Friday 24 June 2011

Friday Farrago: Vampire Assassins and the Samba Queen

There will be a rain dance Friday night, weather permitting ~ George Carlin


One of the things I've had to get used to living in the UK is the complete lack of summer. Well, maybe not a complete lack, but there sure isn't much of it. We had a couple weeks of gorgeous weather last month and now the rain gods are paying us back big time.

Never mind. At least it's an excuse to curl up with a good book and some hot cocoa. I also find rainy days very conducive to writing.

We're fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance. ~Japanese Proverb



Great picture of me, huh?

Bwahahaha!!! Yeah, I know. Totally not me. Put me in a Brazilian samba club and I stick out like a sore thumb. But not because I can't dance. I can dance, baby! Boy, can I dance. ;-)

Last night I went dancing with my work peeps. Sort of a good-bye to one of the girls who is headed back to Brazil. I haven't been dancing in ages and it was so invigorating. When you spend so much time hunched over a keyboard, locked inside the ravings of your own lunatic mind, it's good to get out and get your groove thang on.

Or maybe that's just me. But I highly recommend a good old booty shake from time to time. Just to shake up the creative juices.

Books are a uniquely portable magic. ~ Stephen King



This week I've been reading Stephen King's On Writing. I think it should be a must read for any writer or aspiring writer. Heck, even if you have no interest in writing, it's still a great read. Part autobiography and part how-to, it read just like one of his novels. I'm a little over a third of the way through.

I also finished Janet Evanovich's latest installment in her Stephanie Plum series: Smokin' Seventeen. Hilarious as ever.

I was reading indie author Theresa Ragan's novel A Knight in Central Park before I got sidetracked by Evanovich. Before I get back to it, I thought I'd enjoy a quick read, so I downloaded a novella by Samantha Warren. It's the first in her Vampire Assassin series. I read more than half of it during my lunch break and will probably finish the rest on my ride home. It's a great read for a great price.

And speaking of Samantha, let me tell you a little story about WHY I bought her novella. Just in case you were wondering?

Us indie authors (and I imagine authors in general) often wonder how to promote our books. As a reader, I don't think I had any real awareness of just how hard it is to do. But as both reader and writer I do know that slapping your book (literally or figuratively) in someone's face and screaming "Read my book!" isn't the way to do it.

Samantha didn't do that. Instead she responded to a Tweet I made. I responded back. We had a "brief" conversation that had nothing to do with either of our novels and everything to do with reading, movies, and Firefly.


Yeah, baby! That's what I'm talkin' about! But I digress...

The point is that the awesome Samantha made an effort to connect with me. As a person and as a fellow lover of books. And that made me want to read her books. So I headed over to Amazon and downloaded one then and there.

This is how to market, people. Not with slick, shiny, in-your-face ads, but with connections. Conversation. If you want to know more about effective Twittering and Sacred Cow Tipping, I highly recommend checking out Kristen Lamb's blog. You'll thank me later.


Now how about YOU? What have you been reading this week?




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