Book reviews are essential for getting books noticed, and people who love books often decide to write book reviews, either as professionals or just by posting their opinions online. Getting started as a book reviewer is not difficult, although a few guidelines should be followed. So you want to be a book reviewer. You love to read books and you think you can make some extra … [Read more...]
Italics, Fancy Formatting, and Bad Writing
A good writer relies on good word choice and well-written, effective phrases and sentences to get his point across. The definition of a well-written sentence is really its ability to communicate the author’s meaning. Novice writers too often may feel they aren’t getting their points across so they rely on emphasizing words by putting them in bold, italics, or underlining them, … [Read more...]
Proofread Everything—and then Proofread Again
Proofreading is incredibly important. Not only do typos and grammatical errors in your writing make you look uneducated or just lazy, but they are also a distraction to the reader. Good authors or anyone publishing anything, whether it’s a book, pamphlet, website, or blog, need to have their work proofread, both by themselves and also by others. As an author, I know the … [Read more...]
Photos and Images Promote Books
Whether they are cover art or interior photographs and illustrations, your book’s images can be key players in promoting and marketing your books. Here are a few tips for optimal image use. Books generally have at least a couple of images connected with them—at least the cover art and the author photograph. Other books may have numerous interior photographs, black and white … [Read more...]
Top Ten Signs You’re a Lazy Author
If you want to be a successful author, you will be a busy one. Books do not sell themselves, and being lazy, whether it’s while writing the book or when promoting it, is going to end up with poor results. Here are some things not to do if you want to be successful as an author. When it comes to being an author, the old saying, “If a thing is worth doing, it’s worth doing … [Read more...]
How to Make an Effective Book Video Trailer
Book video trailers are among the latest trends in book selling. Film previews have worked for years in helping to promote films, and book videos can do the same, capturing the attention of the Internet audience and people who are more visual and auditory in their thinking. By focusing on the images, narration, and music, authors can create an effective multimedia marketing … [Read more...]
Subject-Pronoun Agreement: How to Get It Right
Subject-pronoun agreement is an issue all authors must deal with when they write. Failure to make your subject agree with your pronouns results in a poorly written book and a clear sign that the author is not skilled in the English language. Writers who struggle with subject-pronoun agreement can learn a few rules to rewrite their sentences so they are grammatically correct and … [Read more...]
Trying to Do It All: Priorities for Authors
Authors must promote their books to be successful, and the more they promote, the more likely success will come, but while the process can be exhilarating, it can also be exhausting. Here are some simple tips for authors to keep things in perspective and manage to enjoy rather than be overwhelmed by being an author. Recently, one of my fairly successful author friends said … [Read more...]
Authors: Why Your Emails Don’t Get Replies
Email can be an author’s best friend by helping an author reach people around the world and make contacts, ranging from finding an agent or publisher, to a publicist, or by sending out newsletters to readers. But authors carefully need to word their messages to make sure they are really communicating so they are not ignored. Although for the past twenty years, email has been … [Read more...]
Creating and Maintaining Your Online Author Image
Once authors publish their books, they become public people. They are subject to having people do online searches about them and their books. Authors need to be proactive, therefore, about creating and sustaining a positive online image. Once you become an author, you are, in the eyes of others if not your own, a celebrity. Even if the paparazzi aren’t chasing after you, … [Read more...]