The Unseen Pages Project - An Innovative Book Marketing Idea

Tweet

So I get this e-mail about T.L. Hines' latest marketing project. Seems the guy is once again on the cutting edge! Here's the scoop:

T.L. is disassembling a copy of his upcoming novel The Unseen and hiding pages all across the country. Well, actually, WE are the ones who get to hide the pages! Sorta like Book Crossing, only with individual pages.

In T.L.'s words, here's all the info:

Right now, people all across the United States and Canada are helping me disassemble and hide one complete copy of my latest book, The Unseen, in dozens of locations. You can see who those people are and sign up to join them if you want; we'll start hiding pages the first of October or so.

That's 192 individual pages (383 pages, actually--but each individual page has a front and a back), hiding in unseen spaces--much like Lucas, the main character in The Unseen.

Why? Well, a multitude of reasons, but foremost among them is: to have fun. Maybe sell a few books, maybe meet a few new people, maybe get a few unexpected surprises...but for me, that all comes under the category of having fun.

Check out all the fun (and lots more info on how it all works) at T.L.'s special section of his website devoted to the Unseen Pages Project.

And speaking of contests, my good friend WordVixen is running one over at her Squidoo lense, and you could win some nifty skin care products. Check it out here.

The Evolution of Another Book Cover - The Unseen by T.L. Hines

Tweet

I love seeing the changes book covers go through during their design process. I've talked about this subject before, but I found another book that's gone through at least two strikingly different renditions (and I suspect went through many more than this based on statistics of these sort of things). The book is T.L. Hines' debut from Thomas Nelson, The Unseen. Here are the two covers side by side (click on the pic to enlarge it). What do you think? The one on the left was an earlier version, the one on the right looks to be the final.















There's definitely the same theme going on here, but that final version is quite intriguing. Make you want to read the book? From the publisher's description it sounds pure Tony Hines!

TL Hines Advice

Tweet

A recent quote from TL Hines (author of the novel Waking Lazarus), really hit home for me. It appeared on Chris Well's blog, Learning Curve. Chris asked TL, "What advice would you give to aspiring writers?"

Part of TL's response:

Write because you love it, not because you have a huge desire to be published. If you're writing for the love of it, enjoying the creation and escaping into the minds of other characters, you'll ironically be on the path to publication. If you're writing because the most important thing in the world is seeing your name in print, you're misguided. You'll be worrying too much about what sells. You'll be chasing every new trend. You'll be frequenting writing boards online, and asking questions such as, "Should I use Courier or Times New Roman on my manuscript?" And frankly, you'll be spending less time actually writing.

I know of which I speak, because I've been there. I wrote my first book, went through more than 80 rejections from literary agents. I chalked it up to learning, put away the book, then wrote a second book. Again, more rejections. Maybe 100 of them this time.

Frustrated, I started writing a third book, wondering why I should even bother. Then, I realized I had a bad case of publication fever, and I had to sit down and say to myself: "You know what? It doesn't really matter if I ever get published, because I love writing. So I'm going to focus on writing, and quit worrying about publishing." With this admission to myself, I felt a weight lifted from my shoulders.

And ironically, about two weeks after being honest with myself, I received an email from Dave Long, acquisitions editor for Bethany House, who had downloaded the first chapter of my first book and was interested in seeing more. A month later, I had a two-book contract.

I don't think the timing on any of that was a coincidence.

Read the full interview here.