It’s Copper Centurion Giveaway Competition Time!

A Copper Centurion Giveaway has been announced! Click on the link for your chance to win a signed, paperback copy of my newest novel!


Goodreads Book Giveaway

Copper Centurion by Daniel Ottalini

Copper Centurion

by Daniel Ottalini

Giveaway ends April 16, 2013.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

If you’re looking for the opportunity to win a brand new, signed, paperback copy of Copper Centurion, then you’ve come to the right place! But I urge you to click only if you like one of the following things.

  1. Romans Vs Barbarians
  2. Airships
  3. Fun new gadgetry
  4. A Female Roman Senator
  5. Getting lost in the middle of Scandanavia
  6. Elephants vs Wolves
  7. Learning that Vikings did not have horns on their helmets
  8. Fun new latin words
  9. Operation Northern Gale
  10. Togas.

Quite an impressive list! I could tell you more, but then what would be the point in getting the novel? Check it out now! Giveaway ends April 16th!

GoodReads Giveaway & Createspace Publishing Announcement

Website giveaway update and Goodreads Giveaway introduction! Win a FREE signed copy of Brass Legionnaire. Goodreads Link – http://bit.ly/LD8kvz


It is with great happiness that I announce the publishing of the createspace paperback version of Brass Legionnaire. You can find it here before it has a permanent place on amazon.

Or, if you’d prefer to enter a giveaway for the book, I’m giving away three copies on the website here or if you are a member of Goodreads, you can click on the link below.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Brass Legionnaire by Daniel Ottalini

Brass Legionnaire

by Daniel Ottalini

Giveaway ends June 01, 2012.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

As you can see, the giveaways end soon! And, if you are a smart and crafty person, you can enter to win in both places! One just requires a comment (the website) and the other simply requires you to be a member of Goodreads! If you sign up for both, and somehow win both, I’ll send you just one copy and redraw for someone else (it’s only fair after all!)

I have the actual books here. They are ‘proof’ novels, but they are exactly the same as the real ones! Hope you are excited! Sign up soon, the contest ends in three days!

Brass Legionnaire Signed First Edition Giveaway!

Enter for your chance to win a free, signed, paperback copy of Brass Legionnaire! Contest ends May 31st, so hurry up and enter today!


Hi everyone!

It is with great pleasure that I announce the creation of my FIRST  ever giveaway for Brass Legionnaire!

Here’s how it works. You comment below with your email address if you aren’t a wordpress person, or you simply comment with your wordpress account. (P.S. I won’t be using the email address for anything else!) The giveaway ends MAY 31st (because that’s when the books arrive in the mail!) I have exactly THREE books to give away to interested parties.

Why have a give away? Well, in the best of worlds, everyone who gets a copy of the book will be heads over heels in love with it and give me stellar reviews! In the real world, I’m simply hoping that people give me some honest and (hopefully!) good reviews.

It’s been a real journey to write this novel. I hope people find it worthwhile of their reading time. Oh, and did I mention that I’ll be signing each book – it might not be worth much now, but you never know about the future! I’ll announce the winners (randomly chosen by tried and true papers in a hat method) on June 1st (that’s a Friday). The books will be sent out that Saturday as long as I get addresses.

P.S. I’m poor, so only readers in Canada and the U.S. will be able to get a paperback copy of the novel. However, if you win and live elsewhere, I’ll send you a free coupon for smashwords so you can get your free online ebook copy.

So what are ya waiting for? Hurry up and enter to win!

10 Things to do Before Publishing Your Novel (Besides Editing)

10 things every aspiring author should do before their book comes back from editing!


Hello all!

So it’s been about 4 weeks now since I sent Brass Legionnaire off to the editor. I’ll admit freely, once it was out of my hands, I sort of… blanked. I was truly faced with a ‘now what’ type of situation. So for the last couple weeks I’ve been trying to tie up other loose ends that I figured I might as well get done now. So in my free time (My day job and graduate school keep me fairly busy, so that’s rare right now!) I put together a list of a few things that you can do while waiting for the book to come back.

1. Get some nice cover art (Mine was handled by the great people over at Streetlight Graphics, but you can also check out 99 designs or deviantart and post a job offer on either one.) Alternatively, if you’re a great artist or have a deft hand on photoshop, hunt down what you like and tweak it in the best ways. Great way to do it on the cheap if you need to.

2. Set up a personal author blog or website (Like this one) or perhaps even a website just for your book or series. However, don’t jump the gun too early. I have my entire website ready to go on Wix – a flash driven site that is really quick and simple to use – but I haven’t gone live yet because I feel a bit silly doing it without a product to show! Since I can’t do ‘preorders’ I’m simply holding off until the book goes live, then I’ll probably buy one of the smaller packages just so that I can get my domain name (and not have to worry about having other stuff in my URL), but I’ll save my money until then!

3. Set up a business/promotion plan – How will you promote your book? What will you do? Will you advertise? if so, where? Who is your specific target audience? What is best for them? Text ads, picture ads? You’re going to have to do some hard thinking on this one. Don’t limit yourself just to facebook or google. There are a variety of other sites out there that host ads, so find one that is more likely to be frequented by the people you are targeting!

4. Create a free audiobook sample of your first chapter. A lot of people offer a ‘free sample’ of their book to entice readers in. Even if you don’t plan on doing a full audiobook, a sample chapter (read by you, or someone you know whose voice is better!) can draw in a whole host of new people. Make it free on iTunes, put it up on YouTube. The more exposure, the more likely you are to rope someone in who is actually interested! Personally, I’d want to make it a full audiobook eventually, but in the meantime, it’s another cool way to build some hits.

5. In connection to that, create a book ‘trailer’ all you really need is some basic knowledge of iMovie or another video editing program and some effects and definitely your cover art. Alternatively, you can pay someone to make a (probably better) product, but it will cost you. For example, a basic book teaser at Circle of Seven productions will set you back a cool $800. But if you’ve got the money to spend…

6. Make some business cards/bookmarks. One of the most basic things to do is make a nice business card with your name, email address (not your phone number!) website, and title (you are a soon-to-be-Author!) along with a picture of your cover art. Don’t have cover art yet? Set it up except for that one part. Then it’s a simple copy and paste situation. You’ll probably want to use photoshop for this, but you can pay someone to do it. Personally, I like the control (And also screaming at my computer when photoshop goes wacky!) Then, it’s a quick upload to vistaprint or Zazzle. Be even fancier, add a QR code to the back and direct it to your website! Integration baby!

7. Set a reminder to copyright your book when it is done editing. No really, you need to remember to do this! Click here to find out more. You can also pre-register your book if it is in the process of editing to get a bit of a head start on the copyright process – Another chunk of money you need to shell out, but you don’t want people stealing your hard work now, do you? I’ll be honest though, I’m not sure if the pre-registration is a good deal. Readers?

8. Make sure you’ve got an account on Goodreads, Amazon, Smashwords, and anywhere else you plan on selling your book.

9. Make sure you’ve got a well-written synopsis for your various book pages and a good blurb or two for your front page or inside cover.

10. Write your bio, your acknowledgements, then sit back and wait!

Anything I forget? Please let me know! (Due credit where credit is due 🙂 )

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