Lilian Duval has been fascinated with lottery winners for years, and they’re the inspiration for her intriguing novel You Never Know, which explores how an ordinary man copes with terrible luck, and later, amazing luck, when he wins the Mega-Millions lottery. Her story collection, Random Acts of Kindness, will be published in 2012.

Lilian and her husband are both survivors of the 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. They live in a small house in New Jersey overlooking a large county park. She’s an amateur classical guitarist and enjoys attending concerts, plays, and movies in New York City.

You can visit her website at www.lilianduval.com or follow her at Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/lilianduval and Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lilian-Duval/121776657899250?sk=wall.

Welcome to Book Marketing Buzz, Lilian.  Can we begin by having you tell us a little about your book?

Tobias Hillyer had a promising future until a car accident claimed the lives of his parents. Abandoning his dreams, he dropped out of college to take care of his orphaned, brain-damaged younger brother. Now in his late thirties, Tobias struggles to provide for his family, working dead-end jobs that fall far short of the academic career he had imagined.

Then he wins the New Jersey Mega-Millions! His financial worries eliminated, Tobias anticipates nothing but smooth sailing ahead for himself and the people he loves. But he soon finds that his amazing stroke of luck may threaten everything he holds dear.

Over peaks and valleys, this uplifting journey challenges everything we think we know about luck, life, and what we value most.

What is the first thing you did to promote your book once your publisher accepted your manuscript?

I hired Author Marketing Experts (AME) and signed a contract to pay them thousands of dollars for internet marketing.

After that, what happened?

My publisher took seven months to publish the book. During that time, AME sent me lots of forms to fill out. Things were going well until one of their senior staff members left the firm, at which time their work became spotty and disorganized. I cannot attribute one single book sale to their activities.

What did your publisher do to promote your book?

Nothing at all, but we agreed on that to begin with. My publisher, Wheatmark, Inc., is independent and does not take responsibility for marketing books.

What’s your opinion on blogging?  Do you see that it is helping sell your book or is it not making much difference in terms of sales?

I cannot tell for sure. Anything that attracts attention to a book is beneficial, but I wonder how many people buy books because they read about them in blogs.

I understand using the social networks to promote your books is also an effective marketing tool.  Do you find it is or isn’t?

About this, I’m not sure either. It seems that the best of the social networks is LinkedIn, which attracts many serious, professional people.

Besides blogging and using the social networks to promote your books, what other ways are you promoting your book?

I hired an excellent online marketing company, Pump Up Your Book, run by Dorothy Thompson, a very pleasant professional who started working on my campaign even before sending me a bill. Her fees are a small fraction of what AME charges and she does much more work—with enthusiasm and genuine interest.

I also hired a traditional NY City public-relations media specialist, Carol Fass, whose campaign for my book has just begun. She has a first-class reputation, and I hope that will help my sales.

If you had to pick just one book marketing tool that you’ve used to promote your book, which would you say has been the most effective?

So far, what has worked best has been word of mouth: people who love the book telling other people about it.

What are your experiences with offline promotions such as booksignings?

They’re fun and helpful, but on a small scale with regard to sales.

Thank you for this interview, Lilian!  We wish you much success!

Let’s just say you’ve been invited to guest post on someone’s blog. I’m not sure why but some kind of automated brain block suddenly sets in and I don’t know whether it’s because there are so many things to blog about or maybe you have that one chance and you want the subject to be PERFECT, but suddenly you find yourself with your hands on the keyboard but they’re not going anywhere.

Since Book Marketing Buzz is all about books and authors and everything in between, I have compiled a list of blogging topics an author might want to go through to give them some ideas on what to blog about. I send this list to my authors just in case they need ideas and you might get some benefit from them, too, if you ever need a topic to blog about.

Blog Topics:

1. Pet Peeves of the Publishing Industry
2. 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Becoming a Published Author
3. 10 Things You Didn’t Know About (author’s name)
4. 10 Things You Didn’t Know About (author’s book)
5. How to Avoid the Slush Pile
6. How to Meet Deadlines and Remain Sane
7. How to Avoid the Rejection Blues
8. Why Book Covers are So Important
9. How to Write Nonfiction (or other genre) Like a Pro
10. What to Look for in an Agent
11. What to Look for in a Publisher
12. 10 Tips for Finding a Publicist
13. 10 Tips for Becoming a Better Writer
14. How to Sell Your First Novel
15. Practical Advice for Beginning Fiction (or other genre) Writers
16. Five Mistakes Writers Make When Querying Publishers
17. Booksigning Tips to Sell That Book
18. How I Made My First Sale
19. A Day in the Life of (author’s name)
20. How to Promote Online
21. How to Sell Your Book Online
22. Why Social Networks are the Keys to Good Networking
23. How to Network Online to Promote Your Book
24. The Right Way and the Wrong Way to Promote Your Book Online
25. How to Make Your Characters Believable
26. What Inspired Me to Write My Book
27. My Publishing Journey or How I Became a Published Author
28. Why Blogging is Important
29. What Makes the Perfect Book Blog
30. How to be a Good Guest Blogger
31. Finding Your Voice: Writing in First Person (or Third)
32. Why Mentors Are Important
33. Inside the Mind of the Author
34. The Footsteps I Follow: Authors I Admire
35. How to Overcome Radio Stage Fright
36. Why Writing is a Form of Personal Therapy
37. Why Winning Awards Helps Author Recognition
38. How to Write a Winning Writing Competition
39. Beware the Procrastination Demons
40. Booksigning Horror Story
41. Publishing Horror Story
42. How to Put Your Best Foot Forward at Conferences
43. How to Find a Critique Buddy
44. How to Create a Great Work Area for Inspiration
45. How to Write by the Seat of Your Pants: Outline or No?
46. How to Research Your Story Before Writing Your Book
47. How to Handle Pressure: Writing Under Deadlines
48. Why Choosing Your Setting is Important
49. 10 Things I Wish I Knew About Being an Author I Didn’t Know Before
50. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Getting Published

What I am finding is that blog hosts love for their guests to give them quality content that will help their readers and perhaps be linkable. What I mean by linkable is that if it is something of value to a blogger, they will write about your blog post and link to it. This means more exposure for the blog host which is always a good thing.

You can use the above topics as you choose, changing them to suit your needs, but I hope this helps!