Awesome Fantasy Book needs your vote … now use your vote wisely (remember Brexit and Trump!)

My book Blood On Borrowed Wings has been nominated for a prestigious March / April Group read.

It’s on Goodreads in the ‘Grimdark Fantasy’ Group.

Please follow the link below to vote in the poll – it would really help book sales, exposure and help me out massively.

Vote for my book on Goodreads here.

In a world where so many imbalances can be caused by a  misused vote, please take a minute to do something positive. It won’t change the world – but for just a  moment of your time, it might change mine.

Thanks for reading.

D

My Book – reduced? What the fudge?

After my book has soared the heights of position 11 on the Fantasy books list on Amazon and then dived to the murky depths of position 2,987 – I decided I should try and promote it.

 

It is on sale for the next couple of days to all the blogging faithful who may like a copy. Now’s a good time to buy (cue all my mates moaning that they paid top whack!) The Kindle Countdown Deal is on.

 

I have already had some great reviews from unknown readers and fellow bloggers, check them out on Amazon, you may like what you see.

Please click here to see more about Blood On Borrowed Wings

Share this if you would like to help a humble indie author spread the word (or, well, a hundred thousand of them!)

 

Thanks for dropping by.

D

 

Antisocial media

I am thinking of launching five new anti-social media sites:

Get outta my fucking face-book.

A kick in the googles.

Twatter.

Fistagram.

Word-depress.

 

I may hold out before trying to patent any of them.

 

Movie Quotes butchered by kids Quiz

Click here to run show

 

Here’s a short film I have stitched together of my daughter and two niece’s reinterpreting famous lines from famous films.

Check it out, have a laugh and see how many you can get right.

Please feel free to share, the lil uns would love to go viral.

Enjoy

 

Not troubling ‘Game of Thrones’ yet.

It is 6 months since my novel ‘Blood On Borrowed Wings’ went live on the Amazon store and I thought I would let everyone know how it is going.

Click here for a link to my ebook on Amazon

I have shifted 350 copies and had 23000 pages read through the Kindle subscription service too.

I know sales don’t seem especially high – I am not troubling any bestsellers lists – but for the genre it ranked at 11th best selling at one point and it has far exceeded my hopes on how many people would invest their time (and money) on reading it. The feedback has been great too. The paying public do not write reviews often, but the reviews I have received have been positive, honest and encouraging.

This coupled with my lack of marketing budget and ineptitude on social media, means any sales at all are minor miracles to me.

I would really like to thank everyone who has supported me so far with reviews, interest, social media shares and plain old ‘Can ya get a shift on and write book 2?’

And can I ask 3 things

1. If you have bought it and / or read it – please leave a review on Amazon, it really does help with sales.
2. If you haven’t bought it – buy it, it is a great summer read.
3. Share it with as many people you can to help give me a chance. When I hit 500 sales I will be putting a proposal together for agents and publishing houses.

If anyone out there would like a free copy, please let me know and I would happily exchange one for an honest review.

Thanks Bloggers and followers.

(Book 2 is on it’s way, stop going on about it!!)

 

D

Review: Blood On Borrowed Wings by Darren Stapleton

I am lucky enough to have had a well-read, objective and totally honest review of my novel by a blogger I follow. Check out his site for more great reviews and read on to see what he thought of my novel…

 

 

Description: Stay low. Keep moving. After Drake Theron ditches his wings and military brothers, he turns mercenary to forget a horrific battle where so much more than lives were lost. When women st…

Source: Review: Blood On Borrowed Wings by Darren Stapleton

Sexism in fiction – Ladies I need your help

Fellow Bloggers, I need your help – Is my book sexist?

Before you skim along, thinking this is a means for me to garner female favour or to promote my book, I really need your help with this.

Now, I do not believe in saying that I am in touch with my ‘feminine side.’ I do not really know what that means. That certain personality or behavioural traits should be defined as gender specific is ludicrous. I am however painfully aware of the lack of positive or powerful roles there are for women in science-fiction. I acknowledge there are vast and highly popular exceptions to this, Ripley, Trinity, Leia.

But for every good example there are ten others, where women appear in stories as victims, for sexual reasons, as mothers, wives and daughters who need to be saved by some hero dripping machismo and one liners to make them swoon, drop their knickers and thank God or The Third Moon of Xxylon for man.

They are all too often titular cliches of the powerless, gorgeous and scantily clad.

I never made a conscious effort to write strong female characters in my book, the story demanded it and I am hoping I have pulled it off (insert ironic innuendo here.)

So before I launch into the daunting salvo of Book 2, can I ask you a question? Are the women characters in my book well rounded? Is there a balance? Do I need to make more of an effort to address what I see as an imbalance? Or am I doing OK?

My plan is to introduce more positive female roles in Book 2 as I am mindful that the three main female characters in my book are all quite negative. Powerful, but negative (I mean, the main ‘bad guy’ is not a guy at all.)

So if you are interested in giving me an opinion – I am very interested in hearing it. I would happily email you a free ebook copy that you can read through the Kindle app on any tablet or Kindle device. Or I can send directly to your Kindle via your Kindle Email address. Or if you prefer, as a word.doc file.

Just contact me through this blog, with details and I will do the rest. Alternatively you can email directly on curlydaz@aol.com

A link to my book on Amazon: Blood On Borrowed Wings

I would really value your opinion before launching into book 2.

Thank you

 

 

How not to launch your book on Amazon…

A good way to launch a book is to take it squarely by one of it’s corners and fling it as far as you can.

E-books are more traumatic to launch, as I have recently discovered, having published my first book, ‘Blood On Borrowed Wings’ on Amazon last week.

So, for all the friends who have asked me how it is going, and to all the first time writers / publishers of hidden gems, to you steadfast bright-eyed Bloggers – here’s a guide on how it went.

1. Social media is only as good as the friends you have on it. Do not think that because you have spent six years of your life crafting a masterpiece of storytelling that could be lighting up Hollywood as soon as THAT producer gives you THAT call … do not think, for one minute, that it is anything more remarkable than anything else appearing on Facebook. It is no more significant than someone’s kid smashing pureed fruit into it’s face. It’s no more precious than a digital witty postcard telling you why women like gin, men like tits and everyone loves retro and vintage and beards. it is just another event on the screaming scrolling wall of shite, and by many it will be ignored or forgotten (not that I am bitter. Ha Ha)
2. The support you get through social media is invaluable in selling and getting a buzz going around your book. I am lucky enough to have some great friends who have shared links, bought copies, left reviews and…well…just even taken the time to read what I have posted. The success I have had thus far is because of them. The limited nature of my success is of my own making – I do not use Facebook, have never twatted a tweet in my life and thought a Blog was somewhere people went to defecate (turns out I was right.)
3. Every sale is celebrated. For me, the important thing was finishing my novel and making it as good as it good be. But once it was published I started to care about if people were reading it. Buying it. Burning it. Liking it. It is nothing to do with money or pride. It is to do with having created a living entity, a personal one at that, and releasing it into the wild to fend for itself. Of course I am going to want to know how it is doing.
4. However good your book is (and of course, I kind of like mine) the sales are going to look something like this.
5. 
6. This could be for many reasons, but I have highlighted the main ones here:
7. I do not know how to number lists correctly.
8. I do not know how to market my blog or book or self correctly.
9. I do not know how Amazon works.
10. I do not know how graphs work.
11. The book is toilet.

7a) I do not know how to number lists correctly.

1. And no matter how I look I cannot find a blogger to review my book who does not have a back catalogue occupying them until the next millennia…(but I know you are out there … and I will find you … I will … Bwah ha ha! > evil laugh.)
2. So if you are a book reviewer who wants to read something by a genuine trier (I’ve looked, that is a word!) check out my book blurb via the link on this blog and get in touch if the mood takes you. A free copy awaits.
3. If you are a fellow author about to launch a book – take heed. Social media, networking and shares, links and blogs are how you will help people find out about your book. It might matter how good it is, but equally as important is the quality of promoting and marketing you can do. This is the yin and yang of self-publishing. Quality writing and quality promoting. Well, to paraphrase Meatloaf … one out of two aint bad.

 

A big thank you to all of my friends and family who have helped me launch my book. Thank you for taking the time to help and for believing in me and what I have written. Now get back to posts about why dung beetles are like men. Who knows? There might even be a list of something somewhere for you to read.

 

 

 

Sometimes Stellar Storyteller Six Word Story Challenge

Take the challenge, if you can.

Book Launch

Hello all.

It’s been a long time.

Just thought I would hurl a preliminary post out there to see if any of you are left and this blog site is still active?

I have finally finished my novel and will be launching it on Kindle in the next week or so. Follow this site for updates and more information.

Let me know if you are still out there (short / sarcastic / caustic / insulting comments) and watch this space…..

 

Thank you