With the authors I have, and at the rate they produce books, it's hard to keep up with them. But here, in no particular order, are some of them who have new books out for your reading pleasure.

Love vampire stories? Then January Bain is an author for you. Her Forever Woman takes us into the life of Winter Kennedy who, if she doesn't do something drastic, will soon die from an incurable disease. Her drastic measure? Becoming a vampire because they live forever. She makes contact with Christopher St. John, an ancient vampire of the Pharaoh Clan, but soon after doing so, she falls in love with a completely mortal man and changes her mind, deciding to take life, however short it may prove to be and live it to the full with the man she adores. But the vampire won’t accept that and kidnaps her, hiding her away in his mountain top home in the wilds of Alaska. Will her true love be able to rescue her from her final fate, before it’s too late?

Some of the astounding authors I have the privilege of editing have agreed to share a few tips on promotion with the world--what works, what does not work, and their views on how our electronic books fare in this rapidly changing publishing world.

I'm proud to present, in no particular order,

John Paulits: What I manage to do is post my various books in a number of places; Facebook, Library Thing, Manic Readers, my website, the books are all posted on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and many other book-selling sites.  Certain friends share my Facebook postings with their friends.  And I have business cards which I give out when appropriate, noting my writing and my website.

January Bain:  I post on a lot of sites like these: Karen Find out about books, paranormal romance, the haunt, CTR, not to mention on all the new sites that Enchanted Books introduced me too.

Kerry Tolan: My primary promotion remains a combination of my Facebook and author website. Conventions come next.  I also participate in one major SF/F forum doing writer-helping-writer stuff, and that too has garnered some interest and a review.  Blogs have also helped.  I continue (over a year now) having a novel in the first or second page of the "rising" category (SF/Fantasy) on Scribd.  Based on analytic data, the grand majority of visits to my site come from Google using my name.  Next come links from other site links (Champagne author's page being the greatest source). 

Unfortunately, the Champagne chats (Coffee Time & others) have consistently proven to be of no use so I stopped participating in them several years ago.  That crowd really is interested in Romance/Erotica/Urban Para--not in straight forward SF.

So, here's advice to pass on, from my perspective of the game.

1.  The book will sell itself for the most part.  If the story is good, word of mouth will follow.  This is the primary means of promotion.  
2.  Daily participation in social media is a must--though it shouldn't all be about the book.  Just be interesting and comment on other posts as well.
3.  Author's website.  Duh. This is where people come to look for you in detail.  
4.  Participation in at least one well-read forum where you don't promote, you participate.  Promotion ("soft" selling) will happen.
5.  Scribd, Goodreads.  Be there.
6.  Blogs--the more you can guest at, the better.  This (and reviews) would be near the top of the list if it wasn't so hard to land one).
7.  Conventions - for SF/F folks this is a powerful but expensive (though tax deductible) way to steer folks toward your novels.  

I've lots of entries in my personal blog that deal with this stuff as well. http://kmtolan.blogspot.com/

I do what I call my "promotion" cycle daily - in fact, this is what I'm doing right now (check email first).  Next stop will be Facebook, then the SF&F forum I'm on.  I don't do a daily or weekly blog simply because I can't see that much effort being worth it.  That's why I use Facebook.  I do have a presence on Google Plus, but pretty much abandoned it due to low interest in that site.

Gary Starta: I've been hard at work promoting Demon Inhibitions, in fact it's the most promotion I've ever done for my books. First, the cover seems very helpful so kudos to your design dept. for an appealing cover!
 
Some of my promotions are through Independent Author Network. Cold Coffee/Books N Sync and a book club site I've used. 
 
I always ask people to like both my Amazon page and my FB Demon Inhibitions pages...
 
I've had a book trailer created http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfDfl2lxZhU
 
I constantly tweet and use FB to promote the links, videos and any other mention of the book. Reviews have been hard to come by. 
 Chris Fenge: As for promotion, I’ve done various things. I created a website, then arranged feature articles in the local papers and displays etc. at school… (Husband) did a blitz on Twitter and has featured the book regularly on his Blog and Facebook. He’s also a member of The Wordcloud writers community (and I know I got a few sales that way). Meantime I was doing an (exhausting) blitz on libraries and reading groups around the UK. As far as I can tell, this didn’t repay the effort involved. What I’m involved in at the moment is an anthology of short stories with the Writers Vineyard (Big Mike set it up). It’s a promotional freebie to be published next year... a school presentation I’ve lined up for next month – it really helps to have links with teachers.  (NB: Esp. if you are writing YA, but don’t forget, school kids don’t usually have a lot of disposable income they want to spend on books when there are so many other entertainment media available to them. jgg)

Cathy Coburn: I've tried in the past to do the blog thing and chat thing, and I still will do it, but I don't think I have ever sold a single book because of a blog or a chat. I may be wrong. I've done other stupid stuff, like where ever I go I leave behind a rack card or business card or book mark from my book sitting on the seat or tucked into the pocket on a plane. I never knew if this would work until someone I went to school with about a hundred years ago was on a plane reading my book when the person sitting next to her said, she had just read the book and loved it. And guess where she found out about it . . . She found a rack card sitting on a seat and it intrigued her.

I also have found the twitter people to sometimes make deals with me, you read my book and I'll read yours. Have read a few crappy books this way, but they have always come back to say they loved mine. I also have developed many author friendships this way.
Then LinkedIn helps you intermingle with other professionals who like to read.

I have already pushed When the Dam Breaks, though, and have many, many people who are waiting for that one.

Helen Henderson: Many authors, for a wide variety of reasons, prefer to stay out of the limelight, so they don't consider live or in-person interviews. An alternative that allows the best of internet radio distribution (without the worry of call-ins) and with the benefit of editing, is the theauthorshow.  Seeing how other authors handle the interview is a good idea when there is no opportunity to repeat. Unlike blogtalk radio where you can appear on a show with each new release, other venues like theauthorshow are pretty much a one-shot deal. For myself, I kept the contact in the potential file until I had more to offer than just one release."

Marisa Quinn: I make an effort to update my blog on writing as a semi regular basis and I've been promoting it on Twitter, Facebook, and just recently set up rss feeds to it on amazon and Goodreads. I've set up author pages for myself on amazon and goodreads as well and loaded my book trailer onto YouTube and Goodreads and Amazon. I actually have an interview booked in Feb (closest date they had) on a website and I've done a couple of guest blog posts the past few months. The next step I'm going to take is to pay for advertisements on some websites. 

The Salamander Stone

Oh, my! Is it a paranormal story, a romance, an adventure? The answer is a resounding yes! This book has it all.  

Amber, whose father is dead and whose mother is locked up in an insane asylum, suspected of his murder, lives as a boarder in a supposedly excellent British school where she's been sent for safe-keeping.  Amber knows, though, she is not safe--that no other student is either--especially the best and the brightest. She uncovers proof that appalling things happen to innocent kids in that school, unspeakable horrors committed in the name of science. She must escape to alert the authorities, but which authorities? Once free, she discovers there is no one she dares trust, for she's battling a conspiracy so earth-shattering it threatens not only the human race, but the very planet we live on. She is forced into hiding because she can no longer trust even those on whom she should be able to rely. On every side, danger and evil lurk and friend turns to foe. Some want her for the power they believe she can wield, others want to destroy her because of that very power. 

The only person Amber can rely on is... Amber.

I'm still snickering! Jennifer Loy, who brought us Million Dollar Bra a few months ago, is back in fine form with Sunset Sizzle, featuring  newspaper columnist, Sarah Hart, who's about to lose her job unless she comes up with a really hot article to celebrate summer romance. She's already booked a vacation in Hawaii and isn't about to give that up. On the advice of a senior editor, Sara elects to find the subject for her column on a sizzlin' Hawaiian beach. The plan: To grab the first cute, single guy she sees and find him a vacation romance. Keith, Sara's article subject, will get an all-expenses paid time of his life, with hot dates thrown in daily (or nightly). The catch? Keith isn't interested in what she offers. Instead, he want to date her. But, of course her article can't be about her, so they bargain and finally reach an agreement and Sarah makes a promise she believes she'll never have to fulfill. If she hasn't found him the love of his life in one week, then she has to give him one steamy night on Sunset beach.

Keith goes along to get along and to get his own way--that date with Sarah. But, as with most great plans, there are snags. Snags such as a much-too-interested married woman who wants Keith--whom he absolutely does not want; a shark diving date he also does not want; a terrifying turtle-biologist, crazy roadside fruit stand kids, paparazzi and tough-guy men-in-uniform from a nearby base.  Will Keith even make it to the date with Sarah before running from her set-ups?


To read Jennifer Loy is to laugh, and to enjoy, and to cheer for a couple of super characters who bumble through their romance until they finally, actually, really (though at times you gotta wonder if...), they do get it all together. Don't miss this one. It's fun from the first word.

Today, we have a novella to celebrate.

Echo, a beautiful goddess, must not stop running. Pan, the delusional God of the Satyrs, believes she is his soul mate and has ordered his minions to bring her back.  After years of imprisonment, Echo is determined to find her true soul mate and to rid herself of Pan once and for all.

            When Narcissus, a vain Greek god, hears Echo battling Pan’s men, he goes to her rescue. The couple band together and use their combined powers to defeat Pan’s evil soldiers. Desperate to put distance between themselves and Pan, Echo and Narcissus run off together. As they begin to form a relationship of their own, word reaches Pan of their actions and he vows to steal Echo back from Narcissus. But is his love for her enough? Or is he doomed to think only of himself for all of eternity?

Marisa Quinn has written a delightful novella featuring a young woman who doesn’t realize she’s directly descended from the gods and goddesses of mythology. Her awakening to the truth of her ancestry places helps explain the problems that have beset her all her life, and enlightens her to the fact that somewhere, somewhen, she has a soulmate—and dumps her smack into the middle of an ancient battle…

If you love mythology (and who among us isn’t fascinated by these ageless, yet still-fresh tales), Echoes in the Wind is the perfect quick read at the right price for a quiet loll in the hammock between two shade trees while the kids nap, or a sumptuous soak in a tub full of bubbles before the guests arrive, or if your pleasure is drifting on a mattress in the pool, you can count on this novella for entertainment. (Around water, slip your electronic reader into a Ziploc™ bag, seal it up tight, and you’re good to go!) Trust me, I do this all the time, even in my kayak.

Echoes in the Wind is available direct from www.champagnebooks.com, and other places that sell electronic reads.

WHEW! Lauren's at it again.

Okay, a little out of order here—but with Lauren Gallagher at the wheel, you can expect out of order things to happen, and this book is especially appropriate for a hot summer day at the beach—just don’t let the kids read over your shoulder!

Deanna stomps off to the beach to give her sister’s would-be-groom—who backed out at the last minute—a very big piece of her mind. She’s so choked with Nick, who’d been her best buddy since forever, and who was by now supposed to be her brother-in-law she means to give him all holy hell—then ends up giving him a  piece of a much different kind.

You know what hot, tropical nights can do to a gal. And a guy. After that, Deanna and Nick have a huge problem. They’ve discovered they’re more than best buddies. They are in love and definitely in lust with each other and there’s no turning back. Only… what are they going to tell Deanna’s heart-broken, jilted sister?

Probably Loren Gallagher is the only one who could pull this off. Oops! Poor choice of phrase, maybe, but what can I say? It's the right one.

THE DARK LADY

In this medieval fantasy, R.J. Hore’s protagonist, Princess Nefasti,  is another young woman beset by issues out of her control, apparently at the mercy of whoever murdered her father, the king, and left her mother close to dying, making her heir to  the throne of Vadio. Her three uncles all want the power that will rest on her slender shoulders once she’s of age—and they want it now. More to the point, each simply wants it for himself and none much care if she lives to reach her majority. At least one  of them would prefer she does not. But… which one?

Not one of them, her uncles, the plotting ambassadors from foreign courts who see her as a means to join their respective kingdoms with hers through forced marriage, have bargained for Nefasti’s own brand of personal courage and determination—or her having distinct plans of her own and the will to carry them out. This bold young lady, whom everyone sees as a pawn, is not to be trifled with. She not only knows secret passages throughout her castle home, she knows secrets gleaned by creeping along those passages—and uses them to her advantage, wiping out her enemies one by one, thus earning herself the title “The Dark Lady.”

R.J. Hore has created wonderfully well-drawn characters, from evilly cruel to foolishly foppish--but no less dangerous—to the  brave, bold and dedicated, each one expertly portrayed, made real enough to haunt the memory of the reader.  Find The Dark Lady in many electronic formats and in print at www.champagnebooks.com; www.burstbooks.ca; and most online sites for book-buying. Also, visit the author's own site: http://www.ronaldhore.com/