Writing Blog

20220119 Release Day

January 19, 2022 6:00pm

My latest book came out in the past couple of days:

ASIN: B09QFFMZT8	Patch of Green Product Type: Book
	Amazon's Price: $ 12.99 Buy Now!

Adult horror, killer plants, you know the drill.

So… what does a release look like?

Well, my publisher (Little Demon Books) did a full-on social media blitz (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram that I know of) leading up to the release day and then hit it hard on the day itself. They arranged for two print interviews and a DM interview on Twitter. I think they also sent the book to a BookTuber. Last year they also made a few ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) available, resulting in some amazing pre-release reviews:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/59338103-patch-of-green

So, for my part (not being really marketing savvy), I asked people to please promote my book for me (and several have – thanks to those members of the WdC community who did just that! Love you to bits!) on the socials and also hit Twitter myself. My son hit Facebook and a local horror podcaster also promoted it. A story appeared in my local newspaper, which was done a week ago, including a picture of the book.

All right that was promotion organised before and on the day.

Next, I received 3 requests for interviews – one podcast, one video (which I have said I will only do if my face does not appear), and another for a blog. A woman from another company who has published a few of my short stories organised a blog tour for me and that starts in three weeks. This is where you go around and give guest blog posts or blog interviews within a community.

I was supposed to do a talk at the local library, but COVID has seen that cancelled.

What else? I received a phone call at 2am my time to be talked to by a radio station in the USA. A ten minute interview went on, where they asked me more about Australia than my book. I received an email asking if I would be up for a phone interview, scheduled for 30 minutes, but they never got to me when they said they would. The state’s main newspaper refused to even review the book (because local authors don’t get the views or clicks, apparently). A state radio station, the public one, has a “book corner” the first Tuesday of every month, and they’ve booked me for March; I don’t know yet what that involves. The local radio station where I go every month has cancelled all outsiders from coming in due to COVID.

I am expecting a box of 20 books any day now, which I am expected to autograph and then send back to the USA where they will be sold by some-one for a premium. At the moment, that’s been my lot.

And that’s a book release for a writer published by a small independent publisher on the opposite side of the world.