My First Published Interview!

Happy Thursday everybody! I would like to direct your attention to a blog called The Bee Writes.. HERE

This is my first published interview! I'm so excited I hope it gives me the little boost that I was looking for. If you're searching for a new way to get your name out there, I suggest you head on over and try to get yourself an article! It's important to get your name out there in any and every way possible because the more people see your name, the more they'll want to know about you and eventually your books! That's pretty much it for today...it's been a slow week. Have a great rest of the day! :)

#MinuteMondays - Analyzing an Excerpt from an Article by Tracy Kuhn

["A man writes some books. They’re not brilliant examples of literary prowess but are obviously entertaining because millions of people buy them, and after all, who are we to decide what someone else should read, right?

His books all follow a certain formula and you know how they’ll end but that’s fine. People obviously like that. There are hardly any women in his books and the ones that are are very one-dimensional, and often defined in terms of their sexuality. But never mind, he’s a top bloke!

People make fun of him and complain and roll their eyes when he publishes a new one but they buy them anyway. He’s very rich and doesn’t care what people think. Good for him. Nobody would be able to recognise him in the street of course but writers don’t write to be pin-up stars.

Another male writer churns out books at an alarming rate, often a few a year. He has a team of co-writers. It’s more a successful business model than a creative endeavour but he has millions of fans and has earned a kind of respect from his predominantly male readers.

His books feature women but he’s one of many authors who glamorise violence (often sexual) against women. But again, good for him, he’s found a way of making lots of money, let him get on with it. What does he look like? I have absolutely no idea.

Then we have a woman. She writes books. Their literary merit is a matter of opinion; as with any book it’s very subjective, but they have sold in their millions. There’s some debate about what her books are about, and I haven’t got room here to talk about the differences between S&M and abuse, but some say that the books are about a BDSM relationship in which the female character has all the control, others say it’s about sexual violence and a controlling, abusive partner. Some of these people may even have read the book.

Most people are familiar with what she looks like; for example, I personally know that she recently left a gym without any make up on and was wearing a blue quilted jacket, with jeans tucked into calf length boots. In case you were wondering. Oh, and by the way she’s 52.

Her books have turned everyone into a literary critic. Her readers (predominantly female) are called stupid or desperate. Her writing is picked apart, sentence by sentence. She’s torn apart on social media. It’s not bullying of course, it’s for our own good and it doesn’t count in this case because hey, most of us doing the attacking are women who are defending other women, so you can’t touch us. To do so would be to condone abuse, you animal!...."] -  "Women, Know Your Place!" Tracy Kuhn for BooksByWomen.org for the full article click HERE

First of all, I must say WOW! When I first came by this article, I thought it would be something I skim through and offer my 'mm' and 'ohs' to, however, that was NOT that case. After reading this full article by Tracy Kuhn I was BLOWN away. She didn't hit the nail on the head, she SMASHED it! Kuhn is drawing a comparison between a successful unnamed male author (I get the sense that it may be James Patterson..anyone else?) and an equally successful unnamed female author (I think we all know that it's E.L James). In this piece Kuhn notes the differences in the way these two authors are treated by society and I must say it's fairly spot-on.

My thoughts are this: Take any successful male author and you will see nothing but praise for the genius work he's created, even if his books are redundant in their story lines. Why is that? It may be because...well he's just the man. Now look at Mrs.James. Here is a woman that's broken records on so many levels and continues to get picked on for what she's created. Since slut-shaming has been deemed unacceptable is this the new thing, #CreativeShaming? For some odd reason, people all over are acting as if Fifty Shades of Grey is the most embarrassing thing she's ever done and won't let her live it down (even though it's probably the first book they've picked up since the Twilight series). The masses just love finding the next big thing to hate, don't they? Even though I'm sure James is not bothered by the harsh criticism, after all that's what comes with the big scale author life and she's too busy planning her next big project. Though, I must say I'm not sure it's just a woman thing. I think James in particular gets picked apart so wildly is because she's a woman having a voice about sex and God forbid a woman having such an influential voice about sex. What are your thoughts?

The Importance of Social Media!

What's up everybody? I hope you're enjoying your weekend - I promise whatever you're doing beats getting over being sick like me! Which is why I haven't posted in about two days or so, I barely had the energy to text (Ha! Imagine that in this day and age). Fortunately, today is a new day, it's beautiful outside, the temperature is perfect, and I'm feeling 100% better! In today's blog post I want to welcome you to the age of Social Media - if you haven't been welcomed already. I will be talking about the important role it plays in today's marketing and how it can help you as a self-published author. As you can see, a great deal of the world's population is constantly active on social media. Though this may be a scary thought to those of you who are convinced social media will be the demise of the human race, we all have to look at the positive outcomes of the new way of networking. As an author, it is very important to build relationships with your readers, for they are the ones that support you and will be looking out for your next piece of work. With social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and more it's very easy to engage with them. On these networks they can follow you for updates and share your posts - resulting in the growth of your audience! Also through these platforms you can reach out to them individually, this creates a better bond than an all-inclusive, trying-to-reach-everyone-at-once marketing scheme. Though there are a variety of different social media sites and apps, the ones I would recommend most for authors would be Facebook and Twitter. Ever since I've joined Twitter I've been included in a group called ASMSG. It stands for Author Social Media Support Group and it consists of roughly 1100 members who are all authors supporting each other's works on social media. It makes for great exposure and you discover new reads by people just like you! One thing you have to remember when using social media is that it's all about consistency and delivery. Overall, it can be extremely beneficial to you in building your following and getting your work out there!

On and Off Days

It's HUMP DAY! We're almost into the weekend so everyone hang in there (even though we all know that if you're a self-published author the online marketing never ceases no matter what day of the week). Today I'd like to talk about ON and OFF days when it comes to marketing your book online. So you've got your social media sites up and running and you have a decent amount of people looking at your blog and following your tweets. You've got a few people reviewing your book but you need more, so you tweet out to book lovers, offering free books in exchange for a review. Just yesterday this tactic seemed to be the master key you've been looking for! However, today it seems as if all the locks have changed. What am I doing wrong? You may ask yourself. Is it the way I'm wording it? Is it the time of the day? What changed? Sometimes you may just have to realize that there will be good days and there will most definitely be bad days in this hectic world of online marketing. Don't be discouraged! The best thing to do in this situation is keep at it the way you were doing before - send out a mass amount of tweets and in due time the people will get back to you! It's not the end of the world. Keep pushing!

Maybe the Best Way to Sell is to...Not Sell?

Good afternoon (or whichever time of the day it is for you :) everyone! How are you today? I've been spending my days off completely immersed in the social media world pushing my book as if my life depended on it. We all know how tiring online marketing can be whether you're doing it for your book or a business in general but I think I might have reached a breakthrough - don't sell. WHAT?! You might ask, as I asked myself as well. However, you have to think about it. Imagine that you're a tourist in Times Square in New York City and you see all of these flashing lights advertising items and services of various sorts and you also have people on the street in your face trying to get you to purchase something. Everything's moving so fast and you can barely catch up. That's kind of how it is on social media, EVERYONE is trying to get something out there! So how about a new approach? Make friends, talk to people, and slowly ease them into what you do. Lead them to your blog or your twitter and most importantly build a following. In this day and age, having a following is so much more important than the product you're pushing, that is a guaranteed fact. Yes, you may have created a masterpiece but in all honesty no one is really interested in what you've created unless they're truly interested in you. With that being said, head off into the rest of the week with these words marinating in your mind. Happy Tuesday!

#MinuteMondays - An Excerpt from Ch. 6 of 'The Improbable'

Hey everybody, I hope you enjoyed your weekend! As I continue to grow my presence online, I'm learning new ways to engage with readers from all over. With that being said, I want to start something called #MinuteMondays. This will be where I share excerpts from books that I've read and from my own book, just to to enjoy or discuss. I hope you like it! :)

In this scene, David is with his best friends Timmy and Chris at Chicago's Prestigious City Club for a drink. He sees Eva-Marie outside and wants to apologize for his unpleasant behavior but things don't go exactly as planned....

“What do you have to do?” Chris asked.

“Trying to take down Chicago’s Trioxytin producer,” I shrugged. “I’ll be undercover so from now on I’m not David O’Neil…I’m David Finley. And I’m not a cop and my father isn’t the chief.” It was imperative that I let them know in case anyone asked them about me.

“So what do you do…?” Chris eyed me.

“Can we tell whoever asks that you’re a male prostitute?” Timmy asked, looking at me expectantly.

It went silent as Chris and I stared him down with questioning looks followed by our laughter. It was a great feeling taking a break away from the seriousness of the station. “Just say I’m a law student,” I shrugged.

“David Finley, attorney at law!” Chris said in a voice that made me sound like a superhero.

“He said law student you goof,” Timmy shook his head.

“It’s the same thing you idiot.” Chris argued.

“Do you not hear yourself?” Timmy looked at Chris and rolled his eyes.

While they bickered back and forth, a couple eating on the porch outside caught my eye. How long had they been out there? The female was partially facing me; I could only see her lower profile with her sun hat covering the rest. At least seven shopping bags surrounded her feet and a black man who I had recognized from the party sat across from her – Ray. Instantly, I knew it was Eva-Marie. I wanted to see her; I actually felt…bad for being so rude to her.

After she had blown up on me in the elevator, I was mad at myself for being such a big prick to gorgeous woman. She had looked stressed as it was and it was clear that I had only made it worse that day. Everything she had said to me made sense, she’d set me straight like no one ever had. It was…a bit of a turn on. Something inside of me that I couldn’t quite put my finger on just desperately wanted apologize to her. I had no plan of action and I didn’t even think she’d listen to me after the way I acted towards her.

Without thinking about it for too much longer, I rose from my seat and made my way outside. My palms broke out in a cold sweat and I had no clue what I was going to say. Not even a hint at what I was going to say. It felt like my throat had gone dry but at that point it was do or die since I was already standing at their table, behind Ray.

“Eva?” I wasn’t sure if I had meant to say her name as a question or statement. I wanted to go back inside. What was I doing? Usually I had no soft spot for anyone in my heart.

She slowly set down her iced tea. The brim of her sun hat covered one eye but her dark eye was still as intense as if both were uncovered. My God, those eyes! Her brown skin looked radiant against the navy blue and floral print of her thin, short-sleeved dress. Not a curl was out of place and her lips were colored perfectly red once again. She was every bit as stunning as I remembered.

“Yes, that’s me.” She said. Eva lifted her head and her dark eyes focused on me. She raised her eyebrows, probably wondering what I could possibly have to say to her.

The man she was with rose from his seat and turned to see me. “That’s Eva-Marie to you, do you know her?”

“I’m David. David Finley.” I answered and offered him my hand to shake.

Ray shook my hand while he stared at me with squinted eyes. I didn’t like him already with the way he was staring. “Do you know her, Mr. Finley?”

“I do, actually. We met–” I began but Eva cut me off.

“Ray, honey, this is the man that saved me from drowning the night of the party.” She stood. “Now I never got to thank you Mr. Finley,” Eva-Marie took a step closer to me with her arms crossed across her chest, staring at the ground. “As we’ve discussed before.” Her eyes bore into mine and by that I knew she was referring to the elevator incident. “And judging by your attitude in the previous times we’ve ran into each other, I don’t see why I should.” She looked at me expectantly with Ray behind her appearing as if he was ready to jump between us at any moment.

I was in a tough place because I had come to apologize and Eva-Marie didn’t seem like she was willing to accept anything I had to say. Well if she didn’t want it she was going to get it and that was going to be the end of it. I didn’t need her annoying attitude. “Well if you must know that’s why I came out here. Not for a ‘thank you’ but I, myself, wanted to apologize to you. In the incidents that occurred between us, I was out of line. I had no right to yell at you in such a way and for that, I’m sorry. But it seems like you’re not willing to let it go so I’ll just leave it at that then.” I heard her gasp as I turned to walk away. I tried to do something nice and she didn’t want to accept it, I knew I never should’ve walked out there in the first place!

“Hey!” Ray called. He caught up to me and placed a hand on my shoulder.

I turned around immediately and swiped it away forcefully. “You get your goddamn hands off of me.” My anger began to boil.

“What in God’s name possessed you to come out here and speak to my woman like that?” He demanded.

“Maybe if you could control your bitch and her attitude I wouldn’t be talking crazy to her!” I hissed, getting in his face. Eva-Marie’s attitude had lit the fuse and he was going to make me explode. At that point, I was ready to take him out.

“Okay fellas, okay, c’mon break it up!” Timmy’s voice came from behind me and Chris appeared in front of me, pushing me back away from Ray.

Ray chuckled haughtily. “You keep that dog on a leash.”

“Whatever he says doesn’t matter, man.” Chris said trying to get me to make eye contact with him.

“As long as you keep yours on one,” I spat and reluctantly followed Chris and Timmy back inside.

On Twitter and It's FREEBIE FRIDAY!

Hey everyone, happy Friday! What do you have planned for this weekend? I'll be working as usual. Sigh. I'm also going to through myself into marketing in all of my free time this weekend so pray I don't hurt myself trying to do this (haha). Also, I'm now on Twitter (@_tiarajames) so feel free to follow for any updates :) ATTENTION TO THE MONEY SAVERS: Today (Jul 24) and tomorrow I will be giving away my book, The Improbable for FREE! So tell everyone and head on over to Amazon to download it - you can also click on the 'books' tab here on the blog and it will direct you to the download link!

For Readers AND Writers!

It's been a while...once again! Lol. Well between working every day of the week and stressing over only to get accepted into my dream school in New York City (The Fashion Institute of Technology!), I found some time to escape to Georgia with my two closest friends and forgot to post this video. I would really like to get this going so by the time I'm in school I've racked up a good amount of followers! Spread with your fellow readers and writers!

Author Request - Itsy Bitsy Book Bits

Hello everyone and happy Monday! Yet again it's been a long time since I've posted anything. However, now that I have a full week off of work due to a vacation that never happened... I have time to get to work on marketing and blogging! It took a lot to get myself in the mood to want to get on the computer and puts hours into this but then I just had to keep thinking - 'The book is not going to put itself out there'. So after I logged onto Facebook, I saw that I received a message from Itsy Bitsy Book Bits asking to fill out a form to let them know whether I wanted to participate in an author interview, a giveaway, and plenty of other activities to just kind of get my name out there as an author as well as my book. I wanted to share this with everyone just in case you are an author or know an author trying to get themselves started in the industry! Also, Itsy Bitsy Book Bits was one of the first Facebook pages to promote my book. So spread the word! Here's the link to the form for you to fill out!

http://goo.gl/forms/7Ro8qbwh1Y

What's Holding You Back?

Sears Tower

Hello everyone! I've taken a long break of about 10 days not because trying to find help with marketing is very very VERY exhausting. In fact, it's so exhausting that I had to plan a mini getaway to Chicago with my best friend to clear my mind. Now with a clear mind I feel like I know what it is that I have to do in order to see an increase in sales and a growth in audience. Stick to my original marketing plan. The only reason I haven't gone through with my original marketing plan was due to the lack of money - you know that little green piece of paper that happens to control the world we live in? Yeah, of course you do. Sigh. Being a college student is hard as it is, but throw in a rental car that I'd been renting since the beginning of May and the result is all of my paychecks being cut in half. Double sigh. However, recently I purchased a 2015 Scion so my hopes now are to have my bank account level out so I can start pouring money into marketing. It may take about a month or so but that's where keeping my head held high and having faith in the success of my book comes in - I have to know that nothing is going to happen overnight. Whatever it is that's holding you back from getting your book out there the way it should be, create a plan to overcome it! After all, life is all about getting through the adversities - what would life be without them?

Gaining Momentum....

Everyone should always always ALWAYS prepare and brace themselves when it comes to marketing their books. If you don't have a team (as you would if you traditionally publish) to do it for you, then you'd better know that there are hours upon hours of staring at a computer screen and copying and pasting the same message - that all can add up to extreme exhaustion. When I first started a few days ago, I simply looked up sites that promoted books; that search wore me out the first day. It was very boring and I just felt like no one was going to reply (side note: you're going to send out A LOT of emails with no reply). So a few days later, I chose to try a different tactic, due to not wanting to jinx it I'm not going to speak on it too much (yes, I'm childish for that I know lol). However, this new tactic seems to work better than my first one. So anyways, the point of this post: gaining momentum. In relevance to authors, this means building your audience so you can have people talking about it. Let's be honest, once you put your book out there for the world to take hold of, it's NOT going to just 'catch on' and continue to spread like wildfire (if it does then you're literally just so lucky!). Each day I learn that what I put into it is what I'm going to get out of it, though that's something you're taught all the time you never really get it until it applies to your own life. When you wrote the book, you had a plan for it; so just like when you wrote the book, create a plan for it to gain momentum. Do free promotions, discount it, do whatever it takes to get your book out there! Unless you're James Patterson or E.L James, don't worry about sales in the beginning.

The Online Marketing Beast is Born.....

Photo Credit to Stacy Rodriguez

And so, after working what seems like nonstop for the past week since my book has been released online at Amazon.com, I have two days off. Of course my first thought was to take the day (Sunday) to go to church with my best friend, grab some Indian food (my fave), spend some time at the mall, and then head home to chill on the couch and watch all of my favorite movies that are being played. I'm talking, the best movie day you could think of - Lord of the Rings, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (one of the all time faves), and Think Like a Man! HOWEVER, I had to remind myself that I'm an author now...I always have to be working. Meaning I always have to be getting my book out there in some way shape or form. So it is time for me to consult the notes I made in my phone long ago to start my online marketing venture. Initially I was a marketing major at the University of the Virgin Islands....maybe I should've kept it that way. LOL, just kidding I'm still keeping my fingers crossed about getting off the waiting list at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City!

Happy Loving Day!!

In the event of LOVING DAY(the 48th anniversary of the Supreme Court overturning laws that banned interracial marriages) and its relation to my book which tells the story of Eva and David (an interracial couple), I had to post this (from newstome.blog.ajc.com)! If you're reading 'The Improbable', how far along are you? What are your thoughts? Comment to discuss, I love to hear from you! FYI, this book isn't just an interracial kind of book (meaning you don't have to be a black female who likes white males or a white female that likes black men) it's literally for any and everyone who falls in love with their story. This is a book for everyone so leave your worries at the door and start reading and falling in love!

F R E E !

(Teen Books Free Logo)

Who doesn't love free? No one. That's why I decided I'd make my book available for free and the results exceeded my expectations. The order numbers jumped from 7 to 145 books in one day! Haha, I don't care about the money just yet I really just want people to enjoy the story I'm putting out there! I'm actually very glad I decided to take this independent, online publishing route. I created my own cover with no one nagging me about what's going to 'sell to the market', I didn't have to wait MONTHS OR YEARS for an agent (even though I sent out plenty of queries and was rejected by quite a few, still waiting to hear from some more), and I got to get it out there super quick so there was no 'we'll release this in 2050 when the market is ready' -_- The only downside I would say to publishing so quickly is not having it properly edited for grammar. I hate when I'm rereading and STILL find errors, like I can't believe with the number of times I've gone over it there's still things I missed! Oh well, in due time all the necessary changes will be made (grammatical). ANY WHO, so I made my book free; initially the free dates were from June 9-June 13, but I decided that was too long, so I wanted to change it to June 9-June 11th. I messed something up so it won't be free on the 10th (SORRY) but will remain free on the dates from the 11th to the 12th (YAY). Back to the point - making it free and available to anyone opened a lot of doors, teenbooksfree.com even posted my book on there website which I believe is where a lot of the traffic came from! It makes me so happy to go to sleep knowing there are around 160 people around the world reading a story that I created. I will NEVER get over this feeling!

PUBLISHED!!!

SOOOOO, I hit 'Publish' on Amazon on June 6th and didn't bother checking anything since. Today after I came home from an 8-hr long orientation for my second job, I decided to share the link on my Facebook and Instagram. I then proceeded to check my sales on Amazon just for the heck of it, kind of laughing to myself knowing I hadn't sold anything because I hadn't done any marketing. To my absolute surprise, I HAD SOLD 7 BOOKS WITH ONE OF THEM BEING IN FRANCE!!!!! The first thing I did was smile and post about it on Facebook, and then I called my mom. After talking to my mom, I cried with tears of pure joy. The feeling of people being in the possession of my hard work is something that I can't even explain! I'm so excited to see where this goes. Yes, the numbers aren't that impressive but with time they will be and I'll be grateful whether it's 10 books or 10,000 books sold. So I guess you could say today was a VERY GOOD DAY! And called for one (or two) well-deserved glasses of wine. :) Sorry if the quality of this picture is so S-wordy (lol), I broke my iphone 5C and had to way down-grade to a 4....not even a 4S...a 4. Let that sink in.

Bienvenue Everyone!

Okay so this is my first blog post...
First and foremost, I want this to be a community for people that are just as excited about this book as I am! When I say that I mean the kind of people who would enjoy dressing up like it's 1950 everyday, partying carefree, and driving around in a vintage drop-top convertible on the way to get ice cream. Words can't express how ecstatic I am to share this story with the world, I've never been so excited about a project of mine - mainly because this is the first project I've gone all the way through with. I put a lot of thought and hard work into this novel, I became obsessed with David and Eva's love story and I hope you do as well. Feel free to contact me with questions or comments!

- Tiara James, 2015

The view from my dorm room in St. Thomas, USVI; A picture I took the day I finished writing The Improbable