Category Archives: A Most Malicious Murder

Compliments Are a Writer’s Catnip

16 Monday Jan 2023

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I had the nicest compliment when I took J.J. (AKA the Ancient One) in for his shots last week. I had mentioned to my vet at his last visit (a few months ago when he had a UTI) that I’d written A Most Malicious Murder. She told me that her mom had also published some stories and we chatted a bit about being indie authors and how that had really opened up publishing for a lot of people

Cut to last week’s visit when my vet shocked me silly by praising AMMM to the skies and went on to say that she’d told her mom about it, who also loved the book and left a review on Amazon. I told her a little bit about the impetus behind AMMM and the possibility of a sequel and she was very enthusiastic about that so maybe I do actually have to write the damn sequel after all.

A Pale Blue Eye (or: Who Do I Have to **** at Netflix to Get A Most Malicious Murder Optioned?)

06 Friday Jan 2023

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The Pale Blue Eye Director Discusses Working with Christian Bale - Netflix Tudum

As a writer, it can be a little frustrating to see projects with similar premises to your own work getting optioned and turned into movies. Which is why I may have screamed a little when I saw the trailer for The Pale Blue Eye, because the moment I saw Harry Melling I thought, “Holy God, that’s Edgar Allan Poe, which meants this has got to be a mystery story set during his time as a cadet at West Point.”

I may have cursed as well, I don’t remember. Granted, this story has few similarities to A Most Malicious Murder other than the fact that both have Edgar Allan Poe as a main character, fictionalize a part of his life, and deal with murder. But still, my Inner Taskmistress is currently screaming at me for not doing more to get Murder optioned as a film, especially seeing as streaming services are hungry for content. (Trust me, working for yourself is not as easy as it sounds.)

So I’m going to do my best to tastefully ride the coattails of The Pale Blue Eye in order to drum up interest in A Most Malicious Murder. Because Mellie has cats to feed and they like the GOOD kibble.

I’m Gonna Make You a Deal

09 Thursday Sep 2021

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Reviews have started trickling in for A Most Malicious Murder, thank you kindly, and one of them asked a question — “Dare we hope for a sequel?”

Part of me is looking at my collection of ongoing romance series patiently waiting for new volumes and whimpering. Part of me is saying, “Well, if there’s interest…”

So here’s the deal. I do have a vague idea of a sequel set in Richmond, VA, and I will write it IF I sell 250 copies of A Most Malicious Murder. I have currently sold 35 copies (which is not bad for the first week, seeing as I’m a newbie in the field). Once the counter ticks over to 250, I’ll get the sequel started. If you enjoyed AMMM and want to see the continuing adventures of Eddy and Charles, leave reviews for the book at your favorite online bookseller, talk it up to your friends, mention it to podcasters who love true crime and historical fiction (thanks, Rachel!) and help me sell the dickens out of this book.

In other publishing news, the proof for the print version of AMMM arrived yesterday. Apart from a goof on the title page it looked great, so I uploaded the corrected version and pulled the trigger. As of this morning it is now available for purchase, so if you prefer print to ebook I’ve got you covered.

And as the weather here in the clavicle of Texas is downright balmy today, I’m about to move my laptop out to the patio and do some more work in the sunshine, tra la.

Phew

08 Wednesday Sep 2021

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In the last two days I’ve received a five star rating and a five star review on A Most Malicious Murder. Let me tell you why that is a massive, MASSIVE relief.

I know I’m a good writer. That’s not arrogance — that’s me being published since 1995, repeatedly selling stories and novels to publishers (I’m indie now as a financial decision, not because I couldn’t get stuff published the traditional way), and getting reviews from complete strangers saying that they love my stuff. Okay, so I’m competent with words.

But AMMM was my first novel under my own name. Moreover, it was in a genre I had never written in before (alternate history mystery). Mystery has its own set of rules and tropes which I had to learn pretty damn quickly while I was editing, and alternate history requires a buttload of research in order to get it right. So with AMMM I was in real weenie-shrinking territory, to paraphrase Bill Murray — I had to hit all the mystery points and I had to get the history right even as I twisted it out of true. And while I thought I’d done a good job with it and my editor assured me that it was a good story and people would enjoy it, I couldn’t be sure until it was out there doing its job with readers.

Now it’s out there, and I’m getting good feedback, which means I can finally release this breath that I’d been holding since August 31st (you would not believe the color my face turned — I went straight past Rampage Raspberry into “Um, poke her and see if she’s still alive” Umber). Which bodes well for future books (right now I’m torn between the time travel novel with Lewis Carroll and Alice Liddell, the novel where an evil Ancient Egyptian queen wreaks havoc on Dallas, or the space opera retelling of Sense and Sensibility).

In the meantime, however, I think I’m going to relax with a refreshing adult beverage. Because I earned it.

Well, this is interesting

04 Saturday Sep 2021

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As many of you know, I’m an old hand at the indie author game. Been doing this since 2015, I have lists of reputable reviewers and promoters, I’m running ads, my chops are good, and I know what to do.

But. A Most Malicious Murder is my first novel under my own name, and as a result I’ve had to do things like find non-romance promo groups on FB, use my own Twitter and IG accounts to promote the book, and do other stuff that my public persona hasn’t done before.

As a result, I’m getting offers. You know the kind — book tour companies asking to promote my book, random strangers on FB wanting to message me about how they can help me promote my book, et al. Luckily I’m an old hand at this so I have my promo game lined up, but if I’d been a newbie with no idea of the jackals waiting outside the door I might have handed over a serious wad of cash in the hopes that my book would be promoted.

And I would have been both 1) disappointed and 2) out a serious wad of cash. For one thing, most pro book promoters/reviewers/et al don’t go looking for customers (I say most because I found BookSirens when they followed me on Twitter. But they didn’t contact me or offer anything, and I did due diligence, researched them, and found them to be a recommended outfit). They’re already swamped with people wanting to hire their services — they don’t need to go after you.

And yes, there are small, hungry promotion companies out there that want to build a good reputation and will bust their butts to promote your book, but they’re few and far between. The bulk of the people who have been contacting me this week are some flavor of scammer who see someone they think is a newbie and are throwing their regular scripts at me in the hope of getting money out of me.

Ho ho ho. Yeah, no. Thanks for playing.

Soon, my Precious. Soon…

30 Monday Aug 2021

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For indie authors, writing and editing the book isn’t the last step. We then have to get a professional cover, get it formatted, and upload it to various sites (Amazon, D2D, Smashwords, et al). All that has now been done.

Now comes the marketing and promotion (yes, they’re different) phase. Marketing means figuring out what market you’re trying to target with your book. In the case of MMM, I’m targeting older SF readers who also like historical fiction and romping mystery yarns, as well as Poe and Carroll fans who may like a mystery starring the authors. You also have to figure out the best way of reaching them (SEO, Amazon ads versus FB ads, book tours, ARCs, release day parties, swag, et al). Promotion is taking all of that information and putting it into action.

I am currently in the marketing phase for MMM. I have Amazon ads ready to go (it’s useless to put them up at the moment because Amazon won’t put up the Look Inside feature that gets readers hooked until your book is actually released). I’m currently taking a class on FB ads so I’ll probably get those up in a week or two. I have ARCs up at BookSirens and BookSprout so that reviewers can read the book and leave reviews, hopefully good ones. I’ve been doing pre-promo on Twitter and FB with ad graphics, and I have eighteen pre-orders.

Tomorrow, the book will be released on Amazon, and B&N/iTunes/Kobo/SM/Google Play soon after. I know some people prefer to stay entirely with Amazon, but I make decent sales on other platforms so I like to use them. My Amazon ads will go live, and I’ll retune my ad graphics for “now available” and start using those on social media. I’m also going to hit various Poe and Carroll websites and see if they’re interested in reading the book and posting a link to it somewhere. Finally, I’m going to start a newsletter so that people can be kept up to date on other releases from me (I have an UF series in mind, plus a space opera).

I must admit, all of this has been made much easier by the fact that I’ve been publishing romance as Nicola M. Cameron since 2015. But there are differences, as well — a lot of SF review sites simply will not look at indie books, and too many places still want physical ARCs. So i have to adjust for that, plus the fact that I can’t use 95% of my usual reviewer list who are romance-only. Still, the bulk of the groundwork has been done, so now I just have to dig in and get to promotin’.

And it’s off

27 Friday Aug 2021

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As of 5:00 PM today the final MS for A Most Malicious Murder was uploaded to Amazon, so the seventeen people who were kind enough to pre-order it will get it delivered to their Kindles at 12:01 AM on August 31st.

I may have squeed just a little bit, I dunno.

And boy, do thanks go out to my editor Theresa Havens and the beta divinities J. Kathleen Cheney and Peter White for going over the manuscript because man, I missed a number of things. Like, oh, the whole “Eureka!” moment that a mystery is supposed to have? You know, the moment where House stops in mid-sentence, looks into the distance, and you know he figured out what’s wrong with the patient? Yeah, that. Also kinda skipped the whole part that explains why Poe didn’t die in 1849.

Luckily I had those bits in my Cut Parts file and was able to slip them back in at appropriate points. But dang, Mel. You know better.

Of course, my job isn’t finished. Oh, the writing/editing part is done, yeah. But now I have to compile the .epub and .mobi versions for Smashwords, the .epub version for Google Play, and the print version. And I have to ride herd on promotion and marketing, which means sending the book to reviewers/Bookstagrammers/BookTokers/influencers for review, crafting Amazon ads, checking out promo deals, and figuring out unexpected places that would be interested in an alt-history mystery starring Poe and Carroll. And I have to create more promo graphics. And make a book trailer. Um.

On the upside, I have complete control over every part of the publishing process, and if I do it right I’ll make way more than I would if I’d submitted it to a traditional publisher. So I’ve got that going for me. It’s just a lot of work.

I also really, really, REALLY need to clean this house because my sister’s coming for a visit at the end of September and … yeah. Kinda let things slide. But it’ll be good to get everything washed, dusted, and properly clean for a change. The J Crew will be pissed that I’m removing their hair from everything, but oh well.