Hello all you lovely readers in the blogosphere,
After attempting to send this newsletter out to my subscribers, I decided to post it here on my site, to share my good news with you. Please enjoy.
Welcome to News and Inspiration from the Heart for April 2023
This month I have a lot of behind the scenes news to share with you, and a couple of extra features at the end. I hope you’ve had a lovely month. Happy reading and let’s get started with all the goodies inside.
News and Updates
This month, I have a special person to thank for helping me move my website from wordpress.com to a self-hosted wordpress.org site, hosted by Dream Host. Thanks to Jack Falejczyk for his time and technical expertise and the work he’s doing on the back end to help me get my new and improved site up to speed. Stay tuned, because I will be making some changes to my podcast in the near future, and, drum roll please, I am in the process of placing eBook versions of The Spirit of Creativity: Inspirational Poems for the Creative at Heart up on my site for sale. For those of you who are visually impaired, I will have Daisy audiobook and BRF formats available as well. Stay tuned, because I will be sending out a special announcement once my sales page goes live.
As for Shadows on the wall, I edited five chapters last Monday and I’m six chapters away from sending the book to beta readers.
Speaking of that, I need your help. My entire book title is Shadows on the Wall: Spirit Writer Society book 1. However, the phrase “shadows on the wall” is used so much in music and there are so many books with this title, that I don’t want to send the wrong message to my readers with an overused cliché. Here’s how you can help: Read the blurb pasted below and pick the title you think fits the storyline by April 15. Send your suggestions to annwrites75@gmail.com and I’ll pick three lucky winners at random to receive an eBook copy of The Spirit of Creativity: Inspirational Poems for the Creative at Heart and announce the winners in next month’s newsletter. Here’s the blurb:
After twelve-year-old Becca Martin and her little sister are kept away from the Stepping Stones by an invisible force, she forms the Spirit Writer Society to solve the strange occurrences happening around her. Mysterious messages begin to appear. How can Becca, with the help of her friends and Papa Joe, uncover the truth, find a lost treasure, and solve the mystery before the shadow engulfs them?
Featured Articles
8 Questions to Consider Before Launching a Podcast
I wrote the following article for the World Blind Herald last month:
Introduction
Starting your own podcast is a great way to increase brand awareness for your business. However, there are several things to consider and action steps you must take to ensure the success of your podcast. Here are eight questions to ask yourself before recording your first episode. Be sure to have a method for journaling, so you can brainstorm a list of possibilities for each question and create an action plan in preparation for your podcast launch.
Check out the Blogpost I created with a list of questions to help you create your own podcasting plan. In this post, you’ll find links to the podcast episode and YouTube video, in which I unpack these questions and give you tips and suggestions to get you started.
A Blast from the Past
How Not to do Book Promotion
This article was one I pressed on my site, when pressing posts was a lot easier than it is now. If you are a writer, or you know someone who could use this valuable information, please pass it on, because the information in this article from four years ago is still relevant today.
Book Recommendation
Today is the launch of Mark Snoad’s debut novel entitled, Maggie and the Mountain of Light, published by Monarch Educational Services. The book description and purchase links are as follows:
A Middle Grade contemporary fantasy featuring a 12-year-old female protagonist named Maggie, who battles food allergies, asthma, and anxiety. Maggie attends an ‘apocalypse training’ camp in London run by the Wayfinder Girls (a pseudo Girl Scouts). Maggie finds out about the secret that the Wayfinder Girls have kept hidden from the world; they protect Earth from inter-dimensional threats. Maggie is invited to join the elite Guardians programme but struggles to know what to do; she is barely coping with this world as it is, let alone having to deal with other worlds. She reluctantly accepts, only to be swept up in a magical adventure which pushes her, and her unit, to the limit. It’s been described as Men in Black for kids but features an all-female team.
You can purchase Maggie and the Mountain of light at Amazon, Barnes and Noble and wherever books are sold.
I interviewed Mark on my Inspirational Journeys podcast to celebrate his book launch. For links to the YouTube video and podcast episode, visit my podcast show notes, where you’ll find all the information listed above, an excerpt of the book and links to connect with Mark online.
Do you have a book you’d like to recommend? Please send your recommendations to annwrites75@gmail.com with “book recommendations” in the subject line. In the body of the email please provide the book title, author’s name, description, and a purchase link. Books must be clean, containing no strong language, explicit adult content, or violence, to be considered for inclusion in a future issue of my newsletter.
Until next month, I wish y’all a Happy Easter. Happy reading and God Bless you.
Hugs,
Ann Harrison
PO Box 877 Rochelle, GA 31079