Day 8--First Amazon sale, Lulu Book Review, and the Today show

We have reason to celebrate, folks of America--I've made my first Amazon sale! *throws confetti everywhere and performs the ever-popular Irish jig*

Now that I've made the jig come back in style, I'm going to get down to the actual post. If you go to my book, you can clearly see that where once there was no sales rank that now it is in the 300ks. This isn't a great sales rank, but it's a sales rank and I've sold a book, and that's good enough for me.

Coming up in the near future--a review from the allegedly famed Lulu Book Review. This will be yet another great review on my review page of (currently) only 2 reviews. THAT will change soon, as my teen librarian has just reported that she read the book and couldn't put it down, and yes she would be happy to write up an Amazon review. I have a record so far of no reviews less than four stars. Let's hope it stays that way, because that would be a landmark for success. If I get up to thirty reviews and never have less than 3 stars, I will be satisfied.

And the Today show! No, I haven't booked it yet, but they are one of my top priorities. You will be seeing this face very soon on your morning television. *points at his own face then wonders why he keeps doing asterisk commentary*

A pitch letter and press release, plus a Q+A sheet and a free signed copy of the novel are in order for them. Hint: if I get booked on this show, I will be GOLDEN.

Anyway, 98 sales. Will you be the 99th?

That's all from Dawson. Remember, reVamped is coming next week. Don't miss it. *notes that it would probably not be hard if you are following this blog because it will be featured first thing that I get the vid up*

Dawson

Tag Double Life!

Hey, folks--here's a quick update. I have read a blog about getting your book noticed on Amazon and have seen the value of getting my book in the top ranks of being tagged in "Science Fiction" on Amazon. I would like for every one of you to go over to my book's page and tag it as science fiction.

That's all for now!

Hoping for over 700 tags,

Dawson

Day 7--Fancypants reVamped, Rise of the Amazon Sales Rank

Hey, there! Here's a first announcement of what is to come from my Fancypants813 YouTube channel (which you can see at the top of this blog). I am going to be starting something I call Fancypants reVamped.

What does this mean for your weekend? Details ahead.

What Fancypants reVamped is going to do? Well, you can already see by going to the Fancypants channel that I've made a channel look overhaul. And coming up next is an actual Fancypants logo, which I am excited to unveil. On top of all of this, we're going to be making an announcement video which will probably be funnier than all my current Dragon Talk videos combined.

Speaking of Dragon Talk, new episodes will be coming from eager questioners, resulting in 6 brand new Dragon Talk episodes! That's right, we're going to drive the episode number up from 9 to 15 in a matter of a couple weeks. Also, we'll be unveiling a new comedy show, which YOU, as the public, will be able to vote on a name for.

I've said too much already.

And coming up next is the "rise of the Amazon Sales Rank," obviously parodying "Rise of the Silver Surfer," the ugly sequel to an ugly first movie. But I digress. I am definitely going to be upping my Amazon sales rank because of the upcoming promotional campaign I am working on, which involves a media mailing campaign, bookmark giveaways, TV and radio campaigns, booksignings, and a Website that will feature this blog as a main part of it.

So, that's coming up in the near future. Be expecting more great things to come from this person in the future. I will continue to please all of you with my literature, videos, and this very blog.

G'day to ya then.

Dawson

Blog Day 6--2/23/09. Current sales: 97

Hey, all. It's me here again. So, my Amazon profile got over 100 hits last month.

Yep. I really don't have much to talk about.

So, follow my Twitter and keep reading this blog. I'll post again when updates come about.

Dawson

Blog Day 5--2/22/09. Current sales: 97

Okay, scratch everything I said about buying my book just from Amazon. I have something WAY more important than that, so PLEASE buy my book from Lulu during the month of March. If you have the sudden urge to buy it in February and can't wait til March to pick it up, please head on over to Amazon, but this is EXTREMELY important.

Lulu.com, the printer of my book, is running a contest through the month of March to see what three salespeople of books can sell the MOST copies of their book, directly from Lulu, in a single month. These copies cannot be purchased by the author of the books, so no cheating allowed. they also can't be bought outside of Lulu. That means that NO BUYING off of Amazon during the month of March.

I know, I know: you wanted to take part in Amazon's free Super Saver Shipping when you coupled your purchase of my book with another, but this can wait. The contest prizes are $1,500 for 1st prize, $750 for 2nd, and $500 for 3rd. Also, the 1st prize winner will recieve promotion in an email sent to ALL Lulu members, as well as an interview on the Lulu blog. This is a HUGE opportunity for my book. The money will be used to further my efforts with the book.

Now, on with the task at hand. I have expanded my list of people I want on the authors' retreat. The list is now:

- Christopher Paolini
- Eoin Colfer
- Jeremy Robinson
- Sara Gruen
- Jeff Kinney
- JK Rowling
- Chris Baty

These are all some great authors--you should read their stuff! Chris hasn't published any novels that I am aware of, but he HAS written 10 novels, I can tell you that. He's the founder of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, which is the contest in which Double Life was written.

Also, I have made a big decision. I have dreamed from the get-go of Double Life becoming a movie, but I have made a decision: I want no one else but my cover designer Phil Dragash and I to be the head honchos--or at least intimately involved--in this project. I certainly will not allow any other Hollywood writer to be writing a screenplay for Double Life when I am perfectly capable of doing so myself.

Why have I made this decision? Because I want to protect the story. I want people to be able to watch the movie and say "Wow, I want to read the book!" Or if they are fans, I want them to say, "Wow! That was so much like the book!"

My pet peeve is that Hollywood ruins books when they adapt them into movies. They don't realize that the main audience of this film will be fans of the book who just want to see the movie put to the screen so they can SEE the characters and SEE the action in movie format, which generally gives them excitement and it makes the book come to life. Unfortunately, most book-to-movie adaptions don't give this, with the one exception (that I have found) of Lord of the Rings. Excellent book-to-movie. Instead, with films like Eragon, we get artsy fartsy adaptions that say, "No, we need to chop that necessary character and add some 'comic relief' (or some other equally two-dimensional character.)" This is not what I want for my book.

THAT is why I want to be deeeeeply involved in any movie version of my book that may come about, because it's movies like Eragon that while I discovered the book through the movie, I grew to hate Hollywood adaptions even more.

So, that was a great post. I liked writing it. That's about all I have for you today. hope to talk to you soon.

Dawson

Blog Day 4--2/21/09. Current sales: 96

Okay, so I skipped a couple of days of writing in the blog. There are some good reasons for this. Number 1, I was writing up my marketing plan, and number 2, I called in sick for school on Friday. I think you can accept my apologies, so let's move on.

Amazon sales still are flat--0 people have actually BOUGHT the book on amazon. Plenty of people have SEEN the book on amazon--it shows the book at #5 on the searches (much better than the #18 that it used to be), but still the sales are slow. If you want to buy my book, either buy it direct from me if you want a signed copy and live in the local area (if you don't, email me at dawson@vosburgs.org and we can work something out) or buy it off of Amazon. Until I get a few amazon sales, Lulu sales are restricted.

Well, not really--it's just I wish that you would buy it off of Amazon instead. ;)

Anyway, I've been mulling over the idea of a writers' retreat either this summer or some other time of break when I have money. My invites are as follows:

- Christopher Paolini
- Jeff Kinney
- Jeremy Robinson
- Eoin Colfer

Pretty short list right now, but I'm guessing it would be a lot of fun, going to some remote and beautiful place with computers and typing our brains out. That would be fun. If you hadn't noticed, these are my favorite authors. Well, the ones that are still alive, that is. Tolkien, CS Lewis, and Charles Dickens certainly cannot attend.

That's still in the ideas stage, though. Just a thought of something I would like to do.

Now, I will rant about something that has nothing to do with books: the Pepsi logo redesign. In case you haven't seen a vending machine recently, this is what it looks like.


























My question is: WHY??? Let's start off with my basic and biggest complaint.

They changed the freaking Pepsi globe.

Yep. They made the one of the most recognizable logos in the world into something that looks like a cheap Aldi grocery store brand. Apparently, that white crap is supposed to be a smile. WhatEVER. That wasn't what the logo was supposed to look like in the first place. It looks more like a Barack Obama advertisement.

Hey, that'd be kinda funny--put an Obama O on the Pepsi can.

Also, the stupid lowercase font. Everyone's trying to have the "thinnest font around." It looks like they took a good, solid-looking sans serif font and sliced everything off until it was this ugly creature that I would leave by the side of the road in a heartbeat.

Sierra Mist is unforgivable. It looks like that Walmart Mountain Dew knockoff called Rocky Mist. Seriously, go check it out. They look very similar. Besides the stupid font and stupid gaussian blur on the "Mist" part. That's what REALLY makes it look off-brand.

Then there's my least favorite: the Mountain Dew.













































This is just irredeemable. Mtn Dew? What the heck? Whose idea was this? No. No. You're trying to keep up with a trend that died out years ago. Taking vowels out of words does NOT make them cooler. No.

Also, the logo really turns off the demographic. This kind of logo--especially the background--does not attract young people. It attracts its old main audience: hillbillies.

Okay, I've said enough. I'll be posting more when updates come along. Or tommorrow, whichever comes first.

Dawson

Blog Day 3--2/18/09. Current sales: 94

So, I'm going to try to write in this blog daily to keep everyone updated on my book, writing, etc, etc. No real updates on what I discussed tomorrow, but a few more enjoyable and less technical goodies that I hope you will enjoy.

First of all, I am about 11k words into the sequel to Double Life. Yes, I have the title, and yes, I have the cover already made. No comment on what they are, but I can tell you: the cover once again looks fantastic. Phil's work is tremendous and I am glad to have him as a friend working in the business with. Trying to recreate the look of his work is impossible--trust me, I've tried. Don't.

Anyway, the sequel is going very well story-wise, and I've snuggled in some gems to answer some questions left hanging by the sort of drop-off ending that stopped the story in its tracks when you finished the first book. ;) Some character threads advance, and you learn a lot more about the characters you thought you knew. Also--well, I shouldn't say anything about THAT. Want to keep some surprises for you in the second book.

Anyway, as soon as this book is edited and ready to roll, we are going to do a pre-order campaign again. That's right. Another pre-order campaign. The first one--eh, sort of successful. I sold 17 copies on pre-order. But we're going to beat that this year, aren't we? This year, I am aiming for 500 pre-orders, at least 200. This will be easy (or easier than Double Life's campaign), as I will have a group of eager readers waiting for the sequel who would love to have it on pre-order.

Why do I need to have at least 200? Because I'm going to make them look--er, special. That's right. Matte, non-glossy covers with embossing. Yeah. It's going to be awesome. So if you want to feel the letters as you run your hand across the cover, please pre-order. I will announce it on this blog and on the forthcoming Dawson Vosburg website. It isn't done yet--in fact, I've hardly even begun yet ( I've only done the "index" page and have yet to enable the cool interactive features I want). But it'll be here soon, soon enough for the pre-orders.

I plan to have a midnight release for either the second or the third book. I really love midnight releases--watching the one for Brisingr on Youtube was a tantalizing experience. I really can't wait!

Well, that's all I have for now. Talk atcha later.

Dawson

Blog Day 2--2/17/09. Current Sales: 94

Things have been relatively slow lately, but are hopefully going to start picking up when I reach the 100-sale mark. My book hit Amazon a couple weeks ago, and I quickly submitted a PDF for the Search Inside feature. So now, if you want, you can go over to Amazon and read (part) of the first chapter of my book. I need some sales, as I have made 0 of them on the Amazon page, so I'd like to see SOME kind of sales rank.

(Note: If you want to buy it on Lulu because it's cheaper, the postage will even it out. It's worth the extra 4 bucks, and if you order my book with another item you can get the Super Saver shipping.)

I have recieved my bookmarks from Overnightprints.com, which is a good printing website--I got 100 marks for about a quarter apiece.

I've been talking to a friend of mine about a signing at a Waldenbooks signing--as in the Waldenbooks in the Mounds Mall (a fairly tiny and run down mall in Anderson.) I am excited for more booksignings and events to be going on, starting at the small bookstores and then moving onto the big guns, like Indianapolis and Chicago stores. THAT would be something worth working toward.

I might be getting stocked in the Noblesville, Indiana Borders store--the one in the new Hamilton Town Center Mall. You know the one. The HUGE Borders store. It might make a spot in the local section, and that's just a stone's throw away from getting a signing booked. ESPECIALLY after getting a signing at Waldenbooks. Takin' it one step at a time.

In news about Cougar Press--we're looking at office space in the Union Building in Anderson. $7/square foot on the fourth floor--not sure if that's buying or renting. I hope it's buying. 7 bucks a square foot every month doesn't sound too good to me. We're still accepting manuscripts, so send 'em on over! I'd especially like to see submissions to D Productions. That'd be a really good thing.

So, in other words--things are going well after being slow for a while. I'll keep you updated if any updates come my way. Remember, I'm always working on my writing, always working on marketing, always reading.

Oooh! One more thing. I've been formulating a plan to host a writer's retreat this summer. Just a vague idea right now, but I'd like to invite some of my favorite authors--Christopher Paolini, Jeff Kinney, Jeremy Robinson, ladadadada...still just an idea, though. I'll keep you posted if it ever happens to come about.

Catch ya later. I'll keep you posted.

Dawson