Support Other Authors

   One lesson I've learned over the last eight months that I've been an indie author is how important it is to support other authors.  Whether they are a traditionally published author that has been around for years or an indie author about to publish for the first time, one can learn things to make them a better writer, a better teacher, and an all around better person.  Each book we read and review and each author we connect with molds us into something more well-rounded than we were before.  An author spent months, if not years, to create their baby, their masterpiece, and they deserve to be noticed.  
   When I was nearly finished writing my debut novel, One Petal Flower, another author, Javier Robayo, reached out to me knowing I would need help.  LOTS of help in fact!  He assisted me with: getting my website started, my blog started, editing my manuscript, my book cover design, my blurb, recommending a formatting person, and getting all those sentences into a beautiful paperback.  Thank goodness he found me at just the right time or I would have STILL been lost...that, or I would have had a craptastic book out there for sale!  (Haha!)  Now that I've learned a ton (so it seems!) I'd love to help another upcoming author along.  In the meantime, I've been retweeting, reading/reviewing, and generally trying to help as much as I can.  
   Getting word out about your book is definitely the greatest challenge.  I thought revising was difficult.  Nope, it's getting my book noticed.   I've been swapping books with other authors in hopes of an honest review, offering giveaways on Goodreads,  participating in interviews, tweeting my book's information 3-4 times per day along with retweeting other people's (and then they retweet mine in which I'm very thankful), and occasionally asking book reviews/bloggers to review my book (they are certainly very busy people and I appreciate each one of them!).  
   Genres can be so vastly different: Romance, Historical, Young Adult, Erotic, New Adult, Western, Science Fiction, Horror, Crime, Paranormal, Chick Lit, Middle Grade, Children's, Christian, the list goes on and they even mesh together sometimes.  One genre may speak to the depths of our souls, yet another may bore us to tears, but that doesn't mean we should ignore those genres and only focus on our own.  If we don't particularly like a certain genre we can still help out by finding a person who does. 
   I don't want to look desperate for anyone to read my book.  I want them to WANT to read and enjoy it.  I write to entertain.  I want them to read it because young adult/paranormal happens to be their favorite genre.  The challenging part is finding the readers.  Books need to be seen/talked about, and that's difficult for an indie author to accomplish.  You are a needle in a haystack.  How do most people find books they want to read?  I personally use my Kindle to scroll through books and read reviews on Goodreads.  I have bought a book or two just from a tweet or a Facebook post. 
   Personally, I like to have 10-20 books in my TBR pile because I know I'll have many hours of relaxation/enjoyment ahead of me.   And might I note that in my TBR pile I have quite a few indie authors and I'm just as excited to read their books as I am for the more popular titles that are out now.  It would be wonderful if my book, One Petal Flower, was in someone's TBR pile because they found it on their own accord and it sounded interesting to them. 
   I hope we all can lend a hand to other authors out there and not stay on that narrow, blinded road that screams "Look at me, me, me!" and instead take the road that says "Look at all these wonderfully talented writers!"

<3,
Kristi