Skip to main content

Stop Reading Best Sellers

There are a LOT of fantastic books out there. Wonderful plots with rich characters who interact in ways that we'd never dream of ourselves. Fantastic authors with storytelling abilities that make us all wish we could write a book of our own.

... and most of them have never seen the bright light emanating from a five star review.

My taste in books has taken quite the turn since I started trying to get people to read my own work. You never know how hard it is to pull a reader away from the "Best Seller" aisle until you've got a stack of books collecting dust on the shelf. Not to say that those best sellers haven't earned their place for one reason or another (and of course I don't complain when something I've written hits a 'best of' chart), but they aren't the only books out there worth reading.

When I talk to readers about where they find their books, it's very common to hear that they make a beeline to the recommendations that they've gotten through big media. Picking a book because you liked the movie rendition is pretty common, for example.

Personally, I don't get out to see movies much any more and I haven't had a cable or magazine subscription in a couple of years. But I still don't have a shortage of things to read. Here's a short list of some of the places that I have found some of my new favorite books.


  • Facebook - I subscribe to a couple of different groups where books by new authors are the main topic of discussion. Aspiring Authors and Book Reviews by Lynn are two of the many pages I follow that always have great suggestions.
  • Other Bloggers - I love bloggers that are also authors. Graeme Brown's New Voices: Emerging Author Reviews and Interviews is a great resource for learning about writing, and checking out new novels.
  • The Kindle Store - Just search for "Free" in the kindle store. There are all kinds of interesting things that will pop up, many of them are promotional free copies of new titles by unknown authors.
The next time you're looking for something to read, make sure to at least glance at some of those books by authors you've never heard of. You might stumble onto something amazing - and if you take the time to give a review, I know you'll make the author's day.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Don't Wait

I awoke Friday morning to a message from someone whose name was only vaguely familiar. Laying in bed, scrolling through Facebook on my cell phone, I opened the message. It was a quick note from a woman who was good friends with a woman who I have been close to for over a decade. I read it, and reeled with shock. My friend, a woman who had been with me through the best and worst of times, is gone. Taken from this life because of a driver who didn't stop at a stop sign on a country road. "Accidents happen," many say. It's true, but it isn't right. We never know when our time is going to be up. Today might be your last day, or mine. There's no way of predicting what will happen tomorrow... this evening... fifteen minutes from now. There are many tragedies stemming from this simple accident. First, a mother with fierce love of her two teenage children was stolen from them. A woman who was a pillar of support for so many has fallen from their list of who to cal...
2 comments
Read more

Proofing.

The first printed copy of A Giraffe in the Room has arrived in my office. The giant "Proof" stamp is wonderful to see, and I am looking forward to picking through the pages to make sure that the novelette is ready to be released commercially. Every time writing takes a step forward - whether it is the completion of a piece, reading through editing mark ups for the first time, or getting a print proof in the mail, it is a wonderful feeling. I hope that everyone who finds their passion gets the chance to feel the pride of taking a step forward.  I will say that at under 50 pages, I think A Giraffe in the Room looks a little bit like a pamphlet that someone would hand you through the open crack of your screen door as they try to tell you about the Good News. Other than the brevity of the thing (it is a novelette, after all), I'm very pleased with the little bit of it that I've had a chance to look over. I hope to comb over it this week, and estimate that copies ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Missing Deadlines

Life - not only is it the final frontier, but sometimes it is also a whirlwind. These days, I feel an awful lot like Toto in the Wizard of Oz. It is like I've been shoved in a basket and taken through the tornado to a land that looks like nothing I have ever seen before. My husband and I made the difficult decision to close down our retail store and move the whole business back home. That has translated into weeks (or months?) of sorting, selling, packing and storing everything that the business has owned. Right now, there is a mountain of inventory, paperclips, toddler-work-toys and extension cords rising up from the floor of my living room. I have rehomed a fraction of the mountain in the last two weeks, and I hope that eventually I will muster up the courage and energy I need to tackle the rest of it. Add to that weeks upon weeks of birthdays, holidays, the start of summer... and writing has gotten pushed far down the list of priorities. Not that I'd be able to writ...
Post a Comment
Read more