10 Ways You Can Help
Well, here we are. It is now June 13th, and there is only a month left before the release of my debut novel, The Deathsniffer’s Assistant (which you can preorder now on Amazon.)
I’ve been in an almost constant state of anxiety for two months now, and every day it gets a little bit crazier! I’ve poured so much of my life into this novel and in such a short time, it’s going to be turned out loose into the world. Already, strangers have their hands on ARCs and are weighing in with their thoughts on Goodreads and Amazon. The Deathsniffer’s Assistant is rapidly outgrowing the little enclosure it was born and raised in, and when that gate gets thrown open a month from today, it’s going to be truly out of my hands… and into yours.
Presumably, everyone reading my blog are already fans of mine. You’ve come here because you like my thoughts on fantasy, feminism, or are just interested in my book. You might want to help me out. How can you do that? Well, here are ten things you can do if you want to put yourself at an inconvenience to help me out:
(Note: If you don’t want to do any of this, that’s fine! This is for those who want to go above and beyond to support me. Just reading my book in any context is awesome and wonderful.)
1. Buy my book.
This one is obvious, but it’s important! Buy my book. This will give me money, which is good, but it will also boost me on the websites that are selling it, making it more visible to readers who haven’t heard of me or my book yet, but would really like to.
2. Buy other books at the same time as you buy my book.
Amazon’s algorithms will associate books together if they’re bought often enough. If you’d like to buy something alongside my novels to try and tie them together, I suggest anything by Gail Carriger or the Lady Trent novels by Marie Brennan. They’re all fantastic, and I think there’s a lot of overlap between who would like them! If enough people do this, there’s a higher chance that Amazon will suggest my book to people who buy those books.
3. Leave reviews for my book.
It’s super important to get reviews in this digital age. The more reviews something has, the more vendors notice it exists. It only takes five minutes to write a decent review, so if you want to help me out, writing reviews and posting them on Goodreads, Amazon, and/or the CQ site is the best thing you can do other than buying my book. Maybe even more than buying my book!
4. Leave ratings for my book.
If you hate reviews and just can’t bring yourself, just a star rating on Goodreads, Amazon, or other applicable site helps, too! While not as important as reviews, a rating does the same thing: bumps the book up in search algorithms so that other people can discover it!
5. Subscribe, like, and share.
Following me on my social media platforms helps a lot, especially if you like and/or share my content! It’s a big, wide, and ferocious internet where you can shout into the jungle for hours and have nobody hear you. The more people you have shouting too, the more someone is likely to notice. And ten people shouting something slightly different is a lot less obnoxious than one person shouting the same thing over and over again! We writers have to be really careful about how much self promotion we do, because too much can turn readers off. You can connect with me here on my site, on tumblr, on twitter, on Goodreads, and on Facebook!
6. Tell a Friend.
With the advent of self and independent publishing, there are so, so many great books out there, more than ever before. There are more amazing books than even voracious readers will ever be able to get through. I have books on my “to-read” list on Goodreads that I bought five years ago or more! But when a friend tells me I’ll like something, that book gets bumped way up my list and I’m way more likely to get to it quick.
7. Gift a Friend.
An even bigger incentive than someone telling me I’d like a book is suddenly finding it in my mailbox with a note from a friend saying they just need to talk with me about it so read it right away! When someone buys a book for me, it jumps right to the top of my list! If you want a friend to read The Deathsniffer’s Assistant and tell other people about it, nothing helps more than thrusting the book right into their hands!
8. Request it at your Local Library.
Libraries do more for writers than you probably realize! You may think that someone borrowing my book from a library is a sale I lose, but that’s not true at all. People who borrow from libraries will often later buy a book that they liked a lot, and it increases the odds that one of them will love it and have a huge reader’s network that they can share it with! When you request my book at a library, or donate a copy to a library, that makes it more available to everyone else.
9. Request it at your Local Bookstore.
If your local big chain location doesn’t have the book, put in a request that they start to carry it! The Deathsniffer’s Assistant will be available from Barnes & Noble and Chapters at launch, and hopefully more international vendors later! If they don’t have the book on shelves, it’s because they don’t think people will buy it off the shelf. If you ask for them to stock it, they’ll realize there’s a demand!
10. Google Me.
Take the time to Google “Kate McIntyre” or “Kate McIntyre Author” or “The Deathsniffer’s Assistant” and then click on the links that lead to my site, my Goodreads profile, my author page on Amazon, and so forth! This will trick poor Google into thinking that people really care about some debut author in Eastern Canada and her book, and Google will show me to more people accordingly!
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There we go! Ten things you can do as we head into release that will help put The Deathsniffer’s Assistant on as many radars as possible. Again: you don’t need to do any of this! Just being here, reading these words… you’ve already made a big difference! However, if you really want to put yourself out to bolster my career, all of any of these things are wondrous gifts given to me from your sweet hearts.
Here’s hoping that I keep my head on my shoulders and get through the next month!
