Anne R. Allen's Blog... with Ruth Harris
Writing about writing. Mostly.
by Anne R. Allen Welcome to our new blog!! I hope you’ll find our new WordPress site is easier for comments and searches. Because we have a high-profile blog, a lot of people contact us because they want us to promote their services to our readers, usually through contests or deals. Sometimes these services are […]
by Chris Syme Self-publishing and social media have empowered writers in ways we never dreamed of a decade ago. They’ve also forced us to learn a lot of stuff we never used to have to bother our artistic little heads about. These days, whether you’re trad-pubbed or indie, the rise of social media has put […]
by Anne R. Allen Blogging can boost your career in so many ways, as I wrote in my September 13th post, “Does an Author Really Need a Blog?” This blog sure has helped mine. Plus if you write non-narrative nonfiction like, ahem, How to be a Writer in the E-Age, a blog is pretty essential to your platform. […]
by Mark Williams How would you like to double, triple or even quadruple your titles without writing a single extra word? Think E Unum Pluribus. The United States’ original motto “E Pluribus Unum” translates as “From Many, One”, a reference to the creation of one country – the USA – from the myriad colonies that fought the British […]
by Anne R. Allen “Blogging doesn’t sell books.” “Don’t waste your time blogging.” “Make book trailers! Email those newsletters! Spend more time on Pinterest and Instagram! Blogging is so over!” I’m hearing this stuff every day. But I still think a blog is one of the best uses of an author’s time. Even if […]
by Anne R. Allen When I teach blogging to new writers, the most common question I get is: “What should I blog about?” My answer isn’t the same as you’ll hear from the major blogging gurus, because most of them are teaching people how to blog for its own sake. They will all tell […]
 We’ve got a must-read guest post for you this week. David Congalton, screenwriter and radio superstar here on the Central Coast of California, tells us how to be a good radio guest. Radio is still essential to book promotion in the digital age. Most car-commuters still listen to broadcast or satellite radio and the popularity of […]
 by Anne R. Allen A lot of marketing gurus are advising authors to cut back on blogging and social media and go back to the email marketing of the last decade. “The author with the biggest mailing list wins,” has become a mantra with self-publishing gurus. Go to most blogs and websites these days […]
A social media executor can keep you from haunting the Internet forever by Anne R. Allen One of my blogger friends died last week. Ann Calhoun was a regular commenter here from the beginning and often gave me suggestions for blog topics (she commented as “Churadogs”.) Her own blog, Calhoun’s Cannons, grew out of a local newspaper […]
by Anne R. Allen Lots has been written about the pain caused by online bullying of children and teens—and that stuff is horrific—but we don’t hear as much about the cyberbullying that goes on in the adult world. But cyberbullying can have disastrous consequences, no matter what the victim’s age or social status. In […]
The self-publishing movement that was sparked by the introduction of the Kindle ereader eight years ago has taken the entire industry on a rollercoaster ride that shows no signs of slowing down. The only thing we can count on in today’s publishing world is change. Solid advice given yesterday may not work today. Authors need […]
by Anne R. Allen Everybody keeps telling authors we should blog. But for a lot of new authors, the challenge of a blog is daunting. How can we write our books if we’re spending every day blogging? You can’t. And you shouldn’t. If you think you have to blog every day, or even every […]
by Anne R. Allen I’m not going to pretend that picking a title for your book is easy. In fact, it gets tougher all the time. We have to consider a lot more than how grabby a title looks on a bookstore shelf these days. In choosing a title now, we have to think […]
Anne R Allen’s Blog With Ruth Harris