Welcome to the round up with posts that you might have missed during the week on Smorgasbord.
I hope that despite the increase in cases in most of our countries, you are staying safe. With politics and Covid-19 it is hard to find some good news headlines but tucked away you can find a gem or two.
Canadian Researchers Gave Homeless People $7500 Each And The Results Are So Uplifting
Challenging the stereotypes of homeless people in Canada, a research project from a Vancouver-based charitable organization found that simply giving money to homeless people isn’t as bad an idea as some people might think. Read more:Good News Network
New Fix-It Clinic is Using Zoom and Global Community to Help You Repair Items For Free
How many YouTube tutorials does it take to screw in a lightbulb? One—if that many.
Fixit Clinic
But when you need to fix something that’s beyond your level of DIY expertise, with nearly a bazillion videos offering differing and sometimes conflicting repair advice, it can be hard to know where to turn—or, at least it was until the advent of Fixit Clinic. Read more about this great initiative: The Good News Network
So if you need a bit of a lift and a change from the daily litany of pessimism head over toThe Good News Network
On the home front the last couple of days I have been moving pot plants around, taking some around the back of the garden to see out the next few months and setting out the winter flowering plants. Not a very bright day but with rain coming in for the next ten days I took the opportunity to take some photographs…
This week William Price King introduces us to the life and music of American classical and jazz pianist and composer Don Shirley, the musician that is featured in the recent film Green Book which is well worth watching.
Donald Walbridge Shirley (January 29, 1927 – April 6, 2013) was an American classical and jazz pianist and composer. He recorded many albums for Cadence Records during the 1950s and 1960s, experimenting with jazz with a classical influence. He wrote organ symphonies, piano concerti, a cello concerto, three string quartets, a one-act opera, works for organ, piano and violin, a symphonic tone poem based on the 1939 novel Finnegans Wake by James Joyce, and a set of “Variations” on the 1858 opera Orpheus in the Underworld.
Born in Pensacola, Florida, Shirley was a promising young student of classical piano. Although he did not achieve recognition in his early career playing traditional classical music, he found success with his blending of various musical traditions.
Discouraged by the lack of opportunities for classical black musicians, Shirley abandoned the piano as a career for a time. He studied psychology at the University of Chicago[14] and began work in Chicago as a psychologist. There he returned to music. He was given a grant to study the relationship between music and juvenile crime, which had broken out in the postwar era of the early 1950s. Playing in a small club, he experimented with sound to determine how the audience responded. The audience was unaware of his experiments and that students had been planted to gauge their reactions
During the 1960s, Shirley went on a number of concert tours, some in Deep South states. For a time, he hired New York nightclub bouncer Tony “Lip” Vallelonga as his driver and bodyguard. Their story was dramatized in the 2018 film Green Book, in which he was played by Mahershala Al
In late 1968, Shirley performed the Tchaikovsky concerto with the Detroit Symphony. He also worked with the Chicago Symphony and the National Symphony Orchestra.He wrote symphonies for the New York Philharmonic and Philadelphia Orchestra. He played as soloist with the orchestra at Milan’s La Scala opera house in a program dedicated to George Gershwin’s music. Russian-born composer Igor Stravinsky, who was a contemporary of Shirley’s, said of him, “His virtuosity is worthy of Gods. Discover more about the life of Don Shirley: Wikipedia
Now time for a small selection of tracks from the albums of Don Shirley
“How High the Moon” was written by Morgan Lewis and Nancy Hamilton and first appeared in the 1940 Broadway revue “Two for the Show”. This piece later became Ella Fitzgerald’s signature song. Don Shirley is featured here in this rare live performance with his trio: bassist Ken Fricker, and the cellist Juri Taht.
“Dancing on the Ceiling” from the album “Don Shirley Presents Martha Flowers” was composed by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart in 1930 for the musical Ever Green. Originally it was part of the musical “Simple Simon” but was taken out of the production just before opening night. The game show “Name that Tune” back in the 1970s presented this song on their program and it was correctly identified and the winner took home the grand prize of $100,000. Whereas conventional jazz trios used drums or guitars to supplement rhythm Shirley’s decision to use classical cello goes a long way in highlighting his aesthetic, which the fancy setting of this old standard exemplifies.
“Orpheus in the Underworld”, released in 1956 on the Cadence label, is a set of original rhapsodies that Shirley based on his own painting which happens to appear on the cover of the album. These improvised rhapsodies do not get your typical jazz treatment, rather a reminder of the classical pianist of the year 1800 spontaneously creating fantasies and moods.
“Water boy”, from the 1965 Columbia album of the same name, is an old prison song, and Avery Robinson’s arrangement of this piece expresses the flavor of the thud of the mallet on the rocks that prisoners were compelled to split. Juri Taht’s cello thuds project this image – a heartbreaking, continuous pounding sound which is interrupted only in the middle refrain by the prisoner’s memories of freedom as the melody presents a glimpse of hope, but then reality sets in, and the water boy returns to the reality of the suffering in his life.
My thanks to William for the amazing artists he has brought to the blog and thank you for dropping in today. As always your feedback is very welcome.
William Price King is an American jazz singer, crooner, and composer.
His interest in music began at an early age when he studied piano and clarinet in high school. At Morehouse College in Atlanta where he grew up, he sang in the Glee Club and studied classical music. After graduation he went off to the Yale School of Music where he earned a Masters degree. From there he journeyed to New York where he created a jazz trio ‘Au Naturel’ which performed in some of the hottest venues in Manhattan including gigs on Broadway and the famous ‘Rainbow Room.’ These gigs opened doors for performances in Montreal and a European tour.
While touring Europe he met a lovely French lady, Jeanne Maïstre, who, a year later became his wife. King left the group ‘Au Naturel’ and settled in the south of France where he started a new life on the French Riviera, opening his own music school – the “Price King Ecole Internationale de Chant.” He has had the pleasure over the years of seeing many of his students excel as singers on a professional level, and some going on to become national celebrities. He continues to coach young singers today, in his spare time.
His debut jazz album was entitled “Home,” and was a collection of contemporary compositions he composed, with lyrics written by his wife Jeanne King. His second album was a Duo (Voice and Guitar) with Eric Sempé on the guitar. This album included original songs as well as well known standards from contemporary jazz and pop artists. The “King-Sempé” duo toured France and thrilled audiences for more than three years before going their separate ways. King has formed a new duo with French/Greek guitarist Manolis, and is now exploring new ideas, in a smooth jazz/soul/folk direction.
In addition to singing and composing, King has been collaborating with author Sally Cronin over the past few years on her blog “Smorgasbord – Variety is the spice of life,” with the series “A Man And His Music – Jazz, Contemporary, Classical, and Legends” and now, the “William Price King Music Column.” Working with author Sally Cronin has been an exhilarating experience in many ways and has brought a new dimension to King’s creative life. King has also created a micro blog, “Improvisation,” which features and introduces mostly jazz artists from across the jazz spectrum who have made considerable contributions in the world of jazz; and also artwork from painters who have made their mark in the world of art. This micro blog can be found on Tumblr.
His vocal mentors are two of the greatest giants in jazz, Nat King Cole and Mel Tormé. King has a distinctive wide-ranging voice which displays a remarkable technical facility and emotional depth.
Welcome to the weekly round up with posts you might have missed on Smorgasbord.
I hope that you are all well and thanks for dropping in today. I am taking full advantage of the sunshine this weekend as the nights are drawing in and the temperatures are already dropping. Still grateful for the quick blast and a good book.
As in most places our infections are on the rise which in not unexpected after the restrictions were lifted. Although here in Ireland the government has been very cautious about moving through the various stages. There are still clusters in the major cities such as Dublin and Cork. We are grateful for our rural location and without the influx of visitors this summer (despite the devastating effect on small businesses) we have been relatively free of infections. All we can do is continue to be careful and stay positive.
I hope the posts this week will have kept your spirits up and this week William Price King,Carol Taylorand Silvia Todesco provided us with great jazz entertainment and wonderful recipes to ensure we don’t waste away in isolation.
Colin Guest joined us last Sunday to share his life changing moment which resulted in him meeting his lovely wife and finding great happiness.
My thanks to you for all your support during the week….
Welcome to the round up of posts you might have missed on Smorgasbord this week.
I hope all of you are well despite the increase of infections in many of our countries. With two more countries in Europe being removed from the air bridge scheme it is becoming a gamble taking that long awaited holiday.
This week we should have been basking in the sunshine by the pool of our selected villa in Malta. Back in June we decided to lose our deposit and cancel the trip, thankfully no flights booked, as my two older sisters were not keen on the travel aspect and even then there was the threat of 14 day quarantine there and also back in Ireland and the UK.
As it turns out, whilst in June there were relatively few cases in Malta, with the arrival of their summer visitors this is not the case now.
Yesterday I shared a brilliant funny from Biff Sock Pow which resulted in quite a few comments on the subject. Another ‘fan’ of the block editor Beetley Pete (Johnson) had shared it and started this particular chain of events….
WordPress Block Editor and the Classic Editor
Like many I was under the impression that the Classic Editor would be fully supported at least until the end of 2022. And Carol Balawyder sent a link through that confirms that and it was only updated a month ago: WordPress.Org – Plugins – Classic Editor
For the last couple of months I have been accessing the classic editor via the WPAdmin and as of today still able to do that. However, I have lost one of the functions that I used nearly everyday for my 6pm. post which was to ‘Press’ a post from another blogger. Being able to schedule a reblog for a specific time was great and it meant it was much easier to share the work of others. Now when I try to ‘press’ a post it forces the block editor and there is no other option. So I will set my alarm to remind me to reblog posts I want to share.
Anyway, hopefully the ability to access the original classic editor by clicking on WPAdmin will continue as promised until the end of 2022 when I will be nearly 70 and probably after 10 years of blogging might consider my options.
I am not against progress but when it impacts the time spent preparing blog posts, loss of functionality I do feel the need to question the point of it. I know that the commercial bloggers who are in it to make money want to create adverts and blocks suit their copy writing abbreviated style of writing. But for longer articles and stories it is not useful. I certainly don’t have the time to spend additional hours putting together an author or book promotion which is the most frequent post on the blog.
I have a couple of links to share that I think you might find interesting.. and also a great Youtube tutorial which shows you how to access the classic block editor when you are forced across to the new editor.. It also shows you how to create a post from scratch.. Very useful and will be referring it to myself when I need it.
My thanks to regular visitor and wonderful supporter of my blog and others Michael of Bizmarcfor sourcing this useful post from Fraggles Other Place where you can find a post on the Classic Editor and the New Block Editor with links to Youtube tutorials.. One of which I am sharing here which shows you how to access the Classic Editor currently and also when forced into the block editor. Useful to see it virtually with an explanation.
I am currently accessing the Classic Editor via the WPAdmin button and have been doing so for the last few weeks, but very pleased to have this guide for when the inevitable happens. More on that after the video.
I was interested to find out more about the Origins of WordPress and how it makes its money as a non-profit and found a blog post from 2016 that has some interesting elements. I suggest that you read the full post but here are a couple of snippets to get you started.
“Before we can answer the question about the ownership of WordPress, it’s important that you understand which WordPress you are talking about.
The #1 root cause for confusion is that often people don’t know that WordPress.com and WordPress.org are two fundamentally different products with different owners.
WordPress.org is the popular content management system (CMS) that you always hear about. This is the real WordPress, and it is 100% free. It is often referred as self-hosted WordPress. When you hear things like you can create any type of website in WordPress with plugins and custom themes, this is the WordPress people are talking about.
WordPress.com is a web hosting service that offers a stripped down version of WordPress to make it easy for you to blog. You don’t get all the WordPress goodies like plugins, custom themes, etc.”
“Who owns WordPress.com
WordPress.com is owned by a privately held company called Automattic.
You have to understand a little bit of history of the open-source WordPress project to understand Automattic’s contributions and the reasons why they get favorable treatment such as the ability to use the WordPress trademark and the coveted WordPress.com domain as part of their paid product.
Automattic was started by the co-founding developer of the open source WordPress software, Matt Mullenweg.
Matt created Automattic in 2005, almost two years after WordPress, with the primary purpose to make WordPress hosting easier and allow people with little technical knowledge to start a blog with WordPress.
Now time for the posts that you might have missed during the week and my thanks to William Price Kingand special guest this week on the Author Spotlight D.G. Kaye, Debby Gies.
And of course to you for dropping in and commenting and sharing the posts.. I am very grateful..
Welcome to the weekly round up with posts you might have missed on Smorgasbord.
Thanks for taking time to drop by and I hope you are having a good weekend. Things are much the same here so nothing new to report. I am however in full writing mode so spending a little less time on social media except for topping and tailing the day.
A warm welcome back to William Price King after his summer break and I am sure you will enjoy his first post in the new season.
Carol Taylor was also here with her A- Z and this week she has some amazing foods, methods and recipes beginning with the letter ‘Q’.
The first guest in the new Author Spotlight last Sunday was Harmony Kent who shared her remarkable and challenging journey to being the person she is today.
Coming up tomorrow – D.G. Kaye shares how her ingenuity and perseverance landed her a fabulous job that was career and life changing.
I hope that you enjoy the posts from the week and as always thank you for your support that keeps me motivated.. Sally.
Cholesterol plays a vital role in a number of key functions within the bodyyet it has been demonized and come under attack for the last twenty years. For the majority of the population, heart disease and coronary heart disease is lifestyle related and can be reversed by making changes to diet and lifestyle.
Thanks very much for dropping in today and I hope you have enjoyed catching up with the posts.. and that you will join me again next week.. thanks Sally.
The music festivals such as Glastonbury will not be laid on this year with thousands of fans putting their glamping (and less than glam) weekends on hold until next year.
Whilst not the same as sitting in the rain and mud, amongst thousands of other fans listening to the headliners, over the next three months, every two weeks, we will be staging a summer music festival of our own.
William Price Kinghas been writing the music column for the last six years, showcasing wonderful musicians and singers of the last 75 years and I will be playing music from those series.
I will be also sharing tracks from my favourite musicfrom the last 50 years across the rock and roll, country and pop charts.
We hope you will enjoy the music and thanks for joining us through the summer.
The first song today is from the legendary Barbra Streisand and it dominated the charts in the 1970s and is still critically acclaimed today.
“The Way We Were”won the Oscar for Best Original Dramatic Score and Best Original Song. It ranked at number 6 on AFI’s 100 Years …100 Passions survey of the top 100 greatest love stories in American cinema. The song became a million-selling gold single, topping the Billboard 100 and selling more than two million copies. Billboard named “The Way We Were” as the number 1 pop hit of 1974. In 1998, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame and finished at number 8 on AFI’s 100 Years … 100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema in 2004. It was also included in the list of Songs of the Century, by the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment for the Arts.
My friend and co-presenter on ExpressFM and later on television was Adrian Knight and I drove him nuts by getting him to add this song to the playlist at every opportunity despite its notoriety in some quarters. Christina Aquilera – Candyman
“Candyman” received praise for its musical style while some criticized its sexual content. Commercially, the single peaked within the top 10 in Australia, Canada, Hungary, New Zealand and Romania, as well as the top 20 in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. In the United States, it peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling one million copies in the country. “Candyman” is also certified Gold in seven additional countries.
A music video for the song was co-directed by Matthew Rolston and Aguilera herself. The video received an MTV Video Music Award nomination for Best Direction at the 2007 award ceremony. The single achieved a Grammy Award nomination for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance at the 2008 ceremony. Wikipedia
Thanks for tuning in this week.. Williamis on his summer break but will be back with a new series on September 1st.. in the meantime we hope you will enjoy the summer of music.
Welcome to the round up of posts on Smorgasbord that you might have missed this week.
I hope all is well with you, I am sure that many of you in the UK and Ireland have been experiencing the benefits of Storm Ellen who seems like a very bad tempered individual. The wind has dropped marginally compared to the last four days and one benefit of our unpredictable weather for the last three weeks is that I have not had to water the pots once..
There are worst things however than too much water and I hope that the current California bush fires are soon brought under control. It is devastating the area and over 770,000 acres have already been destroyed. With everything else happening on top of Covid 19, it is another blow to the health and safety of millions.
Book reviews and other marketing observations.
I continue to make some tweaks to both the main Cafe and Bookstore and the new Children’s Cafe and one of the prime objectives is to increase reviews for the books on the shelves.
I spend a lot of hours a week checking the main sites of Amazon US and UK and Goodreads to find recent reviews for books.. and this usually includes a visit to the author’s Twitter account to check if they have shared news of a new review. I have a few observations to share with you.
I will start with Twitter
A great many authors who are on Twitter are not taking advantage of their Pinned Tweet to promote their books along with an Amazon link to buy them. The pinned tweet allows you to expand your profile and market either your books or blog, and it offers anyone visiting your Twitter account to check you out, something to retweet.
For example, if you have just 10 visitors to your account per day and they have an average of 10,000 followers, your book or books when retweeted is reaching 100,000 people. Of course not everyone of those 100,000 is going to pay attention to the tweet but 100 might and be interested enough to follow you and to head over to Amazon to check your books out.
Also is someone shares your pinned tweet it is a good idea to reciprocate, and usually they are good people to follow.
Amazon Author Pages
Amazon will create an author account on alternate country sites but they don’t fill in all the details. New authors particularly need to make sure they are adding their bios and photos to the account. Also new books need to be captured and added to the author pages as that is not always automatic either.
Goodreads
Although owned by Amazon, Goodreads does offer a place where all your reviews globally can be added by readers irrespective of how they came by the book… bought, a gift, borrowed from a library. I notice that a number of author’s have their books listed but do not have an author page, or do not have all their books listed.
Writing reviews
One of the very interesting observations is that those who review other people’s books receive more reviews themselves. One of the reasons for that is the writing community we belong to across blogging and social media. It is not just tit for tat reviewing, but an appreciation that an author takes the time to support and promote other authors within the community and encourages people to explore their own books and reviews. A review is also an opportunity to showcase your writing skills, even if it is short and to the point.
In the new series for the Children’s Cafe that you will find below, I am asking you to send me the link for any children’s book you have reviewed on your blog or posted to Amazon or Goodreads.. I will promote both the author of the book and also you in the post. I hope this will encourage more reviews for these books that are so important in igniting the imagination of children.
Using a blog to share excerpts from past books.
Whilst there are some restrictions on sharing all of a book, there is no issue usually with sharing a decent size excerpt of books on your blog with one of the top reviews. This is particularly relevant for older books and the first books in a series. Not only does it give a reader an opportunity to see you in action but promotes the later books in the series too.
Even though I serialise all my older books I still find that readers buy the books if they don’t want to wait 16 weeks or so to read it all, and they also very kindly review on Goodreads which is not dependent on the book being bought.
It is important to share on your social media of course so that people can head over to read it.
Responding to comments.
I know I am banging that drum again, but there are some very good reasons why interacting with someone who has taken the time and trouble to comment on a book promotion does result in sales and in reviews.
People buy people first…if they have made a connection with you they are more likely to head over to look at your other books.
It has an accumulative effect and over a number of promotions I see the level of comments increasing. This does not just apply to the single author promotions but to the multiple author updates or special features. And it does help the other authors in the promotion when it is shared as it reaches a much wider audience.
I have created a Pdf of my Book Marketing series which covers all of the above and also a step by step guide to setting up your blog to make it easier for readers to buy your books and review them.. just email me on sally.cronin@moyhill.com if you would like a copy.
Back to the week in hand.…Here are some posts from the contributors to the blog that you I can recommend you reading.
D.G Kaye shares the life, love and work of Mexican artist Frido Kahlo who was born before her time. A tumultuous life and marriage and an extraordinary talent..Love and Life of Mexican Artist Frido Kahlo
Welcome to the round up with post you might have missed on Smorgasbord this week.
I hope everybody is doing well.. I am sure that like me you are watching the headlines and keeping up do date with not just your own country’s progress with the pandemic but also on a worldwide basis. At this point all we can do is remain safe and avoid covidiots that seem to think social distancing and masks do not apply to them.
On a positive note...I have made a few tweaks to new book releases from August 26th that I hope will increase exposure for the authors concerned. If you are already in the Cafe and Bookstore you new book announcement will be added to the Cafe Updates on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays. I hope that the fact that there are four authors in the post, it will generate more views for your new book. Over a period of a couple of weeks they usually generate an average of 150 views and multiple shares on Twitter and Facebook.
If you are a new author to the Cafe and Bookstore I will post the usual introductory promotion with bio etc.
This is the latest way to share your work and I now have some wonderful stories of defining moments in the lives of authors in the Cafe and Bookstore. It would be wonderful to share your stories too so perhaps you could read the post and read my story so you can see how it will look. The series begins the last Sunday of August and I am now booking for the second week in October.. Look forward to hearing from you.
If you missed them here are some posts from my contributors this week that you might like to head over and read.
Debby Gies interviews Adele Marie Park about her childhood on the island of
Rousay part of the Orkney Isles where she encountered tales Finn Folk,
Selkies and mermaids.. Adele has just released her latest book, Sea Dragon – Wisp II and shares what is coming next. As always Debby’s questions are tailored to her guest and the interview makes for interesting reading.D.G Kaye interviews Adele Marie Park
Carol Taylor with her Saturday Snippets with posts ranging from Bees and their importance to our environment, Lemon Meringue Pie, National Afternoon Tea Week, Music from Jimi Hendrix, Rooftop farms, removing hooks from shark’s mouths and respect for those who died during the holocaust.. As you can see a varied and interesting post.. please head over. Saturday Snippets with Carol Taylor
Time to catch up with the posts from the week here on Smorgasbord.. thank you for all your support and also to Debby Gies and Silvia Todescofor their wonderful contributions this week. William Price King is back with a brand new Music Column on September 1st.
Welcome to the round up of posts you might have missed this week on Smorgasbord.
Another week has flown by, and like many of you, I have avoided reading the headlines and news stories on a daily basis. I am usually an upbeat positive person when it comes to life in general, but even I have to ration my exposure to the constant stream of negativity.
Thankfully our community of writers do share the positive aspects of life, and here are three posts I would like to draw your attention to if you missed.
Each month D.G. Kaye, Debby Gies participates in the #WATWB – We are the World Blogfest spreading positive news about people and events. This month an inspiring woman in the UK has been collecting an item usually scrunched up and thrown away. Her project is Keeping the Homeless a Little Warmer: D.G. Kaye WATWB – We are the World Blogfest – Keeping the Homeless a Little Warmer
Carol Taylor shares amazing recycling projects including this week The bad and the good in the story of plastic.. and on Tuesdays she has been sharing some of the positive outcomes of our recent isolation. In this post you can enjoy the wisdom of a wonderful man called Sadhguru, and a video of abandoned places being reclaimed by nature. Sobering thought and Nature’s resilience
Retired teacher and author, Pete Springer shares the inspiring story of a former pupil of his, Samy Awwad, who at the age of only 16 has already created an incredible reputation as a champion for millions of children around the world whose lives can be saved by vaccinations. A wonderful post that I recommend you head over to read: An Impressive Young Man
Before I share the posts from the week… here is the promotion for the new Author Spotlightbeginning in September.. along with my story of a life changing moment in my life that set me on a different path after just one date! I have already received some amazing stories and I am looking forward to sharing this new series.
A new series for authors in the Cafe and Bookstore and I share my Life Changing Moment.
In this new series I am inviting authors in the Cafe to share what they consider to be a defining moment in their lives that resulted in a major positive change.
Here are a few examples, and I am sure you will have plenty to add:
Meeting a stranger with surprising consequences
Accepting an invitation that took you out of your comfort zone
Being fired from a job or resigning without another job lined up that turned out to be an opportunity.
Taking a wrong turn on a journey and discovering something about yourself.
Being in the wrong place at the right time when an opportunity presented itself.
Overcoming a challenging situation such as a failed relationship and finding happiness.
Taking part in a charity challenge such as a parachute jump and how it conquered a fear.
Accidentally walking through the wrong door and finding an uplifting experience
Moving to a new country and feeling immediately at home.
You can choose to stick to the facts or can write a fiction story that has ‘A Life Changing Moment’ as its theme.
If you follow the link beneath the image you can read my story and the post is an example of how your own will look.
As always my thanks to guests and contributors who make blogging such a pleasure and to you for dropping in, commenting and sharing…here are the posts from the week.
Welcome to the round up of posts you might have missed this week on Smorgasbord.
I hope you are all doing well and that your families are safe and well. There are mixed messages as always about what we can and cannot do and clearly there are still some hot spots around our countries and the world where life continues to be very difficult.
I thought I would give you a hint of the new promotions that are coming up in the next couple of months and to remind you of those running at the moment.
I am creating a spin off Cafe and Bookstore for Children’s books and Early Teens… As Robbie Cheadle pointed out in a comment this week, it is very difficult to market children’s books, especially at the moment with virtual launches. Also because many children’s books tend to be print only. The authors with books suitable up to 12 years old will have separate entries for their children’s books in this new Cafe but will still retain their entries in the main bookstore with other books they may have.
There will be new author and book promotions, separate children’s cafe updates and special promotions at certain times of the year such as Christmas.
I really would like your help once it is set up to spread the word to children’s authors who might like to have a promotion for their books and be showcased in the new cafe. I have a post going out about it on the 27th of July.
I am putting the entries together in the next week and will share the link in the promotional post. If I have missed any books of yours that are suitable for children up to 12 years old you can let me know at that point.
I have had a great response to the post and August is now fully booked but if you would like to participate in September then just let me know. An ideal opportunity to promote your blog posts and I will also top and tail with any book details, author bio and links. Full details are in the post.
Coming in September – the return of the Sunday Author Interview… with a new theme and questions… promotional post on July 30th.
As always I am very grateful for the time and effort that the contributors to the blog put in to produce such amazing posts, and to you for dropping in. If you have time to leave a comment it is always appreciated and it also is a way to connect to others who pass through the blog. This community has never been more important as it is today, and the stronger it is, the stronger we are as individuals.
Calling All Fixers
Are you that person who has a dire need to fix the people you care about? Are you that person who thinks nobody can fix things like you can? Let me tell you, I was one of those people, and I learned that there are definite limitations when it comes to thinking we can repair others—despite how much our hearts truly wish we could.
There is little doubt that this last three months of lock down has impacted all our lives. Marjorie Mallon has compiled an anthology that shares her own diary of events over that period about the pandemic and life as a family in lock down.. and the thoughts and poetry of others within the blogging community including myself.
![A Reluctant Little Prince by [Jean M Cogdell]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51NB2NVTrHL.jpg)
![Who's That in the Cat Pajamas? (The Dolcey Series Book 1) by [Sojourner McConnell, Ellie Barrett]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41w8218v4sL.jpg)
