As most of you know, I haven’t been writing lately. There are several reasons for that, but not very good ones. I spent the last week at the RNConvention in Las Vegas, so I’m hoping being around a couple of hundred authors all week and sitting in on amazing classes will jump start my writing. So far, I still seem to be suffering from jet lag or something. Or maybe the little bout of dehydration (or heat exhaustion, who knows?) because of my stupidity in Vega. I hope I feel better by tomorrow!
Happy writing, everyone! Here is a picture from the RNConvention book fair. That’s me signing something. 🙂
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Your books look very impressive. 🙂 Any tips for signings if I ever get around to doing one? What other authors were near you?
Lucy Carol was on my right. She just published her debut novel, “Hot Scheming Mess”. I’m not sure who was on my left, but she left early because she wasn’t getting any sales. I didn’t get many, but I wouldn’t have left before the end. There was one author at the same table who is actually a law enforcement officer, and she has real pink handcuffs that she uses to arrest child molesters and wife beaters. Do you see the point? 🙂
One thing, at a book signing, you should always do is ask the reader if they want the book personalized. Some might be giving the book away and just want your name. Others are buying it for themselves and would love a personal comment with their name on it. The person who won the raffle basket I donated wanted me to sign and personalize all five books I had included. I wrote something a little different on each one.
The most important thing is to engage people. It’s not just about selling your book, you’re selling yourself. If you’re not well-known, you might not sell many books, but people will remember you because you were nice. I also want to mention there were several book reviewers at the convention. Hopefully, some of them that took my card will read and review.
Even though I was disappointed in my book sales, I would have people come up to me and point to some of my books and say, “I have that one and that one on my Kindle.” 🙂
Do you know who H.P. Mallory is? She’s pretty well-known. She was selling books at the book fair. She also conducted a class on Facebook.
Now that my luggage finally arrived, I’ll be going through all the business cards, bookmarkers, etc. I have and figure out what authors I want to try out.
I’m thinking of going to another Vegas book conference/fair (?) next year. It’ll be my first. I’m not sure whether to buy a load of my books to take or just go and take a around ten to hand out. I’m so introvert too, I can imagine myself hiding in the corner till it’s over then regretting the whole waste of it. *Groan.
Hope you’re feeling back to your old self very soon.
Shah X
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A lot of it will depend on how well advertised and how popular the book fair is. Maybe you can ask other authors that have been there how well it does. The convention I went to was the very first one, and it wasn’t as accessible to the public as I thought it would be. I took about 10-12 of each of my 5 paperbacks, and I should have only taken about 4 of each, probably. I don’t know what I will do if I go next year.
Hang in there. I hope you can reboot the writing soon! After three frustrating summers, I have finally concluded that I just don’t get much writing done in the summer so I should stop expecting to. I make the most progress during the school year.
Have a lovely weekend!
I don’t know what it is about summer and writing. I guess there’s just more going on.
It took me about a month before I was able to write anything after I got back from the RT Booklovers Convention. 😀
Your books love wonderful in that row. They’d definitely grab my attention if I was walking by.
I hope I’ll get things together next week. I haven’t had a dry spell like this before. At least, not in a long time.
Love the pic. I hope you get that old writing feeling back soon. Actually, I hope the muse strikes both of us–having a bit of a writing slump myself. Here’s to hoping…
I think we all have slumps, Tia. It used to be easier for me to churn words out. I hope it starts getting easier again.