Surviving another 1 star review

 Nothing can bring me down quite so quickly as a 1 star review. The worst is when it has no accompanying worded review. Why didn't they like it??? All other reviews received have been 5 stars. So now I'm second guessing everything that makes me an author. I liked the book. The kids that read it liked the book. 

 

It's like my baby. And that baby just won the Ugly Baby contest. Deep down, a part of me asks, Is the book really that bad? Did they mean to click 5 stars and accidentally hit 1? Yeah, probably not. 

BUT... if you're going to hit someone with 1 star, have the decency to back it up with some detail.

Because 1 star sits like a brick in the pit of my stomach.

 So, if you as a reader feel the need for some reason to deliver the worst review possible, at least make the effort to inform the public what you didn't like about the work. Because I'm open to criticism and I'm not saying I'm the perfect writer. I'm far from it. The thing is, I have no idea what's wrong with my book.

Self doubt has been my enemy. And I worry about how I can sell my book to the public this weekend. But I will lift my chin, take a deep breath to calm the nervous butterflies and present the work to the best of my ability.

Please be kind to each other.

Write on!

Angie

Imaginarium Convention 2021 - Louisville

It was nice to be back in Louisville, Kentucky for the Imaginarium Convention. Almost for a moment, we could forget COVID didn’t happen. Happily vaccinated authors, gamers and film makers filled the rooms at Holiday Inn. Old friends got to re-acquaint with each other and new friendships grew.

Panels and workshops were plentiful and informative. I had 3 panels to sit on: Young Adult, Paranormal, and Children’s Lit. The events were so well-attended, I chose to sit out of the Paranormal panel – already 5 panelists; so for the sake of social distancing, I sat out.

Great questions were asked and the panelists readily imparted their wisdom. Almost ever table in the Vendors Hall and Creative’s Alley was occupied with a merchant.

On Saturday after hours, an awards banquet was held to honor 2020 and 2021 winners in various categories. I had the honor to accept Best Children’s Book for 2020 for My Mom Is Sick and It’s Okay.

Imaginarium is such a great event for networking and creating new alliances. The event serves to boost confidence in everyone.

Now that Imaginarium has concluded, it leaves a feeling of excitement for what next year will bring!

June Book Selling Events!

 I have June events scheduled to sell books! It's been one year and seven months since I've been to such an event. For some reason, I'm terribly nervous! And really excited, too. I have eight new books to debut that include several children's books (and corresponding coloring books).

Now that I'm fully vaccinated, I feel a little more comfortable going out in public. Unfortunately my daughter's age hasn't been called for the vaccine yet, but we're still wearing masks when we go to stores. Outdoor events we feel more comfortable now.

My first two events in June are all outdoors. I have masks ready and hand sanitizer on the ready to place on my selling tables. July is my one and only event that is indoors, but it's usually pretty small and I'll be fully masked.

Now is the time where I need to remember what my pitch is for each book I have. It's been so long, I've forgotten how to quickly tell someone interested a little bit about my book without stumbling over words.

Everyone stay healthy and write on!

Angie

Designing covers is hard! COVER reveal

 I usually delegate the job of cover designer to my husband - the computer guru. I took for granted how hard it was. I decided with the next two books in my young readers series, Hay Days, that I would do all the work. I used Krita to produce my cover. There are so many buttons to click and so many things to learn with this program. After a brief tutorial (and several re-visits to my husband to explain again) I managed to complete 2 covers. 

When I did my first cover - a coloring book named Amazing Horses, I used Publisher. And it was easy and simple. But I learned it was very limited or impossible, if I wanted to make any changes. Soon, it became evident that I needed a more advanced program for future book covers. A program that used layers to make a more well-rounded design. 

 

So this was the photo that would be the main subject for my cover. Meet Mindy, my 27 year old Quarter Horse. She's turned out to be an excellent cover model. (She'll work for carrots.)

Thirteen layers four days later, this is the cover design courtesy of Krita:

Designing covers will get easier with every cover I do. It only takes time and patience (lots of patience). I'm looking forward to finishing more books so I can jump back onto Krita and get my creative juices flowing.

I'm so looking forward to bringing my two new books to summer book events! I'm hoping the kids like my cover and book idea as much as I do!

Dream big and write on!

Angie McPherson

New barn kittens become newest book muse! Misty's Wish

 2020 was such a rough year, but one of the bright spots was in late summer we adopted 2 barn kittens to bring to our horse barn. We had 2 aging barn cats (more than 12 years with us) but the brother cat, Nooshy, went away to pass on. That left Lucy and we thought it a good time to bring in a couple of new kittens. The plan wasn't to give Lucy a replacement, but we thought Lucy might be a good teacher to the new kittens. At first, she didn't like them at all. Months later, she still barely tolerates them, but the kittens don't seem to mind.

The kittens came from a Barn Cat Program from our local Southern Indiana animal shelter. They were both tortoiseshell females. Very shy at first, but now they won't let you leave the barn without some quality petting time.

Misty

Pumpkin

 

So, with the new additions came a new book and a matching coloring book! Misty's Wish is a story about a barn kitten that feels out of place in the barn and wishes for something more. The story emulates the new kittens life - including interaction with a skunk and Misty's excessively vocalizations. In other words, she's got something to say and she's letting everyone know!

Misty's Wish: Picture Book

 

 

Misty's Wish: Coloring Book

 

 

I had a lot of fun writing this story and was excited to work with Asiri Kulathunga,  I worked with for My Mom Is Sick and It's Okay again for all the illustrations.

So, if you're looking for a cute book about a kitten that wished for more, please check out my books on Amazon! And if the stars line up later this year, I'll have them on hand at some book events. (I'm going to keep thinking positive about this!)

Happy reading to all!

Angie

Making my first EVER book trailer!

 So, I attempted my very first book trailer... ever... this week. The idea came up while I was in my online book group meeting. No one had made a book trailer before. Me, being a glutton for punishment, volunteered myself to do what had never been done before!

My only criteria: spend no money. I know paying someone to do this would be better. I'm not THAT computer literate. But I also realize I don't have much of a platform to make paying someone worthwhile. I've heard book trailers don't help with sales. My thought on this, is it might help. Even if I get one sale from this, I'll be in the black. So, other than the time it takes me to make this book trailer, I'm not really out anything.

The first thing I did was do some research on the internet. I found that I can make my trailer on PowerPoint. That's great because I'm sort of familiar with that program (had to do some of my Masters as a PowerPoint presentation, as well as this summer I completed 2 presentations on PP for Imaginarium Convention on coloring and children's books).

To PowerPoint I went. This will be quick and in a nutshell, mainly because I'm not an expert and don't want to be responsible for telling people how to do things wrong! 

I came up with:

-Background (courtesy of Pixabay)

- Sample illustrations from book (4 or 5)

- Simple points of text

- Music (courtesy of Pixabay)

 

Some trailers are several minutes long. I chose something less than a minute. I wanted it short and sweet and to the point. With the help of my very tech-savvy husband, I was able to complete the book trailer and post it in a couple of hours. I know each time I do this, I'll be able to cut the time down, as well, if I decide to do more book trailers.

So, without further adieu, here's my book trailer below. I also have it on YouTube (first time I've ever posted anything on that site, too). 

 YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gbGZoTdfHM

 Now I'll wait to see if I have more book sales due to this posting! Here's to hoping it does!

Until next time!

Write on!

Angie

 

Back to the Norm... soon... hopefully!

 Sorry, it's been so long since I've last written. This pandemic is wearing me out, between working from home and taking care of kiddo. We've had some changes over the summer and even had to live in a camper for a few months while our house was being fixed. We're back inside and it looks great.

Some great news, My Mom Is Sick and It's Okay won first place for Children's Book in the Imadjinn Awards from Imaginarium. This year, the convention went online, but it was a great time and I had a lot of fun being on various writing panels.

I'm currently working on 3 new releases for the kids:

* Book 2 for Hay Days - Emma Gets Schooled (Chapter Book for Young Readers)

* Misty's Wish - Children's Picture book about an adopted kitten that wishes for more

* Snipping Loses a Shoe - Children's Picture book about a horse that loses his shoes and all the barn animals chip in to find it

Stay tuned and let's hope for a safe, effective vaccine so we can get back out there for book events (and other great things)!

Write on!

Angie