What do Readers Want?

Weekend before last I spent in San Francisco with some of the biggest names in romance talking about how to increase our presence on Amazon and reach more readers. This conference was small, personal and so unique. It’s not often you can ask Belle Andre or Tina Folsom or Sara Fawkes about their success.  Not to forget Nina Lane, Delilah Fawkes, Courtney Milan, Cynthia Woolf and several other Best-selling authors that attended.

We spent the weekend discussing metadata, keywords, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Street Teams and all the other details that help sell our books. As we sat there, I couldn’t help but wonder if we shouldn’t be asking questions of our readers.

So I would like you to take the following unscientific, totally random for my own purposes survey. It’s only five questions, with a bonus round and someone (randomly drawn number), who answers will receive a free book just because they participated. The results will be tallied and shared with other authors.

Is Black Friday Out of Control?

It’s November, and already the black Friday buildup has begun.  Amazon is advertising Countdown to Black Friday deals. I signed up for an ad from Book Blast for their Holiday advertising. Put your tennis shoes on and be prepared for the holiday races to begin. 

Our family is small, and we have to travel to San Angelo to spend Thanksgiving with my parents who live about thirty miles out of town. There are main roads into town, but at night or early in the morning you have to watch for deer. In the past, on two separate occasions, my parents have hit deer crossing the road at night, which does considerable damage to your car. When we drive out to their place, my husband, and I are always watching for those rascally deer who run right in front of you. Once we’re there for Thanksgiving, we usually don’t go anywhere in town until it’s daylight.

Plus, I find it very hard to get up at three in the morning and go shopping just so that I can get some great deals. I’m snuggled up under the covers, dreaming of Ryan Gosling and how I can persuade him to appear on my next book cover. But a lot of people enjoy this early morning shopping spree. I know women who pour over the sales ads and plan their shopping excursion.

Sylvia McDaniel asks: Is Love only for Virgins?

I’m hard at work finishing up my new Christmas novella. This one is a little different. I went back to my best-selling western series, The Burnett Brides that I had written years ago. The series, set in the old west, is about a mother who has three very stubborn sons who have not gotten married. She wants grandchildren, and they’re not even married. So she pulls some tricks and by the time the third son is married, the children wanted to return the favor of finding her true love. I never wrote that book until now.

Eugenia Burnett (be careful what names you choose in books because they stay around a long time) has sworn never to remarry. She doesn’t need a husband or want one. She’s a free spirit doing what she pleases and doesn’t need a man to boss her around. Yet she’s not given up her matchmaking ways either. Now she’s moved on to the people she knows, and she’s putting widows and widowers together. Until one widower, Wyatt Jones (think John Wayne meets Maureen O’Hara) lets her know in front of a crowded restaurant that he’s not interested in any of the women she keeps sending him except her. He wants to marry her.

I’ve had a lot of fun with this book. The story just seemed to write itself with me hanging on for the ride. I love it when books are this easy to write. But this book is special because it’s about an “Older” heroine.