All of my books are special to me. That doesn’t mean everyone else will find them special. Finding book readers interested in each book is part of marketing books.
Saying a book appeals to everyone is dreaming. No book appeals to everyone. How do you find those people a book does appeal to?
Determining Book Audiences
Finding book readers for my books will take some thought. Let’s focus on these four: “Waiting For Fairies”, “Capri Capers”, “For Love of Goats” and “Asclepias: A Study of the Living Plants of the United States”.
The first step toward finding book readers is taking a good look at the book. What kind of book is it? Who might want to read it?
Looking at “Waiting For Fairies”, I see it is a picture book to be read to a young child. It has a number of Ozark night creatures in it. And it has a bit of whimsy with fairies in some illustrations.
This book might appeal to parents of a preschool child, if the family is interested in nature along with fairy stories.
Both “Capri Capers” and “For Love of Goats” have goats in them. Both are humorous. The first is an over-the-top melodrama complete with dastardly villain, heroine and hero with lots of action. The second is fun short selections about goats, many filled with tongue twisters and alliteration.
These might appeal to people raising or wanting to raise goats. The first might also appeal to a reader who likes a fast-paced, humorous story. The second might appeal to people who like words and the sounds of words.
Nonfiction Poses Challenges
“Asclepias” is far different. It is a serious botanical work on milkweeds covering how milkweed flowers work, growing milkweeds along with the history and detailed descriptions of each species of milkweed found in the United States. It is highly illustrated with diagrams and photographs.
Dr. Rintz wrote these volumes so the serious amateur not necessarily familiar with botanical terms could understand what he was describing. The readers for this book might be these serious amateurs along with professional botanists interested in milkweeds.
The next step after finding book readers in theory is finding them for real. For me that presents big challenges.
