As Sylvia Day published Entwined with You this month, we caught up with her for a video interview. She shared her success story as a self-published author, offering some advice for aspiring writers as well.

Since she landed a book deal with Penguin’s Berkley Books imprint, she has sold more than 7,000,000 copies in English the last ten months. Here’s an excerpt:

I try to convey to [my readers] all the time how grateful I am. Because I know they can spend their hard earned dollars on any book. If they’re going to spend it on mine and then spend the next few hours of their life with it, the least I can say is “Thank you” … Gratitude goes a long way. Never forget that you are where you are because your readers are there for you.

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Ever thought about getting a literary tattoo?

BuzzFeed has created a video called, “Can You Guess These Amazing Literary Tattoos?”

The idea is simple: see a tattoo alongside the literary quote that inspire it. We’ve embedded the video above…

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Here are some literary events to pencil in your calendar. To get your event posted on our calendar, visit our Facebook Your Literary Event page. Please post your event at least one week prior to its date.

Hip hop star Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson has penned a memoir called Mo’ Meta Blues: The World According to Questlove. Hear him talk about it at Barnes & Noble (Union Square branch) on Wednesday, June 19th starting 7 p.m. (New York, NY)

Novelist Ru Freeman will be discussing her new novel, On Sal Mal Lane, with author Deborah Baker. See them on at the Center for Fiction on Thursday, June 20th starting 7 p.m. (New York, NY)

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Jocomo by Timothy Cohorst has climbed the Smashwords section of our Self Published Bestsellers List, the only children’s book to ever crack our list.

To help GalleyCat readers discover self-published authors, we compile weekly lists of the top eBooks in four major marketplaces for self-published digital books: Amazon, B&N, Apple iBookstore and Smashwords. You can read all the lists below, complete with links to each book.

If you want more resources as an author, try our Free Sites to Promote Your eBook post, How To Sell Your Self-Published Book in Bookstores post and our How to Pitch Your Book to Online Outlets post.

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The National Endowment for the Arts director of literature programs Ira Silverberg has decided to leave the federal agency on July 11, 2013. The former Sterling Lord Literistic literary agent took his current post in October 2011.

Literature program officer Amy Stolls will serve as acting director of literature until a new director is in place. Silverberg joined the NEA in October 2011. He offered offered this statement:

My time here has been nothing but extraordinary. Having had a chance to see, first hand, the various transitions our field is going through — podcasts, e-books, changes in the retail landscape — has been humbling. Helping to guide our field through those transitions has been empowering and has provided me with an education I could find nowhere else. Briefly, the demands of family are such that I must return to New York. This is a bittersweet time for me as I have truly loved the work I do here — and have been aided by a stellar staff.

(Link via Sarah Weinman)

Caitlin R. Kiernan won the best novel award at the Bram Stoker Awards for The Drowning Girl. The Horror Writers Association revealed the winners at a gala this weekend.

Below, we’ve rounded up free samples of the scariest books of the year–did your favorite horror novel make the cut?

All the winners are listed in bold.

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Timebound by Rysa Walker has won the 2013 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. The YA novelist won a $50,000 advance and a publishing contract with Amazon Children’s Publishing’s Skyscape imprint.

Readers voted for the grandprize winner, picking Cary, North Carolina author as the winner of the sixth annual competition. Here’s more from the release:

Walker’s Timebound was inspired by her love of history and science fiction and explores how the choices we make affect our future. In the novel, 17-year-old Kate learns that she’s inherited a genetic license to time travel when her grandmother shares a strange blue medallion, an even stranger tale about future historians, and the unshakeable conviction that the fate of half the planet lies in Kate’s hands.

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The paperback edition of Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson comes out on September 10, 2013 with a brand new cover.

We’ve embedded the cover image above, with a Norman Seeff photograph from 1984. What do you think?

Does inspiration strike when you are bored? I remember making up intricate stories as a kid trapped at long school assemblies or endless services.

Neil Gaiman shared a key writing tip at The Guardian last week: “the best way to come up with new ideas is to get really bored.” The novelist has decided to take a break from social media to seek more of this personal time. Check it out:

Watching school plays was ideal, he continued. ”You have to sit there for hours and you can’t read or use a phone or check something on the web. I’ll come out afterwards thinking: ‘Did I just plot out an episode of Dr Who there? I think I did.’ “

German author Oliver Potzsch has sold more than a million copies of the books in his crime series that began with The Hangman’s Daughter. The series has been published by Amazon Publishing.

AppNewser has more details about the sales:

This includes the combined worldwide sales of print, audio and eBook editions of his three books: The Hangman’s Daughter, The Dark Monk, and The Beggar King. The news comes as the author is readying to release his fourth book in the series, The Poisoned Pilgrim, which comes out on July 16th.