Short
Takes is a new feature here focused on works that can be read in under an hour,
give or take 30 minutes or so. Today’s post covers three recent works – a how-to,
a preview, and a children’s book. All are ebooks.
Advanced Kindle Book Marketing
If
you’ve ever wondered how much book publishing has changed over the last decade,
here’s a good place to start. Advanced
Kindle Book Marketing: How to Sell More Ebooks Online with New Amazon
Promotions and Bestseller Tips by Lucinda Sue Crosby and Laura Dobbins.
This is not so much about how to publish an ebook generally or how to publish a
Kindle book, but rather how to develop marketing strategies and plans
specifically selling books via Kindle (whether they’re original Kindle books or
Kindle versions of hardcover or paperback books).
Crosby
and Dobbins go extensively through the basics: from keywords and book
categories to promos, book reviews and using social media. One chapter includes
good information on the strategic use of “free days,” those times when you (or
your publisher) can, or should, offer your book for free. It’s not as obvious
or as simple as you think it might be.
Remember
that the book is strictly about ebook marketing on Kindle and Amazon, and it’s
exhaustive in that regard. You’ll need to seek other resources if you’re
looking for a book on how to publish an ebook.
Related note: After 27
years, Big Sleep Books, an independent bookstore in St. Louis devoted to
mysteries and suspense, is
closing June 30. The owners attribute the closing to Amazon and Kindle –
which only underscore the importance of ebook marketing for authors.
On Becoming Generative
Speaking
of interesting developments in ebook marketing, artist and writer Makoto
Fujimura has published On
Becoming Generative: An Introduction to Culture Care. What’s
interesting is that it’s a special preview to his soon-to-be-published book Culture Care. It’s a short work, some 25
pages, but it’s packed with the thinking of an artist who’s been considering ad
writing about the idea of “making culture” for a number of years.
The
preview includes a short personal storu about bringing beauty into our lives; a
longer essay on “An Artist’s Journey Toward Generativity;” and then a
discussion of what “culture care” actually is. Fujimura defines the purpose of
culture care providing “care for our culture’s ‘soul,’ to bring our cultural
home our bouquet of flowers, so that reminders of beauty—both ephemeral and
enduring—are present in even the harshest environments where survival is at
stake.”
The
preview promises that the complete book will be thought-provoking, insightful,
and an artifact of “culture making” itself.
Maggie Arrives
Those
of us who live in urban and suburban areas are becoming more familiar with
wildlife not normally associated with the neighborhood. Animals (especially
deer) are finding ways to adapt to the encroachment of development. In my own
area of suburban St. Louis, I have seen coyotes, opossums, raccoons and foxes
(rabbits don’t count as wildlife).
The
Adventures of an Urban Fox: Maggie Arrives by Yara Evans
is a delightful children’s book, the story of an urban (or suburban) fox who
begins showing up around the yard, driving two cats to complete distraction. Illustrated
by artist Luciana Betti, it’s based on a true story (including the cats). It’s
a story with a point or moral to tell – about what happens when ostensible enemies
reach out to one another in a time of need.
On
Yara Evans’ author’s
page on Amazon you can see photos of the inspiration for Maggie and a
video. Evans lives in London, and looks after two cats when she’s not keeping
an eye out for Maggie.
Top photograph by Karen Arnold via Public
Domain Pictures. Used with permission.
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