This post is the sixty-fourth post in a series about writing a novel. You can check out the list of past topics at the end of this post.
The holidays can make a great setting for a novel. And the holidays can be a good time to sell your holiday-themed story.
Writing a holiday-themed book
You can write a spooky or horror filled novel for Halloween or a sweet romance for the Christmas season. I even know an author that set her story at Thanksgiving. Of course, you are not limited to these holidays. You could set your romance or satire on Valentine’s Day. However, the appeal of a Fourth of July tale will just not have the same pull as a Christmas Holiday tale.
Christmas, by far, is the most popular holiday to write about. A quick search of books on Amazon brings up over 25,000 titles, and this doesn’t include Children’s books.
Tips to writing a Christmas Novel
- Keep it short – Consider writing a novella or even a short story.
- Invoke the senses – Think of snowy scenes, the aroma of hot chocolate or a baking pie
- Think happy ending – While I know there are serious stories out there that take place during Christmas, your best bet is to leave the reader at least satisfied and for a romance that would mean ending with a Happily Ever After.
- Publish it in time – Aim to publish your holiday novel in November or at the very latest the first week of December.
- Promote it – Promote it not just the year it comes out but every holiday season and reap the benefits of those holiday readers.
If you write a series, perhaps you can take some of your characters and write them their own holiday story. And even if they don’t celebrate “Christmas” you can still write a story that takes place at a winter holiday. (Think Gift of the Night Fury from the How to Train Your Dragon TV series.)
It may be too late this year to get out a Holiday book, but if you invest the time now, you can have a book that will sell well each holiday season.
Promoting your book (any book) during the holidays
Cold winter nights where readers want to snuggle up with a good book or perhaps the abundance of new iPads and e-readers, there are many good reasons to consider running a holiday promotion.
Pre-Holiday Sales
If you have a book in print, you can host a holiday book signing. You can promote your book as a great gift or stocking stuffer. While folks can actually gift e-books, if you offer your book only in electronic form, you probably shouldn’t expect a lot of people buying your novel for others.
If you have an e-book, you might consider offering your book at a discount during Cyber Monday.
If you have published a Christmas or other holiday novel/novella/short story, you definitely need to run a promotion starting at the end of November/beginning of December and get it in the hands of those holiday readers.
Post-Holiday Sales
Instead of trying to find readers before the holidays, sometimes it is easier to approach the new owners of Kindles, Nooks and other e-readers or tablets. And there are quite a few others out there with gift cards waiting to fill up their e-readers.
Of course, the trick is to reach those new readers and let them know about your book sale. As with any promotion, you need to know how to reach the readers of your genre.
Another idea is to create a bundle or box set of books and offer them at a reduced price. Or perhaps get a few indie authors together and offer some of your books as a bundle.
No matter how you plan to do some holiday promoting, just make sure you take advantage of this book-buying season.
Previous topics
#1 – Deciding to write a novel – Writing Myths
#2 – Three areas to develop before starting to write a novel
#3 – Finding a Story Idea and How to Know if it “good enough”
#4 – Developing Characters for your Novel
#5 – Major characters? Minor Characters? Where does everyone fit in?
#6 – Developing the Setting for your Novel
#7 – The importance of developing conflict in your novel plot
#8 – To Outline or not to outline
#9 – The importance of a story arc
#10 – The importance of tension and pace
#11 – Prologue and opening scenes
#12 – Beginning and ending scenes in a novel
#13 – The importance of dialogue…and a few tips on how to write it
#14 – Using Internal Dialogue in your novel
#15 – More dialogue tips and help with dialogue tags
#16 – Knowing and incorporating back story into your novel
#17 – Hinting at what is to come with foreshadowing
#18 – Tips for writing different scenes in your novel
#19 – Dealing with Writer’s Block
#20 – Killing a Character in your Novel
#21 – Keeping things realistic in your novel
#22 – Establishing Writing Goals and Developing Good Writing Habits
#23 – Using the five senses and passive voice in your novel
#24 – The benefit of research in fiction writing
#25 – Novella or Novel, Trilogy or Series – decisions for writers
#26 – Avoiding Plot and Character Clichés
#27 – Novel Writing – Endings and Epilogues
#28 – Fantasy Novel Writing – World Building, Dragons, Magic and More
#29 – Finishing your First Draft
#30 – Your Second Draft and Beyond
#31 – Picking Stronger Words and Watching out for Homonyms
#32 – Omitting unnecessary words in your novel
#33 – Beta Reader, Proofreaders and Copy Editors
#34 – Knowing your grammar or at least using a grammar checking program
#35 – Using a Revision Outline during your Novel Editing
#36 – Editing Techniques: Taking a Break and Reading Aloud
#37 – Publishing Options for your book
#38 – Self-publishing an ebook decisions
#39 – Picking Your Book Title and Your Pen Name
#40 – Investing in an eye-catching book cover
#41 – Writing an awesome book blurb
#42 – Deciding on Front Matter for your novel
#43 – Deciding on Back Matter for your novel
#44 – Formatting your eBook for publication
#45 – Pricing your e-book
#46 – Selecting Categories and Keywords to improve your Novel’s visibility
#47 – Book Promotions: Cover Reveal and Pre-Orders
#48 – Publishing your novel with Amazon and KDP Select
#49 – Publishing your e-book with Smashwords or Draft2Digital
#50 – Marketing your E-book
#51 – Finding your Book’s Target Market
#52 – The importance of Book Reviews and how to get them
#53 – Is it worth it to offer your book for free?
#54 – My results from offering my novels for free
#55 – Amzon’s Kindle Countdown Deals explained and my results
#56 – Selling your book through book ads
#57 – Using a Book Trailer to promote your novel
#58 – Offering your novels or short stories as a box set
#59 – Deciding whether to offer your book as an audio book
#60 – Taking your book on a virtual book tour
#61 – Writing your Author Bio and selecting an Author Photo
#62 – Setting up your Amazon Author Page and International Amazon pages
Danger doesn’t make an appointment…it just shows up.
National bestselling author, Lisa Watson, is a native of Washington D.C., and writes in the Multicultural & Interracial, Contemporary, Romantic Suspense, and Sweet Romance genres. Having her debut novel nominated for Best Contemporary Fiction, sparked Lisa’s desire to continue creating engaging storylines, strong characters with universal appeal, and a keen sense of humor. They are drawn together by love, respect, and a strong family ties.
Aside from a brief stint of madness during their teen years, Vance James and Ayisha Glenn are not each other’s idea of relationship material. Vance, a financial analyst and avid golfer, is preoccupied with getting his fill of women, and finding that special someone doesn’t factor into his plans. Yet all it takes to turn his world upside down is one remark from Ayisha about his lifestyle. Suddenly, his focus shifts and he’s spending his days trying to prove he can be the man she needs.
J.L. Campbell is fascinated with Jamaican flora and has hundreds of photos to prove it. She writes contemporary and sweet romance, romantic suspense, women’s fiction, as well as new and young adult novels.
For Shannon Johnson, full-time wife, mom and freelance writer, life as she knew it changed one spring afternoon with the ringing of her doorbell. On the other side stood Vaneetra James, former mistress of Shannon’s husband, Daniel. With two sons, Shannon resisted the urge to leave Daniel in order to keep her family intact. However, she refused to deal with the issues resulting from Daniel’s extramarital affair.
Nicole Hampton is a compassionate woman, who loves to create stories readers can relate to in a way that validates situations that occur daily the lives of many. Her love for reading developed at an early age. She often spent hours becoming lost in the worlds of characters of her favorite books. Born in the South Suburbs of Chicago, IL, reading offered an opportunity for Nicole to dream about life outside of her community and fed her desire to want to explore the world beyond her modest surroundings.
Phil Jacobson, a young African-American computer enthusiast and hacker, lands a prized position as a programmer with Intellect Technology Incorporated, a leading technology company. While coping with being one of a select few minority programmers the company has recently hired, Phil discovers a fellow hacker has uncovered evidence that points to his hiring as being part of a more egregious cover up.
Perry Busby is an author and founder of Buzz Word Publishing. In addition to writing, he is a freelance programmer and data analyst. His client list includes both government and private organizations; from NASA, to the Federal Reserve Bank, and political campaigns; from Fortune 100 companies to non-profit organizations and local business. After 30 years of designing and analyzing software and data, Perry now turns his creative energies and keyboard to write about a journey that has been just as adventuresome as it has been nerdy. When he isn’t writing, Perry dedicates time to engage and counsel minority youth and college students on the obstacles and opportunities of working within the IT sector.
Gargi Kapoor is the only one convinced her brother, Dev, is innocent of the crime he was convicted of. When he is sent to the hospital with an unexplained paralyzing disease she finds herself having to lean on the last person she’d ever want to depend on — a man who wants her brother to pay for stealing his mother’s life savings.
I am an author, speaker, and radio show host with a fanatical obsession with the Lord, Star Trek, K-dramas, anime, romance books, old movies, speculative fiction, and knitting. An off and on addict to Mountain Dew and marshmallows who writes to fill the void the sugar left behind.
Ellie’s life hasn’t gone the way she expected. Forty something, divorced, she’s moving to Santa Fe to help her dad run the family’s art gallery on Canyon Road. It’s another big change in a series of changes that has Ellie doubting herself at every turn. Right now the only two men she wants to focus on are her son, Tristan, and her dad, Gene. Romance is the furthest things from her mind.
Jo Carey grew up in the Midwest but her curiosity and gypsy-spirit has kept her on the move. She’s lived in eight US states and spent three years living in Ireland. She has always loved creature movies, so creatures and bugs often show up in her books.
Terrell Williams began life as the 2nd eldest son of 9 children (4 girls and 5 boys) and was reared in less than affluent circumstances. The second in his immediate family to graduate from college, he went on to marry a wonderful woman, and who eventually became the proud parents of 4 children (3 girls and 1 son who is also his namesake).
Into Another World 