From time to time I’ll ask another writer to be a guest blogger. My first guest is my friend Mary Ann de Stefano. Mary Ann is a writer, editor and more. Not long ago she wrote the following essay for the Florida Writers Association blog, and I asked if I might repost it here on “Jumping Off Cliffs.” Both she and FWA agreed and here’s her worthwhile missive which all beginning writers should take to heart.

TALE OF TWO WRITERS

Recently I had the opportunity to do manuscript evaluations for two writers who had many things in common—and one important difference.

Both writers had completed drafts for mysteries with an edge of romance. They are females around my age and readers with little writing experience or instruction. This was the first attempt at a novel for both of them. They had created interesting female protagonists and stories with great potential, and they demonstrated an ability to write well with a unique voice. There were many positives about both manuscripts.

However, I felt their work was at an early draft stage, and although the manuscripts held promise, there were significant issues with plotting, pacing, characterization, and style that would need to be addressed in revision.

As always, I delivered the written evaluation (a comprehensive and detailed set of notes) as part of a conversation with the writer, and, as always, I pointed out what worked in the manuscript as well as what didn’t work, and I offered encouragement along with the reminder that no one gets it right the first time.

The first writer—I’ll call her “Ms. Pink”—eagerly soaked up the advice and asked a lot of questions. We had a lively to and fro about her story, her characters, and writing in general. There was a lot of laughter as we talked (just as there was great humor in her work). She said she enjoyed the process of writing for itself. Writing a book was like a giant puzzle to her, and she wanted to see if she could figure it out. My feedback gave her more information about how to solve the puzzle, and she looked forward to digging into her book again.

The other writer, “Ms. Blue,” didn’t receive my feedback quite so well, even though I provided her with the same gentle but realistic mixture of positives, negatives, and encouragement. Much of my advice, she said, was familiar, because a family member had told her the same things. Shortly after we talked, Ms. Blue wrote me to say that she would not continue to work on the book, she would not read the evaluation—and she would give up writing.

Ms. Pink told me that family members often asked her when she was going to be published. She answered them by saying something to the effect that if she played tennis, they wouldn’t be asking her when she was going to play at Wimbledon, or if she played golf they wouldn’t be asking her when she was going to be in the Masters Tournament.  Good answers! Great attitude!

But Ms. Blue had apparently believed she could fast track to Wimbledon, and when it became clear that wouldn’t be as easy as she thought, she gave up. It made me sad that she gave up, but she had set herself up for disappointment with faulty notions about what it takes to be a writer.

Many successful writers will tell you they have “practice” novels stuck away in a drawer. We understand that learning to play an instrument takes practice, and we’d never assume we could perform at Carnegie Hall after doodling around with a violin for a few months. You wouldn’t want a surgeon who had picked up a scalpel for the first time to take out your appendix. Yet somehow we believe, some of us believe, we can successfully write a book—a hugely complex task— without the training, time, and practice it takes to do it well.

Ms. Pink is willing to do the necessary work. Ms. Blue isn’t. Which writer are you?

______________________________

Mary Ann de Stefano is a writer, editor, and organizer of writing workshops with 30 years of experience in publishing and writing consulting. Besides working one-on-one with writers who are developing books, she builds websites and advises on e-marketing. Mary Ann does business at MAD about Words, named as a play on her initials and love for writing.

A version of this article appeared on the Florida Writers Association blog.

In last week’s post I announced my first free promotion of MATANZAS BAY as part of the KDP Select Program which gives authors up to

‘Matanzas Bay’ by Parker Francis.

five days over a 90-day period to offer their book free of charge. I’d heard from many authors who had done free promotions with varying results. As I said, giving away books for free may seem counter-productive, but the idea is to find new audiences who will, hopefully, purchase your other books.

So how did it turn out? To recap, the books were free from Saturday, February 23 through Monday, February 25. During that time nearly 30,000 books were downloaded and my ranking in the Top 100 Free Books continued to climb. By the end of the first day, 9,369 books had been downloaded and MATANZAS BAY had reached #19 in the Top 100 Books, but it was #1 in the Hard-Boiled Mystery category.

By 5:30 Sunday, there were over 15,000 free downloads, and I was beginning to see a surge in sales for BLUE CRABS AT MIDNIGHT and BRING DOWN THE FURIES, which I hoped would happen, but hadn’t anticipated it happening during the free promotion. I was up early Monday morning to check my stats and was amazed to see the free downloads had jumped to 24,178 and MB was still #1 in Hard-Boiled Mysteries, but had climbed to #5 in overall free books. Both CRABS and FURIES continued to sell at a higher rate than before the promotion.

The free promotion ended at midnight Monday with a grand total of 29,870 free downloads. And I was amazed to find that readers in other countries were downloading the book as well, including 85 in Germany.

If I looked at the promotion as a glass half empty, I might think I’d lost out on thousands of sales, but I prefer to look at it as introducing 30,000 new readers to my books. In a perfect world a good percentage of those people would enjoy MB and decide to purchase the other two titles. We all know we don’t live in a perfect world, but I was anxious to see if over the next few weeks there would be an uptick in sales as they finished reading MB and looked for another Parker Francis book.

Surprisingly, I didn’t have to wait for weeks. Instead I saw increased sales of MB almost immediately after the end of the free promotion. It helped that MB remained in the top ten of Hard-Boiled Mysteries. I also saw the sales ranking drop—which is a good thing indicating increased sales—over the next few days from over 100,000 to below 2,000, and I saw MB sales approach 200 in just 3 days. Another unexpected benefit was the jump in “Borrowed” units by the Amazon Prime members. Prior to the free promotion only one lonely borrow had taken place for the entire month of February. As of this writing, three days after the promotion, 80 people have borrowed MB.

I know that some authors, particularly in the early days of the KDP Select Program, reported much higher sales, but I’m pleased with the results and excited to know nearly 30,000 people will be exposed to my book. Will they all buy my other books? Of course not. Some people only want free books, but from what I’ve seen so far it was definitely worth it.

Now the trick is to have more titles available for readers to select once they finish reading my three Parker Francis-penned titles. So you’ll excuse me if I get back to work.

‘Matanzas Bay’ by Parker Francis.

Several months ago I decided to add MATANZAS BAY to KDP Select, Amazon.com’s program which loans books to Amazon Prime members. The book loan is free to Prime members, and authors are compensated through a  global fund ranging from $700,000 to the current $2.2 million for this month. All of the authors in the program receive a pro rata share of the fund each time someone “checks out” their book from the lending library.

The results in terms of revenue generated has varied from its first year where many authors reported higher revenues than normal. I resisted climbing aboard this bandwagon because Amazon demands exclusivity for the 90-day period a book is in the Select program. This means it can only be sold on Amazon.com. Not Barnes & Noble for the Nook, or any of the other  e-tailers.  But after tracking my sales and seeing that the majority has come from Amazon.com, it began to make more sense, particularly since the Kindle app may be added to almost any device.

One of the promotional wrinkles Amazon offers to authors in the Select program is the option to offer our books for free for up to five days in that 90-day contract period. In other words, Amazon shoppers can reap the greatest of all bargains—free books. And who doesn’t like free?

You might wonder why an author would give their book away for free. Good question. The answer lies in the vast reach of the Amazon.com market. When we offer a book for free, we can reach a potential audience of millions of new readers. Of course, not all of them will be interested in any particular book, but there must be many people looking for a good mystery, and the free promotion allows them to sample new writers at no cost. If they like that particular book, then they may purchase one of the other books by that author.

All of this is preamble to announcing my first free promotion for MATANZAS BAY this week, February 23 – 25. Tell your friends they have the opportunity to add an award-winning mystery to their Kindle library. And if they enjoy Quint Mitchell’s St. Augustine adventures, they can then purchase BRING DOWN THE FURIES and BLUE CRABS AT MIDNIGHT.

I’ll let you know how the promotion turns out, and if it spurs increased sales for the other Parker Francis offerings.

Writers hold an awesome power in their hands. We’re able to create “storybook people” from the depths of our imagination. I like to think of it as playing God. Of course, with great power comes great responsibility, and I take the people-building process quite seriously.  I hope my readers appreciate the end-results of all the planning, plotting and layering I’ve done to create my character’s personalities.

Readers can relate to many of the characters in BRING DOWN THE FURIES because they’re a lot like people we know. Maybe people we care for a great deal. There’s old Verla Covington, for example, the unofficial hostess of the Magnolia Inn, a grand old southern plantation-like B&B. From his first meeting with Verla, Quint has the feeling he knows this woman. Something about her is so familiar. Only later does he realize she reminds him of his great-grandmother, a woman he hadn’t thought about in years since he was only four or five when she died.

Verla plays a big part in Quint’s motivation as he pursues the Heartthrob Bandit and tries to identify a dangerous serial arsonist who has targeted Quint as his next victim. Another major subplot is the feud between a conservative minister and the lead researcher at a nearby archaeological site. The feud erupts into a cultural war that inflames emotions on both sides and attracts the attention of the national news media that descend on little Allendale like sharks in a feeding frenzy.

They’ll also meet Wilburn Peeks, the county sheriff, a crusty, no-nonsense ex-Marine who can’t abide private detectives messing around in his town. As we soon find out, Sheriff Peeks already has his hands full with the serial arsonist who’s destroying Allendale one building at a time. Another spicy old gal, Iva Mae Higginbotham, plays a big part in the story as it pertains to the Heartthrob Bandit.

Author John Dufresne said it best when he reviewed my book and said, “As in the best of plots, nothing here is as it seems.” If  readers enjoy unraveling mysteries along with a lead character who keeps fighting through all the adversity life—and a sadistic author— throws at him, then they’re sure to enjoy BRING DOWN THE FURIES.

The question most indie authors are asked is how can you get people to notice your book. It’s a good questions considering hundreds of thousands of new books, many of them ebooks, enter the marketplace each year. After the more traditional marketing techniques are tried, we begin looking for the non-traditional. One of these new tools is the Blog Tour. A Blog Tour is much like the traditional book tour where authors drove or jetted around the country or region appearing on talk shows and doing signings at a variety of book stores. Today you can tour from your own home by appearing on various blogs as a guest poster or being interviewed by the blog host. Others will review your book.

I did this to a limited extent with MATANZAS BAY, hitting six or seven blogs with interviews and guest posts. Tomorrow I launch the grand tour with more than 25 blogs lined up. I’ve already responded to questions from three bloggers, with more on the way, and many will be posting reviews of my book.

There’s also a goodie basket to be given away at the conclusion of the tour. It includes a $50 Amazon gift card, a $25 Barnes & Noble gift card, and autographed copies of both MATANZAS BAY and BRING DOWN THE FURIES. You can see a listing of the blogs at the bottom of my special Book Tour page and keep up with my progress. The gift basket was just announced this morning with a 50-blog blast and there’s already over 1,300 people entered to win.

Wish me luck and I’ll do the same to you and hope you win the gift package.

I know the anticipation has been building and you’re about to burst to learn more about The Next Big Thing. Here it is: A Blog Hop is a way to help readers find new authors through social media, and, hopefully, help the authors sell more books.

I was tagged to be part of the Blog Hop team by Amy Shojai, author of the dog-centric thriller LOST AND FOUND, which NY Times bestselling author James Rollins called, “Riveting, heart-wrenching, brilliant, the debut of a stunning new talent.” You can learn more about Amy and her debut novel here. And I’ll tag five more authors at the end of this post who will write their own Blog Hop next Wednesday.

Now it’s time for me to answer 10 — count them — 10 questions about BRING DOWN THE FURIES.

1. What is the title of your book?

This one is hardly a surprise. BRING DOWN THE FURIES is the title of my newly released Quint Mitchell Mystery. My third in the series is tentatively titled HURRICANE ISLAND, and will take Quint to Cedar Key on the west coast of Florida. The third installment is only in outline form at this point, but I hope to start on it soon after I ring in the New Year.

2. Where did the idea for the book come from?

MATANZAS BAY was set in St. Augustine, Florida, but I wanted to find another setting that would mix a bit of history with major conflicts, and possibly a tie to archaeology as I’d done with the first Quint Mitchell Mystery. After doing some online research I discovered the Topper site, an ongoing archaeological project outside Allendale, SC where archaeologists had found artifacts dating back 16,000 years. The lead researcher claimed some of the artifacts might date back at least 50,000 years, which would mean humans inhabited North America long before the last Ice Age. Bells began ringing in my head when I read about the Topper site, and I asked myself what if a Creationist minister feuded with the archaeologist and it boiled over into a tension-packed media circus. Researching Allendale, I learned that General Sherman’s troops had burned down the original town on their way to Columbia. This historical morsel triggered more ideas and I decided fire should play a major role in the story. That led to the idea of a serial arsonist at work in Allendale.

3. What genre does your book fall under?

While classified as a hard-boiled mystery, FURIES has elements of the suspense thriller as well.

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in the movie version of BRING DOWN THE FURIES?

 Most authors dream of having one of their books made into a movie. Of course, most screenwriters have the same dreams of selling one of their screenplays. But since we’ve been asked to imagine (and if novelists can’t imagine they’re in the wrong line of work) let me pick a few who seem to fit my image for Quint Mitchell. A few actors came quickly to mind including Kyle Chandler and Mark Ruffalo. I also can picture Matthew Fox of Lost fame in the role of my sometime charming and quick-witted protagonist. Who wouldn’t want any of these fine actors to star in a movie of their book?

Sheriff Wilburn Peeks plays a major part in FURIES as the tough-talking adversary who gives Quint a hard time for much of the story. Of course, I’d love to see Tommy Lee Jones play the crusty sheriff after seeing his remarkable portrayal of Thaddeus Stephens in “Lincoln.” I can also envision Ed Harris in the role and maybe Bruce Greenwood, even though he’s not quite old enough, but might be by the time the film was made in ten years.

One more role I’d try to fill would be Nurse Allene Skinner-Jarrett. Allene plays Quint’s love interest, or perhaps lust interest would be more accurate. She’s a bit of a tease, but exudes sensuality and knows how to push Quint’s buttons. I can picture Charlize Theron or Jennifer Garner slipping into (and out of) her medical scrubs to treat Quint, but I doubt they’d take a secondary role so I searched the IMDB database to find a few faces that worked for me, and yes, this is purely a visceral reaction and not related to acting talent. One of the first who popped out was Lauren Cohan (left) who plays Maggie Greene in “The Walking Dead.” Another was Danielle Fishel (right) who has a fairly long filmography, very few of which I’d heard of, but I can see her in the role of Nurse Skinner-Jarrett.

5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

A serial arsonist threatens a small South Carolina Town and PI Quint Mitchell is caught in the backdraft.

6. Is your book self-published or traditionally published?

I prefer to call it independently published.

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

The first draft took about 8 months, and I worked on it another three months revising and rewriting the manuscript before turning it over to my editor.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

This is a tough one. I don’t like to compare myself to other writers since each is unique. I’ll leave that to others, and was flattered when one reader said the book reminded her of John Sandford’s Virgil Flowers stories. Quint Mitchell is a stand-up guy who tries to do the right thing. He’s not an unstoppable force like Lee Child’s Jack Reacher. And while he has some baggage, it doesn’t overpower him. He can and does crack wise to lighten a tense situation.

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

This was mostly answered in question #2, but as the author of a series I’m always looking for the next big idea, a premise with what Steve Berry calls the “ooh factor.” And while FURIES is set in a small South Carolina town, the clash of faith and science combined with the pervasive 24/7 media culture we live in provides the story with universal themes.

10. What else about your book might pique a reader’s interest?

Readers of mysteries expect more than crime and punishment. They want to learn something new while living vicariously through a protagonist they care about. FURIES is imbued with a sense of history, and Civil War buffs will enjoy reading about how the residents of Allendale have long memories when it comes to General William Tecumseh Sherman. They’ll also learn what makes a serial arsonist tick, and about the archaeological survey being conducted on the banks of the Savannah River. But mostly, readers will enjoy the book as an entertaining read. As Marilou George wrote for The Kindle Book Review, “This mix of civil war history and suspense will keep you fully engaged and is jammed full or twists and turns that lend to the tension of the story. The writing flows and builds to a fever pitch as the story takes on a life of its own.”

 ____________________________________________________________________________________

Now I’m passing the baton on to five outstanding authors who will post their Next Best Thing Blog Hop on Wednesday, December 19. Their goal is to each assemble their own team of five writers and answer the same ten questions. Be sure to bookmark their sites and read their Blog Hop posts next week. Here are the five members of my team:

• Chuck Barrett is a retired air traffic controller and the author of three thrillers featuring Jake Pendleton, a former NTSB investigator. You can read his Blog Hop post right here.
• Sharon Cobb is a professional screenwriter and author of a hilarious spoof of Hollywood at its most zany.
• I met Charles Cornell at the FWA’s Royal Palm Literary Awards banquet after he had won for the Best Thriller of 2012.
• My friend J. W. “Jim” Thompson has not only published five thrillers, but he’s on the Board of the Florida Writers Association and  chair of the RPLA’s.
• Ron Whittington keeps his businessman and sometime espionage agent protagonist hopping in his two thrillers. But Ron seldom sits still himself.

Check them out next week, and keep reading!

You’ve heard of Hip Hop, the Bunny Hop, the movie HOP and maybe you older folks have even heard of Hopalong Cassidy. Now comes a totally new Hop — the Blog Hop. I’ve been tagged to participate in this new form of network marketing for authors by Amy Shojai who recently published her first thriller. Each author must line up five other authors who will in turn answer the same ten questions about their book or work in progress. My turn to do the Blog Hop is this Wednesday, December 12, so please return here on Wednesday to see how I’ve answered the questions, including what movie star I picture as playing Quint Mitchell in the movie (oh, if that were only true).

I’ve tapped the following five authors who will post their Blog Hop next Wednesday: Chuck Barrett, Sharon Cobb, Charles Cornell, J. W. Thompson and Ron Whittington. I’ll tell you a bit more about each of them in my next blog post.

Stay tuned because things will be hopping soon.