SULLIVAN'S WAR Signed Print Editions

Hello, all! I released Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure as an eBook around the middle of July, and the response has been phenomenal! Sales of this book, combined with sales of my other titles, gave me my highest-grossing month ever. My work also continues to attract glowing 4- and 5-star reviews.

To all who have bought and read my books, thank you for helping me toward my goal of being able to support myself as a writer. I still have over a year to accomplish that goal, and I can already see it on the horizon.

Today, I'm pleased to announce that signed print editions of Sullivan's War are now available for preorder. You can buy it alone for regular price ($12.99 + S&H) or in combination with my collection Short Stories for just $18 + S&H, a discount of $5 off the combined price of the books. Short Stories is also available individually and is currently on sale as well.

Each order also comes with signed postcards featuring the covers of the books and a selection of bookmarks. All options can be viewed at my web store, here. 

If you prefer an eBook edition of Sullivan's War, it can be purchased for the Kindle or the Nook. Links to all eBook stores can be found here. EBook links for Short Stories can be found here.

Thank you again to all my readers. Your support has been overwhelming, and the only way I know how to repay it is by writing books that you'll hopefully enjoy. Up next is a novel called Chrysopteron, followed by the sequel to Sullivan's War, Sullivan's Wrath. Look for Chrysopteron in October and Sullivan's Wrath near Christmas.

Best,

Michael K. Rose

Is Your Novel "Long Enough?"

Books of Varying Lengths

As you may know, I've recently released Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure. It collects three novellas (called Sullivan's War: Books I, II and III) which were released individually but make up one story line. Those novellas, usually priced at $2.99 apiece, have been selling fairly well. But The Complete Adventure's sales have been fantastic, selling in twelve days nearly as many copies as Book I, even though Book I's price was reduced to 99 cents near the beginning of the month.

I had suspected that I would see an increase in sales once I released The Complete Adventure, and here's why: I'd read long ago that many readers prefer to read only novels. They do not particularly care for short stories, and novellas? What the hell is a novella? The unimpressive sales of my collection Short Stories seems to support this idea. Even though Short Stories has a good number of positive reviews and I promoted it as heavily (if not more heavily) than Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure, I sold nearly 7 times as many copies of Sullivan's War as Short Stories during July. And remember, Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure was only available for the last twelve days of the month.

Now, I'm one who has always been a champion for short stories. I write them, obviously, and I even wrote a blog post called "Why I Love Short Stories." Another post I wrote as a guest on ME Franco's blog is called "Short Fiction is Dead?" In it, I propose that the eBook revolution will see a reemergence of shorter fiction. One thought is that a short story or novella can be published without the concern of making sure a "book" is of a profitable length. Now that printing costs are not a factor, any length can be a profitable length, assuming the story is sufficiently attractive to readers. Well, the three Sullivan's War novellas have been profitable, as have a few of the short stories I released individually. But my experience these past two weeks with Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure has convinced me that full-length novels are going to be even more profitable. And while profit should not be a writer's sole consideration, it is unavoidable if one wishes, as I do, to make a living at it.

So is your novel long enough? What is long enough? The dividing line between novels and novellas ranges from 40,000 words to 60,000 words or higher. Will readers be "unsatisfied" with a 40,000-word novel? Does the word novella scare some people away? And what can one reasonably charge for short stories, novellas, short novels, long novels? I've been publishing my fiction for less than a year, and I'm still trying to work all of this out. But the sales of Sullivan's War: The Complete Adventure have convinced me that, for now at least, I should probably not focus on writing short stories quite as much. Novels are what readers want, and I have about a dozen novels waiting to be written. I just hope I can make them long enough.

What do you consider to be a minimum length for a novel? If you prefer novels over novellas or short stories, why? I'd love to hear any thoughts on this topic; just leave a comment below.

Best,

Michael K. Rose

Edit: Please read the followup to this post here.

Building An Author's Promotional Package, Part 2

Yesterday, in “Building An Author’s Promotional Package, Part 1,” I talked about writing a description for your book, and a bit about press releases. Today, I would like to talk about the next two elements you should include in your promotional package: images and quotes.

II: IMAGES

Just as your description can pique a reader’s interest, the cover of your book and any associated images can as well. Always include an image of your book cover in the press package. It draws the eye in a way that a dense paragraph of text can’t. I also like to include an advertising banner, so whoever is helping you spread the word about your book has something eye-catching to put across the top of the page. I’m not going to get into the elements of good or bad cover design; there are many other discussions about that. But here are a couple of my banner ads as an example of what those can look like (my blog displays them too big if I go up a size, so click on them for a better view):

And here are two banners from paranormal thriller writer Micheal Rivers:

 

You can see that you can use an "abstract" type background, like in the Sullivan's War banner, you can put the actual book cover in the banner, as I have done with Short Stories, or you can zoom in on certain elements of book cover, as Micheal Rivers has done. From these examples you can also see that you can condense your book description down into a single line ("Can Rick Sullivan Defeat His Enemies Before He Defeats Himself?" or "Can You Bargain with the Dead?"). That, along with the book title and your name, will pretty much fill the space in your banner ad. But if you have a little extra room, your website or a quote from a reader, as in Sullivan's War banner, are also great things to put in your banner ad. 

In addition to your book cover and a banner ad, you should include a photo of yourself. Typically called a head shot, this will give a face to the words. And make sure it's a good face. The way I see it, there are two main schools when it comes to the head shot: casual and not casual (I don't use the word "formal" because sartorially that means white or black tie, and I don't want you dressing up in a tux or gown for your head shot).

The casual head shot is what most authors will opt for, as we live in a casual society. I have chosen to go with a non-casual head shot:

However, if you decide to do this, make sure it is a real part of your persona. Between the symphony, opera and occasional ballet performances and plays, I end up wearing a coat and tie quite a bit throughout the year. I am comfortable in it. If you feel like you're suffocating when you put on a tie, chances are you're going to look like you're suffocating. Be comfortable, but avoid any clothing that could be seen as objectionable or anything very revealing (unless you write erotica, I suppose).

Even if you do go for casual, try to avoid the common snapshot. Have an actual photo shoot with a friend taking pictures of you, telling you which poses/smile/etc. look the best. You want your photo to look like a professional author's photo (pick up some books around your house to get an idea). You want to exude an air of confidence and professionalism. It's purely subconscious and completely unfair, but if you look untidy, readers might worry that your writing is untidy.

III: QUOTES

This is where you really have to plan ahead. What you want to do is find some authors or readers who really enjoy your work. I was very fortunate in this, as I didn’t have to seek them out. People began leaving glowing reviews on my product pages at Amazon and from there I connected with many of them via Twitter, Facebook and email.

Once you have a list of people who you feel you can count on for a positive review, people who not only like your work but love your work, you will want to have a review copy of your book ready about a month before you release it to the general public. A review copy is simply a draft of the book (these days it's often an eBook) that is not quite finalized but is complete and close enough to being revised and edited that a reader can get a good sense for the work. Send this review copy out to your short list of readers. If they enjoy it, you will hopefully get a nice quote from them to add to your promotional package. Another thing you can do once you have your cover image finalized is create a book entry on Goodreads and list it as "Coming Soon!" You can ask your readers to leave their reviews there as well as at the Amazon and B&N and other stores once the book is for sale. Great quotes, especially from other authors, can interest a reader in your upcoming book as much as a great description can. Another benefit of listing your book on Goodreads in advance is that you can start getting people entering for a book giveaway, if you choose to do that.

Of course, if other authors send you quotes to use in your promotional material, it is only right that you offer to do the same for them. Be very careful, however, that a quid pro quo isn’t established wherein you say nice things about their book simply because they said something nice about yours. However, unless they are truly bad writers (or you are hyper-critical), there should be something you like about the book. Even if their book may not be your cup of tea, look at it from the perspective of its intended audience and try to see what they will like about it.

Tomorrow, I will conclude the "Building An Author's Promotional Package" series with two more elements you should include in your package, one optional element as well as one final element that I think is a rather novel idea. Stay tuned!

UPDATE: Read Part 3 here.

5 MORE Ways to Help Authors Without Spending a Dime

I have received great feedback and a lot of hits on my blog post 5 Ways to Help Authors without Spending a Dime so I thought I'd run a part two, taking into account some of the suggestions left by readers in the comments section. I hope you enjoy these suggestions and put them into practice!

1. Jennifer wrote: "And also don't forget that at the end of the day, a short note to the author letting him/her know how much you enjoy that author's writing can be just the right amount of encouragement at just the right time." She is absolutely right! A few kind words can make all the difference to a writer if sales have been down or s/he's received a negative review. If you enjoy something you read, let the author know!

2. Rachel wrote: "Also how about hitting Yes if you find a review helpful or No if you don't." This is not something I had thought about until recently, when I received my first (and so far only) negative review. Several of my fans and friends rallied around me to click "unhelpful" on that review and reassure me that the reviewer was completely off-base. The fact that the review was so nasty and vindictive made this support particularly welcome.

3. Jeff wrote: "For Twitter, I try to get the most value out of those 140 characters that I can, so whenever possible for thank you's or welcomes, replies, retweets, etc., etc., it helps to add the authors book title, link, whatever you can get your hands on." A great idea! If your followers see a unique tweet coming from you--someone they know and trust--rather than an RT, which a lot of people tend to ignore, it might make them look at it a bit more closely. For authors who have been really supportive of me, I've even made up a file of tweets about their books, which I try to send out once a day.

4. Jeff also wrote: "Don't forget to join an author's blog site (which I just now did btw)." Authors blog. A lot. It's part of that whole attention whore thing I mentioned in the first 5 Ways to Help Authors... post. Now, following a blog helps you because if you like that author and the content s/he provides, you won't miss anything. But it can help the author as well. Here's how: say a prospective reader happens across the blog and sees that many people are following it. This will let him or her know that this author has something worthwhile to say and they may be more likely to stick around and see what it's all about and, perhaps, buy a book or two.

5. Tell Your Friends! This one is so basic that I overlooked it the first time around. If you enjoy a book, write a review, of course. But people you know from work, the PTA, old school friends, etc. may never get around to trolling Amazon for your reviews. Tell them about books that you love and, most importantly, tell them how to get a copy! Send them emails or DMs with the link so they don't forget!

Keep the suggestions coming in the comments section!

Best,
Michael

5 Tips for Great Author Interviews

Ahh, the interview. It seems like all writers love giving them and many love being on the receiving end as well. (Hey, get your mind out of the gutter!) I've had the pleasure to give several interviews and I've also interviewed one of my favorite writers, Benjamin X. Wretlind (see here). Having just finished giving a couple more interviews, I've been thinking about what makes for a great author interview. With that in mind, I decided to compile this list of five tips for interviews that both interviewers and interviewees can benefit from.

1. Consider a "Live" Interview - Many interviews consist of a list of questions sent to an author who then writes a response to each one and sends it back. This is fine and works well and all but one of my interviews have been conducted this way. But when I interviewed Benjamin X. Wretlind (and he, in turn, interviewed me) we conducted "live" interviews in which each question is based on the previous answer given. This takes a lot more time, of course, but makes for a much more fluid and engaging read. See our interviews here and here.

2. Make the Question Your Own - Often an interviewer will ask fairly standard, safe questions. Answer them, of course, but then find a way to say something that the interviewer didn't ask. Give your answer personality, let the reader get a deeper insight into your mind. Go into detail about your thought process when writing/creating characters/coming up with story ideas.

3. Propose Questions - If you are being interviewed, ask the interviewer to ask specific questions that will allow you to address topics that you think will make for a good read. If you are the one doing the interview, give your subject the opportunity to add questions of his/her own. If the interviewee is able to do this the answers will be much more engaging because s/he will be talking about something they really like discussing. It will make for a more dynamic interview.

4. Read Your Subject's Work - This is a tip for interviewers. Try to read something by the author you're interviewing. I know this is not always possible but if you can ask specific questions about the author's book it will be more likely to pique the reader's interest in the work. Asking a broad question about the theme or plot can do this if the interviewee responds in the right way but when the reader sees that the interviewer was interested enough to give the book a read it will help promote the work. (Again, see the interview Benjamin X. Wretlind gave me for an example of this).

5. Open it to the Public - This isn't something I've had the opportunity to do yet but I think it would be a good idea. If, at the end of the interview, the blog's host opens the floor to questions with the understanding that the interviewee will answer them in the comments section, this will engage the readers and keep their interest in both the blog and the author's work for a longer period of time. A thoughtful response to a reader's question could make the difference between a quick read that's just as quickly forgotten and a sale.

And with that last point in mind, I'd love for you to add a comment if you have any more tips for creating great author interviews! To read all the interviews I've given, see my Interviews page here.

Buying Indie Month

Inspired by a blog post by Benjamin X. Wretlind (He outlines the reasons why quite elegantly; read them here: http://bxwretlind.com/blog/2012/02/02/buying-indie-month/) I am buying one Indie book a day for the month of February. I will update this page with each purchase throughout the month. If you want to recommend your book to me--I favor science fiction and literary fiction--leave a comment below with the Amazon US store link and I'll take a look! I also encourage you to hop on board with this idea, even if only for part of the month. Indie writers need to stick together and show the rest of the world the great quality that is out there by getting our books to the top of the best-seller lists!

01. Ties that Bind by Carolyn Arnold
02. Moonlight on the Nantahala by Micheal Rivers
03. Nighteyes: A Will Castleton Adventure by David Bain
04. Betrayed by Wodke Hawkinson
05. The Dark Path by Luke Romyn
06. The Fall of Billy Hitchings by Kirkus MacGowan
07. Judgment Tramp (An Eb Maclean novel) by JD Currie
08. Space Orville by Jeff Whelan
09. A Dream of Storms (In the Shadow of the Black Sun) by William Kenney
10. The Watchers of Ur: Cradle by LaMonte M. Fowler
11. Hope Road by John Barlow
12. California Blood by Pete Palamountain
13. Black Beast by RS Guthrie
14. The Rings of Alathea by Dan Moore
15. Legend Unborn, The Key of Souls - Book 1 by David G. Welsh
16. Xenocide by Larry Kollar
17. Archaea by Dain White
18. Outback Love by Teri Heyer
19. Lunara: Seth and Chloe by Wyatt Davenport
20. Convergent Space by John-Paul Cleary
21. Gabriel's Redemption by Steve Umstead
      Attic Clowns: Complete Collection by Jeremy C. Shipp
22. Vigilante by Claude Bouchard
23. Dead of Knight by William R. Potter
24. Hot Roast Beef with Mustard by James Paddock
25. Leiyatel's Embrace by Clive S. Johnson
26. The Code by Craig McGray
27. What in Hell is up with Heaven? by Christopher David Petersen
28. Weimar Vibes by Phil Rowan
29. Farewell to Tyrn by Ryan Harvey

Related Posts:
Benjamin X. Wretlind's "Buying Indie Month" Post
Benjamin X. Wretlind's "Buying Indie Month, Revisited" Post
J.D. Currie's "Buying Indie Month" Post
Five Ways to Help Authors without Spending a Dime

To Prime or Not to Prime

As anyone who knows me knows, Sullivan's War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil is being released Friday, January 20. So, do I enter it in the Amazon prime program?

My answer, at least for now, is "no." Why not?

I have entered my other ebooks in the Amazon Prime Program and I am, for the most part, happy with the results. But I do wonder about something. Do Kindle owners peruse the list of ebooks and mentally take note of the Prime books they're interested in with the idea of waiting until the author makes them free? I simply don't know. And I don't want sales of Book I to suffer if this is the case. I know there is an argument that making the first book of a series free increases sales on the other books but since I do not yet have the others released, I will not benefit from this for another couple of months.

I do, however, have Sullivan's War: Prologue - Sergeant Riley's Account in the Prime program. I hope that I can use the free promo days for this book to increase the visibility of the series and entice readers to purchase Book I. I also want to make Book I available on B&N and give that another go. Perhaps having a longer work will help sales at that store (I understand short stories just don't sell as well as longer works.)

When I have Book II ready for publication I will reevaluate this decision but for now I think it is the right move. Does anyone who's released series have any other tips? I'd like to do everything I can to make Sullivan's War a success!

5 Ways to Help Authors Without Spending a Dime

That's right, not one thin dime!

Let me start with a confession: this is a self-serving post. I readily admit that and hope all my readers take the following action to help me. But you can do these things for any writer whose work you like, and I encourage you to do so. Every little bit helps.

1. Tags - This refers to Amazon listings. If you view a book on Amazon you can scroll down past the reviews and find a section called "Tags Customers Associate with This Product." Books with lots of "agreement" on a tag will show up higher in search results for that term. Unless the term is "rubbish," "tripe," or "infantile," this is generally a good thing. There should already be several tags there as most authors will tag their own books. The way you can help is by agreeing with those tags. To the left of each tag is a box. Simply click inside that box and your "agreement" will be registered. But you're not done! There may be more tags hidden. On the example below, you can see the words "See all 15 tags." Click on this to reveal the rest of them (your page will refresh). You can also, if you like, add tags of your own. I would only recommend doing this if you've read the book, however, and are sure the tags are appropriate.

2. Likes - The next thing you can do while at a book's Amazon page is "like" the book. As with tagging, you do not have to have bought the book to like it. The Like button in next to the book's rating. Just click on it and you're done. It will change from a blue "Like" button to a orange "Liked" button (as seen below). This, as far as I can tell, doesn't help with search algorithms or anything like that but if a potential buyer sees that a lot of people "like" a book and it has a few good reviews, they may be more "likely" to buy it.

3. Facebook Shares - Attention-starved writers like me will post stuff about their books on Facebook. I know, weird, right? If you're a true blue friend or fan, you can share their posts to your Facebook friends. You don't even have to comment on it, just share it and it'll get more eyeballs on the book.

4. Twitter RTs - This is another easy one. Writers tend to Tweet about their books as well. I know! Just click that little Retweet button and your Followers will all get to see how weird your literary tastes really are:

5. Buy Free Books - Writers, being attention whores, will occasionally give their books away for free. Why would they do such a preposterous thing? Because it's not about the money but the art, and as long as people are reading our work, we could care less about turning a profit. No, wait... that's not it. It is about the money! And the best way to sell books is to give them away. If people read one book and like it, they'll hopefully buy more. It also gets our books on those Amazon Free charts and despite what that cop in Provo told me, exposure is a good thing. So when you see an author announce that their book is free, whether permanently or only for a day or two, go buy it. You'll help them out and, who knows, you might get something out of it, too: you might actually like the book! Part two of this is to review that book you got for free! It was free, it's the least you can do, right? Personally, I don't leave negative reviews. This game is hard enough. But whatever you do write, make sure it is honest and reflects your true feelings about the work. Review readers are notoriously harsh toward works that seem to have "fake" reviews attached to them.

So, I hope this has encouraged you to go support me...er... your favorite writer. Leave a comment with other tips that you know of for supporting writers for free!

Best,
Michael

Also read 5 MORE Ways to Help Authors without Spending a Dime.

Thoughts on Ebook Pricing

   Since I've started uploading my fiction to Amazon and Barnes & Noble I've been thinking a lot about pricing. There are some that say "offer it free to get exposure." Others say "no more than 99 cents." Still others say "Don't charge 99 cents or give it away free. Readers will devalue your work in their minds."

   Well, I kind of agree with that last point. Free is a good option to get your work downloaded, yes. But are all those downloaders actually reading your book? Also, will they then go on the buy other books you have for sale? However, I don't agree that 99 cents is a price point that "cheapens" readers' opinion of your work. It is a great price for some works.

   So here is a pricing model that I have developed. Since I mainly write science fiction I have based the different categories on the Nebula awards categories:

Short story (up to 7,500 words) - .99

Novelette (7,500-17,500) - 1.49

Novella (17,500-40,000) - 1.99

Novel (40,000+ words) - 2.99

   Based on that model my current releases Sleep (2,500 words) and Inner Lives (12,000 words) are priced at .99 and 1.49, respectively. I'm still toying with the idea of starting books at a lower price upon release, then upping the price to fit the model.

   What do you all think of this pricing model? Would you buy (or have you bought) a short story for .99? Does anyone else have a model that they use? Feel free to comment below!