Welcome to this issue of the Carnival of the Indies blog carnival. This issue is for November, 2012. We welcome your submissions on topics related to writing, self-publishing, book design or marketing books.
A collection of outstanding articles recently posted to blogs, your reading here will be richly rewarded.
See the end of this post for links to submit your blog posts for the next carnival, or for participating Bloggers and Featured Bloggers to grab your sidebar badges. Thanks to everyone who participated.
Featured Posts
Jeff Bennington (@TweetTheBook) presents Winning in Amazon’s KDP Select: Part 1 posted at The Writing Bomb, saying, “This is part 1 in a 3 part series. I also submitted part 2, and part 3 will be posted soon.”
Joanna Penn (@TheCreativePenn) presents 5 Ways To Get Your First Draft Material Out Of Your Head And Onto The Page posted at The Creative Penn, saying, “You can’t edit a blank page, so you can’t start rewriting until you’ve got something to work with. How do you get your first draft material from your head onto the page? Here’s 5 ideas.”
Steven Saus (@uriel1998) presents Social Media Is Dead: Why Independent Creators Need To Get Back To RSS and E-Mail NOW. posted at ideatrash, saying, “Social media companies (particularly Facebook and Twitter) seem to be in the process of going for the easy, big bucks of big media companies, and are willing to sacrifice what made their services popular. Independent creators, while still using these services, cannot rely on them any longer. We must be able to reach our audience through internet-standard tools like e-mail and RSS.”
Book Design and Production
Walt Shiel presents Are Long Subtitles Bad? posted at Making It Easy, saying, “Many people seem to think subtitles are only for nonfiction or need to be clever and catchy, but that ignores one of the most important aspects of subtitles in our internet-centric world — discoverability.”
Jane Ayres presents Backtracking: Lessons in Indie Publishing Part 2 – Cover Designs posted at The Beautiful Room, saying, “This blog post shares my experiences of working with a designer on the covers for my indie published titles – and what I learned from this adventure.”
Indie Author
Laura Pepper Wu presents “How do I get more traffic to my site?” posted at 30 Day Books, saying, “When you first start out blogging with no audience, it can be discouraging – that’s often why a lot of bloggers give up. Here are six easy ways to drive more traffic to your website.”
Joseph C. Kunz, Jr. presents 10 Signs That You Are Not Ready To Self-Publish posted at Kunz On Publishing, saying, “Are you really ready – not just your manuscript, but you – to self-publish? Here is a list of the most important things you must consider before getting into self-publishing.”
Patty Jansen presents Making a name for yourself: a different view of paid advertising for self-pubbed authors posted at Must Use Bigger Elephants, saying, “Companion article to one that was featured here a while back”
Lenore Skomal presents Never have a backup plan posted at Writers and Authors, saying, “That is not the permalink, as it is a guest blog. It ran on Nov. 14th, if that’s any help.”
Laura Rae Amos presents social toxicity: part 1, the Twitter psychotic breakdown posted at LauraRaeAmos.com, saying, “On the edge of giving myself a social media panic attack last month, I wrote this post about finding balance. How do we know when to pay attention to all that great advice we writers receive, and how do we know when to just tune it out?”
Michael J Holley presents Why Are We Still Having Dilemmas About Self-Publishing? It’s Done posted at Michael J Holley – Writer, saying, “If you’re a new writer, is there any real incentive to not self-publish? Traditional publishing has just become the modern vanity route.”
Marketing and Selling Your Books
Randy Ross presents Facebook Fan Pages: A Waste of Time (and Money)? posted at The Loneliest Planet, saying, “After a year of developing my Facebook Fan Page, I have more than 2,000 fans, a shopping cart for a self-published book (haven’t sold one, yet), and dozens of applications. Last week, I spent $20 to promote one of my posts to 10,000 people: Unfortunately, many of them turned out to be from outside the U.S. and many didn’t list English as their default language. Has Facebook been worth the time?”
Lindsay Buroker presents How Do You Maintain Steady Book Sales at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc.? posted at Lindsay Buroker — Fantasy Author, saying, “I share what’s working for me insofar as keeping steady sales rolling in month after month.”
Joanna Penn presents Reader Engagement With Transmedia: How To Use QR Codes posted at The Creative Penn, saying, “How you can use one simple thing – a QR code – to give your readers a more interactive experience.”
Phyllis Zimbler Miller presents Staying Out of Hot Water With Amazon posted at Miller Mosaic LLC, saying, “Keeping out of hot water with Amazon requires vigilance on the part of authors.”
Dana Lynn Smith presents Top 15 Reasons to Do a Virtual Book Tour posted at The Savvy Book Marketer, saying, “Virtual book tours are a wonderful way to get your work in front of new audiences.”
Sarah Bolme presents Where’s the Money? posted at Marketing Christian Books
Self-Publishing Success
Nick Thacker presents Specific Generic Advice – Episode 1: Write A Good Book posted at LiveHacked.com, saying, “Want the best, most specific-yet-generic advice there is? Read this series!”
Writing Tools and Tips
Pavarti K Tyler presents NaNoWriMo – Word Count is Good but my BETAs are better posted at Pavarti K Tyler at Fighting Monkey Press
James Moushon presents Book Industry: An Interview with Expert Joanna Penn posted at eBook Author’s Corner, saying, “Joanna is one of the leaders in the new book publishing environment we live in. I was honored to be able to interview her.”
Marcy Kennedy presents Is Genre Dying? posted at Marcy Kennedy’s Blog, saying, “Superstar literary agent Donald Maass says that genre is dying, but the four qualities he says make for bestsellers are actually a description of how genre is evolving, rather than dying.”
James J Parsons presents Scrivener on the Go posted at Speaking to the Eyes, saying, “A post about using Scrivener on computers other than your main machine through a USB stick–a convenient way to write on the go.”
Alexander M Zoltai presents The “Right” Way To Write ~ Writing Advice for The Brave . . . posted at Notes from An Alien
Joseph C. Kunz, Jr. presents The 5 Essentials Of A Powerful Book Introduction posted at Kunz On Publishing, saying, “Your book’s introduction is a very power marketing tool that can help your book be successful. Using these five sections in your introduction can have a dramatic impact on your book’s sales.”
Laxmi Hariharan presents Why writing is like a weights’ work out posted at Young Adult (Old Soul)
R. E. Hunter presents Profiling Your Characters, part 1 | Writing & Random Thoughts posted at Writing & Random Thoughts, saying, “Discusses use of the five-factor personality model and personality profiling in developing story characters.”
Well, that wraps up this issue. I hope you enjoy some of the great articles here, and let other people interested in self-publishing know about the Carnival—Use the share buttons below to Tweet it, Share it on Facebook, Plus-1 it on Google+, Link to it! The next issue is December 30, 2012 and the deadline for submissions will be December 20, 2012. Don’t miss it! Here are all the links you’ll need:
The original announcement post
Carnival of the Indies web page
Submit your article here
Bloggers, grab your official Carnival of the Indies Badges here
Follow Carnival of the Indies on Twitter
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