The Resqueth Revolution 2009 Blog Tour

Char's Book Reviews and Writing News is proud to announce: for the next two weeks, we will serve as the base of operations for the virtual book tour of a new science fiction novel, The Resqueth Revolution!

What is a blog tour?
A blog, or virtual, tour is a way for more readers to have access to authors on tour and for authors to meet more readers than is possible in a traditional tour. Instead of traveling from one book store to another, the author travels from one blog site to another.

In a traditional tour, the author might spend two to four hours at each store before being bustled off to the next stop. Readers hoping to see the most popular authors might wait in line for hours and then be limitted to a few precious seconds of verbal exchange with the person they've waited so long to meet. Newer authors don't have the same travel budget as established authors, so only fans in large, metropolitan areas are likely to have an opportunity to meet new authors whose work they admire.

In a virtual tour, the author spends an entire day at a blog stop and interacts with readers through the blog's comments. Readers and authors are not limitted by time or distance. Because some readers and fans will follow the entire tour, each stop on the tour is designed to provide a different experience for the readers.

The Resqueth Revolution Tour offers the following tour stops:

• March 16 - The first review of The Resqueth Revolution at the Unwriter blog site and Chapter 1 of The Resqueth Revolution at Char's Book Reviews



• March 17 - How to Write Exciting Action Scenes, part 1 of 2 at Write First, Clean Later
  
  
• March 18 - Katy Hines interviews Mark Phillips at Katy Hines - Walking on Water



• March 19 - How to Write Exciting Action Scenes Part 2 of 2 at The Dark Phantom



• March 20 - Mayra Calvani interviews Mark Phillips at Book Talk Corner



• March 21 - Opportunity to win a signed copy of The Resqueth Revolution
  
  
• March 22 - Chapter 2 of The Resqueth Revolution



• March 23 - Angela Wilson Interviews Mark Phillips at Pop Syndicate



• March 24 - How, When, and Why to Write About Violence in Fiction and Film ,part 1 of 3 at Brain Cells and Bubble Wrap



• March 25 - How, When, and Why to Write About Violence in Fiction and Film, part 2 0f 3 at Free Spirit



• March 26 - How, When, and Why to Write About Violence in Fiction and Film, part 3 of 3
at Straight from Hel


• March 27 - Opportunity to win a signed copy of The Resqueth Revolution



• March 28 - Winners Announced
  
  

Followers of the 2009 Resqueth Revolution blog tour will have two opportunities to win a signed copy of The Resqueth Revolution.

• Everyone who leaves a comment on the tour will receive one drawing entry per comment per blog site. At the end of the tour, two entries will be drawn at random and the winners will receive their very own, signed copy of The Resqueth Revolution.
• Everyone who answers all quiz questions correctly will be enterred into a drawing for the grand prize – a signed copy of The Resqueth Revolution, a Resqueth pen, magnet and calendar, and a signed copy of Hacksaw, First in the Eva Baum Detective Series.
  
  Other web appearances:
  • The Military Science Fiction site interviewed Mark a few weeks ago. His interview will be published soon.
  
  • The Bluestocking blog interviewed Mark for their participation in the Ultimate Blog Party 2009, March 20-27
  
  • Carolina Conspiracyinterviewed Mark on Feb. 25, 2009
  
  • Suite 101 interviewed Mark as part of their Writer's Rituals series

The Resqueth Revolution can be ordered from your favorite bookstore, purchased at bn.com , Amazon.com, or any e-bookstore.

Touring with Books - the interview

Yesterday we talked about book tours and some of the benefits of virtual tours. Today we begin a discussion on the different forms a virtual tour stop can take.

One of the most popular types of blog tour stops is the interview. This can take different, creative forms. In the past few months, I've seen:

• The blog host interviews the author
• The blog host interviews a character from the book
• Te blog host interviews the illustrator, editor, or publisher
• The author interviews a character from the book
• A guest interviewer interviews the author (i.e. students interview a children's book author)

Although not part of a blog tour, you can see an example of an interview post today at Carolina Conspiracy. The fine folks over there interviewed Mark H. Phillips, author of The Resqueth Revolution, about his writing habits. Drop in and say hello.

Thanks to one of those weird karmic coincidences, the editor of The Resqueth Revolution was also recently interviewed. That interview had nothing to do with the book and the timing was not planned, but hey, it's available. If you'd like to read about how a great editor approaches the task of helping authors fine-tune their work, check out the LJ Sellers interview at The Blood-Red Pencil.

In fact, that site has been running a series of editor interviews that provide a great source of information for writers trying to figure out what editors do. If you are struggling with how to select an editor for your work, I recommend hopping on over to The Blood-Red Pencil and reading the whole "Meet the Editor" series. You'll find a variety of services, personalities and approaches to editing. Chances are, one of them will feel right for you.