Interview with Intisar Khanani (Memories of Ash Release and Giveaway)

I admit, I first read Intisar Khanani's Sunbolt because her name reminded me of Inisar (the Nuran Setari).  I'm shallow that way. :)

I enjoyed Sunbolt thoroughly - it's a fast-paced novella about Hitomi, a street girl with a secret and a lot of trouble heading her way, and when I saw Intisar was releasing a sequel, Memories of Ash, I grabbed the opportunity to ask her a few questions about the world of Sunbolt, and her plans for the story's future.

So for fans of Intisar, and those hearing of her for the first time, here's a little background to a grand new world (and scroll all the way to the end of the post to enter a giveaway that includes a couple of my books!).

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Q: In Sunbolt you use elements that readers currently associate with paranormal/urban fantasy (vampires, weres) in a secondary world – but, of course, they have a long tradition in high fantasy as well.  Do you think there's more scope these days to do interesting things with well-known creatures in secondary worlds?

A: Absolutely. I think the advent of indie publishing has meant a freedom for authors try new things in a way that traditional publishing wouldn't have approved of--if for no other reason than that it would make it difficult to decide which shelf to put the book on. I think there's scope both for trying new things with well-known creatures in secondary worlds, and for bringing in cultures and their mythos and legends that have been traditionally ignored.

For example, in Sunbolt, both Hitomi and Kenta are from a culture that is built around historic Japanese culture. Further, Kenta is a tanuki--a raccoon dog known as both a trickster and a drunk in Japanese folk lore. As Hitomi continues to travel through the Eleven Kingdoms, she will meet with other cultures reminiscent of real-world historical cultures, as well as their attendant fantastical creatures.

The danger with this kind of approach, of course, is cherry-picking cultures for exotic elements. We see that happening in more than a few mainstream fantasy novels that claim the "diversity" label. It's unfortunate, because a culture is more than just a pair of chopsticks, or some unusual architecture, or a few key dishes--or that really cool fantasy creature. For example, jinn seem to be quite the thing nowadays, especially among authors who haven't researched them past the obvious. I find it incredibly frustrating as someone who grew up with stories of jinn and have lived in cultures that maintain a strong tradition of believing in--and even interacting with--jinn. So while there is definitely more scope for incorporating fantastical creatures in all different walks of fantasy, I do believe there's a responsibility on the part of the author to not only do their research, but to incorporate the diverse cultures they are drawing on as fully as possible in their works.

Q: Hitomi starts off her adventure as the classic streetwise orphan – but with established connections to the city's underworld.  Do you prefer your protagonists to have a strong social network, or face new beginnings with new people?

It really depends on the story and the character. In my novel, Thorn, the heroine is not only leaving everything she knows for a new land, but her identity is forcibly stolen from her along the way. She ends up without connections or support beyond a single, magical creature who witnessed the switch. Being on her own, and responsible for choosing her own fate, are critical in Thorn's development over the course of the story. So I guess I've already written both ends of the spectrum! I do really enjoy pulling characters out of their comfort zones and throwing them at a completely new situation. Even in Sunbolt, Hitomi is quickly pulled out of her social network to face some unpleasant situations on her own.

Q: Hitomi obviously has quite an adventure still ahead of her.  Do you have plans for other stories within Hitomi's world, or do you like to create a new world for new stories?

I really don't know... I love Hitomi's world, and have put a good deal of time and research into building it. I suspect I'll want to place other stories there, though I sincerely doubt there would be any overlap in timelines. But I haven't decided yet--I'm still just trying to get Hitomi's story down!

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Thank you, Intisar, for the interview, and best of luck with the new release!  See below for details of Intisar's books, and to enter in a giveaway for a selection of SFF books - and a Kindle Fire.

January SFF Sale

If you're looking to sample some Indie SFF, then this 1 January sale is a great place to start!  There's a wide range of sub-genres, and even a few compilation/box sets.  I haven't read all these authors myself, but can recommend Patty Jansen if you're looking to try another Australian writer.

Some of these specials will only last for a few days, and I'll be switching my prices back starting from 3 January, so get them while you can!

Anatomy of a Promo

My approach to self-publishing involves very little promotion.  I did submit my books to a small handful of book bloggers way back when I was starting out (and was very fortunate that one of them was The Book Smugglers!).  Along with the enormously generous support I've received from other writers, book blogger reviews have definitely made readers more inclined to pick up my books.

However, for the newbie author with no rep at all, no word-of-mouth, there is one primary method to build sales:

• Write and release books.
• Make one free (particularly first-in-series).
• Get buoyed along by 'also boughts' and bestseller lists.
• Build fans/mailing list/newsletters.
• Rinse/repeat, along with judicious use of that year's Holy Grail (currently Bookbub).

For those interested in the behind-the-scenes of this process, I've been grabbing charts and stats to show the impact of free on the sales of my books.

To start off with, here's a long chart of Book 1 and Book 2 of The Touchstone Trilogy, where you can see the impact to my sales over several years.

To give you some idea of how much money is involved in these rankings, first here's my sales for April 2014 (for all books in all Amazon markets) during a period when I had no freebies running.

Since I've released no new books this year, this gives a good idea of what my sales look like with no 'price juicing'.  [Non-Amazon sales are currently around a tenth of these amounts.]

And here are my sales for the fortnight or so following the 'Holy Grail' I mentioned earlier - a Bookbub promotion on the back of a free first book in a series.

You used to be able to do this just by setting your book free - way back in the dark ages of 2011.  Nowadays you only really get this big a boost using something like Bookbub (a free/cheap book alert service with several million subscribers).  Of course, it's becoming rather difficult to land a Bookbub promotion these days. ;)

Most of these sales are of Touchstone, which remains my best-selling series by far:

Amazon Sales - 1 June 2014 to 9 June 2014

Sadly, it's rare that price juicing has a permanent impact, but free is definitely a way to get your book out there and it's a hell of a rush to earn the equivalent of a book advance in a fortnight.  I gave away around 30,000 free copies of Stray this time (only a tiny fraction of those will ever be read), and will probably simply leave the book on permafree from now on.

And as the years go by, I slowly increase the numbers of 'my' readers out there - people who look specifically for my books and buy them when they're put out.  Not because of any price juicing or random encounter in the also-boughts list.  The career of a self-publisher can follow a very different path to trade authors (where pre-promotion and first week sales are so important).  Mine has been a slow build thing, but fun and interesting and a viable second income.

And most certainly not an endless grind of promotion.

AAtS - Progress and Promotion

Getting toward the end of And All the Stars' first draft - there's around four chapters still to write, which in theory will be done by the end of August.  Since I've been planning a number of these scenes for quite some time, and also because there's a lot of action in the end-game chapters, this should be do-able.  I write action a great deal quicker than transitional and emotional chapters, and conclusions are often more exciting to write (if only because you can see the light at the end of the tunnel).

[Of course, I'm self-sabotaging a little playing a lot of The Secret World, which is a very good MMO indeed.]

After the first draft is done it's an immediate re-read, which is good for identifying changes of tone, and of course massive great inconsistencies and loose ends you've forgotten to tie.  Then beta readers, then editing rounds, copy-editing rounds, I'm sick to death of this book rounds...  In theory I should make my provisional release date of 3 October.

Now that release is getting closer, one of the things I'm turning my mind to is promotion.

I have a comfortably minimalist approach to promotion (ie. it's not something I enjoy so I don't spoil my fun with it).  I've had my Goodreads giveaway ticking away in the background since May, which has at least made the book a blip on some readers' radar.  I ran a single ad on a blog (The Book Smugglers) where I know I gained a few readers, so that any of those readers who don't follow me have a chance to notice it.  I'll run an ebook giveaway on my blog for those who do follow me!

The one thing I'm yet to decide relates to a site called NetGalley.  NetGalley is a review copy distribution site used by many publishers.  It is possible (but rare) for self-publishers to place a book on the site (for a fee of $399 per book), but whether that will translate to any reviews is another question altogether.  It's not something I'd normally consider, but AAtS is definitely the most commercial book I'm likely to write (the female-focused adult high fantasy I usually produce is _not_ a hot genre) and so I'm at least thinking about it.  [It's not that I can't cover the cost - it's that I'm a self-publisher and thus far less likely to get arc requests than the many many many other books available there.]

But, either way, it's exciting to be nearly finished on this one.  I'm very much looking forward to reader reaction to my pure unmitigated authorial evil some of these plot twists.

Playing with gifs...

I don't do much in the way of advertising my books - but it's fun making gifs!

View from the Free Train

A month ago Amazon price-matched Stray as a freebie.  Today I've unhitched from the free train, setting the price to $0.99 on Smashwords.  This will filter to B&N, Kobo, and Apple and eventually Amazon will price-match again - a process which can take between two days and several weeks - so if you were thinking of suggesting someone check out Stray, warn them the price will go up soon (and then again after Caszandra has been released, when I intend to set Stray back to its 'normal' price of $2.99).

For those interested in the value of the free train, here are the results of my free month.

In September (before free) I sold 35 books total on Amazon US (and some unknown small number on other sites where I can't view sales immediately).

In October (and the last day of September post-free) I gave away 14885 copies of Stray on Amazon US.  Many of these will have been to people who will never read the book, or who are not the ideal audience for my genre, but just sensibly collecting the freebies while they're there.

However, some obviously read the book, since I sold at Amazon US:

• 638 copies of Lab Rat One
• 48 copies of the Medair duology
• 36 copies of Champion of the Rose
• 12 copies of The Silence of Medair
• 11 copies of Stained Glass Monsters
• 9 copies of Voice of the Lost

The majority of the freebies went in the first week or so, and then the giveaway rate slowed down.  It's still going at a 100 or so a day.  Sales of Lab Rat averaged at over 20 a day for quite some time, but now have slowed to a little over 10 a day.  The cross-overs to my other books were a nice bonus, particularly since my fantasy is rather different from the Touchstone Trilogy, and won't necessarily work for the same readers.

Stray also went free on various other sites and (though I can't say exactly how many), I seem to have sold a few books on those as well.  I also picked up over 20 reviews on Amazon, and maybe a dozen reviews on other sales sites, book blogs, Goodreads, etc.  Reviews are valuable, both in explaining the book to potential readers and by sheer weight of numbers showing that the book has been considered worth reading.  I'd read that the free train does attract negative reviews and found this to be true - I picked up two more one star reviews (from people reading only the opening of the book), but this was more than balanced out by positive reviews.

The free train is a way to raise a book's profile, and get into Amazon's Also Bought recommendations.  I'm fairly sure that Stray will sell at least a few a week despite no longer being free.  It remains to be seen whether word of mouth will lift the series' sales again, but overall I would unequivocably recommend the free train - at least for the first book in a series.

Facebooking

My primary use for Facebook previously has been to play a large amount of Bejewelled and Gardens of Time, but of course it has been remiss of me not to set up some form of author page there.

Thanks to the kind prompting of Brooke, I now have an author page on Facebook:
There's also a "Like" button in the right column of the blog.

[Hopefully this won't make _too_ obvious how much time I spend playing games when I should be writing... O.o ]

Guerilla Advertising

You can tell the Kindle has Arrived in Australia when they have demo models sitting at the checkout at Woolies (supermarket).  I certainly blinked to see them there.  And then, of course, I did what no doubt every self-respecting author does when they see a demo model unprotected:

I could only add the sample, but it gave me a laugh, and it fell in nicely with my Touchstone Promotional Month, just begun today in lead-up to me releasing Caszandra some time in November.  This will include a giveaway at Goodreads of the entire trilogy in trade paperback, a limited-run ad, and me hauling out the biggest gun in the self-published author's arsenal, known among Indie circles as "riding the free train".

You can't set the price of self-published books as less than $0.99 on Amazon, so to get it listed free you have to spark Amazon's competitive edge by listing it free on Smashwords (and thus on Barnes & Noble, Apple, etc) until Amazon price matches.  Stray went free at US Amazon around 3.00pm yesterday and just under 24 hours later I believe a picture will tell a few thousand words...

Of course, vast numbers of free ebooks are downloaded without being read, but if even five percent of those downloads translate into someone reading the book, it's still more success in a single day than the whole of the 7 months Stray has been out.  [And about half of those sales of Lab Rat came in the last few hours - which I guess means there's some astonishingly fast readers out there.]  It's all about visibility, about results like this:

Stray will remain free for approximately a month (I say approximately because all this secondary price-matching stuff makes it very difficult to be exact - it hasn't been matched on the UK or German stores, for instance).  It will be very rare that I'll ride the free train, so it's a good time for the e-curious to check out Stray!  [Pity it's so atypical of the rest of my work, but heck, I might get a few cross-overs.]

Self-pub Q&A

Q's from Dave:

1) What can you say about your method for tracking sales data? How do your sales trends influence your decisions about timing of new releases, advertising etc?

2) Given your experiences with Glacial Decisions Publishing Inc, have you foresworn traditional publishing altogether or are you still trying to get some of your work into the trad pipeline?

3) What haven't you said yet about your cover design process?

Sales data

Tracking sales data for a self-publisher is fairly straightforward (unlike traditionally published authors, whose sales numbers may as well involve sorting through the entrails of a goat, so far as I can tell).

I e-publish through KDP, which posts sales within an hour or so (broken up between the three Amazon areas - US, UK and DE) and Smashwords which posts sales immediately for sales made on site (and emails you about them if you want), and sporadically posts data from other distributors that I sell through via Smashwords (Apple, Kobo, etc).  Hard copies are through CreateSpace, which again is fairly immediate data.

These are my US KDP sales so far this month:

As you can see, my rambly SF diary is just a tad better a seller than my high fantasy, but that's apparently a general trend - high fantasy is considered a very non-hot genre at the moment.  [Of course, it would help immensely if I did more promotion work.]  I'm nowhere in the league of people making a living off their writing (hundreds of sales a day), but I've been having a great time reading some of the reviews popping up on Amazon which show me that for a couple of people I've become a "to buy" writer - that I meet their particular tastes, which is a really nice thing for me.  [I also have a hilarious one-star review for being a swear-bear.]

Timing of new releases, advertising

Sales trends have no influence whatsoever on what books get put out when - I put them out when I'm satisfied with them, and they have a cover.

In terms of advertising, I haven't tried to time anything as yet, though I gather people buy more leading up to Christmas, but for e-books post-Christmas is the biggie, after all those new e-readers are unwrapped.

I do tend to second-guess myself about pricing, and it will be interesting to see whether sales drop off drastically for Stray when it goes back up to $2.99 in a week (let alone my high fantasy going up to $4.99).  I've decided to stick to the pricing schedule I posted, at least for a while.

Traditional publishing

I don't submit any more, and have no particular motivation to return to the submission queue.  I suppose if I started selling amazingly well a publisher might approach me, and I'd have to make some form of decision.  It would be sensible to work with a traditional publisher for foreign language sales, but for English language books I'm not sure I'd want to give up e-book rights and apparently e-book rights are the big deal-breaker these days.

Still, not something I need to worry about unless that whole "selling amazingly well" thing happens.

Covers

Are fun!  I'll talk about them more when I'm finalising the cover for Voice.

Promo Month

I've lined up a small amount of advertising in a couple of weeks, and for a month all four of my current ebooks will be $0.99 to go along with the promotion.

Self-publishing has a Catch-22 situation in regards to discoverability.  It isn't all just word of mouth - particularly where Amazon is concerned you need a sustained burst of sales in order to have your book start appearing in the "also purchased" and "recommended for you" lists.  So you need to sell a lot to sell a lot.  Just dropping the price to $0.99 won't necessarily get you anywhere at all - there's a ton of books for $0.99 or for free on Amazon and search results are ordered according to number of ratings and reviews meaning, again, that the more you've been read the more you'll be read.

There's any number of things a self-publisher can do to promote their books:

• Chase reviews from book bloggers.  Something of a challenge - a book blog with any significant audience will be getting free books from publishers, and will often have a "no self-publishers" policy.  Whatever their policies, almost all blogs with an audience will be drowning in books sent to them for review.  However, a review from an established blog which is willing to negatively review books as well as gush about the ones they like can have a tangible impact on sales.  And a review from a small blog is still a review!
• Run giveaways.  I run giveaways at Goodreads - I have two up at the moment (for Stray and Stained Glass Monsters - you need to join Goodreads to enter).  I initially thought this would be a good way to get reviews but it's not entirely effective - winners aren't obliged to review, and so far I've had a less than 50% review response.  It is, however, quite a useful way to advertise for only the price of a few books, and I get the occasional sale from those too impatient to wait for the giveaway to finish.
• Paid advertising.  Not necessarily effective, though with the right venue, cover, content and price point there's a chance of one of those valuable sales bursts.
• Networking.  Blog tours, reciprocal promotion with other authors, building an audience on a non-related blog (known as having a platform), friending everyone in sight.  These are time-hungry pursuits and results vary wildly.  Writers who have a platform, a tangible connection to others, will have a nice springboard for sales.  Writers who insert their book into every post they make (or any post they make) will gain themselves a nice backlash.  Mileage varies.
• Word of mouth.  Someone loves your book.  They tell friends.  On it goes.  Requires someone to love your book first. :)

And none of these compare to popping up in the first search results for your genre on Amazon, which is the reason for the temporary low prices, combined with a paid ad (for "Stray").  It might work, it might flop, but it's my current concession to the business side of self-publishing.  On the whole I'm not a particularly successful self-publisher - the writing is far more fun than the promotion aspects.  Because I chose to have painted covers ('cause I love 'em!) it will take me a while to break even in costs.  On the up side, there's no hurry whatsoever.  I put the books out there, make my occasional stabs at promotion, and go back to concentrating on writing the books.

Curiously, the Aurealis shortlisting was not effective promotion.  It got my book mentioned on a lot of sites, but led to I'd say no more than a dozen sales.  Still, the judges' report was great for the ego:

"The magic is variously humorous and breathtaking, and Höst has a fresh voice and an unusual heroine—a diplomat rather than a mage. You can read Silence of Medair for its strong, conflicted heroine, its playful subversion of fantasy tropes, or its deep, detailed analysis of the nature of racism. If not, just read it for the beautifully crafted prose."

Currently I'm working on "Voice of the Lost" while waiting for my proof of "Lab Rat One" to arrive.  [Well, currently I'm reading a lot of Rex Stout and playing computer games, but theoretically I'm working on "Voice".  :D ]

Read an Ebook Week

Promotion time!

I've signed up two of my books for the "Read an Ebook Week" event over at Smashwords.  Use the RAE50 code to receive a 50% discount on "Champion of the Rose" or "Stained Glass Monsters" during RaEW.

Coupon Week!

Time for a coupon promotion!  This week you can get my e-books at 50% off at Smashwords using the following coupon codes:

• Champion of the Rose: KN45D
• Stained Glass Monsters: PJ57V
• The Silence of Medair: KA23G

 The coupons codes are not case sensitive, and are good until 31 January 2011.

A Fine Point of Etiquette

As my first reader reviews trickle in, I find myself wrestling with the nebulous etiquette of the internet.  One thing I've seen over and over the past couple of years is an increasing resistence to self-promoting authors.  Authors who send friend requests to everyone who so much as mentions their book.  Authors who comment on reader reviews (or, worse, argue with them).  There is a thin divide between networking and pushing.

I quite understand the desire to show up wherever discussion of my books arise, all hyped with eagerness and offering to answer any questions.  Or to just go "thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou" because someone managed to read something I've written.

So far (fortunately for my fragile little ego) my first few reviews have all been overwhelmingly positive (I particularly enjoyed book-blogger Alana's review at her Sunshine and Bones blog; she handed me one of the best compliments I've ever had).  And, gosh (golly gee-whiz other non-expletive exclamations) it is HARD not to jump in and squee at people.

So this is a generalised, non-pushy, hopefully the right side of internetiquette THANK YOU to those who have read and especially those who have said Nice Things about my books.

I am smiling.

A New Year's Launch

Just hit Go on the e-version of "Stained Glass Monsters" over at Smashwords.  I've hit Go for the print version as well, but that takes longer to process so it will be a week or two before I'm able to go ahead with my next Goodreads promotion.
I particularly like the detail on the SGM cover, and it is both spectacular in thumbnail and well worth the full view - it would be a  pity to miss out on the lovely glimpses of Eferum-Get in the background, or the way Rennyn's ribbons are twined around her fingers.  This time I even managed to make the title legible in quite small thumbnails.

My launches are all quiet ones, since self-publishing doesn't really lend itself to big launch parties.  You press Go, you wait for approval, and then you wait several weeks more while the book's listing trickles out to other sellers.  You don't really want to make too large a fanfare if readers can't even find the book listed.  Medair and Champion still haven't reached The Book Depository, which is my benchmark of "available" (since that's where I buy most of my books).  And, of course, there's only a limited amount of fanfare you can indulge in as a self-pub without making yourself obnoxious.

Still, the quiet approach gives me time to adjust to the learning curve involved in all this.  And, of course, edit the next release (Touchstone!  So BIG!).

Around the World

Just finished my first book giveaway promotion at Goodreads, which has been a fascinating experience.  Goodreads is a great site, and I had 845 people who thought it might be nice to get a copy of Champion.  The ten who won were scattered all over the world - from New Zealand to Russia - and it gives me a real kick to think someone on the other side of the planet will see Soren through the fight with the 'wretched shrub'.