Hi everyone. I'm Jason Moser and published my first novel Spy Among Spies: Operation Teardrop and am looking for reviewers. I've primarily sold my book to family and friends but am gearing up for a more commercial selling of my work. Everyone who has read my book has loved it and can't wait for the sequal(s) to be published.

I'm in the US Navy and it has been a very slow process for me to publish my work. But I'm motivated and have four more fiction novels I'm working on final draft.

Anyway, hope to meet some great people here and can't wait to read some of your work!

Jason
Fiction Author

Posted on Tuesday 02 of January, 2007 [00:47:52 UTC]

by Jason W. Moser
Fiction Author
(c) 2006 Copyright by Jason W. Moser
3-28-06

Author's Note: Rejection is a common occurence among authors. This article has been written to let you know that you aren't alone out there and that this happens regularly. Don't ever lose sight of your dreams of publishing your work.

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You are finally ready to publish your first novel after years of writing, rewriting, and even more rewriting. The time has come. You are now ready to send off your manuscript to some publishers. But are you really dealing with rejection as well as you think?

You spend days getting you book into the correct format, draft up a query letter, and send the letter off to a handfull of publishers. Now you wait! In several weeks, you finally receive a few responses letting you know that they are interested in receiving your manuscript for possible a publishing contract. Your spirits are high as you package up your manuscript and mail it off to the interested publishers.

Weeks go by and nothing. You try everything you can think of to contain the excitement coarsing through your body. Finally, a letter comes in the mail from one of the publishers. You tear it open as though it contains the key to life. Your spirits and the letter both hit the floor at about the same time as you read the words, "We regret to inform you that we cannot accept your manuscript at this time." The letter hurt, but you shake it off; a minor setback, but there's still a few more publishers who haven't responded yet. Every few days you receive another letter, each with the same dismal response.

Time and time again, new authors are shot down by a few publishers, their dreams destroyed in a few short sentences, and before they know it, they are dealing with rejection. One time isn't too bad, but after three or four rejection notices, you start to question your own writing as your confidence dwindles to nothing.

Skills in dealing with rejection are a must for new and inexperienced writers. But you must prepare yourself mentally each time you submit a manuscript to a publisher. Keeping your confidence at an all time high is the only way to stay motivated as an author. Here's a few ways to help you deal with rejection to get you through the certain feelings of inadequacy you may experience during the process of publishing your book.

1. Use self suggestion to thwart the rejection attack. Write down a few positive and encouraging phrases regarding you and your writing. "I am a great writer!" "Anyone who rejects my book will be missing out on great things to come!"

Write down three of four similar phrases applicable to you. Now commit them to memory. Read them aloud in the morning immediately after you wake up. Read them aloud a few times throughout the day as well as right before you go to bed. The more you read them, the more confidence you will build in your subconscious mind and the less likely a rejection letter will crush your dreams. This is a powerful tool suggested by Nepoleon Hill in Think & Grow Rich.

2. Get an agent to handle the brunt of the attack for you. Though they do cost a lot, an agent can be your best friend and great buffer. They handle interference between you and publishers, ensuring you maintain your confidence and continue pumping out your books while they press your book on publishers.

An agent's job is to find a good publisher to publish your book. They deal with all of the coorrespondence to and from the publishers and find the right publisher as quickly and painlessly as possible for you. You will never see a rejection note, thus never feel that emotional strain upon your confidence.

3. Self-publishing is a great way for dealing with rejection. If you are capable of formatting your own book, you can self-publish. There really isn't that much to it. It actually takes more time and effort to put your book in manuscript format than it does to format it for actual printing (this includes creating the cover and back page content).

The downside to self-publishing is the post publishing efforts may be more time consuming work; you don't get some of the perks of being published by a big name publisher. You do, however, save a lot of money, maximize your royalties, and never, ever get rejected by a publisher (so no dealing with rejection).

Improper dealing with rejection can be a make or break aspect of your writing career. There are many ways out there to learn techniques for dealing with rejection so you never give up on your book publishing dreams.


Published on Write and Publish Fiction.

Posted on Tuesday 02 of January, 2007 [00:22:38 UTC]

By Jason W. Moser
Fiction Author
(c) 2005 Copyright by Jason W. Moser
10-28-05

Pre-Thought: A sales letter is a useful tool for any business, whether it's for selling your books, or even trying to sell a product of service. These suggestions will work for any application.

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There are several ways to jump start sales for a new work of fiction, but one of the most effective selling points is your sales letter. With the proper format and layout, your marketing letter can do a majority of the selling for you, just leaving you with the task of getting eyes on your letter. Most traditional publishers rely on submitting your book title and description to all the major bookstores, but if you self-publish your fiction, this will give you a leading edge to start racking in some great sales.

Writing a sales letter is a simple eight-step process that involves a little bit of marketing and writing skills. With the proper format, this can not only attract your readers, but can also interest them so much that they simply have to buy whatever it is you are ultimately selling.

In order to market your fiction in the best possible fashion, you must first determine the angle of your marketing piece. By angle, I mean the unique approach you will use to gather your reader's undivided attention. An angle is a component that captures your reader's attention with an astonishing twist that keeps them reading your sales letter once they start. It can be a true story related to your book such as how you came up with the story idea, or something else to that nature. It can most certainly be an actual exciting excerpt from your book that makes readers beg for more by the time they finish reading the first paragraph.

The next crucial component, and probably the most important, is your headline! You've been to the store and seen those outlandish tabloids lining the bookracks, haven't you? Each of them contains fantastic headlines so outrageous that you just have to pick them up and read the farfetched stories they are trying to sell. Amazingly, they work and tabloids rake in millions of dollars each month selling those fiction stories.

It's amazing how a single headline can be so intriguing that you have to open up the paper just to see what it's all about. The same goes with your fiction sales letter headline. Your headline needs to reach out and grab your reader's attention. This will usually be the first thing your reader sees that starts them reading the rest of your marketing letter.

Your intriguing headline can be a short excerpt from your story such as follows: "John felt a soft scrape across the top of his left shoulder. The air in the room escaped as he slowly turned to see..." This particular headline makes the reader curious as to what John saw once he turned around. Make your headline so strong that your reader wants to continue reading to find out more!

The next component of your sales letter is an opening that adds drama and completes your angle all in two to three paragraphs following your headline. Your opening is important because it makes your visitor feel as though you are talking directly to them. Use the word "you" a lot throughout your opening. Also, start your opening with a salutation such as "Dear fiction reader" or "Dear mystery enthusiast" to call attention to your audience. Remember, you are talking to the person reading your letter. Don't think of it as a bunch of people reading it; think of it as one person reading it. Your sales letter opening should introduce your story and give a brief description of what your story is about; however, don't give away too much information. Keep your readers in suspense.

Your next step is to explain to your readers how they will benefit from reading your story. You should tell the reader the entertainment value of your book. Think about how you would benefit by reading your book, then think about how they can benefit. Everyone wants something of value if they are expected to pay money for something. Add value to your book during this stage of your sales letter.

Since you are the author of the fiction work, you are consequentially assumed partial of your own work. A simple solution to set your readers at ease is to add a testimonial or two that raves about your book. A simple way to get testimonials is to give a copy of your work to a few people for free on the condition that they let you know what they thought about it. Quote them word for word about how they felt about your masterpiece and add this to your sales letter as your next step in the process.

If you notice, most best selling novels have a page or two dedicated to brief testimonials from various media sources saying how good their book is. Prospective buyers want to hear from others about what they thought. Don't use negative remarks, as this will kill any attempt you may have at selling your book. Use these negative remarks as constructive feedback to potentially make your work better.

A properly written sales letter should be similar to a query letter you submit to a literary agent. With all letters, you lead to a conclusion. The next step, therefore, is to conclude your marketing letter with a closing statement. You should try to tie the closing statement in with your opening to make your letter flow. This is also where you add an action element into your marketing piece. A typical desired action can be to subscribe to your newsletter, visit your book's website, or download a sample of your book; the list of potential actions is limitless. Remember, the key focus of your entire sales letter is to make your readers want to read your book, so send them where they can view a sample of your book, or ultimately buy your book. You can also send them to a mailing list signup where they will consequently receive a link to your book's purchase page. Complete your closing statement with your name and book title directly underneath it as your signature.

You're not done yet. Next you should re-establish your sales pitch before completely ending your sales letter. Add a P.S. to the bottom of your marketing letter to capture your reader's attention one last time. Touch back upon your angle and benefits your readers will get from your story. The way people read your letter is starting with your headline, reading your opening, skipping to the bottom to see who wrote the letter, and naturally the P.S. at the bottom. This is an expected tendency of someone reading your advertisement, so ensure you emphasize what actions you want them to take somewhere within these areas.

Finally, put your sales letter to work by placing it on your home page of your web site word for word where your work is ultimately sold. This is what is going to captivate your potential buyers when they visit your web site and make them want to purchase your book. In addition, you can use this letter as an email advertisement or newsletter broadcast. Don't mention "buy my book" or "you must purchase your copy of my book today" anywhere in this marketing letter. This is selling and may turn people off. It is already implied that you want to sell your book. Just tell people why they should buy it, not that they should buy it, and they will buy it.

Think of your sales letter as walking onto a car lot to buy a new car: A good salesman won't tell you that you have to buy the car you are looking at. They romance you into buying the car by telling you all the great benefits of the particular car you are interested in. Romance your potential readers the same way and you will sell more books than if you simply tell them to buy your book.

Published on Write and Publish Fiction.

Posted on Saturday 09 of December, 2006 [14:52:55 UTC]

An Article by Jason W. Moser
Fiction Author
(c) 2005 Copyright by Jason W. Moser
10-29-05

Forward: A book cover is the primary selling point of you fiction novel in most cases. If your cover attracts a reader's interests, they will pick up your book and start looking through it. Don't be intimidated by other people's fancy covers. You can make a great cover with little to no experience.

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In your quest to self-publish your novel or short story, you may run into a little trouble with how to design a book cover. There are several ways to make an attractive cover for your book, but most writers fail in this particular area because they can't afford the photo editing software or don't trust their artistic abilities enough to do the work themselves. Making a book cover graphic is a simple process that anyone can do with a little guidance and effort.

You do have an artistic ability as a writer; it's mostly with words, but this artistic ability can also be manipulated toward graphic design. Your goal with self-publishing is to do so in a way that is most cost effective for you and at the same time look professional enough to make the sale. If you learn how to make your own book cover, you will greatly reduce the cost to produce your novel or short story.

Creating a book cover isn't as hard as it seems. The first thing you should do is gather ideas at your local bookstore; look at several new stories in your genre and compare styles, formats, graphics, and layouts. One thing you will find in common with almost every book out there is that they have a title and author's name on the cover. Your main focus will be on the book's title; this is what captures the reader's attention and makes them want to pull your book off the shelf.

The title of a book gives a basic description of what your book is about. It should fascinate your reader to the point they have to pick it up. Your title is a simple word or phrase that represents the primary focus of your book. Overall, what is your book about in five words or less? To choose a proper title, brainstorm the content of your book and create a word or phrase that sums up everything for your reader. Your title is the book's first impression, so this is a crucial stage when you design a book cover.

Once you have a satisfactory title for your book, open your word processing program or photo editing software and type it out along with your byline. Play around with different fonts and font sizes as well as locations on the page. You are looking for a layout that will automatically make your potential readers focus on your title. Don't use plain fonts; try to use a font that fits the era or time frame of your story. Make it a legible font that will give your reader a good feel about your book, but at the same time subconsciously tells them a little bit about your book. When playing around with your font types and sizes, ensure you make the byline smaller than the title as to not distract from your primary focal point. Now think of a color that corresponds with your book's theme. A books theme is the main picture people get when they read your book. Examples of themes are love equals red and death equals black. Each theme should have a corresponding color. The theme color you choose will be your background color for your cover.

If you have some creativity in you, and I know you do, try to choose a particular scene in your book that has a corresponding picture (a barroom, a mountain, a river...) that you can use to design a book cover background instead of just a plain color. Pictures tend to give your reader an image of a scene within your book so when they do read it, they can get a better picture in their mind about what's going on around them. Don't choose a picture that will distract all attention away from your title.

After you have a title, font, and background, choose a complimentary color for the title and byline font of your book. Making your title and byline stand out from your background is a key ingredient of designing your own book cover. Play around with different color harmonies to see what presents the best mood as you look at it. If it looks good, you're done. Have others look at it as well to give you constructive feedback to make it even better.

Learning how to design a book cover can take a little time and effort on your part, but will ultimately pay off when you present your book to the world. You don't have to be a full-fledged artist to make this work; all you need is a little creativity to effectively create a great book cover.


Published on Write and Publish Fiction.

Posted on Saturday 09 of December, 2006 [14:47:20 UTC]

I'm a 34-year-old fiction author and entrepreneur residing in Chesapeake, Virginia. I was born in Pennsylvania and raised in Montana. I joined the Navy just out of high school and have been in for over 16 years now. I'm attending college in pursuit of a BS in Web Design and Multimedia at Westwood College Online and enjoy designing websites and online programs. Along with writing, I love to design websites and build complete online business models.

I've been writing fiction stories since I could hold a pencil, starting with comic-style pictorial stories about war. I don't know why I'm so fascinated with war as the main topic of a lot of my writing, especially since I've never been in a combat situation in my life. I guess action and adventure just thrills me to no end.

My actual fiction career was born during study hall sometime in October 1985. I just started writing and didn't stop. I pretty much concentrated on that book, first hand writing it, and then typing it.

I joined the Navy and more ideas for more stories poured into my brain. I continued to write, but the longer I worked in the Navy, the less time I had to write, until my writing flame slowly flickered down to a soft ember. I had several stories finished and typed out (very rough drafts), but began transferring everything over to computer. Thank God I printed everything out because I was using 5 1/4 diskettes to save all of my writing on my 286 computer.

It was very frustrating having to start all over again, but not having a lot of money on hand to hire people to typeset my stories, I was stuck doing it myself. It was very difficult to get back into it. I had to do something to rekindle my fire.

The Internet caught my attention about 6 years ago, drawing me further away from my writing. I was still writing, but it was in the form of webpages and advertisements. I really enjoy online business, but I haven't seen any success with it, even when I was really fired up about a product or service.

I just recently discovered some amazing dream building exercises that restarted that dusty old dream factory. When I started the program, I was trying to concentrate on other passions I have (entrepreneurial type passions), but I just couldn't seem to get into it. I ultimately found myself back where I started so many years ago...my writing.

I have self-published several reports, poems, and just recently my first fiction novel, Spy Among Spies: Operation Teardrop. I have 9 more novels in the works and with my newly aligned goals, will be publishing some of them within the next year.

Jason W. Moser
Write and Publish Fiction

Posted on Sunday 27 of November, 2005 [04:45:26 UTC]