One of the most original and promising new ideas I have heard about in the world of book publishing comes from Stephen Elliot, author of seven published books, who created his own Lending Library.  Elliott had the notion that using advance copies of his forthcoming book, The Adderall Diaries, would result in significant advance publicity and ultimately in increased book sales. Through social networking he found 400 readers who signed up to receive, read, and forward on a copy of his book. The original cost for launching the promotion were the costs of the initial number of advance copies produced and of mailing them. The cost to the person receiving the book was only the cost of mailing the book to the next person via parcel post - about $4. 

Elliott found his experiment to be wildly successful in that it gleaned many Facebook conversations and mentions on other social media sites, several articles about the method and the book, interviews, book reviews, and a web site hosted conversation about his book. In other words, he achieved his goal of creating a great deal of buzz about his book before it was actually published.

Previously in this blog when I have discussed the opportunities offered by new technologies for promoting books, I have always suggested that sharing information and generating word of mouth recommendations through social media are excellent means for authors to utilize to create interest in their works. The Lending Library is an extra hook for getting people interested in and talking about a book and may well be worth a try.