One of the things I continue to read in book reviews of Nerd Girl, is that people don't understand why I titled the book "Nerd Girl". After all, Julia is smart, pretty, but not quite a nerd in the traditional sense.
Well, I have a very good reason. The availability and easy accessibility of eBooks, has revolutionized the world of publishing. However, no matter how convenient eBooks are, there are also some limitations. EBooks don't support footnotes, endnotes, and embedded images (i.e. graphs/charts) very well.
When my manuscript was finished, I worked with a professional editor. At that time, I hadn't decided on a title yet for my book. As my editor, Erin, and I continued to go back and forth, Erin helped me to demonstrate Julia's personality more by suggesting that we include footnotes for some of her more anal and professional references. I loved the idea and we started having a lot of fun with it. For example, Julia works at Megasoft (which if you haven't figured out, is actually a cover name for Microsoft). There are a lot of Microsoft acronyms in the book, that originally were referenced by a footnote and a sometimes accompanied by a small humorous anecdote. Julia also referenced a few more charts as well that were intended to demonstrate her anal way of thinking and how she organized some facets of her life. The end result was that Julia's whole personality was highlighted and brought out more clearly with the use of footnotes and charts. Yes, she is an attractive, funny, smart woman. But she's also anal, loves science fiction, technology, and has some very nerdy tendencies. When the editing process was done, the title "Nerd Girl" jumped out at me and my editor was in enthusiastic agreement.
After the editing process was completed, the formatting process began. I was heartbroken to learn that eBooks did not support footnotes, images, or endnotes very well. You could force it but then the formatting of the book would be compromised, and readers would be lost and irritated. At the editorial expense of some of Julia's more nerdy personality traits, I had to make a heartbreaking decision to pull those pieces out. In the final version of Nerd Girl, you still get a good idea of Julia's personality, but not the parts that I thought made her an adorable nerdy woman <big SIGH>....
That being said, this was my first experience with indie publishing and lesson learned. Since the book cover had already been designed and since I didn't have unlimited funds, I kept the title "Nerd Girl". It works for some and not for others.
And for those of you wondering....well, now you know. At some point, I may end up publishing a paperback version of the original Nerd Girl manuscript. We'll see....
Saturday, June 21, 2014
Saturday, January 18, 2014
Marketing 101: A New Author's Voyage of Discovery
As a first time author, this whole experience of putting a book out there continues to be a journey. Like any first time adventure, both the thrill and fear of it is facing the unknown and figuring out a way to get past the bumps while enjoying the rest of the ride. I thought I would share with you my book marketing journey. It continues to be a voyage of discovery...
Nerd Girl was released on December 1, 2013. With some trepidation, I reached out to my friends and family, letting them know what I had done. Many of them didn't even know I had been writing a book, let alone had just self-published it. I then reached out to my local community which included neighborhood bookstores, local newspaper, school community, and old Microsoft colleagues and friends. Nerd Girl continued to be well received. My local Queen Anne bookstore ordered some copies, the local community paper wrote a feature article on Nerd Girl and self-publishing in general. Girlfriends keep telling me about how they've suggested the book for their book clubs. The outreach, support, and encouragement has been uplifting.
I decided then to be brave and reached out to a select list of book bloggers. The thing with Indie authors, especially those written for the romance genre, rely heavily on book bloggers to write reviews and get the word out. I follow several book bloggers on my own and of course I reached out to them first. I randomly found many others on Goodreads. I think I probably sent out about 15 requests for review and received about a 50% response back. Not too bad, given I was a no name. Many of them told me they wouldn't be able to get to the book for 6-8 weeks due to their extensive 'to-read' lists, but that was fine with me. Some read them right away. The 48-72 hours of waiting time from the time the blogger says they've started your book to the time when they finally reach out to you to give you their review, is nail biting. I hate it. Someone has my book, the one I worked tirelessly for over a year on, and they will summarize their feelings in a few paragraphs, either telling me they loved it, hated it, or thought it was just... meh.
Fortunately, bloggers have been supportive and on the most part positive. I'm so appreciative that they were willing to invest their time to read Nerd Girl. Their enthusiasm for the art is awesome. They are passionate, silly, critical, and the best cheerleaders one could hope for. I am forever grateful.
And then there are the not so good reviews. These hurt. In fact, they're downright mean and cruel. I've learned quickly that authors need to have a very thick skin. I've chosen to not read these reviews because unfortunately, most of them are hurtful and not productive in any way. Fortunately, they are the outliers, that 10%. I appreciate that people like different books, so I'll leave it at that.
The next part of my journey is a book blogger tour. What is that you ask? I wondered the same thing. This is just another new leg of my journey. Bloggers sign up to feature Nerd Girl on their blog. They provide reviews, book excerpts, author interviews, and guest posts. I'm doing a blog tour for Nerd Girl, with the support of Indiesage. The blog tour dates will be Jan 27 - Feb 7. The following is the list of participating bloggers. Wish me luck!!
Nerd Girl was released on December 1, 2013. With some trepidation, I reached out to my friends and family, letting them know what I had done. Many of them didn't even know I had been writing a book, let alone had just self-published it. I then reached out to my local community which included neighborhood bookstores, local newspaper, school community, and old Microsoft colleagues and friends. Nerd Girl continued to be well received. My local Queen Anne bookstore ordered some copies, the local community paper wrote a feature article on Nerd Girl and self-publishing in general. Girlfriends keep telling me about how they've suggested the book for their book clubs. The outreach, support, and encouragement has been uplifting.
I decided then to be brave and reached out to a select list of book bloggers. The thing with Indie authors, especially those written for the romance genre, rely heavily on book bloggers to write reviews and get the word out. I follow several book bloggers on my own and of course I reached out to them first. I randomly found many others on Goodreads. I think I probably sent out about 15 requests for review and received about a 50% response back. Not too bad, given I was a no name. Many of them told me they wouldn't be able to get to the book for 6-8 weeks due to their extensive 'to-read' lists, but that was fine with me. Some read them right away. The 48-72 hours of waiting time from the time the blogger says they've started your book to the time when they finally reach out to you to give you their review, is nail biting. I hate it. Someone has my book, the one I worked tirelessly for over a year on, and they will summarize their feelings in a few paragraphs, either telling me they loved it, hated it, or thought it was just... meh.
Fortunately, bloggers have been supportive and on the most part positive. I'm so appreciative that they were willing to invest their time to read Nerd Girl. Their enthusiasm for the art is awesome. They are passionate, silly, critical, and the best cheerleaders one could hope for. I am forever grateful.
And then there are the not so good reviews. These hurt. In fact, they're downright mean and cruel. I've learned quickly that authors need to have a very thick skin. I've chosen to not read these reviews because unfortunately, most of them are hurtful and not productive in any way. Fortunately, they are the outliers, that 10%. I appreciate that people like different books, so I'll leave it at that.
The next part of my journey is a book blogger tour. What is that you ask? I wondered the same thing. This is just another new leg of my journey. Bloggers sign up to feature Nerd Girl on their blog. They provide reviews, book excerpts, author interviews, and guest posts. I'm doing a blog tour for Nerd Girl, with the support of Indiesage. The blog tour dates will be Jan 27 - Feb 7. The following is the list of participating bloggers. Wish me luck!!
| Date | Blogger Url |
| January 28th | https://www.stoneangelreviews.com |
| January 28th | http://tugceninkitapligi.com |
| January 29th | Sistascrazybookobsession.com |
| January 29th | https://www.pearlsandpeacocks.com |
| January 30th | http://www.truestorybookblog.com/ |
| January 30th | http://literaturelitehouse.blogspot.com/ |
| January 31st | http://shortandsassybookblurbs.blogspot.com/ |
| January 31st | http://jezabellgirlandfriends.weebly.com |
| February 3rd | http://despoinapersephone.blogspot.com/ |
| February 3rd | http://www.akiikomorireading.com |
| February 4th | http://aliaaelnashar.blogspot.com |
| February 5th | http://www.sarahsbookblog.com/ |
| February 6th | https://www.lovethosebooks.com |
| February 7th | http://concupiscentbibliophile.blogspot.com/ |
| February 8th | http://tugceninkitapligi.com |
| February 8th | http://michbookreviews.wordpress.com/ |
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