Bell Bridge Books: Another small press who "gets its"

So I'm fresh back from Dragoncon and exhausted as it is quite an event but I wanted to share with you all one of the discoveries I found while there.

Bell Bridge Books (Belle Books) - is a small press that sponsored the Writer's Conference portion of Dragoncon. I sat in on several panels that members of their organization were on and I was so excited to see another small press that "gets" what is going on with the changes in publishing and is doing well.

I wasn't "consciously" aware of Bell Bridge when I went to Dragoncon but when I got back to my hotel room I "looked them up" and then the pieces clicked into place. They are one of the presses that did fabulously well with the Sunshine Deals and as a result of that got several of their titles in the top 100 and even the top 10. Also according to their website they have three books that reached #1 (an accomplishment for any book and especially well done as there are few small press offerings that can say this.

I recently saw on Kindle boards that one of my fellow KB'ers, John Hartness, signed a book deal with them. I'm very excited for both parties as I think this will be a very good fit and based on the little bit John told me, Bell Bridge is willing to think outside the box and are not threatened by a hybrid publishing approach.

So...I know that Ridan is not not open to submissions, but for those that think a small press might be the right approach for you - I would recommend Bell Bridge as someone to put on your list.

Bios continued - the short form

Well, I'm back and utterly exhausted. Between the Dragoncon convention(Congrats to Ridan author Nathan Lowell who won a Parsec Award), our research trip to Death Valley (yes it was 124 degrees!!) and our extended stay in California (thanks to Hurricane Irene) we are back.

I'm utterly swamped with all manner of things as getting Internet was virtually impossible in the wilds of California and at the convention. But I need to finish up my blog on bios so here goes....

In my last post on the subject Bios...is yours working for you? I covered the long form where you want to forgo the standard where you live, grew up, went to college, or how many pets you have. But now let's talk about the short form. Most notably your twitter bio which gives you 20 more characters than a tweet (160 - but this also includes spaces).

What you say here will really depend on where you are in your career and, like all good bios should change as your success as a writer, and your platform evolves.

It's now September and the "indie" versions of Michael's books are officially out of print and the life of a big-six author is about to start. If he puts out some of his future books through self-publishing then he'll be switching to a true hybrid author but for now the only books that can be ordered are the Orbit books so he is "just" big-six - so guess what - I just updated his twitter bio.

@author_sullivan: Orbit Author: Theft of Swords (Nov) ● Rise of Empire (Dec) ● Heir of Novron (Jan) ● No ancient evils, just unlikely heroes and classic fantasy adventure.

Let's dissect this a bit so you know why I made the choices I did.

• In most of publishing there isn't a lot of publisher loyalty - in other words most readers won't care if you are published by Simon & Schuster or Penguin - in most cases they won't even know. But this is not the case for genre fiction. In particular, romance, science fiction, and fantasy readers will watch the release schedules of a few prominent presses (Harlequin, Elora's cave for romance/erotica, and Tor, Baen, Orbit, DAW for fantasy/science fiction. So I made sure to make the fact that Michael writes for Orbit to be part of his new brand - it will help him get found when people search on Orbit. So if you are in a genre where there is publisher brand - use it to your advantage.
  
  
• I think it is essential that if you are an author, you need to have your title in your bio. The problem comes when you have multiple titles. I suggest putting your biggest seller and next upcoming release. But in Michael's case his big seller is no longer available so I opted to play up the fact that all three books are coming out soon and in consecutive months.
  
  
• It is also important to get your genre in your bio - if you work in multiple genres try to get as many in as you can.
  
  
• The last thing I did is put in something to differentiate Michael's fantasy from other fantasy. Coming up with something short and concise takes time and practice the things I wanted to get across is a departure from a standard troupe (ancient evils, orphans destined for greatness) if I would have had room I would have added the orphans (and have had it in the past but didn't want to lose the space for all three titles since they are upcoming. I also got in that his characters (Royce and Hadrian) are unlikely heroes - in just two words you get a pretty good idea that they are your standard "good guy" knights or kings
  
  
• Notice that I use bullets to break things up. This is a great space saving technique to get a bunch of things down in a small amount of space. For my own bio - I do a lot....Public speaker, publicist for Riyria Revelations, Founder of Ridan Publishing, educating people about changes in the industry. Using bullets is a great way to get all that down efficiently.

USING LOCATION
One more thing I want to point out since we are working the profile page of twitter. You can get a bit more "branding space" by using the location field. Most people use this to type their city/state but there is no rule that says you have to. Here are some examples:

Michael J. Sullivan (fantasy author): Where unlikely heroes dwell
Robin Sullivan (me): Publishing's cutting edge

So this is what I do, feel free to share your own ideas as well. I try to be "factual" and use this to get many branding keywords as possible out there but I'm interested to hear what techniques other use.

John Locke's Simon & Schuster Deal

Okay,
I'm just fresh off the plane and I know I need to talk more about bios but something occurred that I've been waiting for so long on that I have to post on this.

Simon and Schuster signed John Locke to a print-only deal. This is HUGE for indie authors that are having success in the ebook world, and quite frankly it was something I didn't think I'd see.

I love that traditional publishers are starting to think outside the box and this is a win-win-win for all parties involved (readers, Locke, and S&S). Now, of course it took someone who could sell 1,000,000 books in less than half a year to get such a deal but once one pebble falls, others are sure to follow.

Bottom line...traditional publishers really shine in the bookstore model, so having them do what they do best, while giving the author freedom to play with ebooks (where the big-publisher really doesn't bring any "value add" and in fact can be a deterrent as their prices can be pretty high) is something that really makes sense to me and is a great advantage for the author.

I'll be keeping my eyes out to see if more of these "creative" deals start springing up. Just one more reason why there has never been a better time then now to be an author.

Earthquakes, and Hurricanes, and Wild Fires, Oh My...

For those who may have been wondering if I dropped off the face of the planet. Well I sorta have. I had a planned 4 day trip to Death Valley with Michael who needed to do some hands on research for his current book. Just minutes before we left the earthquake hit our area. No real damage but spooked the heck out of the dog who refused to come back in the house (we all went outside in case another one was coming.

As Saturday approached (our planned return date) it was pretty obvious that our flights would not make it through. I couldn't even get to the airlines via phone to rebook so I finally just said screw it and got new one-way flights home for Tuesday from San Francisco so we could travel a bit.

Since Saturday we've been roaming the Sierra Nevada Mountains and visiting Sequoia and Yosemite National Parks. There is a wild fire in Yosemite that is burning a number of the residences of the park rangers. One of the roads into the park is closed and about 1,000 fire fighters are woking to contain the blaze and they are evacuating some areas that have never been evacuated in the past.

I will be heading home today then tomorrow take off again to DragonCon so I'll start posting again in a bit. I'm sure you are more interested in marketing and publishing tips then hearing about my adventures but I thought I should at least stop in and tell you'll what's been happening.

Bios...Is yours working for you?

One of the things that you'll use over and over again (on your blog, in the back matter of your book, during author interviews) is your bio. Yet most are sorely lacking. I'm the first to admit that I was guilty of writing a "less than desirable" bio in the past - but that's why we are here - to learn from my mistakes and hopefully do better in the future.

First you should recognize that you need more than one bio. I actually suggest 3:

• Super short - for twitter (160 characters)
• Medium - 500 - 600 characters
• Long - 500 - 700 words

Your bio should change over time. Every few months I look at the bios of myself, my authors, and Michael to see if they should be revised. Did you just release a new book? Get an award? Cross an important milestone?

I'll come back another day and discuss the super short and medium but for today I want you to think about your "long form". It should:

• Give the reader insight about you
  
• Be engaging
• Be truthful and heartfelt
  
• Tell a story

I'm going to pick on Blake Crouch for just a second. (I love you Blake but you illustrate my point well). He's a great writer of hardcore Thrillers and in some cases they get a bit on the "disturbing side" as many works of that genre does. Here is Blake's bio from Amazon:

BLAKE CROUCH is the author of DESERT PLACES, LOCKED DOORS, SNOWBOUND, and ABANDON, which was an IndieBound Notable Selection, all published by St. Martin's Press. Blake's latest thriller, RUN, his first indie release, hit the Amazon Top 50.

His short fiction has appeared in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Thriller 2, Shivers VI, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, and other anthologies.

In 2009, he co-wrote "Serial" with JA Konrath, which has been downloaded over 500,000 times and topped the Kindle bestseller list for 4 weeks. That story and ABANDON have also been optioned for film. He is currently at work with JA Konrath on the novel STIRRED, the conclusion to his Andrew Z. Thomas series. Blake lives in Colorado. His website is www.blakecrouch.com.

Blake took the "establish credibility route" - which is fine. He mentions his books, and how successful they have been - but this really doesn't "pull me in" or endear me to him as a writer. Readers like having a personal connection with people they read and Blake didn't give us enough about "him" to do this. I read an interview once where Blake mentioned that when he was young his parents were pulled in for a conference when little Blake wrote a paper for school that was "disturbing"...What a great insight!! What a fun story for someone who writes about serial killers and grisly murders. Blake, why isn't this in your bio?

To illustrate the "tell me a story" aspect of the bio let's look at Michael's

After finding a manual typewriter in the basement of a friend's house, Michael inserted a blank piece of paper and typed: It was a dark and stormy night and a shot rang out. He was just eight years old. But the desire to fill the blank page and see what doors the typewriter keys would unlock wouldn't let him go. For ten years Michael developed his craft by studying authors such as Stephen King, Ayn Rand, and John Steinbeck...just to name a few. During that time he wrote ten novels, and after finding no traction in publishing, he gave up and vowed never to write creatively again.

Michael discovered that never is a very long time, and he ended his hiatus from writing after a decade. The itch returned when he decided to create a series of books for his then thirteen-year-old daughter, who was struggling in school due to dyslexia. Intrigued by the idea of writing a series with an overarching story line, he created the Riyria Revelations. Each of the six-books were written as individual episodes but also included intertwining elements and mysteries that develop over time. Michael describes this endeavor as something he did "just for fun with no intention of publishing." After presenting the first manuscript to his daughter, he was chagrined that she declared, "I can't read it like this, can't you get it published?"

So began his second adventure on the road to publication, which included: drafting his wife to be his business manager; signing with an independent press; and later creating a small press. After two and a half years, the first five books sold more than 60,000 copies and ranked in the top twenty of multiple Amazon fantasy lists. In November 2010, he leveraged his success and received his first commercial publishing contract for three novels from Orbit Books (the fantasy imprint of Hachette Book Group, USA). In addition, Michael reached international status with foreign right translations including: France, Spain, Russia, Germany, and the Czech Republic.

Today, Michael continues to fill blank pages and has three projects under development: A modern fantasy, a literary fiction piece, and a prequel to his bestselling Riyria Revelations.

AWARDS AND ACCOLADES
2010 Fantasy Book Critic #1 Indie Fantasy (Wintertide & Emerald Storm)
2010 Iceberg Ink Award Best Read (Avempartha)
2010 Fantasy Book Critic Top 25 (Wintertide & Emerald Storm)
2010 Bookworm Blues Overall Best Reads of 2010 (Avempartha)
2010 Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Fantasy (The Emerald Storm)
2010 Fantasy Book Critic Top 12 Novels as of First Quarter (The Emerald Storm)
2010 Foreword Magazine Book of the Year Finalist (Avempartha)
2010 Foreword Magazine Book of the Year Finalist (Nyphron Rising)
2010 Fantasy Book Critic Top 5 Novels of Second Half of 2010 (Wintertide)
2009 Winner of Book Spot Central's Fantasy Tournament of Books (Avempartha)
2009 Speculative Fiction Junkie's Top 5 Close Contender(The Crown Conspiracy)
2009 Top 10 Books by Dark Wolf Fantasy Reviews (The Riyria Revelations)
2009 National Indie Book Award Finalist (The Crown Conspiracy)
2008 ReaderViews Annual Literary Award Finalist (The Crown Conspiracy)
2007 Foreword Magazine Book of the Year Finalist (The Crown Conspiracy)

BOOKS OF THE RIYRIA REVELATIONS (Ridan Publishing)
The Crown Conspiracy (October 2008)
Avempartha (April 2009)
Nyphron Rising (October 2009)
The Emerald Storm (April 2010)
Wintertide (October 2010)
Percepliquis* (January 2012)

OMNIBUS VERSIONS of RIYRIA REVELATIONS (Orbit Publishing)
Theft of Swords (11/2011)
Rise of Empire (12/2011)
Heir of Novron (1/2012)

*Limited edition release

CONTACT INFORMATION
Michael's website: http://www.michaelsullivan-author.com
Michael's blog: http://riyria.blogspot.com/
Michael's twitter: http://twitter.com/author_sullivan
Michael's publishers: http://www.ridanpublishing.com & http://www.orbitbooks.net/

I love this story about when he was a kid, not just because it is true, but it really makes me "like Mike". I can picture him typing on the page. Thinking he just did something great, and scrunching up his fact to figure out what comes next and licking his lips as he starts the next line. It's personal.

The second part of the bio shows Michael as an underdog that had to go to great lengths to get his books to an audience. It concludes with him finally "making it" and we all feel good whe we see a little guy win.

Finally we round out the bio with a list of his books (in order so people know what order to read them in) and awards that he has won (to give credibility) and last but not least ways in which his fans can reach him.

This is 588 words and when I have to "reduce it for space" I remove in order:

• Awards (brings it to 430 words)
  
• Out of print versions (392 words)
• Reduce contact to just website and email (380 words)

So today's homework assignment...look at your current bios and see if they are working for you as best they can and if not do a little rewriting.

BISG July 2011 ebook Buying behavior

The Book Study Industry Group has been surveying book buyers on their ebook buying habits for the last few years now. In some of the preliminary pages that they released was the following graph:

Green line: % of people who read e-books daily/weekly
Blue line: % ebooks purchased (estimate)

I took away a few things from this:

• First, as I've been saying for ages now there was a dramatic shift in ebook sales for Nov and the "good times" continued through about March where sales stabilized rather than increase dramatically month to month. I saw this first in my husband's Riyria Revelations sales, which went from 1,000 sales per month in September to 10,000 a month for Nov-Feb. November was the first month that most of the "top selling" indies saw their first significant increase in sales including: Hocking, Locke, and Konrath
  


• Second, in 2009 ebooks had not crossed over to the mainstream in anyway and for most of 2009 (including the X-mas season) remained relatively flat
  


• Third, April - June seems relatively level at about 13% - I suspect when we get this data next year it will show relatively flat until about October in which case I think we'll see similar rises as last Xmas season.

The report also reported that ebook sales in Q1 2011 showed 13% of total book sales (based on Bowker Pub-Track's survey of 6,000 US book buyers.

Competing with Yourself...Amazon Marketplace

Today's post is a quick little trick to earn yourself a bit of extra income. If you've read my post on CreateSpace Vs LightningSource you'll remember that one of the advantages about Lightning Source is you can set your discount rate low (20% which is 20% better than the 40% you get from CreateSpace). Now doing so will mean a few things:

• Amazon probably won't discount your books (something to consider in your decision making)
• Most resellers won't carry your books (as there is not enough margin)

But this presents an interesting opportunity for you in that you can offer a discount (and even provide a means by which people can receive signed copies...Amazon Marketplace.

Amazon Marketplace is a free program by which anyone (even you the author/publisher) can offer books for sale. They show up on the Amazon page as shown here:

When you offer deep discounts to the distribution chain, many sellers will beat you in price as they will be willing to offer the books at a pretty tight margin. But since you are only offering 20% discount most will list theirs higher than you can offer yours.

For Full Share I put my books in Amazon Maketplace for sale for $11.95. I make four listings:

• New with signature
• New without author signature
• Used with signature
• Used without author signature

They have an "individual plan" with no monthly fees which I recommend if you are not selling a ton each month. The fees under this plan are:

• $0.99 closing fee
  
• 15% referral fee
• #1.35 variable closing fee

(If you sell more than 40 items a month you can opt for the Professional plan which has a $39.99 monthly fee and eliminates the $0.99 closing fee).

So for those that don't want to pay the $13.95 full list price for Full Share, they'll look under the "new and used" links and find the following:

• $11.95 from Ridan Publishing
• $14.32 from pbshops
• $16.99 from BooKnackrh
• $17.00 from bargainbookstores
• $17.04 from Quick and Easy Marketplace
• $17.65 from super_star_seller
• $18.86 from Buye: Buy to Give
• $19.21 from invise
• $20.40 from any_book
• $20.58 from brookebooks

So who do you think they'll choose? Yep - you and a nice perk is that Amazon charges $3.99 for shipping but if you use Media mail it will only cost you $3.01 for shipping (includes $0.19 for tracking) so you'll make $0.98 off of that.

So...let's break it down. If they buy the book from Amazon or one of the other resellers you'll receive:

• $13.95 - 20% - Lightning Source print fee = 13.95 - $2.79 - (302 * .013 + .90) = $6.37

For any sold through the marketplace you'll receive

• 11.95 + shipping - $0.99 - $1.35 - 15% - Create Space print fee - shipping cost = $11.95 + $3.99 - $2.34 - $1.79 - (302 * .012 + .85) - $3.01 = $4.33

Which is less - but it allows you to offer a discount for the books (many people won't buy without a discount) and they'll be attracted to the option of getting it signed. Plus, $4.33 a book is nothing to sneeze about - most authors make $0.60 - $1.20 on paperback books so you are still coming out in the plus column.

Of course you'll make the most when they buy direct - and you'll have the advantage of getting their email addresses. But that is for another time - so stay tuned.