As a writer, I’m crap at marketing and even my own mother wouldn’t listen to me give advice on this topic. As a reader, however, I can give you a nicely specific example of what made me try out a new author this week, which may give you fiction writers looking for marketing tips a few good ideas. Read on.

First, I came across this link to some funny book reviews by YA adult author Sarah Rees Brennan. I happened on this at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, which reviews romance novels, also with a sense of humour. I don’t often read straight romance novels (but I like fantasy books with romantic relationships), but when I do, I want them to be good (as opposed to actually making me sad and angry because the hero is an alpha-male arsehole and the heroine is a freaking doormat and I wish she would just have sex with his twin brother like he keeps accusing her of doing because the twin brother IS MUCH NICER, you silly girl). Therefore, I visit Smart Bitches quite often.

  • Lesson one: doormats should go with the nice guy. Alpha males need slapping down by feisty heroines, not pandering to by doormats. Also, you never know how readers will stumble on your site or otherwise find information about your book. In this case, the association happened to be funny book reviews. Don’t limit what you talk about to only your own work. Talk about anything that interests you.

Second, I read through the author’s archives of book reviews, and discovered that a) the lady is funny, b) she has similar tastes in books and authors to me, and c) characters are of prime importance to her, as with me.

  • Lesson two: the best marketing makes connections with people (not consumers, not even readers in your target demographic, whatever, but people). There is no overt marketing here. The author just wants to entertain and talk about books, not sell you something.

Third, on the assumption that someone who reads what I like to read would also write what I like to read, I clicked on the chapter sample on the side of her main livejournal page. Note that the link is not in your face (in fact, you sort of have to look for it), and there’s not much about the book on that site – that’s saved for the official author website.

Note, also, that I knew literally nothing about the book but the title and that I thought the author had a good sense of humour. The sample chapter was enough for me to add the book to my list (and I rarely read YA these days) – good writing, solid character introductions, and (important for me) funny dialogue; she reads like a modern Diana Wynne Jones, and I love Diana Wynne Jones.

  • Lesson three: you can splurge all the money you like on advertising; you can spend all your time on social networking sites and get lots and lots of traffic to your fancy-pants website. That won’t matter unless your sample chapters are read by people who like your style, and the best way to find them is to be yourself, not a self-marketer.
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