Book Trailer, 101

Book trailers are fast becoming the next hot commodity for emarketing books. Like movie trailers, they provide prospective readers a glimpse of your book and even offer wonderful and free venues to air them. Namely, YouTube(www.youtube.com) and Preview The Book(www.previewthebook.com) as well as placing them on your blogs and websites.

But, I don't know the first thing about creating a book trailer, you admit rather dejectedly.

I didn't know anything either about the process, but I've found ways around my lack of computer saavy. Here's how I created my book trailer which you can view below on the 'Introduction' post of this blog.

I had absolutely no experience on the subject until about a year ago when I wanted to revive a crime suspense novel I'd released, December, 2006 under another pen name, that had not gotten much PR. One, it was my first published novel, and two, I was greener than Spring grass:)

I fell upon a peer author who created and produced trailers and was gracious enough to work with me on mine for a nominal--and I must add--a reasonable fee. She tutored me on the ins and outs and worked me through the below steps. All of which helped me when it came to my current release, Curse of the Marhime.

1. Consider carefully the theme and mood of your book.

2. Go to stock photo sites and peruse photos that would work to describe your story and even represent your characters. The stock photos sites I use are http://www1.istockphoto.com and http://dreamstime.com/. These sites do charge as little as $1 per photo but are royalty free. Membership is free and it's easy to register. There are free stock photo sites out there, but I prefer the knowledge that I have definite rights to the photos.

3. Go to stock music sites and choose music you feel would work with the mood and theme as well. This is more grueling than searching pictures but well worth the work it entails to pull the perfect music for you trailer. I use www.sounddogs.com. Again there are free music downloading sites but I choose to be sure of my rights.

4. Now you've selected photos and music, you'll need to write a script. Curse of the Marhime runs two minutes so my script had to reflect this. You can begin with a one minute trailer, as well. A word of advise, I would not go over the two minute mark because they tend to become boring and readers may lose interest. I actually wrote more than necessary but my producer(Allie Boniface) took the script tags that worked best with the photos. I created my script and pictures around the events as they unfold within the book, so it was easy to write. Sort of like outlining the story.

5. Production. This step is lost to me so I turned it all over to my producer. She put the trailer together and then sent me a preview. Curse of the Marhime trailer was perfect on the first viewing and needed no revision process!

I am thrilled with its outcome and am confident that it will entice readers to rush out and purchase my book.

6. Get that trailer out there! Prior to having your release date, you can load the trailer on YouTube and, of course, your own blog/website to get exposure. Once your have a release date, you will want to load it on Preview the Book a very popular site for readers to check out upcoming book releases. And all are free! What could be better? Your publisher will probably have a venue of exposure for you trailer as well, so don't forget to ask.

I hope this information is helpful and I would like to take a moment to direct you to a very talented woman and author, Allie Boniface, if you would like help creating your book trailer. She will work with you or do it all. Fees depend on the level of work and research she does on each project. Please see contact information below:

http://www.allieboniface.com

To sample Allie's work, please visit her YouTube page:

http://youtube.com/user/AllieB1970

Thanks, as always, for dropping by.

Next discussion: The importance of copyrighting your work. Hints and information on how and why you should do it.

It's done!

Curse of the Marhime is a done deal! I put the finishing touches, made all the corrections, looked it over once...
twice...
make that several more times before I finally said enough is enough! And with quivering, hesitant fingers, I attached the file containing my final galley proof and pushed the send button before my brain could manage another delay signal.

Such is the life of an author. I don't know about you, but I am never satisfied. I could proof the manuscript again and again, making changes each time until...

Well, you get the message. I'd never let it go.

Now I move on to the planning of marketing and publicity of my book while I await my release date.

First thing I've done, as you all know, is create this blog. My hopes are my blog and existing website will generate hits and interest. My goal is to establish an internet presense, very important in today's cyber-friendly environment.

I have also requested membership to several author and reader groups so I can gain a following and aid other authors to do the same. It's a big world out there but a small circle, so to speak. You never know who you will rub elbows, and a good motto to live by is "pay it forward."

More on my marketing plans in future posts, but stay tuned because I will talk about creating a book trailer in my next blog session. To sample Curse of the Marhime's trailer, please scroll down to my "Introduction" post. I'll discuss exactly how it was created.

Thanks for stopping by:)

See you soon...

Cold Read Discussion and 'Curse' earns first rave review!

I awoke this morning, shuffled into the kitchen, turned on the laptop, and put a much needed pot of chocolate truffle coffee on, as is my daily habit. I'd been up until 2:30 in the morning working on this and that, so you can well imagine the fog hovering within my brain.

Coffee in hand, I fired up my AOL and checked my email. Nervous energy set my limbs tingling and a hord of butterflies loose in my belly. My 'cold read' review sat staring back at me from the mailbox. Uh, oh...

Non-the-less, I clicked the email open and put a tight reign on my expectations. No, that's not true, I expected the worse. In most things, I'm pretty optimistic but when it comes to my writing, I seem to lean the opposite direction. Go figure.

Perhaps, I should back up a moment and explain the 'Cold Read' concept. I decided I wanted to be absolutely certain there would be no embarrassing errors or issues post-publication of my book, so I chose to send the book out for two unbiased cold reads. One was a professional editor who knew absolutely nothing about me or my story, the other a family member who, basically, loves to read.

Results:

Family member read turned up two typos and positive feedback.

Professional editor came back with a four page review/report of the book including--yes! not horrendous, but a list of errors missed in an extremely grueling editing process.

Moral of this story:

No matter how we strive, and even the editors strive, to make our novels perfect, it seems it is impossible not to miss something. I strongly urge any author to consider this step in your galley process before sending that final proof to production. It certainly panned out for me, and you can rest assured that I will take this step with every project I send to production.

Now for the best part. The review!

"You have a winner here with 'Curse of the Marhime.' Great story idea, colorful and three-dimensional characters, tension, passion and sweetness all mixed up in sexy shape-shifters, magic and mayhem."

Cold read review done by Lill Farrell, Staff editor, The Wild Rose Press

An Introduction...

What to say? Hmm...

Let me begin with a brief introduction. The name is Dayana Knight. I thrive on the darker side of the wood and wander the shadowed scape of misted forests and haunted dreams. Give me a full moon and a hot Were or Vampire and I am one happy girl.

Currently I am launching my debut Paranormal series, Roma Wolf Tales, Book I, The Curse of the Marhime. The release date has not yet been determined but, by all means, please stay tuned as I will post it the moment I have it. For now though, please check out the trailer which I have conveniently placed above if you haven't already done so.

Now onto the blogging at hand. I hope you visit often because I will have lots to reveal about my future plans for this series and other projects, tips on writing, getting published, tricks of the trade, contests, give aways, and just plain rants.

Well...

for now I'll say goodnight. I hope you will visit with me often and please don't be shy, I'd love to hear from you.

Talk to you soon:)