The Results of the "Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off"

Last year, Mark Lawrence convinced ten blogs that normally only review traditionally published books to participate in his "Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off". 300 entries were sifted down to 10 finalists. The winner was announced this past weekend. We really haven't covered indie fantasy since 2014—those reviewers have resigned from this blog—so I recommend that you look through the list and follow the links offered to learn more.



I applaud Mark Lawrence's initiative and effort. I also applaud those review blogs for being open-minded enough to take on the challenge. I hope that this experience changes their attitudes towards the multitude of authors who are either forced to self-publish or choose that path from the start. It seems suspiciously easy for people to forget that Hugh Howey, Martin Weir, Amanda Hocking, Anne Charnock, and Michael Sullivan (just to name a few) all got their start as indie authors. While I'm not saying that all self-published works are equal, they certainly deserve equal consideration at the 21st century equivalent of the book store.

\_/
DED

Your Best Bet

PODy Mouth has a great blog that I encourage everyone in the POD game to read because it's filled with interesting info on the industry. Her latest post Top 10 POD Books Right Now is absolutely essential reading for all POD writers, or those who want to go the POD route. So what's your best bet in POD? Non-fiction. When you look at the list, you will find that most of the bestselling POD books are non-fiction. What are the hottest topics?

• Relationships/Sex
  
• Money management
  
• Self-improvement
  
• Motivational/Management
  

In other words, stuff that people want to learn more about. I would also add health/coping with illness, identity theft, and age related issues--there are millions of Baby Boomers out there and they need to know about how to live after 65: they want to know how to spend money, protect their identity, deal with Medicare, manage their money, and other issues that come into play after retirement.

The Good Stuff

I was recently looking at Daryl Sloan's blog and was pleasantly surprised to discover a list of good independent novels that he has identified. You can see the list at:

http://darrylslibrary.wordpress.com/free-ebooks/

The best part is that all of those books are free to download. Now, when someone asks you if there are any good self-published books, you can point them to the link above. Of course, don't forget to check the PODler's own list of great POD titles listed in the International Print on Demand Book Award Runners.

New Review Blog

Odyssey Reviews is a new POD review blog that's popped up.

The POD review Ring

Alright, so you figured out that I am not the only fish in the pond. Good for you. In fact, there are seven others in the ah...fishbowl known as the POD review ring. Here's a dandy list of these review blogs.

What exactly does a review on any one of these review blogs mean? Probably not very much, I mean, the real question is--do people actually buy the books that have been reviewed on our blogs? I have no idea, but I'd like to find out. One option would be to sign up with Amazon Associates. I've thought about this--about an Associates listing that would feature only books that I reviewed, if they are available through Amazon--but I am not sure what you all think of this. I think, for this to work, all the reviewers of the ring would have to do that, get listings for their reviewed books on Associates.

I'd like to get a poll started: if you're a reader, leave a comment or send me a email so that I can get a handle on the numbers.