Catherine Johnson is the author of the novel, Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace. Visit her web site at www.CatherineJohnsonNovels.info or contact her via e-mail at: catherinejohns58@yahoo.com.
Blogging is hard. But keeping a regularly updated blog that always relates to your book in some way makes blogging a great way to continue expanding your audience. It’s also a means of passing on information that is useful to your readers and provides them with something of value.
For me, the best way to do this is taking a 12-month calendar and finding topics for each month that relate to issues/themes discussed in the novel. I call this the “Blogging Calendar”. Once you have brainstormed an initial calendar, start researching various possibilities on the Internet. The research process can also be the spark for additional topics you may not have considered.
Some of the themes in Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace were: alcoholism and chemical dependency, politics and voter awareness, divorce and child custody issues, health concerns, particularly ovarian cancer, Minnesota history and tourism, and writing and publishing trends. Some months are going to be easier to fill than others, but here are examples of how I started plotting out my blogging schedule.
April
Alcohol Awareness Month (The Pierson family is affected by alcoholism)
September
Labor Day
Ovarian Cancer Awareness (Paul’s first wife dies from it)
Banned Books Week
October
Ministry Appreciation Month
Domestic Violence Awareness
Grandparents Day
Finding topics relevant to your book at least gives authors a starting point. In my case I also keep abreast of current events in the realms of politics and the writing/publishing industry. For example, I posted a blog on the Twin Cities hosting the GOP Convention and tied it together with the Pierson family’s political activism. I’ve also done a number of blog posts on writing and the publishing industry, and again I post whenever something of interest to authors happens such as Amazon’s new policy on Print On Demand (POD) publishing.
Blogging does take work (especially if you have several blogs to keep updated) but think of it this way – you’re not only promoting your book(s), you’re providing reader benefits, and writing regularly which helps you as an author to constantly improve.
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