What is the latest and happy May!

Good day Murderers! Welcome to another Thursday in May. Well, actually...the FIRST Thursday in May! Ha! And this month I will be releasing the second book in the Shannon Wallace Mystery series. I have Mother's Day, May 8 slated.

If you are not on my email list at Kim Smith, author you should be! You will be the first to know the NAME of the book and the first to get the COVER!

By the way...excerpt coming soon!

Before you get the 2nd book however...you need to get the FIRST one!

DO that by clicking on the link cover below.

Happy Reading, yall!





What is on your summer reading list? I have just finished up three books and am almost finished with the fourth. I am right on track for my reading goal this year. You can see what I have been reading here

I hope you will consider reading something by our little troop her on MB4. We love you guys!

Killing those darlings

by Kim Smith

It has often been said that sometimes writers have to "kill their darlings". What exactly is meant by this statement and why on earth would a writer do such a thing?

Well, sometimes a favorite scene, passage, character, or event in a story is not moving the plot forward like it should. It simply exists because we (the writer in question) love it. So the only alternative is to cut it out like a piece of bad apple.

Let's be honest, now.

We love that one line, that joke, that description that is so perfect the reader can smell it. Well, almost. The point is, we LOVE it -- WE the author, the writer of said work has penned something so awesome and earth-shattering that we don't care that it is slowing the story down to a halt. WE DON'T WANT TO TOUCH IT!!!

But touch it we must. Cut it out. Kill that darling piece of writing that you simply adore.

How does one do such a cruel and terrible thing? Well, first you have to discover that there is such a phenomenon in your work.

How do you do that?
Hopefully, you have mean and nasty beta readers who would love nothing more than to tell you to cut it out. Literally. They can be useful things, those betas. Then too, if you are lucky enough to have an editor, that person will be the one to seek and destroy your darlings for you. And the bonus here? You can bemoan the loss of your darling to your heart's content, because you DIDN'T do it truly. The editors and or beta readers were the murderers.

Another way to ditch the darlings in your work is to remember that they ain't dead forever. You can always resurrect those snippets that you cut in another work. Just cut and paste them over in a folder on your old hard drive. There. Not dead forever. Ever.

Thirdly, you will care a lot less about your darlings with each book you write. The more words you pen the fewer darlings you find. It's true, my friend. Darlings can sometimes be a sign of an immature writer. The only way to grow up is to write a lot.

Good luck.
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Kim Smith is the author of An Unexpected Performance, Ten Tips for Getting that Book Written, and several mysteries and romances. You can find more about her at her website, http://www.kimsmithauthor.com

Remaking me

Gosh, it seems like as a writer we are constantly trying to keep our writing lives going from one thing to the next. Lately, I have been to events for writers, and booksignings and so on and it really opens my eyes to the fact that we have a CRUSHING amount of competition out there.

So, what do you think an author has to do to stand out today?

Just hopping by...

...to wish everyone a very happy and peaceful Easter...

Marketing your work aka Murder

This week, Murderers, I am talking about marketing yourself and your book. I am a very poor bellringer for myself, always assuming that people will find my stuff without my hollering at them. Not so. My sales are pitiful. My publishers probably shake their head in wonder at such awful numbers. In other words, my marketing is ... well, murder. At least, it's dead at the moment.

  Here is my take on this stuff:

If you want book sales, you have to have traffic. And you get traffic from marketing your work and yourself. One big part of marketing is having a website that is current. Keeping your focus on the main subject of your life, your books, your writing doesn’t hurt either. Especially if your website is sort of like a blog.

I am going to spend a lot of time over the next week getting my website revamped and just as I mentioned above, current and focused. I have a blog called WritingSpace but it sometimes is anything but writing-related, so I am considering doing a blog event for readers or writers that will bring in traffic. Maybe a contest, or a free offer. (more on this later) Offering things that interest readers is a way to draw attention to your website or blog.

 Another way to get interest is to get book reviews. Too bad papers have pretty much ditched the book review stuff.  Used to be that local papers loved local authors. Not so much these days. But getting some reader reviews is very important so - thinking cap on. Guess I will be out visiting the blogosphere a lot this week too.

 Of course, Facebook and Twitter are a given, but I am not sure I have a lot of followers who are readers. And I want to really get interest, so I am going to have to do my homework on how to use these media outlets to get the most bang without spamming people. Nobody likes spam, except my dog. (hah)

So, Murderers, if you want to know more about this journey of mine on marketing and getting your sales rising, keep checking back. This post is the start of a series, I think. Or should I say I FEAR?