It’s all in a name...
Indie authors listen up, a big
name publisher with a big name author is about to show us how to do it right
while doing it badly. Do it and sell millions. Okay, maybe not us..
First, let me start I am not
knocking Rowling and Harry Potter.
Six years, is it? Since J.K.
Rowling put out a novel and this is what they give her readers? A grade C cover
and a synopsis that not only is poorly written, it fails to even tantalize. And
what makes it worse is she’ll sell millions. It is hailed as her first adult
novel. People will buy it just because ….
It burns me that we indies work
hard to get an eye pleasing novel, we try diligently and labor over a
synopsis. I know I do. I work, rework, tweak
the synopsis to make it as best as it can be and gripping enough that my
readers click on “Read a Sample’, praise be if they buy it.
Am I bitter? Yes. It’s tough to
swallow.
Look at the Rowling synopsis.
Read it. Really read it.
When Barry Fairbrother dies in
his early forties, the town of Pagford is left in shock.
Pagford is, seemingly, an English
idyll, with a cobbled market square and an ancient abbey, but what lies behind
the pretty façade is a town at war.
Rich at war with poor, teenagers
at war with their parents, wives at war with their husbands, teachers at war
with their pupils…Pagford is not what it first seems.
And the empty seat left by Barry
on the parish council soon becomes the catalyst for the biggest war the town
has yet seen. Who will triumph in an election fraught with passion, duplicity,
and unexpected revelations?
This is the writing and ‘Tantalizing
story line’ we have come to expect from Little Brown and JK Rowling? Or is it
me?
Just to prove my point. I made adjustments
to the cover and changed the author name to show you how bad it is without
Rowling on it. Imagine if he put that cover and synopsis on Kindle. How many do
you think he’d sell?
HOLY COW I just had a Revelation!
Maybe this is the new thing. Perhaps
all along I have been missing the boat. Duh, slap me in the face, hit me on the
head, and open up basic Microsoft Paint. Maybe simplicity and a grade school
approach is the key for gaining attention to my books. Yes! For my next
Apocalypse Release (yes, it's a real release), I’m throwing out the artwork I paid for and the synopsis I
wrote and this will be my cover and synopsis.
When an earthquake destroys New
York City, the world is in shock. But as people go on with their lives, things are
not what they seem. Just wait. It is only the beginning.
The world is going to change. Things
will happen. Things will get bad. Man is bad. Children are bad. God is mad. No
one will be glad when it is all said and done. Is there any hope?
I’ll let you know how that works
for me. The release is planned for the end of July.
