More Than 1,000 Readers Enter Book Contest

Entries come from as far away as Australia
Well, the blogosphere contests are over and whew, do I have some work to do: Goodreads announced via an email I received at 3:03 a.m. that 1,099 people—some of them from Scotland, New South Wales, and elsewhere—entered to win a free copy of Sister of Silence!
Now I just have to decide how to choose the winners. Unlike the 156 entries from the DearReader and Shelf-Awareness contests, it’s a lot more work when you’ve got almost ten times as many people who entered the Goodreads contest. There’s the collating and printing of each name, and then they must be cut apart, if I’m going to put them all into a (much bigger) hat. Or I could just go through the list of entrants and look at their photos, and choose the ones with the best smiles. Or the best hairdo, or choose only those folks who like the same kind of books I do. I could even base my decision upon where they live, for instance, by saying I’m going to award a free book to everyone in Texas. Or Tallahassee, Fl.
I’m really not sure what to do—so why don’t you help me? Send your suggestions to the email below or post it on my Facebook or Twitter page. I’ll read them all during the weekend and make my decision Sunday night. The winners will be selected and announced Monday morning.
Maybe you can also give me some feedback on the following: in the first contest, people saw my photo, and 156 of them were “hooked” by this:
Dear Reader,
It took me 20 years to write SISTER OF SILENCE, but if you’re like my other readers, you’ll read it in two days—and learn how I went from abused teen to suicidal mom of four by 21 to award-winning journalist determined to survive.
“Daleen you are a magnificent storyteller.” — Bob Edwards
“It’s a must-read for the brave-hearted.” — Asra Q. Nomani
“It’s a wake-up call for all of us to help end the silence!” — Dr. Jacquelyn Campbell
I’m giving away 10 books plus Starbucks gift cards. Write to me – daleen(dot)berry(at)gmail.com – to win.
But in the Goodreads contest, readers there saw a photo of the SOS cover, and 1,099 entered after reading this:
A victim of child sex abuse at thirteen, she was forced into a shotgun wedding after her high school was featured on national television for having the highest number of pregnant teens in the U.S. But then Daleen found herself married to a coal miner who kept her barefoot and pregnant. By age twenty-one she had four children. Sister of Silence is the amazing story of her personal journey: how she went from being a teen mom to an award-winning journalist determined to break the silence that shatters women and children’s lives.
I’m new to all the sites where people could win copies of my book, including Goodreads, so I have no idea what their numbers are for members, subscribers, unique visitors or anything else. The only thing I can guess, from the much larger number of entries at Goodreads is that people like the cover of my book better than my photo! (And that’s fine by me.) Just a hypothesis, here. What do you think? Send me your thoughts, for I’d love to hear them.
And now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some work to do. Have a great weekend!
Editor’s note: Buy your copy of Sister of Silence for $9.99 here. If you hate the way a real book feels and smells, then skip it and go for the e-book. It’s only $2.99, and it’s also available at the above link for the Nook and the Kindle and at Smashwords, for most other formats out there.