Writer’s Corner – Five Podcasts Serious Indie Authors Won’t Want to Miss
Posted: March 7, 2022 Filed under: book marketing, Book Promotion, Branding, craft, Editing, marketing, Podcasts, Writing, Writing Tips | Tags: Book Promotion, Grammar Girl, Kaye Lynne Booth, Kevin J. Anderson, marketing, Podcasts, Publishing, Quick and Dirty Tps, Six Figure Authors, The Creative Penn, The Self Publishing Formula, Writer's Corner, Writing, Writing Excuses, Writing to be Read 5 Comments
In my publishing courses at Western State Colorado University, my instructors and mentors, Kevin J. Anderson and Allyson Longuiera have introduced us to several useful podcasts for independent authors and/or publishers and I’d like to share them with you here.
Writing Excuses : https://writingexcuses.com/2021/03/07/16-10-paying-it-forward-with-kevin-j-anderson/
Hosts Dan Wells, Mary Robinette Kowal, Peng Shepard, and Howard Taylor offer up tips and writing advice, mainly on craft. This podcast provides short sessions, they claim 15 minutes, but the session for the link above is closer to 30. It’s an interview with Kevin J. Anderson about paying it forward, and it’s really good, so I tought you all might enjoy it. Kevin started out with traditional publishing way back when, but has now established his own independent press in WordFire Press, so he speaks to both sides of the industry, and this interview is proof that whether published traditionally or independently, authors are a good bunch. I’m proud to be counted amoung this tribe.
But the episodes really are brief, so take a little time and explore the site. They have many interesting topics of value to authors at all stages of their career. Here’s the main page link: https://writingexcuses.com/
Six Figure Authors: https://6figureauthors.com/
With hosts Lindsay Baroker, Joe Lallo and Andrea Pearson, this podcast offers publishing and marketing tips, more than craft advice, but as six figure authors, they are crushing it and they are willing to share their advice with their listeners. I enjoy binging back episodes on my lengthy commute to and from my day job. They have a Facebook group which listeners can join, where they can pose questions to the hosts or their guests to be answered on the podcast. Lots of valuable information for authors here, whether just starting out or if you’ve been at it for a while.
The Creative Penn: https://www.thecreativepenn.com/podcasts/
I love this podcast! Host Joanna Penn (with a double N), is an author/enterprenuer and a futurist. Her podcast is filled with interviews and discussion about industry trends and where things might be headed. She’s got a killer accent which makes her fun to listen to, too.
The Self Publishing Formula: https://selfpublishingformula.com/spf-podcast/
Host Mark Dawson is a best selling independent author provides interviews and master classes on self-publishing. He and his co-host, James Blatch both have accents that are heavier and more difficult for me to understand, but they do offer up some valuable information on the independent publishing world.
Quick and Dirty Tips: https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl
This is every writers go-to podcast for all of your grammer questions, with Grammar Girl, Mignon Fogarty, who discusses proper grammar and common grammar mistakes. A quick reference for all grammar questions you are unsure of during writing and editing processes.
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Mind Fields – Marketing to Obsessive Compulsives: Is It Fair?
Posted: August 6, 2021 Filed under: Commentary, marketing, Mind Fields, Opinion | Tags: Arthur Rosch, marketing, Mind Fields, OCD, Writing to be Read 2 Comments
Marketing To Obsessive Compulsives: Is It Fair?
May 16, 2021
That’s not supposed to be a funny title, but it is certainly ironic. Aren’t we all slightly OCD? Isn’t the condition of compulsiveness generic to our culture? Isn’t it nurtured, encouraged, normal, to be obsessive when we’re bombarded with messages to buy stuff that we don’t really need? I’m compulsive. Is there a difference between being compulsive and being an addict? There is, but it’s a question of degree. An addict is compulsive beyond reason, dominated by compulsions that create a self-harming syndrome. A “normal” obsessive compulsive is just another citizen of modern times.
This subject began to entice me when I went hunting for a new camera. I don’t really need a new camera, but my current camera is from 2013. That is ancient in terms of digital cameras and their markets. It’s like having a thirty year old dog. The compulsion to upgrade is generated by massive commercial influences. It’s Canon and Nikon, Pentax and Fujinon. Asian conglomerates pour a lot of money into creating an itch, for the latest gear. The two big companies, Canon and Nikon, continue to manufacture upgrades and new iterations of the same basic camera features. Mostly what the newest cameras do is focus faster and weigh less. A lot faster. A lot less. And they cycle frame rates at 20 shots each second. This enlivens the “lucky shot” school of photography, meaning everyone who shoots with a camera. I bought my first digital camera eighteen years ago. It was an Olympus that featured a 2.1 megapixel sensor. The resolution of camera sensors has taken wings and there are now consumer cameras with 50 megapixels. I own a 20 megapixel camera and it takes beautifully sharp and accurate images. As did my 12 megapixel camera, and my 3.3 megapixel camera.
Do I yearn for the new 32 megapixel camera from Canon? Yes. I can’t help myself. I can’t help wondering what would 32 megapixels look like? One problem is that this kind of gear is really good. The makers of cameras have conquered an array of technical problems that go with acquiring digital images. They are brilliant! How good can these cameras get before CanIkonAx (choose yr company) lunges into our brains and starts taking out the visual cortex to implant image sensors in our heads?
BUT: people like gear. People enjoy gear, so the in-the-brain-controlled- by -your -thoughts paradigm may have trouble acquiring lift. It may never get off the ground because what’s the fun of doing cool jobs when there’s no gear to play with but a chip of silicon within our bodies?? That may take a few hundred years, when we’ve learned that our very hardware bodies are also gear and there comes with this gear some interesting software.
I’ve digressed from my original question. Is it fair to market to obsessive compulsives? Who else is there to market to? If you find a person free of neuroses it won’t be a person easily conned by ads and glitz.
To answer the question: NO! It’s not fair. It’s a way of rigging the society to feed the voracious maws of Business. I’ve written elsewhere on the idea that “contempt sells”. We’re treated with contempt every day. It is assumed by highly placed marketers that we’re stupid. We ARE kinda stupid. A lot of our behaviors are stupid and against our own interests. Electing charlatans to high office is stupid, but it happens all the time. Buying TV sets the size of walls is a bit stupid. It’s kind of cool but still, how big does your TV need to be? Do you need a hoist and crane to install it in your house?
Being OCD is the modern equivalent of being religious. In the middle ages one HAD to be religious or the authorities would hunt you down and kill you. Heretic! In our own times it’s consumerism that drives our religion. There are so many ways to drain our bank accounts, so many temptations that leap from our social media and TV to entice us as if with a sexual appetite.
UHOH! This is the new SEX! No wonder it’s so powerful! People will climb over one another to experience five minutes of pleasure. People do the same thing at a store sale. Climb over each other to save a dollar. Now I get it.
It’s not fair to market to obsessive compulsives, but there is no one else to whom the companies can market. This OCD, which I will now dub Exogenous OCD, or EOCD, has been created by the forces of modern civilization.
It is said by some Buddhists that Emptiness is the true nature of reality. Deep inside ourselves we are aware, and terrified, of this condition. We will do a lot to escape from Emptiness. There is a giant misunderstanding about this term, Emptiness. It isn’t Nothingness. It’s Everythingness pouring into Nothingness. Always and now.
The market will be aimed at obsessive compulsives no matter what else happens. There is nothing we can do about it. We are the obsessive compulsives we hope to protect.
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Mindfields: TV Addicts Anonymous
Posted: February 26, 2020 Filed under: Art's Visual Media Reviews, Commentary, Opinion, Television review, Writing | Tags: "You", Art Rosch, Arthur Rosch, Comedy, Fleabag, marketing, Mind Fields, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, remote control, TV, TV drama, Writing to be Read 3 Comments
There was a time when watching television would make people feel guilty…as if they had nothing better to do. I have something better to do. I can watch better quality TV instead of the ubiquitous TV crapola. These days we have choices in TV-Land. Sometimes my wife and I watch TV all day and all night. I admit to some exaggeration here. I don’t watch TV all day; not any more. There was a time when I was pretty unmotivated and I watched TV around the clock…and I felt guilty about it. Fortunately that time is passed. I watch TV judiciously, choosing carefully what I expose myself to. There are as many TV universes as there are significant demographics. There are ravening people who feast on Jerry Springer and gentle wine-drinking people who watch PBS-only docs and dramas. I fall somewhere towards the latter. My spouse is more broadminded; she helps me expand my range of experiences. She’s addicted to The Home Shopping Network. We are both addicted to shows about animals and veterinarians.
I’m a keen observer of TV-as-cultural phenomenon. It’s the most powerful thing in the world outside of the Hydrogen Bomb. Television has dominated our experiential landscape since the early fifties and never more so than today. We have emerged into a golden age for television. There’s immense variety, convenience, amazing quality and the television sets have become so smart that they require control like a rowdy drunk at a party. It took me days to figure out how our new device functions. I still haven’t conquered the remote control. I can talk to it and it often responds. I’d be screwed if I couldn’t talk to that thing. It wouldn’t surprise me, if, some day soon, the remote responds with something like “Hey, I’m busy, asshole. Try again later.” I would expect rudeness from a television device. After all, this is the thing that brought us “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.” Sometimes I hear my wife talking in the bedroom. Is she on the phone? No. She’s talking to the remote. Begging, pleading, bargaining with the remote.
We love to binge. That sets the tone of our lives. What will we binge tonight? It’s not easy to find binge-worthy stuff. Thank god for National Geographic, Netflix and Amazon Prime. Between Mrs. Maisel, Dr.Pol and Fleabag we have a good time. Fleabag is the work of actress/director/writer Phoebe Waller-Bridge. When we saw the last episode of Fleabag I shouted “Magnificent!” I don’t always offer such spontaneous accolades. Phoebe plays the character known only as Fleabag. She’s a fairly gorgeous creature in her gawky comical way. She’s maybe too tall, her nose is a little skewed, but these aspects are essential to her character. She would be boring if she had all the beauty conventions. The stories revolve around the Search For Love. Who isn’t searching? This quest is especially powerful in the young. It surges in women who are reaching a certain age, an age when their mothers are asking “When are you going to get married?” Fleabag is precisely that age and her obsessions are pulling her puppet strings. If she weren’t wryly self-aware she’d be suicidal. She is recovering from an awful trauma. Her best friend committed suicide over a breakup. She walked out into traffic and gave up her life. This grief haunts Fleabag and steels her determination to continue living. She too has ended a long relationship. Now she’s thrust into the world of men, those strange groping creatures who don’t understand women. Sound familiar? That’s US! The thing is, Phoebe/Fleabag is funny! Her wit is corrosive yet compassionate. When the two seasons were over we were gasping for more. Alas, Phoebe is moving into new productions. Watch her!
We binged on the two seasons of “You”. It’s gripping, but it’s also repugnant. In the beginning of the series the protagonist, Joe Goldberg, seems to be a likeable fellow. He develops into a monster as the tale unfolds. I’m holding back the spoilers here. The story hangs on Joe’s transformation into something sinister. His obsession is, again, Love. Or, more specifically, Women. The show gives us Joe’s thought processes. The narration is Joe’s self-talk and he has a one track mind.
I must remind my readers that I have a “writer’s rule” that I scrupulously observe. “Is this story worth telling?” I have three criteria that stories should encompass. They should be entertaining, insightful, and, if possible, inspiring. If they can’t reach the level of inspiration they should at least not leave us depressed. We get enough of that shit all around us. After watching every episode of “You” and being entertained, I still have mixed feelings as to whether or not we should have gone through the experience. There are plenty of shows about dark characters. Darkness is important to drama. It’s like death itself. Without death there would be no passion in life. All of life’s tensions and excitement are generated by the clash between light and dark. Is this oversimplified? Perhaps. I’m left with a slightly sour feeling about “You”. If I had eaten Joe Goldberg for dinner, I would have gas and diarrhea in the morning. Watch the series, by all means. It’s very good, well acted, well written…but I’ve warned you. Take some Pepto Bismol to bed, put it on your night table.
A Midwesterner by birth, Arthur Rosch migrated to the West Coast just in time to be a hippie but discovered that he was more connected to the Beatnik generation. He harkened back to an Old School world of jazz, poetry, painting and photography. In the Eighties he received Playboy Magazine’s Best Short Story Award for a comic view of a planet where there are six genders. The timing was not good. His life was falling apart as he struggled with addiction and depression. He experienced the reality of the streets for more than a decade. Putting himself back together was the defining experience of his life. It wasn’t easy. It did, however, nurture his literary soul. He has a passion for astronomy, photography, history, psychology and the weird puzzle of human experience. He is currently a certified Seniors Peer Counselor in Sonoma County, California. Come visit his blogs and photo sites. www.artrosch.com and http://bit.ly/2uyxZbv.
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“How I Sold 80,000 Books”: Advice Every Author Should Know
Posted: November 2, 2018 Filed under: Books, marketing, Nonfiction, Promotion, Writing, Writing Tips | Tags: Alinka Rudowska, book marketing, Book Promotion, Book Review, How I Sold 80000 Books, marketing 1 Comment
How I Sold 80,000 Books: Book Marketing for Authors (Self Publishing Through Amazon and Other Retailers), by Alinka Rutkowska offers authors valuable marketing tips coming from the business end of writing. Coming from a marketing background, Rutkowska shares tips on the art of successful book marketing, which might be applied to increase book sales and push the author’s name up on the bestseller’s listings.
Although the advice in How I Sold 80,000 Books is aimed mostly toward nonfiction works, Rutkowska claims it can easily be applied to works of fiction, too. The book takes readers through the author’s step-by-step marketing system, which she uses to sell her own books. She shares her secrets for producing a quality product that sells, talks about the best outlets through which to offer your books, discusses how to put the best price on your books, and effective ways to promote your books. Although every step may not be applicable by every author, they are all good, solid book marketing advice.
The valuable book marketing advice contained within may be why this book was a Readers’ Favorite Book Award winner, and why every author should add How I Sold 80,000 Books to their must read list. I will use much of the advice received from this book and I give it five quills.
Kaye Lynne Booth does honest book reviews on Writing to be Read in exchange for ARCs. Have a book you’d like reviewed? Contact Kaye at kayebooth(at)yahoo(dot)com.
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Halloween: Scary, but Fun
Posted: October 31, 2018 Filed under: Dark Fantasy, Dystopian, Fiction, Gothic, Horror, Paranormal, Reading, Speculative Fiction, Stories, Thriller | Tags: Dead Man's PArty, Facebook event, Ghost Stories, Halloween, horror, marketing, Scary stories, Short Fiction Leave a comment
People love to be scared, especially within a safe environment. That’s why the horror genre will always be popular. Sitting around trying to scare one another by telling ghost stories or urban legends is a passtime enjoyed and induldged by young and old alike. It’s one of the reasons Hallowen is a favorite holiday for many, with haunted houses and ghost stories and a monster around every corner.
But telling ghost stories to pass the time on a stormy night isn’t any type of new passtime. In fact, two hundred years ago, on a damp and dreary night, Mary Shelly’s Frankenstien was created on just such an occassion, when a challenge was issued to see who could invent the best scary story. Today’s monsters may be digitally enhanced, but we still enjoy sharing their stories, searching for an inkling of fear or a rush of adrenaline to get our hearts pumping.
That’s why I hope you’ll all drop in and join in the fun at the Sonoran Dawn’s Dead Man’s Party today on Facebook, where myself and other authors will be reading scary stories, playing games and holding giveaways. Many of the authors from the Dark Visions anthology, which I reviewed this past month, including Writng to be Read team member Jordan Elizabeth, and AtA panel member, Dan Alatorre, who compiled and produced the anthology which climbed up the ratings for best horror anthology rapidly following its release. I gave the anthology five quills and it is well worth the read. I’m excited to be reading a few of their stories for them, as well as my own The Haunting of Carrol’s Woods, and can’t wait to hear the audio recordings of the other’s stories, too. I hope you will join us. It may be scary, but it will be fun.
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So, How Do You Build a Reader Platform?
Posted: August 20, 2018 Filed under: Advertising, Books, Fiction, marketing, Nonfiction, Paranormal, Promotion, Reader Platform, Science Fiction, Western, Writing, Writing to be Read | Tags: book marketing, marketing, Reader Platform, Social Media Marketing Leave a comment
I’ve heard it asked if a reader platform is even necessary. So, let me ask you, as writers and authors, without readers what are we? Of course, we need to have a reader platform. All it is is a fan base equivilent, but it can make the difference between the success and the failure of our books. Without my readers, there would be no one to buy my books, read my books, recommend my books or review my books. So, how does one build a reader platform?
It’s a good question. And I’ve heard of many different methods of doing just that, and none of them require construction tools. Not even a screwdriver. All it takes is what we writers and authors do best: words, communication, contact.
I started out with this blog, Writing to be Read, and the number of subscribers is climbing as I work to improve the content. The thing is, there was no way for me to capture those subscriber emails or reach out to them. So, I created a monthly newsletter, and added a sign-up pop-up, offering a free e-book as a thank you for subscribing. If you sign up for the newsletter, you get a free e-copy of my paranormal mystery novelette, Hidden Secrets, which isn’t available anywhere else.
The trick is to get people to read your work in the first place. You can’t have a fan or a reader unless they have read something you’ve written and liked it. Nobody will follow you, or write a review, or join your reader group, if they haven’t first, read your book. One way to do that is to identify your target audience and promote to them, offering them all the reasons why they will like your work.
Another, and probably the most important, is to be sure your writing is fun and entertaining, if you’re writing fiction. With non-fiction, you need to make the subject matter interesting and present it well. And humor never hurts, no matter what you write. Even dark works can have dark humor. In short, whatever you are writing, make sure that it is quality writing. This should go without saying, but they won’t become your loyal readers if they can’t make it through the book due to the poor quality writing.
After all, a reader platform is really just a fan base of those who are interested in your work, and by finding them and adding them to your mailing list, you are effectively building a reader platform. With this method, I had a big initial burst of subscribers following the launch of a marketing campaign, then it tapered off to a slower rate of growth. My list is growing slowly, but I’m gaining a few new subscribers every month.
Other authors I know start Facebook reader groups or ask fans to join their street teams. I don’t know how well they work, but it seems there’s always activity happening in these groups and they seem to have lots of members. I would think you would have to have a solid fan base to pull ‘groupies’ from, so perhaps this is just an additional step, rather than an alternative method. Most of the authors I know who have street teams or Facebook reader groups, swear they don’t know what they’d do without them, relying on them to spread the word on new releases, post reviews on release day, find reviewers for their books, and/or show up for support at book events. These authors are harnessing the power of their readers and directing it to where it is needed most. And I’m thinking they might be on to something.
Part of the problem may be that I’m a multi-genre author. To date, I’ve published a western novel, Delilah; a paranormal mystery novelette, Hidden Secrets; and a science fiction time travel short story, Last Call. I’ve also had a dystopian short story and a crime romance short story published in anthologies, as well as shorts and poetry online. Western readers, science fiction readers and paranormal readers are not all included in the same crowd. I’m also eclectic in my reading habits, but most folks want to read only their preferred genres. Now how do I find readers that are so hard core they want to read everything I’ve published?
My answer is, I don’t. I’m finding that I must seek out readers for each one seperately and build a seperate reader platform for each one. The western readers who liked Delilah will be interested in the sequel, The Homecoming, when it’s finished, but they may not be interested in the books for my science fantasy Playground for the Gods series, when the first book is released. And many of my readers are authors themselves and they may be interested in the content on Writing to be Read, rather than any of my fiction works. When I look at it in this way, the task at hand seems to be enormous, the goal so far away. I’m not sure where to start, but I’m determined to find out.
I think a good start would be to find out which of my works the readers I already have are interested in, so I’ve added a genre question to the pop-up for the newsletter sign-up, so that I can place readers on different lists and then new subscribers can receive notifications concerning those works that they are interested in.
All of this marketing stuff is new to me and I’m learning as I go, so if you do sign-up for my monthly newsletter, I’d love it if you’d drop me an email and let me know how the whole sign-up process went, and what worked for you and what didn’t. After all, I’m smart enough to know that without you, my readers, I wouldn’t sell any books. I appreciate the fact that you stand by me. Let me hear form you at: kayebooth(at)yahoo(dot)com.
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Looking Back on 2017
Posted: December 29, 2017 Filed under: Books, Cover Art, Fiction, marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Self-Publishing, Writing, Writing Tips | Tags: Books, Delilah, Happy New Year, marketing, Relationship Add Vice, Stories, The Collapsar Directive, Writing, Writing to be Read Leave a comment
Every year at this time I look back and so a review of what was published on Writing to be Read and my writing life. 2017 has been pretty eventful for both me and Writing to be Read, so this year I’m particularly excited about this look back. But, I’m also excited to get out my crystal ball and warm up my psychic abilities as we take a look forward that comes as we start the new year, because I think there may be some exciting things in store.
There were so many things that happened for me in 2017. In April, my western novel, Delilah was published by Dusty Saddle Publishing, which of course, is exciting. Delilah hasn’t done too bad on sales, but it didn’t make the best seller list. It has received some really excellent reviews, and is rated with four stars on Amazon. Although it may not be a huge success, for me it was a hard earned accomplishment, but the reward came the day I received my first royalty check. Yep, I’ve got royalties. Isn’t that the final proof that I’m a writer, at last?
I do have folks inquiring about a second novel, and for those who are wondering, Book 2 is in the working. My crystal ball tells me that it will be published sometime in the coming year, only this book, I may publish myself and skip the publisher as middle man. I’m having a time getting the sales data, and what I do have makes it appears as if what sales I do have, have been the results of my own marketing efforts, so I’m not seeing the benefit of sharing my royalties with a publisher, when I can do about everything they have done for me. In addition, mid-year the rather generic cover the publisher provided for the book was replaced by a cover that fits the story better, done for me by Sonoran Dawn Studios, which I am much happier with.
In addition I had two short stories published in 2017 by Zombie Pirates Publishing. The first, “If You’re Happy and You Know It” came out on August 1, in their science fiction anthology The Collapsar Directive. The story is a futuristic dystopian tale with just a touch of humor, in a world where productivity is high, but you’re only allowed to be happy on the weekend. 
The second story, “The Devil Made Her Do It”, just came out the 15th of this month in their Crime Romance anthology, Relationship Add Vice. It’s a tale about the crazy things we do for love and a girl, Betty Lou Dutton, who leaves hereself open to be taken advantage of and ends up taking the rap. My fortune telling abilities see Zombie Pirates in my future for the coming year, as well. I submitted a little flash fiction story for consideration in their Full Metal Horror anthology. Wish me luck.
The really big thing that happened for me in 2017, or at least I think it’s big, is a landed an adjunct position teaching ENG102:Academic Writing at Western State Colorado University, my Alma Mater. Let me tell you, it has been a crazy ride. I got the position due to a last minute opening, when a scheduled lecturer was unable to teach for health reasons, which was unfortunate for the scheduled lecturer, but very fortunate for me. We got it all figured out and I was hired five days before classes started, so that’s how long I had to restructure both classes to be hybrid classes and figure out how to teach a method of writing I knew nothing about. It was a rocky start, and to be honest, I think I confused many of my students at first, because I was unsure myself, but as the semester moved forward, I gained more solid footing in the classroom, and the students began to figure it out, too. I have now successfully made it through a whole semester, teaching two hybrid courses and it feels great. I know I can do it and I have some experience teaching in a University setting, so I know there will be more teaching jobs in the coming year. My crystal ball is a little blurry in this area, but I know last minute stuff happens all the time, so who knows? Maybe I’ll end up back at Western.
As for Writing to be Read, I’ve had an exciting year there, too. At the beginning of the year, I my friend Robin Conley helped me do a total overhaul of the site, and in August my friend DL Mullan of Sonoran Dawn Studios helped to redesign it. The results are what you see here now, but they were a long time in coming. I’ve added my website right here on the blog and you can reach the different sections by clicking on the tabs across the top to learn about my published poetry and fiction, my westerns, my Playground for the Gods series, or Write it Right Editing. Writing to be Read also gained some great talent in 2017, Robin Conley with her Weekly and Monthly Writing Memos, and Jeff Bowles with his Pep Talks and his God Complex posts, and I am thankful for benefit of their content for the short time they were with me. Unfortunately, life carries folks in different directions and both of these fine writers are no longer able to share their expertise and wisdom with us and I don’t foresee them rejoining us in 2017.
What my crystal ball does show me, is that Writing to be Read has grown in readership over the past year, and I feel it is due to the great and consistant content posted not only by myself, but by Robin and Jeff, as well. Most recently, the content has been almost non-existant, because I’ve had to focus on the classroom and I’ve discovered grading essays takes a lot of time. I don’t think the drop in content from losing my team members or from my not having the time to devote that I should have hurt my numbers yet, but I do foresee such a possibility if the lack of content continues.
In this realm, my crystal ball shows me something very interesting. I see new members of the Writing to be Read team and really great content in the coming year. In fact, a call for action is going out with this post, right now. If you are a writer who feels you might have something to contribute and you’d like to be on the Writing to be Read team, I want to hear from you. Shoot me an email at kayebooth(at)yahoo(dot)com telling me what type of contribution you would like to make and how often you’d like to make it. I’m pretty flexible, so let’s talk.
In years past, I have given a rundown of all the posts throughout the year and which were viewed the most or which got the highest numbers of comments or likes, however that makes for a very lengthy, boring post, so this year I’m only giving you the most interesting facts. For instance, over the past year Writing to be Read has had viewers from the across the globe. The highest number of views coming from U.S., the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Ireland, India and Mexico. It’s top referrer is Facebook, which doesn’t really make me happy, since I’m kind of peeved at Facebook at the moment, but I’ll take my viewers wherever I can get them.
The month to receive the most views was July, with my interview with writer, poet and cover designer Dawn Leslie Mullan being the hightest viewed post. Next up was a “Pep Talk” from Jeff Bowles, “I Think We Need a Break”, and third highest was my post, “An Adventure in Social Media Marketing“. The post that received the most viewed over the whole year was my post titled, “How Do You Measure Success?” which I wrote after signing the contract for Delilah. The second highest views overall were received by “Ah! Sweet Rejection“, which I wrote, oddly enough, after recieving a rejection for Delilah. The third highest was Robin Conley’s “Weekly Writing Memo: Word Choice is Everything“.
Looking ahead to 2018, my crystal ball says it’s going to be a good year. I hope it’s right. I guess only time will tell. So until then…
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Book Marketing – What Works? (Part 4): Interview with author Tim Baker
Posted: September 25, 2017 Filed under: Books, Branding, Fiction, Interview, marketing, Promotion, Self-Publishing, Writing | Tags: Author Interview, Blind Dog Books, blindoggbooks, book marketing, Branding, marketing, promotion, Tim Baker 4 Comments
So far, in this Book Marketing – What Works? series, we’ve heard from speculative fiction author Cynthia Vespia in Part 1, who does all of her own marketing; taken a look at Mark Todd and Kym O’Connell Todd’s online marketing strategies in Part 2; and glimpsed the value of paid advertising with YA author Jordan Elizabeth in Part 3, whose street team was pivotal in getting reviews for her books. This week, we’ll take a look at branding with an author who has developed a brand of his own for his books, Tim Baker.
Tim and I have been acquainted for several years now. He’s a talented writer, whose books are fun and entertaining. I’ve reviewed most of his books at one time or another: Water Hazard, No Good Deed, Backseat to Justice, Full Circle, Pump It Up, Living the Dream, Eyewitness Blues, and Unfinished Business. Tim also weighed in on my Pros and Cons of Traditional vs. Independent vs. Self-Publishing series, where he heralded the advantages of self-publishing. Today he’ll talk a little about branding and about the effectiveness of free promotions.
Kaye: How long have you been writing and publishing your own books?
Tim: My first seven books were published by small press publishers. I decided to publish under my own brand (Blindogg Books) with the release of Full Circle in 2015. Since then I have released one other novel (Blood in the Water) and a collection of short stories (Path of a Bullet).
Kaye: You talk about creating your own brand. Of course, I knew about BlindoggBooks, but we hear about brands all the time. Can you elaborate and explain what it takes to create a brand, and what the advantages are with having your own brand?
Tim: I doubt that the way I created my brand is textbook, but here it is…
At some point between my first and second novel I thought it would be a good idea to have a website. My first attempt was rudimentary at best, but it served the purpose.
While creating it I decided I didn’t want to use my name as the headline. Several years earlier I had doodled an image of a dog wearing dark glasses (a blind dog – more on that story can be found here – https://blindoggbooks.wordpress.com/2012/08/14/is-your-dog-really-blind/ ). So from that point forward Blindogg Books became my brand name…the next step was getting it out there.
I put the doodle on everything…my website, my facebook page all of my social media accounts, book marks, and all sorts of paraphernalia which I would give away at signings and anywhere else I could.
Before long my blind dog was very popular and people recognized it – which I think is the desired result – right?!
As far as advantages, I guess I subconsciously followed the lead of many big name companies who have a recognizable logo. People may not always remember my name, but they always remember the blind dog!
As I’ve said before, my marketing tactics are strictly “learn as I go” – and so far it’s working for me, so I’ll just keep plugging along. I tweek things here and there, but I don’t see myself getting rid of my brand name.
Kaye: What made you decide to go with self-publishing?
Tim: There were two main reasons: Cost and Control.
Using a small press publisher is not free…and it’s usually not cheap. The cost of buying a batch of ISBNs and paying somebody to format the book for kindle and paperback saves me hundreds of dollars with each release.
Self publishing (I actually prefer the term independent publishing) also allows me to have much more control over when my book is released, etc.
Kaye: How many books have you published to date?
Tim: Nobody told me there would be math in this interview!!
So far I have published nine novels, one collection of short stories and two novellas. My tenth novel (24 Minutes) is scheduled to be released in the fall of 2017.
Kaye: What is the biggest challenge of being a writer today?
Tim: This is a tricky question, because it will vary from writer to writer…JK Rowlings’ biggest challenge is probably how to spend her money, while mine is trying to find enough time to write, publish and market my books while working a full time job and trying to have a social life.
Kaye: You’ve come up with some great titles. How do you decide the titles for your books? Where does the title come in the process for you?
Tim: I try to pick a title that does a few things at once…I want it to intrigue the potential reader (very important), I want it to fit the story without giving too much away, and I want it to be catchy. It isn’t always easy, and I usually go through more than one idea. The final title will usually come to me when I’m nearly done with the first draft – although there have been a couple of books where I had the title before I started writing (Full Circle and Backseat to Justice).
Kaye: Do you do any kind of free promotions, where you offer your books for free? If so, how does that work for you?
Tim: Yes. I often offer titles for free download (usually around the release of a new title in order to stimulate a little buzz for the new one) and they always work extremely well. I do giveaways on Goodreads, which also helps to get my name out there. I also give away paperbacks quite frequently. For the amount of money a paperback costs me (usually around $4) I find it’s highly effective to give one to a new reader…it almost always leads them to purchase other titles. We all know the value of word-of-mouth advertising, and giving somebody a free book (which, hopefully, they will enjoy) is a great way to get some. Of course it is much easier for me to give books away now that I have 13 titles under my belt. Back in the day, when I only had two or three, I didn’t feel as though it was as beneficial since I had to give away one book in order to get people to (possibly) buy the other two.
Kaye: Do you participate in KDP Select on Amazon? Do you feel this program is conducive to selling books?
Tim: Yes, I do. As to whether it is conducive to selling books, I really don’t know. KDP allows you to do giveaways, so in that respect the answer would be yes. However, once you sign on to KDP you agree not to sell your books on any other venues (other than live book signings and such) which is somewhat counterproductive as far as selling a larger quantity of books. In all honesty, even though I’ve been selling books for nearly ten years, I still don’t know what works best. If I did I’d have a yacht by now!
Kaye: What works best to sell books for you, as far as marketing goes?
Tim: I don’t think there is one method or specific act that works best…I believe the best marketing tactic is to be consistent, relentless and tenacious. Marketing (to me) isn’t a part time job – it’s a non-stop effort. I often tell people that for every hour I spend writing, I usually put in three or four marketing. This could involve anything from social media posts to handing out bookmarks. I’ve tried a thousand different things and it isn’t one or two of them that made a difference, it was the continual act of doing it.
Kaye: How much work do you contract out? Book Covers? Editing? Marketing? Etc…?
Tim: I contract editing, formatting and cover art. Marketing I do myself, because I have yet to find a so-called marketing expert who will either charge me based on the level of success of their campaign (e.g. work on commission) or give me some sort of a guarantee before I pay them. If you send me an email stating you are the latest and greatest book marketer – I think you ought to back it up, rather than back-pedal with inane statements like “Well, there are no guarantees in marketing.”
Kaye: What do you do for cover art? DIY, or hired out, or cookie cutter prefab?
Tim: I always contract it out, and for the most part I use one particular artist (I call her my cover girl!) I will gladly give her contact info to anybody interested.
Kaye: If writing suddenly made you rich and famous, what would you do?
Tim: I would;
- Quit my day job
- Buy a yacht
- Write more books
- Donate large sums of money to organizations that support human rights and animal rights
- Hire the surviving members of Led Zeppelin to play at my next birthday party.
(in that order!)
Kaye: What is the one thing in your writing career that is the most unusual or unique thing you’ve done so far?
Tim: Interesting question…After careful consideration I’d have to say that the most unusual thing I’ve done as a writer happened when I was writing my sixth novel, Unfinished Business. Research is part of an author’s life, to varying degrees, and my research for Unfinished Business was a bit unusual. The book is about a woman named Meg, a mortician who somehow inherits the task of carrying out the last thoughts of the bodies she embalms. In order to make the book as true to life as possible I interviewed a mortician friend of mine (whose name also happens to be Meg – coincidence? You decide!). So for over three hours I asked questions and learned more than I ever thought I would want to know about the preparation of corpses for funerals, and the life of a mortician.
I’d call that unusual and unique!
I want to thank Tim for joining us today to share his experiences and marketing advice. If you’d like to know more about Tim Baker or his books, check out his blindoggbooks blog, or visit his website, or his Goodreads author page. You can also find him on his Facebook Fan Page or Twitter: @blindoggbooks. Watch for my review of Tim’s latest book, 24 Minutes, which will be out the end of October or early November.
I hope you’ll join us next week, when we talk with romance author Amy Cecil, who launches her marketing strategies on social media and uses a P.A. and a street team in Part 5 of Book Marketing – What Works?.
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Book Marketing – What Works? (Part 1): Interview with fantasy author Cynthia Vespia
Posted: September 4, 2017 Filed under: Books, Cover Art, Dark Fantasy, Fantasy, Interview, marketing, Promotion, Speculative Fiction, Super Hero | Tags: book marketing, Cover Art, Cover Design, Cynthia Vespia, marketing, promotion, Social Media Marketing 4 Comments
Frequently I rant about the time I have to spend marketing and promoting my writing instead of actually writing. It’s no secret that marketing is not my favorite author hat to wear, and I know a lot of other authors who feel exactly the same way. But the fact is, in today’s writing industry, the author must carry most, if not all, of the load when it comes to promoting their work and marketing their masterpieces.
Now, I’m a struggling author, just as many of you are, so I don’t have a big marketing budget and I can’t afford to hire someone to do my marketing for me. My promotions are limited mainly to social media marketing, usually the kind that’s free. Even when I have a little money to put into marketing, I don’t really know what avenues would be effective enough to be worth it.
A lot of the information about book marketing that is out there on the Internet today is geared toward marketing your non-fiction book, whether it be self-help, or how-to, or even a cookbook. These articles tell you how to show potential readers why they need your book, how your book can help them, which is great, except most of their strategies do not apply to marketing fiction.
As a result of this discovery, I’ve been doing some research of my own into the matter, but I’ve found that the effectiveness of any marketing strategy depends on many factors, and results vary from author to author. In this eight part series, we’ll take a look at my findings and interview seven different authors to learn what they’ve found to be effective in marketing their own work. All work and no play makes us all very dull writers, so we’ll get to know a little about each one of them and their books just for fun.
It’s my pleasure today to interview speculative fiction author, Cynthia Vespia. I have review several of her books, including her Demon Hunter saga: The Chosen One & Seek and Destroy and Hero’s Call, Lucky Sevens, and Life, Death and Back. In addition to her great storytelling, Cynthia is also a talented cover artist, designing most of her own covers, as well as working freelance.
Kaye: Would you share the story of your own publishing journey?
Cynthia: Once upon a time I was a young mind hungry for books. I’d read Piers Anthony; C.S. Lewis; and comic books (my favorite being The Punisher). Then one day I stumbled upon a book by Dean Koontz called Intensity. To make a long story short it got me hooked and I knew then I wanted to write. My first novel, The Crescent, was written after seeing a documentary about female gladiators narrated by Lucy Lawless. I self-published it back when self-publishing wasn’t cool. It was fun to see my book in print. Flash forward to today and that same story is in pre-production as a feature film.
Along the road I’ve written several more books and short stories, each of which I’m very proud of. I received a Best Series nomination in 2009 for Demon Hunter.
Kaye: What made you decide to go with self-publishing?
Cynthia: I was published by small publishing houses but I never really saw any benefit when I could do the same things they were doing and they weren’t even really promoting me much. So much like a lot of other authors I’ve gone the indie route.
Kaye: As a fantasy writer, what kind of research do you find yourself doing for your stories?
Cynthia: Honestly, the majority of my work is completely created in my head. Recently the type of research I’ve been doing is for superpowers, modeling, and locations for the Silke Butters Superhero Series. And for my upcoming apocalypse trilogy there was a lot of research regarding weapons and safe-houses.
Kaye: What’s the most fun part of writing a novel or short story/screenplay? What’s the least fun part?
Cynthia: The most fun part of writing for me is in the initial creation of the characters and their backstory. It’s like a sculptor molding clay. You breathe life into your subjects.
The least fun part is in the aftermath which is marketing and promotion. It’s so difficult to posture yourself out in front of a very large crowd of other writers all clamoring for attention.
Kaye: What is the strangest inspiration for a story you’ve ever had?
Cynthia: Probably Sins and Virtues. I was at Alcatraz in SF and I went inside one of the prison cells for a photo. Afterwards, I felt a heavy cloak of energy from what I could only feel was a former prisoner’s spirit.
While writing Sins and Virtues I started to see visions of prison escapes that I had no business knowing about. If you read the first chapter you’ll get a taste of what I mean. That feeling stayed with me throughout the entire novel. It only left when I was done writing.
Kaye: What’s the best piece of advice you were ever given?
Cynthia: I’ve heard quite a bit of good advice over the years. I seek it out, and write it down in my journal. Lately, I’ve been falling back on one from Arnold Schwarzenegger where he said “earn it so nobody can say they gave you shit.”
Kaye: What do you see as the pros and cons of independent/traditional publishing?
Cynthia: Sadly, the pros and cons are one in the same in that everyone can publish a book. There’s a lot of good work being published that would probably never see the light of day due to the politics of traditional publishing, but at the same time I’ve seen a lot of awful books out there too.
The other things I’ve been noticing is that it’s no longer about the writing. It’s become a numbers game. How many FB followers or Twitter followers do you have? How many likes did you get? How many reviews did the novel receive? How large is your fan base?
I struggle with that because I don’t have the time to spend all day on social media when I have other things that take up my time like earning a living. There’s people now who are even cheating the system with paid “likes” etc. to bump themselves up into the top spot. To me, that’s not what writing should be about. It’s about the story, not how much attention you can get for yourself. Sorry if I’m coming off very negative but I’ve been doing this for a very long time and the business model has changed so much now that I hardly recognize why I started writing in the first place.
Kaye: What do you do for cover art? DIY, or hired out, or cookie cutter prefab?
Cynthia: I always do my own cover art. That is one of the beauties of going indie, you can have complete control over your cover. Although, I do have to point out that the comic book look of the Karma character in my Silke Butters series was done by an artist named Ka Rolding, whom you can find on Deviantart.
I also create covers for other authors too, so if you’re in need of a custom cover please look me up at http://www.cyncreativeservices.com/authorstudio
Kaye: What’s your favorite social media site for promotion? Why?
Cynthia: None…lol. I’d rather do a face-to-face event than spend time on social media promoting. But if I have to choose I like Twitter because it makes you think and be clever with your 140 characters. BTW, you’re all using hashtags wrong!
Kaye: How much non-writing work, (marketing & promotion, illustrations & book covers, etc…), do you do yourself for your books?
Cynthia: All of it! I’m a one woman show. It’s honestly extremely exhausting. Like I said, I just don’t have the time needed to put in to make a dent. I even bit the bullet and hired a couple people this year and it still didn’t make a difference. But I’m trying every day. That’s all you can do is try, right?
Kaye: You participate in book events on social media often. How effective do you see Facebook release parties and cover reveals, etc… being?
Cynthia: It depends on the crowd and your time slot. I’ve had some that were very active (including my launch party for Karma) and then others where nobody interacted at all, or not until later on. I find them effective for exposure. I’ve actually gained quite a few new FB friends from events so I’ll continue to do them. But I will suggest going in with a game plan and do some interactive posts, don’t just ramble on about how your book is for sale.
Kaye: What works best to sell books for you, as far as marketing goes?
Cynthia: For me, I like face-to-face conventions. Because of the genre I write in I can easily blend into comic cons. I liken it to an actor doing a stage play over doing a movie. In that regard, they get immediate audience reaction when they are doing a play, rather than waiting for box office receipts from a movie. The same can be said about conventions. I get an immediate reaction from readers (some have even come back the next day to compliment my work) where as stuff online I don’t really see what is working and what isn’t. Also, during conventions I keep a tally on how many books are selling and my 2009 Best Series nominee Demon Hunter is still the biggest seller.
Kaye: Why do you think some authors sell well and others don’t?
Cynthia: Again, it’s all who you know. And a lot of that comes from great networking. There’s something to be said for word-of-mouth. I also believe some genres sell better than others, that’s just the way it goes.
Kaye: Which author, dead or alive, would you love to have lunch with?
Cynthia: J.K. Rowling or George RR Martin. I’m fascinated by the amount of detail they’ve both put into their respective worlds of Harry Potter and Game of Thrones.
Kaye: What kind of Chinese food do you order all the time?
Cynthia: I don’t always eat Chinese food but when I do I prefer orange chicken and lo mein.
I want to thank Cynthia Vespia for joining us and for sharing her marketing strategies with us. If you’d like to learn more about Cynthia, check out her author profile, here on Writing to be Read, or check out her website.
Be sure to catch Writing to be Read next Monday, for Part 2 of Book Marketing – What Works?, where I will interview the co-authors of the Silverville Saga books and Wild West Ghosts, Mark Todd and Kym O’Connell Todd, who will share their experiences in marketing and clue us in to which ones have been most effective.
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Mind Fields – Why Do We Pick On Ourselves?
Posted: April 1, 2022 | Author: artrosch | Filed under: Commentary, Mind Fields, Opinion | Tags: Arthur Rosch, marketing, Mind Fields, Social Commentary, The Human Condition, Writing to be Read | 3 CommentsWhy Do We Always Pick On Ourselves
from Mind Fields at writingtoberead.com
Americans pick on themselves. We do it constantly, relentlessly, awake, asleep, we pick on ourselves about everything. It’s as if a perfectionist mother–in-law sits inside our heads on a platform at the very center of our thoughts and points here and there, hectoring us with criticisms.
“You know you could lose a few pounds,” she will say. She points with a drooping finger. “You’re getting heavy.” Her eyes narrow and she leans forward. “What’s wrong with your face? Is that a zit? How could you have a zit at your age? Your pores are kind of large, too. Speaking of age, wow, It really shows you’re getting over the hill.! I see wrinkles at the sides of your mouth and eyes. And that big one in the middle of your forehead, wow.”
Her elbow rests in her left hand while she taps her cheek with the right index finger. “Who could love a mess like you? Who buys your clothes, a retarded pygmy? My god, where did you get those awful shoes?”
Her inspection continues with a glare all up and down the length of me. “Who does your hair”, she rasps, “a baboon? Get another stylist before it’s too late. The damage that’s being done, what a shame, a real shonda. Your hair is thinning out too, a little bit day by day. You’re getting a pot belly! Ever think of wearing something, a brace, maybe?” She sits in a rocker and lights a cigarette. “I have a skin cream that I can recommend. You’re at that age where it loses its elasticity.”
I’m quivering with shock now but determined to let her have her say. “Your teeth are a little funny. Has anyone ever suggested cosmetic dentistry?”
Pick pick pick, pick pick pick. Am I wrong? Have I overstated the case?
She never stops, this critical demon of the shadows. She is a product of decades of indoctrination. I only say “She” because I had a terrible mother. I’m still pissed off about that.
“I should remind you” she says inside my head, “to get your cholesterol checked. It can happen; any second it can happen, bam! and you keep over.You’re dead! Then what happens to your family? Do you have a good lawyer? My brother in law knows one. And his cousin’s a doctor! Have you checked your prostate lately? I hear there’s a new medication for that. There’s a pill for everything these days, just watch sixty minutes. I mean the commercials, not the show. There’s a pill that’ll help you stop smoking if you survive the side effects. I love the medications where one of the side effects is ‘diminished semen’. What does that mean? What kind of pill can have ‘diminished semen’ as a side effect? Isn’t that the scariest thing a man can hear, short of ‘penis may wither and fall off?’ Loss of semen really means having crappy sex, doesn’t it? So why don’t they say, ‘may have brief weak orgasms’?”
This yapping harridan, this carping abusive inner voice, how did it get inside our heads? Let’s make it simple. First there’s television. There are a lot of good things about television, it’s not the monolithic purveyor of propaganda it might be in some other countries. Still, it hauls a freight train of psychological toxins every second of every day, no matter if the sound is on, whether or not you’ve blocked the commercials. It doesn’t matter. The marketers behind television are so sophisticated that we don’t have to turn on the device to be contaminated. In our society, television has become a self-referential culture, the subject of billions of conversations. It has moved into our thoughts and taken residence, permanently.
After TV there’s movies, the internet, magazines, newspapers, radio, you can’t escape marketing anywhere, not even in an airport restroom.
We barely live real lives any more. We talk about fictional characters whose lives are infinitely more exciting than ours and whose dangers are far beyond anything we would ever permit ourselves to face.
It would be interesting to snatch someone from the past and have this person witness our marketing techniques. Show a Viagra or Cialis commercial. What if we brought someone from the Victorian era, from around 1895, and showed commercials for keeping your thing hard? Every ten minutes another commercial showing a man of about fifty with a woman of about thirty eight, snuggling together, holding hands, watching the sun set. We would have to explain the nature of this product to the viewer. Without the warning “see a doctor if erection lasts more then four hours” there is nothing to indicate what this product does, what’s it’s for. When we explain it to our time traveler, what will this person think about our culture? How embarrassed would he or she be, how shocked at the impropriety?
Well, sure, they were prudes. Their repression caused them vast inner conflicts, but I would speculate it added an extra thrilling dimension to sex. It seems that when we started discussing our president’s blow jobs on the public airwaves, some line was crossed, some basic decency and sense of proportion was jettisoned off the side of our big ocean liner of a culture. Sex also got a little bit more ordinary, a bit more like costume jewelry.
I digress, I was talking about how we pick on ourselves. It’s stupidly obvious. It’s about getting us to spend money. The entire purpose of marketing is to manipulate our desires. The basic technique is to infect us with feelings of inadequacy. Then we are bombarded with glittering images of things we’re led to believe will make us feel better. If we feel bad enough we’ll go out and buy some ridiculous cream, or pill, or car, or hair weave, or something that makes no sense at all, we’ll just go buy anything, walk into Walmart with our credit cards and shop, as an anesthetic. We’ll be perfect consumers, depressed, dazed automatons piling up debt. Glassy eyed, we walk the aisles of the stores, pace the infinite mallways without destination until we find ourselves back home with bags full of junk. How did all this crap appear in our houses? I don’t remember buying an eighty eight inch Super High Definition TV set with a quadruple-woofer ten speaker sound system with Dolby nine point two noise reduction software.
We’ve been had. We’re nuts. We pick on ourselves because all our role models are distortions that are dissonant with real life. We don’t see authentic people in the movies or on TV. We see heroes who can kill a dozen trained hyenas by throwing wooden chopsticks from fifty feet. We are not encouraged to admire people who aren’t particularly beautiful, rich or talented. We aren’t given strength of character as a yardstick of true heroism. It isn’t enough to be an ordinary person anymore, we have to be some carefully crafted mannequin, with no missing teeth, no bad habits. We’re going to live to a hundred and fifty in perfect health, glowing and radiant, with a beautiful partner by our side. There won’t be any old age, slow decay, debility, nothing like that because the inner witch-voice won’t allow us to relax and be human, be ordinary and obey the laws of nature even when they take our youth and beauty.
Isn’t that the primary mechanism of marketing? To raise dissatisfaction to a level where we’ll do anything to “better” ourselves in the form of consuming whatever’s consumable to get a buzz for a few minutes or hours?
Pick pick pick, we’ve learned to pick on ourselves without mercy. Go ahead, take a look at yourself in the mirror! Do you like what you see? Have you been taught to accept yourself with all your flawed genes and pathological behaviors?
Can you accept and love yourself as the unique creation that you are?
Of course not. There’s no money in love.
Not yet.
Arthur Rosch is a novelist, musician, photographer and poet. His works are funny, memorable and often compelling. One reviewer said “He’s wicked and feisty, but when he gets you by the guts, he never lets go.” Listeners to his music have compared him to Frank Zappa, Tom Waits, Randy Newman or Mose Allison. These comparisons are flattering but deceptive. Rosch is a stylist, a complete original. His material ranges from sly wit to gripping political commentary.
Arthur was born in the heart of Illinois and grew up in the western suburbs of St. Louis. In his teens he discovered his creative potential while hoping to please a girl. Though she left the scene, Arthur’s creativity stayed behind. In his early twenties he moved to San Francisco and took part in the thriving arts scene. His first literary sale was to Playboy Magazine. The piece went on to receive Playboy’s “Best Story of the Year” award. Arthur also has writing credits in Exquisite Corpse, Shutterbug, eDigital, and Cat Fancy Magazine. He has written five novels, a memoir and a large collection of poetry. His autobiographical novel, Confessions Of An Honest Man won the Honorable Mention award from Writer’s Digest in 2016.
More of his work can be found at www.artrosch.com
Photos at https://500px.com/p/artsdigiphoto?view=photos
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