Day 43: Writers, are you getting ripped off

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 43: Writers, are you getting ripped off

This might be of interest to self-published writers everywhere.

Have you noticed that your sales are down? Mine are. For a while I did fairly well, I was by no means competition for James Patterson, but there was a steady flow of sales.

Then suddenly, I noticed a decrease. At first, I thought it was because of summer. People are more likely to do some gardening, go swimming, or get together with family and friends when the sun is shining rather than curling up with a book.

As I found out a few days ago, it’s wasn’t the sun who was to blame for my lack of sales, but several pirate sites. One of these sites is Lucentfun.com https://signup.lucentfun.com

Lucentfun and other pirate sites offer free download of books. Mine are all there. Other sites have my books as well.

I wasted no time. I contacted several of these pirate sites and threatened them with legal action if my books weren't taken down immediately. How much effect this will have, I don’t know. Maybe they will take the books down, maybe they won’t. Maybe they will take them down and later put them back up again.

Lucentfun claims that all books are free, but anyone who wants the read anything has to sign up with their site and provide credit card information.

How do I know of these pirate sites ... because I’m subscribed to Google alert. Anytime any of these pirate sites offers my books for free, I get a notification.

If they were to offer only the books of well-known authors, I wouldn’t care as much. Authors such as James Patterson, Stephen King, Dan Brown or Danielle Steel sell millions of books and probably won’t care if someone offers free copies of their work. What do they care about a dollar or two? For self-published writers though, they do care.

Not only do I care about lost income, but I also care about my books’ Amazon ranking. If someone buys a book, the book goes up in ranking and make no mistake, readers do care about ranking, especially if it’s a book by an unknown writer/author.

I have a few favorite authors and when any of them releases a new book, I don’t care about the ranking. I know the story will be good. However, when none of my favorites have anything on offer, I go looking for something else. That’s when I do care about the ranking, the stars awarded and the readers’ reviews.

Not that the reviews are always to be trusted, after all, what’s good for the goose is not necessarily good for the gander. Reviews are up to a certain point valuable though. If I read a review that rates the book ‘absolute rubbish’ or ‘a complete waste of time’ I’m not likely to buy it.

So, not only do these pirate sites rob self-published writers from their royalties, they also rob them from potential reviews.

Day 1: Resolutions

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 1: Resolutions

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Fred, my new laptop. Together we’ll try to bring you daily stories. I do say ‘try’ because I might be busy, tired or just have nothing to say.

For a while I had a project going named ‘365 Creative Writing Prompts’ but there was nothing creative about it. To me, creative writing is fictional, and my posts were anything but. So, I’ve said goodbye to that project and I’m starting something new. This new project is called ‘Between you, me and the lamppost’ but that can change. If you can think of something better, I’m all ears.

Anyway, getting a new computer seemed like the perfect time to start a new project and along with this new machine come three resolutions.

First resolution:

I said goodbye to social media. That mainly means I will no longer look at the home feed of Facebook. I will occasionally post something and still play Bingo and Gin Rummy, but I will no longer look at what other people post. Why? Because I’ve had it with seeing pictures of animal abuse.

Whether it’s a cat or a dog, a bunny or a horse, seeing animal abuse makes me so mad I could throw my computer across the room. So, for the sake of my laptop, I rather don’t look anymore.

Second Resolution:

I’m letting go of the past. For far too long events of the past have dragged me down and giving me sleepless nights. Well, no more. From now on, when memories haunt me, I’m going to push them away, I’m done with them. As someone told me ... Visualize an open box, put memories into that box, close it, put the box in a safe and lock the safe. This is my way of locking away those memories.

Third Resolution:

Recently I started a new manuscript and I intend to work on it every day. In the past, my manuscripts have gathered dust and I eventually abandoned them. Starting a new story is easy, but keeping the story going is a lot harder than some people think.

That’s not the only reason I got discouraged with writing though.

Many years ago, self-publishing was a respected business. Proof of that is John Grisham who self-published his first book ‘A Time to Kill’ and was consequently contracted by a mainstream publishing house.

Ever since that success everyone and his auntie have been self-publishing books. Some are good, some are bad, some are downright ridiculous. I read of a woman who’s 6-year-old son published a ‘book’. The book in question counted only 5 pages. 

Fact is, with so many people publishing their works, self-publishing has lost its value. More than that, self-publishing has gained a bad reputation. Far too many people when they see that a book is self-published withdraw and move on to something else.

Still, I won’t let this get me down. I’ve started a new manuscript, the first 18 chapters are done in the first draft, and I fully intent to keep going.

In conclusion … I’ll try to post something every day, but I can’t guarantee it. Some post will be funny, some venting about this or that, some will be animal stories and with some, you might laugh out loud.

Don’t miss out. Near the top of the page, you'll see 'Follow by email', fill in your email address and have updates delivered right to your inbox. Thank you for reading.

Day 164: Why is it so hard for self-published writers to accept advice?

Just about every writer is familiar with John Grisham’s story. He wrote ‘A Time to Kill’ in 1988, when he couldn’t find a literary agent or publisher he self-published his work and sold the books from the booth of her car. In due time he was discovered and contracted by a mainstream publisher and … the rest is history.

Ever since Grisham’s success everyone and his uncle has gotten it into their head to write a book too. But as Christopher Hitchens said “Everyone has a book in them, and that’s where it should stay.”

Over the years it has transpired that some people have an obvious talent for telling stories, while others should have taken Hitchens words to heart and never put pen to paper (or their fingers to a keyboard).

Not only do those people have no idea what writing is all about, but their spelling and grammar is so atrocious that their writing efforts become laughable.

I recently came across one such individual (lets call her Lesley) and while I tried to remain polite, she lashed out at me with vitriolic expressions. Other than her hurtful words she stated that unlike me she was not raised in the English language.

I had news for Lesley; my mother tongue isn’t English either. I was born and raised in Belgium and I didn’t learn English at school but from TV, watching Dallas, Dynasty and other shows. Around the same time, I started buying English newspapers and magazines, thus learning the spelling and grammar of this new language.

Later still, I joined a writing site, and met a lady who lived in Las Vegas. We started corresponding and she offered to edit my articles before sending them to the publisher. As it turned out, my English wasn’t as good as I thought it was. She pointed out spelling mistakes such as: there/their – advice/advise – affect/effect – bear/bare – stationery/stationary – isle/aisle, etc.

If I had been like Lesley I might never have learned the finer points of the English language. I didn’t take offence when she corrected me, on the contrary, I appreciate the help and made notes.

Some will say that it doesn’t matter how a story is written. If the publisher sees dollar signs he will give the manuscript to an editor who will work his magic on it. Just look at ’50 Shades of … rubbish’. A worse story was never written, but the author had contacts in the publishing industry and whoever took on the project knew that the book would sell because … sex sells.

Anyway, back to Lesley … I had a look at her profile on Facebook and is it turns out, Lesley isn’t even a writer. She joined several writing sites on Facebook without any credentials. She hasn’t written a book, she hasn’t even written a story. Judging by her profile her aim is to sell merchandise and to find a boyfriend.

All her profile consists of are selfies in various poses in various stages of undress. Not that Lesley is a beauty, she’s quite ordinary looking is not a little slutty.

Anyway, I tried to help her, but my help was not wanted. Which is strange because, open any mainstream published book and you will find a section where the author profusely thanks the editor for his/her help. If respected authors can accept help, why can’t self-published writers?

Day 125: Attention all self-published authors

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 125: Attention all self-published authors

Some self-published writers like to brag about their sales, some are happy with a sale here and there, while some are not happy at all and ask for help how they can effectively market their work.

I used to do okay in sales. Nothing to brag about, but a steady flow of book sales. And then suddenly, nothing. The sales all but dried up. When I looked in March at my February statement there were no sales.

Now it so happened that in January we adopted a kitten from the Toronto Cat Rescue and I stayed in touch with its foster mom, Jackie.

During one of our email conversations, I mentioned that I was a writer, that I had written three novels and two children’s books and Jackie promptly ordered copies of ‘Kitten Diaries’ and ‘Debbie’ for her grandchildren.

Jackie had purchased the books in February, yet my Amazon statement said that there had been no sales in February. I waited until April, expecting the sales to show up in the March statement, but that was not the case.

I got in touch with Amazon and they promised to investigate the matter. After a few days, I received an email from Ana who stated that no sales were documented. I told her that I had proof of sales. She asked if she could see that proof. I emailed her a copy and she sent me the following response ...

"CreateSpace Member Services"	Fri, Jun 29, 2:37 PM (8 days ago)
to me

Hello Conny,

Greetings from CreateSpace.

Thank you very much fort contacting us back with additional information. This is very helpful as it assists us with the investigation. 

I have now forwarded the investigation to a representative who is best equipped to answer your question. You should receive a response within one business day. I really appreciate your patience.

When I didn’t hear back from Ana I sent a follow-up email … how did the investigation go? I received no response. I sent a second follow-up email and again, no response.

This got me thinking … how many self-published authors are there who don’t have a clue about their book sales? If they order their own books or someone they know places an order, they know of those sales, but how many more sales are made they are unaware of? They have no way of knowing if someone bought their books or not.

I was lucky that I knew Jackie, and she was willing to share proof of sale with me, but how many self-published authors are out there not knowing anything about their book sales. This could be a scam amounting to millions of dollars.

That’s not all though. Another reason why my sales are down is that my books show up on a number of websites that offers free downloads. ‘Waiting for Silverbird’, ‘Voice of an Angel’, ‘Lily’, ‘Kitten Diaries’ and ‘Debbie’ are all there.

I know about this because I get Google alerts similar to this one:

Conny Manero As-it-happens update ⋅ June 29, 2018
	WEB
	ntg.ebook google.com There was a problem loading more pages. [ntg.ebook] Debbie Conny Manero Free Download.pdf. [ntg.ebook] Debbie Conny Manero Free Download.

Book Descriptions:

Debbie the ferret lives in a pet store. One day, a man named Andrew takes her home. He shows her around the condo and then introduces her to Charlie, the cat. Debbie is terrified, but soon she and Charlie become good friends, and Charlie teaches her about—everything! Come, let Debbie tell you all about ferrets and how they live and read about all her adventures!

How it works:

·         1. Register a free 1 month Trial Account.

·         2. Download as many books as you like (Personal use)

·         3. Cancel the membership at any time if not satisfied.

It's no wonder my sales are down. Amazon is hiding sales and various pirate sales are offering free downloads. 

Has something similar happened to you? 

www.connymanero.weebly.com

Day 81: Scam targeting self-published authors

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts

Day 81: Scam targeting self-published authors

If there’s one thing I hate it is scammers, particularly those who target self-published authors as they are such easy prey. They are looking for exposure leading to sales and scammers zoom in on this.

The other day, I received an email from Aimee A. stating:

 “I hope you do not mind me emailing you; I am emailing you because I would love to review your work on my website. My site is a book reviewing website which has received a great response from readers and now that I have a loyal following who I adore, I am always on the lookout for great books I can feature for them. I discovered your work and I loved what I saw, so that is why I am emailing you today! Your work looks wonderful, and you clearly are passionate; passion is a quality I love because I am very passionate about reading so I hope we are able to work together”.

My guess is that Aimee never read or even seen my work and that a few hundred other writers have received the same message.

Having been around the block a few times, I can smell a scam a mile away and so I cut right to the chase. I asked her how much she is charging. Her response … $75 per book. Her excuse is that she charges this fee because her reviews generate sales. She added that she is a mother of four.

I don’t know what this has to do with the price of eggs. Whether she’s single, married or a mother of a dozen, that’s none of my business and it is certainly not going to influence my decision whether or not to work with her. It was her decision to have four kids and she shouldn't ask others for support to feed and clothe them.

Other self-published authors may not be so wary though and actually believe the nonsense this woman is selling. I had a look at her website and there are indeed a number of books there, mainly mainstream published and yes, they have a good deal of comments. There are also a few self-published works (obviously self-published authors have already fallen for her scam) but they have no comments at all.

Most noticeable is that the mainstream books have quite a long review, too long if you ask me. The book isn’t just reviewed it is summarized. The self-published books on the other hand only have a rather short review, like Aimee couldn’t be bothered with them.

What I do wonder about is … where does she get the time to read all these books? I know a few women with one or two children and their main complaint is that they no longer have time for themselves. They have a husband and their kid(s) to look after, a house to keep clean, laundry to do, shopping to do, meals to cook, etc.

My guess is that Aimee doesn’t actually read any of the books she features on her website, but goes on Amazon, reads the synopsis of the book and a few comments and then elaborates on what she’s read. Also known as creative thumb sucking. 

And for that, she charges $75. Not a fortune, but if ten people fall for her scam that’s a nice sum for her.

I very much suspect that she hasn’t read any of my books, so how can she review them? The email that she sent me is clearly generic and not well written. You would think that for someone who reviews books for a living, her grammar and sentence structure would be better.

Fortunately, I’m not dumb enough to fall for her scam and neither should you. Be on the lookout for someone called Aimee A. and when she contacts you via email or Facebook, and tries to sweet talk you, send her packing. She's a scammer.

www.connymanero.weebly.com

Day 18: Writing – Is self-publishing a good idea?

My Project: 365 Creative Writing Prompts Write something about writing

Day 18: Writing – Is self-publishing a good idea?

Writers are notorious procrastinators. When an idea for a novel is shiny and new they are filled with enthusiasm and scribble (or type) with fire in their hearts and in their fingers, but as time marches on and chapters fail to materialize they’ll use any excuse not to write.

It’s too cold, it’s too hot, they’re tired from working all day, the house needs cleaning, the lawn needs mowing ... you name it and they’ll use it.

Some of them, with every intention to write, sit down and fire up their computer only to stare at the screen or keyboard. From there they’re just minutes away of getting up to make a cup of tea, take the dog for a walk, play with the cat, or do something else that for one reason or another can’t wait.

Me, I’ve given up on novel writing. I wrote and self-published three novels and two children’s books and while I have a forth novel in the making, it’s gathering dust. I just don’t have the motivation anymore to continue writing.

I tried reading a few self-published works and they were bad. Not just bad, they were awful and I thought ... is my work as bad as theirs? No wonder self-publishing has such a bad reputation. So, if and when I decide to continue to write on my fourth novel, I will try to find a literary agent and if I fail, I will shelf the project. If they don’t think it’s good enough, if nobody wants it, then it obviously isn’t good enough for publication.

Every day I see self-published writers promoting their work, tooting their horn about how good, unique or interesting their book is. And I wonder ... did these people even try to find an agent/publisher? If they spend half as much time trying to get published mainstream as they do trying to convince readers to buy their book, maybe, just maybe their work might have been picked up by an agent.

Other than the content of those self-published books, the covers bother me equally. All too often I see book covers with half naked men, showing off their pecks, muscled arms and iron board flat stomachs. Is this what is supposed to make me buy a book? Do these self-published writers think that because some guy is on the cover I’m going to like the story they’ve written?

Other books sport such a plain and boring cover that I don’t even give them a second look. I’m sure you’re familiar with the saying ‘You can’t judge a book by its cover’ ... but this is total baloney. If this saying was true, then why do not all books have white covers with black lettering or black covers with white lettering?

Fact of the matter is, book covers are important, they are very important. You should see how publishers agonize over the right cover for a book. The picture, the colors, the title, the font of the lettering ... idea after idea is presented and rejected until the right combination is found.

While I understand that writers are proud of their work, I don’t like them bragging about it or announcing how many copies they’ve sold or their Amazon rank.

In comparison, I’m reading ‘The Alchemist’ now and what I liked about this author right away is that he was honest enough to state in his foreword that when ‘The Alchemist’ was first published it was a flop. The book didn’t sell, and his publisher canceled his contract. By sheer coincidence the book found another publisher and this time it was a success.

Something that always strikes me when I read a book is that the author has several people to thank. People who helped them in their research, people who supported them and pushed them to keep going, people who read the first draft of a manuscript and suggested changes, and most noteworthy of all, they thank their editor.

A good editor is worth his weight in gold. He will take an ordinary story and make it good, he will a good story and make it brilliant. This and the above mentioned is precisely what self-published writers lack ... they don’t have someone to read their manuscript and give them honest feedback. Writers invariably have fragile feelings and don’t take well to criticism. In turn, family and friends often don’t dare to voice their true opinion.

While there are undoubtedly good self-published books out there, the majority of those I have tried to read should never have seen the light of day.

Feel free to comment. I’d love to hear from you.

www.connymanero.weebly.com

Authors - Marketing

There’s a new type of business popping up … swindling self-published authors out of their money.

If there’s one thing self-published authors want, but know very little about, it’s promoting their work. They know about Twitter and Facebook, but beyond that … it’s anyone’s guess.

So, a number of a number of enterprising opportunists are all too willing to help – for a fee of course. They set up a website or a blog even, promising self-published authors to promote their book. They dazzle them with the amount of subscribers, promising self-published authors to feature their work and then watch the dollars come rolling in.

Continue reading  at: 

http://connymanero.weebly.com/blog/authors-marketing

Selling books

I noticed a post on Facebook today that stated that for a literary agent to show an interest in a self-published book, the author should be able to present sales figures of around 20,000 copies.

I have news for that literary agent … if I can sell 20,000 copies of my books, I don’t need her services. 

Let’s face it, some books fly off the shelves, because of the name of the author while others gather dust because the author is a nobody.  Does that make the books of the big name authors any better … I doubt it.  I’m sure there are excellent self-published novels, while some stories of name authors never should have been printed.

Take J.K. Rowling latest effort for instance.  To say that it gets mixed reviews is putting it mildly.  Some critics rave about her writing abilities, others are less than enthused.  Fact is, A Casual Vacancy was a best seller before it was even available.  Proof that readers care about a name, not a story.

Personally I don’t put much stock in what critics have to say, I’d like to see for myself. 

On the one hand A Casual Vacancy is brilliantly written.  Rowling paints the picture of a cute little town and strips away all the veneer to show its inhabitants in all their disgusting glory.  The question is … do readers want to be confronted with such reality?

The story holds an “interesting” variety of characters, but there’s nothing likeable about them.  I don’t know about you, but if I don’t like certain characters I don’t care about  them, and if I don’t care about them why would I want to know what happens to them?  Why would I 

care about:

A heroin addict

A teenage town whore

Two perverted boys

A man who is abusive to his wife and children

A wife who is a doormat

In my opinion, if a nobody had written A Casual Vacancy, nobody would have shown any interest.  But because the book is of the hand of the great J.K. Rowling it turns into a bestseller. 

But back to self-published books.  What they mainly lack is good P.R.  If nobody knows about the book, how is it ever going to sell?  Robin mentions a few interesting strategies in her blog post http://robintidwell.wordpress.com/2012/10/24/selling-books/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook

  

Meetups, writers’ groups, book clubs, volunteer organizations. All of these are places to meet people, talk to people, and mention your book.

Good advice Robin, but who has that kind of time?  Most people have jobs and when they come home there cooking and cleaning to be done.

Send a review copy to your local stores. If they see it, in their hands, and look at it, they might take a chance on you.

Another good idea, but here’s the thing.  I did that and was greeted with a lot of enthusiasm, until the store owner found out that my book was self-published and suddenly I was cold product.

In suburbs where book stores are privately owned a self-published author might have a chance, but where I live (Toronto) the book industry is monopolized by Chapters Indigo and they won’t touch a self-published author with a ten foot pole.

Organizing book signings is a tricky situation.  Let’s say that an author does manage to get a signing, he needs to invest in a certain quantity of his work.  That requires not only financial resources but a car.  Have you ever tried to lug around + 50 books?  If they sell, great, if not you’re a few hundred dollars out of pocket.

It all comes down to money.  If you have money you can enlist the help of a P.R. firm, you can stock your own books and you can devote all your time to blowing your own horn.  If you don’t have money … well, you’re pretty much on your own.

Still, I’ll take some of your advice and I’ll let you know what happens.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/sep/27/jk-rowling-the-casual-vacancy-review-roundup