Editing Thoughts

This week I have been picking the threads up of my writing life... pulling out the project that was put on hold. When you take a month away sometimes it’s hard to dive back in. This is a good time to edit.

When I read Chuck’s Kubler Ross Stages of Grief of Editing I had to laugh. (Warning it’s Chuck!) My editing thinking is usually harsher. ‘Good grief how did I come to write this mess....’ I have to stop myself from deleting it all and curling up into a snotty whimpering ball in the corner. 

I must have been sending out unconscious signals on editing because some great posts on dealing with criticism fell into my Twitter feed.

Stephen Pressfield has a great post on pushing forward into a project -The 1 way I screw myself up.

Jami Gold also has a great post on criticism and how to deal with it. (even when it’s your own.)

Last Night The Booker Prize went to Marlon James from Nigeria. So this begins his author celebrity life where his every utterance will be scrutinised. Quartz magazine has an article on why turning authors into celebrities is bad for the reader.

Future Book has been compiling manifestos lately from people in the publishing world about how they see the future and what changes they would make. Porter takes a look at some of the ideas- from how to treat publishing interns to instantaneous transfer from writer to reader.

Many people in the publishing world are wondering how to get their books into the Asian market. Christine Sun has a very informative and detailed look at Fiberead, a translation service with a difference.

The Author Earnings team has published a new report on what sales look like in the rest of the eBook market outside of Amazon. Kris Rusch takes a look at what it means and offers some advice for Indie Publishers going forward. Kris also has a great post on front list... and how the Traditional Publishers are finally understanding what a backlist means in sales for the front list. If you didn’t understand that sentence go and read the Kris Rusch’s very good article.

In the Craft Section,

The writing world is heading into NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month.) The goal is to write 50,000 words in the month of November. That means that there are plenty of writing tips around NaNo in October.

K M Weiland on the 6 tasks you need to do before you start(Bookmark)

Ava Jae has her list of prep links for NaNo

Teddi Deppner has all the tools you might want to try out while NaNo-ing

Jami Gold also has a list of writing resources for NaNo.

How to find Book Ideas – Now Novel

Plotting mini arcs- Janice Hardy- (Bookmark)

In the Marketing Section,

Why Book PR needs lots of lead time

Media Kits – Janice Hardy

Manuscript to eBook cleaning guide – Joel Friedlander (Bookmark)

7 crucial mistakes authors make with their email lists

Marketing books on Social Media- Anne R Allen

A 12 month strategic plan for marketing your book before release- C S Lakin (Bookmark)

Generating Reader Reviews

Website of the Week

Joe Konrath has long been the go to website of Indie/Self publishers. Here is today’s guest post by Andrea Pearson with the Master Class on how to plan for success in the long term.

To Finish,

After all the editing and publishing, authors are after readers. Angela Ackerman has a great article on finding readers... What are the themes of your book... are there groups out there you can market to? You might find them in very unexpected places.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons  - Ida Myrvold

Sparking Ideas

My brain is still buzzing from Tinderbox – that and I’m finding myself falling asleep at odd times. Some of this, I’m told, is body readjustment after a long campaign of heightened stress levels. I put it down to operating on about 3 hours sleep a night for a week.

For those of you who have never been on a committee putting a big event together... there are many behind the scenes details to organise. We started planning Tinderbox 18 months ago, scoping out what we wanted to have at our conference and researching who would be the best fit to deliver it. We had to do all this with one eye on the changing publishing marketplace. With themes established then it was booking presenters in and finding a suitable venue. Booking your presenters early is key! Along with the quality of the presenters the following list can make or break a conference, food, wifi, room size, assessments, hands on workshops, goodie bags and transport. All of this needs to be tied down early so that if anything falls over you have time to fix it.

Tinderbox was fantastic! The presenters were inspiring, the food was amazing and the high creative energy of the delegates was encouraging. My team were called Goddesses and I bow down before them. And the Wifi stayed on, with a little help.

Meanwhile in the outside world....

Stephanie Meyer sent the publishing world into the Twilight zone... with a gender bent version of Twilight.

Waterstones – the biggest bookshop chain in the UK decided that they would cease to sell the Kindle, apparently because e-publishing is failing.

Porter takes a look at whether Print is really triumphing, while Traditional publishers are joining Kindle Unlimited.

Yup everybody is still mixed up.

Stephan Pinker, Linguistics Professor and International Grammar Guru, declared that writing rules were only superstitions.

Macquarie University published their findings on authors in Australia which makes fascinating reading. Your average Aussie author is a woman, writing genre fiction, earning twelve grand.

In Florida the Novelists Inc (NINC) conference wrapped up. This conference is for novelists who have had two or more books published. Elizabeth S Craig has a round up of what was discussed at the conference. Very interesting takeaways here...

In The Craft Section,

NaNoWriMo is coming up so here are 7 ways to keep it going throughout the year.

5 tips for making writing a daily habit (Bookmark)

Hiring a freelance editor

How authors and editors can work well together

How to hook readers - Setting the stage and Puzzle Pieces

Understanding Point Of View

Style Sheets and Guides -Ruth Harris (Bookmark)

In The Marketing Section,

Can serials be profitable in Kindle Unlimited?- Lindsay Buroker (Bookmark)

Translate your book with Bablecube

6 tips for finding a cover artist- Jami Gold

How to Twitter tips- Molly Greene (Bookmark)

5 lessons learned between debut and second book

Website Of The Week

Inky Girl has a newsletter. This is a great resource for all those artists out there. 

And the Bookshelf Muse Library software is launched!

To Finish,

The Ten commandments of Indie Publishing is a very good pep talk for writers as is Jane Friedman’s Author Business models, a must read!

As I was putting together this roundup I was struck by the fact that many these links were ideas discussed at Tinderbox. Just add coffee and an enthusiastic crowd soundtrack. Or make plans to go to the next National conference in two years time.

To bed to bed….

Maureen

@craicer

Pic Flickr Creative Commons / S J Liew