More Writers Tools

I hadn’t really decided what I was going to write about today when I began preparations for Tuesday’s critique evening. I had been really slow this week in getting it together to write anything coherent on my current work in progress when I realized I needed to do a little research. Along the way to finding the ultimate restaurant in the Edinburgh, Scotland area, I stumbled across a couple of great websites I thought all of you should know about.

First up is the blog for Harlequin Blaze located at http://blazeauthors.com/blog/. Here you will find items from authors, special story themes and items from the editors themselves. There are also humorous stories from the authors which had me entertained for a while. So, if you are looking to write for Blaze this is the place to be. Occasionally, they give away critiques and hold contests for a chance with an editor.

Next up is an amazing set of podcasts located at http://www.podfeed.net/podcast/Harlequin+Meet+the+Editors/13708# . I didn’t know that all the editors at Harlequin did these in order to better clarify their positions on submitting to them and acceptance by them. They are done very well and with eighteen podcasts, there is sure to be something right up your alley.

Another great site is one called Romance University at http://romanceuniversity.org/and what caught my eye here was the column about men done by a male psychologist. The first one I read was about how guys really interact with each other and women as well as how men open up to each other. After reading that column, I better understood why my DH had said to me on numerous occasions when we talked books, ‘Honey, guys really don’t act that way.’ Now I understand why. There is tons of good information on this site gals!

Next came Maggie Lawson’s website at http://www.margielawson.com/ and again, I was surprised at exactly what she had there. This woman is a NYC bestselling author yet she finds time to hold classes, puts those class notes and exercises in notes so those who can’t afford actually attending one of her workshops in person can take it like a self study type of workshop. Now some of the classes may not help me, but there is still lots of good information.

These were the best in my opinion but here’s a list of even more good websites with very brief explanations on what they are:

http://paranormalromanceblog.com/ - This is Harlequin’s Paranormal blog. Lots of interesting articles, author interviews and author ramblings.

http://www.romance-ffp.com/ - This is the official website of RWA Futuristic, Fantasy and Paranormal chapter commonly known as FF&P. Great information so join when you can.

http://translation2.paralink.com/ - This is a free translation website. Good for if you are trying to translate something. We used it for Russian to English and were pleasantly surprised.

http://www.etymonline.com/ - This is a free etymology dictionary and was given to me by another author friend. You can look up anything here. And I mean anything.

http://paranormalityuniverse.blogspot.com/ - Paranormalty is an interesting mix of authors and industry professionals again in the paranormal field but isn’t bound by one publisher.

http://fierceromance.blogspot.com/ - Fierce Romance talks about the kinky side of romance including BDSM so if you don’t know much about it, this is where you can find out.

http://www.scifiguy.ca is a very interesting review site which talks about the industry of sci-fi and sci-fi romance as well as the books themselves. You can win all sorts of freebies here.

Now, I know there are tons of good places out there to learn things but very few have been as thoroughly checked out as these have been. Goes to show you just what can happen when one is bored...LOL!

Now for the fun stuff!

Celebrate my new novel, More Than Robotics and get me on the best seller list for September by purchasing it TODAY.

From now until mid-October I am also giving away one copy of a previously released elf book, newest to oldest, in anticipation of this year's Christmas release, An Elf's Love. The giveaway book this coming week is The Thing About Elves!!! Also, I will be giving a copy of the first book in my Orchid series, Fluke, to the first person who comments today only! And don't forget to leave me your email addy in today's comment so I can get you your book! It's another double-whammy week as you have the chance to win TWO FREE eBooks!!! One now...one later!

I know you’ll love both these series as much as I love writing it! Enjoy getting ready for Christmas AND a space ride during the month of September!

All you need to do to be entered is to just comment on my blog, The Many Shades at www.themanyshades.blogspot.com to get into the weekly drawing. Every Wednesday is my day to post here and the contest runs from then till midnight Tuesday for the weekly portion. So come see about all the wonderful promotion opportunities I'm offer fellow authors AND the planned giveaways for all readers out there.

Hope to see you there!

Just to get you even more excited about these FREE giveaways, here's list of the previous winners! See...people really do win...and are enjoying their books right now. This could be YOU!

August Giveaway SiNn
9/2/2009 Annalisa
9/9/2009 quilting reader
9/16/2009 Susan [garysue@dejazzd.com]
9/23/2009 Laura Beck
9/29/2009 Gwynlyn MacKenzie

Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you all next week!

Lynn

Interesting Author Tools

I'm on my new machine and don't have any pictures except cover art...and isn't it a wonderful cover? Yeah, I'm on the elf track again. I'll talk more about this is July...

This week when trying to decide what I would write, I ran across some interesting things for writers. Some of these you all may know and some you might not.

The first is a place called Tiny Url. The website for this is http://www.blogger.com/www.tinyurl.com and it does something miraculous. It takes a large url, like the purchase link for one of your books, and makes it small. So basically, you go from this

http://www.extasybooks.net/ebjmsite/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=ebook_flypage&product_id=5045&category_id=31&manufacturer_id=65&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=44

to this

http://tinyurl.com/AnElfsMagic

with very little effort. The page is self explanatory and these tiny urls can be book specific. This looks more polished and professional in my opinion. I use these in all my promo now and it does look much better.

Last week I had talked about promotion and given you a yahoogroup to join, so you would get pinged every day about promoting. This week, I'm going to give you a list of links where promotion is welcome. On these lists, you can promote anything. You should check them out.

An Alternative Read http://groups.yahoo.com/group/An_Alternative_Read/

Cupids Library Reviews http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cupidslibraryreviews/

ebook Chatters http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ebookChatters/

Hot Romance Readers http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HotRomanceReaders/

Infinite Possibilities http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Infinite_Possibilities/

Moonlight Fantasy http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Moonlight_Fantasy/

Don't forget to check to see if they have any posting rules. Most groups have but they are easy to follow. These are but a few on my list which ranges between 80-300 groups. Do I belong to them all? No, I don't but I go regularly to check them out and see if they are offering author days. It never hurts to just join then change the email to special notices only. That way you're there and will only have to make a minor change to become a regular again. And there are always giveaways on these groups. Nothing wrong with some free books for any of us.

Another thing you all may have run across are book trailers. I have been asked many times whether you need one or not. I'm not sure if an author does but I can tell you it does generate interest. Take a look at one of my trailers and see what you think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMsz9fmy9ls

Now what is amazing about this video is two things. One is that it has been viewed 2,136 times. To this day, I get people emailing me and asking about this video. It's a little long but nicely put together even if there is an error in it that no one caught. LOL! Oh, well, it didn't distract anyone at all since no one pointed it out.

The reason the error was never changed is that making a video is time intensive and I had moved on by the time I noticed it. Still, videos are a great way to get the word out about your books.

That's all on the promo front this week. I wish you all luck in getting the word out about your books. Drop me a line and let me know.

More on epublishing and RWA: the epublishing dilemma has been heating up over at RWAchange. The group is renaming itself in order to not violate any RWA edict on use of the name as well as to better define what they are about. The new name will be Romance Writers for Change with a completely new website and yahoogroups. There is still a lot of misinformation floating around out there, so I suggest that all of you read everything carefully before you decide which side of the fence you'll end up on.

One of the best articles I've read this week really hits the nail on the head, so to speak and I think you'll see the truth of this blog. The link is http://www.blogger.com/www.theresameyers.com/blog/ and the author, Theresa Myers, is a long time RWA member. Very interesting to see another's perspective. And look under June 25th if the blog doesn't come up correctly as the software is new and while it's the same, there are some new features which I'm not sure I quite have down yet. LOL!

Next week I'll be gone to Idaho but plan to have something up. I'm not sure if it will be pictures or a travel log but it will be something. Then I'm off to visit a friend in Canada. She lives north of Vancouver and I can't wait to go. I'll keep you all posted.

One final thing...the winner of my summer pack is...drumroll please: Debby Creager (cleo@hbeark.com). Debby, I will be emailing you this weekend for your snail mail addy. And I want to thank all of you for participating. I'll be having another contest in late August for the release of my next elf book, Giselle's Elf, coming out August 1.

Until next time...hope you have a great week!

Lynn