Orlando Figes, Award-Winning Historian, Wrote Fake Reviews

It seems that, ever since the New York Times article about buying reviews was published, the one which revealed indie bestseller John Locke had bought reviews, the floodgates have opened.

Every day a new writer with an, as Sir Humphrey Appleby might have said, 'a creative interpretation of the facts,' is brought to light. What is perhaps most notable about the latest dramatic revelation is that it doesn't involve an indie author. This comes from The Telegraph:

Orlando Figes, the award-winning historian, has admitted writing derogatory reviews about his fellow writers' work.

Apparently Dr. Figes even "threatened to sue a fellow historian for libel when his name was linked to the online reviews."

But not only did Dr. Figes rubbish the work of his colleagues, he heaped praise on his own:

The reviewer [Figes] meanwhile described The Whisperers, Prof Figes's latest book, in more positive terms.

"Beautifully written ... leaves the reader awed, humbled yet uplifted ... a gift to us all," he said.

A spokesman from Birkbeck College said of Prof Figes: "He's on sick leave and we're offering our support."

You can read the article here: Award-winning historian Orlando Figes: I posted anonymous reviews on Amazon. Thanks to the Passive Voice Blog for posting a link to this article.

I must admit I'm stunned by the apparent ubiquity of the problem; I'm guessing this could be the tip of a very big iceberg.

Other articles you might like:
- Book Promotion: Where's The Line?
- John Locke Paid For Book Reviews
- 8 Ways To Become A Better Writer

Photo credit: A miniature painting of the Baum des Todes und des Lebens (The Tree of Death and Life), by Bertold Furtmeyer for the Missal of Archbishop Bernard von Rohr of Salzburg, a handmade miniature manuscirpt commissioned by him around 1481 and now in the Museum of the Bavarian State Library (Bayerische Staatsbibliothek), Munich, Germany.

8 Tips For Blogging Success

1. What's your angle?
Since you're reading this chances are you're going to blog about writing. That's terrific! There are SO many sub-topics no one can adequately cover even a fraction of them.

2. Narrow your focus
There are many ways to blog about writing. For instance:

- Authors: blog about your books, your book tours, the progress you're making on your current manuscript, where you get your inspiration, your process, writing tips, and so on. Kim Harrison's blog is a great example.
- Writing News: What's going on in the writing/book publishing world. New markets (e.g., Kobo's Writing Life), new reading devises, trends in the industry, who is in court for what (e.g., the DoJ lawsuit), etc.
- Writing 'How-To': Give writing tips, interview writers, editors, book publishers. Talk abut different writing systems (eg. Michael Hauge vs Christopher Vogler vs Blake Snyder), etc.
- Book blog: This is an idea for the brave. Post the unedited first draft you're working on, day by day. Or, serialize a longer story. Could do this with several authors contributing.
- Book Review Blog: These are sorely needed, especially for independently published books. Involves reading books and given an honest opinion.

3. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) matters
Choosing a blog name
I think everyone, even writers that hole themselves up in a cabin, 100 miles away from the nearest hint of civilization, know the importance of optimizing their website and/or blog for search engines. Hands down, the most important part of SEO is your choice of name.

This deserves a post--heck, a series of posts--all on its own but the rule of thumb I keep in mind is to use a name that is going to be relevant to nearly every post you make. (For instance, "Karen Woodward" is the name of my blog and each post includes the line: "posted by Karen Woodward". That's a very simple way to make sure the title of your blog is always linked to the content of your posts.)

If you're going to be setting up an author blog then you've got the name of your blog, it'll be the name you write under. Otherwise, try to pick something that exemplifies what your focus is. For instance, David Gaughran named his blog after one of his books, "Let's Get Digital" which also nicely summarizes the theme of the majority of his posts. And I think "Let's Get Digital" works especially well because it is easy to remember.

Choosing a domain name
Having decided what you're going to name your blog you now need to hope that it's available as a .com or, if not, a .net or .org.

Even if you won't be using your domain name right away--this may be the case if you're starting your blog over at Blogger.com or Wordpress.com--you still want to grab your domain name before someone else does. It only costs about 10 dollars a year and is well worth the investment.

4. Read great blogs
This probably should have been my first point. Just like writers have to read the work, both good and bad, of other writers so bloggers need to read other bloggers.

Naturally you're going to read other blogs--lots of other blogs--in your area, but you also want to read successful blogs outside your area.

For instance, I love Penelope Trunk's blog. I don't always agree with her--wouldn't that be boring--but I like reading what she has to say. She's engaging. And she shares what she has learnt from blogging, what has worked for her, what hasn't. Great stuff.

5. Commit to your blog
I feel as though my blog is like a child, or at least a needy cat. Through it might not seem like it in the beginning, having a blog is quite the committment and, like any committment, it can be stressful.
It helps--and it helps your blog to grow--if you have a set writing schedule. For me, I post 2 blogs each weekday and 1 on Saturdays and Sundays. That said, you also have to be flexible. For instance, last week I spent 6 hours on one post so I only posted one blog that day.

I think the single biggest factor in growing a blog is the number of posts per day. That and the quality of the posts. The second most important factor is consistency. Even if you blog only once a month, make sure you are consistent. That said, sometimes to need to ignore all the rules and do your own thing. Whatever works.

6. Learn what your audience wants
Blogger has analytics/stats you can use to see which of your posts was the most popular. You can also find out which of your posts were the least popular. This will give you an idea what your audience is interested in. If you're not set up on blogger (I think wordpress.org & wordpress.com also have built in analytics), or even if you are, I highly recommend using Google Analytics. It's free and it'll tell you everything you ever wanted to know about your blog traffic. I also recommend linking your Google Analytics account with your Google Webmaster Tools account.

7. Connect your accounts
Don't forget to, at minimum, tweet your posts. I would also advice cross-posting to Facebook. Even if you're like me and you don't use Facebook much, enough people do that it's probably worth it. Also, make sure your readers can subscribe to your feed and give them the option of having your posts emailed. Feedburner is great for this.

8. Guest posts
I've had wonderful experiences with guest posters. Not only have I received fantastic content for a fraction of the work, but I've made connections within the writing community. I want to put up a page with guidelines for guest posts in the hope this will encourage more of my readers to submit content. For instance, do you accept guest posts (yes please!), what topics you'll accept, how long the posts should be, how much lead time you need (this is important for folks doing promotional posts for a new book), and so on.

Okay, gotta run! I hope you've found something helpful in this post and best of luck to you. If you have a blog please do leave a link to it in the comments. :-)

Other articles you might like:
- Ursula K. Le Guin On Academic Criticism & Philip K. Dick
- Are You Writing The Right Book? 5 Ways To Find Out
- Fifty Shades of Alice In Wonderland: Sales Peak At $1,000 Per Day

Photo credit: Geoff Campbell

Snake Oil Salesmen And The Indie Author

I know I posted about this yesterday, but this article by Kris Rusch is excellent. Kris talks about companies that charge for things like editing, formatting, etc., and then ALSO take 15 or more percent of the author's royalties.

In one of my previous blog posts I called these companies Vanity Presses because the moniker seemed to fit, but no one else is using that name. To make things easier I'm going to call these companies Snake Oil companies, because not only are they selling authors something they don't need, they're selling something which can harm them.

Judging from what I'm hearing in the community and from friends, as well as friends of friends, it seems that more authors are turning to Snake Oil companies to put their books online. I had thought, though, that these scams appealed mostly to writers who didn't have the money to pay a flat fee for cover design, etc., but it seems I was wrong. Kris writes:

This writer has multiple New York Times bestsellers published at more than three per year for at least twenty years. She has sold 35 million copies of her books. She can afford to pay someone a flat fee to put her out-of-print backlist up as e-titles. She can afford to pay someone with real experience to handle her social media for her.

Instead, she gave it all to a start-up for 15% of royalties earned.

That’s not the scary part. The scary part is the Terms of Use that she had to agree to in order to go with this company.

.  .  .  .

And then this POS [the Terms of Use] gets even worse. Let’s say  you do cancel. Do you get the e-pub or MOBI files of your e-book, the one that  you paid for through 15% of your royalties? Nope. Those files are proprietary to this service.

By the way, the service doesn’t pay for copyedits or proofreading, and so you get charged for those services by a flat fee separately. If you read the bestselling romance writer’s supposed Facebook post, you can see why this service doesn’t do copy edits. But really, there’s no one at the service who knows how to design covers either, certainly not covers worthy of a New York Times bestselling author.

And speaking of that author, she’s spending thousands for a service she’s tied to at 15% of royalties earned. If she cancels, she gets nothing.

To read Kris Rusch's article in full click here: The Business Rusch: A Warning To All Writers Who Need Help Indie Publishing.

There are many reputable companies who charge a flat fee for things like cover design, formatting, and so on. Joe Konrath has links to the folks he uses (you may need to scroll down the page) and John Locke has recommended Telemachus Press and still uses them to format and publish his work.

This is from the landing page at the Telemachus Press website:

Telemachus Press is a "work for hire" author services epublishing company. What makes us different than a vanity press? You keep 100% of your royalties and receive complete sales reporting. All material that we create on your behalf belongs to you — it's your property. We store all working copies of your book (interior and cover files) on a secure FTP site where you have access to your work 24/7. You don't need our permission to retrieve a copy of your files. We set up all eBook accounts in your name. It's your book - access sales reports and keep all royalties. Some of our channel partners are listed below. We work for you.

I've never used Telemachus Press, but that's the sort of information you need to ask about when you're shopping around for someone to help you put your book online.

Best of luck to you. And, remember, don't get so caught up with these publishing details you forget to write!

Other articles you might like:
- Writer Beware: The Return Of The Vanity Press
- Indie Authors: Don't Give Anyone Ownership Of Your Work
- Book Promotion: Where's The Line?

Photo credit: en.wikipedia.org

Indie Authors: Don't Give Anyone Ownership Of Your Work

Over the past few months, like mushrooms after a rain, scammers have sprung up offering to help indie authors publish their work.

These companies charge the moon for everything from editorial services to formatting to custom design work, and then, ON TOP OF THIS, they take a percentage of your royalties! Here's what Dean Wesley Smith has to say about these people:

I can hear the questions. “But I can’t do covers, so shouldn’t it be all right to trade the work on the cover for a percentage of the sales?”

NO!!!!!!!!

For some strange reason, smart writer after smart writer seems intent on wanting and fighting to give away ownership percentages in their work, both with agents, with traditional publishers, with small presses, and with indie publishing “helpers.”

Some writers "believe it's fine to exchange work for a percentage of their property". It's not.

For example, you have a gardner come to your house to mow your lawn. But instead of money, you decide to give the gardner a percentage ownership in your home.

No one would consider this, so why do we find it so easy to do in the case of our manuscripts?

Companies that “Help” indie publishers.

There are two types of these companies. The Good and The Scam.

You always know The Good company when they never ask for a percentage of your work. The fees are up front for the work you need and stated, not hidden. And you always retain all rights to your work and the money goes directly to your bank account.

They work off of what is called a “menu” of services. They are, for the most part, the good. You decide how much you want to pay up front and either pay it or not.

The Bad company tries to hide any fees from you, tries to get you to give them a percentage, wants to handle your money before it goes to you with every sale, even tries to get you to sign up in their online agreements before you can even look at their site.

Solution: Run!!!!

I checked out a few of these companies because I wanted to find out how egregious their sins were. I found that many of them were up front about the amount of money they charge for services. One company publicly listed publishing packages costing up to--I kid you not--$10,000!

I pretended to be interested in this company's $5,000 package, one which included a website--I used to be a website developer--and asked to see an example site. Folks, these were the plainest, straight out-of-the-box, websites imaginable. The company was using free open source software to create the websites, something anyone with zero skill could do, and it only takes 5 minutes. Most hosting companies will set one of these sites up for free. That's right. For free! AND this company was demanding authors give them a cut of their royalties as well. My gosh! The nerve of some people, it's astonishing.

The Best Case Scenario
Let's say, for the sake of argument, that you find a company, a small press, that does a great job with cover art, and formatting, and editing, etc., and let's say they take somewhere between 15% and 50% of your book in lieu of charging you for the services they provide. Here we're talking about a traditional publisher, but a very small one run by one person, sometimes two.

Here's what Dean has to say:

So you sign up with some small press publisher or some agent “publisher” who promises to get your book into electronic print, and then pay you FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE PLUS 70 YEARS 15% every month of everything that comes in.

Yeah, that’s going to happen and if you believe it will, I’ve got a very old bridge to sell you.

Imagine your grandkid trying to chase the grandkid of the agent sixty years after you die to get money and you start to see how really silly that idea is.

You all know how difficult it is to stick with something. Writing a book for instance! Your book is important to you, right? You love it (or at least you did in the beginning!) and yet it is so very easy to put down. We say things like, I've been so busy, one of my kids got sick, and so on. And there's nothing wrong with this. Life happens.

Imagine what it's like running a small publishing company in your spare time. The owner/publisher will likely wear more than one hat. They are responsible for acquiring manuscripts (a LOT of reading), negotiating contracts, doing cover art, line editing, formatting and uploading manuscripts and paying authors on time. AND they will probably do all the customer relations. Talk about stress!

How many of these small publishers do you think will still be around in a year? Two years? Five years? Not many. Consider: A medium sized publishing house probably has a few people on staff so if one person needs a break, if life intervenes, then someone else can step in and take over. Generally this isn't so with a small press.

So what happens when a small publisher folds? They've published your ebook and you don't have access to their accounts, and they'll likely have an account on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and Smashwords just to name a few.

How do you get control of your book? The best case scenario is that the publisher will unpublish your book and send you the artwork they used for your cover along with the electronic file of your manuscript. But even then, because your book was unpublished, all the reviews your book received will be gone. You'll have to start over from square one.

And that's the best case scenario.

So what do you do? Dean writes:

— First, never, ever allow anyone to work for you for a percentage, either of income or ownership.

— Second, start learning how to indie publish your own work. It’s scary at first, but fun after that, and it gives you a sense of intense freedom. That way you can be clear-headed on signing a deal with anyone else.

— Third, make sure every contract you sign has a set date where the exclusive rights return to you. Period. Never sign a contract with a “speed limit” or a dollar figure of sales. Just set a date and if the publisher wants the work after that date, they can negotiate a new deal with you.

That's good advice. And it does get easier with practice. Read the rest of Dean Wesley Smith's article here: Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing: The Myth of Giving Away 15% Ownership in Your Work.

Other articles you might like:
- Book Promotion: Where's The Line?
- John Locke Paid For Book Reviews
- Fifty Shades of Alice In Wonderland: Sales Peak At $1,000 Per Day

Photo credit: marfis75

Joe Konrath: Selling Your Books To Libraries

Joe Konrath and Blake Crouch are going to sell their entire ebook catalogues to the Harris County Public Library. These are their terms:

1. Ebooks are $3.99

2. No DRM.

3. The library only needs to buy one ebook of a title, and then they can make as many copies as they need for all of their patrons and all of their branches.

4. The library owns the rights to use that ebook forever.

5. The library can use it an any format they need; mobi, epub, pdf, lit, etc. And when new formats arise, they're’re free to convert it to the new format.

In short, the library buys one copy, and never has to buy it again.

Joe and Blake said they'd extend these terms to any library.

That's a petty good deal! I don't know much about this area but I believe that the usual practice with ebooks is only a certain number of copies can be loaned out at a time and each book can only be loaned out a certain number of times before the library has to renew the license.

Here's how the librarians at the Harris County Public Library put it:

Accessibility
Libraries are not able to purchase all of the eBooks we would like to purchase due to publisher and author concerns about copyright protection in the digital format.  Only two of the big six publishers will sell eBooks to libraries, and those pricing models either limit us to a low number of checkouts or charge us more than twice the retail price for a book.  Very few picture books are available for us to purchase, even though small children are a large part of our customer base and we often use digital books in storytimes.  With adult fiction titles, we can’t always offer complete series because of format availability or publisher restrictions.  Some publishers would even like to implement a plan that would force people to come to the library to check out eBooks, rather than being able to do it online, which kind of defeats the purpose.  Librarians are also making the adjustment to focus on providing access for our customers through leasing or subscription, rather than only owning items to be a permanent part of a collection.

Better Public Experience 
Because of the way we have to purchase electronic content, our customers often have to jump back and forth online through multiple access points, instead of simply finding a book and clicking to check it out.  This can make the borrowing experience quite confusing and complex.  Then add the confusion about which formats match which devices.  We’re not just providing materials for one type of device, our customers use Kindles and Nooks and iPads and cell phones and devices we probably haven’t heard of yet.  We are constantly learning about all of these devices because we are now free tech support for the public.  Our customers show up with their new eReader in a box, and we teach them how to use it.

I would urge everyone even the least interested in how libraries have changed over the years and the pressures they are under to read the entirety of Joe's post. I've only excerpted from the letter the librarians at the Harris County Public Library sent Joe and it's well worth reading in it's entirety: Ebooks For Libraries

Other articles you may be interested in:
- Stephen King's Latest Book: A Face In The Crowd 
- Fifty Shades of Grey - Oh My!
- Book Promotion: Where's The Line?


Photo credit: Friar Balsam

Stephen King's Latest Book: A Face In The Crowd

I'm late to the party! Hodders released Stephen King and Stewart O'Nan's ebook, A Face in the Crowd, August 21st. A Face in the Crowd is also available as an audiobook in MP3 and CD form. For more information on purchasing options, read Stephen O'Nan's blog post.

Here's a link to an excerpt from the audiobook version: A Face in the Crowd.

STEPHEN KING & STEWART O’NAN
A FACE IN THE CROWD
A New Story Coming August  21, 2012

We are delighted to announce a chilling new story entitled A FACE IN THE CROWD. Set for release on August 21st, the original eBook and simultaneous audio digital download marks a second collaboration between Stephen King and Stewart O'Nan (Faithful).

What if you were watching your favourite sport on television and the camera swung to a familiar face in the crowd?  Someone who couldn't possibly be there?
Dean Evers, an elderly widower, sits in front of the television with nothing better to do than waste his leftover evenings watching baseball. His adopted Florida baseball team, the Rays, are going strong. Suddenly, in a seat a few rows up beyond the batter, Evers sees the face of someone he knows from decades past, someone who shouldn’t be at the ballgame, shouldn’t even be on the planet. And so begins a parade of people from Evers’s past, people he has wronged, all of them occupying that seat behind home plate. Until one day, he sees someone even closer to home…

A FACE IN THE CROWD is a beautifully written story about grief, loneliness and revenge.

To read the rest of the announcement, click here:  A New Story Coming August  21, 2012 from Stephen King & Steward O'Nan.

The publication of this book came as a complete surprise to me--I try to keep up on all things King. Looks like a good story, I'm anxious to read it.

It's nice to have something to tide us over until the release of Joyland and Doctor Sleep next year. You'll recall that the announcement of Joyland caused a stir because King wasn't releasing an ebook version. With A Face in the Crowd he's releasing an ebook but no print version. I think this confirms what I've long thought: King's an innovator. He's trying out new things. 

I hadn't read any of Steward O'Nan's work before but after looking over his bio I'm wondering why that is. I love it when I find a new authors (well, new to me, he has been writing for some time).

Happy reading!

(I was about to hit the "publish" button when I remembered the last post I did. Ed Robertson opined that $3.99 was the best price for an ebook. King and O'Nan are selling this book in the UK for 2.99 which comes to $3.48 in the US Amazon store. Seems like Stephen King agrees!)

Other articles on Stephen King you might enjoy:
- Stephen King: 15 tips on how to become a better writer
- Neil Gaiman Interviews Stephen King, King talks about Dr. Sleep
- Stephen King Reads An Excerpt From The Dark Tower

Tips For First Time Writers

I've started reading Ed Robertson's blog, Failure Ahoy!, regularly. Ed meticulously tracks the performance of his books in response to various promotions on Amazon and, now, Barnes & Noble. Many would keep this information to themselves thinking it could give a competitive edge, but in true Indie spirit Ed shares his findings with the community.

So when Ed published a post giving advice for first time authors I read it with interest. Here are some of his tips:

The new sweet spot for ebooks is $3.99
99 cents, then $2.99, used to be a good price point for ebooks but now an ebook sold for 99 cents has gained something of a stigma and even, though to a much lesser degree, $2.99, since that is the lowest price a writer can sell their work for and earn a 70% royalty. IMHO this thinking is wrong but with marketing sometimes it is all about perception.

That said, making your book free for a time (see below), or lowering it's price to 99 cents as part of a promotion, can be a good strategy.

Join Kindleboards
Ed cautions that you might not see any gain from this for a few months but that, for him at least, joining the Kindleboard community was a good investment of his time.

Join Goodreads
The folks over at Goodreads are mighty nice and I enjoy the community. Ed writes:

It's probably worthwhile to get your book listed on GoodReads. I am not intricately well-versed in how Goodreads runs, but if you have librarian status, or know someone who does, you should be able to add your book easily. If you can't, it's no big deal--someone will get to it eventually--but Goodreads seems to be a fairly important part of developing your book's infrastructure, a concept I'll get to in a bit.

Free is your friend: Enroll your book in Amazon's KDP Select Program
If this is your first book you have no reviews, no 'also bought' recommendations. In short, no one has the foggiest idea who you are. Ed writes:

But perhaps the most important thing you can do after hitting publish is this: make your book free. Right out of the gate. Give away the hell out if it. Schedule it for a two-day run, sit back, and see what happens.

"What happens" probably won't be much. I think it's vitally important to set the right expectations at this stage, and for most beginning authors, the reality is you're going to sell very little right off the bat. In concrete terms, you're doing very well if you're selling 1/day. Many brand-new books from first-time authors with no platform can easily go days or weeks or even months between sales. A month from now, your sales column might consist of a number between 1-9, and that is perfectly okay.

At this phase, that means every single sale is a success. Every sale means someone stumbled over an unknown book and thought it looked interesting enough to pay money for. Do you know how hard it is to make that happen? Remember: 1,504,243 ebook titles and counting. As a brand-new book, the only place you're showing up is in the new releases list and in keyword searches, and even then, anyone who found your book is either obsessive or almost superhumanly dedicated to finding new books, because they probably had to dig through dozens of pages before they happened upon yours. In terms of its present visibility, your book may have a "Buy" button on its page, but in many ways it still hasn't really been published.

So cheer every day you do get a sale, but try not to be surprised or disappointed when you don't. It's probably going to be some time before your book starts traveling down some of the main avenues to discoverability.

And that's why we're going free right off the bat--to try to kickstart a couple of these avenues.

If you are a new author (or just feel like one!) I highly recommend reading Ed Robertson's article in its entirety:  I'm New to Indie Publishing and This Is Awesome and Terrifying, Part 1: Releasing Your First Book.

Other articles you might like:
- Book Promotion: Where's The Line?
- John Locke Paid For Book Reviews
- 8 Ways To Become A Better Writer

Photo credit: Mrs Logic

Book Promotion: Where's The Line?

Buying Reviews
The world recently learnt that successful indie author John Locke bought reviews for his novels. Locke was confident in his writing ability so he stipulated reviewers were to give their honest opinion, but the fact remains he paid for reviews, something which goes against Amazon policy and at least one law.

A couple months after commissioning the reviews, sales of John Locke's novels took off. Coincidence? Perhaps. It was in December, a time book sales explode, but even so it seems as though Locke's decision to pay for reviews may have been a significant factor in his success.

My first reaction was astonishment. I had read Locke's book, How I Sold 1 Million Ebooks in 5 Months and his emphasis was on building a community and, as any indie author knows, building a community takes time and a lot of hard work. In The New York Times article which exposed Locke's business practises, I read this:

Mr. Locke is unwilling to say that paying for reviews made a big difference. “Reviews are the smallest piece of being successful,” he said. “But it’s a lot easier to buy them than cultivating an audience.” [Emphasis mine]

Indeed.

Then I remembered, indie authors have been offered the opportunity to pay for reviews for a while now, and from no less a name than Kirkus.

Kirkus charges $425 for a standard review, $575 for their express service. They guarantee the review will be approximately 250 to 350 words.

From the Kirkus website:

Kirkus Indie will send you the review via email, at which point you may choose to keep it private or publish it on our website (at no extra charge). If you choose to keep it private, it will never see the light of day. If you decide to publish the review on our site, you may use it any way you choose—on the back cover of your book, in marketing collateral, on your website or in a letter to an agent or publisher.

If you choose to publish your review on our website, we will also distribute it to our licensees, including Google, BN.com, Ingram, Baker & Taylor and more. On top of that, our editors will consider it for publication in Kirkus Reviews magazine, which is read by librarians, booksellers, publishers, agents, journalists and entertainment executives. Your review may also be selected to be featured in our email newsletter, which is distributed to more than 50,000 industry professionals and consumers.

So Kirkus gets a minimum of $425 per review and the author has the opportunity to bury the review if they don't like it.

My question: Why is it okay for Kirkus to sell reviews?

Sockpuppet Accounts
Recently Stephen Leather told the Old Peculiar Crime Writing Festival, and so the world, that he uses sockpuppet accounts. I'll let wikipedia explain what a sockpuppet account is:

A sockpuppet is an online identity used for purposes of deception. The term—a reference to the manipulation of a simple hand puppet made from a sock—originally referred to a false identity assumed by a member of an internet community who spoke to, or about himself while pretending to be another person. The term now includes other uses of misleading online identities, such as those created to praise, defend or support a third party or organization, or to circumvent a suspension or ban from a website. A significant difference between the use of a pseudonym and the creation of a sockpuppet is that the sockpuppet poses as an independent third-party unaffiliated with the puppeteer. (Wikipedia, Sockpuppet (Internet))

For instance, let's say Matilda has published a book--whether herself or through a traditional publisher--Keeping Hummingbirds Happy and she creates an accont on Amazon under an assumed name, Hummingbird1. This is a sockpuppet account. Using this account she will give her book a good review. Of course one positive review is unlikely to make much of a difference so she creates Hummingbird2, Hmmingbird3, and so on.

I would like to stress that Stephen Leather never publicly said he had made a sockpuppet account on Amazon. He admitted to having one on Twitter, which is a very different thing. Stephen Leather is a fellow indie author and I have no wish to attack him.

That said, what startled me about Stephen Leather's admission (well, that he admitted it at a writers' conference in front of dozens of people surprised the heck out of me!) was that he apparently thought everyone had sockpuppet accounts. Here's how it went:

Stephen Leather: I’ll go onto several forums, from the well-known forums, and post there, under my own name and under various other names and various other characters. You build this whole network of characters who talk about your books and sometimes have conversations with yourself. And then I’ve got enough fans…

Steve Mosby: So you use sockpuppet accounts basically?

SL: I think everyone does. Everyone does. Or I have friends who are sockpuppets, who might be real, but they might pick a fight with me.

SM: Are your readers aware of this, or…?

SL: Well, I think that everyone … well, are the readers aware of it? No … But they’re not buying it because of the sockpuppet. What you’re trying to do is create a buzz. And it’s very hard, one person, surrounded by a hundred thousand other writers, to create a buzz. I mean, that’s one of the things that publishers do. They create a buzz. One person on their own, difficult to create a buzz. If you’ve got ten friends, and they’ve got friends, and you can get them all as one creating a buzz, then hopefully you’ll be all right.

If readers aren't buying one's books because of ones sockpuppet account(s), then why go to all the bother of setting them up? Sure, to create buzz, but if there's no connection between 'buzz' and booksales, why do it?

Does it work? Do paid reviews and sockpuppet accounts help sell books?
I would imagine the answer is yes, they do. Or at least the folks who pay for the reviews and spend the time to set up the sockpuppet accounts believe they do.

But I think the real question isn't whether these techniques help sell books, but whether an author's time is best spent buying reviews, setting up sockpuppet accounts or writing new work.

How many books do you think Stephen Leather would have been able to write if he hadn't been busy with sockpuppet accounts? Does the amount of money that SL made due to his sockpuppet accounts exceed the amount of money he would have made on sales of new books?

It is, of course, impossible to know. I think the best way of selling books is to write more books. I know how much time it takes me to maintain my @woodwardkaren Twitter account, I can't imagine maintaining two. I would have no time for writing! If a person has a real twitter account, a couple of fake twitter accounts and three or four fake Amazon accounts, when are they going to find the time to write?

You've heard the old saying: Are you a man or a mouse? Here's mine: Are you a writer or a sockpuppet? We are our choices. Let's write.

Other articles you might like:
- John Locke Paid For Book Reviews
- Fifty Shades of Alice In Wonderland: Sales Peak At $1,000 Per Day
- Hugh Howey, Bestselling Author Of Wool, On The Key To Writing Success

Links to articles (off site):
- Anonymous Author Shares Fiverr Experience
- The Best Book Reviews Money Can Buy
- Publishing's Drug Problem
- Fake Reviews: Amazon's Rotten Core

Photo credit: johndal

Ursula K. Le Guin On Academic Criticism & Philip K. Dick

Ursula K. Le Guin

This is from Ursula K. Le Guin's interview over at Wired.

On Academic Criticism

Wired: There’s been a large amount of academic criticism devoted to your work. Do you ever read any of that, and is there any that you think is particularly noteworthy?

Le Guin: Well, I read some of it. A lot of it’s kind of written for other academics, you know? But there are certain writers, like Brian Attebery or Jim Bittner, who I think really understand my work, and sometimes can explain it to me. “Oh, is that what I was doing? Hmm, never thought of that,” you know.

On Philip K. Dick

Wired: I’m a big fan of Philip K. Dick, and when I attended the Clarion writers workshop, Tim Powers and Karen Joy Fowler assigned each of us a book to read that they thought would resonate with us, and the book that they assigned me was The Lathe of Heaven, which they described as an homage to Philip K. Dick, and I’ve always wondered if that’s true?

Le Guin: Oh yeah, definitely. You know, I couldn’t write a Phil Dick book, but I could steal some of his tricks, in a way. Pulling reality out from under the reader all the time, changing reality on them, the way he does. Well, I did it through dreams. Phil would have done it another way. But yeah, homage to Phil Dick is right.

Wired: Did you know him at all?

Le Guin: We talked on the telephone, and we corresponded some, but we never actually met. Except, we must have met in high school, because we were at Berkeley High School at the same time, but nobody I know remembers him. He is the unknown man from my class at Berkeley High.

Wired: Well, that’s sort of funny, because in a lot of his stories — one that comes to mind is Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said — it’s about a guy who suddenly nobody knows who he is anymore. I wonder if that was autobiographical in any way?

Le Guin: Oh, must be. [laughs] I don’t know. I’m rather proud of the fact that I was defending Phil Dick’s work early on, when he was not being paid much attention to and never kept in print. And I kept saying, “This guy is really good. This guy is writing completely original stuff. You know, it isn’t conventional, it isn’t run-of-the-mill. It’s different, but it’s really interesting.” And of course Phil picked up on that, and you always like it when another writer likes your stuff, you want to know that writer, so he may have written me or me him, and we talked some. I got a little bit bossy and told him that the women in his novels were kind of predictable. I didn’t think he’d really pay any attention, but he did. Apparently he really tried to think about the way he’d been handling women in his fiction. That touches me. You know, he didn’t have to pay any mind to anything I said.

Wired: Do you remember what year that was, that people would look for that sort of change in his fiction?

Le Guin: I think the novel where he tried to write women differently was VALIS. So it’s kind of late. We’re getting into the novels after he had that sort of revelation thing he had, and began writing a rather different kind of book.

Read the rest of her interview here: Ursula K. Le Guin: Still Battling the Powers That Be

It astonished me to learn that Ursula K. Le Guin's publishers were putting pressure on her to make her books "more like Harry Potter". Can you imagine! I suspect even J.K. Rowling would be scandalized.

Other articles you might like:
- 8 Ways To Become A Better Writer
- 10 Tips For Decluttering Your Life and Increasing Creativity
- Jane Friedman: How To Build An Awesome Twitter Bio

Photo credit: Marion Wood Kolisch

Jim Butcher: Cold Days, The Next Dresden Book, On Sale Nov 27th, 2012

I'm jumping up and down right now! Okay, not really. It's too early for that. I'm finishing up the dregs of my first cup of coffee after getting four hours sleep. The only thing that's going to make me jump right now is if I sit on a tack.

Jim Butcher is my favorite author and his Dresden series is one I've followed for years. Usually a series will go downhill over time but Butcher's Dresden series has gotten better. Ghost Story was great but Changes (the second to last book) was amazing.

Update (Aug 31st):
SPOILER WARNING!!! IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE LAST TWO BOOKS IN THE SERIES AND LIKE BEING SURPRISED, DON'T READ ON!!

If you want to read the blurb for Cold Days scroll down.













Cold Days is available for pre-order. Here's the blurb:

HARRY DRESDEN LIVES!!!

After being murdered by a mystery assailant, navigating his way through the realm between life and death, and being brought back to the mortal world, Harry realizes that maybe death wasn’t all that bad. Because he is no longer Harry Dresden, Chicago’s only professional wizard.

He is now Harry Dresden, Winter Knight to Mab, the Queen of Air and Darkness. After Harry had no choice but to swear his fealty, Mab wasn’t about to let something as petty as death steal away the prize she had sought for so long. And now, her word is his command, no matter what she wants him to do, no matter where she wants him to go, and no matter who she wants him to kill.

Guess which Mab wants first?

Of course, it won’t be an ordinary, everyday assassination. Mab wants her newest minion to pull off the impossible: kill an immortal. No problem there, right? And to make matters worse, there exists a growing threat to an unfathomable source of magic that could land Harry in the sort of trouble that will make death look like a holiday.

Beset by enemies new and old, Harry must gather his friends and allies, prevent the annihilation of countless innocents, and find a way out of his eternal subservience before his newfound powers claim the only thing he has left to call his own…

His soul.

To read more about Cold Days visit Jim Butcher's website.

Jim Butcher is not only an excellent writer but he gives marvelous writing tips and advice.
- Jim Butcher: How To Write A Story
- How to build a Villain, by Jim Butcher

I feel like a little kid waiting for Christmas!

Photo credit: Unknown