The Binding Stone Released!

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TheBindingStonecoverfinishIt’s been a busy six months. On top of work on volume 3 of Journeys of Wonder (which is slated to arrive next month) we’ve also been hard at work on Fuzzbom Publishing’s first novel – The Binding Stone, by Lisa Gail Green.

And finally, we’re excited to announce that the book is for sale on kindle. You can get your copy for $3.99 here.

This novel was a pleasure to work on – and we’re so incredibly proud to have been a part of it. It’s got a little bit of everything: action, romance, adventure, seals…and is a non stop thrill ride from start to finish. Here’s the description from Amazon’s website:

Tricked into slavery by the man she loved, the Djinni Leela has an eternity to regret her choices.

Awakened in the prison of her adolescent body, she finds a new master in possession of the opal that binds her. But seventeen-year-old Jered is unlike any she’s seen. His kindness makes Leela yearn to trust again, to allow herself a glimmer of hope.

Could Jered be strong enough to free her from the curse of the Binding Stone?

In addition, we’ve also set up two new websites…both of which are a work in progress. The first is www.djinntracker.com and is dedicated to The Binding Stone and The Djinn Series (of which The Binding Stone is book 1).

The second is www.fuzzbompublishing.com which is the main site for Fuzzbom Publishing. However, due to our already established following here, the Journeys of Wonder blog will still be the place to go for all Fuzzbom Publishing news.

As we noted, both of these websites are in a raw phase and contain little more than links to buy our books. Over the next few months though, we’ll be adding content and expanding each site.

Also, in the following weeks we’ll be discussing the launch of this book including the process of putting it together and setting up a small press. We’ll also discuss our pricing choices and why we currently decided to enroll it in KDP select.

But for now simply enjoy The Binding Stone

Interview with Author Lisa Gail Green

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Today on the Enchanted Inkpot, our cover artist, Lisa Amowitz, interviewed our author, Lisa Gail Green, about her upcoming book: The Binding Stone.

It’s a fantastic interview – and really gives an insight into our publication process. You can read it here.

And look for the Binding Stone to be released on kindle and paperback this May!

Does Advertising a Free Promotion Work?

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Yesterday we ran an experiment.

We’ve been running free promotions on our books for some time, and, as we documented here, it’s because those promotions always translate into an uptick in sales.

However, free promotions take a lot of work. In the weeks leading up to our promotion we’re listing the book with various sites and twitter/facebook feeds (as documented here). On the days of the promotion we’re listing ourselves on daily feeds and constantly getting the word out to organizations that deal with free books.

It’s a lot of work.

But does it even help?

To find out, we listed volume 2 for free secretly. We did absolutely no promotion. We didn’t advertise it on our website. We didn’t even mention it to our friends or family. It was just another day in the life for our book, except for the fact that it was free.

So what were the results?

Prior to this promotion we ran two multi-day promotions for Volume 2. One in December and one in February. While both of these promotions ran for multiple days, in both cases we noticed that the majority of our downloads came on day 1.

December 2012: 557 downloads domestically.

February 2013: 479 downloads domestically.

Neither of these were considered particularly successful numbers as we easily break 1000 downloads in our volume 1 promotions. Still, they provide a good benchmark, especially given how close in number they are. Plus for both of these the advertising we did was generally the same (the only major difference between the two was that the Feb promotion was done in conjunction with a free promotion for volume 1).

Now the big question…how did we do with no promotion at all?

April 2013: 13 downloads domestically.

That’s right – just 13.

So, what does this all mean.

1. Obviously advertising helps. People like free things and letting them know it’s there leads to more downloads. We expected this.

2. However, we also expected a few more downloads than this. What this means is the book isn’t getting enough exposure outside of free promotions. If it were, more than 13 people would have discovered it was free in one day – especially since some of those people probably found it through websites that simply scour Amazon for free books.

3. The time spent working on advertising is worth it.

We still don’t know which aspects of the advertising lead to the most downloads. We’re convinced some of the sites we list with lead to a great number of downloads while others lead to few or even none. Since we’re running them all concurrently, it’s impossible to tell which is which. We hope to explore individual advertising opportunities more in the future.

Have any of you had any experience with free promotion advertising? Please let us know in the comments below.

 

The Binding Stone ARCs

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There has been much excitement about “The Binding Stone” cover, and people are already excited about the book – at least according to Goodreads. Already 44 people have marked the book to be read.

TheBindingStonecoverfinishThe book is scheduled to come out next month, as we’re currently working on the formatting and print design. In the meantime, in about a week, we’ll have a limited number of advanced reading copies for reviewers.

If you are a reviewer and are interested in receiving an ARC, please leave us a comment below or email us at BindingStoneARC@journeysofwonder.com.

All we ask in return is that the review (and it should be an honest review) be placed on Amazon when the book is released.

Djinn: The Binding Stone Cover Reveal

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We are pleased to reveal the cover for Fuzzbom Publishing’s upcoming book: Djinn: The Binding Stone by Lisa Gail Green.

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The cover was created by the incredibly talented Lisa Amowitz – and more of her work can be seen here.

And here’s a brief description of the book:

Tricked into slavery by the man she loved, the Djinni Leela has an eternity to regret her choices.

Awakened in the prison of her adolescent body, she finds a new master in possession of the opal that binds her. But seventeen-year-old Jered is unlike any she’s seen. His kindness makes Leela yearn to trust again, to allow herself a glimmer of hope.

Could Jered be strong enough to free her from the curse of the Binding Stone?

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We’re so excited about this book – and we’re amazed by the cover. Visit us on Goodreads which already has an active page set up where you can list it to be read.

Djinn: The Binding Stone will release this spring on Kindle and paperback. But we’ll have a limited number of Advanced Reading Copies available sooner than that. If you’re interested in being an advanced reviewer, please let us know in the comments below. We just ask for an honest review of the book to be placed on Goodreads and the Amazon page once it’s active.

What do you think of the cover?

Volume 3 Cover + Interview!

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While the current free promotion for Volume 1 and 2 is still going on, we’re also hard at work on Volume 3 which we expect to release next month. It features 5 brand new stories and an incredible cover by artist Jenny Ceja Lee. Jenny was also kind enough to give us an interview on her entire process.

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1. Hi Jenny! Thank you so much for your amazing work on the cover for Volume 3. To begin with, can you tell us when you first knew you wanted to become an artist? What got you into art?

I started drawing ever since I learned to hold a pencil. From a very young age, I drew on everything: from place-mats and books, to the white walls of my parents’ house. They bought me reams of paper, sketchpads and a variety of drawing media to encourage my talent and discourage the would-be Michelangelo paintings on the walls.

 

2. How did you get the idea for the cover of Journeys of Wonder: Volume 3?

I have always fancied fantastical beasts, especially dragons, but they are a bit overdone these days. So, I meshed several creatures into one for more of a chimera look. From there, the background evolved into a lush jungle, which allowed me to work in some nice eye-catching colors, while trying to create a sense of mystery.

3. Tell us a little bit about your process in designing the cover.

We started with the concept of the monster, and iterated through a few different ideas of what the background should look like. Once we had settled on all the basics, I started illustrating out the details and gradually built upon those ideas while getting feedback from the publishers. When I draw digitally, layers are my best friend. They allow me to experiment without risking the elements already in place.

4. What is the meaning of life?

Chocolate chip cookies.

5. How do you feel about the final product? Did it come out the way you hoped? Were there any changes along the way?

I had not worked on an art project of this scale in quite a while, so I am very pleased with the outcome of the final book cover. Originally, we were going for a scorched desert theme background, but we decided on a Mayan jungle to mix things up from the previous covers.

6. What did you enjoy the most about working on this cover? What did you enjoy the least?

Working on this cover has inspired me to get back into my favorite past time: drawing! I also had the opportunity to use the new drawing tablet that my husband gifted to me over the holidays. What I enjoyed least was having to work on it during my spare time, rather than being able to focus on it without disruption from start to finish. Life’s just too busy sometimes!

7. Tell us a little bit about some of your other work. Have you ever designed a book cover before?

I love drawing subjects from the Medieval era: castles, knights, dragons, elves, and so forth – in both digital and traditional formats. This is my very first book cover!
 
8. Where can we see more of your work?

My web site is currently under construction, but you can view my artwork in the future at www.jenniferceja.com.

Thanks so much, Jenny! What do you think of her cover? Let us know in the comments…

 

Slow Down

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It’s been a while since we’ve had a post – a big part of that has been the amount of work we’ve been putting into both Journeys of Wonder, Volume 3 and our new book acquisitions.

In that time, we’ve noticed another phenomenon. Our sales, for both volume 1 and volume 2 have slowed drastically. We had been selling quite strong into the holidays, but once the holidays passed, sales almost came to a complete halt.

Why is this? We’re not sure – both books, especially volume 1, have been getting mostly favorably reviews. And the best part is we’ve been getting reviews from random people – not just book reviewers that we sent review copies to. That’s a sign that the books have reached a new circle of people outside our first two degrees of separation.

So why the slow down? We have some ideas…

1. We have fallen a little behind on volume 3. We had hoped to get it out in Feb., but March is looking more likely. Releasing more books helps the sales of prior books – so not getting volume 3 out has hurt us.

2. Sales for volume 1 have always been better than volume 2. We think this is because people don’t realize that each volume is a stand-alone. Many people avoid volume 2 until they’ve had a chance to read volume 1 – and people don’t have a lot of time, so that can take a while. We’ve toyed with changing our naming scheme to help alleviate this problem, but we’ll be sticking with it for now.

3. We’ve been so busy, our marketing has fallen off. We haven’t seen great results from our marketing pushes, but we have seen results.

4. It’s been a long time since our last free promotion. Free promotions do help generate sales.

So that’s what we’ve come up with – any other thoughts as to what may or may not drive sales?

Website Down

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Some of you might have noticed that Journeys of Wonder blog was down this morning. We apologize for the inconvenience, but everything is up and working again.

This was a planned outage – as part of our restructure of websites with the introduction of the new books to the Fuzzbom Publishing line. Everything should now be running even smoother than before.

Expansion Announcement

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Journeys of Wonder began as an idea amongst friends. Our initial plan was a simple one – to release a collection of short stories we had never been able to publish. It was, initially, never meant to become an ongoing series.

But once it was released, something happened. Interest in the book was high (over 6000 copies have been downloaded). The second volume performed nearly as well and the third volume is due out in couple of months. Not only that, but slowly we put together a solid team of editors, designers, and writers.

So with that, expansion only made sense.

Fuzzbom Publishing, the publishing arm of Journeys of Wonder has acquired a number of new books to be published in 2013 and beyond.

The first novel slated to be released comes from one of our Journeys’ authors – Lisa Gail Green. Her debut novel is entitled DJINN: THE BINDING STONE and is a YA paranormal with the following description:

Tricked into slavery by the man she loved, the Djinni Leela has an eternity to regret her choices. 

 

Awakened in the prison of her adolescent body, she finds a new master in possession of the opal that binds her. But seventeen-year-old Jered is unlike any she’s seen. His kindness makes Leela yearn to trust again, to allow herself a glimmer of hope.

 

Could Jered be strong enough to free her from the curse of the Binding Stone?

 
THE BINDING STONE is a fantastic story and the first part of a trilogy – a perfect first novel for Fuzzbom.

But that’s not all. We’re also excited to announce that we will be republishing A WRITER’S GUIDE TO HARRY POTTER by S. P. Sipal, currently only available for Kindle ereaders. We will be professionally editing the manuscript and then making it available for other ereader formats as well as a print book through CreateSpace. With the re-release of this title, Fuzzbom Publishing will be making an entrance into the world of non-fiction.

These are exciting times and the publishing industry is changing fast. But there is still a place for great books, and we firmly believe that both of these books fall into that category.