Small Business Saturday is a wonderful effort that has taken off, initially thanks to American Express (hardly what one would call a small business), and now because it has gained a momentum of its own. I would like to suggest, however, that supporting a little or lesser known author is another way to share in Small Business Saturday. Those of us in that category don’t have storefronts, but we are most assuredly in the marketplace. There are a number of sources such as the Independent Author Network at http://www.independentauthornetwork.com/ or lesser known authors may also be the subject of pins on Pinterest (https://www.pinterest.com/) or mentioned on Shelfari (http://www.shelfari.com/). If you have a Kindle, check out the lower priced books because despite the on-going discussions within the author community of whether they should or not, a lot of independents keep the price on their e-books low as a way of introducing themselves. You can skip past the names you recognize and spend some time perusing titles that intrigue you by authors that you aren’t familiar with yet. In all fairness, I am the first to admit that all self-published and small press authors are not created equal and the fact that someone has written a book with a cool title and good “back cover description” doesn’t mean that you will like the book. (On the other hand, haven’t you also been disappointed with best sellers that you didn’t care for?) A feature such as Amazon’s “Look Inside” is nice since you do have a chance to read more than a few lines to see if you at least like the style of writing.

At any rate, even if you don’t necessarily decide to explore more indie authors today – if you’re inspired by doing so on Small Business Saturday – that counts!