Keeping Up To Date

I'm highlighting the following comment from this week because it gives me the perfect chance to make sure everyone has access to all the best ways to stay updated with what's releasing, and when, and to answer a FAQ. 

First, let's talk advertising, so you can figure out which medium works best for you as a follower. 😊

I'm not on TikTok, because, let's face it, my books aren't suited for it. I'm not a trendy sort of gal, and video is definitely not my medium of choice. 

But I am active on social media, and use it to keep readers updated on WIPs, upcoming releases, and then debriefings and behind the scenes content once a book is out. (I blogged/Facebooked/Instagrammed about Lord Have Mercy for more than a year, so if you're not plugged in, then yes, you missed out!)

I post most frequently on Instagram. 

I hype my books there, provide links to blog posts and new releases, and also share my farm life, chiefly horses and flower growing. 

I share all my blog posts, new releases, and weekly hashtags like the Fearless read-along and Teaser Tuesday on my author Facebook page. 

You can follow me there to see my updates in your FB feed, and to join the Fearless Read-Along discussion group. 

I don't have an email newsletter because it would be redundant. You can follow the blog and receive an email each time I add a new post: the blog comes straight to you!

Go over to the righthand side of the blog's home page and scroll down until you reach the Followers section. Doing this myself reminded me that I need to do some major sidebar updates, but the followers are still there. Click the Follow button circled in red to sign up for email notifications, and then never miss a post. 

If you don't have a Google account, or don't want to follow the blog, but still want to know when a new book drops, then you can follow me on Amazon.

You'll get an email when I release a new book. The site has also gotten much more functional in recent years, and books are grouped together on series pages. 

If you're a Goodreads user, you can follow me there as well. My blog is linked to it, so you can see all my posts that way, and new releases will show up in followers' feeds.

Again, a newsletter wouldn't contain any new information already available in the blog, so I feel it's unnecessary. With regard to "newsletter swaps with other authors," I find those shady. When authors trade email lists, and send newsletters to non-followers unsolicited, that doesn't engender any goodwill with potential readers; in fact, it makes you spam. So I'm not down for that. If an author has a newsletter, it should only get sent to those who sign up for it, in my opinion. 

I've had tons of questions lately about Kindle Unlimited. I don't use it, and there's a good reason for that:

The premise of KU, for anyone who doesn't know, is that readers who sign up for it can read program-included books for free, and then the authors receive payment from Amazon based on the number of times the book is read to completion. It's an imperfect system to start. For an author, choosing to list a book for KU means you can't offer that book for sale on any other platform: no Nook, no Kobo, no iBooks, nada. That's fine if an author chooses to pull or withhold their books from those other sites.

The problem? Amazon counts books posted on pirate sites as being in violation of the KU agreement. Pirates create an epub file, illegally upload it, and the author is none the wiser. A crackdown in the last few years has seen multiple authors get deplatformed by Amazon because of this, and they've either not been able to restore their author accounts, or spent lots of time and money trying to get back on the platform. There were even instances of authors reporting "rival" authors to Amazon in a deliberate attempt to get their books booted off the site. 

It's ridiculous, and it needs to be addressed by Amazon, but suffice to say, I have zero interest in getting involved in all of that drama right now. Given the insane pricing of NYT bestselling ebooks (which are never on KU, BTW), I feel very confident in my competitive pricing. LHM is the exception, because 1) I didn't want to punish the readers who bought each installment by undercutting the price on the final, compiled product, and 2) the compiled edition is the length of four full-sized novels. The price breaks down to exactly the same, and, honestly, it's worth it. Think of it as buying a boxed set instead of a lone book.

Okay, I think that's all the bases covered for now. 

This week, Beware of Dog turned two weeks old, and I announced that the next release will be Drake Chronicles book six, Avarice of the Empire. Tomorrow we'll dive into Chapter Twenty in our Fearless Read-Along. Make sure you're following me on one of the accounts listed above to stay apprised of everything that's going on in my neck of the woods! Huge thanks to everyone who follows, likes, shares, and comments. You guys are the absolute best!