Winged Effigy: Facebook

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Thursday, August 23, 2012

Living the Dream! Sylvia Day releases REFLECTED IN YOU snippet

After I set this up today they released a chapter of the book!!!
/www.goodreads.com reflected-in-you-a-crossfire-novel

Check out this excerpt from Sylvia Day's upcoming Crossfire novel, REFLECTED IN YOU:

REFLECTED IN YOU SNIPPET ON FACEBOOK: (https://www.facebook.com/AuthorSylviaDay/posts/10151034706498457)

The first book in this series, BARED TO YOU, brought on all kinds of "Next Fifty Shades," "Beyond Fifty Shades," "The New Fifty Shades!"

This is a very erotic book, there's a wee bit of BDSM, but there's also pathos for the abuse both principal characters. Here's my review from April:Bared to You, Very Steamy with a Bite (Spoilerish)An Out of Genre Experience

Sylvia Day

Here's the description from a August 20, 2012 press release:

BARED TO YOU is the first book in the Crossfire trilogy about recent college graduate Eva Tramell and billionaire Gideon Cross. The book finds Eva accepting her first job at an advertising firm located in the New York City skyscraper owned by Gideon. When she and Gideon first meet, the chemistry is overwhelming and instantaneous. But both Eva and Gideon bear emotional scars, and a healthy romantic relationship is foreign to them. The trilogy explores the developing physical and emotional relationship of these two complex characters.

The press release also says that BARED TO YOU is selling 80,000 per week in the UK! Not bad for a book that started out as self-published. This is a bit like going viral on YOU TUBE or Facebook but hopefully with more than the fifteen minutes of fame afforded those events and the reward must be what is putting that smile on Sylvia's face.

Sylvia Day

That same release goes on to discuss the new book:

REFLECTED IN YOU, the second book of the trilogy, is due in-‐stores on October 2, and the public is waiting with breathless anticipation. The book is already sitting in both Amazon’s Top 50 and Barnes and Noble’s Top 100— and has been there for months.

I'd say Sylvia is "living the dream." I don't know if it is the dream for most writers but she must feel like pinching herself to see if she's awake.

Saturday, July 21, 2012

QUICK STUDY BUSINESS References

At BEA I am always fascinated by all the non-book things as well as the book vendors. I am also a sucker for reference charts -- ever since calculus.

I found this one vendor Bar Charts, Inc.'s QUICKSTUDY.COM who has dozens of these handy reference guides, (Hmm "Literary Terms" -- I might have to get that!). The one I picked up at the show was "Social Media Marketing. "

I think this is aimed at a small business without its own IT/marketing staff, because if you did have IT people and they didn't know most of the content, then you have more problems than not knowing social media. I found some information I didn't know. But, I think the speed with which our world reinvents itself more than justifies an inexpensive item like this.

Some of the sections: Ten Ways Social Media Can Benefit your Business, Types of Social Media Sites, Best Practices. Cautions.

At $6 most people and companies could more than afford this informational reference.

Friday, January 13, 2012

Money for Nothing And Your Chicks for Free

Amanda Hocking on the London Underground

Image by TheCreativePenn via Flickr

In July of 2010 on my other blog, Fangs, Wands and Fairy Dust, I asked my readers, "what should I read?" I had a list of books. I got a comment from one Amanda Hocking who, in a demonstration of why she was successful at self-publishing, said "Well, I think you should read my book My Blood Approves," which I had on that list. I did and I recall that I was immediately struck by how true her dialogue was.

I saw this Guardian article, noted on Facebook by my friend Dana of Readaholics Anonymous:
Amanda Hocking, the writer who made millions by self-publishing online
People were upset by Amanda's success for three reasons I think:

She was successful. They imagined she "swanned" about and her books magically jumped onto people's Kindles. No, she spent hours and days, possibly week, self-marketing by talking to bloggers. Oh, and her books were good.
Then, she signed a contract with a publisher. People responded, "A ha! I knew it, she was a fake all along! She sold out. " Huh? I never got this. After writing and successfully marketing four-plus books she wanted to take more time writing and less time selling. Go figure.
Finally, people were upset because she succeeded. Her books had achieved the double whammy of both selling and attracting the notice of a publisher.

I remember people saying the same thing about Anne Rice's late eighties or early nineties multi-million dollar contract.

There is nothing we hate more than people who are a success and smart and who work hard. You can do one of those things and be okay, two is putting you on thin ice and three, well three will send you right to Hell in the proverbial hand-basket. When, like the song says, you get money for nothing and the chicks (checks, chicks?) for free, we are consumed by fear and jealousy. We do not really value artists or any creative, mental work because deep inside we each think, "I could do that, it's easy."

I have noticed this in politics, in business and elsewhere. Not SO much on a personal level, but that gang-up and beat on the smart guy mindset is more a function of a clannish mentality that must somehow go back to the cave. You know, That guy is a hard working, smart success and our partners might like him or her more than they do us. Let's beat him up before he gets the chicks or guys and the better cave. I think we need to evolve past this fear that someone else is going to be a success and leave us in the dust. We won't run out of mastodons and starve to death.

People seem to have calmed down about Amanda's success. Personally, I hope she does get the better cave and I think she already has a guy, but I wish her all the best. Hard work and talent as a recipe for success. Who'd a thunk it?

I am hoping today for no less than great success shoveling snow. But, I am not going to work that hard at it and would be thrilled were someone to surpass me in the field.