Live-tweeting the ghost investigations for our latest book

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As we announced in our previous post, our current work-in-progress has moved from research for a new paranormal fiction (Silverville Saga, #4) and into its own nonfiction book.

But we had no idea how deep those waters were becoming.

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First, though, this is the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop, hosted by our incomparable Ninja Captain, Alex J. Cavanaugh (thanks, Cap'n!), postings shared on the first Wednesday of every month by a host of conspiratorial scribblers:

"Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!"

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Now back to the promised topic:

Live-Tweeting our Ghost Investigations

You could say we live in an ideal writers retreat -- 30 miles from the nearest town (pop. 5,000), surrounded on three sides by Colorado high country public land, and only three dozen families in the hundred square miles around us.

One irony is that our kids grew up thinking we lived in a really boring place. Sure they could go horseback riding, hiking, mountain-biking, or cross-country skiing -- all from our backdoor. But that was nothing special to them because it was all they knew. And they certainly didn't realize we had spent years getting to a point where we could call this home.

Another irony is that, although it's a great place to live and write, it's so isolated it makes book promotion a
logistical challenge. Once you get past the four bookstores within 60 miles, it's hundreds of miles to get to a population density with a demographic that supports much readership. And even then, plane connections to conferences or guest appearances from our place are a nightmare.

(We know, we know -- poor little us to be "trapped" in such a terrible place!)

Our promotional solution: we decided to embrace social media to expand our platform and reach, and with  ,vengeance. The plunged into this blog, our Website,  Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google-Plus, and Goodreads as well as blog hops and tours (thank you, generous hosts!) and all the links to these various venues through our assorted author and product pages -- plus all the interconnecting RSS feeds we could muster (no telling which of the above platforms you used to reach this posting!)

But we're still just two tiny voices amid the clamoring social media throngs of other authors -- despite the accolades and awards our books have garnered.

So, back to the "deep waters" we mentioned at the beginning. Plunging once again into the deep waters of a new form of promotion, we're taking a close look at using Twitter. Since our latest project is a nonfiction of sorts -- a travelogue on haunted hotels in our region -- our newest initiative is to try live-tweeting our investigations. (Even though we early on set up a Twitter account, we soon ran out of interesting tweets while laboring away composing our fiction -- BORING!)

We've finally taken Twitter seriously, and we're hoping the nature of this project will be fun for our followers if they get to "join us" during the actual investigations. Now it's a matter of honing our thoughts into 140 character posts. And trying to find suitable Wi-Fi connections in some of the remote places we'll be visiting in coming weeks.

Wish us luck, and join us if you care, to see what ghosts we can "scare" up -- or vice versa.

Our Twitter feed is @WriteintheThick