Jan Peregrine Reviews How to Get Great Reviews Frugally and Ethically

How To Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically

Subtitle: The ins and outs of using free reviews to build and sustain a writing career

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson

Nonfiction: Writers/HowTo/Marketing

ISBN: 978-1536948370

Available on Amazon as E-book and Paperback 

Reviewed by Jan Peregrine originally for Facebook

The title and subtitle of this book live up beautifully to their claims! Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of the multi-award-winning How to Do It Frugally Series of books for writers, emphatically reminds me of yesteryear book titles with that nonfrugal use of words in her title/subtitle! The generous text carries on this theme with six sections, appendix, and close to 300 pages. This ARC e-book, free until it's print-published, is my introduction to the author and it won't be the last book of hers that I read. We're FB friends now and she published my White Trash book review on her blog. Not only a cool lady, but a very helpful one!

Howard-Johnson's latest e-book is the kind of self-help book that serious writers need. I sure do. While I have the book-writing part down, nary a writer's block to dog me, I unfortunately am messing up big time on the promotional part. Maybe I should blame the former dysfunctional review site I wrote for. Not making much money for my writing has become second nature to me...or something like that.

First she shows us the ropes to build the backdrop of our artistic performances to the reading/listening public That means getting to know who's out there who may help us to promote our books. There are lists we can make of people, reviewers, and publishers who are potential interested parties, especially if we hook them with a blurb about our book. I'd never thought of that. Also she encourages writers to review books where other similar authors will likely read them. That's a great suggestion and Howard-Johnson knows of review opportunities I've never heard of.

She really has a lot of useful tips and links, but I have one for her. Recently I read a young adult novel by Sonya Sones and since she included her email address on the back flap, I emailed her about my concerns regarding her story. I was thrilled to hear back from her right away! She had the erroneous impression that I hated it and would give it a bad review. While I did email back and clarified my impressions, I'll be more careful the next time I email an author. Brief reviews via email don't seem like a good idea.

So now I feel more confident that I'll be better able to promote my own books with effort put into it, even if they're self-published, because Howard-Johnson knows of reviewers who welcome self-published books and are not book bigots, heh.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Jan Peregrine writes reviews for Amazon, Goodreads and her Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/jansbooks/?ref=aymt_homepage_panel. She plans to be a fequent contributor to The New Book Review.

MORE ABOUT THIS BLOG

 The New Book Review is blogged by Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers. It is a free service offered to those who want to encourage the reading of books they love. That includes authors who want to share their favorite reviews, reviewers who'd like to see their reviews get more exposure, and readers who want to shout out praise of books they've read. Please see submission guidelines on the left of this page. Reviews and essays are indexed by genre, reviewer names, and review sites. Writers will find the search engine handy for gleaning the names of small publishers. Find other writer-related blogs at Sharing with Writers and The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor.