Mary’s Merchandise Mart: We Have More Than Bookmarks

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Welcome to the only place that provides authors with the merchandising choices of their dreams.  We don’t even charge real money.  Oh, we’ll get to that part near the end because you don’t want to ruin the surprise.  Now, what kind of event are you preparing for?  A convention, a book signing, a contest, a craft fair?  We recently had one author who was promoting her book during a dog sledding competition.  She was in the race and we had to create some specialized merchandise.  So, what do you need?

Conventions are common and simple, but only if you let them be.  The vendor room is cutthroat since people rarely bring enough money to spend on everything they want.  I know they have cards, but many get uncomfortable once that comes about.  You mentioned it being a fantasy series and you already have books to sell as well as stickers and bookmarks.  Not a bad start, but do your bookmarks project holograms of your characters?  I thought not.  Those are our best sellers and you can make it that each one has a random character.  Make them a collectible set and you can sell hundreds.  Oh, those are the freebies?  In that case, I’d just pick your favorite character and leave it at that because the scramble for all of them only helps if people are paying.

How are you on signage?  Decent banner and flanking standing signs, which are more than most people have.  Now, I don’t want to push you too hard on this, but what about screens that show various scenes from your book?  Nothing with spoilers, but an animated depiction of a few action scenes could draw people to your table.  We can even have it done in a way that it travels from this side along the raised banner and down this side.  If you are worried about revealing too much then you can write an action scene that isn’t in the book and use that.  Spelling and grammar wouldn’t be important here as long as our programmers get the general idea.  We can include these prismatic cubes that can show the buyer these scenes whenever they want.  They come in key chain size, but they cause the human brain to imagine that they’re on a big screen.  I’ll put you down for a maybe on this one.

Now, we do have some fun fantasy specific merchandise that will require some information from you.  Come this way and you’ll see that we have a working forge in the back.  Our blacksmiths can create the signature weapons of your characters, which you can sell for any price of your choosing.  We also have jewelers if there are unique pieces in your stories.  This is fairly popular among fantasy authors, but you have to make it clear that none of these are magical.  There have been some problems with buyers suing for false advertising since they assume replicas of fictional weapons possess powers.  That should be easy to fix.  Another special service is that we can craft an animatronic version of a monster that appears in your books.  Space is an issue, so don’t ask for a dragon if you can’t get it into the room.  Since this is something you would want to sell, you might want to go for a small amount of fairies, tiny dragons, goblins, or anything that you can pack into the back of a van.  Then again, you could also have one big thing that you keep outside and run a raffle.  That’s been successful in the past, but you will have to warn those running the convention.

Was there anything else you wanted?  Hats, mugs, t-shirts, and phone cases are all options that we can go over in a few minutes.  My real job is to get you interested in our more unique services.  Oh, you want to know about the payment now?  Step over here and have a seat.  Don’t worry about the helmet being put on your head.  I assure you that it isn’t hooked up and my hand on this lever means nothing.  All of what we can provide will be yours for the simple price of an idea.  Give us one of your story ideas and we are at your service.  Could be a full series or a single book as long as you let us take it from you.  Why?  What if I was to tell you that I’m from the future where humans no longer have imaginations and I’m sending the ideas of modern humans back to try and revive the creativity of our species?  Now, should I pull the lever or not?

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Derailing Bedlam: Stand Clear of the Closing Doors, Dammit! Part 1 #fiction #adventure

As usual, here is your warning that this story has cursing, sex (not graphic), innuendo, and violence.  It’s my Rated-R action adventure called Derailing Bedlam.  This is the fourth outing (third official) for Cassidy and Lloyd, so feel free to click on one of the two covers to see how it started.  Each one is 99 cents!

Cover by Jon Hunsinger

Cover Art by Jon Hunsinger

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Conversations With Colleen: Meet Author, Ian Hutson

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Truth and the Serpent, on #LisaBurtonRadio

coldhandboyack's avatarEntertaining Stories

Lisa Burton

Welcome to this week’s edition of Lisa Burton Radio. I’m your host, Lisa the robot girl. They say fame is fleeting, but is it really? What if you were involved in something so nefarious that your legend held on for centuries, eternity even? We’re not taking flavor-of-the-month on some reality show, or a public meltdown by some YouTube sensation. This is the big time. Let’s give a warm welcome to this week’s special guest the Serpent, and I mean the Serpent. “Welcome to the show.”

“Thank you for having me, Robo-Girl! And I must say, it’s a pleasure being with you. And to be clear, you’re not an animatronic puppet are you? I’d hate to find out, that I’ve been having a conversation with a hairy old man hiding behind a curtain …”

“Nope, one-hundred percent robot girl here. The only hairy old man around here is working on something…

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Come and be interviewed for my new 2019 Author Interview Series

Unknown's avatarDon Massenzio

2019It’s a new year and time for a new series of author interviews.

One of the features of my blog that I have enjoyed the most is my author interview series.

Over the past few years, I have posted over 200 interviews. We have learned about many authors, both traditionally and independently published. We have learned what makes them tick and what techniques have worked for them in creating and promoting their work.

whats your storyFor 2019, I’m looking to post weekly author interviews based on responses to 10 questions. To change it up a bit this year, I’m giving authors 20 questions from which they can choose 10. This will make each interview somewhat unique. These 20 questions are brand new to my blog interviews. This means, if I’ve already interviewed you, you are welcome to participate as we will learn even more about you.

If you participate in my interview…

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Plans for 2019 . . . Not As Deep As I’d Hoped

Ahnold

I wish I had a more complicated plan than what I’m about to write.  Many authors have declared that they are going to reach various milestones.  I’m still working on getting back to a level of stability, so I don’t feel like I can reach that far.  Heck, I’m not even doing this on January 1st, which shows I’m struggling to retain some sense of order in the author side of my life.

By the way, that’s really what this post is going to be about.  My personal and day job life are going to be worked on throughout the year, but I can’t share a lot of that here.  I need to keep them separate because others involved request privacy.  So, I’ll talk a bit about it, but not in any detail.  Anyway, what are my goals for 2019?

  1. Publish War of Nytefall: Rivalry in March/April.  This is the easiest goal because the book is ready to go.  Just need all the small parts.  I don’t know if I’ll get much help with promoting since I feel like not releasing a book in December hurt my progress . . . Not that I had any since my semi-retirement announcement.  Still, I’m always happy for any help that is offered.
  2. Write, edit, and publish War of Nytefall: Eradication.  This will be a later year publication if I can pull it off.  I’m dropping from 4 to 2 releases since I can’t put in the time.  This is still optimistic since I need the time to write and edit.  Only release I might be able to pull it off is because Rivalry is already written and edited.  I might have to drop to 1 a year.
  3. Continue maintaining my blog.  I’m more focused on this than other social media sites.  In fact, I don’t seem to get anything from places like Facebook and Twitter.  I’ll have a tweet get over 100 retweets, but no sales.  Facebook is just a ghost town for me.  Is social media even worth it if you’re not spending hours a day on each site?
  4. Gradually put together The Longbow of Ichabod Brooks.  This is a long shot since I need to focus more on War of Nytefall, but I can always add a little to his story when time permits.  Unlike the big novels, I can take longer breaks while working on the short stories.
  5. Finish outlining and planning the Sin stories.  Might even figure out an overall series title for him.  Adventures of Sin is too close to Sinbad.  Although, the two might have more in common than I realize.  Tales of Sin?  The Soulless King Series?  Children of the Crimson Haze?  That last one is a bit too long and I do think I should focus it on Sin, who is a character with a strange quirk.  Sin of the Dead?  Considering the overarching story is that a contest to ascend a new God of Death has begun and Sin is an unwitting contestant, that might work.

That’s really it.  Seems more than it really is, but I’m still fighting a massive blow to my confidence.  Not having much support on this side of the computer makes it hard to accept the support I get on here.  That’s something else I need to fix this year.  I want to be able to shrug off the naysayers who seem to be unhappy regardless of what I do.  They’ve made me feel guilty about going near my books while saying they never intended to do me that much harm.  Don’t get me wrong here.  I love being involved in teaching because I feel like I’m helping kids and making a difference in their lives.  Being able to do both would be great, so I really need to figure out a balance.  Anyway, this post got longer than expected, so good luck to everyone in 2019.

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Where Your Muse Hides

Harmony Kent's avatarStory Empire

Hello SErs! Happy New Year! I hope you’ve all had a good holiday season. Today being the first post of 2019, I thought it might be nice to kick things off by looking at creativity … more specifically, where it comes from. What are we talking about when we mention having a muse?

Personally, I’ve never experienced talking to or with my muse. It doesn’t manifest that way. I found my creative flow after learning to meditate, and it was in that quiet mind that I discovered what could be called my silent muse.

Below is a great video about the split brain and its implications for the muse within. Please do take a look, especially the bit that talks about the brain telling itself stories! The video lasts for just under five minutes. Youtube has lots of great videos on the brain and personality.

In summary, we have two…

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Teaser Tuesday: Start 2019 with the Legends Finale #fantasy #adventure

Cover art by Jason Pedersen

Let’s kick off 2019 with an excerpt from Legends of Windemere: Warlord of the Forgotten Age.  Enjoy!

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Guest Post – Self Publishing Platforms and Accessibility – by Victoria Zigler

eranamage's avatarLibrary of Erana

Victoria Zigler is a prolific author, mostly of books for children and poetry. She has an impressive catalogue. She is also blind – and has visited the Library Of Erana in the past to discuss the accessibility (or otherwise) of publishing, reading and enjoying books. I’m pleased to welcome Tori back, where she discusses the issues of self-publishing on Amazon vs Smashwords.

Tori – over to you

“Which platform is best for self-publishing?”

It’s a question you’ve likely heard many, many times – one especially popular with people comparing Smashwords to Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) – and one that will have a different answer, depending on who you ask, and what experiences they’ve had using one platform or the other.

Here’s another question for you though:

“Which platform is more accessible for visually impaired authors who rely on screen readers?”

This one may also come with different answers, depending…

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Bring it, 2019!

I was going to do a big post thinking back about this year.  Honestly, it started off messy and continued on that route.  Anxiety issues, semi-retirement from being an author, and a bunch of personal disasters.  I feel pretty thoroughly battered from life and those who have chosen to be the deliverers of pain.  So, I’m just going to avoid looking and hope the future is even a little brighter.

Happy New Years . . .

and screw you, 2018
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