Market Your Novels Without Social Media

I have been a big fan of the podcast Writing Off Social for a while now, and I met the podcast hosts, Sandy and Mary K., at the 2025 Novel Marketing Conference.

I had taken their Writing Off Social—the Course Lite, and while I was very, very good, I felt it didn’t have as many insights for fiction authors as opposed to nonfiction authors. Which makes sense since Sandy and Mary K. both write nonfiction.

When I talked to them about it at the conference, I spouted off some feedback I had come up with while listening to their course, and they asked me to write it down in an email and send it to them. Well, I had time to wait at the airport and it turned into a huge long email missive with lots of information.

They were very gracious and invited me to join them for an interview on their podcast, which was totally exciting! It was my first podcast interview! I was a complete dork!

But we didn’t talk about everything in the email I’d written to them since we didn’t have time.

I thought it might be helpful to take what I’d already written and separate them into several blog posts, which might help other fiction authors who want to market their books without using social media.

Comments

Writing Fight Scenes

I love martial arts movies and action flicks. So naturally I'd write action scenes. I discovered that it takes a slightly different writing style. These are some of the things I learned, although this list isn't exhaustive by any means. Action-Reaction A fight scene is always Action-Reaction. He punches, she staggers back. She kicks, he blocks and swings a fist at her. Watch out for putting your reaction before your action: She staggered back when he slammed his fist into her shoulder. The rule of thumb is to have each action-reaction have its own paragraph, although that’s not always possible. Sometimes the sentences are too short for their own paragraphs and can be combined. It’s up to the writer how to format it: He swung a roundhouse punch. She bent backward and felt his knuckles swish past her nose. versus: He swung a roundhouse punch. She bent backward and felt his knuckles swish past her nose. Short sentences = fast reading flow Use short sentences and phrases to make re...

How to write a kiss

There was a question on the writer’s Discord server that I’m on where someone asked how to write a kiss. They weren’t specifically asking me, but I was able to give a short answer for how I write kisses. I write and read traditional romances, so my kiss scenes tend to be heavily influenced by the genre and by how my editors critiqued my manuscripts. You basically want to focus on the emotion of the kiss and how the kiss makes the point of view character feel, as opposed to going deep into physical detail. Ideally, the description will show that the kiss is something special and not just them macking. For example the kiss made her feel ___. Or the kiss was ___ which made it seem that he felt ___ for her. “The kiss made her feel as if she were incredibly precious to him.” “His lips were gentle and almost tentative, as if he were afraid of frightening her.” “The kiss surprised her and yet felt as familiar as if they’d kissed a thousand times before. The kiss felt like home.” I...

What’s a chapter-by-chapter synopsis?

Some editors or agents ask for a chapter-by-chapter synopsis. Not all of them do, so don’t automatically assume you need one. However, it’s the easiest type of synopsis to write, in my opinion. It’s simply a list of each chapter number, and then a couple sentences describing what happens in the chapter. Any significant spiritual or internal conflicts should be included, as well as major plot points, red herrings, symbolism, etc. The chapter-by-chapter synopsis will take the reader on a shortened version of the same ride you’ll give your novel reader, so include the dead ends and frustrations and obstacles that beset your characters. Each major character should be named, and minor characters can also be named if they have a significant impact on the storyline. However, peripheral characters shouldn’t be named in a chapter-by-chapter synopsis. I usually write a chapter-by-chapter synopsis first, then cut that down to a 1-2 page synopsis which I use for my proposals. Most proposals call f...

Story Sensei

Search This Blog