Readers are right. Everyone else is WRONG. In this blog post,, I said:

* Sometimes editors are wrong

* Sometimes literary agents are wrong

* Often ALL buyers of your writing are WRONG. (By which I meant buyer of your writing services, rather than readers.)

Anyone who stands between you and your readers can be wrong, and can steer you in the wrong direction. Only your readers are right.

Readers are what writing is all about, and when you have direct contact with readers, your writing will take off.

As proof, we have this blog post, How I Became a Best-Selling Author – Yahoo! Finance, about Darcie Chan’s rejected novel which gained 400,000 readers very quickly:

“This past May, Ms. Chan decided to digitally publish it herself, hoping to gain a few readers and some feedback. She bought some ads on Web sites targeting e-book readers, paid for a review from Kirkus Reviews, and strategically priced her book at 99 cents to encourage readers to try it. She’s now attracting bids from foreign imprints, movie studios and audio-book publishers, without selling a single copy in print.”

You’ll notice that Darcie Chan’s novel has only been selling online since May, 2011. That’s 400K copies in seven months.

Since there’s no shelf life for digital books, the novel will snowball. Judging by the publicity Ms Chan’s getting, I predict she’ll hit a million copies sold sometime next year. If I were a betting person (I’m not) I’d bet on the second quarter of 2012.

Are you writing a book? Great. Here’s the best tip I can offer you: build your readership as you write.

The easiest way to build your readership is by blogging.

You can also build your readership by selling a snippet, or excerpt, of your book-in-progress (or any of your published books) online.

This article, Publishers to Use Digital Works as ‘Literary Appetizers’ for Novels – WSJ.com, talks about Ballantine Books and Harlequin selling “bridges” (excerpts) of authors’ works and says about author Steve Berry’s snippet:

“The 6,000-word piece, ‘The Balkan Escape,’ is too short to have been published as a paperback original. In effect, it is a literary appetizer, inexpensive enough to attract potential readers who might otherwise not be willing to buy a new novel from an author whose works they haven’t yet read, said Mr. Berry.”

Should you give your snippets/ excerpts away?

The notion of selling excerpts from your books brings up the question: “Should you give your excerpts away to build readerships?

“Free” worked very well online for a long time. However, in 2010, I think people are over it. Here’s the thing about “free”: it will devalue your product.

You can certainly give away a “free” first chapter — or part of a first chapter, under 1500 words. Once you’re giving away two or three thousand words, or more, you’re devaluing your product.

Everyone and his dog gives things away these days as a marketing ploy. For authors to give away parts of their books is ineffective. No one values what they get for free. Charge a nominal amount for your excerpts, and there’s a chance that people will actually read it, rather than just download it, and forget about it.

Another tip: build a list of your readers while you’re selling snippets — ask for readers’ email addresses.

Are you thinking of buying an ebook reader? Amazon’s Kindle Wireless Reading Device (6
has been out for a while, and is hugely popular.

However, there are many other options, with new ereaders appearing regularly. Barnes & Noble have the Nook, and of course, Apple has the iPad.

I’m looking forward to receiving my Apple iPad Tablet (64GB, Wifi), which is arriving in around a week.

While I’m looking forward to reading ebooks on it (including the ones I’ve purchased for my Kindle, I’m much more interested in using it for writing.

Have you bought a portable ebook reader? Which one did you buy, and why did you choose it? Please tell us in the Comments.

You’re writing your book, and you’re a bundle of nerves: what if no one wants to read it?

These days, you can lay those fears to rest. I’ve been recommending that you blog your book on this blog, but there are many other things you can do.

I love this idea, for example Synergizing the Book and Web: The Future…? | Digital Book World:

“The Amanda Project is a first of its kind transmedia experience – ‘an interactive, collaborative fictional mystery for girls ages 13 & up, told across a variety of different media including an 8-book series, a website that features games, writing, art & social networking, and a related series of blogs, satellite sites, music, and merchandise.’”

Can you create a synergy between your book and the Web?

Remember, your aim is to get readers. Once you have readers, getting an agent (and a publisher) is a piece of cake. Get creative — there are many, many ways you get can readers for your book using the Web.

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