Vote for...

Dropping into the Twitter and Facebook publishing world conversations provided a welcome relief from the Election fever which is gripping two nations. 

The worry over the vote and who is voting and who is skewing the vote can get overwhelming and put people off voting.

Things that caught my eye this week.

Clay Shirkey’s post... All the big guns are weighing in on whether Clay is right about Amazon and the future of publishing.

Brian O’Leary has some good things to say, which are backed up by a who’s who of publishing pundits in the comments.

If you are inside the big five camp.... poor us. Amazon is the bad guy. We had to collude on pricing to compete with them. We are the best arbiters of taste for the public.

Amazon on the outside… Why do higher ebook prices have to subsidise hardcovers. Lack of access to physical bookstores made us big. Publishers gave Amazon digital rights 7 years ago and never thought about the impact...

Reader’s voting with their feet.

Hugh Howey on DRM Is it dumb or brilliant? (When the argument flags pull out DRM)

Agent Chip MacGregor and his new trends in publishing post. This is nice roundup and one for writers to think about.

Writer’s vote with their M.S.

How can writers face their fear...

Chuck’s ten things you should never say to a writer

Vote for Chuck!

In the Craft Section,

How to find your characters breaking point – Janice Hardy

Top apps for writers

The biggest mistake new writers make – Anne R Allen

How do I revise my novel- the plot whisperer.

5 techniques to get objectivity – Jami Gold

Getting your character to change – K M Weiland

Editing- behind the scenes

In the Marketing Section,

Using Calibre to get a quick digital copy of your book.

13 great truths about making a living writing

Quality not Quantity

Publishing Middle Grade how one writer is doing it.

To Finish,

If you are needing to escape from all the voting madness and give yourself some writing time here is a list of the worlds best writing retreats for you.

It is New Zealand's Sufferage day where women campaigned and got the vote 121 years ago (first country in the world!) On the eve of the general election…

"Do not think your single vote does not matter much. The rain that refreshes the parched ground is made up of single drops" - Kate Sheppard. 

Sorry this blog is late again...

maureen

Pic from flickr.com/photos/alancleaver  The green tick is not an endorsement of any political party. 

Just get out and VOTE!

What goes in...

This week I sat down with a bunch of committed writing friends to start to pull together four months of creative ideas of what to include in our National Conference of Children’s Writers and Illustrators 2015. Planning a good conference takes time and much thought. My guiding principal is IT IS A WORKING CONFERENCE. Attendees must get knowledge out of it for their money. It is a big chunk of cash and writing time that poorly paid writers and illustrators have to give up so every dollar needs to really be worth it.

Kameron Hurley has a guest post on Terribleminds which is the must read post of the week. (year) Kameron outlines the need for writers to think business. These are some of the issues I would like to explore at the conference.

Hugh Howey takes a hard look at Barnes and Nobel booksellers. What they are doing wrong and will it destroy them. This was echoed yesterday in a comment from one of my writing friends about New Zealand’s biggest book seller chain.

Passive Guy takes a look at agency clauses in contracts. This is an interesting post about tricky legalese in contracts.

The Futurebook team have a twitter chat every week and this last week they were looking at Metadata. How can you find out what you need to find out... and why is it so important. 

Jon Bard takes a look at the KDP Kids Books app that Amazon released last week.

Lauren Sapala has the two most important things writersneed.

  

In the Craft Section,

How to plot a character driven story or why Harry Potter didn’t end up a nutcase.

How to make sure readers don’t close the book

How to draw fantasy maps

How to write for the 21^st century (pet peeves from an agent)

How to use a developmental editor

How to edit first drafts (great post)

How to set the stage (great post)

In the Marketing Section,

How to use the Manuscript Wish List site effectively.

How to boost book sales passively

How to use Noisetrade book marketing effectively

To Finish,

Six years on from the first conference we organized and issues we never thought of then are now on the table. Storytelling has different wrappers now.

Gaming companies need story content too. This week one of my writing friends was asking for some help with a project her company was working on. They had the idea, they had the graphics, they just needed the story to go with them. Kevin Spacey looks at how storytelling has changed in the shows he has been in.

maureen

Sorry late again… Recovery one step forward two steps back...

Pic: Flickr/Creative Commons Inger Maaike

Wouldn’t this be a cool conference bag?