Featured Author: Richard Sutton

Richard Sutton has 2 terrific books, The Red Gate, and The Gatekeepers,  for sale at Smashwords, featuring an Irish/Celtic family with a secret that they must guard. I love the theme of guarding the past against today's world, and the setting plays an important thematic role in both books.

I asked Richard to do the Q&A:

10 Questions

1) How long have you been writing?

About 40 years now – since I was 18 or so.

           

2) How are you marketing your books?

I’m trying to work online through online as well as print media, direct marketing to booksellers and through my own blog site and other writers and readers sites. I still don’t tweet, and facebook gives me headaches!

           

3) Tell us why readers will like your latest book.

The second book in the O’Deirg family saga looks at serious issues using humor to “grease the joints” and keep things moving, Overall, I really enjoyed writing this, and I hope my readers will feel that in the reading.

             

4) How do you edit your books? Do you have help?

I have a couple of principal editors I’m involving now each step of the way. The first is my wife, who is called upon regularly even during drafts. I also use a series of Beta Readers, authors themselves, who can give me important observations and comment regarding the mechanics of the work beyond simple proofreading.

           

5) Where are your books available?

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Red-Gate-Helped-Uncover-Familys/dp/1441472258/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245847439&sr=1-1

Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002BDU5HC

Barnes & Noble: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/The-Red-Gate/Richard-Sutton/e/9781441472250/?itm=2&usri=The+Red+Gate+Richard+Sutton

Kobo Books: http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/The-Red-Gate/book--KLJpSpAy0Ct0SRPU2D9eg/page1.html

Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/4927

In addition, they’re in the Bowker listings and the Ingram catalog, so they’re carried by a few bricks and mortar booksellers as well.

           

           

6) What have your reviews been like so far?

I’ve been very lucky that they have been very good, even when they were not so good! My most recent was one I was really pleased with, by author C.J. Good:

http://www.amazon.com/Gatekeepers-story-ODeirg-secret-continues/dp/1449924182/ref=sr_1_109?s=STORE&ie=UTF8&qid=1283957055&sr=1-109

           

7) What do you deal with at your blog/website?

I use it to tackle a range of writers and readers subjects plus my own rants covering a lot of the annoyance duJour.

           

8) Have you found reader discussion groups for your genre?

I have found some discussion among Irish and Celtic forum groups on Amazon and on the web, but hope to broaden the range based upon my writing in more than one defining genre.

9) Would you like to review your favorite Smashwords writer?

Of course! It helps if it is someone I know, as I hate writing reviews of work that has been thoroughly dissected before I come to it.

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10) What are you working on now?

The current Work in Progress is a novel I’m tentatively calling Sullivan. It’s another family issues book, but it is set in the present, here in the Southwestern USA. It reveals a devastating secret as human remains are uncovered that point towards the title character. He has anger management issues that are close to getting the better of him and his resources are vague at the best. It’s more mainstream than my last books, and I am going to pitch it as John Nichols channeling Elmore Leonard. Oh, did I mention that it’s very entertaining, too?