Challenging The Big Boys

Last night I attended a prestigious lecture. The Book Council of New Zealand invited Lani Wendt Young, the current Pacific Laureate to deliver the speech, Stories from the Wild: Reading and Writing in the Digital Age. It was a notable speech from a passionate speaker. First, it was given by a Pacifica woman. (an indigenous voice… how rare!) Second, It was given by a successful independent author who is carving out a whole genre of contemporary Pacifica super-natural tales to great reviews. Third, the lecture was a consummate takedown of the white towers of traditional publishing. This piece in the Spinoff written by Lani is only some of the very telling points she made. It was brilliant. I can’t help agreeing with others that we witnessed something profound that will change publishing here.

Meanwhile over in the USA many people in publishing seem to think James Daunt of Waterstones UK will come in like the White Knight on a charger to fix the Barnes and Nobel chain and it will be tea and crumpets all round. Kristen Lamb is skeptical of the way James Daunt may go about it and it all stems from how he turned Waterstones around. Publishers better be clearing space from the warehouse floor for all the returns and workers… don’t expect a pay rise.

Last week I linked to an interesting article by Anne R Allen on whether your reader really needs to know all the little details of your life. This week Cheri Baker picked up on Anne’s theme and looked at her marketing manifesto. 

Porter Anderson gets around the world as the roving editor for Publishing Perspectives. This week he looks at the successful Beijing International Bookfair. Among their offerings to the 320,000 visitors was a whole section devoted to English language learning for early childhood. 

The lawyers are back from holiday and lawsuits are piling up. 
The AAP is taking Audible to court over captioning
Authors Guild is taking a class action against Cengage Publishers over their subscription service.
The Romance Writers Of America are taking a lawsuit over the trademark of the word “Tamer”. The funds for this have been provided by the authors of the Cocky Collective. 
(Cockygate lives on..) 

Kris Rusch continues her look into licensing IP. She comments on how the whole thing can get overwhelming and offers some great ways to think about how to tackle which rights to license. How much do you care about the story? She suggests learning about licensing by first working with a story you don’t care too much about.

Scott Myers of Go Into The Story has a great roundup of the posts he made as he broke down Andrew Stanton’s TED talk on what makes a great story. Go Into The Story is mainly aimed at screenwriters but authors can learn a lot from the screenwriter's approach to story.

In The Craft Section,

Worldbuilding- Writelife- Bookmark

Get out of the writing doldrums- Jane Friedman

5 tips for engaging characters- Bethany Henry- Bookmark

7 Rules for cliffhangers- Ruth Harris- Bookmark

5 ways story stakes keep readers glued- H R D’Costa

In The Marketing Section,

Audiobook Promotion ideas-Mary Locke - Bookmark

Creating promotional copy that works- Janice Hardy

How to create a pre-launch strategy- Rachel Thompson- Bookmark

7 Social Media Tips for Authors- Scot La Counte- Bookmark

How to title a book- Dave Chesson- Bookmark

To Finish,

Recently Rachel Gardner shared that her fellow agents had a brainstorming session thinking up side hustles for their author clients. A side hustle is another stream of income. So writers based on your research what could you get a side hustle in…Hmm Spacecraft design anyone?


Maureen
@craicer

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Christmas wishes

Today I was braving the hordes with my kids as they did their Christmas Shopping. This is a once a year activity where the kids get to budget and think creatively. (Sounds like publishing.) While they were engaging in creative accounting to make their dollars go further, I was wondering what I was going to write for the last blog post of the year. This was not a year I planned. I was going to have a go at writing a small series of junior fiction books because I wanted to challenge myself. I was going to finish tidying up my Mars book and send it out!

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

I ended up spending way too much time this year staring at hospital food and wondering how anyone was supposed to get well while eating it or whether it was all a psychological experiment to make you get well faster. (If so, it didn’t work as I kept going back.)

So next year... (God and Surgeon willing.) I will restart...

Joanna Penn was in Auckland recently and wowed authors at a meet-up. She was sponsored by Kiwi tech guys Booktrack. They’re the guys behind soundtracks for books. Joanna interviewed them to find out all about this nifty idea.

Chuck is curious about everybody’s experience with Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited. Is it worth it to the author?

The Verge took a trip into the ‘Zon to find out what might be coming in 2015.

John Scalzi has called out a couple of digital magazines about their rights grab… and they listened. Always check the copyright clauses!

I’m in conference planning mode with a bunch of excellent, talented, goodlooking and creative Children’s Writers and Illustrators for the New Zealand National Conference of Children’s Writers and Illustrators. October 2-5 2015 Wellington. (Start looking for those cheap flights.) Janice Hardy writes about the benefits of a small writers’ conference. She is right on the money with her thoughts. (and we have some interesting things planned...*grin* )

One of the tricky things about planning a conference is trying to predict what will be relevant in publishing a year into the future. The Bookseller is doing just that by asking a bunch of publishing tech people what they think will happen in 2015.

In the Craft Section,

7 rituals to steal from creative people

Writing Unforgettable Characters

How to become a better writer – Rachelle Gardiner

6 ways to write your title

Sample Permissions letters - Jane Friedman (Bookmark it)

Writing Faster but keeping it OK

Stop research becoming procrastination (guilty)

In the Marketing Section,

The before you submit check list

Book Promotion networking for Introverts

Marketing Strategies

4 reasons readers don’t buy your book

Set Book Marketing Goals for 2015

My Writers’ Christmas Gift wish and K M Weiland's big book launch give away

To Finish,

I would like to thank all the writers and readers of this blog, the writing communities on Facebook and Twitter, and the Wellington writers who have had my back all year. Although most of you didn’t know what was going on behind the scenes your comments and thoughts encouraged me to keep going even when the going was tough.

Wishing you all a Happy and Safe Christmas. See you in 2015.

maureen

pic from Flickr/Creative Commons/ Berit Watkin

Breaking The Container

This week in the publishing blogosphere...

If you have any interest in the global publishing world you will be aware of the new VAT rules coming into the EU. This is where the governments of the EU finally get tax off Amazon... or rather Amazon tells all authors who publish with them that they will add the tax on.

The ongoing saga of Maurice Sendak’s estate is back in the news. He had collected some amazing paintings folios and first editions. Then the executors pulled 10,000 original items from the Sendak collection held at a Philadelphia library. Is it in accordance with his wishes? There is quite a debate on as the executors are not writers...

Boy books.... Girl books.... Book books!

A seven year old girls complaint about a non-fiction book being promoted as a boys book has prompted a change in policy from a publisher.

The news that over 60,000 UK boys have failed in their literacy by age 11 has galvanized a children’s writer. But he has an interesting way of going about it. Build some free gaming apps to go alongside his novels. Is there buy in from his publishers... YES. (This reminds me of a proposed idea along these lines here - No publisher buy in.) This is all interesting in light of a recent study on the use of tablets in schools.

Where are the books exploring conflict for children and teens from the other side. One writer is appalled that they are the only one writing with middle eastern protagonists.

New Zealand writers have been reeling lately with a string of publishing houses closing their NZ offices. Writer Beware has posted a warning, that writers taking their own rights back after disputes with publishers have to be very careful.

Jane Friedman has a guest on her blog sounding a note of caution on signing up for Kindle Unlimited.

Rachel Gardner details the kinds of rejections from editors she gets as an agent. (These are for books that went on to do well –we are not alone)

In the Craft Section,

What makes your characters uncomfortable- Janice Hardy

Double your Story Conflict in seconds. –K M Weiland

Are Series worth it if you are not published? –Ava Jae

The brutal truth about Beta Readers

20 ways to become a more productive writer

Plotting the non plot driven novel

Scenes - and how to write them

New ideas on how to plot

10 tips for short story writing

In the Marketing Section,

Social Media- how to toot your own horn without turning off your audience

How to develop a business mindset- Rachel Gardner

Juggling multiple projects – Elisabeth S Craig

Update on the ACX alternative in audio books. (I linked to this a few months ago, so the update makes interesting reading.)

5 ways to start building your fan base

To Finish,

Two big projects that made the news this week.

One of the biggest YouTube sensations in recent years is a teenage girl blogging about her life. Girl Online by Zoe Sugg was released as a book this week and broke all sorts of records for a first book. How did this happen?

Serial, a podcast sensation, finished its first season... and asked its listeners for donations to do a second. How can publishing learn from this success? The Bookseller asks.

The power of the storytelling transcends the container it is delivered in.

maureen
Pic from Flickr/creativecommons/Joanna Bourne

Stripping Back

After the full blog post last week... you may be thinking what more can there be?

Last year the talk of Digital Book World week was Hugh Howey with his ground breaking Print Only contract. Hugh wasn’t on the panels last week but he was still making waves with this incredible post speculating what he would do in the first month if he was the new CEO of a ‘New’ Harper Collins.

This list of 13 points was talked about, applauded and then analysed by Porter Anderson who included Hugh’s agent Kristin Nelson’s PS about what she would add to the new look publishing company.

Every point makes you sit up and go yeah! 

Hugh then followed it up with what he would do in the second month. Nailed It!

Anybody thinking of starting a publishing company… here is your blueprint. Brilliant stuff.

Recently the publishing bogosphere was talking price points and how you set prices on your books... Kris Rusch has been writing a series of articles on the business of writing and she is one savvy lady. Take a look at her latest post, pricing and discoverability, it is a comprehensive master class in pricing books... ebook, print, series... If you add this info with Hugh’s that is your brain expander for the month.

Joel Friedlander always has useful tips and here is the blogpost that explains how you pull neat quotes out of your book and make them jpeg graphics...sweet!

Rachel Gardner has a blog post on what you should do if you think your work has been pirated.

In the Craft Section,

Top tips in Combat writing.

Elisabeth S Craig's post on reason's why you kill your characters… has been shared around the blogosphere this week. You may selling your character short when you send them down the river.

Jody Hedlund has 5 top ways to rivet your reader.... and she uses children’s books as the example.

How lists can help you write.

In the Marketing Section,

Ava Jae has the blog post explaining why you can’t chooseany old 50 pages to send to an agent.

Writer Beware has warnings about Agent Artery, a dodgy outfit who will send your MS to agents on your behalf. It is a shocker! To start with they address your prospective agent as ‘Human’... not even Dear Human....

For those of you who like infographics Media Bistro has a funny one about publishing your book... This could be a good one to share around to all your author friends.

To Finish,

Anne R Allen has an interesting blog post on whether your writing is your hobby or your profession... or both. This is a nice post helping you make sense of your creative compulsive drive.

I’ve been painting and scraping in my old cottage today so am crawling off to bed to dream of a bright new publishing world... or probably neverending paint stripping... Think of your own picture for this weeks roundup…hehehe.

maureen

A Change In The Climate

Almost every month I find myself wondering if there are any climate change skeptics still around. The weather will get more extreme. Storms will be bigger.... and in the last week we have seen a Super Typhoon slam into the Philippines.

Candy Gourlay has quickly put together a kidlit author initiative and asked her fellow kidlitters to donate prizes for an online auction fundraiser. So far 125 authors have responded and there are some very cool writers and items to be picked up.

This week in the publishing blogosphere Porter Anderson was waxing lyrical about the self publishers who originally eschewed gate keepers now banding together to differentiate themselves from the mass of self published work out there and setting up gate-keeping awards as a badge of honour. This discussion is being had in NZ with various bodies including the NZ Society of Authors.

Rachel Gardner has a nice blog post on the tension between the business of writing and writing itself and another on 12 mistakes that authors make connecting with readers.

Writers Digest West conference has just wrapped up and WiseInk has a great list of takeaways from it including a shift in attitude to self publishing.

Writer Beware has an alert out on an outfit from Germany offering to blog your book. I treated this as spam when it showed up in my inbox but some people have been caught.

Roz Morris has reposted her comprehensive blog post on what to do before you spend money on publishing. If you missed this when I posted it before its well worth a re-read.

Larry, James and Randy got together to talk storytelling craft. This is a great article and really they don’t need any other introduction than their last names. Brooks, Scott Bell, Ingermanson, authors of some of the best writing craft guides out there.

In Craft,

Dialogue do’s and don’ts

Anti Villains...great article

Two great articles from K M Weiland when characters want the same things and 7 ways to decide which idea to run with next.

Hanging writing rules out to dry

On Stephen Pressfield’s site - the heirarchy of needs as it applies to your characters

Are you writing in the right POV?

10 writing exercises to free your mind

Writing slogans to put above your desk

Jami Gold- Do you know what you plan in advance?

This week’s Marketing Links,

Jane Friedman with another big article on marketing 101

Creative Book Launches from the Writers Helping Writers team

Selling through Indie Bookstores

4 reason’s you need a business plan

Marketing your manuscript

Enjoy marketing

To Finish,

The Toast had an interesting article from Sarah Rees Brennan which explores sexism and self promotion. It is a thought provoking article and echoes some of the conversations NZ has been having in the last week. I think we are ready for a ‘climate’ change.

maureen

pic from Flickr/ creative Commons Chascar

Trick Or Treat

Happy All Hallows Eve,

A couple of years ago Young Adult writers decided to hand out scary books to trick or treaters...and it has gained a following amongst the writing community in the countries that celebrate Halloween as a cultural festival. All Hallows Read...go to your local second hand bookstore...buy up ghostly children’s books and R L Stines...and hand them out.

This week in the publishing blogosphere there was a flutter as Larry Kirshbaum announced he was going back to agenting after heading up Amazon’s print publishing operation. Larry was up against it, when he was hired two years ago as all the bookstores holding onto deals with publishers decided they wouldn’t stock Amazon printed books. Traditional Publishing pundits have taken a ‘We Won Against The Mighty ‘Zon’ attitude but others aren’t so sure... Anyway you look at it, the authors are the ones suffering with poor print sales and no exposure to the bookstore browser. If the Mighty ‘Zon ever works out distribution into the bookstores for print books... the game will be changed.

In the blogosphere it is NaNoWriMo time and tips abound for how to tackle the month where everyone tries to write their 50,000 word opus. Editors and agents are shuddering because December heralds all these manuscripts hitting their floors. Many of them are saying they won’t look at a book that arrives in December because it won’t have moved beyond a first draft.

If you are not heading into the bunker to write you may be interested in the changing ownership hop of Figment, the teen writing community that keeps getting bought by very big publishers.... If I was very cynical I’d wonder whether they were keen to get their hands on the next big young thing who knows nothing about the cut throat business of publishing.... Lucky I’m not.... Dave Gaughren has a good blog post on this subject.

A Publishers Weekly article this week is definitely scaring quite a few people. The article has anonymous agents and editors saying publishers are beginning to carefully change contract wording so it doesn’t say what format they will publish the book in. If publishers don’t commit to a print edition or they go to a POD print edition so that rights will never revert back...or the Print edition will be under their new imprint where the writer pays costs (read Author Solutions here) then writer’s dreams may rapidly turn to nightmares.

A couple of weeks ago I was looking for a comparison piece on the indie music scene and the indie publishing scene and couldn’t find one and then into my Twitter feed pops this opinion piece from a musician writer.... Interesting reading.

Mark Coker looks at the economics of Ebook lending library style.

Joanna Penn has an interview with an expert on selling books into Germany. They have the biggest population of readers in Europe.

Now for all those great Craft Treats

These are the best blog posts I’ve seen on plotting this week.

Structure in HarryPotter and how JK Rowling followed the rules.

Plotting made easy.

Other inspirational writing tips worthy of bookmarking

How to figure out a great Concept

How to fix the sagging middle,

Why Voice is so important.

What do you do with a semi colon and other useful grammar stuff

Can you include song lyrics?

Telling vs Showing and how to figure it out.

NaNoWriMo a collection of tips and resources.

To Finish,

Two stellar opinion pieces.

On writing Y A from a literary writer... and what he learned, which was a heck of a lot!

Hugh Howey on the challenge of connecting with readers directly. You need to do it.

Here is my All Hallows treat for you...Writing tips fromGreat Authors. 

Print out a couple of these and hang them over your desk!

maureen

This great pic was from http://www.flickr.com/photos/rattler97/

New Moves

The weather scientists this week said that Winter has been so warm that Spring has come a month early. And this is a symptom of climate change. At the moment we have a late blast of winter going through and it is bleak and wet out there. (So breaking Elmore’s sacred rule never start with the weather....)

In the publishing blogosphere this week...

KOBO KOBO KOBO KOBO...

Kobo launched three new e-reading devices this week in NewYork...and got the publishing blogosphere talking...because along with the hardware...Kobo has new content to go on the hardware. Kobo Kids a dedicated e-bookstore for children...Beyond The Book for all stuff beyond the book including a special Font for dyslexics... and other nifty things. So another shift in the publishing world has happened.

Also in a quietly heralded move...The Alliance of Independent Authors has done a deal with PubMatch. If you are a member of Alli you can get a 90% discount on getting all your overseas rights sold...Read all about it...It is an interesting move.

Dave Gaughren has been comparing distributors...Smashwords and new kids on the block Draft2Digital.

Long Time readers of this blog will know that I have a bit of a geek thing with space etc etc and that this year the prominent writers in the SFF Geek community have been calling out misogynist and threatening behaviour towards women in the community. John Scalzi (just stepped down as Pres. SFF) has been targeted for his very vocal support by troll lowlifes. This week around Social Media a picture of John in a dress went viral calling John a feminist. John’s beautiful reply will have you chuckling. Way To Go John...also if you haven’t read any of his work...you are really missing something, he is a great writer!

Bob Mayer has 53 books under his belt and has decided to write a quick article about ten things he has learned as a writer...This is a good checklist for yourself.

The fabulous Debbie Ridpath Ohi and her comics on rejections...This will put it all in perspective.

Roz Morris runs a few blogs which I have referred to over the years in this blog...however I haven’t ever profiled her Undercover Soundtrack blog. Writers who write with soundtracks in their ears, talk about why they write to music and what sort of soundtracks they use.

In Craft,

Eleven Tips On Editing

Five Places To Find Critique Partners

Ten Things Emerging Writers need.

In Marketing, There are some very fine articles this week.

From Writer Unboxed –A key book principal that authors mustnot forget.

From Killzone – The best way to market your book.

From Marketing tips for Authors – tips for authors onAmazon.

From Bookshelfmuse...marketing for introverts.

Website to check out.

If you write Midgrade...Check out Emblazoners. This is another example of an author collective that niche market themselves. Roam around and get a feel for what they are doing and read the excellent article on writing midgrade series.

To Finish,

Rachel Gardner writes about Happy Authors and the things they don’t do.

Be Surprised.

maureen

pic from Flickr/ Creative Commons

http://www.flickr.com/photos/clearlyambiguous/