What is a virtual book fair? How does it work? Find out what to expect for The Cozy Mystery Library's upcoming April Cozy Romance Book Fair.
Instead of traveling miles to a book festival or having to skip bookish events, we now have the ability to get together online for virtual book fairs. Even better, we can host book fairs specific to the cozy mystery community. The Cozy Mystery Library is planning to do just that in 2021.
We have four cozy mystery book fairs in the works:
Spring - (April 11th)
Romantic Cozy Mysteries
Summer (July)
Café/Baking Cozy Mysteries
Fall (September)
Paranormal Cozy Mysteries
Winter (November)
Holiday Cozy Mysteries
(All holidays from all year long are included!)
We're already starting our planning for our April 11th book fair!
Romantic Cozy Mystery Book Fair: Sunday, April 11th
The spring book fair, focusing on romantic cozy mysteries, is currently being planned. Authors can contact me any time about any of the book fairs, whether it's just to get more information or to submit their books. I'm inviting authors who have romantic cozy mysteries to contact me this month to submit the books into the upcoming April romantic cozy mystery book fair.
We don't have a name yet for the romantic cozy mystery book fair. We'd love for you to take a poll on our Twitter page to help us make our choice!
How the fair works for authors:
Authors can submit their book titles, covers, preferred online vendors, and any author merchandise, and let me know if they are attending the event (this means being available to chat in text not on video the day of the event.) *We are looking for romantic cozy mystery books for the April book fair. Authors please submit your books before March 5th.
Authors must be able to place any books and merchandise they plan to include in the fair on discounted sale at least for the day of the event. (Books in the fairs do not need to be free, but must be on sale.)
Books will be put into a catalog sent to readers via email and will be put in the book fair all via affiliate links (*The Cozy Mystery Library is not selling any books or merchandise, we are only making them available via affiliate links, so they can still be in kindle unlimited.)
If you're an author whose books will be on sale at the event, but you're not attending, you don't need to do anything else after #3.
If you're an author attending the event, you need to submit a bio/intro less than 200 words for a video compilation that we will put together. You can either submit the written bio and I (Astoria Wright) will narrate it, or you can record your own audio/video to introduce yourself and your books. You'll receive a schedule of when to attend (generally a 20-30 minute time period) starting as early as noon AZ mountain time.
How the fair works for book reviewers/bloggers/podcasters:
Reviewers, bloggers, podcasters and anyone in the cozy mystery community can submit the titles/screenshots/logos of their websites/podcasts, etc. and provide merchandise links and pics of that merchandise to include in the fair.
Bloggers/podcasters and anyone wanting to introduce their sites to cozy mystery readers should send in a bio/intro of no more than 200 words and are encouraged to attend the event (this means being available to chat in text not on video the day of the event) in order to answer questions from cozy readers. You can either submit the written bio and I (Astoria Wright) will narrate it, or you can record your own audio/video to introduce yourself and your work.
Those who attend the fair will receive a schedule with a time slot in which they will be expected to attend (generally a 20-30 minute time period). *Time slot expected to be sometime after noon AZ mountain time.
How the fair works for readers:
An invitation will be send out via social media and to subscribers to The Cozy Mystery Library by mid-March. You'll then be able to register to attend the fair!
In April, subscribers to The Cozy Mystery Library will receive a catalog of all the books and merchandise with their regular prices and the prices for the day of the fair.
Readers will also receive a schedule of events for the fair. Here's the general layout of the fair:
Author Introductions/descriptions of the authors' works will be presented via video and participants can comment and ask questions of authors in attendance
Cozy community introductions and descriptions of podcasts, blogs, magazines, or other community resources will be presented via video and participants can comment and ask questions.
Polls will be available for readers to share their opinions about cozy topics.
Puzzles and games will be available for readers to play together or play on your own and chat with others while you're playing.
Raffles/prizes are still being decided - stay tuned!
*To those who attended A Frightfully Cozy Book Fair in Fall last year, this book fair will have a slightly different format.
More plans for the fair on the works, and we're open to suggestions!
Let us know your thoughts in the comments or on social media!
Join the conversation: