Amazon's KDP Select: The Verdict from a Newbie Skeptic

by A.M. Khalifa, thriller writer, Google+

I've been dragging my feet and avoiding test driving Amazon's optional KDP Select program that gives writers a set of preferential marketing tools in return for a 90-day period exclusivity to the Kindle Store. Even while hearing writers I respect and admire like L.J. Sellers and Jodie Renner singing its praises. 

I chose to go the indie route to be the master of my writing career. So understandably, the mere mention of someone else exercising exclusivity over my work triggers an allergic reaction. I want my ebooks to be available to readers through all outlets like Kobo, Nook, Sony and Apple, and not just Amazon.

Having said that, I've always been attracted to KDP Select's free book promotion tool. Until quite recently, the high ranking attained on Amazon's bestseller lists during the free promotional period could be converted to paid sales after the promotion ends. But in their excellent resource for indie publishing, Write. Publish. Repeat, Sean Platt, Johnny B. Truant, and David Wright explain how in 2013 Amazon shuffled the rules of the free book promotion, which effectively broke this ability to convert high ranking to sales.

Despite that, I finally bit the bullet. I was curious enough to give KDP Select a shot with a recent novella I published, The Jewish Neighbor. I figured the only way to find out how Select really works is to try it. And since this piece had been lingering on my blog collecting digital dust for many months with little feedback, I had nothing to lose.

To cut a long story short, the results were outstanding. The book was downloaded thousands of times across all of Amazon's territories, but no where more than Amazon UK. It's about a Syrian woman who accepts an arranged marriage to an exile in London to escape the horrors of the civil war ravaging her country, only to find herself in an equally grim situation, with the only tenderness coming from the least expected person - her Jewish neighbor. So it made sense there would be keen interest from Britain. But I also broke ground in places like Amazon Germany, Canada, India and France, which was a first for me. 

Things got even more interesting after the free promotion ended. The Jewish Neighbor started climbing up the ranks in Amazon's paid bestseller categories in both the US and the UK. It hit number 500 of all of Amazon UK's paid kindle content, and then lodged itself as the number 1 bestseller in the inspirational romance category for at least a week. And also locked in second slot on Jewish-themed literature for a few days.

All in all, I sold more copies of that piece than my entire one year writing-career, across all of my titles. At one point I was selling thirty copies of The Jewish Neighbor every hour.

But it didn't stop there. This unexpected performance started funneling customers to my other titles. My overall sales spiked, including my flagship content, my debut novel, Terminal Rage. The daily sales average of that quadrupled compared to how it usually performs on any given day, no doubt as a result of the increased exposure.

So what's the verdict, from a new writer and a former skeptic like me? 

KDP Select is an incredibly powerful marketing tool for indie writers. But it's not for everyone and not for all your content. I don't think it makes strategic sense for a first time writer just wetting their feet to put their debut offering on KDP Select, denying themselves the opportunity to explore the overall landscape. The program seems better suited for writers with a larger body of work who can afford to make certain works exclusive to Amazon, without alienating users of other platforms.

In my case, hot on the heels of The Jewish Neighbor's success, I enrolled many of my other similar titles in the program, leaving out for now my full-length novel, Terminal Rage. I still like the unlimited free promotions you can do on Kobo, as opposed to Select's limitation to a maximum of five days free promotion every 90-day enrollment period. And I have to admit, I have a soft spot for Kobo and the openness of their platform. Unlike my perception of Nook, I don't want to discount them for dead just yet. Being the smallest of the three main players, they also try harder. At the Frankfurt Bookfair last October they were serving free crab cakes, chardonnay and awesome teal-colored tote bags that make me a huge hit with supermarket cashiers in Rome.  

Then again, I may wake up one day and realize that five days of KDP Select every 90 days are far more valuable than 365 on Kobo. I will keep you posted.

The way I see it, Kobo, Nook, Apple, Sony and Smashwords all have their niche segments of the market. But you can't be an indie writer today and fail to notice that Amazon is increasingly where it's at.

Writers, what have your experiences been with KDP Select, and if you've been on the fence like me, have I managed to sway you to at least try it once? And readers, have you discovered literary gems through free downloads?

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Special Offer! My sizzling-hot short story, The Egyptian Affair is available for free, for a limited period on Kobo.

A.M. Khalifa's critically acclaimed debut novel, Terminal Rage, was recently described by Publishers Weekly as "dizzying, intricate, and entertaining."  He lives in Rome, Los Angeles, and Sydney, sometimes at the same time.

The ebook version of Terminal Rage is now on sale for $0.99 on Amazon.

Boxed E-Book Sets: Easy to Set up – Big Potential!

Guest post by Ian Graham, thriller writer 

After a month-long march complete with heralding trumpets and marching pikemen carrying signs of sales, the calendar finally rests on Black Friday and the holiday shopping season has arrived. The internet is replete with advertisements for incredible bargains, and Amazon’s Kindle Store is no exception. Every season, entrepreneurial authors looking to lift their visibility and boost book sales come up with new and interesting ways to attract reader attention, and this year, more than any other, seems to be the year of the boxed set.

All over the Kindle-verse, sets featuring multiple books packaged together are popping up. Some sets feature two or more titles from a single author, while others feature titles by different authors, but with a common theme such as romance, crime, horror, or politics. Last month, Allan Leverone, Steven Konkoly, and I decided to have a go at our own boxed set, and the Black Ops Bundle, Volume 1 was born of our efforts. Jodie contacted me about sharing our book-bundling venture with CFC readers & writers.

As is true with any book project, the behind-the-scenes work is just as important as the final product. Here are some quick points to think about if you're considering taking this avenue yourself and a bit about what we’ve learned along the way.

1) How many authors will be involved?

Whether you already have a group of author friends you’re going to work with or you’re planning on approaching other authors, this should probably be one of the first things to be decided. When we first began talking about our boxed set, we decided that a small number of authors would be best. There are boxed sets available that have as many as nine authors featured, but the minimal amount of space allotted to each author on the cover design doesn't do much for any one individual in terms of visibility, and may, in fact, do a disservice to that author’s brand. Additionally, as with anything, the more people involved, the more opinions there will be on every step of the process, potentially making the planning and design phases very complicated. So, less is more.   

2) How will you price your boxed set?

Prices for boxed sets do not seem to go much higher than five or six dollars, with the emphasis on value. Many sets are priced much lower, several as low as .99. The more authors you have involved, the smaller each slice of the pie will become. Splitting royalties nine or ten different ways hardly seems worthwhile for any one individual, even if sales climb into the thousands. Of course, the reverse side of this is if you have multiple titles available and plan to feature older works by each author. In this case, perhaps the chance at gaining additional readership by being placed in a set with other authors is more important than profit. 

For the Black Ops Bundle, we decided to go with a middle price point of $3.99. This means a reader can purchase three well-reviewed, full-length novels for a little over a dollar each, which is an incredible value. Additionally, at this lower price, someone who has read one of the books featured in the set and liked it may not think too much about re-purchasing it for the other two books. In an effort to trip the all-important Amazon algorithms, we are planning several promotions throughout the month of December that will temporarily lower the price in the hopes of catching a larger profit from the increased visibility after the promotion ends. 

3) Who will handle the publishing of the set and take on the paperwork burden?

If you’re planning on only featuring books from one author, then this point doesn't really affect you, but if a multiple-author boxed set is what you have your eye on, this is vitally important. Combining products by multiple individuals means dealing with multiple individual businesses, each with their own tax liabilities. Unfortunately, Amazon does not have a feature that allows for multiple payees, so one person will have to publish the boxed set through their vendor account and take on the burden of paying the other authors involved. This means that the income from the boxed set, for tax purposes, will be placed on the publisher and whatever business entity they have set up.

If all authors involved live in the United States, this isn’t a particularly difficult issue. Once the publisher is decided upon, each author should submit an IRS Form W-9 to that person so they can be easily, and properly, identified when it comes time to file taxes. To avoid paying taxes on all of the income associated with the boxed set, the publisher will need to file a Form 1099 on each individual author, which will list the amount of money paid to that author and shift that amount from the publisher's income column to the expense column, and will make the individual author responsible for paying any taxes associated with that amount of money.

If you're not in the United States, or if you're dealing with authors located in more than one country, I would recommend seeking the advice of each country's taxing authority or a qualified professional accountant.

Authors, I hope you have found this post informative and helpful. Please take a moment to leave a comment and let me know.
Readers, I hope you'll check out the Black Ops Bundle, Volume 1, featuring three well-reviewed, full-length political thrillers.

Slán Abhaile!

Ian Graham is the author of one novel and two short story collections in the Black Shuck political thriller series featuring former IRA volunteer turned American patriot, Declan McIver. The first full-length novel in the series, VEIL OF CIVILITY, has received praise from professional reviewers in both North America and the United Kingdom, and was chosen as e-thriller.com’s Thriller of the Month for September 2013. To learn more about the Black Shuck thriller series or to connect with Ian, visit www.iangrahamthrillers.com.   

PDF Perfidy--or Why PDF's and eBooks Don't Make Good Pals

Kimberly Hitchens is the founder and owner of Booknook.biz, an ebook production company that has produced more than 2,000 ebooks for over 1500 authors and imprints.

This week's blog article was inspired by both Liza Daly and editor Rob Bacon.  Liza, of Threepress, had written about the need for actual "PDF Conversion."  Rob wrote to me, saying, "but isn't this what you do?  Isn't she wrong?"  To which I replied,"Sadly, no; the only way to 'convert' PDF is with a great deal of manual labor."  Rob asked me for an article for his newsletter for his website, "The Perfect Write," and about the time this article appears, so will it appear in his newsletter.  I hope that some frustrated authors out there will find it useful.  It's a bit long--but it's covering a fair amount of ground, so please try to bear with me.

What's Wrong With My PDF→Word Conversion?  It Looks Perfect!

When people look at the results of automated "PDF to Word®" conversion sites, or software, different people see different things.  To an author, who only has a PDF copy of a book from her backlist, it looks like manna from heaven—a Word® file that looks perfect!  To an ebook professional, however, it’s like the movie Lake Placid—a serene, gorgeous surface, beneath which danger lurks.    

You’ve probably heard people talk about how they tried to upload a PDF at the KDP®, or tried to use a program like Adobe Acrobat® to "make" a Word® file from their PDF, only to have achieved wholly unexpected and dismal results.  This happens a lot, particularly to people who don’t have expertise in Word®.  When you use a program like Acrobat®, or one of those online conversion web sites, the file that you get back will often look exactly like you think it should.  And you’ll think it’s great, and be thrilled.  But, underneath, where it counts—where Word's invisible codes tell text what it is and how to display—lurks an unholy mess waiting to bite you when you try to actually use that file, rather than just looking at it.  

Let’s look at one real-life example, to kick off the discussion.  This prospective client came to us, having exported his “Word®” file from PDF, and then uploading the file to Amazon®.  As he ended up coming to us, you can already predict (plot spoiler ahead!), that the results weren’t good.      

When a display or layout program like Acrobat® tries to export a Word® file, it tries to “tell” Word® what it thinks it is seeing.  Because a PDF is not a word-processed file, it’s using a completely different set of codes, and different types of codes, to achieve the layout that you see when you view it.  This is because Acrobat® is a layout program, not a word processor.  Acrobat® and other layout programs only care about how the end product looks; word processors care about what the elements (words, sentences, paragraphs) in a document are.  Do you remember the old parable about three blind men and an elephant?  Well, the Acrobat® conversion to Word® format is a bit like that; Acrobat® tells Word® based upon what it thinks it sees; what it interprets as your intent—not what Word® actually needs to “hear.”  Let’s look at how Acrobat® “sees” a page of text, to the naked eye:

Figure 1:  This is a page from a PDF, exported by Adobe Acrobat to Word. Looks great, right? Perfectly normal?

Figure 1 is one of the pages, in Word, that was the result of an “automatic” export from Adobe Acrobat® to MS Word.  (You can see full-size copies of both images used in this article at:  https://www.dropbox.com/sh/zz18q9jdls181xa/RHDMacY0Qc )

This small section looks fine, right?  But those of you with eagle-eyes may have noticed that something isn’t quite right—why is the first word in each line underlined with the dreaded squiggly-green line?  Why does Word® think that’s a grammar error?  To see why that’s happening, let’s look at this exact same page with “reveal codes” turned on (what you see if you click the pilcrow icon ¶ on your Word® 2007-2010 Ribbon, or in the main toolbar for older editions):  

Figure 2: Holy Pilcrow, Batman!  What are all those ¶'s, and what do they mean? 

Now you can see what’s really going on.  When Acrobat® exported that file into Word®, it “thought” that every line was its own paragraph.  That’s right—if you tried to upload this file at the KDP, every single line you see there would come out, in Kindle, as its own paragraph, not words inside a much larger paragraph.  That’s what Word® is trying to tell you, with those squiggly green lines—it’s trying to say, “Hey, you didn’t capitalize the first letter of this new sentence.”  Word® thinks that those first words on each line are actually the first words in a new sentence. 

Why does it think that?  Because immediately before those words, Word® obeys a pilcrow command (at the end of each line, over there in the right-hand margin).   That pilcrow instructs Word, “I am marking the end of a paragraph.”  Word® knows that the very next word is the first word of a new paragraph, so it must be the first word of a new sentence, and therefore, should be capitalized.  That’s what those little pilcrows, and the little squiggly green lines are telling you:  Here There Be Dragons!  

But:  Won't It look Fine, Anyway?  Without Those Cruddy Pilcrows?

When this file was exported to Kindle by the prospective client, what he saw, to his horror, was this (I’m simulating the actual output, starting with the first line of the “paragraph” near the bottom of the section shown that starts with, “Some of the nuns…”):

Figure 3:  Obviously, not what he expected!

Obviously—this was not what he’d had in mind.  This was prose, not poetry or some type of experimental Haiku.  He’d expected his Kindle book would look like Figure 1…but what he got was far, far different, making the book unreadable and thus, unsaleable.  Why did this happen? 

The way a word processor works is actually pretty simple.  Every single element in a word-processed file, whether it's a paragraph, or an italicized word or phrase, or smallcaps, has invisible tags surrounding it that identifies it to the program and tells it how to display.  More importantly, those codes (tags) tell the program what it is. (A word, a paragraph, etc.)  An example of how this looks in code (HTML), which is what actually runs word processors, and is used to make eBooks, is this: 

<p class=”indent”><i>This is a paragraph in italics, in HTML</i>, which is the “language” used to create Kindle books.</p>

What this looks like, on a Kindle device:

This is a paragraph in italics, in HTML, which is the “language” used to create Kindle books.

A word or phrase in italics, for example, is surrounded by tags like this to start italicization: <i>.  The program is told to stop italicizing the words by a closing tag, which looks like this: </i>.  This is true whether it’s Word, Wordperfect, Open Office, Libre Office…well, you get the drift. 

In the above example, you see me tell the program that the paragraph starts with the word “This,” after the opening paragraph tag, and ends with the period after the word “books.”  The italics styling starts with the word “This,” and stops after the word, “HTML.”  In most word-processors, most of this happens invisibly to you, and can only be revealed using either Word’s Styles menu, or by working in the actual code, as most ebook conversion companies do.  This is the “black box” effect; magic happens behind the screen that makes stuff “just happen.” 

Exhibit 1 and the result shows just one very simplified explanation of how things go badly wrong when exporting PDF files to Word.  I used it because it’s the easiest to demonstrate.  Far larger, and harder to find and fix, land mines await the unwary. 

Much text formatting, like italics, can go horribly wrong.  One such case is a client that came to us because no matter what she did, when she uploaded her “Word” file (made from her PDF) to the KDP, none of her italics showed up.  It turned out that Acrobat® told Word® that the italics were in a special italic font that isn’t available on Kindle—so of course, the italics never showed up.  Sometimes, Acrobat® tells Word® that a symbol exists, but uses a special symbol font to create it—and again, that symbol’s font may not be on your computer, and it’s certainly not on Kindle devices.

It’s important to remember:  PDF is all about layout, and how text looks; word-processors and eBooks are all about what elements are (words, sentences, paragraphs, pages, sections), and then how they are displayed.  In eBooks, the structure (what something is) takes precedence over how it looks.    

All real paragraphs must have that pilcrow code at the end; that instructs Word® that the paragraph is where it should be, and that the next paragraph starts immediately.  But again, most of the chaos caused with “auto-magic” convert-PDF-to-Word® programs is not visible to the eye in Word; the problems only surface after the document is converted into code.  Even I, after five years of making ebooks, can sometimes not see the problems that are hidden deep in the code of a “faux” Word® file until I export the file into code, and then find the hidden Dragons waiting for me. 

If you can, it’s best to leave conversion from PDF to Word® or eBook to experts.  Yes, I know that sounds self-serving, as I own an ebook-making firm, but it’s true.  If you have a lot of expertise in Word® (or another word processor); if you have a true command of Word’s Styles, macros, etc., you can absolutely do all the clean-up yourself, but whether you do it yourself, or pay someone else to do it, all that “cruft” that is put inside a PDF-exported/created Word® file must be cleaned up before you can make a successful, clean, beautiful-looking ebook. 

The “paragraph” problem can be cleaned up with time and some effort, even by those without a lot of expertise in Word.  You can go through and delete all those unwanted paragraph codes, but you have to do it one line at a time.  Don’t do what one of our clients did:  she thought it would be “faster and easier” to use search and replace.  She chose “all” on the search and replace menu—and ended up with a book that was one giant paragraph long!

***

Remember:  you can see full-size examples of today's images and examples at this link:  CLICK HERE.   You'll want to see them larger size in order to view them clearly.   This is "stuff" worth reviewing, and worth knowing about before you decide to take on PDF→Word→Kindle conversion for yourself.  As I said above:  it can be done by a determined beginner, but do know and understand what you're getting into, upfront, and don't be easily discouraged.  Good Luck!

Getting Scroogled and Amazon Attacks, Part II

Kimberly Hitchens is the founder and owner of Booknook.biz, an ebook production company that has produced books for over 1,000 authors and imprints with over 2,000 produced books up on Amazon and other retailers.

Hi, Gang!  We interrupt this incredibly insightful blog on Amazon's Persnickety Punctiliousness, Part II, to talk about Being Scroogled.

Are You Getting Scroogled?

For anyone that hasn't seen the ads, or the kerfuffle on the Net, Microsoft has made a point of letting GMail or Googlemail users know that they are being "Scroogled" by Google.  What's Scroogling, besides something that sounds like Big Booty Sex?  Being Scroogled is what happens when you use your GMail account and email someone--anyone.  If you email someone, say, Auntie Flo, telling her that you're shopping for a car, you might find it a bit startling that suddenly, everywhere you go, you see GoogleAds for cars and car websites.  Is Google prescient?  No, they're not:  they're reading your email.

"We don’t need you to type at all. We know where you are, with your permission; we know where you’ve been, with your permission; we can more or less know what you’re thinking about."
Google Chairman Eric Schmidt at the The Atlantic Washington Ideas Forum in 2010

"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place."
Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt on Consumer Privacy

What did he say?  Seriously?

Yup:  Google is reading your email.  You can see Microsoft's discussion about it, here:  CLICK HERE.  Oddly enough, and maybe it's because it's Google, I haven't seen the big outcry that was heard 'round the Net when people had their knickers in a twist about Facebook invading their privacy.  Frankly, to me, what you say on Facebook is public, and if that "privacy" gets invaded, it's the same thing as the goodies from a criminal endeavor lying about in plain sight.  But reading my email?  I don't care if it's bots or a program--I don't want Google or anyone else reading my damn email.  I wondered why, recently, I was seeing Google ads for the very same project management system I am already using at Booknook.biz; now I know.  I'd answered a GoogleMail question I'd received, asking about project management systems, and I'd said that I use TeamworksPM.  Now, everywhere I go--everywhere--I see ads for this self-same system.  To say it's annoying doesn't do it justice.

What Happened to My Privacy?

But the bigger issue is:  Google, get out of my damn email. In a day and age in which privacy is ever-dearer and harder to find, I don't want someone, mechanical or otherwise, poking around in my email skivvies.  I mean, seriously:  if I became angry and referred to someone as a "dildo" in an email (not saying it's happened, but, hey, I'm human), I shudder to think at what ads I might be seeing afterwards.

###

 

Amazon Strikes Again!

 

Meanwhile, back at Booknook.biz:  you may recall, faithful readers (ha!), that sometime ago, I blogged about "Amazon's Punctuation Punctiliousness," referring to it as "persnickety."  Well, we've had another event at Booknook.biz that has simply reinforced my irritation at what seems to be the unequal treatment of better-selling authors with regard to mere typos.  Now, I'm as keen for clean books as the next guy (maybe not as much as Jodie, but, hey, I'm a bookmaker, not an Editor), but anyone who believes that any book out there is "perfect" is deluding themselves.  So, what happened?

 

Believe it or not, today we received a "Kindle Quality Notice" ("KQN") for one of our top author clients, a bestseller on several continents with a large list of books.  What for, you may ask?  The book in question is a backlist title, and was scanned, OCR'ed, etc., so as scanning causes errors it's not that surprising.  The KQN was for TWO--count 'em, TWO--"typos."  Both were mere spacing errors, where the scan created a slight amount of space between the first letter of a word and the rest.  Not quite a full space--but a small gap.  TWO errors. Now, mind you, this is out of a book that has 220,015 words.  Yes, Two Hundred Twenty-Two Thousand and Fifteen words.  In print, 800 lovely lusty pages. 

 

I'm not a math whiz, but I make that an error rate of 0.00001.  Yes--one one-millionth.  That's the error rate; one one-millionth of 1 percent.  I wrote to Amazon again, as I do on almost every KQN that comes in (invariably for the  best-selling authors, as I noted back in July of last year), and asked them once more to establish a clearer and better threshold--something like, 1 word out of every 10,000 can have an error, or whatever they think is a reasonable threshold--and to apply it evenly across the board, to all authors and publishers--not just the best ones.  It's grossly unfair for people who have already paid good money for scanning, OCR, proofreading, cover design, book creation, etc., to get the short end of the stick, simply because they are the ones that get read, and whose readers report errata. 

 

So:  Why Not Fix Print, Then, Too?

 

I noted that they wouldn't dream of asking someone in print to "fix" their book--why ask those who've submitted professionally-created ebooks?  I understand their mindset; the bulk of their self-published authors type up a Word file and submit that, so fixing it isn't that big of a deal.  But what about the other thousands of authors who paid someone, just as they would have paid for a print book?  What about authors who have both up?  Why is it always the ebook that gets the Quality Notice?  Why the double-standard, both about curation and ebooks versus print?  In this day and age, much of what's sold in "print" on Amazon is made at Createspace or other POD houses--so why not make print authors "fix" their books, too? 

 

And I'd really love, love, love to know if KQN's get sent to Random House and the other legacy publishers.  I think that while Amazon certainly has every right to seek the highest-quality content, they need to start curation at a much more fundamental level.  If they're not going to do anything about the Broken Bones of the world (see my July post), then really, they need to stop telling first-rate authors, the bread-and-butter of Amazon's world, to fix books that have an error rate of one one-millionth of a percent.  That's just ridiculous.  Amazon, c'mon, think about this, will you? 



This is Hitch, over and out, until next time.

 ###

How Should a Character be Killed?

By Andrew E. Kaufman

I know it’s an odd question coming from someone who writes thrillers, but recently, I had to give it a lot of thought.

I was about halfway through my latest novel, when I suddenly realized that one of my characters needed to die. It made perfect sense, and most importantly, was a crucial element in driving my plot.

Admittedly, I’ve killed off plenty of characters in my books, and figuring out the method was never a problem, but with this one, I actually hadn’t planned on it, so the surprise caught me a little off-guard.

I really had to think about this.

While killing off a character has to work well with the plot, just as important, is how they are killed. It has to connect with the suspect’s frame of mind and their motivation, fit perfectly within the story, and it has to make emotional as well as logical sense.

I’ve often read books where the method of murder made me scratch my head. It didn’t fit, seemed illogical, and as a result, bumped me out of the story. I remember one in particular where fancy explosives were used, and yet there was no mention prior to this that the killer had any knowledge on the subject. As a result, I lost confidence and interest in the story and in the author. I stopped reading.

In this instance, in my book, the killer was sending out a message, so it not only needed to be powerful, but it also needed to be specific and had to resonate strongly with my protagonist. I wanted it to shake him up in a very personal way. In other words, I couldn’t just shoot the victim dead because it wouldn’t have meant anything to the reader and would feel like a copout.

After a lot of struggling, a lot of thought, I did finally figure it out. I don’t want to give away the story before the book comes out, but I will tell you this: the message was that my protagonist was playing with fire.

I think you can figure out the rest.

But how about you? Authors, what goes into your thought process when you decide to kill off a character? Do you ever struggle with it? 

Readers, what’s your experience been? 

Some Great Resources for Kindle Authors & Readers

by Jodie Renner, editor, author, speaker
As an editor and a new Kindle author, I'm always on the lookout for resources for me and my clients. I just discovered a great new website for e-book authors and readers. This site looks like a gold mine for both Kindle readers and writers who publish on Kindle.

Scroll down for links to other great sites for Kindle authors.

The Kindle Book Review reviews and features e-books. They also have a “Freebies” page, with daily alerts, and they feature Kindle books by talented authors who have at least 10 reviews with a 4.0-star rating or better. According to their home page, they strive to be a filter for readers, weeding out Kindle books with poor reviews.

They have separate pages for novels under various genres, like Horror/Suspense, Literary Fiction, Romance, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Thrillers & Mysteries, and Young Adult.

They also offer a Best Indie Book Contest, and you can advertise your e-book with them, for a fee.

 

In addition, they have an excellent "Author Resources" page, with lists of links to many other sites where you can promote your Kindle book.

Author Resources:

Great Websites for Marketing & Connecting with Readers:

• DigitalBookToday.com (Book Buzz Circle)
• WorldLiteraryCafe.com (Book Buzz Circle)
• The Kindle Book Review (Book Buzz Circle)
• The Women’s Nest (Book Buzz Circle)
• 99-cent-network.com - monthly promotions and events
• goodkindles.blogspot.com - nice book blog
• booktweetingservice.com - tweets to large audience $29
• kindlenationdaily.com - large audience with lots of promo ops.
• The Independent Author Network - nice site to build online presence
• Kindle Boards - talk books, and daily book/banner ads that are affordable.
• Author Marketing Club - FREE! A slew of great stuff for authors (Free promos, support, reviews)
• Kindle Mojo – A book promotion site
• BookBub.com - pricey but has a large email following
• Bookgoodies.com - author features/reviews/free book posting
• eReaderNewsToday – ads
• Thanks to Angela Ackerman for these great links:
• Gutsy Indie Publishers  - great FB group that is about helping and sharing knowledge, not promoting to each other.
  
  Why Isn't My Book Selling? -A blog for people to crowd source opinions on Book covers, blurbs, pricing and marketing choices to help determine why a book might not be selling, and how to turn things around. Run by the very savvy and helpful Victorine Lieske
  
  Promo: Addicted To Ebooks - A place to list all the info about your indie book--free!

Places to Promote Your Freebie Days:

• Top 100 Best Free Kindle Book List brought to you by digitalbooktoday.com
• WorldLiteraryCafe.com (tweet Teams/Free day announcements for members [free])
• bookdaily.com - get your book excerpt mailed to thousands of opt in readers
• storyfinds.com - great site to promote freebies and 99¢ books
• bargainebookhunter.com - Offers free promo & sponsorships.
• eReaderNewToday – free ebook submissions
• booktweetingservice.com – tweets to large audience $29
• ebookswag.com - Promotes to a decent sized facebook crowd.
• Freebooksy - Promote free books & offers paid features.
• freeebooksdaily.com - Announces free books and does author interviews.
• kindlenationdaily.com - large reach but expensive.
• centsibleereads.com - up and coming free/low cost book promtion with a friendly touch
• Kindle Mojo – a book promotion site for freebies and non-freebies
• Kindle Book Promos - Free book announcements/Sponsorships
• Book Daily.com - Emails daily book excerpts to their reader list
• Author Marketing Club - FREE! Free day promos and book promos
• BookBub.com - pricey but has a large email following
• Bookgoodies.com - author features/reviews/free book posting
• BookDealHunter – promotes freebies
• http://ereadernewstoday.com/ent-free-book-submissions/
• http://BookDealHunter.com

Get Reviewed:

• booktweetingservice.com – free reviews
• Kindle Book Reviews – free reviews
• Do you have more review sites to add here?

Tweet Hashtags “#” and Twitter Folks to Help Promote Your Freebie:

• #kindle #kindlefire #ebooks #FREE #mustread #goodreads #greatreads #freeebooks #Kindlefreebooks
• #AmazonPrime #Kindledeals #kindledeals
• @FreeKindleStuff @FreeReadFeed @free_kindle @Freebookdeal @freebookpromos @frebooksy
• @KindleBlaze @KindleBookBlast @KindleBookKing @KindleDaily @Kindlbookreview @digitalBKtoday
• @KindleFireDept @KindleEbooksUK @KindleFreBook @KindleFreeBooks @KindleFreeStuff @KindleKing
• @KindleSurprise @KindleUS @KindleUK @KindleDE @KindleES @Kindle_Max @kindle_mojo @Kindlefreebies
• @Kindlestuff

If you know of other Twitter groups, Facebook pages, etc., please let us know in the comments.

Great Websites to Learn From:

• The Writing Bomb
• thecreativepenn.com
• thebookdesigner
• A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing - J.A. Konrath’s blog
• Scott Nicholson’s Blog - A clear leader in the indie field; worth your time

Kindle Book Reviews also offers a short list of cover designers, formatters, and editors, as well as  advice for getting your book noticed and sold, including specifics on your book cover, book blurb, price point, marketing, reviews, and strategies for gaining the maximum sales through offering your book for free for short periods.

Website: http://www.thekindlebookreview.net/  Twitter: @Kindlbookreview

Readers and writers: If you know of other great e-book author or reader resources, please let us know in the comments! Thanks!

 

Jodie Renner, a freelance editor specializing in popular fiction, has published two books to date in her series, An Editor’s Guide to Writing Compelling Fiction: Writing a Killer Thriller and Style That Sizzles & Pacing for Power (soon to be re-titled Fire up Your Fiction), which won a Silver Medal in the FAPA Book Awards, 2013, and Honorable Mention in the Writer’s Digest Self-Published E-Book Awards, 2013. Upcoming title: Immerse the Readers in Your Story World. For more info, please visit Jodie’s author website or editor website, her blog, Resources for Writers, and find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Jodie also blogs alternate Mondays on The Kill Zone blog. Subscribe to Jodie’s newsletter here.