Category Archives: Books

Books do so much. They teach, inspire, motivate, educate and entertain. You can travel to other parts of the world, simply using your imagination, as you read travel books. This blog that is written largely by author Denise Turney has a wealth of material on the book industry. Whether you are an author yourself, an editor, publisher, freelance writer, content marketer or literary agent, there is something for you at this blog. Enjoy exploring the articles and learning from what is shared in the articles here.

Happy Thanksgiving Blessings to Love and Share

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By Novels and Books Author Denise Turney

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The best Happy Thanksgiving blessings to love and share work wonders year-round. After all, Thanksgiving is the perfect time to focus on your blessings, people and experiences that you are thankful for. Focus on what you’re thankful for and you could shift into a better mental state, at any time of year. Even more, you could alter your energy enough to attract more good into your life.

Focus on Thanksgiving

Zoning in on appreciation is a quick to-do. For example, you could write down 13 relationships, experiences and successes that you’ve had over the last 12 months. This is how my early morning unfolded. And I’m grateful for it. This morning, I paused and considered my family.

Gifts of openness, honesty, trust, care, presence, love and more are what I’m blessed to receive from my family. For you, it might be family that enriches your life too. Or, it could be the fact that you earn your entire income engaging in activities that you love. That is a situation that’s worth an expression of thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving Blessings

Here’s a quick start on other life experiences that you could hold appreciation for. However, you might be so busy that you don’t take the time to think about these blessings. Today, consider changing that habit. Instead of overlooking what you’re thankful for, invest two minutes into each day to zone in on what you can “thank” someone, the Creator, the universe or nature for. You might appreciate:

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  • Physical health that fuels you to travel, spend time with family and friends and do work that you love
  • Mental balance that makes it easy for you to feel loved, cared for, valued and loving
  • Housing that offers shelter, reliability and comfort
  • Fresh water to drink
  • Access to physical, psychological and emotional support (even if you don’t need the support now, it’s a blessing when support is easy for you to access should you need it in the future)
  • Ability to travel to destinations that excite you
  • Colleagues who appreciate and support you
  • Supportive customers and clients
  • Creativity
  • Pets who are excited to see and be around you
  • Rest and a good night of sleep
  • Skills and talents that have opened doors for you
  • Living in an area that gives you easy access to the theater, restaurants, libraries, bookstores, worship centers, nature or other things that you enjoy being part of

Benefits of Practicing Appreciation

This year on Thanksgiving Day, focus on your blessings in the morning. At the end of Thanksgiving Day, think about your blessings again. In less than eight hours, the list of experiences that you’re thankful for will have grown since morning. Whether you spend Thanksgiving Day alone or with family, friends or at a shelter, you may be able to enjoy a delicious Thanksgiving dinner.

That alone is an experience to be thankful for. Consider getting into the habit of counting your blessings. Get into the habit of looking for more people to appreciate. Doing so could open you up to more loving relationships. An Emotion study found that, “thanking a new acquaintance makes them more likely to seek an ongoing relationship.”1

Studies have also shown that living with thanksgiving improves physical health. People who practice appreciation, have been shown to experience fewer body pains, according to Psychology Today.1 Start living with a spirit of thanksgiving every day and you could also sleep better.

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Improved mental and emotional health have also been linked to active appreciation. In fact, the more frequently you practice thanksgiving, the deeper the benefits may be for you.

There’s also a link between being appreciative and self-esteem. Psychology Today shares that, “Other studies have shown that gratitude reduces social comparisons. Rather than becoming resentful toward people who have more money or better jobs—a major factor in reduced self-esteem—grateful people are able to appreciate other people’s accomplishments.”

Happy Thanksgiving

Furthermore, looking for experiences and people to be thankful for could make you stronger psychologically. Not only could searching for things to appreciate improve your self-esteem, it could steer you away from depression and feelings of isolation.

Additionally, you might become mentally strong to the point where you navigate through an unexpected challenge without feeling like you’re falling apart. If you think back to instances when you counted losses and challenges instead of looking for experiences to be thankful for, you might discover that it was during those times when you felt at your lowest.

So, consider using this Thanksgiving Day as a launch pad into a lifetime of appreciation. To kick it off, I truly thank you for supporting my writings and my books. You are a part of my thanksgiving. When I think about how much I love to write and create stories, the chance to use this passion to connect with awesome book buyers and book readers is a huge-huge blessing. I am so grateful for you and your support. Happy Thanksgiving!

Resources:

  1. 7 Scientifically Proven Benefits of Gratitude | Psychology Today

7 Reasons Books Are a Top Entertainment Choice

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By Books Entertainment Writer Denise Turney

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It doesn’t matter the time of year or what’s going on in the entertainment world, books are always a winning choice. Remember when you read a story that kept you on the edge of your seat? While you turned the pages, your hands might have shaken or maybe you smiled, swiped a tear or laughed. You may have felt a myriad of emotions, ranging from peace to joy to sorrow to hope. Talk about a deep emotional payoff. This is just one reason why books are a top entertainment choice.

Books Are a Top Entertainment Choice Because They Build on Entertainment’s Core

Admittedly, it’s easy to miss. Yet, that doesn’t change how books are a top entertainment choice because they are built upon entertainment’s core — storytelling. Your favorite movies, television shows, live stage plays and popular songs and video games, rely on storytelling. Dance might even rely on storytelling. On top of that, the best books are written with a rare sincerity, a sincerity fueled by passion and not money.

Still, there are more reasons why books are a top entertainment choice. Some of these benefits may be hidden. But that doesn’t mean that you’re not getting a lot of gain from reading books. Check out these seven reasons books are a top entertainment choice:

  • Education – Reading good books doesn’t just teach you about the book’s topic, it broadens your vocabulary. If you read books written in your primary language and a secondary language, you could learn a new language. Nonfiction books teach you about a broad range of topics, including the brain, health, wealth management, inner healing, governments, cultures, history, science and geography.
  • Stress Reducer – As an avid book reader, you know how reading good books lowers stress. It may take 20 minutes before your brain shifts away from worrying into relaxation. Yet, once that shift occurs, you can settle into a story and, before you know it, you’ve forgotten what you were worrying about. Your mind will have broken free.

Good Brought on from Reading Good Books

  • Empathy Booster – The best fictional books dig into the human condition. Great novel characters confront issues that humans have been facing for decades, sometimes centuries. Furthermore, it’s for this reason that works by writers like William Shakespeare, Frances E. W. Harper, Olaudah Equiano and Edgar Allen Poe remain relevant near centuries after those stories were written. Learn what motivates characters to do what they do, and you could become more empathetic in your day-to-day life.
  • Brain Exercise – Here’s a benefit gained from reading books that crosses both sides of your brain. Read a mix of scientific books and great fiction and you can exercise both the left and right sides of your brain. Choose to read different types of books, and you can do more to boost your cognitive abilities. You might especially notice this when you read books that require you to complete worksheets.
  • Improved Sleep – Lower stress can lead to improved sleep. Similar to watching a riveting movie, reading a good book could lull you into restful sleep. As a tip, don’t be surprised if you have dreams about scenes you read in a novel, especially events similar to what you may currently be dealing with.

Benefits That Guarantee Books Are a Top Entertainment Choice

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  • Better Communication – Watching characters deal with challenges can help you learn better ways to communicate with the people in your life. Even more, as you read more books, your expanding vocabulary and deeper empathy can strengthen your communication. Here’s another way that reading can lead to better communication.
  • Continual Growth – Whether you’re reading books to be inspired, to be entertained or to reduce stress, as you continue to read books, you continue to learn. Reading books help you continue to grow.

Furthermore, reading books offers a great escape from life routines. It’s a good way to take a recess from watching news programs. And who doesn’t want a break from watching one negative event after another?

Lower Your Mental Defenses

If you’re a fan of self-help books, you could work through emotional or mental blocks while reading. Another takeaway you might get from reading self-help books is the inspiration and techniques to start practicing self-awareness.

This single change could see your life grow sweeter. After all, if you’re not aware of how you could be arresting your development or holding yourself back, you might not know what to change to break free. This reveals another advantage gained from reading good books.

Reading good books helps you lower your mental defenses. Get caught up in a story and it could be days after you finish a novel before you see links between a novel character and yourself. It might take that long before you notice the main characters in popular books you love struggle with similar relationship, childhood, sexual or emotional issues that you do.

Real Links Between Your Life and Your Favorite Books

Let the characters transition from surviving to transforming to thriving and you might, even if it’s only subconsciously, start to believe that you too can and will make these rewarding transformations.

So, enjoy reading good books, fiction or non-fiction. Let your inner light guide you toward books that speak to what you’re dealing with now. You may get a lot more than an emotional lift from those books. You might put those books down and realize that you’ve gained a lot more than entertainment.

Repurpose Marketing Content to Attract Readers and Sell More Books

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By Books Author Denise Turney

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Eager to save time as a book promoter? Repurpose the marketing content at your website. In addition to saving time, when you repurpose marketing content, you attract readers using at least two data forms. Learn how to turn blog articles and other content into videos, posters, postcards, interviews, quizzes and press releases to sell more books.

Mapping Out Your Online Book Marketing Plan to Sell More Books

Let’s look at what makes an online book marketing plan, particularly the process of scheduling marketing content development and distribution. During this review, keep your goal top of mind. Your aim is to sell more books.

The below schedule is a general scheduling example. As you focus on selling more books, you’ll add specific actions to your content schedule. Pay attention to how many of the below steps use content you’ve already created.

  • Monday – Rewrite five existing blog posts, adding SEO phrases into the posts. As a tip, type phrases related to your book’s focal areas into Google. Examples include science fiction games, romantic mystery for retirees and novels with the best travel destinations. See how many search results come up for the phrases. Scroll down the search results and check the “People also ask” section in Google. These could become new blog article titles or article headings for repurposed content.
  • Tuesday – Develop scripts for social media videos that cover a month of video production. Use re-written book descriptions to fill-out the video content. After you write the social media video scripts, write a description for each video. Plug two to three SEO phrases that surfaced during your Monday work.
  • Wednesday – Shoot a month of social media video content. You’ll be working with lighting, sound and background branding materials. For example, you might shoot videos in front of your company logo. Depending on how long the videos are, this could take four or more hours.

More Ways to Sell More Books

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  • Thursday – Start writing content for your next four weekly literary newsletters. Include a video in each newsletter. Also, add a feature interview in each newsletter. And incorporate coupons and product/service discounts into the literary newsletter. To make your newsletter robust, fill it with data, price discounts, part of a rewritten blog article, etc. that book lovers appreciate. Use crisp subject lines, the type of subject lines that stir emotion, to encourage newsletter opens and reads, a step that can help you sell more books.
  • Friday – Schedule social media marketing feeds. To save time, use an automated social media posts scheduler like Hootsuite, Vistaprint, Buffer, etc. While scheduling social media posts, add a mix of videos, quotes, information on upcoming events, feature interviews, newsletter releases, etc. To bring social media marketing posts alive, embed not-to-be-ignored pictures into the posts. Images and videos attract book lovers, helping you to sell more books.

That’s just a start. Keep reading to discover ways to maximize your online and offline marketing efforts without spending a lot of time.

How to Repurpose Existing Marketing Content

This is where repurposing your existing marketing content really comes into play. To sell more books without investing an hour or more a day into your marketing efforts:

  • Add quotes to images on your author website and distribute as flyers on social media. You’ve seen those posts on social media, the ones with flowers, a sunrise, a woman climbing a mountain, etc. that are topped with a motivational quote. This time, let the quote come from a blog post, press release or interview that already exist at your website.
  • Place existing book covers on drinking mugs and t-shirts and sell those at your author website. Another thing you could do to sell more books is to use this swag as giveaways.
  • Upload products designed with your book covers to Etsy, Pinterest, etc. to attract readers and sell more books. Make sure your author website URL is on each product.
  • Edit book marketing videos into short snippets. Upload the snippets to TikTok, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.
  • Distribute existing marketing videos across a range of video platforms. For example, you could distribute your marketing videos to YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook Live, iHeart Radio, Google, Apple, Spotify, etc.

Organic Ways to Repurpose Marketing Content and Sell More Books

  • Build marketing videos into mobile holiday catalogs, sharing the videos on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. As with other ways to repurpose material to sell more books, the most you’ll generally do is edit, cut and paste existing marketing material.
  • Use published blog articles to create free e-books. Add your author website URL to the bottom of each page of the e-book. Also, add a page that list all of your titles to the back of the e-book. You could sell more books by simply showcasing your titles to more readers.
  • Create bookmarks and branded calendars that include snippets from your published blog articles.
  • Develop speaking presentations and trade show brochures using material from your literary newsletters, press releases and book descriptions.

To keep content at your author website fresh, re-write 10 blog articles a month, starting with older blog posts. As with your other marketing efforts, be consistent. In addition to repurposing marketing content, create new videos and blog articles. It’s an effective way to attract new readers and build relationships with these readers which, in turn, helps to sell more books.

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Implementing Your Book Marketing Content Plan

Building out your online book marketing plan takes time. If you’re pressed for time, you could hire an experienced marketing writer to create content for you. And, of course, you can repurpose your existing content.

Stay on track with a marketing calendar. For instance, you could start with the daily schedule presented earlier in this blog post. Then, plug in article titles, SEO phrases, image quotes and video script topics. Also, add due dates, getting clear about when you’ll complete action items.

Keep going. And stay open. Be flexible. Take free online book marketing courses from people who actually sell hundreds of books a year. Over the course of a year, you’ll find areas in your marketing plan that you need to tweak. Take advantage of new technologies, saving time and making it easier for you to attract readers and sell more books.

How You Can Promote Books Without Spending Money

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By Books Author Denise Turney

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Forget relying totally on paid book ads. Explore these ways to promote books without spending money.

First, let’s acknowledge what you have done. After all, book marketing is tireless work. It starts with writing a riveting novel or a hard hitting, informative non-fiction book. Kudos to you if you have knocked out this part of the book marketing process. Take time to celebrate. Then, roll up your sleeves and prepare to work, announcing your books to readers.

Taking the Book Publicist Route – This One Will Cost You

If you want to punt book marketing efforts to someone else, you could pay a marketing agency or publicist to do to that work for you. But taking that route will cost you. In fact, Writer’s Digest shares that the average book publicist rate is $100 an hour. Also, to get traction from a book publicist’s work, you may need to hire the publicist for three to four months prior to book publication and another three months post publication.

On average, you can expect to spend $5,000 to $10,000 for a book publicist. Take this path, and you’ll definitely want to vet a publicist or a marketing agency thoroughly. After all, you want to get your money’s worth from every book marketing effort that you invest in.

And, if you do pay for book marketing, check to see that the book publicist or marketing agency has deep experience marketing (and selling) books. For instance, check their references. Even more, check that they have influential media and book industry contacts. This helps them land you newspaper, magazine, radio and television interviews.

Free Ways to Promote Books Without Spending Money

Ensure they have gained 5,000 or more sales for other books that they’ve marketed. At the minimum, an effective marketer should have generated 1,000 book sales in a year. If not, they might not have the best skills. Before you sign a book marketing contract, speak with authors who have worked with the book publicist or book marketing agency you’re interested in inking a deal with. Do your homework.

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That’s a good first step if you choose to pay someone to promote your books. Just don’t miss out on free promotion tools. Are you ready? I’m going to share several ways to promote your books, marketing techniques that won’t cost you a cent.

Fortunately, you could knock out a few of the below steps over a few weekends. I didn’t add this one to the list because it’s not free. But you definitely want to have a sharp official author website. Media contacts will visit your website to learn more about you.

In fact, add your website URL to postcards, magnetic automobile stickers, your email signature and all printed material related to your books. Other steps include:

Marketing Tools to Promote Books Without Spending Money

  • Add a book blog to your official author website – You could use a CMS like WordPress to do this. However, if you do add a blog to your official author website, write and publish a new post to your blog weekly, if not more. Include SEO phrases in blog posts in a natural, easy-to-read way.
  • Schedule podcast interviews – Check directories like Interview Guest Directory (interviewguestsdirectory.com) to find podcast that interview authors for free. Schedule interviews with these podcasts. iTunes, Google Podcasts and Blog Talk Radio are other places that you can look for podcasts to interview on, letting listeners know that you have new books for sale.
  • Get on the radio – Similar to podcasts, reach out to radio stations that interview authors. As a tip, contact DJs who cover topics similar to the topic your book focuses on.
  • Use television – Share content from your nonfiction books with viewers at your local public broadcasting station. Also, reach out to local, regional and national television stations if your book has a holiday theme, relates to current events, etc.

More Tools You Can Use Without Spending Money

Take advantage of author newsletter book ad swaps – Exchange book ads with other authors. For example, you could advertise an author’s book in your newsletter and, in exchange, have that author advertise your book in her or his newsletter. Also:

  • Share book designs on social media – Use free book design services at places like BookBrush (bookbrush.com) and Canva to create designs to share on social media. Post about your books on social media to build your audience of potential book buyers.
  • Work with book directories – Add your book literary directories. This directory has free and paid listings (https://www.selfpublishingreview.com/2014/07/author-directory-sites-the-complete-list)
  • Start a literary video channel – Launch your own author video channel on platforms like YouTube, Vimeo, etc. Akin to operating a book blog, update your video channel weekly.
  • Launch a literary newsletter – Tools like Constant Contact, MailChimp, Emma and Benchmark make it easy to create and distribute literary newsletters. While these tools aren’t free, they do cut down on the time it takes to create and distribute newsletters. Yet, you can also create a literary newsletter using Word or PowerPoint and distribute manually to your email list for free, but this takes work and more time.
  • HARO (helpareporter.com) – Help a Reporter Out (HARO) list websites and media outlets that are looking for people to interview for articles, etc. Some HARO contacts include books in their catalogs.
  • Search paid book marketing sites – Some paid book marketing sites offer free marketing services. You might have to look for them. For example, BookDoggy (bookdoggy.com) will feature your book in their newsletter and on their website for free. All you have to do is include a BookDoggy ad in your literary newsletter that has 3,000+ subscribers.

Stay Encouraged

Whether you’re marketing books to land on the New York Times bestseller list, Essence top selling books or Amazon bestsellers, you’ll have to invest time. The same applies if you only want to sell a few thousand copies of your book.

The point is to keep introducing your books to new readers. That’s not all. To increase your book sales, you’ll need to keep your book in front of readers who are already familiar with your work. This is when blogging, starting a podcast and creating a literary newsletter can really pay off.

Another way to grow your book sales without spending money is to write new books. In fact, authors with 12 or more books in their catalog tend to sell more books than authors with less than 8 published books. Stay encouraged. Keep advancing. Keep writing!

How Reading with Children Strengthens Families

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By African American Books Author Denise Turney

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Reading with children strengthens families in ways other bonding activities don’t. Even more, reading, writing and math are subjects that children use throughout their lives, in one form or another. In fact, reading and writing play a major role in one-on-one and group communication. School, work, finances and personal relationships are affected by each of the three subjects. Yet, of the three, reading books is too often limited to the classroom.

Lasting Benefits From Reading Books

You have to use math skills to balance your personal budget, operate a business and ensure you don’t get ripped off while engaging in money exchanges. And, even if you don’t use long hand, you have to use a form of writing (or typing) to communicate via a memo, email, card or letter. It’s hard to stop using writing and math skills.

But finding interesting books to read may be perceived as a “chore” or an activity that’s limited to school. This can happen despite the fact that reading books is a key to lifelong learning. And here’s another benefit of reading, especially parents and caretakers reading with children. Reading books with children can help strengthen families.

Think about the people who you felt a deep connection with as a child. Did any of those people read 2nd grade books or 3rd grade books to you when you were a child? If they did and they enjoyed reading to you, enthusiasm filling their voices, it wouldn’t be shocking to learn that it’s those people who you remember fondly when you look back on your childhood.

Fun Times Reading Books

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I can still see and hear my aunt reading books to my siblings and me. She put so much inflection in her voice, glancing up at us, her eyes expanding with excitement, as she read important parts of a children’s book. Soon, I was strengthening my passion for reading books. To this day, I know that my love of discovering good books to read is rooted in the way that my aunt read to me when I was a kid.

Years later, I passed that same habit of finding great books to read and sharing them with my son. We had so much fun reading stories like the Bernstein Bears series, classic 2nd grade books and standalone novels. Just thinking about those times brings a smile to my face.

Before long, my son was reading books to me. We were growing together. And, perhaps more importantly, we were strengthening our bond.

Reading with Children Strengthens Families – It’s A Great Investment

In fact, the bond between children and parents may strengthen because reading books, even short 2nd grade books and 3rd grade books, takes time. Even more, reading books is a time investment that demonstrates how much someone means to you.

Think about it. Would you sit down and read a book to or with someone you didn’t want to be around?

Furthermore, it takes time to find good books to read. Bring home a new good book to read to or with your child each week and, after awhile, your child may realize that you’re investing time in her or him. Top that off by choosing great, entertaining stories and your child could start looking forward to the times when you sit down together and explore good stories.

How to Encourage Kids to Read Books

If you’re struggling to find ways to get your child to want to read as a start, consider the following actions. Keep trying different techniques. It might surprise you how fast your child goes from having an unwillingness to read to having a passion for reading books.

  • Start reading books to your child early, definitely before your child starts school.
  • Choose fun 2nd grade books (earlier grades if you start reading to your kids before they start school).
  • Read with enthusiasm. Make reading books fun.
  • Ask your child what she thinks about the book’s characters. Also, ask your child what she thinks the story is about and what her favorite parts of the story are.
  • Select a day and time to read books to your child. After all, he’ll come to expect you to invest time to read entertaining stories to him.
  • Make seasoned popcorn before reading books to your child. Snack on the popcorn before or after you finish reading.
  • The following day, ask your child how he enjoyed the book that you recently read.
  • Also, ask your son for suggestions on interesting books to read.

More Way to Encourage Kids to Read Good Books

Another way to encourage your child to read books is to find great books to read when your child’s cousins or friends visit. Even more, take your child to the library and bookstore. To show your child how much you appreciate good books, pick out a few good books for yourself while you’re at the library and bookstore.

If you really want to have fun, wear a hat similar to a hat worn by a book character. That, or you could pull on a cool t-shirt that’s similar to a t-shirt worn by a major character in a popular children’s book. And, let your child dress up. Then, enjoy reading great books together.

Although reading with your children can strengthen your family bond, there are more benefits of reading books. For example, reading is a good way to get some brain exercise. Reading can also help you to relax. Try it.

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Keep Reading Great Books

Read a relaxing book an hour before you head to bed and see if you don’t sleep better. Now, this has to be a relaxing book, not a book that’s going to scare you or keep you up guessing what’s coming next in the story.

Another thing. The more books you read, the easier you may comprehend articles, research material and written policies and procedures. Improved comprehension could shorten the time it takes for you to grasp new skills.

For your child, improved comprehension could shorten the time it takes her to study for exams. Your son or daughter might even start to recognize which parts of a class textbook is most important, helping them to know which sections of a book to focus on.

But the lasting benefits of reading with your child have to do with your child and your relationship. It’s a fun and entertaining investment that says, “I love you.”

How to Launch New Books to Boost Book Sales

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By African American Books Author Denise Turney

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One of the easiest ways to boost book sales is to publish a new book. To yield good results, you need to launch new books successfully. Then, you need to work to sustain your efforts. If you want to keep sales coming, you have to keep marketing and promoting your titles. This applies whether you’re a self-publisher, hybrid publisher or publishing a new book through a small press or a traditional publishing company.

Prepping New Books to Launch

But first things first. After you write a book that hooks you, pass the manuscript to an editor. And don’t just focus on price when choosing an editor. Look for an editor who has deep experience editing the type of book you wrote. For instance, some editors work mainly with children’s books, while other editors focus on adult mystery novels.

If you’re seeking a way to save on editing costs, polish your book before you send it to an editor. As a tip, you could submit chapters of your manuscript to a professional writer’s critique group. Another way to tighten your manuscript before you send it to an editor is to ask beta readers to read the manuscript and offer you feedback.

Now, here comes the fun part. And, not just the fun part – but the time-consuming part as well. Are you grinning?

To boost book sales and launch new books successfully, you must consistently market and promote your books. It can’t be any book marketing effort. To succeed, you have to incorporate smart book marketing actions into your book sales plan.

Map Out Book Marketing Strategy to Boost Book Sales

The book industry is fiercely competitive. Yet, you can earn six-figures or more a year in the industry. Part of the work to boost book sales starts months before your book is published. So, map out how you are going to market you new book months before the book is published. To save time, you could create two spreadsheets in the same Excel workbook.

In one spreadsheet, list free book marketing tools you’ll use. Examples include social media platforms, free design tools like Canva and word-of-mouth. Before you start filling out the second spreadsheet, listing paid book marketing options, do some research. Find out which book marketing agencies and websites specialize in your book publishing genre.

Research Book Marketing Options to Boost Book Sales

Also, find out which book marketing companies showcase new books. Here are more points to consider during your research:

  • Does the firm market new books to read in print, audio and e-book format
  • How many followers does the firm have if book promotions are only on social media? (Check their social media platforms to see how engaged their followers are. As an example, look for comments, shares and how many of their posts get re-posted.)
  • Are the firm’s newsletter subscribers mainly other authors who have subscribed to their newsletter, people who may never buy another author’s books? Another stat to check has to do with newsletter subscriber engagement. To boost books sales, find out the open and click rates the newsletters have.
  • Is there a limit on the number of books a book marketing website spotlights in a daily or weekly newsletter? After all, if there are too many books in a newsletter and your book is listed midway or further down the newsletter, few people may read far enough down the newsletter to see your book.
  • What’s the cost to run a daily, weekly or monthly website literary ad? And how many impressions does a typical ad at the firm receive?

Also, find out the number of people in your book’s target audience the marketing firm reaches. This is important. Remember, book marketers can promise you the moon, stating that working with them could land your new book on a best seller list. Yet, a promise and an actual result aren’t always the same. So, do your research.

Schedule Book Marketing Initiatives

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After you finish researching free and paid book marketing options, create a schedule. Within this schedule, include the date you will start and end free and paid ads. For deeper impact, consider running ads on your backlist books too. In addition to running ads (free and/or paid), here are more ways to boost book sales after you launch a new book:

  • Take pre-orders for your new books
  • Work with an experienced website designer and build an official author website. Then, add a blog to the website. As a tip, update your blog with a new article at least once a week. And use relevant keywords in your blog articles to attract readers. Google Keyword Planner is a free tool that you can use to find keywords. To highlight your books, add your book covers to the top or side of your blog.
  • Take advantage of Amazon’s free marketing tools if you publish e-books and print on demand books through Amazon. For example, you could do a Kindle countdown deal or you could offer a KDP e-book for free for a week. If you do use Amazon book publishing tools, apply to have your new book become part of their marketing newsletters.
  • Create your own literary newsletter. Add feature interviews, book coupons, links to your new book releases, etc. to the newsletter.

More on Book Marketing Initiatives

  • Schedule online and offline radio interviews. Also, interview on podcasts that spotlight authors. To get more traction, consider interviewing on podcasts and radio stations that are looking for guests who cover topics that your book focuses on. For instance, if you wrote a novel about a character who has ADHD, you could interview on shows that focus on mental health, learning or brain function.
  • Attend virtual and in-person book conferences, cultural festivals and writer’s conferences. These are good places to meet new readers and boost book sales. Even more, these are good places to showcase your books. As a tip, if you do attend conferences and festivals, consider bringing free book excerpts. For example, you could bring 100 copies of a two-page excerpt and hand them out to people who stop by your booth. But don’t just hand out excerpts. Ask people who stop by your booth to sign up for your literary newsletter. In fact, you could bring a printed sign-up sheet so readers can add their name and email address to subscribe to your literary newsletter. (Keep a copy of the sign-up sheet in case someone says they never subscribed to your newsletter.)
  • Use tools like Canva and Book Brush to design book marketing flyers and social media posts to share at your website, on postcards and on social media platforms.

Manage Book Marketing Budgets While You Boost Book Sales

Keep an eye on your budget throughout the book marketing process. After all, you don’t want to spend so much money on book marketing that, even if you sell 1,000 books a month, you find yourself in a financial hole.

And, going forward, always do your research before you pay for book marketing. Also, follow-up to ensure that marketing actions you paid for actually occurred. One good way to achieve this is to ask marketers and promoters you run ads thru to email you links to the places where they ran your ad. Get ad stats too, stats that show how many people clicked on your ads and/or bought your books.

Looking for more book marketing support? Check out the below book.

Types of Content Marketing That Increases Book Sales

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By African American Books Author Denise Turney

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As an author, finding the right content marketing that increases book sales is a shortcut to literary success. By itself, this type of content keeps your name and your book titles in front of book buyers. This may sound easy enough as a writer. After all, writing is your bread and butter. But it’s not a slam dunk. On top of that, content marketing isn’t a one-time deal. It’s not like writing a bestselling book.

Scheduling Content Marketing That Increases Book Sales

In fact, to gain enough traction with content marketing that increases book sales, you need to publish new content weekly. You might get greater results if you publish content daily. Think about newspapers and how they keep fresh content in front of readers.

So, before considering the types of content marketing that can increase book sales, get clear about how often you’ll push out fresh material. Make it easy on yourself. Create a content marketing schedule. Items to include on the scheduler are:

  • Dates that you’ll publish book marketing content
  • Topic or content focus (book marketing tools, image metadata, simple video marketing techniques, etc.)
  • Key phrases built into the content
  • Links to relevant content at your website
  • Social media platforms that the content will be marketed on

Types of Content Marketing That Increases Book Sales

Building out your content marketing schedule helps to keep you on track. As you develop the schedule, you may realize that you need to bring on a freelance content marketer to create the content. In fact, this choice frees you up to write more books. But more about that later.

For now, let’s look at types of content marketing that increases book sales. The effectiveness of each type varies. Yet, each of these types of book marketing content could introduce you to new readers. To begin:

  • Blog content is a type of book marketing you can control. If you add a blog to your author website, you can increase your overall website traffic. Just be prepared to add new blog content each week, at the minimum.
  • Newsy book marketing content may be a good fit for marketing platforms like Outbrain, Newscred and Contentful. With these platforms, you can push book marketing content out to media and digital websites. Exercise financial discipline to avoid overspending.
  • Social media book marketing content is an effective way to connect with readers. And, you have options. There’s organic and paid social media marketing. As a tip, before launching into paid social media marketing, take free training courses offered by the social media platforms that you want to work with.

More Types of Book Marketing Content

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  • Email marketing still works. For example, you can introduce book buyers to your titles via digital postcards, coupons and direct email.
  • Simple video marketing is a winner. As an author, you could use simple video marketing to read excerpts from your books. Other options include sharing book marketing tips, your list of top 10 books and details on upcoming book festivals you’re attending.
  • Text messages are another option. As with other book marketing options, make sure you gain approval to send book buyers text messages before pursuing this option.
  • Digital newsletters work too. Not only can you launch your own literary newsletter, but you can also cross promote books in other author newsletters.
  • Offline book marketing content includes direct mail, print book catalogs, print postcards and flyers.

Link content marketing that increases book sales to your official author website. After all, this makes it easy for book buyers to keep up with what you’re doing. And it helps to build reader trust, not to mention grow your online and offline presence.

Working With a Freelance Content Marketer

As previously mentioned, you may find it beneficial to let a freelance content marketer write your book marketing content. Should you take this approach, research content marketing prices. For example, you might pay a freelancer 15 cents a word. Or you might pay a freelance content marketer by the article. Also, decide if you’ll include editing in the overall price that you’re willing to pay.

Another option that you could use is a web content agency. Take this path, and you could leave book marketing content scheduling, key phrase research and writing to the agency. As a tip, work with a book marketing agency that gives you access to a personal dashboard.

This way, you can log into your marketing account and review analytics. For instance, you could review how many clicks key phrases generate. You could also review the number of visitors each book marketing article gets. Also, pay attention to social media accounts that certain articles get better results on. For example, do your images perform better on Pinterest or on Twitter? Or do shorter articles about your books’ topics perform better on Facebook while longer articles perform better on LinkedIn?

Working with a Digital Content Agency

Some digital content agencies let you indicate if you want their platform to automatically post your content when it’s likely to gain the most views. You could do a split test and ask that some articles be published at specific days and times. For other articles, you could indicate that you want to take advantage of the platform’s automated posting dates and times.

See which works best. And don’t worry. Even while marketing bestselling books, it’s good to be flexible. After all, the types of content that help with marketing books today may not prove effective tomorrow. Furthermore, the best days and times to publish book marketing content may shift.

This brings up another point. Even if book marketing content works, helping you to gain more book sales, you’ll likely need to make changes. So, be flexible and resilient.

Stay Free of Magical Thinking with Content Marketing That Increases Book Sales

Accept what data shows you. Definitely avoid magical thinking. In other words, steer clear of thinking that just because you wrote a book or because the story is a winner that a book is going to become a bestseller. Also, staying away from magical thinking can help you to spot changes in your book marketing results.

Even more, not only can it allow you to spot book marketing changes, but it can also equip you with the courage to adjust to those changes. For instance, you might notice that the digital content agency that you’ve been using for two years is no longer generating book sales for you.

If you’re in the habit of treating everyone with respect, it should be easy to sit down and discuss these changes with the digital content agency. Who knows? They may have received similar feedback from other authors and are rolling out updates within days.

Flexibility and Persistence Can Really Pay Off

In addition to being flexible and staying free of magical thinking, be resilient and persistent. Soon, you’ll see that persistence is at the core of content marketing that increases book sales. You have to do what you say. Simply put, you have to be dependable.

Book buyers need to know they can read fresh book marketing content from you at certain times. Although you might not realize it, there could be hundreds or thousands of people reading your content. Some of these people may be hopeful book authors. Others may be avid book readers, people who just need to know a little more about you and your books before deciding to buy your titles.

So, be persistent. Keep trying new content marketing types. Every day, do something to grow your readership. There may be thousands of readers who will love reading your books, if only they knew about those stories.

How New Authors Gain Book Sales

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By Book Author Denise Turney

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Yes. New York Times bestselling books are often written by household name authors. Readers know what to expect from these authors. To readers, there may be less monetary and time risks involved with these titles. But that doesn’t mean that new authors can’t gain book sales. In fact, following are techniques that help new authors gain book sales.

Launching New Books

That’s good news. Unfortunately, simply writing a book, even a beautifully crafted story, isn’t always enough to gain book sales. Furthermore, publishing a book on a major platform like Amazon, Kobo or Barnes and Noble also is no guarantee that new authors will gain book sales, let alone enter the ranks of bestselling books.

Despite the genre, new authors could gain book sales if they publish books in January. To get more sales, the book genre is another factor to consider. For example, romance and self-help books may perform better when they launch in January. Children’s books and cookbooks may do well when published in December, and science fiction does well when published May thru August.

Getting to Top Selling Books

Yet, here’s the thing. During the end-of-year holiday season, authors of bestselling books are marketing and promoting their titles. That puts new authors in competition with household name authors which is why January launches yield results. In addition to launching new books at the start of the year, to move books for sale, new authors can:

  • Design catchy book covers using tools like Canva, Book Brush, Pic Monkey, 99Designs. Consider posting two to three book cover options on social media and asking people to vote on their favorite book cover. Another option is to share three book covers with family and friends and ask them to tell you which image they like best.
  • Also, write an attention-grabbing book description. It’s this overview that may determine whether readers simply flip a book over and put it back down or pick a book up and buy it.
  • In today’s digital book world, it’s important to add the right keywords to book overviews. Why? Keywords are what will help attract readers to new, classic and older books. In fact, keywords will impact search engines, Apple Books, Google Books, audio books and Amazon bestselling books.
  • And here’s another tip. If new authors aren’t gaining book sales, they can update their book description, trying different keywords within the description.

More Ways for New Authors to Achieve Top Selling Books Status

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Here are more ways for new authors to gain book sales. The first choice sounds easy. Yet, there are still authors who don’t have an official website.

  • Therefore, it’s important that new authors have an official website. When developing a website, consider using the author name as part of the website URL. It may not be a good idea to use a book title as part of a website URL if a new author plans to write more books.
  • To polish the story, let an experienced book editor look at the book. New authors and established authors are so close to their stories, it can be hard to spot mistakes in the writing. Even more, authors may overlook parts of a story that should be carved out. Another thing authors can miss that can hurt sales is an area of a story that could be stronger with dialogue or scene change.
  • Back to the official author website. Don’t just create a book author website. To get traction, add a blog to the author website. Add a new blog article that has relevant key phrases at least once a week. Here’s another tip. Website content management systems like WordPress allow authors to add a link to their book’s Amazon sales page.
  • Depending on the budget, new authors should consider trying paid ads. But watch the budget to avoid getting dreamy and overspending with minimal results.

Even More Ways for New Authors to Gain Book Sales

Places to test books for sale ads include Book Bub, Bargain Booksy, Cush City, AALBC, Facebook and Amazon sponsored ads. Here’s another tip as it regards ads. Run two ads to test which images and ad copy pull in more book sales.

  • Also, review book marketing analytics. This could keep new authors from entering states of magical thinking. After all, magical thinking can cause new authors to think that their new title will soon be among the Amazon bestselling books and New York Times bestselling books just because they wrote the book.
  • Create, publish and market book trailers.
  • New authors can also create their own Vimeo or YouTube Channel, offering writing and marketing tips.
  • Notwithstanding, the fact is selling enough books to see a title among the top selling books takes work. Which is why book marketing analytics aren’t always fun to review. But they offer insight into the types of book marketing techniques that are working and the techniques and strategies that need to be changed or stopped.

Pathway to Book Sales Online and Offline

Even more, podcast interviews, offline radio interviews and television interviews are effective ways for new authors to gain book sales. Other ways for new authors to gain book sales are to design and mail post cards using tools like Canva or VistaPrint. Thanks to the Internet, these postcards can be in print or digital.

Other options to announce books for sale include posting flyers on college and university bulletin boards. As a safeguard, authors should ensure they get approval from school administrators to post the flyers. And creating book newsletters is another way for new authors to gain book sales.

Definitely encourage family and friends to spread the word about the new books. This is not the time for authors to be shy. This raises another point. If new authors are assertive, there are a myriad of actions they can take to promote and market their books.

Keep the Momentum Going

For example, new authors can attend book festivals and cultural events that attract their book’s audience. Teaching college writing courses is another way to pull in more book sales. Additionally, there are book tours, book reviews and book swag to share with attendees at major events.

In closing, as the Internet and the world continue to change, new authors can develop innovative book marketing strategies. They can also take advantage of marketing apps and social media book marketing tools. To continue growing book sales, authors have to keep releasing new books. And, they have to keep introducing their new books and their backlist to book buyers and book readers.

7 Tips to Help Kids Love Reading Books

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By Books Author Denise Turney

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Despite what you might think, many kids love reading books. As long as I can remember, I have loved to read books. Even more, I’m from the school of book readers who loves holding a paperback in my hands. Could be the scent wafting off the pages. Or it could be the way that it feels to hold a good book against my stomach while I flip the pages.

Benefits of Reading Books

Like a train, boat or airplane, books took me to different places. In fact, it’s how I got to Paris, Kenya, Spain and Australia while I was growing up in housing projects. And, all the journey cost me was an active imagination, concentration and a library card. Oh, and the help of talented authors who knew how to use a pen to carve out worlds of wonder.

Back then, I read 35 to 50 books a month. Every Single Month. On top of that, I ran track, kept up my school work and wrote poems and short stories. Honestly, there are times when I think that books may have saved me from experiencing the full sting of trauma.

Reasons Kids Turn Away From Reading Books

Yet, benefits aside, it’s not always easy to help kids love books. In fact, some kids don’t like reading books because they think that they’d have to invest too much time into a book, even really good books. Other reasons why kids might turn away from reading books include:

  • Reading books feels too much like being back in school
  • Ebook reader stories are a turnoff due to having to stare at a screen
  • Story topics aren’t exciting to kids
  • Other events, choices vie for their attention
  • Parents, other adults and older siblings telling them reading books is boring
  • Benefits of finding good books to read is hidden from kids

Advantages to Kids from Finding Good Books to Read

Fortunately, there are a myriad of benefits that can be gained from reading books. Chance to explore other parts of the world is just one benefit. More benefits gained from digging into the best books to read include:

  • Increased empathy – While exploring books to read, kids can learn about different cultures. They can also learn how people experiencing challenges similar to their own feel. Even more, when kids love books, they can see how these same people overcome challenges. This alone can be inspiring, motivating and empowering.
  • Brain strength – Reading exercises the brain. According to Reading Horizons, the brain’s occipital lobe and the parietal lobe are stimulated while reading books. This stimulation helps kids process visual information. It also helps kids process letters into words.
  • Reading comprehension – The more kids love books, the stronger their reading comprehension can become.  Whether kids are reading children’s books in print or via an ebook reader, the more they read, the easier it may become for them to understand what’s shared in a story. As it regards school, kids may shorten the time it takes to study for tests. Additionally, they might recognize what to focus on in a book, including non-fiction textbooks.

More Advantages of Kids Finding Good Books to Read

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This happened for me. Granted, it took several years of avid book reading. But after reading kids’ books, I could spot areas teachers were likely to focus on in tests. Soon, I could read textbooks and know just what to highlight and zone in on.

More reasons for kids to find good books to read are to exercise their imagination and to open themselves to new ideas. Also, characters in some children’s books may keep kids from feeling alone. For example, a child who’s being bullied in school might feel less alone while reading a kids books series about a girl who’s also dealing with bullying.

Reaping Rewards When Kids Love Books

Building a broader vocabulary is another advantage for kids finding good books to read. Also, if kids read more advanced books as they age, it can help them maintain healthy cognitive abilities. Other advantages include:

  • Supports healthy sleeping
  • Improves concentration
  • Lowers stress (a plus in a busy digital world)
  • Aids healthy self-esteem (Of course, this depends on the books that kids read. Good books to read can support healthy self-esteem.)

Tips to Help Kids Love Books

Yet, with all the advantages and benefits of reading kids books, it can be hard to get kids to read. So, how can you encourage kids to read more books?

Check out these tips. For starters, let your kids see you reading books. This next tip is closely connected to the first. When your children are young, read good books to them. Other actions that you can take to help kids love books are:

  • Turn your kids’ favorite books into a play that the entire family can participate in
  • Let your children pick the books they want to read
  • Ask your children questions about books they read
  • Buy your kids books for their birthday and on holidays. They make great additions to other gift options.
  • Make a trip to your local bookstore fun. For example, you can go to brunch, then to the bookstore and later to a movie.
  • Take crayons and draw cartoons based on book characters and plots to help kids love reading books
  • Get your kids a library card. Also, let your kids participate in fun library events.

Fans of Good Books

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Even more, you may find it beneficial to let your kids read good books with you. For instance, you can read parts of a book and let your kids read other parts. As you see the benefits of your kids reading books, you might encourage reading more.

Who knows? Along the way, you might find good books to read and become a book lover yourself. And, kids who become fans of good books might grow up and pass book reading on to their children. In today’s world, you have more options.

Thanks to the digital world, you can find good books for your kids to enjoy on an ebook reader. Furthermore, your kids can read free or discounted books online. If their school has a book club, they can even share their thoughts and feelings about books they read with their classmates and peers.

How Books Help You Heal

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By Books Author Denise Turney

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Wikimedia Commons – Picture by Michael Klajban

Books offer great entertainment. But they do more than that. Good books help you heal.

Have you ever had your guard up to the point where you didn’t notice that you were making mistakes with your life? When you’re this guarded, you may refuse to see your mistakes and open to change, to start to heal. As powerful as digging in your heels against change (including inner healing) may feel, it’s not the way to start living your best life.

Good Books Lower Resistance to Healing

You could talk with a friend, placing yourself in an environment where you feel safe enough to lower your guard and begin to heal. That certainly helps. But friends get busy. Despite their best intentions, there are instances when good-good friends face so many challenges of their own that it’s overwhelming for them to offer an open ear, especially if you’re resisting the very change that you most need to make right now to start the healing process.

This might surprise you. Yet, reading good books can lower your resistance to inner healing in unexpected ways. Highly crafted books are gentle in how they adjust perception and loosen erroneous beliefs. For example, powerful, complicated book characters grab your attention by spotlighting the character’s shortcomings and personal challenges.

Before you know it, you’re rooting for some book characters while wishing that other characters reap what they sow. Even if you’re usually alert, it may be weeks after you finish a novel before it dawns on you that one or more of a book’s major characters have strengths and areas for improvement that are similar yours.

Good Books Provide Clarity During Healing Process

Without realizing it, you can witness the effects of specific causes (e.g. anxiety, violence, poverty) on someone’s life while you read good books. But that’s not all. Another of the gentle ways that books help you to heal is how books gently let you see alternatives for choices that you’re facing.

This happened for me when I read comedian and actor, Bernie Mac’s book, Maybe You Never Cry Again. I can still visualize the scene where he wrote about the last odd job that he took to pay bills – the last job that he took before he went after what his heart called him to do — succeed at comedy. Thanks to what Bernie Mac shared in the book, I knew that I had to pull out the stopper and go after my novel writing full tilt boogie. Reading Maybe You Never Cry Again helped me to heal from the habit of putting off what I knew I must do.

The Ebony Tree by Maxine Thompson gently showed me the rewards of letting the past go, even old family history. Talk about moving into healing page-by-page. And, I still remember the first time that a woman who’d read Spiral told me that, after reading the book, she’d decided to forgive, a sure way to heal.

How Books Help You Heal

Although I didn’t write Spiral around the message of forgiveness, that reader’s feedback was beyond inspiring and encouraging. Think about all the good books you’ve read so far. How have those books changed your life? How have those books helped you to heal?

During my childhood, it was good books that helped me navigate challenging real life events. I got so much courage and positive energy and inspiration to heal from books like the Pippi Longstocking series, Ramona and Mildred Taylor’s Roll Of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

So, yes. Good books help you to drop your guard so that you can have more clarity around pivotal life decisions, the types of choices that are part of the healing process. Books do this by putting characters in situations that millions of people face. Because you’re not in the spotlight (the book’s major characters fill those roles), you can witness what’s going on without fear, without becoming defensive. And making the right choices is healing. It really is.

Enjoy What You Love About Good Books

I love the power of healing you can gain from reading good books.

Other gentle ways that good books help you to heal are by switching your focus off of perceived problems which, in turn, lowers stress. Also, good novels help you to heal by giving you something fun and engaging to do with your partner, family or friends.

After all, book clubs aren’t the only groups that can have fun reading and digging into good books together. You could even turn a good novel story into a play that you put on with family, friends or a local theater. Additionally, good books turn you away from work. They also give you a great option to replace being online for hours or surfing your phone all night.

So, here’s to good books! Hope you enjoy reading a good novel today as you continue the path of inner healing.