Five Stones is one of six Editors' Picks of the Month at Story Circle Book Reviews!

I am very excited to share this news with you.

I discovered that Five Stones is one of six Editors' Picks of the Month at Story Circle Book Reviews (Story Circle Book Reviews Editors' Picks)!

It took 16+ weeks to get free reviews from book review sites (I've got two reviews back), but I think it's well worth the effort. I'm at a point where I am trying to make a decision about hiring a professional editor to polish my book more or not. I guess I need to figure out what my ROI will be and if that's the outcome I want from it.

Keep on writing!

A review from storycirclebookreviews.com

I guess when it rains, it pours? Well, this review wasn't as good as the readersfavorite.com review, but the problems are manageable. 

Reviewed by Enid Cokinos (three stars)

Jennifer Kim's novel, Five Stones, is an enjoyable read packed with believable characters and engaging dialogue. The story, set in current-day San Francisco, centers on the Kim Family. The five daughters—Mihae, Jihae, Soonhae, Kihae and Marhae—are all born in United States, but they are still held to the standards of their Korean heritage, particularly as it pertains to courting and marriage.

Though Mrs. Kim loves her five daughters—each unique in her own way—her attitude toward them is clear: after graduating from college, she wants them married.

When her daughters were children, they were like five beautiful jewels strung around her neck...As they grew older, the worries over their future, specifically the question of marriage, turned the precious jewels into rough stones. Some were smaller than others, but all of them heavy, jagged and cutting. With each passing year, the five stones around her neck grew heavier, and the pressing burden was unbearable at times.

Mihae and Jihae, the two oldest daughters, who have "utterly failed to procure a husband, acceptable or not," cannot escape their mother's determination as she sets up suhn after suhn (a blind marriage date, sometimes accompanied by the dating pair's mothers) without their approval. They protest, but the strong-willed Mrs. Kim is unrelenting.

The middle daughter, Soonhae, has other plans for her life, and the two younger daughters are not yet of marrying age. Though Mrs. Kim's focus is on her two oldest daughters, it does not stop her from fretting about her younger daughters, hoping they will find husbands at the appropriate time, as well.

Romance blossoms throughout the book, but several twists and turns keep the reader wondering if Mihae and Jihae will ever find true love. It is an enjoyable read, but unfortunately, this self-published book did not undergo a thorough editorial review for grammar, punctuation, and style, which is reflected in the overall rating.

Though it's a not five-star review, I like this review for several reasons:

1. It clearly spells out what I need to work on - grammar, punctuation, and style.  I agree with maybe punctuation and certainly style, I'm not sure about the grammar. Still, it's a matter of preference, so I just have to work harder to fix these things.
2. She said it was an enjoyable read with engaging characters and believable dialogue.
3. She said it keeps the reader wondering if the two sisters will ever find love. So, it wasn't predictable.

This site will only review hard-copy books. So, if you put your energy into writing a book, work on it a little longer and get it published through createspace.com. It only takes your time to get a physical copy. I don't know about you, but there's something quite satisfying in holding a physical copy in your hands.

If you're interested in getting a book reviewed, you might want to check out the link below.

http://www.storycirclebookreviews.org/gettingreviewed.shtml

Good luck!

A review from readersfavorite.com

I submitted a request for a review on readersfavorite.com on 2/4/15. This was one of those book review sites where you can pay to get your review expedited, but I opted for a free review. 

It wasn't about the fee they charged for a 2 week turnaround review ($59), but the fact that even if it only expedited the review, saying I paid for a review seemed to taint it validity somehow. I did pay for my Kirkus Review review, but it was Kirkus Review. I don't know.... Anyhow, instead of 2 weeks, mine took 16 weeks (sent in the request on 2/4/15, and my review came on 6/9/15). And it was well worth the wait for me.

Reviewed by Nandita Keshavan for Readers' Favorite (Five Stars)

Five Stones is an excellent modern Korean-American version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice by Jennifer Kim. I enjoyed reading about the Kim family's story, with witty and dramatic twists of the plot and the suspense of two unexpected romances, with their celebrations and struggles. At the head of the family is a stern but loving matriarch who makes multiple attempts to ensure that of her five daughters, those who are eligible to marry will find a suitable match. The Kim family is an interesting one, with each daughter adopting distinct traits. The five daughters are like five stones around her neck till she finds suitable marriage partners for them.

This book will appeal to readers who are interested in family matchmaking alongside secret interests with an Asian twist. Furthermore, it contains the medley of humour, suspense and heart-rending moments of Austen's work, but with a modern feel. I really appreciated the lack of pretentiousness of the characters. Though the story has twists and turns, you still get the effect that the events could happen to anyone in similar circumstances, that all the characters are believable and likeable. The plot in the book concerning the eldest daughter - Mihae - is the most interesting and the suspense, love, persistence, humility, jealousy and trust issues are riveting, and run alongside and overlap with the issues that Jihae faces. It's an engaging book which warns against false first impressions and shows the value of intuition versus believing false stereotypes. I believe it would make a great film, and would appeal to people of all ages.

I like this book review site for several reasons:

1. There was a minor error in my review, and it was corrected in less than 24 hours!
2. The review was posted on Barnes and Noble website (this is not so common from my experience),.
3. The reviewer seemed to have read the book completely (another reviewer referenced events from the first four chapters only, which led me to wonder if this person read my book all the way through).

If you have a book you want to get reviewed, I think this is a great site to submit your material (all submissions are digital).

Here is a link for you to check it out if you're interested.

https://readersfavorite.com/book-reviews.htm

Good luck.

Printing books through Createspace

I'm not a patient person. One of the hardest things for me to do is to wait. So, once I've finished my latest books, Last Chance Lane and Five Stones, I've uploaded them to the Kindle store before I had time to create physical books. Actually, I had no plans to create physical books for either of the books when I first wrote the stories. Publishing through iUniverse was quite expensive, and I didn't want to go through that with two books simultaneously.
 
Now, on to marketing.... I've watched some youtube videos, and the general consensus, from my perspective, is that marketing is wasted if you don't have several books, more than three or four, written already. If a reader liked your book, you should be able to refer the reader to another book of your or another several books so that the reader will have a choice. So, if I don't want to spend money on marketing, I need to find some forms of free marketing. The simplest form is a review. If you look around, there are several websites, bloggers, etc. who review books. I even read somewhere that you should ask Amazon reviewers if they'd review your book (within the same genre).
 
AND that is the reason for putting in a lot of work to print physical books through Createspace.com. Getting Reviews. The process is surprisingly painless, and I'm quite happy with the covers I was able to create with the use of Pixlr.com and already existing templates. Most of the review sites, bloggers, and Amazon reviewers prefer a physical book.
 
And a very good secondary reason for it is the giveaways on Goodreads.com. Goodreads.com will allow only physical book giveaways. So, here I am, creating physical books.
 
Now, going back to patience, what I found out is that one of the by products of creating a physical book on createspace.com is I ended up with a file that's perfectly suited for the Kindle Store. So, my patience doubled the work for me, but now, I know better. I'll make sure I create my physical book first and release my digital and print book on the same day.
 
I know there are many book publishing websites out there, and I haven't tried any others, but so far, I'm very impressed with how easy it is to work with Createspace.com and Kindle publishing.
 
So, go forth and write.
 
Happy New Year!

"industrial standard" sizes for books

Urg! I thought I was done with my work on Createspace.com for Last Chance Lane, but there's a little hiccup. Actually, it's a pretty big hiccup because I thought I was done.

When you start a project on Createspace.com, one of the first things you have to do is to choose the size of the book or trim size. You have a lot of choices; twelve of them in fact. But when they didn't notify me was the fact that if I choose anything other than one of the "most popular trim sizes," then it limits where your book will be sold or made available.

Here are the trim sizes (in inches) you can choose from Createspace.com:

• Most Popular Trim Sizes - 5x8, 5.25x8, 5.5x8.5, 6x9 
• More “industry-standard” choices - 5.06x7.81, 6.14x9.21, 6.69x9.61, 7x10,7.44x9.69, 7.5x9.25, 8x10, 8.5x11  

The "standard distribution" is free, and it includes Amazon, Amazon Europe, and Createspace eStore. 

The "expanded distribution" is also free, and it includes bookstores and online retailers, libraries and academic institutions, and Createspace direct. BUT only for the trim sizes under "most popular trim sizes." 

So, if you chose the "industry-standard" trim size 5.06 x 7.81 inches, then the expanded distribution channel is closed to you until you change the physical size of your book. Fortunately, there's not much difference between 5 x 8 and 5.06 x 7.81 (hopefully), so the digital transition seems good. But I can't trust good enough on my computer screen, so I have to order another set of proofs to make sure they look OK. 

So, the important lesson here is... pick one of the most popular trim sizes if and when creating your book on createspace.com. Other than this minor issue, I really don't have anything to complain about createspace.com. Actually, I'm amazed at how straightforward things are on createspace.com. 

So, if you've got a good book waiting to be seen in print, this is a good place to try. Did I tell you my proof was about ~$2.50 each? With paying ~$4.50 for shipping. I can't believe they can do business it like this! But I'm sure they are making enough money from the books they sell online.

 Larger size is glossy cover, and smaller size is matte. I was experimenting with fonts, trim sizes, etc. I'll be going with the smaller size with the matte cover.
 

A free book download on Amazon

Hello everyone.

I'm running a promotion on Amazon. You can download my latest book, Last Chance Lane by Jennifer R. Kim, for free on 12/3.

I'll tell you about how things are going in my next blog.

Enjoy!

So many decisions to make...

I've uploaded my e-books on Kindle (Waiting for Appa, Last Chance Lane, and Five Stones) as well as Nookpress (Waiting for Appa and Last Chance Lane), but ultimately I've decided to only publish them on Kindle/Amazon to try out their KDP Select program.

Nookpress (Barnes and Noble) has many pluses on its side, such Read in me Store program, Lend Me program, Samples, eGifting, and Affiliates program, and check out the link for the programs.

https://www.nookpress.com/support
 
But I thought KDP Select program offered more intriguing options. I've cut and pasted the reasons why from Amazon's Authorcentral.com site.

Why Enroll in KDP Select?

Earn higher royalties (Sure. I'd like to make more money, but this is not my primary reason. However, I was intrigued by the idea of getting a cut when a customer with Kindle Unlimited option reads more than 10% of my book.)

• Earn your share of the KDP Select Global Fund amount when readers choose and read more than 10% of your book from Kindle Unlimited, or borrow your book from the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library. Plus, earn 70% royalty for sales to customers in Japan, India, Brazil and Mexico. 

Maximize your book’s sales potential (I'm still trying to figure out who to generate more interest/sales. So, these promotions tools were a definite plus for me. I'm not sure about the Kindle Countdown Deals, but I'll definitely do Free Book Promotions. So, I'll keep you posted on when and how well or not so well it went.)

• Choose between two great promotional tools: Kindle Countdown Deals, time-bound promotional discounting for your book while earning royalties; or Free Book Promotion where readers worldwide can get your book free for a limited time.

Reach a new audience (Because I'm still trying to find my audience, this is my primary reason for choosing Kindle/Amazon over Nookpress/Barnes and Noble.)

• Help readers discover your books by making them available through Kindle Unlimited in the U.S, U.K., Germany, Italy, and Spain and the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (KOLL) in the U.S, U.K., Germany, France, and Japan.

This KDP select program is a 90-day program. I have to renew it or get invited (?) to renew it every 90 days. So, I thought I'd try this first, then go on to Nookpress/Barnes and Noble.

If you choose KDP select program, you cannot sell your e-books elsewhere on the web. There are additional limitations, so please check it out before you try it, too.

There are many KDP select videos on Youtube, and I've watched a quite a few, but to be honest, I didn't find a lot of them useful. Most were self-promotional videos, and I had fun watching them, fantasizing about seeing one of my own one day, but I didn't find them overly useful. BUT since there are so many videos available, I could have veered off at a point and completely missed videos that are quite useful and helpful.