Month: February 2013

Tutorial: Resizing Pictures

Why in the world could I possibly need to know how to resize a picture? you ask. Well, Skippy, it goes like this. A reporter or blogger or some other nice person who wants to feature your book asks you for a jpg image of your book cover – or a head shot – no larger than 500kb. But the only image you have of yourself looking all sexy and authory is 4 megabytes. So you send it anyway. BAD AUTHOR!!!! That’s a really good way to annoy someone who’s trying to help you. But…how do I make the image smaller? you say. Well, I’ll show you.  Aren’t you glad you asked?

See the cover above? The size of the original file is 606 kb. That’s over half a megabyte and still doesn’t meet the criteria of the 500kb requested by whomever. Making it smaller is very fast and easy. Go to the folder where your picture is stored. If you mouse over it, that should tell you how large the file is. (I knew you were going to ask that next. Ha!) See the photo below. Continue reading “Tutorial: Resizing Pictures”

Tutorial: NovelRank

Do you often wonder how many books you are actually selling? Of course, you’ll get your report from Amazon each month and maybe even a report from your publisher once a year or quarter, but what if you could find out how many sales you were making on a daily basis, or even on an hourly basis? Even better, what if you could spy on your rivals and see how their books are selling? Well, gather round everyone, you can!

Now, don’t spread this about, but I am going to give away a secret I have hung onto all year. It’s allowed me to check out other authors’ books and compare my sales then go off and cry in a dark room. I discovered a site that can tell you what sales you have made. It’s called NovelRank. Here’s all you need to know. Continue reading “Tutorial: NovelRank”

T. A. Bradley Announces New Title

Author T. A. Bradley is pleased to announce the release of his new horror thriller, Primordia.

Scientific ambition, a mutated virus and a case of mistaken identity plunge a family and their community into the depths of a horror that no one could have imagined. The nightmare begins with a simple virus infection. Ross Clayton, a scientist and dedicated family man receives an experimental pacemaker. When he is murdered, the pacemaker fuels the mutation of the virus and he is reanimated in a near primordial state. In an attempt to save his daughter, Ross unleashes an unfathomable terror. And it just might be unstoppable.

Primordia was released on January 2, 2013 and is currently available from Amazon.com, Amazon UK, and Smashwords.

Mistakes I Made So You Don’t Have To

Guest post
by Mark Hamner

I learned a lot from my first foray into novel writing, to say the least. Most of these various lessons were, I hate to say, learned the hard way. Let’s take a look at two of my…learning opportunities…in the hope they may help some new writer somewhere to avoid the mistakes I made the first time out. Continue reading “Mistakes I Made So You Don’t Have To”