Group items tagged

Don’t worry about making word counts each day.

writing in a notebook instead of a word processor

a weekly writing day/coffee with a friend.

The industry has long suffered the irony that effective publishing is most evident when invisible; it is only when standards are less than felicitous that we realise how well what we read is managed most of the time.

Gone is our confidence that publishers and agents know exactly what everyone wants to (or should) read

The copy editor, a traditionally marginalised figure, is now in strong demand.

Before I write a scene, I envision a stage and my characters upon it. Who would want to go to a play and watch the actors meander around the stage talking to themselves or reflecting on problems while eating, getting ready, shopping, driving in the car, talking on the phone, etc.?

Brilliant website design and why it’s so important for authors. James mentions some of her favorite authors who have ugly and terrible websites. BUT if the author is established, it doesn’t matter. New authors don’t have this luxury. We have to stand out in the market. We have competition. The author website is a way to connect. It’s critical to make a good impression and a personal connection. You can only do this through your web presence and social media. Bring them back to reading your work, so they will read your books, enjoy them and tell their friends. Chris Guillebeau, author of the recent $100 Startup tells how it was easy for him to get a book deal as he had an established platform online. Read more in James’ guest article - Is your website hurting your writing?

A bad choice of colors can kill first impressions.

A mystery might be greys and blacks, whereas a go-getting kickass non-fiction book might be red and modern white.

There’s a final dilemma. Publishers are now paying lower advances, releasing fewer titles and selling digital content at lower prices than print content (which in turn affects royalty payments to both agent and author). Assuming this is the new reality, there will be less money to go around for the number of agents now in business. Plus, will it be worth an agent’s time and energy to sell a project that doesn’t pay more than $1,500 upfront? Probably not. One agency has quietly come out with a new model that requires authors to pay a minimum commission—i.e., the agent must earn a minimum amount on a sale no matter what advance the publisher pays, which means authors would “share” a larger part of the advance upfront (or even pay out of pocket in the case of very low advances). Undoubtedly, there’s no shortage of aspiring writers who would be ecstatic to pay more to an agent if it meant securing a publishing deal. But such a model is sure to raise ethical concerns. Agents may take projects knowing they will ultimately be paid by authors rather than by publishers. Is the industry (that includes the author!) ready to accept such a shift in how agents profit?

I'm not talking about throwing in the towel on writing.

if a writer is pursuing publication with the goal of making money, they're going to find themselves sorely disappointed.

hose who are pursuing publication for the money are probably better off getting a job at Walmart for a much steadier and reliable income.

The skill is copywriting.

A query letter is not a straightforward description of your work. It’s a sales letter. It should be persuasive and seduce the agent into requesting your work.

And this is why writers struggle with queries, because they can’t bridge the gap between writing to entertain (or inform or inspire) and writing to persuade. It’s a different mindset, and it requires an ability to look at one’s work as a product that has a selling point.

over time, more and more blog traffic arrives from Search Engines

In order to optimize your post for a particular keyword phrase you can get a free plugin, called WordPress SEO which helps you to use the keywords you’ve found in all the right places.

Now is the time to jot down all those people who will want your book, why they’ll want it and how effective they’ll be at getting more people to want it. Know – really know – who your market and readership target is.

No point in writing a book if you don’t know why or if it’s special.

where else might it fit in perfectly?

What are those authors doing in those precious first pages? In every book I looked at they were introducing me to a character so unique and compelling that I cared about what happened when the high stakes action came into play a few pages later. They opened not with a bang but with a voice—a choice well worth emulating. 

Rosanne Parry is teaching "Vampire-Free Fiction: Writing Real-World Novels for Young Readers"

Content is King

If non-fiction, create stand-alone pieces  anywhere from 300-700 words per post. If fiction, craft a stand-alone episode with a provocative title.

Set up some Google Alerts to see who else is writing in your niche.

“The biggest challenge [to authors today] is self-restraint. Publishing tools, like Smashwords make it fast, free and easy for any writer anywhere in the world to publish. But we don’t make it easy to write a great book. Many writers, intoxicated by the freedom to self-publish, will often release their book before it’s ready.”

authors have to realize that sometimes the efforts they make to promote their books…well…simply don’t have the hoped for impact. Why? Because these days readers spend most of their time in Cyberspace searching out information on their interests and seeking out the advice of experts and opinions of others. In the process, they may—or may not—discover you and your book.

why authors might need to stop focusing so much attention on marketing and rely more on discovery

A Behind-the-Scenes Look. Give us a sense of what it is like to be a novelist. How did you feel when you finally landed an agent? What does a typical writing day look like for you? What’s it like to see your book in print and hold a copy in your hand for the first time?

In the United States we’ve developed a concept for these books that relies on the subtle interplay between text and art—a trapeze act, as it were, between writer and artist.

I was shocked to see how few picture books made the new hardcover best-seller list, aside from Jane O’Connor’s “Fancy Nancy” books and titles such as Lane Smith’s It’s a Book. Looking at the list, it’s easy to understand the pressures on editors who love to create picture books. Any bottom-line-driven publishing executive looking at what’s selling in America would order them to hunt for more werewolves, zombies, and vampires.

So possibly the problem isn’t with the genre itself, but what’s happened to it.