I’ve posted several things here about my journey to publication and my experiences after. I thought in my continuing efforts to share this rather remarkable journey, I thought I’d do a series about the things which are cool, and still a bit surreal. Attending conventions as a speaker is pretty high up there, but I’ve already posted about attending New York Comic Con last year and C2E2 a few weeks ago. I’ve also posted about doing signings/readings/meet & greets. A common factor those share is meeting fans. For the most part, the people I meet aren’t fans yet. They’re typically just people who attended the panel I was on, or stopped by the bookstore while I was there, either for an event or just stopping in. In short, they’re people who haven’t read the book yet, and I get the chance to interest them in reading it. Meeting these people is great, and I love the fact that more than a few have been genuinely interested in reading my books after meeting me.
Just recently though, I’ve started getting legitimate fan mail. As in emails or posts to Facebook from people I don’t know who just wanted to tell me they really enjoyed my book(s). This is rather surreal, but also exceedingly awesome! I don’t know as every author feels this way, and I’m sure the more popular authors can’t keep up with the inflow of messages, but as for me, it’s nice to get the positive feedback from readers. Please, feel free to drop me a line. I know from the other writers I’ve met and talked to, we all struggle sometimes, worried how our latest book will do, so if you’ve read something and you like it, there are a few things you can do.

1. Send the author a note. Though as I said above, best seller author probably won’t be able to reply back, as much as they’d like to.
2. Post a review. I know it seems straightforward, but posting a review on one of the various sites (Goodreads, Amazon,Barnes & Noble, etc) is helpful not just to tell others you enjoyed the book, but also to us authors. Despite what advice might be given, we read our reviews…all of them.
3. Tell a friend. Let someone you know about this book you really liked. Better yet, if you really liked the book, pick up a copy and give it to them.

Writers write because it’s what we love to do, and in many cases, something we did before we were getting paid for, and would likely be doing even if we weren’t. That being said, the most common dream of a writer is to be able to earn enough from writing to make a living. Trust me when I tell you, having a “day job” and being a writer leads to some very exhausting days. Make no mistake though, it’s a labor of love, and hearing that someone really enjoyed something we wrote makes it all worth while.

So on behalf of writers everywhere (yes, it’s pretty damn presumptious, but what the hell). Thanks, please keep reading, and please, pretty please, with sugar and a cherry on top, review and spread the word.