Wednesday, October 17, 2012

The Great Review (Contest)

Here we are on another Shadow Spinner release day. Today is "Part Seven: The Moth and the Shadow."
Of course, it's FREE! today, Thursday, October 18 and tomorrow, Friday, October 19. Make sure you pick it up! Also, "Part Six: The Man with No Eyes" is also FREE! today only.

Here's something interesting:
I like the idea of switching covers every so often. I mean, when you're doing a serial book, why have the same cover all the way through, right? Why not offer the consumer some variety? Especially when you have someone as talented as Rusty Webb doing your covers! It seemed like a cool idea to me.

Evidently, it wasn't such a good idea. On Monday when I had parts 1-5 available for FREE! there were an undisclosed amount of downloads on parts 1-4 (because I think I'm not supposed to post my actual numbers or Amazon will get upset), but there were only about 25% as many downloads on part 5 as any of the other parts individually. I can think of no other reason for this than that the cover changes at part 5, and the visual recognition just wasn't there. I find it really kind of odd. I had another cover change in mind that would happen around chapter 12 or 13, but, now, I think, maybe, I shouldn't do that. The whole thing is a little disappointing, but it's a good thing to know.

This is the part where I would normally start begging for reviews. I'm growing tired of it, and, if I am, I'm pretty sure you guys are too. But, see, "The Man with No Eyes" is sitting at just one review and "The Cop" at three. I'm starting to feel like little Oliver, "Please, sir, I want some more." Because I do. It's enough to make the idea of purchasing reviews tempting, but, you know, only not, because that still steams my ears. The difficulty of getting people to leave a 20 word review makes me understand the temptation, though. Especially since begging doesn't seem to work. So here is what I'm going to do:

The Great Review Contest!
Between today and, oh, say Sunday, for every review you leave for one of my works, I will put your name in a drawing for a FREE! book. Yes, that's right, a FREE! book, and it doesn't even have to be one of mine. However, there are some qualifications:
  1. It must be an independently or self-published work (this includes small publishers). No big, traditional publishers here.
  2. It must be an e-book, and
  3. It must be for the Kindle or Kindle app.
So go and leave some reviews on any of the Shadow Spinner parts or on The House on the Corner or even for "The Evil That Men Do" or Charter Shorts (which doesn't have a single review!). After you've done that, leave me a comment here to let me know where you've left reviews (and under what name you left them), and I'll mark you down for an entry for each and every review you leave! It's that simple! And, really, 20 words is not that many. I mean, a lot of you are writers, so 20 words should, you know, come out when you sneeze.

I'll announce the winner in Monday's post (which also has a super, secret announcement!). If you win, just let me know what book you want, and I will buy it for you and send it to you. It's as easy as that! ANY BOOK! Well, not any book, but you know what I mean. I hope you do, anyway. It can be one of my books, or it can be any of these great up and coming authors that we all want to support. And, hey, I just did a review on a great book that you could choose!

And just to be clear, I want a real review, meaning an honest review. I'm not offering to buy 5-star reviews here; I just want to get some activity going, so, you know, I'm not gonna secretly mark you off the list if you give me a bad review.
However, if offering incentives to get people to actually stop and leave a review (and click the "like" button) doesn't work, I may have to resort to coming to people's houses. And none of us want that!

11 comments:

  1. No idea on the differences in downloads.
    Reviews. Goodreads count? (I don't have an Amazon account.) First I have to read Matthew's manuscript. At my pace, I should be done by Halloween - of next year. (Just kidding!)

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  2. I've been similarly annoyed that my book "Where You Belong" has had only 8 reviews for like a year now. Yet it still sells around 10 copies a month. You'd think just ONE of those people might bother to read and review it, right? Though for me it seems the people who aren't lazy enough to review it are jerks who give it one-star so maybe I'm better off.

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  3. M.J.: Have you had a chance to read any of them yet?

    Alex: I thought about making goodreads count, because I'd like reviews there, too, but, if I had to pick one or the other, I'd prefer Amazon, so I went with that. However, I'll make an exception for you.

    PT: Yeah, I don't know what to say about it. I get not reviewing big time books and movies and things, because, really they don't need the help. What I don't understand is why more people in our place, the ones struggling to get their stuff out there, don't step up. I review everything I read, because I know how vital those reviews are.

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  4. You don't know where I live!!

    I'm really bad about the reviews, I know. Gah, I'll do it, I'll do it!!

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  5. That's interesting about the cover change issue~ I'd be totally open to seeing different covers.

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  6. L.G.: How do you know? Hmm...?

    Jess: Well, I could be wrong, but it's the only thing I could think of that made any sense.

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  7. I just got around to reading six and seven and then came to your blog to see that I was being threatened with home invasion if I didn't do so.

    Whew. Glad to avoid that. *Arms home defense system.*

    Anyway: They are great, as usual. I have put in a review of chapter 7, and I didn't even resent it.

    Also: I put a plug for you on my blog today; you're sandwiched in between politics and PTs cheeseburger thing tomorrow, but you'll have all Friday evening to yourself.

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  8. Briane: Thanks, Briane! I can't say how much I appreciate it. I would if I could, but I don't think they've made up the words, yet.
    So: "klsdfhgjkh ljjdlg ;lrbjktt ljhfglap!"

    Oh, and I wouldn't invade your home. You have a deadly bounty hunter living there who may or may not have a disintegration ray.

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  9. He DOES have a disintegration ray. Built it out of Legos. No idea how he did it. I'd like him to build an Integration Ray, too, because otherwise the neighbor is going to be REALLY mad about his mailbox.

    I spent about 5 minutes trying to decide if that was a code that you wrote. Is it a code?

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  10. LOL
    Oh, man, I want to just be mean and hold whether it's a code until your son builds the integration ray. You need to teach him that he should always build the integration ray -first-.

    But, no, it is not a code. Except for "fglap;" that part is a code.
    :P

    Just make sure they (because I'm assuming both of them have use of this ray) don't disintegrate the dog, because that would just be sad. Cats are okay, though.

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