Sparkly Monsters??

​This week my biz partners and I had a somewhat amusing conversation about my marketing strategy. Thinklings likes to stay positive, friendly, and fun, but there's one area where we will take a negative stance, because people need to be aware that there's a problem that needs fixing . . . and we're trying to fix it! The problem is in the publishing industry, and on our About Us page you can read about what's wrong and how we're working to solve it.

The funny part, when discussing the use of negative marketing for my book in particular (saying what my book isn't / doesn't do), was when Jeannie said, "Sarah's micro niche* is tired of lovey-dovey sparkly monsters." Hahaha! All righty then. I can guarantee you won't find lovey-dovey sparkly monsters in my books. Neither will I go to the opposite extreme and put in anything too gory or graphic. Balance. I'm always aiming to achieve that. 

Why no sparkly monsters who won't really harm you? Because, quoting from The Princess Bride, "Life is pain, princess." I was bullied from Kindergarten through 12th grade and grew up feeling wrong (not as in incorrect, like with answers on a test, but like somehow something was deeply, fundamentally wrong with who I was). I know the depths of pain, with not only the childhood bullies, but also 13+ years of illness and torturous meds starting in young adulthood, and also having lived in The Void with suicidal thoughts and wishes for my entire mid-20s. So how could I deny pain in my writing? How insincere would that be!!

But . . . life is also more than just pain. Not going to preach here. Just gonna say: I've made these discoveries personally (about pain and what lies beyond if you reach for it), and if I hadn't made the latter discovery, about true life being so much more than pain, then I wouldn't be here today.

It is far more valuable to sparkle not on the outside but deep down, deep inside where that glow of hope can't be shaken or stolen.

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*Meaning the very specific audience I target w/ advertising: people who enjoy reading the kind of stuff I write.