Another Fine Idea: Print on Demand

Here's an exciting bit of news: I've decided to give print on demand a try for Allies and Enemies. Only a few days ago, I contracted a designer to finish up the cover art and I've pushed the "go" button to have the formatting done for the book interior for Amazon's Create Space. By the end of the month, I should be dangerously close to having an actual physical book of my book. (One of the actual instances in which the over-used term "literally" would be well... literal.) I'm very excited about this, considering that I'll have actual access to the sales info instead of the unfair and inexplicably frustrating situation with BookTango who has YET to deliver any sales data to me, even though its well past the 4 week mark.

Seeing stars: Amazon Reviews

I admit it. I was the kid in class that reminded teacher that he or she had forgotten we were supposed to have a quiz that day. This made me wildly unpopular. It was just part of who I was/am.

Besides, my main motivation was to get those wonderful little “A”s sketched across the top of my page of loose leaf. If I were to look at them now, I’d recognize them as the scrawl of an exhausted teacher and ultimately useless. But at the time, those precious “A”s looked like tiny Rembrandts, my personal masterpiece and evidence that someone approved of something I had done.

So I find myself reminded of those times when it comes to the reviews of my book on Amazon. There are even stars, just like 4^th grade. A means of arbitrary categorization. It’s very cool to get 5 stars, mind you. It means someone had a great time reading your story. A very flattering experience. For a while, I was getting a mess of those.

Then it happened, as it was bound to, a two star rating with a review that was a little on the vicious side. Contextually, I saw this two star review just as I was still internally snoopy-dancing about the fact that Allies and Enemies: Fallen had received the top 50 for military scifi onAmazon. (Totally cool seeing my book cover on the same screen as some of the “rock gods” of the same genre.) So, to see this was a bit of a let down.

My gut tells me this one bad review is exactly what it was: my book just wasn’t their cup of tea. It’s going to happen. Even Stephen King gets bad reviews and I have been his “number one fan” forever.

But it begs the question: Do I address it? Ignore it? How do other authors deal with negative reviews? I’ve become a big fan of Lindsay Buroker, having encountered her steampunk books. She’s got some nice advice about dealing with this:

http://www.lindsayburoker.com/tips-and-tricks/tips-for-dealing-with-bad-book-reviews/

Ultimately, I choose to have faith in the readers out there browsing for a new adventure. They’re intelligent folks that can make their own decisions, weighing the good against the bad. I accept the fact I can’t change everyone’s mind and it reminds me that with each word or agonized-over passage I grow as a writer.

What do you think? Leave a comment.

Lookie! I'm in the Top 50 for Kindle ebooks for Military scifi

A nice surprise to wake up to, Allies and Enemies is in the top 50 (barely) for ebooks in Military SciFi.

Allies and Enemies: Fallen on eReader News Today

You guessed it! Allies and Enemies: Fallen is up on eReader News today. http://ereadernewstoday.com/more-ereader-deals-for-10-1-15/