WITS Hosting Karen Salmansohn's Virtual Book Tour

Today we welcome Karen Salmansohn to our blog. She is discussing The Bounce Back Book – how to thrive in the face of adversity, setbacks and losses.

YVONNE: Tell me something about yourself and your writing background.
KAREN: I am a best selling self help author with over 1 million books sold with past titles like How To Be Happy Dammit. Journalists have called me “Deepakl Chopra meets Carrie Bradshaw” because I offer empowering psychological self-help ammo, delivered with a feisty sense of humor. (Luckily, I have Carrie’s shoe collection and not Deepak’s.)

YVONNE: What is the title of your book? Give us the basic story line so we’ll know what it’s about.
KAREN: This new book is called The Bounce Back Book. It has a symbolic red rubber cover on the outside, and inside tips on how to thrive in the face of adversity, setbacks, and losses, covering everything: a bad breakup, a serious illness, the loss of a job, the death of someone close, bankruptcy, slander, rejection…all kinds of life challenges.

YVONNE: What inspired you to write this book?
KAREN: A few years ago I went through a sexual assault and was going through my own tough time of needing to bounce back. Because I’m a self-help book author for a living, I became very aware of wanting to learn all the best principles of resiliency–to not only help myself, but share what I was learning with others. This book is filled with interesting research studies, nutrition tips, and personal advice to help folks going through tough times. Inside is all the stuff which helped me, so I might help others.

YVONNE: Is this the first book you have written?
KAREN: No, I have a bunch of best-selling self-help books like How To Be Happy Dammit – and its sequel books, like Enough Dammit and The 7 Lively Sins (how to enjoy your life dammit) …and some business books, like the best seller How To Succeed In Business Without A Penis (where I explain a woman doesn’t need a penis to succeed—just ballsiness!).

YVONNE: How long did it take to write this book? Any interesting tidbits about your writing method or how the book developed?
KAREN: The Bounce Back Book took about a year to write and six months to creative direct. I also package my books. I used to be in advertising, so I am involved in the whole creative directing process of my books. My goal is to create cool and fun self-help books for people who would not normally be caught dead reading self help books. Or self-help you could give to a friend as a gift and they wouldn’t slap you.

YVONNE: Where is your book(s) available? Do you have a Web site or blog where we can learn more about you or your book?
KAREN: More info about The Bounce Back Book is at my site www.notsalmon.com. It’s available in book stores everywhere as well as amazon.com etc.

YVONNE: As far as marketing, do you do more online publicity or print/radio/TV promotion?
KAREN: I’m a big fan of doing blog tours like this one to get the word out about my books. But really as an author you need to do a media mix. Repetition works, repetition works, repetition works. My book is also very visual as well as verbal, so on my site I have flash art of some of the inside pages for people to see (www.notsalmon.com). I also am working on a contest–collecting the most inspiring bounce back stories–and giving away prizes like a luxurious spa trip. More info about this will also soon be posted up at my site.

Enter my Bounce Back contest for a chance to a free Fairmont Spa vacation! (A fabulous spa package for 3 days/2 nights for two people, and two personalized spa treatments for each person at Willow Stream Spa in gorgeous Fairmont Newport Beach, California. You will be indulged like never before in one of seven decadent treatment rooms appointed with over-sized spa beds!)

Simply buy The Bounce Back Book before July 1st and send me the proof of Amazon receipt to notsalmonstafff@notsalmon.com. Then you have until August 1st to send me an uplifting story of glory over a tough time. Submissions should be between 400 and 1200 words and depict your personal tale of "woe" to "wow." Looking forward to hearing about your incredible come-back!!

YVONNE: Any other comments or things you would like for us to know?
KAREN: Hmmm… I guess I’d love to give a tip for folks going through a challenging time…something from my book. One of my favorites is “If you ask depressing questions, you will 100 percent get depressing answers.”
Many people going through a challenge ask themselves questions which further weigh them down like: “Why didn’t I . . .?” “What if . . .?” “Why me?” We wouldn’t accept some of the mean and nasty questions we ask ourselves if they came from an outside source! So you need to stop and swap these questions immediately for these questions which bounce you upward, like: “What’s within my control to change?” “What can I do to move forward?” “How can I grow from this challenge?”
For me…writing this book to help others helped me to personally grow from the challenge I went through. And I hope my book helps others to grow as well.

YVONNE: Thank you for giving us the opportunity to get to know you and learn about your book. I wish you well.
KAREN: Thanks! Right back at ya!

For more information about The Bounce Back Book Virtual Book Tour, visit http://thebouncebackbookblog.com/