Writing Wednesday: To Excerpt or Not to Excerpt?

I got a call from my oldest son, who finally finished reading DEFIANCE (book 2 in my mermaid series) and is reading the copy of DECEPTION (book 3 in my mermaid series) that he actually purchased at Booksmith when he was home in December.

I mean, I have a pile of copies on my office shelf, but he bought his own at the store. "Now I have to read it, since I paid money for it," he said with a smile that day. I bought him dinner and margaritas in return. (He's 22, totally legal.) Well, I made my husband buy everyone dinner after the booksigning, but we're married, right? So it's just like me buying, except with less effort.

Anyway.

Does reading excerpts online make you more likely or less likely to actually buy the book? Does getting a book for free - either an ARC or a contest win - make you more likely to put it at the top of your reading pile or less likely than if you chose and paid for it yourself?

Personally, I love excerpts on blogs, and the extra chapters at the end of  books that tease you with the next book in the series. I've clicked links to buy a book after reading the excerpt, and I've totally gone back to amazon and ordered the next one in the series when I like the teaser chapter.

This is why I encourage guest bloggers to share excerpts - I know it works on me, so I'm assuming it works on other readers as well.

But not always. Sometimes it backfires. I may like the premise, but the blurb doesn't hook me so I hesitate. And then inevitably forget about that particular book when the next shiny thing comes along.

And does size matter? How long is too long? (Excerpts, people, we're talking excerpts. Get your minds out of the gutter.)


So that's what I'm thinking about today. And if anyone wants to chime in, let's get a conversation going. I may or may not be able to participate in said conversation as I'm in an all-day meeting today with my day-job peeps - but you all know I'd much rather be chatting with you.

In the meantime, Happy Writing!