With all the frenzied promotion happening online these days, it’s easy for authors to rely too much upon social media. At times, the online competition can overwhelm authors with the constant pounding of review, giveaways, and buy links. Add guest blogging and your own, sometimes ignored, blog updates, and the sheer wall of books and authors can threaten confidence leading to unnecessary insecurity about your very writing itself.

There is hope for the frazzled writer however. It’s in the form of local promotion and like social media (most of it anyway) it is free. It’s also a chance to get out from in front of the computer and stretch your legs a little. Below are some local resources some that I’ve learned about and used and some by other creative authors.

Considering the fact that during most of this period England was at war with France and America, many of the weapons of this period are military ones e.g. the general infantry of the British Army was equipped with muskets called Brown Besses, whilst the cavalry were equipped with flintlock carbines of various descriptions.

The Light Dragoons had Paget carbines (named for the Paget family). The Heavy Dragoons mostly had Elliot carbines and shortened versions of the Brown Bess rifle. The men also carried Tower flintlock pistols and sabres. (Imagine how laden down they were).

When I retired after twenty-five years in law enforcement, I thought I was pretty much done with all things police related, other than watching a couple shows on television. I could finally write the romance story I’ve had in my head for three decades. Since it was a romance and not a thriller or mystery, it never occurred to me that I’d wind up applying directly and indirectly skills I learned conducting investigations. How wrong I was.

My first two books, Heroes Live Forever, and Journey in Time, were part of a paranormal series I write. Heroes had a reincarnation aspect to the story. The hero and his best friend are aware of what is happening when they enter into the experience. The heroine has no memory of her previous life and connection to the hero. In order to convince her that the outrageous tale he tells is true, as I wrote the scene, I put him across the interview table from me. I mentally returned to my detective time. I asked myself what questions would I ask a victim/witness/suspect. What answers would they need to give me to convince me they were telling the truth? To convince the heroine, they had to convince me first. If I believed it, I could make it believable on the page.

In my current release, The Next Right Thing (Harlequin Super Romance, March 2013), the heroine is a private investigator. Because I am also a private investigator in real life, I didn’t have to research her career all that much. But even if I wasn’t a PI, there are ways I could have learned some basic techniques and tools of the trade to help me write a private eye or sleuth character. In this article, I’ll offer six such tips.

Six Research Tips

Tip #1: Read books on investigations. There are hundreds of books on topics, from background investigations to identity theft to personal injury investigations. One resource for investigative books is PIstore.com.

So you’ve decided to set your novel in a different country and possibly in a different era. If you’re lucky enough, you will have travelled to your ‘perfect’ setting and have lots of photos to help refresh your memory. But if not, where do you turn? And what happens when your research hits a brick wall and you can’t find that significant piece to bring your book to life.

I set my novel in Scotland – Aberdeenshire to be precise. Luckily, I’ve been there and to the specific location on three separate occasions. I took loads of photographs (this was pre-digital era) so it cost me a fortune in processing and yet, years later when I started writing in earnest, I discovered that photos I should have taken, I didn’t. I couldn’t just hop in the car and drive an hour or two with my camera to capture the missing images.

Before I can build the world of my characters, I have to know and understand it. Not to say that I don’t build in layers as I move through the story, but I like to begin on as solid of a foundation as possible.

In preparation for a work in progress, I’ve been reading, watching DVDs, and will be attending an upcoming five part seminar discussing the Civil War.

Movies like Quentin Tarantino’s “Django Unchained” which was set just ahead of the Civil War took some poetic license: dynamite hadn’t been invented, the style of the story-telling. I enjoyed the movie, and I allowed myself to be completely drawn into Tarantino’s story. The movie was almost three hours long, but if someone wouldn’t have told me, I wouldn’t have known.

Before my debut novel World of Shell and Bone launched in early December 2012, I researched how to get the most marketing bang for my buck. I knew I didn’t want to spend a lot of time marketing, so I decided to adopt a targeted strategy versus a general “hit the wall and see what sticks” one. My marketing budget was infinitesimal (read: $0), so cost was an important consideration as well.

While my search turned up many methods of getting the word out (including paid advertising), I’d like to focus on book bloggers in this article. For those who aren’t aware, book bloggers are readers who have websites devoted to the books they read and love.

Congratulations to all Savvy Authors!

Our first Congratulations this week goes out to a Savvy Authors member Jody E. Lebel. She placed 1st in the Charter Oak Romance Writers (an RWA Connecticut chapter) 2012 Golden Acorn Writing Contest wtih her mainstream catagory, Running Into the Fire. Congratulations, Jody!

Marian Lanouette's first novel, If I Fail, has been nominated for Best Mystery Novel at Predators and Editors reader poll. Congratulations, Marian!

Congratulations to all Savvy Authors!

Our first Congratulations this week goes out to a Savvy Authors member Patricia La Barbera. She signed contracts for the first three books in her paranormal romance series, The Tala Chronicles, with World Castle Publishers. The Wolf's Daughter and The Wolf's Revenge have release dates in January. Wolf Slayer will be published in April. Congratulations, Patricia!

Mary Hughes signed two new contracts. One is Edie and the CEO, a contemporary romance releasing February 2013 from Crimson Romance. The other is Beauty Bites (Biting Love Book 6), a paranormal romance with Samhain Publishing, releasing August 2013. Congratulations, Mary!