You may have noticed I’ve been doing a blog tour to promote Andrei and the Hellcats. Thanks to the very kind author buddies who let me grace their pages!
How do you do a blog tour? Well, first you find out when your book comes out, and then you make a reminder in your calendar two months before that. Almost all of these blogs don’t want to get your guest post application too early or too late. Two months before publication is a sweet spot. (This is also when newspaper columnists will want to get an advance review copy, fyi. Yes, I had a very busy May preparing for my July book launch.)
John Scalzi and Mary Robinette Kowal have very popular guest-blog series, so they have submission guidelines you need to follow. Follow them!
John Scalzi’s Big Idea Guidelines: https://whatever.scalzi.com/2013/09/07/big-idea-guidelines/
Mary Robinette Kowal’s My Favorite Bit Guidelines: https://maryrobinettekowal.com/my-favorite-bit/
Other blogs, just send a respectful, brief email asking if they have guidelines or would be interested. Most bloggers have a contact form somewhere on their site.
It helps if you suggest a topic for your blog post, like for Cat Rambo’s blog, I suggested writing about the technical challenge of juggling seven point of view characters. “I have an interesting idea your readers will enjoy” is a better sell than “Please promote my book for me!”
Then write the darn thing. Blog posts should be about 1500 to 2000 words long. Blog posts are essays, kids. Have a point, arrive at it with logical steps, use concrete examples, and be entertaining along the way. (Oh yeah, easy.) Perhaps I should write a blog post later about how to write blog posts? I’ve been learning slowly over the years.
Turn the darn thing in on time! I rely on Google Calendar to keep track of deadlines. Sometimes, there will be suggestions/edits from the blog owner, sometimes not. Be professional, proofread, and repeat.
Anyway, I’ve collected my guest-posts here for my own records, but you might enjoy them:
The first blog of my blog tour: how I went about writing the crazy thing as both a stand-alone AND a sequel. Thank you for this opportunity, Dawn Vogel!
Then I gave a mini-interview to Space Cowboy Books:
And THEN I was on John Scalzi’s “Big Idea” talking about the intersection of capitalism and consent in Andrei’s morality:
And THEN I was on Mary Robinette Kowal’s “My Favorite Bit”, talking about how I tackled something I thought I couldn’t do – writing a meet-cute – and ended up loving it:
I have maybe one or two more that are planned… but I’m going to go ahead and make this post live and add them when they go live.
Want me to guest post on your blog? Shoot me a message from my contact form and I will blather about things!
