Author Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Paranormal
Website: Eric Wilder Louisiana Mystery Writer
Author's Blog: Eric Wilder's Blogspot
Twitter: @EricWilderOK
Goodreads: Check Out Goodreads
Facebook: Check Out Facebook
Amazon Author Profile
Author Description:
Born on a sleepy bayou, Louisiana Mystery Writer Eric Wilder grew up listening to tales of ghosts, magic, and voodoo. He's the author of ten novels, four cookbooks, many short stories, and Murder Etouffee, a book that defies classification. His two series feature P.I.s adept in the investigation of the paranormal. He lives in Oklahoma, near historic Route 66 with wife Marilyn, three wonderful dogs and two great cats.
SPOTLIGHT Questions and Answers with the Author
Congratulations on your book: Sisters of the Mist. What do you have on the drawing board next? Do we have another novel from the French Quarter Mystery series coming? Can you tell us the timeline for its release and give us a little tease?
I’m working on French Quarter Mystery #7 tentatively titled New Orleans Dangerous. It’s about a basketball player in the NBA that arrives in New Orleans after being traded to the Pelicans. He quickly learns he has a dark connection with the city he didn’t know about that involves voodoo, incest, and murder. Here is a link for a peek at Chapter 1. https://t.co/ldBiBMJsio
You have a good following on twitter. Since you started before the social media buzz, what impact has social media relationships had on your current success? How did you build your following in your niche? How much has it changed your book launch process?
My presence on Facebook and Twitter has played a large and positive role in my success as an indie author. Books aren’t sold without a continued marketing effort. Like most indie authors, I have a limited advertising budget, so I rely heavily on free exposure on Facebook and Twitter. I also have a Facebook fan page. My followers have increased steadily because I engage with them every chance I can.
Do you do any book signings, interviews, speaking and personal appearances? If so, when and where is the next place where your readers can see you? Where can they keep up with your personal contacts online?
I don’t presently have any engagements scheduled. When I do, it’s always posted on my Facebook fan page: http://facebook.com/louisianamysterywriter
You have great covers. They carry a theme and your brand with them. How does your book cover creation process work? Do you hand over the basic theme or do you have more of a hands-on approach? Do you get your readers involved in its development?
I’ve used two different cover designers: Jim and Joan Higgins at bestbookcovers.com and Andres Grau at 13bookcovers.com. I start by giving them a synopsis of the book, always including several plot elements so they can tie the story into the cover. Book covers are probably the single biggest reason readers choose your book over others. Many designers do exceptional cover work at reasonable prices. Many authors include cover artist information in the front of their books. If you see a cover you like, try to learn the name of the artist who did it and then check out their body of work on their website.
You have a couple great book trailers. (See links below.) They look very professional. Do you know how much impact they have had on your book’s success? Tell us about the process that you used to create your trailers? Do you use the trailer in your character development? Are the pictures and background the way you see your characters and scenes?
Book trailers can be an effective marketing tool. I’ve done a couple myself and hired a professional designer for another. A well-done book trailer helps a book’s exposure and the more times a perspective reader see’s your pitch, the more likely they are to purchase your book.
Several of your novels have been converted into audio books. What has been the impact on your regular sales? Has the audio books gained a new audience for you?
There is a large market out there for audiobooks. Many people would rather listen to someone tell them a story than to read it themselves. Excellent earnings await writers if they can tap into this market. Creating an audiobook is both time consuming and potentially very expensive. Even after obtaining the finished product, you still face marketing it to a different set of buyers. If you have the propensity, drive, patience, and audio expertise, you might want to narrate the book yourself.
You have written several short stories. Can you tell us if they had an impact on the sales of your novels? Are shorty’s one of your styles of writing or are they created to give readers a sample of your work?
I love short stories. I’ve written many, and they have helped me become a better writer. I’ve published various short stories related to my two series and give them away for free or at a nominal price as teasers. I usually include the first three chapters of book one at the end of the story. I don’t know how much this has helped my sales because it is difficult to gauge. I have many short stories on my blog at http://ericwilder.blogspot.com and have sales links at the end of the stories. I get lots of blog traffic, so it’s possible that they have increased my book sales in that way. Whatever, I love short stories and think they are a neglected literary art form.
What is your primary genre? What has been your best marketing approach to this group?
My primary genre is paranormal mystery though the novels have elements of both fantasy and the thriller. I market to mystery readers that love New Orleans. I also have a paranormal series set mostly in Oklahoma. Though in my mind it’s just as good as my French Quarter Mystery Series, I sell less than a tenth as many books because I suspect the perception of most readers is that Oklahoma is an uninteresting place. With that in mind, I’d suggest that writers contemplating a new series attempt to locate it in a place deemed exotic and interesting by their potential readers.
What has been your experience in giving your books away free? Have you been involved in any other type of giveaways and how did that work out? What was your main goal in doing this? Did you run into any obstacles?
When I first became an indie author, I gave away many titles. I’ve heard the pros and cons of this marketing method. My opinion is it’s just plain nuts! Readers have thousands of unread titles on their Nooks and Kindles. Just because a thousand people downloaded your book doesn’t mean that a thousand people have read it. Chances are none of them did. Many factors cause your book not to sell. Price is not one of them. My advice is don’t be afraid to experiment with the price of your book, and don’t reduce the price just because you have a slow sales period. It’s likely you just aren’t aggressive enough at getting your book out there.
What is your method of getting reviews for your novels? Do you seek professional reviews, use social media or do you rely on your reading audience to supply them?
Good reviews are very important, and bad reviews can kill your book before it ever has a chance to get off the ground. In the past, I paid for professional reviews from the likes of Pacific Coast Review of Books. Many similar entities will review your book for a price with the proviso that their review may be good, bad, or somewhere in between. These reviews are expensive and subjective. My advice is to never pay for a review. Ask your friends or members of a writing group in which you are involved to read and review your book, and keep your fingers crossed you don’t draw the attention of a hater: someone that perhaps didn’t even read your book yet pans it for reasons known only to them.
Author's Book List
Sisters of the Mist
- French Quarter Mystery Book 6It's Halloween in the French Quarter as P.I. Wyatt Thomas traces his missing girlfriend to a mysterious convent hidden deep in south Louisiana's Honey Island Swamp. Even if he manages to find her and they both survive, will their relationship ever be the same?
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
River Road
- French Quarter Mystery Book 5In the most haunted city on earth, no one disregards the supernatural, especially P.I. Wyatt Thomas and his business partner voodoo mambo Mama Mulate. Wyatt must go on the run when unknown assailants kill his new client moments after hiring him to find who murdered his mother. The ensuing chase involves a Navy submarine, a former King of the Krewe of Rex, members of an elite Russian military detachment, a voodoo-like sect that favors Satanism, Cuban assassins, southern mafia, and a top-secret C.I.A. laboratory situated in the heart of the city’s medical district. Wyatt must evade multiple dangers to uncover the dark secret behind the most bizarre murder in the history of New Orleans.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Black Magic Woman
- French Quarter Mystery Book 4In the most haunted city on earth, no one disregards the supernatural. When a spirit from a different life begins haunting him, Wyatt Thomas turns to the one person he knows can help—his business partner and voodoo mambo Mama Mulate. To rid himself of the curse, he must travel back in time to Antebellum New Orleans and seek the assistance of Marie Laveau, the most famous voodoo practitioner that ever lived. He has one chance to save his soul and only forty-eight hours to do it or be trapped in the past forever.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Primal Creatures
- French Quarter Mystery Book 3In the most haunted city on earth, no one disregards the supernatural, especially P.I. Wyatt Thomas and his business partner voodoo mambo Mama Mulate. When a famous movie producer hires Wyatt to investigate a heinous death on an island resort for actors, artists, and writers, he thinks he’s earned a paid vacation. Strange monks, Cajun werewolves, and people in a fishing village that practice voodoo populate the island, and he quickly learns his paid vacation is anything but.
Book Trailer: Primal Creatures
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
City of Spirits
- French Quarter Mystery Book 2In the most haunted city on earth, no one disregards the supernatural, especially during the madness of Mardi Gras. P.I. Wyatt Thomas has a rich new client that wants him to prove he isn’t a passeblanc— a person of black heritage attempting to pass as white. Wyatt falls hard for the man’s daughter, a supermodel named Desire with a twin sister and a dark family secret.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Big Easy
- French Quarter Mystery Book 1In the most haunted city on earth, police can’t afford to disregard the supernatural. When it becomes apparent to N.O.P.D. homicide detective Tony Nicosia that the recent killing of panhandlers is related to voodoo, he turns to the one person he knows that can help him—Wyatt Thomas, the French Quarter’s favorite private investigator. Wyatt’s partner, Mama Mulate is not only a voodoo mambo but also a professor at Tulane. When someone needs answers concerning magic, voodoo, or the supernatural, Wyatt and Mama are the ones they ask.
Big Easy is the fun, sexy, and thrilling first novel in the popular standalone French Quarter Mystery Series that takes you into smoky Bourbon Street bars, down dark alleyways, and through the haunted cemeteries of New Orleans. As a reader said, it reads like a collaboration between Charlaine Harris and James Lee Burke.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Audible
Blink of an Eye
- Paranormal Cowboy Book 3P.I. Buck McDivit must stop a killer, but first he must travel back in time to a 1000-year-old Mississippian pyramid and drink hallucinogenic tea with the most powerful Indian chief in North America and his spiritual adviser, a gorgeous woman with a rattlesnake tattoo and designs on Buck's soul.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Bones of Skeleton Creek
- Paranormal Cowboy Book 2Broke, out of work, and desperately in need of a new truck, P.I. Buck McDivit must earn some money before his landlord evicts him. The only job available is a one-time gig as assistant county death investigator. The case involves the particularly heinous death of a local ranch hand. The police think it’s suicide. Buck knows differently. Not only was the man murdered, the evidence indicates the killer is possibly more than human, perhaps even supernatural. When the ranch owner, and employer of the dead cowboy, hires him to find the murderer, he learns revenge wasn’t the only motive. As the situation grows insane, he must solve the murder or become the killer’s next victim.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Ghost of a Chance
- Paranormal Cowboy Book 1When P.I. Buck McDivit inherits an island, marina and rustic fishing lodge on a primordial East Texas lake, he finds it's haunted by the ghost of a long-dead little girl. He soon learns the restless spirit is the least of his problems. To keep the property, he must first deal with foreclosure, murder, and a group of racists known as the New Southern Right that want the island for their own nefarious purposes. If he doesn't succeed, he might not live to enjoy his inheritance.
Order the Book From:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
KOBO Store
iTunes Store
Author Recommended by: HBSystems Publications
Publisher of ebooks, writing industry blogger and the sponsor of the following blogs:
HBS Author's Spotlight
eBook Author’s Corner
Top Shelf Author Advice
Mystery Reader’s Circle
Check out the index of other Spotlight authors. Spotlight Index.
No comments:
Post a Comment