So You Want Your Book Reviewed and Don't Know Where to Start?

When I look back through my writing journey, I realize my mistake was not having a definite plan in place. My goal was to submit to agents and editors and get my book published. I didn’t need to worry about my brand. I didn’t need to do preliminary marketing even though I’d read this was something you should do months before your book is released. I was too busy writing to worry about selling.

In hindsight, I wished I’d paid more attention.

Yes, you can create a vibrant community of raving fans on Facebook who spread the word about you and your books. I point you to Amy Poterfield, Facebook guru.  But that’s for another post.

If, like me, you don’t have an army of raving FB fans, you need reviews. But where do you go to find reviewers. Search the Internet and ask friends.

I started working my way through a spreadsheet of reviewers available to members of the  Indie Romance Ink loop. I marked off the first twenty very quickly. Either they didn’t review paranormal romances or they didn't review ebooks.

Then I got a short list of potential reviewers from a friend:

To Read or Not to Read

Manga Mania Cafe

Joleene Naylor

Rai 29 Book Read N Review
Rainy Day Ramblings
Known To Read

There For You

But I found a gold mine when Kim Jacobs, Publisher of Turquoise Morning Press recommended Manic Readers. If you aren’t familiar with Manic Readers, Author Promotion Made Easy. Don’t walk. Run to the site. It’s awesome. Jump in and create an account.

Look at the home page graphic below. You can see I’m on the list for adding a book and updating my author page.

By clicking on the links you can create your author page, insert pictures, add your bio, links to where you can be found on the web and even a book trailer.

Now, create your book page by clicking My Books, Add a Book. You can even provide a free read.

Here’s what my book page looks like. I need to go back and do some editing. Click on the pencil and it will take you back to the Add a Book page.  I can now add a free read.

Now we get to the fun part. Click the Request Review tab

And this is what you get. You’ll notice that “You Gotta Read Reviews” is the only name with a check box. That’s because I had already requested reviews from everyone else. That’s 19 reviewers in one place. How cool is that!

I still have some work to do and more information to add. It took a couple of hours and I had to send an email to figure out how to edit my information. I got an email within a few hours (it was Easter Sunday after all). They resolved my issue and told me about the editing pencil (between the name of my book and the red x).

Well, that’s what I learned yesterday! I’ll do some more poking around today and see what I can find. If you have some reviewer sites you'd like to share, post them in the comment section below.

In the meantime, I'm planning to run in the The Arboretum, State Botanical Garden of Kentucky and here’s today’s running song.

Happy writing and running, Kathy