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Whether you’re basking in the sun, relaxing in a hammock, or jet-setting to a faraway destination, summer is the perfect time to immerse yourself in a great book. From thrilling page-turners and poignant memoirs to literary fiction and uplifting rom-coms, this list offers something for every kind of reader. Here are the Top 10 Books to Read This Summer (2025 Edition) which are guaranteed to entertain, inspire, and transport you.  1. The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley (2024) Genre: Sci-Fi, Historical Fiction This clever debut blends speculative fiction with historical intrigue. Set in a near-future London, it follows a government translator assigned to a mysterious time-travel experiment involving historical figures plucked from the past. With romance, wit, and biting commentary on power and colonization, The Ministry of Time is smart, sharply written, and compulsively readable. Perfect for: Fans of The Time Traveller's Wife and The Midnight Library.  2. Funny Story by Emily Henry (2024) Genre: Romantic Comedy Summer wouldn’t be complete without an Emily Henry novel. In Funny Story, a children's librarian and her ex-fiancé’s new girlfriend’s ex find themselves unlikely roommates after their mutual heartbreak. Naturally, things get complicated in hilarious and heartfelt ways. Henry’s signature blend of emotional depth and breezy humour makes this the quintessential summer rom-com. Perfect for: A beach read that’s equal parts light-hearted and emotionally satisfying.  3. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride (2023) Genre: Historical Fiction Now in paperback and picking up accolades, McBride’s novel is a moving, multi-character epic set in a 1920s Pennsylvania town. When a skeleton is found decades later, it sets off a story that uncovers community secrets and deep bonds of love and loyalty. It’s warm, wise, and beautifully written. Perfect for: Those who loved The Colour Purple or The Secret Life of Bees.  4. All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby (2023) Genre: Crime Thriller One of the most gripping crime novels in recent years, Cosby’s Southern noir features a Black sheriff navigating a chilling series of murders in a small Virginia town. Gritty, urgent, and socially astute, it’s a crime novel with real literary power. Perfect for: True crime junkies and thriller lovers looking for depth.  5. Real Americans by Rachel Khong (2024) Genre: Family Saga, Literary Fiction Spanning three generations and alternating between perspectives, this poignant novel explores identity, immigration, and genetic engineering. With lyrical prose and a sweeping yet intimate story, Real Americans is a meditation on what it means to belong—in a family and in a country. Perfect for: Book club discussions and literary fiction enthusiasts.  6. The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo (2024) Genre: Historical Fantasy Set in 16th-century Spain during the Inquisition, this dark, magical tale features a young woman accused of witchcraft and the powerful force she discovers within herself. Bardugo’s rich storytelling and lush historical detail make The Familiar a mesmerizing summer escape. Perfect for: Fans of The Night Circus and A Discovery of Witches.  7. Long Island by Colm Tóibín (2024) Genre: Literary Fiction A follow-up to Brooklyn, this novel catches up with Eilis decades later, now living in Long Island, New York. When a figure from her past reappears, she’s forced to confront old choices and the life she’s built. Tóibín’s understated prose and emotional complexity make this a slow-burning but profoundly affecting read. Perfect for: Lovers of character-driven narratives and slow, introspective storytelling.  8. The Rachel Incident by Caroline O’Donoghue (2024) Genre: Contemporary Fiction / Friendship Set in Ireland, this nostalgic, funny, and sharp novel tells the story of Rachel and her best friend James as they navigate life, love, and literary dreams in their early twenties. It’s both laugh-out-loud and quietly heart-breaking. Perfect for: Fans of Sally Rooney or anyone who’s lived through a chaotic twenties-era friendship.  9. Fire Exit by Morgan Talty (2024) Genre: Literary Fiction / Indigenous Voices Following his acclaimed debut Night of the Living Rez, Talty returns with a deeply emotional novel about a man reckoning with fatherhood, identity, and the secrets of the past in a Penobscot community. Perfect for: Readers looking for intimate, powerful Indigenous storytelling.  10. Operation Absolom by Robert Cubitt Genre: World War II Action Book 1 of the Carter’s Commandos series, this sees the hero of the series, Steven Carter, volunteering for the Army commandos of World War II. Searching for adventure, carter gets more than he bargains for when Operation Absolom leaves him cut off behind enemy lines during the Norwegian winter. Can he survive? Can he escape and make his way back to Blighty? Perfect for: Lovers of historical military fiction with a compelling hero. We hope you find soemthing in that list to tickle your reading taste buds and we wish you happy holiday reading.
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 In today’s digital-first world, social media has transformed from a place to catch up with friends to a powerful tool for professionals - including authors. Whether you’re self-published, traditionally published, or somewhere in between, using social media for book marketing can significantly increase your visibility, build your author brand, and drive sales. But to succeed, you need more than just a presence - you need a plan. In this guide, we’ll break down how authors can effectively use social media to promote their books, connect with readers, and grow a lasting platform.  Why Social Media Matters for Authors Before diving into the "how," it’s important to understand the "why." Social media gives authors:
 Choosing the Right Platforms Not all social media platforms are created equal - each serves a different audience and content type. Here’s a quick breakdown: 1. Instagram
2. TikTok (BookTok)
3. Twitter (X)
4. Facebook
5. YouTube
 Creating Content That Resonates Content is the core of your social media marketing. But what should you post? The key is to diversify while staying authentic and consistent. Types of Content for Book Marketing
 Building a Community, Not Just an Audience One of the biggest mistakes authors make on social media is focusing solely on promotion. Social media is a two-way street. If you want followers to care about your book, you need to care about them first. How to Build Relationships
Timing & Consistency Matter You don’t need to post every day, but you do need a schedule. Create a content calendar to help plan posts in advance, especially in the months leading up to your book launch. Content Planning Tips:
Leveraging Paid Ads & Influencer Partnerships Once you’ve established your organic presence, consider investing in paid promotions to expand your reach. Facebook & Instagram Ads
Book Influencers & Reviewers
 Tracking What Works
Use platform insights and link tracking to understand what content performs best. What to Track:
Use what you learn to refine your strategy over time. Final Thoughts Social media can be overwhelming, but when used strategically, it’s one of the most powerful tools available to authors today. Focus on building a connection with your audience, being consistent, and providing value - not just selling. Over time, you’ll not only grow your readership, but create a loyal fanbase that’s excited for everything you write. Remember: Readers don’t just buy books. They buy into authors. So be yourself. Be present. And most importantly, tell your story - on the page and beyond it If you have enjoyed this blog or found it informative, make sure you don’t miss future instalments by signing up to our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook if you do.  Writer’s block - the frustrating moment when words dry up and creativity takes a nosedive. It can strike anyone, from novelists to bloggers, students to screenwriters. If you’ve ever sat in front of a blank page, paralysed by self-doubt or unable to translate thoughts into words, you’re not alone. But here’s the good news: writer’s block isn’t a life sentence. With the right strategies, you can overcome it and rediscover your writing flow. In this article, we’ll explore the root causes of writer’s block and offer practical, proven solutions to help you break through the barriers holding you back.  What is Writer’s Block, Really? Writer’s block isn’t just “being lazy” or lacking talent. It’s a psychological and emotional barrier that prevents a writer from progressing. Common causes include:
Understanding that writer’s block often stems from internal pressures rather than external ones is the first step toward overcoming it.  1. Set Lower Expectations—Then Exceed Them One of the quickest ways to short-circuit writer’s block is to give yourself permission to write poorly. Write garbage. Write nonsense. Just write. When you remove the pressure to be brilliant on the first try, you free up mental space for creativity. You can always revise later—after all, writing is a process. The first draft doesn’t have to be good; it just has to exist. Tip: Try "freewriting" - set a timer for 10–15 minutes and write whatever comes to mind without stopping, editing, or judging.  2. Change Your Environment Sometimes, a change of scenery is all it takes to shift your mindset. If you normally write at a desk, try a coffee shop, a park, or even a different room. Physical movement and new sensory input can help spark new ideas. Tip: Experiment with writing at different times of the day. Your creative peak might be early morning or late at night - you won’t know until you try. 3. Write Something Else Entirely If you're stuck on a particular project, take a break from it and write something completely unrelated. A journal entry, a letter to a friend, a poem, or even a grocery list - just get your fingers moving and your brain engaged in the act of writing. Often, switching gears can reignite your passion and loosen the mental knots blocking your main project.  4. Set Small, Achievable Goals Big goals like “Write a novel” can be paralysing. Break your task into smaller, more manageable steps:
- Edit one paragraph These micro-goals add up and build momentum. Completing them gives you a sense of progress, which in turn builds confidence. Tip: Use tools like the Pomodoro Technique—25 minutes of focused writing followed by a 5-minute break - to stay productive without burning out.  5. Talk It Out
Verbalising your ideas can clarify what you’re trying to write. Explain your story or article concept to a friend or even speak it aloud to yourself. Hearing your own words helps organise your thoughts and can reveal connections or ideas you hadn’t noticed. 6. You are not alone Seek support from other writers – they know what you are going through. Ideally join a real-life writing group, but if that isn’t possible, join an on-line group and ask for help in getting out of your slump. It is surprising how getting a new perspective on the problem can help. But, above all, never lose sight on the one essential. You are a writer. You may not be able to write at this instant, but you are a writer. To quote the words of ancient Persian origin, but later used by Abraham Lincoln, “This too shall pass”. If you have enjoyed this blog or found it informative, make sure you don’t miss future instalments by signing up to our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook if you do. We are please welcome guest blogger Justin Wigg to our blog page this week. Justin is the creator of Business Hub City, a website dedicated to helping entrepreneurs of all levels. He created the website with one goal in mind: to make it easy for business owners to find the resources they need, when they need them. Justin has been an entrepreneur since he was 24 years old, and knows first-hand how difficult it can be to find quality information online. That’s why he made Business Hub City completely free and user-friendly!"  The line between what you love and what you live off of is thinner than you think. People do it every day—turn an afternoon passion into a full-blown enterprise. But what doesn’t get talked about nearly enough is how uneven, humbling, and downright exhausting that transformation can be. Turning your writing into a business is not just about scaling your skills—it’s about scaling yourself. And to do that, you’ll need to think differently, act deliberately, and accept that joy and stress often sit side by side. Forget the Fantasy of “Doing What You Love” All Day You might start off believing that monetizing your writing will mean endless joy, uninterrupted creativity, and the simple pleasure of getting paid to do what you enjoy. But that belief cracks fast. When your writing becomes your business, it stops being entirely yours. You now have deadlines, readers, expectations. The slow ritual of creating for pleasure gets replaced by a calendar, word count, and sometimes, a creeping sense of burnout. You have to be honest about how much of your love you’re willing to share—and possibly taint—with commerce.  Sharpen Your Acumen Going back to school for a business degree can be a game-changer when you’re ready to move from side hustle to sustainable venture. Programs like those offered by the University of Phoenix, The Open University and even short course offered by FutureLearn are designed to help you stand out while you continue building the brand you believe in. Whether you choose to study marketing, business, communications, or management, the knowledge you gain can sharpen your instincts and provide the kind of strategic edge that helps your business thrive. With the rise of flexible online degree programs, it’s easier than ever to balance coursework with running your day-to-day operations. Put Your Talents To Work Launching a business as a writer begins with realizing that your words aren’t just art—they’re assets. Whether you're crafting blog content, ghost-writing books, or developing brand copy, there’s a real demand for sharp, adaptable voices across industries. Success hinges on treating your writing like a service: knowing your audience, setting clear rates, building a portfolio, and pitching with purpose. When you approach your craft with the same professionalism you'd expect from any other business, you stop chasing word count and start attracting readers who value what only you can deliver.  Time Is a Currency You’ll Need to Budget Ruthlessly Turning writing into a business consumes time in ways that are rarely glamorous. Your evenings shift from quiet creativity to spreadsheets, social media scheduling, responding to reader’s emails, and figuring out taxes. You don’t just need more hours in the day—you need to get brutal about how you spend them. What tasks can be automated? What roles should be outsourced, even on a shoestring budget? If you’re not structured, your time becomes fragmented, and your creative output suffers. The Market Doesn’t Care What You Love—But You Should Still Lead With It One of the hardest pills to swallow is that what you care about might not resonate with readers. The market is indifferent to your nostalgia, your process, or your artistic flourishes. It cares about drama, style, and perceived value. But that doesn’t mean you should sell out. The challenge is finding the overlap between what you love and what the market values. That sweet spot—where passion meets demand—is where businesses thrive. And sometimes, you don’t find it right away. You have to iterate, test, and listen to more feedback than you’d prefer.  You’ll Need to Learn the Language of Money
Running a business isn’t just about bringing in money—it’s about managing it. Taxes, business structures, inventory costs, revenue forecasting, and paying yourself a salary aren’t things you can ignore until tax season. You’ll need to get comfortable talking about money—what things cost, what they’re worth, and what you need to stay afloat. If that doesn’t come naturally, find someone who can help, or take the time to educate yourself. Because without financial literacy, your business will always be on shaky ground, no matter how good your product is. Not Everyone Will Support You—and That’s Fine There’s a peculiar kind of loneliness that comes with striking out on your own. People around you might not get it. They might think you’re making a mistake by quitting your job, or they might silently root for your failure because your risk makes them uncomfortable. Don’t expect cheerleaders in every room. Instead, find a network—online or local—of others doing similar work. Community matters. Not just for encouragement, but for advice, collaboration, and accountability. If you’re looking for easy, this isn’t it. Turning your writing into a business will test your patience, your discipline, and your identity. But if you’re willing to evolve—both your craft and your mindset—you’ll find a kind of fulfilment that transcends either category alone. Discover captivating stories and meet our talented authors at Selfishgenie Publishing – your gateway to a world of literary adventure! If you have enjoyed this blog, or found it informative, then make sure you don’t miss future editions. Just click on the button below to sign up for our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook for doing so.  Understanding a protagonist’s motivation is one of the critical factors in creating interesting characters for stories. In fact, we will go further than that and say that authors should be doing the same for antagonists as well. But in order to do that we also need to understand how and why motivation works in general otherwise we can’t attribute the right motivators for the correct reasons. For example, if our story involves a love triangle, what might motivate one of the characters to abandon their love in order to make the object of their love happy? In a selfish world like ours that makes no sense. But it is a well-used trope in romance. Which is what this week’s blog is about. It’s a whistle stop tour of motivational theory and what it can do for you as an author.  The first thing to understand is that there is a significant difference between motivation and incentive. The big difference between the two is that an incentive can never be enough for a person to place themselves in jeopardy. After all, there’s no point in being paid £1 million (an incentive) if you are going to end up dead and can’t spend it. But a person may take a dangerous, high paying job if it is the only way to provide security for the ones they love. Love is a motivation, money is an incentive. To put it another way, motivation drives us, but incentives can only attract us. In fiction we are always looking for what drives the character. The lure of wealth may be an incentive for a criminal, but it carries the risk of imprisonment. So, what motivates criminals to take that risk? Understanding that motivation makes the criminal far more interesting than just the lure of wealth, which is a shallow incentive.  Psychologist Abraham Maslow Theories of motivation are generally grouped under one of two headings: content and process. Content theories focus on what things provide motivation and process theories focus on how motivation occurs. To add depth to a character it isn’t enough to know what motivates them (content) it is also important to know why (process). The two together provide layers of complexity and that makes characters more interesting. Abraham Maslow is the grandaddy of content theory. He theorised that in order to function at a higher level, you first require certain needs to be satisfied. In other words, you can’t create great art if you are starving to death. So, you have to have your hunger satisfied before you can achieve your goal to become an artist. This became known as a “hierarchy of needs”. You may, at this point, be tempted to mention the name of Vincent Van Gogh, who only sold one of his paintings during his lifetime. But he wasn’t actually poor. He had a very well paid job selling art in his brother’s Paris gallery before he left to pursue his own artistic career. He wasn’t penniless at the start of his career – though he may have been by the end.  Maslow's Hierarchy Of Needs In practice this means that we are first motivated by a need to survive, but if that is secure we can then move on to be motivated by something at a higher level. In fiction this means that if a character is trapped inside a burning building, they aren’t going to be interested in catching the person that struck the match. Only after they have escaped the inferno will they think about that. A vagrant living on the street wouldn’t be motivated enough to help a damsel in distress, because their priority would be their own survival. But they can be incentivised to help the damsel because the incentive (usually money) secures their basic needs. However, if it looks like they may die in the attempt, the incentive would no longer be enough. They would need some other motive, such as love for the damsel. While good Samaritans may exist, they don’t place themselves in danger. They need motivation for that to happen. As can be seen from that example, content-based motivation is a tricky business and if you don’t understand those sorts of basics, your readers won’t believe in your characters.  But what content theory also makes clear is that what motivates us isn’t constant. Our motivation can change in response to circumstances. For example, we may be highly motivated to succeed in our careers, working long hours and totally immersing ourselves in our jobs. Then one day we meet the girl (or boy) of our dreams and suddenly our career isn’t the most important thing in our lives anymore. Winning the heart of the object of our desire is now what is uppermost in our minds, to the extent that we may throw away our career in order to be with that person. That, of course, runs contrary to Maslow’s theory, because if we lose our job we also lose our security. So, it appears that some motivators are more powerful than others, at least for some of the time. Achievement and competition are theories of content motivation studied by David Mclelland. Today this is often portrayed in fiction as a negative thing; highly motivated achievers or competitors are often depicted as criminals or cheats, driven by their desire to win at all costs. Which is odd, because the sports stars we admire the most are highly motivated by competition and achievement. Not only do they compete in their sporting arena, they also compete off the field by gaining more public acclaim. In modern fiction, the highly motivated competitor that you admire so much would be portrayed as a cheat, because that is the trope that fiction writers use. Competitiveness = negative character traits.  Psychologist B F Skinner Is competition and high achievement a bad thing? That is for you to decide, but I know of one author who uses competition as a motivator for the success of his heroic characters. When it comes to process theories, there is one that is usable in fiction. It is “reinforcement” theory, developed by B F Skinner. This is based on positive outcomes of certain types of behaviour. In fact, this can be traced back even further, to Pavlov and his dogs, but Skinner is better known for his study of humans. If you can imagine a misbehaving child being given a biscuit (cookie) in exchange for better behaviour, it will soon learn that if it misbehaves biscuits (or cookies) will be forthcoming, so that the reward becomes the motivator for bad behaviour. Extending that theory into adulthood, if a character believes that rewards come from bad behaviour they will continue to behave badly – which is great motivation for criminal characters. The opposite applies as well, of course. If good behaviour results in good outcomes, then a character is motivated towards good behaviour. It may also surprise them when their good behaviour results in a bad outcome, eg their loyalty being betrayed. That could be enough for a previously good person to start behaving badly.  Because when we add emotions to motivation, we start to get a powerful mix. I have already mentioned the power of love to derail a career, but there are plenty of other emotions that can drive motivation: fear, jealousy, hatred, greed, disappointment, pleasure, etc. The most challenging question it is ever possible for an author to ask is what makes one man brave and another a coward. This is especially so in stories that involve death but can also be played out in terms of moral behaviour. Nature has given us three responses to danger: fight, flight or freeze. What makes one person choose to fight, another choose to flee and another to do neither (freeze)? Fear is a natural response to danger, so all three responses should be regarded as equal, because nature gave us the choice even if we don’t make it consciously.  But our high regard for bravery and our contempt for cowardice shows that we don’t regard all three responses as being equal. Very often the individuals who take the actions can’t answer our question. Ask most decorated war heroes why they did what they did, and they are unable to answer, or they fall back on cliches like “duty”. But duty only takes us so far. A soldier standing firm in the line of battle is doing his duty. A soldier that charges an enemy position in order to save a comrade is going far beyond that. It happens in real life, but quite rarely which is why medals such as the Victoria Cross and the Congressional Medal of Honour exist to recognise such actions. But in fiction it is the norm for the protagonist to exhibit that level of bravery.  However, the brave person isn’t unafraid. The brave person is one that overcomes their fear. But what motivation is so powerful that it able to make people face down their fear and do incredibly dangerous things rather than running away?
So, what can we give them, in emotional terms, so that they do that? And, more importantly, how can we create a backstory that shows how they developed that quality, based on what we know about motivation? This is where Skinner’s theory becomes important. If, during their developmental years, the character is rewarded for having beliefs and values that we admire, but isn’t rewarded for having beliefs that we detest, the qualities for which they were rewarded will become the motivators. They will also become the barriers when those qualities are undermined. The flawed protagonist is one whose beliefs and values are called into doubt by events, which cause them to question their beliefs and results in an internal conflicts. There is far more to motivation than I have had time to cover in this blog. I recommend further research. How much of that you include in a story is up to you, but layered characters with strong motivations are always going to be of more interest to readers than shallow characters who only respond to incentives. If you have enjoyed this blog, or found it informative, then make sure you don’t miss future editions. Just click on the button below to sign up for our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook for doing so.  This week I want to address an issue about audiences for books and what we really mean by that word. First of all, a little story to provide context. On Facebook, someone posted an idea recently that they were considering. They write true crime stories and were thinking of engaging with a YouTube creator who makes videos about true crime, thinking that a review or endorsement would help their book sales. The YouTuber has a large following, so, on the surface, it looks like a winning idea. Several responses came back saying it was a good idea, because both the author and the YouTube creator were targeting the same audience. I disagreed with that view at a fundamental level. I believe they were targeting totally different audiences. Yes, both audiences are interested in true crime, but that doesn’t make them the same audience.  YouTube is a video medium. It targets people who like to watch videos. To use the marketing term, that’s the way they “consume” their entertainment. True crime authors, however, are targeting their work at people who consume their entertainment in written form, primarily books. Looking at a Venn diagram of the two audiences, there is an overlap where people who like true crime will consume their entertainment in both video and written form. However, it is the size of that overlap that determines whether or not it is worth spending money on the idea, because the YouTuber will probably want to be paid for their endorsement. Readers often seek in depth knowledge, enjoy imaginative story telling and have a keen interest in diverse genres. YouTube viewers prefer visual content, quick tutorials and enjoy entertainment videos.  It is important to remember that just because people like the same genre, they won’t also use the same medium to consume it. Let me take you away from books for a moment to illustrate my point. Everyone has to eat but we don’t all consume food in the same places. Some people like take-out food. Some like going to fast food outlets. Some like to cook at home and some like to eat in a restaurant with waiter service. Despite all of them eating food, in marketing terms each of those groups (and there may be others) are all different audiences. Marketing companies spend a huge amount of time and money to make sure that their advertising is seen by the right audience. They consider TV, radio, newspapers, magazines, internet sites and a whole range of other ways of advertising to decide which is going to be best for them. For example, you won’t see adverts for McDonalds in the pages of The Times – but you will in the Sun. That’s because Sun readers are more likely to eat in McDonalds and Times readers are more likely to eat in regular restaurants. They all eat food, they may even all eat burgers, but they are not the same audience. And yes, we know that some McDonalds customers will sometimes eat in restaurants and some restaurant customers will sometimes go to McDonalds - but they are the overlap in the Ven diagram - a small proportion of each audience.  That is why Amazon advertising is so effective compared to other advertising channels.
Readers go onto Amazon to find books. They may not buy them there, they may buy them in bookstores or through other websites, but they use Amazon for “product research”. So, if you advertise on Amazon, your ad will be seen by people who read books and you don’t have to worry about whether or not they also watch YouTube videos.. The audience for books, regardless of genre, is always the people who read books. Any other type of entertainment consumption is just a distraction and trying to use it for marketing is likely to cost you more than it earns you. It is why none of the book marketing gurus recommend advertising on YouTube. If it was an effective channel for selling books, they would be all over it. And if it isn’t good for selling books, then there is no point in paying a YouTuber to endorse your book – no matter how large their following. Similarly, mainstream publishers don’t use YouTube for marketing. If it was an effective channel, they too would be all over it. So, our key take-away from this blog is that just because two groups of people like the same subject, it doesn’t mean they are the same audience. You have to consider the preferences for how they consume their entertainment, just as restauranteurs have to consider how different groups of diners choose to consume their food. If you have enjoyed this blog or found it informative, make sure you don’t miss future instalments by signing up to our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook if you do.  I’d like to start this week’s blog by asking you to use your imagination for a moment. Imagine you are at a book fair and a potential customer stops in front of your table. They pick up your book, examine the front cover and then turn it over to read the back matter. Then they raise their eyes and are clearly going to speak to you. “Did you write this?” they ask (they always ask that for some reason, that or “are you the author”?). “Yes.” you reply. “Is there anything you want to know about it?” There then follows a conversation about the book, which can take too many forms for me to cover all possibilities. But one question that is often asked is “What inspired you to write this book?” This is the solid gold question. If you can answer that, you have an almost certain sale. Readers love to know the “origins” story of a book. Not the origin in the way “Batman Begins” is an origins story. This is the origin of the idea, the inspiration that caused the book to be written.  But on Amazon (and other retail sites) you are unable to tell that origins story that increases the likelihood of making the sale. Except that you can tell the story. This blog is about how you can tell it. You might think that you could include it in your blurb. But that is not effective. Readers rarely read all the way to the end of a blurb. After 200 – 300 words they are either interested enough in the book that they stop reading or are so disinterested they are already scrolling through the search results looking for something else. Those latter readers are lost to you, so we can dismiss them for the purposes of this blog (though why they are disinterested is the subject of lots of blogs about blurb writing). The trick now is to turn interested readers into buyers. They are the person stood in front of your table at the book fair asking about how your book came to be written. But they are viewing the book on Amazon, so how can you answer that question?  Finally, we get to the point of this blog, which is that you use A+ Content. This is exclusive to Amazon and Amazon claims that using A+ Content increases conversions to sales by up to 10%. In terms of ad clicks, that’s one extra sale for every 10 clicks. Those extra sales alone could pay for the ad. We have blogged about using A+ Content in the past, so this is something of an update based on what we have learnt since then. First of all, what is A+ Content?  It is space on your Amazon sales page that you can use to provide additional information about your books. There are several ways of using it and different types of sellers will use it in different ways. You have probably seen A+ Content when you have shopped on Amazon and not even been aware of it. You can insert graphics, graphics and text, product comparisons and all sorts of other stuff. But the key thing for this blog is that you can provide that “origins” story. The wordcount is limited, so you have to be brief, but a good writer can pack a lot into very few words. A+ Content is inserted as “modules”. Each module is a combination of graphics, text and other elements that allow you to provide the additional information. In addition, you can add keywords to the graphics, so the measly 7 sets of keywords that KDP allows you for your books is now capable of being multiplied. You can use up to 5 modules. The type of content we are about to describe uses 3 modules, but don’t let that limit you. If you can think of ways to use 5 modules, then use 5 modules. Below is the total display we used for one of our books. We’ll talk you through each module below it.  The top module is the attention grabber. It is the sort of thing we use in our ads, so some of our potential readers may already have seen it. As you can see, it makes it clear that the book we are trying to sell is part of a much longer series, which appeals to a lot of readers. Below the main graphic we have used a module that inserts 3 images side-by-side. Each image features a quote from reviews of the book. We created these as images so we could make them stand out more than just using plain text. Reviews are known to be a critical part of the “sales funnel” because good reviews stimulate a desire in the reader to read the book. Our 3rd and final module is the one we think is doing the heavy lifting. It is where we tell the “origins” story. It is an image on one side (it can be either left or right) along with accompanying text which we have headlined “The Inspiration”. You don't have to use an image, of course, but we think that adds greater interest as images draw the eye to the text. It is this final module that will turn interested readers into buyers. Yes, they may still scroll down the page to see more reviews. Yes, they may still go to the “free sample” to read the opening chapter(s). But mentally they have already bought the book if they like the “origins” story that goes with it. Just an FYI, when the Amazon page is viewed on a phone, the A+ Content is usually the first content to be seen, so you can get a strong message across even before the reader gets to the blurb.  How do you upload A+ Content onto your page?
Go to your KDP bookshelf and select “promote and advertise” from the drop-down menu to the right of the book (3 dots). On the marketing tools page, look for “A+ Content”. Select the marketplace for your book (you can use different content for different Amazon territories) and then go through the various steps to select and insert the modules you want to use. I suggest you read the KDP tutorials on A+ Content before you start if you want to avoid wasting time, because the process isn’t as intuitive as KDP’s designers would like to think. You can find more information here. A+ Content If you want to use A+ Content on both an ebook and paperback page, you have to create it twice, once for each ASIN. If you have enjoyed this blog or found it informative, make sure you don’t miss future instalments by signing up to our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook if you do.  Why do so many authors suffer from “Imposter Syndrome”? It seems that every other post on X (formerly Twitter) or Facebook post that I see from authors doubts their ability to write, yet they are unlikely to choose writing as a career (or at least an ambition for a career) unless they actually are able to write in a coherent manner. I’m not talking about false modesty, or “humblebragging” as it is sometimes known, which I also see a lot of. That is a whole different thing. A typical humble brag would look something like “I can’t believe it! I’ve just been asked for a full MS from an agent!” (the exclamation marks are typical of humblebragging behaviour). The use of “I can’t believe it” doesn’t make the brag about being asked for a full MS any less of a brag. I’ve got nothing against the bragging part of it. If an author has been asked for a full MS by an agent, or has just signed a publishing deal, or has just sold the first copy of their book, then that is something worth bragging about. No, it’s actually the “humble” part I don’t like. The author isn’t fooling anyone with it. Own it, boys and girls; just own it. But imposter syndrome is something very different.  Imposter syndrome is a feeling that successful people get that they aren’t worthy of the accolades that they are getting. They feel that they don’t deserve it and that it has all been a big mistake and one day they’re going to get found out. The term was first used by psychologists Pauline Clance and Susanne Imes in their 1978 research paper on the subject. They noticed that a lot of their female students seemed to feel that they didn’t deserve their places in college, even though they were more than capable. Their research was mainly conducted on women, who seemed to suffer a lot from imposter syndrome, possibly because women have historically had their abilities questioned, so they have come to question it themselves. Later research found similar behaviour in people of colour for pretty much the same reason. More recent research has shown that anyone can suffer from imposter syndrome, but it is more common amongst those two groups.  At its worst, imposter syndrome can lead to mental health issues because of the anxiety it causes sufferers. At its best it creates self-doubt, which is demotivating, and it can lead to self-sabotaging behaviour, such as perfectionism. It doesn’t matter how many times people tell sufferers that they are good at what they do, imposter syndrome will always undermine any sense of achievement. But why do so many authors appear to suffer from it? There are a couple of reasons why we do suffer. One of the greatest is family and friends who don’t seem to think we have what it takes to be an author. They can believe in us as carpenters, plumbers, bank managers, marketing managers or whatever, because we are, or were, employed as those. But you have to be special to be an author, right? Actually, no you don’t have to be special, as any author can tell you. All you have to have is an idea, a basic sense of plot and character construction (both of which can be learned) and some basic written English skills, which can also be learned. But that lack of faith in us can undermine our own view of ourselves, especially if said friends and family haven’t actually read our books, so they continue to doubt us without having any evidence of our true capabilities.  But I think that the other main reason is that we are too ready to compare ourselves to the great figures of literature and we don’t feel we measure up well. And I think this stems from the way literature is taught in schools. This creates false comparisons. In all professions there are leading lights; the great movers and shakers who change their industry or redefine their art in some way. Let’s keep away from writing for the moment and use music as an example. Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin and similar figures are held up as the benchmarks against which all other musicianship must be judged, or so we would be led to believe if our high school music teachers had their way. I’m not going to question the abilities of those composers, they were undoubtedly great, but that doesn’t mean that every other composer or musician isn’t also competent. Our orchestras are full of competent musicians, of which a few will be recognised as great soloists. Some might even earn the title of “Maestro” or “Maestra”. But that doesn’t mean the rest are bad. We can extend the argument into the realm of pop music. Lennon and McCartney wrote great songs and the Beatles were a great band. But that doesn’t mean that no one since has written a great pop song, nor that any band since wasn’t as good as The Beatles.  False Comparisons The same applies to literature. It is the book buying public that decides who is a “great” author, not English Literature tutors. Teachers can examine a book and tell you why it was well written and why it was hailed as a “classic”, but that is not the same thing as the author being popular. If it were, then Dickens, Austen and Twain would always be in the best sellers lists and they aren’t and many popular authors would never have been heard of. If you only compare yourself to Charles Dickens, Mark Twain or Jane Austen, you may feel like an imposter. The same applies to modern writers. We’re not all going to win the Booker Prize or the Nobel Prize for Literature. But just because you aren’t spoken of in the same way as the winners doesn’t mean that you are unworthy of any success you may achieve. Stop beating yourself up, as the saying goes. If readers are buying your books and you are getting good reviews, it means you are a good writer. Enjoy that feeling.  Just because your books don’t make it into the Sunday Times (or New York Times) best sellers list, it doesn’t make you an imposter. You have to sell around 100,000 copies to make even the lowest entry into those lists and very few authors manage that in a year (about a hundred, in fact). So, if you only sold 90,000 copies, it doesn’t make you an imposter. In fact you were a great success. And even if you only sold 1 copy, it doesn’t make you an imposter. All that means is that you haven’t yet been discovered and you need to do more marketing to get your books in front of the reading public’s noses.  But above all you must remember that you chose to be a writer. No one puts a gun to an author’s head and makes them write. What made you choose to write was the desire to tell stories. And so long as you continue to tell stories, you will never be an imposter.
Instead of beating yourself up, why not celebrate what you have achieved? Because you have done what only a few thousand people in the world will ever do. You have written a book. If you have enjoyed this blog or found it informative, make sure you don’t miss future instalments by signing up to our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook if you do.  Many an “Indie” author will tell you that the hard part of being an author isn’t the writing of the book, no matter how hard that seemed at the time. No, the hard part is actually selling the book so someone can read it. Let’s face it, it doesn’t matter how good the book is, if no one knows it exists then they can’t buy it. Readers rarely, if ever, just stumble across a new author’s work. The book may occasionally appear on Amazon in search results, but that is the equivalent of hoping to hit a fish by throwing a stone into the sea. If the book has no sales history, it will be so far down the results that you would need a submarine to reach it. We have published many blogs on book marketing, but we thought it might be timely to reiterate the key messages.  We’ll start with the marketing mix – the 6 Ps. Some marketing blogs talk about the 4Ps, but we’re a bit like Spinal Tap, our Ps go all the way up to 6 (younger readers may not get that reference). These are:
You might think that ’promotion’ is the most important part of the marketing mix, but it isn’t. It’s people. You can promote your ‘product’ as much as you like, but if you aren’t reaching the right people, then you are wasting your time and, probably, your money. For this reason we are going to discuss each of those Ps in the order we think is of most importance.  The most important “people” is you. It is your knowledge of marketing which will sell books and it is your lack of knowledge that will hold you back. So, the most important thing we can say at this point is to invest in your “people” and learn how to do it properly. You don’t have to undertake a 3 year marketing degree course, but you do need to learn. There are free courses on FutureLearn and there a lot of books on book marketing available. Invest in yourself before you spend money on paying others to do things for you.  The rest of your ‘people’ are the people who read books similar to the ones you write. They are the ones you need to identify and engage with on social media. I say ‘engage’, because if you just ‘promote’ you will lose their interest very quickly. Yes, you can promote, but only as a small part of engagement. You need people to want to follow you, which means having something interesting to say. And if you doubt that, consider this – you’re reading this blog, aren’t you? That is part of our ‘engagement’ with you. Paying companies to blast out posts about your book won’t get you sales -despite their promises of having a gazillion followers. Because only the posts that reach the sort of people that read your sort of books are of any use and only you can identify and engage with those people.  We’ll assume from the start that your book is well written, has a good plot, interesting characters, has been properly edited, proofread and corrected. It is therefore fit for purpose. Only you and your Beta Readers can judge that. So that part of the next P, ‘product’, is OK. After that the most important part of the product is the cover. Despite the warning in the old proverb, people do judge books by their covers. So, yours must be right for your genre. A picture of a woman in a big bonnet walking through a field of daisies isn’t going to sell many sci-fi books. That cover image is what is going to attract people’s attention, so it has to be eye catching and genre appropriate. The second thing about the cover is that it should tell the reader a little bit about what is happening in between the covers. Call it a visual representation of the plot. A picture is worth a thousand words, or so they say, so make sure that the picture on your cover is using those thousand words to best effect.  What about price? How much should you charge for your book? If you are a big-name author, you (or, more likely, your publisher) can get away with charging £13.99 ($15.99) for your book. If you are an Indie author, don’t even think about it. There is some interesting psychology related to pricing. On the one hand, people expect to pay more for a quality product. On the other hand, everyone loves a bargain, even readers. Where you pitch the price of your book is therefore important. Price it at 99p (99c) and readers may think "It can’t be very good if they’re practically giving it away". On the other hand, price it at £13.99 and readers may say "I’m not going to pay that much to read a book by an author I’ve never heard of". We price our ebooks at £4.99 - £5.99 ($5.99 - $6.99) and that seems to be about right for us. But the key messages are (a) don’t undersell yourself and (b) don’t price yourself out of the market. There are times when you can price at 99p, but those are for promotional purposes. That shouldn't be your basic price.  When we talk about ‘place’ we mean the places where you promote your books rather than the places you sell them. We’re going to assume that your book is listed on all the relevant websites and, for those of you that don’t want to give money to Jeff Bezos, all we can say is that if you aren’t on Amazon, you aren’t anywhere. Internet searches always place Amazon at the top of the results, so if someone is actually trying to find your book, that is where it will appear first – and perhaps the only place on the first page of results. But in our terms, place means your choice of social media site(s) on which to engage with readers and your choice is important. If you want to reach young people, then Facebook isn’t the place and X (aka Twitter) is iffy at best, because young people are always on the newest, trendiest platforms. Only 51% of social media users between ages 12 and 18 use Facebook – the second smallest group.  So, you need to do some basic research to make sure the platform(s) you are using are the right ones to reach your target audience. But don’t rely on social media alone. Local newspapers and radio stations are always looking for content, so a short item (written by you) will fill some column inches for them or an interview will fill five minutes of radio time. But, again, don’t expect them to find you. You have to reach out to them. Also, check your local community resources (libraries, schools, churches, clubs, societies, etc) for events where you can go along and talk about your work (and maybe sell a few copies). One thing about newspapers and other media – don’t pay to go chasing it. If it is offered, great, but the sales it brings aren’t worth the money you have to pay PR people to get it for you.  Promotion can be anything from a Facebook post to a video, podcast, a free extract or paid for advertising. I don’t aim to cover all of those. Instead I’ll focus on the one that you have to pay for – advertising. Social media (and Amazon) has given us all the ability to run relatively cheap advertising campaigns. But which ones work depends on the advertising channel you use. There is no point in paying for an advert on Facebook if hardly any of your target audience ever uses Facebook. We can tell you where we get the best return on our advertising investment – but that would be more confusing because we use different platforms for different books, because different audiences use different social media platforms. What we can tell you is that each platform (including Amazon ads) has its peculiarities when it comes to advertising. Whether it’s how you use keywords, what images you use, what text you use to accompany the images, etc are all different on different sites. It pays to advertise but you have to know how to advertise on each specific platform you use in order to get the best results.  You have to learn to use each site. There are myriad books on the subject and videos on YouTube. Read and watch before setting up your first ad and you may save yourself a lot of money and heartache. Test your ads before you commit a large budget to them. A few £ or $ spent running a test can save you a lot more in the longer term. One tip we will give you is that Google Ads don’t seem to work. Not for us and not for the gurus we have consulted. Google Ads may be great for some types of product, but they don’t seem to work for books. But one important detail about advertising. Make sure your advert includes the following:
 You’re now wondering what I’m going to say about ‘process’. Actually, not a lot. I’ve tried to get the messages in this blog in the order you need to address them. That’s about all the ‘process’ you need to worry about at the moment. But if you want to be successful your ‘process’ must also include research:
Without that research, you may as well be standing on a street corner shouting ‘buy my book’. And you will be no more successful. And, if doing research sounds like too much hassle, then good luck getting people to stumble across your book by chance. If you have found this blog informative or entertaining (or both) then make sure not to miss future editions by signing up for our newsletter. We’ll even send you a free ebook for joining. Just click on the button below.  A recurring theme amongst would-be writers is “How do you start a story?”. For some people this is no problem. An idea pops into their head, they sit down at the place they do their writing and off they go. 80k to 100k words later they have the first draft of their book completed. But for others it doesn’t work that way. For others, getting started is the difficult bit. Sometimes they have an idea in their head, but sometimes they don’t. They just want to write, but how do they get going? Which is what this week’s blog is about. How to start your writing when you haven’t had that spark of inspiration to set you on your way.  Even I need somewhere to start, so I’m going to start with “prompt phrases”. This is simply taking a few words that already exist and then continuing on from where they leave off. I’ll give you an example. “The door opened and …” continue writing from there. Where the writer goes from there is entirely up to them. It may end up as a short paragraph that leads nowhere, or it may end up on the shortlist for the Booker prize. Who knows? But great work always has a starting point and that could be it. So, here are a few more prompts for you to think about.
 It may be that by the time you stop writing, you will actually be able to remove those prompt words and you will still be left with something that stands up on its own. The great thing is that you can use the same prompts over and over again but just continuing with a slightly different set of words to create something entirely new. You can even create your own prompts or take the opening words from favourite books and use those to inspire your own work. “Call me Ishmael” may have started Moby Dick, but it didn’t have to. There could have been a million different stories that emanated from those three words. And, providing you remove “Call me Ismael” from the starting sentence, no one will ever know you used it. If you search “writing prompts” on the internet you will come up with hundreds of articles with thousands more suggestions, some of which may be better than mine.  The important thing about writing prompts is that they actually get you writing, and once you have started, it is easier to keep going. The point about those prompts isn’t that they will lead the writer directly to a story. But they may give the writer a character, a location, a time, an incident or something else that then takes the writer to a story. It’s a bit like wanting to get to a certain street, but you don’t know where that street is. So you stop someone and ask for directions, or you go into a shop to do the same. That then gets you to the street where you want to be. The prompt phrase is the person you ask for directions. (For younger readers, people used to do that before we all had Google Maps). Then there is the “I remember” technique.  Write the words “I remember” then follow it with three sentences. For example: I remember I went to the pub last week. Harry was there. We talked about football for a long time.” At the end of that you can remove “I remember” and you’ll be left with “I went to the pub last week. Harry was there” etc. Where you then take that is where the story will lead you. It may not lead anywhere, and you may abandon it. But there are many exciting and unexpected prospects that can emerge from a trip to the pub. One writer I know gets her inspiration from her favourite songs. She uses them to tap into her memories and emotions and they then give her a starting point for a story.  Pick out a favourite song and listen to it. But while you are listening, ask yourself some questions and jot the answers down.
You might want to listen to the song several times to get more answers or to trigger fresh memories. Once you have that, you can start to assemble the words into sentences. Some words you may use several times and some you may not use at all. They’re your words, do with them what you please. But when you’ve written those sentences, don’t stop. Keep writing, perhaps taking one sentence and writing a second, related sentence, much as you did with the “I remember” technique discussed above.  You can do that with other media as well. A painting, a sculpture, a book, a poem, a TV show, a film, or a play. All of them have etched themselves into your memory for a reason and those reasons can be your source of inspiration. Photographs, like music, are another good source of inspiration. We all have favourite photos, but you might want to dig out your albums and start looking at the ones you took years ago. Or, for our younger readers, access your cloud storage to find your old photos. Use the same techniques as suggested for listening to music. Museums have archives of photographs, many of which are available on the internet. Browse those photos and pick out the ones that call out to you and use them to stimulate questions for which you can provide written answer. Remember Kipling's 6 friends: Who, what, where, when, why and how. Do remember that you can’t use the photos in your book, unless you have the copyright owner’s permission, which often requires you to buy a licence.  Then there’s TV, radio or your news feed on the internet. The basic idea is the same for all three. Turn on your TV or radio or select your news feed on the internet (you might also use social media channels). Make a note of the first thing you see, hear or read. Don’t go searching for ones that may be more interesting. That becomes artificial and removes the spontaneity that is crucial to creativity. It doesn’t matter what it is. It could be a news story, it could be an advert, it could be someone discussing buying a house or selling an antique. Just write it down. Then, using the techniques discussed earlier, elaborate on what you have written. Try to reach around 500 words before you stop. Then imagine a character who is involved in whatever you have written and start to describe them. Some of the things you might want to include are: 
Combining the first 500 words with the character description should allow you to build even more. For example, the character may have friends, an enemy, a lover, a helper and so on. How do these characters know each other? How did they meet? How is each one connected to the original 500 words?  The final suggestion I have for getting started with your writing is the “what if” question. Viewers of “The Big Bang Theory” may remember the episode in which the character of Sheldon Cooper imagines what The Hulk would be like if he was made for different materials, eg what if The Hulk was made of sponge? This is the same sort of thing. So, what if the old lady I saw on the bus yesterday is actually a serial poisoner?” So, you start writing “I saw an old lady on the bus today. She looked so sweet and innocent, but she had a deadly secret?  To change it into a third person narrative the sentence is started with “The old lady was sitting on a bus. She looked so sweet and innocent ….” So, here are some more “what if” ideas for you to play around with.
If you have particular concerns (poverty, social justice, climate change, animal welfare, health, wealth etc), they could be turned into some excellent “what ifs”.  Turning what you have written into a story is just a matter of technique. Short story writer E M Forster describes a story as “‘a narrative of events arranged in their time-sequence’ and a plot as ‘also a narrative of events, the emphasis falling on causality.’ To put that into context “The puppy howled piteously.” is a story. “The puppy howled piteously because it was hungry” is a plot. Turning that simple line about the puppy into a longer story is matter of asking some questions and then answering them, but again focusing on causality.
You may be able to think of more questions. None of the ideas discussed here are a universal panacea. Whatever you start out with may not lead anywhere. But it doesn’t have to lead anywhere every time. All it needs to do is get you writing.  Hold onto whatever you have created (I still have a box file from the days when I still used pen and paper) and go back and revisit these jottings from time to time. Perhaps they’ll provide fresh inspiration.
But, importantly, just because one prompt didn’t lead anywhere, it doesn’t mean that the next one won’t. Ultimately writing is about imagination and these prompts are designed to stimulate your imagination. The rest is down to perseverance. And if you have neither an imagination nor perseverance, you aren’t a writer. You may be thinking “That’s all fine, but this is all about the here and now. I write fantasy/sci-fi/horror/westerns etc and those prompts don’t help me. Wrong. There is nothing that those prompts produce that can’t be transposed into any genre. Those genres are just a set of tropes that tell the reader what sort of book they are reading. The rest of it can exist in any time period or location – real or imagined. To think otherwise is to reveal a lack of imagination. To use the example of the puppy, discussed above, it could live in Middle Earth, on the planet Gargelfarch or in a Native American tipi in 1879. It doesn’t even have to be the young produced by a dog. It could be a baby that has turned into a werewolf puppy and it’s howling because it can’t get out of its cradle to find a leg on which to chew. (Editor’s note: That idea is now copyright, Selfishgenie Publishing 2025). All writing should be fun and fun comes from playing. Anyone who has ever studied the processes involved in creativity and innovation will know that “play” is a big part of it. What this blog is about, really, is playing with words. It serves two purposes. The first is you learn by doing it. The second is that the ideas generated through this sort of play can be turned into something useable. It won’t happen every time, but it will happen. If you have enjoyed this blog or found it interesting, be sure to sign up to our newsletter by clicking the button below, so you don’t miss future posts. We’ll even send you a free ebook for doing so. |
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