MySpace vs. Facebook: Something to Keep in Mind

I’ve tried to write this column three times and my computer keeps shutting down before I can finish. This would be fine if the Word document would save, but unfortunately my computer is in full rebellion. Here’s hoping today lucky number four.

Something to think about when you are using a social networking site to advertise your book and your writing is audience. While this seems obvious, recent articles have come out emphasizing that the differences between MySpace and Facebook aren’t just limited to design and platform, but fall along class lines as well.

In June danah boyd, a doctorial candidate in the School of Information at the University of California-Berkeley, wrote a blog essay entitled, “Viewing American divisions through Facebook and MySpace.” boyd’s studies have led her to her thesis that the previously reported on mass exodus from MySpace to Facebook is not quite what it appears, and instead it is the affluent children of college educated parents (and who are seeking college placement themselves) who are heading to Facebook while those with a working class background or feel disenfranchised prefer (and are drawn to) MySpace.

How does this affect how you market your book? That’s up to you. It all comes down to knowing your audience, whoever they might be.

Thoughts?

You can view a video of danah boyd discussing the evolution of social networking sites on the internet here.

Playing at Being Ginger Rogers*

Kristin Nelson had a great post up at Pubrants covering Michael Cader’s keynote speech for the Backspace conference called, “Things No one Understands About Publishing, and the Internet, Featuring the Most Important Thing No One Ever Tells Authors, and the Most Important Thing Publishers Don’t Know.”

Along with advising authors to campaign like they’re self-published even if they have a big house behind them and know your audience he had some great advice about using bloggers and the internet (bullets five and six) that bear (bare?) further discussion.

In bullet five Kristin summarizes Cader’s remarks on bloggers and how they know when they’re being marketed to, and it’s true. I get emails all the time from publishers (and authors) hawking this book or that, most of which I’m not interested in. The quickest way to turn me off is to just blitz me with a mass email with no personalization or originality. Great, you’ve got a book out that relates in no way to anything I’ve ever discussed on this blog. Why would I want to read that?

Answer: I don’t. You didn’t give me a reason to so I’m probably going to ignore the email.

But what if I’m a tiny bit interested? What if there is something there that makes me think, “Hmm, I want to learn more about this”?

I may not immediately shoot off an email saying “send me the goods.” Nope, I’ll probably do some research first, and almost every time I get this feeling I find absolutely nothing out there (except for a blurb about the sale at Publisher’s Marketplace).

Which leads me to Cade’s (as summarized by Kristin) bullet point six: “Publishing often has it backwards. They keep a big book a secret until the release day and then there is a big publicity push…The internet values what’s old, what can be found in a search, what is repeated over time.” If I go out there looking for information about your book not provided in the publicity release (and let me tell you, a lot of things are not included in the publicity release), I need to find more than that Publisher’s Marketplace blurb and an almost nothing Amazon page acting as a placeholder. Does the author already have a website I can look at? Is there some excerpt out there that I can read to give me some idea of this person’s writing? How can I create buzz for you if I have nothing to link to?

The internet, and buzz by bloggers, is built through those interconnected links.

As soon as you start putting out those emails or sending out those ARCs you should have something in place with more information than your publicity release. You should have something set up so that other lit bloggers can contact you to get on your list or find out more about your product. Say I read about something on someone else’s lit blog and think, “wow, I love this. This is totally up my readership’s alley,” only to find out I need a company letterhead and $0.41 in postage to try and get your attention (yes, Minotaur, I’m talking about you). It’s not like I can’t rise above the adversity that is my relationship with the US Postal Service, but if you are trying to build buzz—especially internet buzz—you should pander to the format used by bloggers: electronic.

The fastest way for me to tell 150 to 200 people about your book (and how excited I am by it) is not to send out a newsletter and pay $61.50 to $82.00 in postage but to hit post on blogger and tell them for free.

And the fraction of that readership that are interested in the title as well? They’re going to do their own readership. They’re going to see what other bloggers are saying and take a look at the web pages the author and publisher have provided. They are going to spin the great Google algorithm and see what they can find.

I fear that this is coming across muddled because I’m suffering the duel affects of too little sleep and mondo allergies, or that I’m perhaps asking too much, but the truth is as soon as those publicity emails go out, you need to have something in place for people online to learn about your book(s). Word of mouth can spread farther and faster in the electronic realm, but it needs something already established to feed off of or link back to. A lit blogger’s casual mention (with or without an accompanying snapshot) of an ARC or publicity statement they received is enough to spur more than a few people to go looking for information on your book.

Give it to them.

Throw up a simple website or make use of a free Blogger page to get started while you’re building the finished product. Set up some way for lit bloggers to email you about getting more info on the title or about receiving an ARC. If you’re afraid that they’re trying to scam you, require bloggers to submit a site address and have an intern check their content out. I don’t mind a publishing company asking me my daily traffic or who comprises my reading audience—that’s good business and hopefully it will help them specialize what publicity emails they send my way in the future.

What are your thoughts?

What’s the first thing you do on the internet when you hear about a book you might be interested in?

*And doing everything backwards while in heels

Better Editing or More Publicity?

On her blog Justine Larbalestier, author of the Magic or Madness trilogy, asked if writers would prefer great editing or great publicity for their books. I've been sitting on this link for over a week now, mulling over the comments, trying to figure out how I would answer it if I were a writer. On one hand, if I had a really strong reader group who helped iron out all the plot wrinkles before my writing ever saw an editor then the lure of more publicity money would make sense. But on the other, look at all the books who've found fame with little or no traditional publicity help? Would more money have helped in these situations?

Given that many of you are writers out there, what do you think?

Is the only bad publicity no publicity at all?

If this were Sesame Street, today’s word would be publicity, brought to you by the letter P and the number 300,000,000, which represents the approximate population of the United States—a fraction of which you are trying to reach with your book.

But this is not Sesame Street. There are no puppets and I have a potty mouth not fit for after-school television. This is a place of learning, of trading information, and the biggest topic of conversation for authors other than “How do I get my book published?” seems to be “How do I get people to pay attention to the book I just published?”

And that, my friends, is where publicity comes in.

Publicity, as defined by Answers.com is:

1.) a.) Information that concerns a person, group, event, or product and that is disseminated through various media to attract public notice. b.) Public interest, notice, or notoriety achieved by the spreading of such information. c.) The act, process, or occupation of disseminating information to gain public interest.
2.) The condition of being public.

Nice and vague, no? The truth is publicity is hard to quantify and define, especially in the book business. What acts as the tipping point to make your book the topic of every bibliophile’s conversation is not what will work for the next author or even your next book. While some methods of reaching the bookselling and book buying public may be successful across the board it is rare that most don’t have to be tweaked in some way. Publicity for a history of the plague should not be approached the same way as publicity for a romance novel. Publicity for a romance novel should not be approached the same way as that for a science fiction novel. Different markets (no matter how many crossover readers they may have) have different requirements, different areas press releases can be sent to, and different overall hooks.

So let’s talk about what works for you as a reader and what doesn’t? Book trailers? Book marks? Websites?

How does that vary from what you do as an author? How do you get out there and promote yourself? What has your publishing company done for you? What have you had to do for yourself? Which seemed to affect your sales more?

And for the booksellers—current or former—out there, what worked for you? Were you a drone when it came to publicity, simply putting the co-opped books out where they were supposed to go without paying attention or did you read the flyers and letters that came through your store? What publicity hooks worked for you: bookmarks, letters, glossies or book articles? What didn’t? How did your own store approach its publicity and those of the authors it showcased?

Everyone is looking for the single answer, the perfect trick to get their book to be on everyone’s to buy list and the truth is that there is no holy, golden key to unlocking the publicity world. All we can do is learn from others’ successes and failures, and identify where the publisher’s publicity job ends and the author’s begins. Using the answers to the questions above I hope to look at where the publicity machine breaks down and how it can be fixed as well as what seems to get the word on through.

Horror stories and once in a lifetime stories accepted, feel free to post anonymously if you don’t want someone knowing why you think so-and-so screwed up big time with some book or another.

And Sometimes All You Need Are Some Snakes…

We talk a lot on this blog about what you need to do to get a bookseller to give you that coveted front of store placement, but perhaps we’re being too logical about this. You see, not too long ago my lone male coworker (I don’t know how he puts up with all of us) told me this story about a movie that went viral on the internet before it had even been made. The movie, Snakes on a Plane, starred Samuel L. Jackson, and inspired so much internet hubbub that the producers even included a fan produced soundtrack.

At the time this conversation only inspired a “Why, Sam Jackson? Why?” from me, and a few giggles. Something the coworker has reinforced by randomly bringing up the subjects “snakes” and “planes,” but I have been snake plane free for the last month or so…until today.

Today I’m busting through a shipment of boxes, bemoaning my sore head and the fact that I don’t need most of this stuff, when what should I find? Why a book based on the screenplay of the movie “Snakes on a Plane,” of course.

The book is going front and center on my mass market wallbay, but not only for making me laugh for five minutes straight. I mean, how can I (or any other bookseller) resist? It’s about snakes…on a M*ther F*ckin’ plane!

Links, Plans, and Marketing Shazams

Quit laughing. I know “Shazams” was lame. You’re looking at reason #473 for why I’ll never be a poet. And no, you don’t want to hear about the other 472 to reasons other than to note that I’m iambic pentameter will one day recover and those dirty limericks were not my fault…I was under the influence. Besides shazams serves a purpose that will be revealed later on in this post, but first:

A sharp reader of the Columbus Dispatch (I just realized I never asked for permission to reveal his name) spotted this article on our favorite topic here: publisher paid book placement a.k.a. co-op advertising/marketing. (This is not the marketing shazam, if you were wondering.)

Your mission: read the article, go hit a couple of B&Ns, Borders, or Books-a-Millions (if you can) and come back here to discuss what you found. We’ll do list comparisons of the tables/a-frames that are not the bestsellers racks (because of course the bestsellers racks would be the same).

The New York Daily News has discovered the truth about book clubs (link stolen from Booksquare)! Women get together and end up talking about sex and relationships? The books are treated as second class citizens? Nooo! Say it ain’t so. And then tell me where I can find one of these clubs. Is the wine free?

Someday I’ll have to remember to actually write about my feelings on Oprah and book clubs (these feelings are range from positive to negative). Someone please remind me, but not today, because today I have a plan. I need to:

• Clean my house


• Do laundry


• Go to the bank


• Pay bills


• Organize all that lovely information y’all submitted for the website post and pull it all together (so if you have anything else to submit, do so now).


• Organize the author good behavior in bookstore post and post that as well.


• Try to remember all the cool marketing techniques I’ve been exposed to over the years, which reminds me…

A very nice reader asked me to list all the marketing techniques I found interesting, and of course once I’m put on the spot I remember nothing. Nothing! I mean, sure there was Stephen King’s cell phone messages for The Cell, but while intriguing not too many authors have the power to get that done (unless you have a brother who works for a cell company), and it will only reach a limited number of people. Then I remembered David Wellington’s Monster Island, about smart zombies (Smart zombies, people! That scares me more than I can say. At least before I could outrun them), and how he released it chapter by chapter for free on the internet before its release (Cory Doctorow did the same). I hear that it is already out-performing Thunder Mountain’s expectations and it just got excerpted in Fangoria (or so a customer tells me). And I mustn’t forget Joseph Nassise who recorded his whole book to allow his readers to listen chapter by chapter for free via podcast.

Gee, I guess I didn’t go completely blank so much as cover territory we’ve been over.

But then, THEN, I got an ARC from Kimberly Raye for her new book Dead End Dating and it came with a little coffin shaped mint tin. She sent out “Death Mints” (with which we immediately started using the Wrigley tagline “Kills bad breath dead”) to go with her book about a dating service for the undead. Very cute. All my non-romance reading counterparts will remember her because they are all enjoying the mints as well and she’ll probably be guaranteed a face-out if nothing else.

I only represent the bookseller half of the equation, and a very small portion of that (so other booksellers please chime in with your own interactions with fun marketing techniques), whereas y’all are the readers (and writers). What magical marketing (shazams, if you will) have you experienced here on the net and out there in the real world? What has caught your eye and made you go “Hmmm, maybe I’ll check that out”?

What works for one book won’t necessarily work for another (a children’s marketing campaign won’t have the same impact on an adult audience), but you can learn from another person’s techniques and maybe it will get you thinking outside of the box. So c’mon people, what have you seen? Heard of?

What worked on you?

Meanwhile I’ll dig around for links on this marketing madness…probably when I should be cleaning my house.

Wait, They Don’t Love You Like I Love You (Thinking Beyond the Internet)

PBW posted at Romancing the Blog today about what you need to do to maintain a successful weblog. Don’t let the romance content of the site turn you off because the advice she offers applies to everyone who’s trying to build a readership. It does not, however, address what you should do for your other readers—those who do not have the internet. The truth is that many people still do not have home computers (or computers at all) and (surprise, surprise) this allows them more time to read books that they are interested in.

These people remain untouched by weblogs, blog tours, online articles and message boards, but they are a strong, vital part of your readership. They learn about your books from magazines, other books, booksellers and through a passing comment from a friend or coworker. And if they like you?

Well, then they pass along your name and words to someone else that they hope will love you just as much.

The world of the internet and its readership does not represent the trends of your readership as a whole, so when you are planning your strategy for book world domination, remember these folks and target them accordingly.

The only question is how?

Suggestions?

Doing My Homework # 5: New Books and Press Releases

On "Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering Pinky" (which is still open for questions), Bethany K. Warner asked:

How do you sell books by new authors? Is it reviews? Cover art? Blurbs on the cover by other authors you like? Do all new books get the same kind of placement/treatment?

I guess I should start with the last question first. No, all new books do not get the same level of treatment or placement. There are no hard and fast rules because there is an element of luck to any book choice. Say the company calls for two bays of books when I only have one available. When that happens we usually build the bay out of the best of both bays or with whatever we have in stock in quantity. I usually have to have three copies of a title before I’ll display it on a table, face it out in section, or place it in a bay. Anything less number-wise ends up spined (there are, of course, exceptions to every rule).

I do a lot of research before books come out. The Boss and I read PW, the NYT Book Review, various magazines, etc for information on upcoming authors, reviews, and cover designs. If the cover is intriguing and we think it will appeal to our customer base, we order it in. If the review makes it sound like something that our customers would be interested in, we order it in. Same goes for books that are getting heavy viral marketing on the internet or lighting up the review sites. If the book is something that we specifically order in (as opposed to just having it show up), it is pretty much guaranteed a place of prominence at the front of store or an appropriately themed endcap.

But what happens if your book just shows up in mass quantities with (or without) a street date and I missed all the buzz? I’m not perfect, I admit it. Take Rob Thurman’s Nightlife, for example (who, as far as I can tell, is a first time writer). Last week I received about fourteen copies of this book that I didn’t know anything about. It doesn’t help that I’m between SciFi/Fantasy booksellers at the moment so I couldn’t even ask anyone about it. What the book did have going for it was the blurb from Simon R. Green, the author of the Nightside series. Green’s newest novel, Sharper than a Serpent’s Tooth, had hit the shelves the week before and was selling well, so placing the books together in the display bay gave us the Green novel and a convenient handsell in one place. “Hey, Simon Green loved it, so will you.”

Customers trust in blurbs or at least they have the power to make the buying public take a second look. If you have all these elements or just some them does it guarantee you book’s success? No, but they can help.

Nalini Singh asked:

Everything that Bethany said and one more: What impact do press-releases about upcoming books have on you as a bookseller?

Press releases give me a heads up. I can’t read every review, catch all the internet buzz, or find out about the newest in tie-ins without help. I’ll get help from customers, readers, and coworkers, but a well written press release may make you stick out in my mind. Or it may not. Will your press release make me put you some place up front? Depends on the press release (there are a lot of really bad press releases out there), the quantity of the title, and the alignment of Venus in the Age of Aquarius. I would have to really fall in love with a book to order it in by the recommendation of the press release alone.

It should be stated that in my store the press releases are given directly to the person involved in a certain section, and not passed around.

Book Sense 101 Publicity: In the End, You Will All Wish You Were John Hodgman

I believe it was right before Christmas—I say “believe” because the past all seems to blur together for me—when the customers started asking, “Do you have John Hodgman’s book?”

“Do you have the book about hobos?”

“It’s about matters historical, matters literary, and matters cryptozoological. You’ve heard of it right?”

The book was, The Areas of My Expertise, and luckily I had heard of it. I’d even read the front, back, spine, inside flap (this makes sense if you’ve held the book), and perused the Hobo names (I’m a fan of Wicked Paul Fourteen-Toes, although MmmmmDandy Dundee is also pretty damn great—they all are really), but I had no idea why people were suddenly so crazy for it.

Turns out Hodgman was on the Daily Show.

Turns out he made Jon Stewart just lose it.

Turns out that Hodgman has been holding steady at number ten on the independent booksellers list since then.

What have we learned from this? If you can make Jon Stewart publicly lose it to the point of giggling, you’ve got it made.

Many, however, will never make it on the Daily Show (the Daily Show’s loss, I’m sure), and it’s hard to get up the courage and stage presence that Hodgman possesses. Not to mention that ability to not giggle right along with Stewart.

Let’s face it though, if it were that easy to get up in front of a live television audience most authors wouldn’t be writers, they’d be television personalities. Despite this, writers these days have to sell themselves to sell books, which means public events, interviews, and signings (oh my!).

Some writers have a head start: they’re radio personalities (Hodgman), or advertising execs (Patterson). They know how to work a crowd; they’ve had years of practice.

My advice? Steal from them. It’s the sincerest form of flattery. Go to signings and speeches, any public events with authors in attendance and see what they do. Adapt what you like where you can, make a list of those things that drive you crazy and never, ever do them.

I cannot help you with the stage fright, but I can discuss the little extras that authors seem to love (bookmarks, magnets, etc), and how well they work on the bookseller level.

On Bookmarks:

In the interest of full disclosure I should probably tell you that I have a special hatred in my heart for bookmarks. Hate, hate, hate, hate. It wasn’t always this way, but I somehow got on a very nice publicist’s list, and I keep getting packages upon packages from her clients. I have no place to put these bookmarks for customer access, and I have my stores own bookmarks to give out. I cannot even put the bookmarks in the appropriate sections because I don’t have anything to hold them in.

Yes, they’re probably lovely.

Yes, you probably spent a lot of money on them.

But nine times out of ten when they get to the bookstore they go straight into the garbage.

If you are so attached to the idea of bookmarks, here’s my suggestion: get together with a bunch of authors wish similar writing styles. Pool your funds to put together a bookmark that says: “If you like this book you should check out…” and fill in the best title from each of you. Do not put a title in for “If you like this book;” leave it generic. Every time you are in a bookstore slip these bookmarks in your books, your similar writers’ books, and any big time author who falls within your category.

Do not get caught. I will disavow any knowledge of this suggestion and this message will self-destruct if you do.

To help with the “not getting caught” tuck the bookmark completely inside the book, so neither end is showing—this will greatly increase the possibility that the bookmark will stay there, undisturbed. If it’s pushed tightly enough against the spine, both the bookseller and the customer will be more likely to consider it part of the book. The reader will get home, start reading their book, and find the bookmark. They’ll look at it—probably even use it (!)—and in the end, if they liked what they are reading well enough they might even use this booklist to buy more books.

Viola! Piggyback sale.

But only if you don’t get caught; this might be illegal.

Um, yeah, and I’d never tell you to do anything illegal, unless it’s getting me the winning numbers for the lotto. I promise we can split the pot.

On Magnets:

Give them out with the bookmarks (if you can’t give up the bookmark love) at signings, or send them to your readers list-serve, just please don’t send them to me. As with bookmarks, most bookstores don’t have any place to put them, and what good will they do you if they are not getting distributed. This could be different for independent bookstores, so you might want to have a link on your website or list-serve so booksellers can contact you.

Speaking of…

On Websites, Print News, and Interviews:

Website? Get one.

Blog? Get one of those, too.

Interviews? Go give ‘em.

If you’re not comfortable selling yourself face to face then do it through the screen of the world wide web. If you’ve got a voice, look into podcasts and see about getting any audio files of radio or news interviews you might be giving. You are your own archival service, so archive, archive, archive.

You don’t have to be an expert to run a website, you can hire people to do it for you as long as you are not too attached to that advance.

You’re building your future here.

Besides, if you have a website, I then have someplace to direct your potential or already die-hard fans towards. If I don’t have the answer I tell them to get on the net.

It has the answers long before I do.

On Bribery:

Cash, check, credit or money order, we take it all. All bribes to get me to hand-sell like I’m possessed can be addressed to:

Bookseller Chick
P.O. Box 42
Book Pages, Smythe-sown Spine
00000

Joking. Booksellers are a cheap lot. We just like to know that we’re being thought of: candy, a card, anything that says “I paid attention.” Paying attention to us gets us to pay attention to you, and if we remember you kindly we’re more likely to push your book or give it a front of store placement.

The best, and cheapest, way to show you paid attention? Smile.

You would be surprised how many authors I’ve had come into my store can’t bring themselves to smile. They’re tired, it’s been a long day, etc. I know, buddy, I’ve had one too, but drive-by signings are there to help the author drive their sales, whether or not my stock has been signed makes no difference to me.

Take a chance, widen those eyes and curve those lips.

Fake it, baby. Fake it.

We booksellers do it all the time, customer service demands it.

On Dumps:

Dumps, for those of you who don’t know, are large cardboard stands to display books usually with a blow-up of the cover or the author somehow attached. When a publishing company hooks up with a bookstore chain, dumps often result as part of the marketing strategy. They are to be placed at the front of the store, or in section to draw the eye of the customer. The bookstore chain then distributes them to all of their little stores and everyone puts them up, right?

Right?

Not exactly. Lately I haven’t been getting as many dumps as I used to, but at one time I would get four or five a week to display. This would be all fine and dandy but I have no room at the front of my store, and no place to put them in section. For the most part, my dumps all get thrown away unused, and I know it’s the same for a lot of other stores. I don’t know if the company knows this, and the agreement to do this type of marketing has some sort of clause (for use in stores only over X number of feet in front, or only in superstores, or only on months ending in Y), or if publishers really do believe that they will be there in the front of every store. I sometimes feel like they’re overbooking us, just like airlines, and assuming that someone will either not show up or take the bump.

There are some gorgeous dumps out there though, and so I wouldn’t want to get rid of them completely. Most publishing companies instruct their author to carry around a box of their books with them (in the case that the store will sell out and then you can restock them), or so I’m told, so why don’t you also have an empty dump. They collapse down quite nicely, are easy to ship, and they provide your own personal display to be placed right by the signing table just in case the bookstore doesn’t have their own dump to use.

Maybe this is common practice, I don’t know, but it’s something to think about.

On Cover Flats:

Love ‘em, wish I got more of them, so that I could do endcap displays with them. As it is now I get so few that I don’t have a chance to make use of what I have. Cover flats can be used as a stand-in for a book to take reservations (if it’s not already out), to decorate the end caps to let people know of coming attractions, and to decorate a signer’s table.

On Foam-core Mounted Posters:

The first time I got one of these was from Seal Press when we called to get some marketing materials for their book No Touch Monkey. We were selling it like crazy (couldn’t keep it in stock, in fact), and since we were expecting a big shipment soon we wanted to be able to advertise it in our window displays. Seal Press sent us two foam-core mounted posters complete with their own built in stands.

The window display was a hit. It’s probably already common practice, but if you are doing a signing or a tour, send these on ahead. Especially if you have a great cover or design on there.

Just like with covers, people like the pretty.

But let's here what works for those of you who are authors? Flats, covers, signings? None of the above?

How about you readers that go to signings? Who have liked and why?

If I missed any aspects, let me know. I’ll cover them when I get back to an internet connection next Saturday. If you think that I’ve got it all wrong, also let me know. I’m just basing my thoughts and feelings on five years of bookselling. I do not claim to be an expert.

This guy does however, and I’ve heard several good things about his book for authors.

Of course, you wouldn’t have to do any of this if you’d made Jon Stewart giggle like a little girl, but we can’t all be John Hodgman, can we.

Razzle Dazzle 'em

If you’ve ever seen the musical (or the movie) Chicago, you know that the title refers to the courtroom scene where Billy tells Roxie,

“Give 'em the old razzle dazzle
Razzle dazzle 'em
Give 'em act with lots of flash in it
And the reaction will be passionate
Give 'em the old hocus pocus
Bread and feather 'em
How can they see with sequins in their eyes?”

The Razzle Dazzle in this case has to do with reviews. I was going to start on the whole “What I think works and doesn’t work at the bookstore level” marketing/publicity column when I noticed there seemed to be some uproar going on. Something about authors having their friends and followers pad their reviews on Amazon with glowing words of praise, while negative reviews are taken down.

Now I cannot say anything about Amazon’s policy on negative reviews, but the idea of padding a book’s reviews with positive ones? As far as I know that’s an industry-wide practice. I used to be involved with a small press, and it was common practice for the editor or someone at the company to post reviews on Amazon. We were even instructed to not make them too glow-y, to go ahead and point out some faults, but to make the overall review a positive one.

And it’s not only review sites like Amazon that you have to be careful of; those little blurbs from other authors on the backs (and sometimes the front) of books? For every author that really means what they write for the blurb, there is one who just jots off some off-hand response. I’m not saying that every author does it, or that your favorite author does, simply that it is done. It’s only twenty to twenty-five words, and the publisher/agent/friend says that they would love it, so it’s okay, right? They’re just doing someone a favor.

Kind makes you feel dirty, huh?

The thing is that you’d never be able to tell and who’d want to believe that of your favorite author. Look at the blurbs from other authors on the back of some of your newest books. What to other authors say about the story, the author? What does that tell you?

Not a whole hell of a lot. There’s not a lot of room to say much, people tune out during long blurbs. Short and to the point sells books. It’s the same reason that whole reviews by newspaper reviewers aren’t included, just salient points broken with ellipses.

Ah, ellipses. They make for some nice creative excerpting. Oops.

Are all blurbs lies? Of course not. People can check reviews. A lot of authors out there genuinely mean what they write for others.

Are all Amazon reviews biased love for the author left by one of their fangirl/boy followers? No, take a look at Harriet Klausner.

Blurbs and reviews are just part of the Razzle Dazzle show that publicists and marketers put on for readers. They serve two purposes:

• to reassure those readers who need the reassurance that someone else loves this book (so obviously they’ll love it too)


• and to piggyback off the other author’s following (for example, if author X writes a glowing review on author Y’s book, then author X’s readers might think that author Y is like author X. It’s a form of branding really with author X acting as the brand). Take a look at the Freakonomics cover again. Levitt and Dubner are using Gladwell’s name prominently for a reason.

And bad reviews and scandals don’t necessarily mean bad sales, look at Frey. It all depends on how you spin it, or who you’re paying to spin it for you.

While I do read reviews in print or on the net and blurbs on books, I tend to take it all with a little salt (a slice of lime, and a shot of tequila). They’re a tool, one I use to gage customer interest and actual book content. Any review, positive or negative, that backs up its statements is a good review in my opinion because it allows me to distill the information that I need.

I try not to let the sequins get in the way.

"Give 'em the old three ring circus
Stun and stagger 'em
When you're in trouble, go into your dance
Though you are stiffer than a girder
They'll let you get away with murder

Razzle dazzle 'em
And you've got a romance"