NESW Member Services & Products
| Help! My Facebook Ads Suck | M.D. Cooper goes into depth on how to create and sustain ads in Facebook. He keeps the math doable and asks great business questions that will help all authors. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | The Quick Fox | Editing services and more for indie authors, specializing in LGBT and neurodiverse stories. Submitted by: S.L. Lahna |
Blog
| David Gaughran's Blog | Gaughran's blog is a plethora of industry news, latest trends, and techniques to increase your audience. He's blunt, speaks with authority, and is fairly easy to follow. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | Writer Beware | Literary scams, schemes, and pitfalls. Also providing advice for writers, industry news, and commentary. Sponsored by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. Submitted by: E.J. Stevens |
Books on Craft
| Self-Editing for Fiction Writers | Should be on every writer's desk--the best guide out there on how to polish your writing before it goes out to anyone. Practical advice, lots of examples, and a down-to-earth style. If I had to recommend one book to a new writer, this would be it. Submitted by: Marissa Doyle Price: $14.99 |
Books on Marketing
| Become a Successful Indie Autho | Craig Martelle does a great job of laying the groundwork for indie authors and gives tough love advice on how to be successful. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | How to Write a Sizzling Synopsis | We all hate writing back blurbs, but this book gives pointers and amazing practical advice to make it easier. It's a quick read and one that will help your business grow. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg Price: $3.99 | Newsletter Ninja | This is a fast and awesome read. The book helps change the author mindset to help maximize longterm relationships with fans. A must have. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg Price: $4.99 | Release Strategies | This book does a great job of walking you through the logic of a release strategy (several of them) and helps you plan out your upcoming releases. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | Write to Market | Chris Fox explains at length how books have to be marketable for an author to make a living. He also talks about how to bend your concepts into certain genres to increase markability. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg |
Cover Designers
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Craft
| Glossary of Ableist Terms With Alternatives | A concise guide to alternative, and more descriptive, words for some terms that may be considered hurtful to readers. The glossary is toward the bottom of the page, but the information in the article is extremely helpful in crafting alternatives to common language phrasing. Submitted by: Odin Oxthorn |
Editors
| The Quick Fox | Editing services and more for indie authors, specializing in LGBT and neurodiverse stories. Submitted by: S.L. Lahna |
Formatting Tools
| Jutoh | Makes clean, elegant EPUB and MOBI files for uploading to ebook retailers. There's a bit of a learning curve to using it but it really isn't bad (I'm semi-competent but not a techie by any means.) I've never had to use it, but I understand from others that the help/support people are good. It's not expensive, and once you purchase it, that's it--no restrictions on how many books you use it for. Submitted by: Marissa Doyle |
Marketing Tools
| Morgan Wright Book Cover Animations | Morgan does super fast work creating short animations to amp up visual interest when marketing or releasing book trailers. She's awesome to talk to and open to suggestions. Submitted by: Odin Oxthorn |
Groups
| Author Support Network | For indie, traditional and hybrid authors to share information and ideas in a supportive, nurturing environment. It's tough out there, let's make it easier on each other!" With 6600 members, it's run by New England-based bestselling romance author Marie Force, who is trying to formally organize the group into a powerful force for the support of authors writing in all genres. She's been using her clout to work with Amazon, Apple, and others to address authors' concerns about the industry. It's also firmly moderated, so discussions don't get lost in promo. Submitted by: Marissa Doyle |
Podcasts
| Creative Penn | Joanna Penn discusses everything from industry news to emerging technologies and has great guests on for topics not generally covered by writing podcasts. - Jeremy Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | Sci-Fi & Fantasy Marketing | Each week features a new author in Sci-Fi & Fantasy talking about their process and providing strategies on how to utilize marketing to sell more books. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | Sell More Books Show | The Sell More Books Show is a great mix of tips for marketing your book and providing you the top five news stories each week. It's just under an hour and a pretty great way to get industry news without investing an uncanny amount of time. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | Writer's Detective | Great resource for police procedures along with tips on how to write convincing detectives. Hosted by a current LAPD Officer, great amount of info. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg |
Software
| AppSumo | AppSumo offers limited-time discounts mostly on business-related software and tools, but some of their deals are hugely useful to authors. It's free to sign up, and so far I've snagged a 100-image package from DepositPhoto for $49 and a free year of Lumen5's professional-level video-making tool (a $468 value.) Submitted by: Marissa Doyle | AutoCrit | Hands down my favorite software to help me edit. Helps with word frequency, grammar, dense sentences. Compares against other stories in your genre and gives awesome information to help tighten your writing. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg | BetaBooks | BetaBooks is an awesome way to inform and manage your beta readers. It makes it easy to get inline edits and broad feedback while gently pushing your readers to finish the book. Submitted by: Jeremy Flagg |