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" I'm realistic about my career as a novelist. I'm certainly not a superstar and far, far from a household name, but I feel successful. "

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" Vera Caspary wrote thrillers - but not like any other author of her time, male or female. Her specialty was a specific type that she pioneered - the psycho thriller. "

" You can write the best book you can, and that might still not be enough. Appeal isn't something that most writers can't strive for or identify. It's something even the best agents and editors can't always identify. "

" One of the biggest differences between you and a traditionally published author is that a self-pubbed author is responsible for everything. Not just writing the book - but cover design, editing, producing, distribution, and publicity as well. "

" Twitter is worth it if you like tweeting. Same is true of Facebook. Or Pinterest. Nothing wrong with having a social presence. "

" Don't add people to your subscriber list just because they once wrote you a note. Or once answered a note you wrote to them. Don't put your address book into your newsletter database. Let your readers sign up. "

" One Tweet can be heard 'round the world if the right people retweet it and the right people notice it on their feeds. "

" MWA and The Author's Guild refused to accept me as a member. "

" We need to write books that publicists and marketers and booksellers and book club leaders and librarians and readers can get excited about. That have something about them that makes them stand out. That makes them shine. "

" Your agent should be invested in the success of your book past the contract stage. After all, if it sells well, she's going to be getting 15 percent of every dime you make. She can be your best advocate in fighting for your book - not just with editing and the cover, but with marketing and sales as well. "

" If no one knows your book is out there, no one will think about buying it. It's as simple as that. "

" Social media buzz can lead to huge successes when people spread the word about something they love and want to share. But authors creating their own buzz? Making their own noise? It's hard to make a lot of noise on our own about our own work. Except, sadly, negative noise. "

" When I sit down to write, I know everything I need to know... I start writing, and within 30 seconds or 60 seconds, I'm watching a movie. I'm not making this stuff up; the characters are acting it out,and I'm just writing it down. "

" I was an avid reader, but never thought seriously about writing a novel until I was in my thirties. I took no formal fiction-writing courses and never thought about these categories when I wrote my first novel. "

" Sales don't always have anything to do with good or brilliant or original. Sales are about appeal. "

" In 'Power Play', Finder uses the thriller structure to make pointed observations about gender in the workplace, the corporate caste system, and the true nature of risk in the global business environment. "

" I just want to sit in my room and write books. "

" I might have created the phrase 'memory tools', but people have always found talismans to help them meditate into a state of hypnosis where they can access their past lives. "

" Do send out a newsletter when you have a new book out or are going on tour. Also list relevant event dates and notifications of contests you are running. "

" I thought if I put my book up on the Internet as a file that you could download, and I told people about it, maybe some people would download it and read it, and maybe I could get some response. "

" Sometimes what you mustn't do is just as just as important as what you must do. "

" Ask your editor or ask your agent to find out what the house's goals are for your book before it comes out. Get some sense of expectations so you are prepared. "

" All the marketing and advertising sells the book as what it is and hopes that the book will be displayed so that your readers can find it. "

" Here's an idea: Spend two or three hours a day at least five days a week in front of a bookstore wearing a sandwich board with your bookcover on it while you chase and chat with anyone you can corral and who is willing to talk to you. "

" I began tailoring my books to cater to one or another universe of readers. I found it incredibly boring; and frankly, it felt stultifying. I'd previously been in advertising. I felt if I was going to create something to fit a specific market, I might as well have stayed with advertising. "

" I've always been fascinated by the concept of reincarnation. I learned that many brilliant people were interested in reincarnation, including Carl Jung. I'm a big Jungian. So I began writing novels involving theories integrating past and present, even if the past element in the novel took place 500 or 1,000 years ago. "

" It's been more than a decade since I put that self-published novel, 'Lip Service', up on a website. Since then, many hundreds of authors have gone from self-published to traditionally published. "

" I think that we need to live our lives for the present... as if it is our one and only wild and wonderful life. "

" I've always been fascinated by how the past impacts the present. For the first half of my career as a novelist, I wrote psychological suspense mysteries. I wanted to be a therapist but was told that while I was a fine diagnostician, I would be a terrible therapist because I wanted to solve everyone's problems. "

" The biggest mistake is to assume that another writer's successful strategy will work for you, too. Publishers' marketers - and even freelance publicists who cost mega bucks - tend to do the same basic things for all books. "

" If I present a boring personal life to my readers, it's going to be harder for them to think of my novels as thrilling. "