How to get your book mentioned in my Examiner newspaper columns
Review
A book review is my opinion of your work. It is open to self-published books, small press and large publishers alike.
Everyone has their favorite genre. Please don’t send me something that I won’t like from the get go. It won’t do either of us any good. This is what I prefer to read:
For my arts and crafts column, the book must be about art or crafts, or activities for children. It has to have something to do with the subject of arts and crafts, or the subject of children.
For my book review column, I will consider fiction or nonfiction books of interest to women.
Fiction should be sweet and mild romance, mystery, suspense, Christian or Inspirational. While I
ocassionally read outside of those genres, I do not read erotica, horror, guy stuff, atheistic, or anything that is not in
keeping with Catholic/Christian morals. I especially like books that have “social redeeming value” or something the reader can take away with them as a positive thought or help for a problem.
Non-fiction can include self-help, psychology, parenting advice, how-to and other stuff of interest to women. No cookbooks, as I hate cooking.
Press Release
I understand that self-published authors have to pay for review copies. As a means of helping them stretch their advertising budget, I will also accept press releases. This offer is reserved for self-published authors and very small presses. This
offer is open to other genres like action adventure, but only in the sweet and mild category. It must
still be in keeping with conservative Christian/Catholic values. By sweet and mild, I mean G, PG, or PG-13.
When I say press release, I am using it as another name for newspaper filler or a wire story. A press release is a story that is ready to go, so that if an editor has a slow news day, he can use the story to fill an empty spot on a page. I can only review two or three books a month, so I have about 28 slow news days. I am willing to take an hour of my time and put your story in my page, but it should be something that only requires a little bit of editing. A preferred length is one page, single spaced.
Because some authors have been confused in the past, let me discuss the difference between journalism and advertising. Advertising is when the copy says “This is an award winning book that will change your life!”
Journalism is when the reporter keeps his opinion out of the copy, and quotes other people’s opinions instead.
In a journalism piece, the copy will say “This book won the Alcott Award in 1999,” said John Doe, principal at Washington High School. “I’ve seen it change the lives of several of my students.”
If you’re not sure of the difference, take a look at my column. If the story has a star rating, and my opinion, it is a review.
If the story does not have a star rating, and quotes other people, it is a press release or filler story.
All opinions should be direct quotes that are attributed to someone who agreed to have their name in print.
You don’t have to include a permission slip. Just ask them if it’s OK so that they don’t sue YOU later on.
It is best if you quote someone who knows about that subject. If you are writing about health, ask your primary care doctor to say something. The people you quote don’t have to be famous, but they should appear to be knowledgeable.
You can quote yourself, and say “said the author.”
Here’s the bad news.
Do not send an article that has to have a byline for someone else. I can’t republish an article that has to have a line saying it was first published in another paper, and it was written by one of their reporters. A byline indicates that the author has retained a copyright.
Here’s the good news.
If I write the story, I keep the copyright. If you write the story, you keep the copyright.
You can send the story to other publications. The Examiner has an edition in every major city, including HI and
AK. Wait a few months, and send it to another Examiner. Send it to your local paper. Use it as a
guest post on a blog. If it doesn’t have a byline, you can get it printed in more places.
Terms of Service
The Examiner pays me according to how many subscribers I have (it’s free to you), how many people read the story, how many likes, tweets and pins I get, etc. So, in exchange for the review or story, I ask the author and publisher
to use as much social media as they have available to them to push as many of the buttons on the page as
possible. I also ask them to subscribe to the column so that they can forward reviews to people they think
will be interested in the column.
Self-published authors should also be willing to push social media buttons on other stories about self-published books by other authors. When you help one of us, you’re helping all of us.
The stories in the Examiner that get the most comments are more likely to make the front page. They are more likely to appear in another city’s edition when they are having a slow news day. Make comments, and tell your friends to make
comments.
If your review is published, it will be indexed in Google by the newspaper. I will post links on Facebook, Linked In and Twitter. I do not put press releases on Pinterest or Good Reads, but I do add reviews.
The above requests are not mandatory, but the following are:
I retain the copyright to all material I write. Please add a link to your web site to draw more attention to the article instead of republishing it. You may quote from the review within fair use limits.
Review copies will be used in give aways or charitable donations and will not be returned.
I reserve the right to not publish a review if I think the content is offensive to my readers, or is not of high quality.
I don’t guarantee when the review will be published.
If you agree with these terms and limits, use the contact form and send either a request for a review, or your press
release. If you ask for a review, and I like your summary, I’ll tell you what my address is in a reply email. A press release should include:
Summary of what the book is about.
Who you are, where you live, what you do for a living, and why you’re qualified to write it.
Photo of the cover in an attached .jpg file. If the photo is pasted into a Word document, I cannot save it as a photo in the .jpg format. It has to be sized so that the first pixel number is 600. If you don’t have a photo, the article will not be able to be pinned on Pinterest.
I know you can’t upload a picture on my contact form. I’ll reply, and that will give you my email address.
Where the book can be purchased, cost, ISBN, etc. If this is a press release, please put this info at the bottom of the page.
The first sentence of the story is what shows up in Google, the newspaper, and Facebook shares. We’ll both get more readers if the first sentence grabs the reader’s attention.
A book review is my opinion of your work. It is open to self-published books, small press and large publishers alike.
Everyone has their favorite genre. Please don’t send me something that I won’t like from the get go. It won’t do either of us any good. This is what I prefer to read:
For my arts and crafts column, the book must be about art or crafts, or activities for children. It has to have something to do with the subject of arts and crafts, or the subject of children.
For my book review column, I will consider fiction or nonfiction books of interest to women.
Fiction should be sweet and mild romance, mystery, suspense, Christian or Inspirational. While I
ocassionally read outside of those genres, I do not read erotica, horror, guy stuff, atheistic, or anything that is not in
keeping with Catholic/Christian morals. I especially like books that have “social redeeming value” or something the reader can take away with them as a positive thought or help for a problem.
Non-fiction can include self-help, psychology, parenting advice, how-to and other stuff of interest to women. No cookbooks, as I hate cooking.
Press Release
I understand that self-published authors have to pay for review copies. As a means of helping them stretch their advertising budget, I will also accept press releases. This offer is reserved for self-published authors and very small presses. This
offer is open to other genres like action adventure, but only in the sweet and mild category. It must
still be in keeping with conservative Christian/Catholic values. By sweet and mild, I mean G, PG, or PG-13.
When I say press release, I am using it as another name for newspaper filler or a wire story. A press release is a story that is ready to go, so that if an editor has a slow news day, he can use the story to fill an empty spot on a page. I can only review two or three books a month, so I have about 28 slow news days. I am willing to take an hour of my time and put your story in my page, but it should be something that only requires a little bit of editing. A preferred length is one page, single spaced.
Because some authors have been confused in the past, let me discuss the difference between journalism and advertising. Advertising is when the copy says “This is an award winning book that will change your life!”
Journalism is when the reporter keeps his opinion out of the copy, and quotes other people’s opinions instead.
In a journalism piece, the copy will say “This book won the Alcott Award in 1999,” said John Doe, principal at Washington High School. “I’ve seen it change the lives of several of my students.”
If you’re not sure of the difference, take a look at my column. If the story has a star rating, and my opinion, it is a review.
If the story does not have a star rating, and quotes other people, it is a press release or filler story.
All opinions should be direct quotes that are attributed to someone who agreed to have their name in print.
You don’t have to include a permission slip. Just ask them if it’s OK so that they don’t sue YOU later on.
It is best if you quote someone who knows about that subject. If you are writing about health, ask your primary care doctor to say something. The people you quote don’t have to be famous, but they should appear to be knowledgeable.
You can quote yourself, and say “said the author.”
Here’s the bad news.
Do not send an article that has to have a byline for someone else. I can’t republish an article that has to have a line saying it was first published in another paper, and it was written by one of their reporters. A byline indicates that the author has retained a copyright.
Here’s the good news.
If I write the story, I keep the copyright. If you write the story, you keep the copyright.
You can send the story to other publications. The Examiner has an edition in every major city, including HI and
AK. Wait a few months, and send it to another Examiner. Send it to your local paper. Use it as a
guest post on a blog. If it doesn’t have a byline, you can get it printed in more places.
Terms of Service
The Examiner pays me according to how many subscribers I have (it’s free to you), how many people read the story, how many likes, tweets and pins I get, etc. So, in exchange for the review or story, I ask the author and publisher
to use as much social media as they have available to them to push as many of the buttons on the page as
possible. I also ask them to subscribe to the column so that they can forward reviews to people they think
will be interested in the column.
Self-published authors should also be willing to push social media buttons on other stories about self-published books by other authors. When you help one of us, you’re helping all of us.
The stories in the Examiner that get the most comments are more likely to make the front page. They are more likely to appear in another city’s edition when they are having a slow news day. Make comments, and tell your friends to make
comments.
If your review is published, it will be indexed in Google by the newspaper. I will post links on Facebook, Linked In and Twitter. I do not put press releases on Pinterest or Good Reads, but I do add reviews.
The above requests are not mandatory, but the following are:
I retain the copyright to all material I write. Please add a link to your web site to draw more attention to the article instead of republishing it. You may quote from the review within fair use limits.
Review copies will be used in give aways or charitable donations and will not be returned.
I reserve the right to not publish a review if I think the content is offensive to my readers, or is not of high quality.
I don’t guarantee when the review will be published.
If you agree with these terms and limits, use the contact form and send either a request for a review, or your press
release. If you ask for a review, and I like your summary, I’ll tell you what my address is in a reply email. A press release should include:
Summary of what the book is about.
Who you are, where you live, what you do for a living, and why you’re qualified to write it.
Photo of the cover in an attached .jpg file. If the photo is pasted into a Word document, I cannot save it as a photo in the .jpg format. It has to be sized so that the first pixel number is 600. If you don’t have a photo, the article will not be able to be pinned on Pinterest.
I know you can’t upload a picture on my contact form. I’ll reply, and that will give you my email address.
Where the book can be purchased, cost, ISBN, etc. If this is a press release, please put this info at the bottom of the page.
The first sentence of the story is what shows up in Google, the newspaper, and Facebook shares. We’ll both get more readers if the first sentence grabs the reader’s attention.