Elevate Your Book Success With Book Fest Awards, Author Marketing Insights, And AI Discussion

Are you wondering if entering your manuscript in book awards is truly worth the effort? Join host Juliet Clark as she sits down with the founder of Black Château Enterprises and The BookFest®, Desireé Duffy, to uncover the true value of recognition in the publishing industry. They discuss why awards matter, how to navigate the submission process, and common pitfalls authors face when promoting their work. Desireé offers expert insights into building a sustainable author platform and the evolving role of AI in the writing process. Discover how to bridge the gap between being a writer and connecting with readers in this insightful conversation about the current landscape of the book world.

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Elevate Your Book Success With Book Fest Awards, Author Marketing Insights, And AI Discussion

Welcome to the show. We have a repeat guest. Our repeat guest is Desireé Duffy. It is that time of year again to get your books in for the Book Fest Awards. We are going to talk about that. For those of you who have not heard Desireé before, she is the founder of Black Château Enterprises, a marketing and public relations agency, Books That Make You, a Webby award-winning multimedia brand that promotes books and authors through its website, podcast, and radio show, and The Bookfest Adventure, a bi-annual online event uniting book lovers worldwide.

She is an advocate for spreading stories. Sounds like she is a gossip, horrendous gossip, but she is really not. Her expansive marketing, event production, broadcast, and public relations background, mixed with her passion for storytelling, led her to found multi-award-winning full-service marketing and public relations firm, Black Château in 2016, Books That Make You in 2018, and The BookFest® in 2020. Stay tuned, you are going to find out here why this award is important and why awards in general are important for your book, and what is going on in the book world, because she is very tapped into it as well. Stay tuned for Desireé.

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Desireé, welcome. It’s so great to have you again.

I am happy to be here. Juliet, how is it going?

Really good. How are you? We changed the background. I think you had a different background last time, too. Good for you.

I got a little sparkly. Got my disco ball back there and some of my author’s books and some art and some stuff. I love cubbies. I love Cinchel. I had fun with this one.

I did too. I just actually looked at a brand new house that had this second island, and the whole back of the island was cubbies, and I was like, “That is so cool.”

Hard to clean, but fun to decorate.

It is. I hate to dust. I do not know what is worse, cleaning the toilet, or dusting or cleaning the bathtub.

Toilet, I will vote for on that one.

Why Book Awards Matter For Author Success

Back to books, guys. Tell us about the Bookfest Awards. I have entered books. I have won. I think great awards are a great way to get validation for your projects.

That is one of the reasons we started The Bookfest Awards. The BookFest® obviously came first. We are actually coming up on our 14th Bookfest because we do it twice a year. It has been seven years. Started in 2020 during the lockdown. When people were looking for things to do, we did an online event. Unlike a lot of the other ones out there, we have kept it going. One of the things that I had noticed is that so many authors had books released around that time. It’s just that they did not get the recognition. They were not doing their book signings.

They were not doing the promotions that they all had planned. Everything shifted so fast. We decided to do the Book Fest Awards, and we went back three years so that people who might have had a book that came out in 2020 or 2019, even, can enter their books in it. We have been going every cent. It happens twice a year. Submissions are open right now. They end on September 15th. The next Book Fest itself happens on October 24th and 25th. Authors can submit their books. We also make it so that there are a lot of genres and a lot of sub-genres.

Juliet, that is another thing that I noticed with a lot of the book awards that were out there, to me, it is not fair to compete in an overarching genre or category like romance when there are so many various sub-genres. It is not fair for that supernatural or paranormal romance to be up against romantic, or a bodice ripper, or something else, where there is just so much variety. We have created it so that there are lots of genres and lots of categories. You can drill down and find something that is very specific for your book, as well as being in some of the broader categories as well. That is the Book Fest and how it came to be.

As I said, I think that it is a lot of fun for authors, especially when we actually announce it. People get their email notifications as well. During the book fest, we play this montage, a video montage. That is the moment that always gets me because the authors, a lot of times they are in the chat and they are watching or on social media. It is like a watch party, too. It really just brings you together, no matter where you are in the world. Just when authors see their books up there and have that recognition, I think that is like the most magical moment for me.

I know. I was really excited. The way you released those, I was looking on Friday night, and I was like, “I guess I did not win.” I figured out how you were releasing, and I was like, “He did.” That anticipation is always fun. It is not just the book award you put on. It is so funny because someone just came to me and they said, “We want to do a book fair, but we do not know how.” I was like, “Watch this woman. She has the most organized events I have ever seen.” You also provide two days of author education and reader education. Talk about that because I do not see anybody else out there doing that.

The BookFest: Bridging The Gap Between Readers And Writers

As somebody who works with authors and does book promotions, PR, and marketing, to me, the most important audience is all about the audience when it comes to marketing, branding, etc. Who are you speaking to? The audience for authors is obviously readers. That is what the book festival initially was. It is to talk to readers about your book, the themes that are in your book, or some of the little tricks you might do in writing a mystery. I know you love to write mysteries. There are so many things where readers themselves want to get a sneak peek behind the scenes, or just hear from their favorite author, or think about different genres, maybe ones that they have not read before.

In the process, I would get in those early days, a lot of people from the industry saying they wanted to do a presentation about the craft of writing, or the marketing, or the PR, or the social media. I like that it is more like a writer’s conference. You have writers conferences, just like any industry has a conference, and you can go there and learn craft and marketing, and the business side of things. That is why we split it up, because at first it was just to let us talk to the readers.

Authors want to reach readers. This is about the readers. We added day two, which is more like a writer’s conference, especially for the authors who might not have gone to a writer’s conference before, or might be new. It is almost like a transition because let us face it, if you are a writer, if you are an author, you have to have been a reader first. A lot of times, readers go, they segue into writing. In many ways, The BookFest® and the way it is structured with the programming in the two days is that bridge between the two.

It is. Now, what do you think Amazon has changed all its algorithms? Are you excited about it? It is forcing authors to build their platforms now, which they really did not before. Are you seeing a lot more people engaged in that, or did they even know they changed?

Don’t Build On Rented Land: Own Your Author Platform

A lot of people do not know there is so much information and stuff going on in the industry right now. The zone is flooded, so to speak. I do like the saying, “Do not build on rented land.” Whether it is Amazon and its algorithms and its changes or Facebook Meta, social media changes, all of these platforms come and go. At one point, TikTok was a thing, and then it almost went away, and then it came back. Even on YouTube right now, YouTube is going through a demonetization phase. A lot of the shows that I watch and listen to on YouTube are changing and being taken down, and YouTube is going after them.

I do not want to make this about that. The point is, whether it is Amazon or social media or whatever, keep in mind that when you have your own piece of land that you own, your own platform, because if Amazon wants to push you there or a social media site goes away, then you always have that. Whether you are using social media or email marketing or whatever ways you are using to get the word out, it still comes back to your website and what you built and what you control. That is the most important takeaway that authors can have from that.

I do too. People do not understand, you do not own that Facebook group. I actually saw someone back in 2013, before Mark Zuckerberg decided communities were the way to go. They had thousands of people on their business page, and she is an agent. She lost visibility of all those people because overnight, and she had not collected them into her email server. In fact, she did not even have an email server at that point.

It is really about getting those people educated. You need your own email server. You need that lead magnet to get people, readers in. It is just hard to get authors to do the work. Although I am excited because more and more people are getting serious about it. Let us talk a little bit about AI books because we were just talking about that a few minutes ago. Tell us about this soulless new venture out there.

Is AI Tainting The Writing Process?

At this point, it has been three years-ish that we have been doing this. It seems like a million years. Honestly, I think that there is so much opportunity that AI brings to authors and so many businesses. It is really impacting our lives in many ways, yet at the same time, it is almost highlighting or augmenting certain aspects of writers or the process, and maybe not in good ways. In other words, if a writer is maybe not worth their salt, or they want to take the easy way out, and they rely too much on AI to help them write or produce their content or put it out in a fast manner, it shows, and it does not look good.

In the very beginning, people did not recognize the AI voice because it was new. As humans, we are really good at recognizing patterns. We can pick it up really fast. Even think of how we can pick up, “That voice sounds like how Barack Obama would speak,” or “That sounds like how Hemingway would write.” We understand voices. The thing with AI is it tends to be repetitive, and it has certain tempos and words and things that it uses. When you read that and start recognizing it, hap. I can recognize writing between the different LLMs that are out there. In other words, I recognize how ChatGPT speaks as opposed to Grip, as opposed to Claw.

You can pick up on some of their idiosyncrasies. It is not this, it is not that, it is this thing. That tempo, it just rings AI, and the sad part about it is that it pulls the reader in the process. Some genres might be a little bit more forgiving. Some genres or readers, I should say, that they enjoy, or they just want to escape. It is like they just want to sit in the bubble bath and listen to something and be taken away. That is fine. I do worry about some of the authors who have put in so much time and energy into writing, and then they rely on that. I feel like it is tainting their creativity, their brand as a creator.

Those apps definitely. For me, those mysteries are just fun to do. The AI is great for outlining. It really does get deep in the outline and keeps me focused. I cannot imagine writing with AI. It would take all the fun out of it. It is kind of a hobby, I guess. I use it to relax except when I have to go back to the grammar and the rewrites. That is not very relaxing, but it does. That is why a lot of really hardcore creative writers are really eschewing it because it does take that creativity out. When I see something on AI, I feel like it is more than it takes the show versus telling it more tells instead of the background, the scenery, the character description. It does not do that well because it has nothing to reference, I would think, which is probably why.

That is human. That is the thing. We are putting ourselves into our characters. That character’s POV is ours. Even if we are imagining it, somehow, sometimes, we have had a similar experience, and we can live that on the page. AI, because it is predictive, just predicts the next word. It brings it to a very rote or basic type of place. You are right too, because you mentioned, having it help with outlining or finding idiosyncrasies or consistencies that you might as an author, you just do not see it. I do absolutely think there are some great uses for AI. It is a tool as long as it is used the right way.

I use it a lot for research as well. It is actually funny because when I sent that lie off to the editors, he said, “You have got a couple of things in here.” He showed me, and was like, “I was researching what Augusta is. What does this whole Augusta look like, because I wanted to describe it.” It left some, think they are called artifacts in there, some of my research artifacts. It is really good for research as well, because not all of us live where we write the stories about. We cannot use our imagination, and we can use pictures, but that is about it. Tell us more about the other things you do, because you do not just have to book a fest. You have all sorts of things that you do for authors.

Marketing And PR Strategy: Inside Black Château And Books That Make You

Black Château is the parent company, the first company that I started. Black Château, I should say Black Château Enterprises, and under that is Black Château, and we do PR and marketing for authors. We have retainers that help them from their book launches from about 2 or 3, sometimes 4 months prior to the launch, all the way to several months afterwards. We call that the author network, and that’s designed to cover the different stages, the different key points that an author needs. Such as getting their advanced reviews. We put the book on NetGallery.

I work with their branding, get their talking points through the press release, and pitch them for media interviews. We do contests and giveaways for them. Everything that an author should be doing, and in some cases, a publisher may or may not be doing, we help them with that. We have several different stages for that. Books That Make You were born. A few years after we started Black Château as a consumer-facing brand, authors want to get the word out about their books, and they need to reach the readers, right?

What Books That Make You does is it has a website that is geared toward the reader. We do book reviews there if authors need an editorial-type book review. We will do that there. We have the Books That Make You show or interview authors and talk about their books. We do events as well. I think you know this, because you have been involved with this. We will do events like during awards season, if there is a gifting suite, we will have authors there signing their books for celebrities, or we will be at the LA Times Festival of Books, giving authors the opportunity to sign books and be at some of these high-profile events.

That is what Books That Make You do. Black Château authors a lot of times do books that make you promotions, and other authors, publicists, marketing folks, and publishers come to Books That Make You For That. We have The BookFest®, as mentioned, and that came about in 2020. That’s the third brand. That was like the unexpected child, Juliet, because I did not expect at that time that I was going to have a whole other company.

It was the most delightful surprise because, as I said, we started The Bookfest Awards, and we do two days of programming, and we do it online, and we help authors reach readers, and we help readers reach books. It’s that thing that brings them together. That is basically all three of my brands in a nutshell. I will not tell you at this point about the fourth one that is being planned. That is a conversation for another day.

What is the fourth one? I cannot believe you are going to run that many. That’s wild. That is a lot of work, Desireé. How big is your staff with that many? I have to tell you guys, I am always stunned by how smoothly, like, they put out a schedule, and it is boom, boom. That schedule, as far as I can see, never gets off. You are never disappointed as someone who consumes the information because it is not, “We had a glitch, and it is twenty minutes late, and then the whole thing is late.” How many people run all of this?

A very small staff. We are a boutique agency. We have about ten at any given time. Not bad. I got to give credit where credit is due. During lockdown, my husband, who worked in theatrical distribution, basically making sure the movies and content got into theaters or got onto platforms, his job did not last very long. I got that technical know-how. Even just setting up that first book fest, I thought I was going to be doing a go-to-webinar-ish type thing, because that’s what I had experience doing. He is like, “No, we can do it this way.”

Fortunately, our website developer, I actually poached him from the last corporate job that I had. He is amazing. He can build the infrastructure, and I learned early on that just about having good people. I tried, I think, as a lot of folks do, and authors will do. There are a lot of firms out there that will do website design and development for pennies on the dollar. A lot of times, you’re working with people who are offshored, and they do not necessarily understand the nuances of what you are trying to say and do, and the technical aspects of it.

Being able to compute or communicate, I should say, in a way I speak so that the technical people can understand it and bring it to life, that’s really important. The team behind the scenes, we have Kim, who’s our event coordinator, and she’s the one with that schedule, by the way, and organizing and setting everything up on the calendar. I just got to throw the props out to having a team that works well and just making sure that everybody understands the vision. I do not know about you, but when I worked in the corporate world, what always got to me is there was something going on.

We had a meeting, and we were doing this. We shifted our focus, and all these things were happening, and we were expected to just do the thing that you need to do. This is your job, do that thing. I like to be transparent, not only with the public, but with our team too. This is why we are doing this. This is why we are doing The Bookfest Awards and changing our focus. If they understand the concept behind it, then everything else falls into place and makes sense. That’s how we do it.

I have not been in corporate America since 1994, I think. It’s been so long, and I never missed it again. It is, and you get in that niche where you have that one little job you do. I think that the hardest thing when people try to start a business is that they have had that one little thing. They got a paycheck because I remember this from real estate. So many people got themselves in tax trouble because they did not understand that now you have both sides, and now you’re the person who has to clean the bathroom. There’s something with toilets going on today, but if the toilet overflows, you’re in charge of it because you own this business now.

There are all these little jobs that people do not understand in the background that happen when you’re an entrepreneur and doing everything that needs to be done. By the way, Kim is amazing. She always gets back to people like that. When I have had her work with my clients, your press release team was the same way. They were just right on top of it. A lot of our award winners did press releases, or a couple of them did with you. Got a very smooth-going machine. If somebody wants to get into The Bookfest and puts their award in, what should they realistically expect in terms of exposure, credibility, or sales impact?

What To Expect When Entering The BookFest Awards

It’s just TheBookFest.com, and you can see The Bookfest awards up there. Understand that it takes time, because we review all of these books. We have The Bookfest Bellwethers, who are like an advisory type board, and they also help with The BookFest® judging. We bring in experts, though. It’s interesting because we have a lot of children’s books, and we feel that the best judges of children’s books are children. We actually have children who will be a lot of times the books are read to them, but then the mother takes down their thoughts and comments.

That’s the thing is just keep in mind that we’re doing this in such a way that makes sure that whether you enter a children’s book or maybe the category you pick is for the technical aspects of your book or the book cover, we have artists, actual designers that will judge that. If there are some kind of websites, for example, that’s where we’ll pull in, I mentioned our website developer. We have a team that will do that. I get poetry, by the way, just so you know, I get most of the poetry books that I judge. We divvy it out that way, and we bring in the bellwethers, especially because of the fact that we have clients and we have people that we know in the industry.

If I see a book where I know the person is like, “I need a bellwether to judge this, so we make sure that it’s all done the right way.” Just be patient, wait for the process, wait for that announcement. Keep in mind that we do email everybody, and it’s an automated system. There are literally hundreds of people who have submitted. Not everybody wins. This is not automatic. You get a trophy. Keep in mind that you can always try next time. If you do win, we’ll let you know via email. Again, through the montage, we feature the bestseller or the first place Bookfest Award winners that way.

As you mentioned, we’ll offer the ability to shout it out. The other thing that’s really hard for authors is, “I won an award now, what do I do?” Share it on social media. We make sure that you’ve got graphics and things that you can use for that. You can share that montage as well. You can get stickers. You can order stickers to put on the book, on the physical book, if you would like to, as well as a placard. There are actual physical awards you can order. We make sure that there are things that you can get, like that press release as well. You can shout it out because if you do not have an account with a press release firm, it’s really hard to get that started.

We try to make a lot of those steps really easy for folks. A lot of authors are like, “I got this award. Now what do I do with it?” Not only do we make it easy for them, but then you, the publisher, or the folks that might be working with them, share it on social media. Make sure that your friends see this award because it’s a little bit of a humble brag moment, but it matters. You deserved it. Again, it goes back to that recognition. Juliet, I know so many authors who will be like, “I cannot even get my sister to read my book.” Or “You’ve heard that. You know what I’m talking about?”

Actually, I’ll tell you, when I wrote my very first book back in 2009, I used to walk with my best friend every day. I feel like, “Did you read the book?” Finally, about a month in, she’s like, “Juliet, I’m not going to read your book.” I was like, “What?” She’s like, “If it sucks, I have to tell you, and then it’s going to impact our friendship. I’m not going to read it.”

I was like, “What kind of friend are you? That’s a tip back in our friendship.” It is really hard to get people to read it. Interestingly enough, and I know my audience is sick of hearing this, but the other day I was listening to a podcast and Buck Sexton, who has an audience of millions, was on a podcast talking about how hard it is to sell books. He has some followers. I really thought about what about the rest of us who have 30 friends or whatever?

It’s important for the authors to get that moment where they have that recognition because we spend years as writers crafting this book. You’re burying your soul. It’s like giving birth. You’ve had this child, and to have nobody look at your child can be just devastating. That’s part of the idea behind The Bookfest Awards.

Sometimes when you get reviews, I remember back in, I think it was 2008, somebody called one of my books and said, “This is a fantastic story, but who edited A Monkey?” I had had an editor who told me she was a New York Times bestselling editor, and it turned out that she was really bad. It was devastating. It was almost like somebody, like your carriage is there, they lift up the blanket, and they go, “Your baby’s ugly.” It is really devastating. That’s what I felt like, “My baby’s ugly.” I’m a much better writer now.

The Reality Of Editing And Why You Need Beta Readers

You learned, you learned that. That’s the thing, especially with new writers, they can take a few notes and just learn because you have that story. I’ve heard many stories just like that. It’s not unusual. Do not feel like, “This happened to me and I’m the only one.” It happens. It just goes to underscore the importance of not just having one editor. No. Not just relying on AI to be an editor. I can help you with some things and might be a good beta type reader, but there are certain folks you need to pull in. Sure, you can get your eighth-grade English teacher to be your editor.

They’re not your only editor. Do not. I do not care how great you think they are. They’re not in the publishing industry. If you get some film flammer in there that’s going to feed you or sell you a bill of sale, you need somebody else to have those checks and balances. We’re too close as writers to our writing. We cannot look at it and find those little inconsistencies or grammatical errors. I do not know how you suggest doing it, but there is no right answer, but I think that 2, 3, or 4 beta readers. If you want to get your Aunt Mary in there, or your cousin, or your eighth-grade English teacher, they could maybe be one or two of them, but there are professional beta readers.

You want somebody who is going to give you their honest opinion and then do developmental editing. Looking at the big picture, the plot structure, story, all of that, making sure it’s all coalescing. You probably want a line editor. Be careful of the folks who say, I’m going to do all the forms of editing. I’m not saying that they cannot. I do not want to yuck their yum and say, “No, you’re wrong.” I’ve just seen so many that say that, but they themselves are blind to some of their own errors. After a line edit, which literally just goes line by line, comes the copy editing. A lot of times, people think that editing means copy editing, but there are other steps before you even get there.

If you try to rush into that copy editing before you have a good developmental edit or before you get some impact from real readers and real professional beta readers, you’re just setting yourself up. At that point, they can go through and fix the syntax and the grammar and everything. If you’ve got a structural change that you then need to make, you’re just going back, and you’re going to get into that endless loop. Even then, at the very end, to have a final proofing, to have a final person who does not know squat about your book. They have not been there.

They were not your developmental editor. They can look at it and be like, “I found this little error. Somebody missed it.” Do not be men. I get authors that are like, “Can you believe my copy editor missed five things, and my proof editor got it?” I’m like, “Do you know that even books that are put out on the market by the big five?” Publishers, on average, have seven mistakes in them, seven typos on average. You know, if you give yourself a little bit of grace as well, and give some of your editors a little bit of grace as well.

Sometimes there are errors, and if you catch them, great, you can always re-upload the manuscript and everything. I cannot stress enough the importance of going through that process as a writer to make sure that the book is the best that it can be. I’m over here, Juliet, doing the marketing and promotion. When authors ask me, “What is the thing that I can do to ensure the success of my book’s marketing?”

I’m like, “Give me a good book.” It’s the product. Can lead, I have a whole thing on this. I can lead a horse to water, but I cannot make them drink. I can lead readers to your book. I cannot force them to buy it. There are marketers out there that will force the buys, and that’s a whole other discussion. Be careful of those folks. That book has to grab them. What’s inside your story? It needs to grab their attention in order to get them to buy it.

It definitely does. The other thing that I’ve found is people will say, “I put it through Microsoft.” Microsoft even put it through to get it straightened up, but then it goes to the editor because I have to consider. Most authors are like this. They have consistent mistakes that they just make all the time. I know what mine are, that never been able to correct them. I’m not talking to interest in correcting because I have not. Do not rely on Microsoft either, because that is the sweetest made for business.

It’s not made for fiction dialogue. It’s not made for storytelling. It’s not made for any of that. I find that people, I lurk in the Facebook group. I never say anything. I do not want to be critiqued because I know this type of business, but I just need them to talk in there about the things they are doing, and I’m like, “I have to just get out of Facebook before I explode because that’s not going to work on it.”

You mentioned beta readers, I actually have an ARC team of about 30 people that I’m using, and I only have out of that 30, I have three people who are family members. That is it. The reason I do that is that people you know, and the family members, and I tell them going into it, I’m like, “I have to be brutally honest, I do not want smoke blowing up my behind.” If it’s bad, I need to know it’s bad.

For the most part, when your mom reads it, or your aunt, Sally, they’re going to be hesitant to tell you that there were problems with it because they’re family, they’re connected, and they do not want to hurt your feelings. I always tell my arc readers, “Arc readers that fields are redundant, but my arcs. You guys, I need you to be brutal with me. I want you to tear it apart like a real reader will, especially with the plot, because if there are plot holes, it ruins the whole book.

Even on the flip side of that, if you get your loved ones to read your book and they give you feedback and it’s glowing, then inside you’re wondering, they are just blowing smoke, aren’t they? It’s not sincere. In a way, you really have to. I love the fact that you only have a couple because those are people that you really know are going to be honest and be brutal if they need to. As an author, either way, you might not get what you want or be suspicious of what you got. It’s like, if you’re sitting there going, “Aunt Mary said it was the best book she ever read.” Aunt Mary must be lying. Where are you? That does not help anyone.

I actually had someone the other day tell me that AI told them how good their book was. I was like, “Okay.” I thought that I was like, “Did you train your AI? Your AI really critiques it?” I would be really hesitant about having AI tell me whether my book was good or not.

Here’s the thing about getting back to that AI conversation. It feeds into what we want, knows that it’s been programmed that way. That’s one of the real dark sides of it too, cause it sounds nice to have somebody that’s always going to be cheerleading and on your side. If you give it your book and it tells you that it’s great. If you really want to do that, authors, I’m not saying do not do it. It might be fun.

It is another way to get a beta reader to get the feedback, but tell them, make sure you say, “I need you to take on the role of the most persnickety and detail-oriented editor working for Penguin Random House and tell me honest feedback.” Force it to give you honest feedback. I’ve had it too, Julia. Actually, I’ve had it on more than one occasion. I had an author once send me his 200,000-word-ish manuscript that was historical fiction and a bunch of other things.

It was very convoluted and interesting. I’m not saying it wasn’t a great concept. When I was basically going back to him with some basic feedback, like, “This is too long. You spend too much time in the opening, just setting the stage and building the scene. It’s too much telling and not enough showing basic stuff.” Basic stuff came back, and he’s like, “This is what ChatGPT showed me. He starts emailing me his chats.”

I’m like, “I do not want to read through what ChatGPT said.” Even then, I was reading it, and ChatGPT was like, “On a score out of 0 to 100, I give this a 79 at this point.” I’m like, “It’s even telling you in a nice way that this book needs some work.” I do, I agree, I caution authors to be very careful with what they might be saying. If you need that ego boost, if you had a hard day and you want to have somebody tell you something good, but do not take it to heart that way. We need humans editing and reviewing our books and reading our books. That’s what it’s all about.

Yes, it definitely is. Where can we find you if we have more questions and if we want to enroll in The BookFest®?

Getting Involved With The BookFest Community

The Bookfest first. Submissions are open now for the Bookfest awards. You can go to TheBookFest.com, and you see right there on the top where it has the awards, and you can click there, and you can submit your book that way. When the Bookfest happens, you can find out if you are a winner. Even if you do not enter, and you’re a writer who wants to learn more about the industry and craft and the business side of things, and have even got insights into the reader’s world, join us for the book fest.

It’s free to watch. There is no webinar-type thing. We make it very accessible because it airs on our YouTube channel, on our Books That Make a You on YouTube channel. We have a section for The BookFest® on the actual BookFest website. It’s right there on the homepage. A lot of people are like, “Where do I go?” It’s like, just go there. You can watch and hang out with us. We also air it on Facebook and X sometimes too, but that’s like the main hub for it. Watch and hang out.

You can subscribe to be a Book Fester. That way you get the Book Fest email alerts, and you get notices when we do send out the call for speakers and ideas because authors a lot of times want to speak and talk about their books to help the readers or to other writers. There are lots of ways that you can get involved as well, because ultimately, The BookFest® is a community. That’s what it’s founded on. Become a Bookfester. You can subscribe. I promise we do not spam you.

We do not send you things that you do not need on a regular basis. Try to make it so that you get information about the Book Fest itself and any special news and information that’s going on. That’s the best way and the easiest way to get involved in the Book Fest. If you’re interested in PR and marketing for your book, find us at BlackChâteauEnterprises.com. If you want to contact me, that’s the easiest way, because there’s a form there, and you can just click the let’s talk button and reach out to me.

You can see more about some of the services that we offer. As well, if you want to get a book review or get involved with some of the things that we’re doing over at the books that make or books that make you, you can go to BooksThatMakeYou.com and find out about the books that make you show and all that fun stuff, and subscribe to have a Webby, that’s our Webby award up there. We have Webby award-winning books that make you a newsletter that people can subscribe to as well.

You do. Try to share your articles as much as you can in our newsletters, so people can find you. Thank you very much for taking the time and sharing this. I’m going to be entering this one again. I thoroughly enjoyed the guests last time. You do not have to stay there the whole day if it’s not your thing. There is a schedule. As I said, they stay right on it. I dip in and out if there’s something I want to know more about. It’s a very great event. Desireé, thank you.

I’ll just add really quickly since you mentioned it. It’s recorded too. If you go to the programming page and you want to see past Bookfest recordings, the videos are all curated and stored right there, as well as on YouTube. You can go back and watch them. It’s all free. I’ve had people say, “I’ve gone to writers conferences and spent X amount of money. The information I’m getting here is free and actually better than some of the information I got there.”

I would agree. I’ll tell you that the event that we went to, which you invited me to in Las Vegas, I was so overwhelmed by everything that was going on there. I never really go to those types of things. It is sort of more comfortable to do it at your own pace on YouTube when you feel like doing it, instead of just being, “Look at all these people here, and I’m a hermit, I’m anti-social.”

That’s a lot of writers, right? We want to try to stay in our little cubby and not socialize unless we have to. That’s part of it as well.

I think it is too. Thank you very much.

Juliet, thank you. I appreciate it.

Important Links

• Desireé Duffy on LinkedIn
• Black Château Enterprises
• Books That Make You
• The BookFest®
• Books That Make You on YouTube
• NetGallery

About Desireé Duffy

Duffy is an advocate for spreading stories. Her expansive marketing, event production, broadcast, and public relations background, mixed with her passion for storytelling, led her to found the multi-award-winning, full-service marketing and public relations firm Black Château in 2016, Books That Make You in 2018, and The BookFest® in 2020.

She is the executive producer for events including The BookFest®, the annual Beach-Bound Book Bash, Jingle Books, and was the license-holder and lead organizer for TEDxResedaBlvd in 2019. She hosts and is the executive producer for the Books That Make You Show. She has programed panels and placed speakers for a wide array of writers’ conferences and organizations including: the Alliance for Women in Media, Digital Hollywood, The Paley Center for Media, IWOSC, LosCon, the Twin Cities Book Festival, Women in Business, WriterCon, and others.

Duffy is a member of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS); on the board of directors for the Writers and Publishers Network; past-president and advisory board member of the Alliance for Women in Media in Southern California; and member of the Los Angeles chapter of the Women’s National Book Association. Black Château holds corporate memberships with the Horror Writers Association (HWA) and the Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA).

Duffy is a graduate of Marian University and Santa Clarita’s College of the Canyons. She holds Bachelor of Science degrees in English and communication, and an associate degree in art and in marketing, and certificates in ecommerce business and entrepreneurship. Desireé Duffy spends her time between Southern California, Oklahoma, and everywhere bookish events and booklovers can be found around the world.