The Secret to Ebook Sales - and a Giveaway!

That's a tantalising blog post title, isn't it?

I've just been over on KarenG's blog, Coming Down The Mountain: From Reclusive Writer to Published Author, which also promised to pass on the secret of selling ebooks. And for a moment, on landing there and eagerly beginning to read, I thought she had the secret, that she knew how to sell ebooks and could tell us all ...

Only she didn't. Well, KarenG gave us the rather useful formula 'cover and price' and asked everyone else what they thought.

Fair enough. It's a hard nut to crack.

Here are some initial thoughts: personal recommendations, blog interviews and tours, twitter campaigns, facebook status updates and author pages, readings and other public appearances, reviews on romance sites, promos on the same, giveaways like this, mentions on Goodreads and other reading sites.

But there must be more.

So how about we have a fantabulous brainstorming session this very day on behalf of our lovely new Embrace authors - Sally Clements, Rachel Lyndhurst, Judy Jarvie, Maggi Andersen, Cody Young, Michelle Styles, Kate Allan and BL Bonita - and see if between us we can't discover THE SECRET TO EBOOK SALES!

Any ideas and suggestions accepted, however bizarre or difficult to swallow.

And best of all, there's a free copy of one of our Embrace launch titles on offer to one of our idea-spinners, to be randomly allocated by my random selecting machine on Wednesday noon GMT!!

So let's have your ideas ...

Embrace Books Has Launched!!!

It's just after midnight here in the UK and is now February 14th 2011, which means it's Embrace Books launch day!

Now all those pre-purchased Amazon Kindle titles will be whizzing through cyberspace on their way to - hopefully! - hundreds of eagerly waiting Kindles and ereaders around the world.

So please come in, we've been waiting for you to drop by. Take a drink, whatever you feel like, and start chatting. Tell us what you're drinking, what you're wearing, which Embrace titles you're after or have already bought.



I'm on the champagne cocktails, and can hardly walk in these incredibly high heels. Mind the balloons and streamers ... !!

It's the first few moments of Valentine's Day. And Embrace Books is live!

LAUNCH WEEK ROMANCE PARTY!!

Embrace Books launches tomorrow, Monday 14th February, which - appropriately enough - is Valentine's Day in some parts of the world.

To celebrate our launch, the Embrace blog will be hosting a week-long cyber romance party, with Embrace authors weaving in and out, talking about their books.

So you're all invited to grab a drink on your way in, join one of the authors' groups for a chat, then join in with the fun by leaving a comment.



Tell us about your fabulous party outfits, the cocktails you're drinking, the delicious hors d'oeuvres, canapes and petits fours, and any famous writers you jostled in the queue for the restroom!!

And please do tell us if you've bought one of our superb, ground-breaking launch titles. They're all up for grabs on Kindle, e-Pub and in some instances as paperbacks!

Red Velvet: sexy, sophisticated romance

After Dark: intense, page-scorching romance and erotica

Embrace Regency: daring, unconventional Regency and Georgian romance

Embrace Historicals: bringing the past vividly to life

Find our new Red Velvet page at Salt

The fabulous Red Velvet line of sensuous, contemporary romance at Embrace now has a browsing page at Salt.

Find our Red Velvet launch titles HERE!

Date for your Diary - We Launch on Monday!!

Blog Frenzy Begins

Hi. I'm Judy Jarvie and along with all the other Embrace launch authors I'm completely besides myself with excitement about the forthcoming launch of Embrace Books.  To be honest I'm counting down the days like a kid with an advent calendar.

 

To this end I'll be out and about touring the blogs of some lovely writer chums (starting from today) and talking about my new releases - in particular Nanny Behaving Badly from Embrace.

 

Please pop by on the blog tour or visit my blog - and find out reasons why I'm so intrigued by sassy firemen and nannies who sometimes like to err on the naughty side. Are you and your Kindle counting down the days too?

Judy 

 

Blogging With A Hot Fireman and A Feisty Nanny

Rachel Lyndhurst - Tuesday 1 February

http://rachellyndhurst.blogspot.com/

Sarah Grimm - Thursday 3 February

http://www.authorsarahgrimm.blogspot.com/

Marcy Bassett-Kennedy - Monday 7 February

http://marcybassettkennedy.blogspot.com/

Suzanne Jones - Thursday 10 February

http://suzanne-sj.blogspot.com/

Amber Leigh Williams, The Cozy Page - Monday 13 February

http://amberleighwilliams.blogspot.com/

Sarah Grimm – Tuesday 14 February

http://www.authorsarahgrimm.blogspot.com/

Marcy Bassett-Kennedy – Friday 18 February

http://marcybassettkennedy.blogspot.com/

The Minxes of Romance – Wednesday 23 February

http://minxesofromance.blogspot.com/

Suzanne Jones – Thursday 29 February

http://suzanne-sj.blogspot.com/

Rachel Brimble - Thursday 3 March

http://rachelbrimble.blogspot.com/

Too hot to handle! - BL Bonita's 'Savage Sun' gets a cover

Launching on February 14th. Only two weeks to go!

Stunning new covers for Michelle Styles, Kate Allan and Cody Young

Been drooling today over our two latest covers from The Cover Factory for our February launch line-up at Embrace. I think you'll agree that they're just fabulous and to-die-for.

Cody Young's Victorian tale of passion and secrets: SCANDAL AT THE FARMHOUSE

And THE LADY SOLDIER, a stunning and highly unusual Regency romance from the writing team of Michelle Styles and Kate Allan.

Both these scrumptious books - and a host of others - will be available for sale on Amazon Kindle and other e-platforms from February 14th.

Embrace Books is about to happen!

Winter Newsletter - OUT NOW!

I know it's a few weeks late - mea culpa, all you lovely romancers - but the Winter Newsletter for Embrace Books is out and winging its way to subscribers. It's also available via Facebook and Twitter, for those who befriend us there.

If you're not on the subscribers' list, you can sign up here. 

We have news on Michelle Styles and Kate Allan's jointly written and highly unusual Regency romance, The Lady Soldier, complete with 'deleted scenes' reinstated.

There's also a Love Letter written specially for us by romance writer Phillipa Ashley, from the point of view of a yearning Anne to her distant Captain Frederick Wentworth (a 'what happened afterwards' look at Jane Austen's Persuasion).

Not to mention some detailed How To tips for new writers on 'Writing the Opening to Your Novel' and more news on the impending launch itself.

In fact, the next newsletter will be our Launch Issue!

I shall pass swiftly over how terribly exciting that prospect is, and merely say that the elves have been very busy at Embrace this past week, with e-proofs winging their way to and from authors. This kind of activity will continue over the weekend and into early February, and then .... drumroll! ... we intend to launch Embrace Books officially on Valentine's Day, February 14th 2011.

So watch this blog space in the next two or three weeks, for some tremendous things are starting to happen here at Embrace HQ!

Erotica For All

Marvellous to see our latest Call for Submissions up at Erotica for All.

We're looking for Trios of hot romance for single volume digital publication - 3 stories by the same author, that is, with a common theme or link of some kind.

The whole package, i.e. all three stories combined, should not exceed 15,000 words.

Interested in submitting three stories?

Send all three as separate Word attachments - preferably not Vista, i.e. docx - to
jane @ embracebooks.co.uk

Introducing "Trios" - triple-decker hot romance

In general, we only publish novels and novellas at Embrace Books.

However, knowing how much we love short stories ourselves - especially, ahem, the hot, romantic variety! - it occurred to us that a "trio" of stories, a generous triple-decker portion of romance, would be the same length as a novella.

So why not put out a few mini-collections of short fiction by the same author?

Which is why I'm here today, putting out a general call for submission from authors who may already have some short romance stories on the back burner, or have been inspired by this to write some sexy stories for us. Send them to us at Embrace. We'd especially love it if they are linked by a common theme, though this can be any kind - including genre.

Three paranormals, for instance, or three Regency stories. Or three contemporaries revolving around a family or a group of close-knit friends. Three stories about long-lost loves returning would also work perfectly. Or a theme of enemies becoming more-than-friends.

Feeling inspired to write yet?

Here are the general guidelines for submission, and as soon as our first TRIO is available for digital sale, don't worry - we'll let you know where and how to buy it!

Embrace is currently seeking TRIOS of short stories all by the same author to be published in one mini-volume, preferably hot romance (straight, gay, lesbian or bisexual) with a common or linked theme.


We accept contemporary, historical and paranormal stories. But they MUST be romance and deliciously hot.


Please state TRIO theme in your submission and submit all three stories at the same time as three separate Word attachments: total word count of the whole collection should not be less than 10,000 nor exceed 15,000.


And don't forget to tell us something about yourself in the accompanying email: jane@embracebooks.co.uk

Category Romance

This is just a friendly shout-out to all those writers who follow this blog.

We're currently keen to see short category romance submissions at Embrace Books.

I'll be taking pitches for these and other books at four UK writing and literary festivals this year, but am also open to new email submissions from overseas.

For those interested, here's a quick guide to category romance submissions:

Red Velvet – 50-60K in length
Sexy, sophisticated romance with feisty heroines and believable Alpha males. Contemporary and paranormal categories. Millionaires acceptable but not necessary. Sexual content required in all books, and can be a key element, but should not be overly explicit.

After Dark – 55-65K words
Passionate, scorching romance and erotic romance. Open to unusual and daring storylines. Contemporary and paranormal settings. Must include explicit sex, which in some cases may be central to the plot.

We also take historical romance and historical women's fiction within our Embrace Regency and Embrace Historicals series.

To submit your work, please follow our simple guidelines at Embrace Books.