I seem to be getting more and more of my emails bouncing back with vacation autoresponder messages, are you? It’s a sure sign August is here and it’s time to make the most of summer holidays. But on the way out of the house, grab something to read this week’s articles, you’ll be glad you did.

Chris Brogan on Chris Brogan
Writing a Book — Finding Time
“As I’m about to complete my fourth, and my fifth will be finished a few months after that, I can tell you that it most certainly does take time, but that time can be found. Here are a few ways to ‘find’ time.”

Laurel Marshfield on BookBuzzr
What’s an Author Brand?
“The author story (aka brand) refers to the complex messages authors put out into the world about themselves and their books — which we then absorb and retain in a highly individual way.”

Gordon Burgett on Gordon Burgett’s Blog
How do you define (or find) a profitable niche for your book?
“A niche is a unit that shares specific traits or behaviors in common. Here, we are talking about creating a book for a group of buyers that have a common interest—and conducting a pre-test before we do all the writing and investing, to see if it will be profitable in advance.”

Lisa M. Griffin on The Creative Penn
How to Find an Illustrator for Your Book
“You have decided to self-publish your completed manuscript and have decided on a company to print your book. Great! But you still have to make a critical decision, the artwork. Namely, who can do it, where do I find them and how much should I pay them?”

Miral Sattar on LiveWires
Crunching Books
“I came up with the idea for BiblioCrunch.com while conducting research for my thesis at NYU and working at TIME.com. I was looking for ways to diversify revenue streams for digital and print media and found that there was a void in the e-publishing space for digital books and bookazines that smaller companies like BiblioCrunch.com can fill.”

Photo by NDanger