Season’s Greetings

This time of year usually is for reflection on the year that has been.

Did you do all that you said you were going to?

Was it a good year?

Did you achieve the required book sales?

Do you write under your own name or do you use a pseudonym?

For some of us writers, we don’t mind using our own identities while some of us prefer to be a little more private; but just how private are we?

As most of us are aware in today’s society, our privacy and data are constantly under attack. For those of us that read the book by George Orwell called “1984”and read about Big Brother watching us, may have thought at the time that this was a bit far-fetched, now we realise just how prophetic that book was.

You may write on your laptop, desktop, Smartphone or your IPod but everything on these devices are at risk, if you don’t use the right safeguards. Use of firewall, anti-malware and anti-virus programs are very necessary for any of these devices you may use, you don’t necessarily have to use all three but definitely one, preferably two of these would be prudent.

Keeping them updated is very important.

I’ve heard many times this year people who have lost their work because of viruses, Trojans and worms, the common denominator was their systems had no protective software.

Your devices are constantly under threat, not just by hackers, or programs like “Weeping Angel”, phishing pages, ransom ware, and a host of other such maladies, not only are corporations, government, and other organisations watching you, the person next door maybe as well.

Naturally someone with access to your spending patterns can quickly build up a profile of you and as such could potentially steal your identity, and with the use of key logging could see every keystroke you make on your device and have all the information you have.

Hopefully, you will already know this, if you didn’t you now do. I was speaking to someone earlier in the year, he told me that the book he was writing had been erased and he suspects that someone else is using that work that he’d created.

If someone knows that you are an author, it’s not out of the bounds of possibility that person might steal your work and publish it under their name, happens with music and screenplays, it could happen to you too.

So as we lift a glass to celebrate the year that is been, let’s safeguard our books, devices and other equipment because they are important to us and we should not be negligent.

There’s no use crying after spilt milk.

Most of us know that when we are writing, we save our work frequently in case of a mishap; therefore we should protect the device that the work is on. Do you use your camera on your computer? No? Many people now put a Band-Aid over it.

The song Every Breath You Take by The Police, has these lines “every move you make, every step you take, I’ll be watching you”. Unprotected devices can reveal much more than you may want them to.

Let’s be creative and protect our work, someone somewhere is interested in finding out more…….and more.

Season’s greetings everyone

The post Season’s Greetings first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

Looking Ahead

Following on from my last blog, where I touched on the well worn subject of written books versus e-books, I have decided that in this blog to take a look at well used items that may well become antiques or obsolete in future years. A few of these could be: –

Business cards Microsoft purchased LinkedIn for $26B; do we still need business cards?

Cash Always king, but in an effort to track everyone, cash has got to go. But I still love it.

Cameras Mobile phone? Then you have a good camera. Do you need to buy a camera?

USB Keys Portable. However everything is now stored in clouds.

Phone boxes most people have a mobile phone, are phone boxes still necessary?

Glasses With contact lenses and laser eye surgery now the norm; are glasses necessary?

Printers Do we really need to print that? Probably not!

There are of course many more everyday things such as, my jokes, CDs, DVDs, iPods, calculators, ATMs, stand-alone radios, and even the noble envelope that could be phased out over the coming years. Pretty much every “ism” should have died out a long time ago, but let’s keep our fingers crossed.

Wrist watches I believe will see a downturn in sales over the coming years, as many children & adults can easily see the time every time they look at their smart phone.

The e-book since its inception has and did create a wave of excitement and literary creativity.
Do you use still pen & paper? Computer/laptop keyboard? Or a voice activated system?
I do believe that everyone does have at least one book in them, maybe a Magnum Opus as it were.

Picking up a pen, or sitting in front of keyboard, gathering inspiration and a workable idea that you can translate into the appropriate words and writing them down is not as easy as it may first seem. Then, once written, reviewed, spell checked, book cover designed, sale price decided on, accounts created, and then book launched live is quite a process.

Then the wait for the sales to come pouring in…..

As many of us know marketing your e-book,  is not the easiest of arts to learn and few authors have enjoyed great sales and revenues from the books they’ve written.

In the coming weeks I will be looking at highlighting a service for subscribers to this website.
If you have a book you have written yourself, you can write a short description of what the book is about, provide a link to where the book can be purchased (Amazon, EBay etc) also a JPEG of the book cover. All we ask is a donation for this service.

We have a large database of authors, book readers, screen writers, reviewers and of course site visitors, so who knows it may result in additional sites although I can’t guarantee that of course. But nothing ventured nothing gained.
So till then, read well, write well & be safe.

B

The post Looking Ahead first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

The state of play

In recent years you have seen many e-book blogs sites disappear.

When this particular blog first started there were a large amount of sites that were dealing with this particular sector, however this has changed quite dramatically.

Has this sector really changed since inception or is it just our perception of it?

What do you think? Is this the case?

E-book’s are popular because anyone that feels they have a book in them, can create and self publish their own book and many have felt that they could make a good living by being a writer.Many e-books have been written, some will have sold quite well, and there are many more that won’t have sold many copies.

Naturally anything that is ready to be sold, has to be marketed and while your book may be good, if no one knows about it, it won’t sell.

I started this blog as a place where people like myself who read and/or write a lot could visit and share their particular skills and techniques with others of a similar mindset and leave with something new. My ethos has always been if you care you share.

Has the demographic really changed?

At one point many sites were predicting the death of the traditional book, E books were going to be the only way to read, and the buying of the right electronic device was the main decision that had to be made.
So what has changed, if anything?

Being a Londoner and travelling on the underground as frequently as I do, one of the main things that people do when they are travelling is to read either one of the free newspapers that are given out, or text/play a game on their mobile smart phone, or to read their book of choice.

So are people reading by an electronic device or the traditional book?

From what I see on a regular basis it is about a 60-40 split in the favour of  electronic reading. But the good old paper and ink is still there. Similarly not so long ago people prophesied  that vinyl records were dead, but now they are making a strong comeback.

Whilst you can buy a CD or download the song of your choice, the one advantage vinyl records have always had is that they are personal, every record has a little story behind it. In many ways the traditional book has the same thing. In addition to this you don’t need to buy an expensive reading device; you just use your eyes or braille.

While I love e-book’s, I cannot deny that when I get a spare moment, I do love going to an old 2nd hand bookshop, breathing in the familiar aroma of old books, leafing through what’s available and carrying out a couple of books. The printed book does have a disposability factor where you can give it to a friend; leave it where you finish reading it, selling it to a second-hand shop or throwing it in the bin. You can also resell it on Ebay or donate it to a charity. The choice is yours,

With an e-book you can of course store it on your device or delete once you finish reading.

I feel now is a settling point whereby both the e-book and the traditional book have shown that they have their relevant places in the market.  E-book blogging sites such as this one have their relevant place, also when they blog it has value.

Or are e-book blogging sites a thing of the past?

The post State of Play first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

Caroline Geish is a world-famous country singer living a perfect single life. Adrien Martel is a handsome and successful plastic surgeon who moves next door. After meeting Adrien the country starlet is framed for murder and taken to jail. Caroline’s parents must rush to prove her innocence before she is sentenced to life in prison. With the help of Caroline’s family attorney Paul Weinsmith and Nate Corel a tenacious investigator they unravel a deep-rooted plot to destroy not only Caroline, but also her entire family. Unfortunately, time is short and the evidence against the starlet is strong. Caroline’s team must work quickly to uncover a dark history, save Caroline and clear the family.

The post The Neighbor first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

Looking into my crystal ball I will predict that sales of red roses, Hallmark cards and boxes of chocolates will be higher on this day, than any other day of the year.

I suspect your response to my “prediction” is “well everyone knows that” and you would be right.

Is everyone that predictable? Well no of course not but generically my predictions are a fairly safe bet that 2 out of those three things will be given in most cases, but not all.

Romance (in my opinion) is something that is inspired.

As many of you are writers, authors, ghost and screen writers here is a question.

Lets say that for Valentines Day, you were told by your partner that all they wanted was a book.

Not any old book but a book that you have chosen especially for them to read.

What book would you choose for them, would it be romantic? A thriller? Biography?

It would also show your partner that you know the type of book they like, but maybe it could be a way of you introducing your partner to a genre that they had never taken the time to read.

The question once again is, what book would you give you partner?

Have a great Valentines.

B

The post Valentines Day first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

With comparative costs it surely must make economical sense for most companies to switch to a digital format.

Change is a necessary thing, but many will resist it, even though they know they should embrace it.

The next question surely has to be, who will be the next to take the step up to an all digital format?

This should have already been debated in the boardroom, if not then questions have really got to be asked.

I would love to know just who you think will be next  to step up.

Here’s to a great year.

Keep on keeping on

Paul

The post Who Will Be Next? first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

I am now looking into my crystal ball and will try and see what lies before us all.

I can’t see those lottery numbers but I predict someone will win it. (no hiding my skills eh)

Looking ahead I think that it is time to throw out these “how to sell a billion books in 3 hours” type of marketing drivel.

The essentials are and will always be true. You can make a sale if someone is interested in what you have written, but you have to tell them that you have written an  e-book in the first place.

A lot of people I have spoken with last year, were authors, and had self published their own work, which is great. I then asked them who knows that they have written an e-book, the answer was simply “my partner” or “my friends and colleagues”.

A simple way of spreading the word is to get your friends or work colleagues to simply put at the end of an email they send to their friends, something like “my friend has written a book called ABC by A.N.Other, check it out, let me know what you think”

That with a link will get clicks onto the sales page for your book and if the intro to your book is punchy enough you will get sales. You won’t have to pay for that either.

Plus if the email if forwarded on as many are, your link will be passed on all over the place and you may well pick up sales from areas you may not have considered.

I predict a lot of e-books that were written last year and even the year before will start gathering sales, as the amount of Kindles, Surfaces, and other eReaders that were given as presents, means that everyone of those recipients NEEDS to buy e-books to read on their new device.

I also predict that there will be a new wave of first time writers and self-publishers, who will need a little guidance from some of you pros, amongst them will be some that will come up with bestsellers.

Any great ideas or sales tips that you may have simply go to

The Writers Collective

and drop your suggestions in there, while there will be some that may consider themselves the font of all knowledge, at one point everyone was a novice.

I can see the traditional publishers cranking up the ante on the self-publishing market.

For those that are turning over a new leaf, hopefully that will be an electronic page in a book we have written.

What predictions do you have? Let me know.

Lets have a great 2013, and make the changes that benefits us all.

Byron

The post Happy 2013. The Year of Changes first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

It is taken from nearly 300 film executives, who are then asked to submit their ten favorite script that were submitted in to them.

For 2012, there had to be at least 6 recommendations for entry, so henceforth this is why it cannot be conceived as the best of list.

So for you screenwriters or budding scriptwriters it is definitely worth a look-see.

As well as the name of the script it also lists:-

The Author, Agency, Agents, Management, Managers and Production Company

If you are a budding script writer then these could be good for you to approach for your work.

You would probably be better with having several scripts handy rather than just one, having more than one script shows seriousness (not that one really good script doesn’t) but there will be “flavor of the months” or a certain styles or storyline that might be “in vogue”

www.blcklst.com/lists/2012_black_list.pdf

Seasons Greetings

The post Ladies and Gentlemen..The Black List 2012 first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.

Throwing Grapes and Moving Mountains : A Devotional Journey for the Hungry Heart

“The beauty of a word from God is that it ignites a passion within your spirit. It satisfies an underlying thirst you did not know you had and it births a fierce longing for more!”

Spiritual growth is not a given, yet it is open to all who would seek after God. His love shouts through the pages of His Word, and Throwing Grapes and Moving Mountains provides an open window to glimpse the grandeur of God’s passion and commitment to His children. Soak in the truths found within, and your walk with Christ will be energized and strengthened. You will be challenged to live honestly before God, and in doing so, find a new depth of love and encouragement to refresh your spirit.

“Receiving a devotion from Jan is like a kiss on the cheek from my heavenly Father … Jan’s devotions are meaty and full of Gods words of love and encouragement, challenging me to go deeper with Him and recognize the ‘strong and fierce love’ that God, my Father, has for me.”

The post Throwing Grapes and Moving Mountains : A Devotional Journey for the Hungry Heart first appeared on The E-Book Writers Blog.