As an Indie author, I think ebooks make reading more accessible to more readers in a variety of ways. eBooks give anyone with a little technical knowledge and the drive to publish the means of making that dream come true. But I think there should be more guidelines and oversight to make sure the formatting, technical, and editing standards are met before a manuscript may be published.
Many critics of contemporary romance think that it's formulaic because all of them end in a Happily Ever After. But every character has their own story and there are thousands of ways to get from a rocky beginning to that miraculous ending. Knowing that a couple is going to get their happy ending encourages readers to know that it can happen for them, too.
They are the most important factors in selling your current book. That's what draws them into making the purchase. But if your story and characters are unappealing to the reader, they won't buy your next book.
I do read them. How else will I know what readers think? If it's a glowing review, I'll use it in promotional material. If it's less than flattering, I try to decide if I can use the comments to help me improve my writing. If not, I try to just move on. You can't please everybody all the time.
I have to curb my tendency to write what I want a man to say in any given situation, not what he would actually say. Since I write contemporary romance, there's a time and place for both but I have to be careful not to make men too tender or too wordy. They're generally more forthright in their opinions.
Prepublication, I wrote whatever I wanted whenever I had time to write. Now I take a more disciplined approach. I plan ahead what books will come out when and write on a schedule that keeps me on track.
Probably conflict and plot, that's what most people would say. But I spend my life avoiding conflict, so I'm not a fan of it in the written form either. For me, I enjoy interesting characters and strong dialogue more than anything else. Characters with flaws, characters who grow, characters with intelligence who don't go in the basement during an electrical outage when there's a killer on the loose.
I've been writing off and on my whole life. My head was always filled with thoughts and observations that I felt compelled to chronicle. Those thoughts and observations eventually turned into manuscripts with characters and journeys that I needed to share with the world.
