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Smashwords’ Summer/Winter Promotion!

Time for a special little promotion!

I hope you guys are all enjoying the summer(or winter, if you’re living down south). Of course, it’s raining in Denmark! No scandinavian summer without flooded basements…

But to provide you with a little extra reading material when you’re lying outside, enjoying the sun, or hiding out from the cold inside, I have decided to participate in Smashwords’ Summer/Winter Promotion!

In July, you will be able to get Huntress and Resounding Echo for free and Silent Sound for 50% off!

What are you waiting for? Get a move on!

Books in the Smashwords’ Promotion

Huntress Cover                    Resounding Echo Cover                     Silent Sound Cover Angel

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Read an E-Book Week on Smashwords!

Read an E-book Week

I know I’m a bit late in announcing this, but I wanted to tell everyone that I’m participating in Smashwords’ ‘Read an E-Book Week’!

The event runs from 3-9. March, and it’s an amazing chance to discover new writers at bargain prices. As a treat to people who follows this blog, as well as those following me on Facebook and Twitter, both Huntress and Resounding Echo will be free during this week.

If you have yet to pick up one of those titles, it’s the perfect chance to do it before Silent Sound gets released in late March or early April!

I plan on spending ‘Read an E-Book Week’ discovering a lot of great new writers, and I hope all of you will do the same! 

Why are you still reading this? Get going! 

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Aggressive Indie Promotion

Book Magic Fantasy—–

Goodreads, Twitter, book forums… They’re everywhere.

I’m talking about the thousands of indie authors attempting to promote their books. And not the ones that send the occasional tweet advertising their books or the ones who have a book cover in their forum signature.

I’m talking about those that try to force their book down your throat at any given moment and have absolutely no interest in anything besides getting you to buy their work.

I’m absolutely sick of them.

It’s no wonder independent writers have such a bad reputation, because many of them are just damn annoying and downright shameless.

Understand me right, I’m an indie author myself and of course I promote my books. I have to, or no one would ever know about them. But I consider myself above practically begging for others to read my books.

I’m sure everyone who uses book discussion forums have seen the indie authors who pretends to have something to say in a thread, but it turns out they just want to advertise their book.

Yeah, I totally agree!

By the way, I written a book on “almost” the same thing: *Insert link*

And that would be one of the less shameless examples…

Everyday I encounter more and more writers who seem to have nothing else in mind. I can’t count the times I have had someone say that my book seems “really interesting, and by the way, could I read theirs?”. Really, it’s actually more pathetic than it is annoying most of the time.

Many people also uses my Twitter feed, because they see I’m a writer and I have a pretty big following. They merely write @mlouring before their tweets to show up on my Twitter stream. If they’re going to violate my personal space, they should at least buy me a cup of coffee first…

Another example is one time I started a thread on a book forum asking for fantasy book suggestions. The thing about that forum is that it forbids self-promotion in there. What did this desperate author do? Go to my website to throw their book in my face, of course! Because I wanted to read some fantasy recommended by others, so of course I would want to read their book, right? Forum rules shouldn’t hinder me in discovering this wonderful new book they had written,  should it?

I realize I’m ranting… It just makes me wince every time I see another author demean themselves to this desperate behavior. It’s also clear that many readers are getting annoyed by this. For example, despite not using Goodreads to promote my work, many will keep their distance from me when they see I’m a writer. Many refuse to ‘friend’ authors on there, because they know they might be force-fed self-promotion from them. And I completely understand them.

Aggressitivity hurts not only the author in question, but all indie writers. Then so many will do everything to promote their book, the indie community as a whole appears desperate to sell their books and no one have respect for that.

So to all of you who succumbs to this behavior, I can only say: Have some respect for yourself. If your books seem interesting, when you don’t have to force them upon others! And for the love of God, stop trying to promote to other authors. They are trying to sell books as well, they don’t have time to ‘help you out’, if you don’t have time to even say “hi” before you start telling them to read your book.

And if I see anyone start promoting their books in the comments on this post, God have mercy, I will hurt you. I will hunt you down, find out where you live and hurt you.

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New Facebook Page

Facebook IconI finally made a proper Facebook page and I must say I’m already enjoying it.

Their new page design and Timeline update really open up for some great opportunities to create a unique and interactive site. Gone are the generic and boring Fan pages as you can now personalize the design within seconds. I’m in love.

Never really liked Facebook much before(Properly because I really don’t care what people had for lunch an hour ago…), but I’m really positive about my new page! I’m pretty sure it’s because I can make the header purple now…

Go check it out and join me to talk books or whatever else you might want to chit-chat about(It IS Facebook after all…)! I’m also dying to talk to some other fantasy authors, and I’m currently looking for books to feature on the page and I would rather showcase indie books than ones everyone knows already.

Check it out:  http://www.facebook.com/MichelleLouring