Insecure Writer’s Support Group

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IWSG — To Review, Or Not To Review…

Today’s the day for the Insecure Writer’s Support Group (IWSG) where, on the first Wednesday of every month, writers get together to share their insecurities and offer encouragement. The IWSG was created by Alex J. Cavanaugh, and you can learn all about it and sign up for it here. IWSG_Badge

I will soon be sending out ARCs and requesting advance reviews for my fantasy adventure novel, Lady, Thy Name Is Trouble. I know that getting reviews is vital if I want my book to rise above the obscurity that self-publishing can bring. A solid word-of-mouth campaign is essential for an Indie book to succeed.

So it stands to reason that if I’ll be requesting reviews, I should be willing to give them in return. I’ve never written a book review because of the horror stories I’ve heard about authors who took offense at not-so-shining, albeit honest, reviews and retaliated by trashing the reviewers’ books, giving them terrible one-star reviews on all the online sites, and having their friends do the same.

The thought of going through something so devastating has persuaded me to keep my opinions to myself. However, I don’t feel that it’s fair of me to ask other writers for reviews if I’m not willing to reciprocate.

I would love to know how other writers feel about this. Do you write reviews? Do you ever worry about the bad apples out there trashing your books?

I would also like to thank the IWSG for putting together the Insecure Writer’s Support Group Guide to Publishing and Beyond – Available Now! Thank you! Can’t wait to read it!

 

 

 

© Lori L. MacLaughlin and Writing, Reading, and the Pursuit of Dreams, 2014. All rights reserved.

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IWSG / Font-tastic Dilemma

Today’s the day for the Insecure Writer’s Support Group (IWSG) where, on the first Wednesday of every month, writers get together to share their insecurities and offer encouragement. The IWSG was created by Alex J. Cavanaugh, and you can learn all about it and sign up for it here.

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Click here to see this post with the various fonts.

Click to see this post with the various fonts.

I’ve been playing with various fonts, trying to decide which one to use for my book cover title. But it seems like there are a zillion fonts out there. How on earth does one choose?

My novel is romantic fantasy adventure. The romance element inspires thoughts of flowery and curvy script like Vivaldi from my computer’s font files or like this free file I found online called A Yummy Apology. Fantasy should be more exotic like Endor or Half-elven or Immortal, while the adventure element needs something strong and bold — Bodoni MT Black, Stencil, and Impact are all possibilities.

Swordplay is essential to the plot as well, which draws me toward a serif font that is clean and sharp like a blade. I really like Castellar and Imprint MT Shadow because of the added depth of the lettering. There is so much more to the main character than even she knows and in my mind, the shadowed depth of the letters symbolizes this.

So many choices. And once I figure out the title font, I need to decide if I’m going to use the same font for both title and author or choose another for the author.

Lori L. MacLaughlin (Cardinal), Lori L. MacLaughlin (Slender Gold), Lori L. MacLaughlin (Celtic) …

Which will it be? Sigh …

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Celebrate the Small Things

Celebrate The Small Things is a weekly celebration created by VikLit to celebrate the happenings of the week, however small or large. You can learn all about it and sign up for it here. CelebrateSmallThings_Badge

I love the idea of focusing on the positive and taking time to think about the good things that have happened, so for this week I’m celebrating:

  1. Finished going through the proofreading edits for my book! Now on to cover design…
  2. Had great conversations and met several new blog friends from my first Insecure Writer’s Support Group post on Wednesday.
  3. Actually got caught up with some of my household chores.
  4. Celebrated National Donut Day today with a Boston Crème donut. Absolutely delicious!

What other celebrations are going on out there?