reviewers work anonymously. Right now I am reading an independently published book about the Civil War and, I am very pleased to say, it is very good — beautifully written. So I am happy about this and will blog about it when I am done.

But learning to seek attention for our work is a long and arduous process. I still believe that independent publishing is the wave of the future. The average paperback book published by a major press today sells for $8.95 and earns its author 55 cents. Publishing independently gives you a better percentage but you’ll make up for it in the time you spend promoting, promoting, promoting.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I have to overhaul my web site and incorporate all my separate web sites into one. This is going to be a big job. And I have to keep sending out press releases and interviews and... well, I have to keep pushing. I don’t want to but I have to. And what I am trying to make myself realize is that I don’t do it for me — I do it for my characters.

My friend Maureen just finished The Old Mermaid’s Tale (read the first chapter free). She describes herself as a picky reader but she says she loved it. She cried and she fell in love with Baptiste and, talking to her, I was pleased to note that she caught a lot of the subtleties that I’m not always sure are meaningful. I wish I could put Maureen on my web site. She’d convince everyone to try the book. I need to be able to promote my book like she would... we all need to do that.

Thanks for reading.