If you like it, put a ring on it? No, that's not right...

Ah, the world of publishing a book. It's all movie contracts and phone calls with Stephen King...

No. No, that's a lie. It might be real for SOME authors, but not for me. And not for many self-published authors who do everything out of pocket. For us, it's much more "spend your day online trying to promote your book in ways that make you almost uncomfortable."

Like right now.


Hi! I'm Benjamin W. Bass! Please buy my book.

It is also much more than that. It's trying to get your book noticed by more than just friends and family. It's trying to get your book to a point where it is bigger than your circle of friends. And that, unfortunately, is where the whole "Thanks for reading my book, would you please leave a review" comes in.


Yep. You've read it and now I want you to take five minutes out of your day to leave a review. I know it sucks... but it means a lot to me. It means a lot to ANY author and more to those of us that have taken the self-publishing route.

Reviews, to be blunt, are one of the only reasons people will buy X over Y. If X has 245 reviews and is rated 3 stars... it'll still get purchased and promoted more than Y if Y only has 10 reviews - even if they're all 5 star reviews.

Here's how this bullshit breaks down...

Amazon will most likely leave self-published authors to fend for themselves. They don't really care one way or another. They have little time or money invested in you and they get profit from you, but they leave it up to you to sell your own.

Once that little gem of yours starts to pick up steam - Amazon will see it as a potential earner for them and start to promote it on their own. Now that you've done the leg-work, they'll put your book in various "also purchased" lists and it will become more visible to other people. Thus - the book will continue to be seen and, in theory, sell more.

The faster these reviews come in also help the author's rank on Amazon. This, like the reviews, will put them in a new bracket of internally promoted titles and names.

So - there you have it. My plea to you, the reader, to become my voice and get the word out for my book. I can only do so much. I've already spent every spare dime I had making the book and buying a few ads.  This helps, but not as much as you'd think.

You, the author, cannot wait for people to just find your book and have it be the next best thing without the people who've read it singing your praises.

And that sucks.

But if we all spend 5 minutes saying "HEY! I JUST READ THIS BOOK AND YOU SHOULD TOO!" - We all win.

Thank you for reading. Have a great day!

-BWB