This week I’ve been catching up with what was happening at
Book Expo America (BEA) which is North America’s largest book fair. Porter has a quick run down of what everyone was talking about.
The Wall Street Journal took a good look at book covertrends... it’s all about yellow! Cover designers are being asked to pop it on
book covers because...digital. (And here I thought the ‘in’ colour was blue and
there had to be water on the front.)
Meanwhile Meg Rosoff was collecting her Astrid Lindgren
medal and stating publically that childhood now is under threat from governments. Well said Meg!
In Ireland Catherine Ryan Howard was musing about what
happened when she chucked what she thought she should write in favour of
what she wanted to write – everything changed.
Kris Rusch is continuing her great Deal Breakers series with
a MUST READ on Rights clauses. Writers need to be reading this series by Kris.
This week I have also seen comments about authors needing specialised lawyers
to read publishing contracts because they are getting trickier.
Bookbub and Goodreads have been learning off each other...
changes are afoot. This is an interesting article that Indie publishers should
scan.
Becca and Angela are bringing out two new writers thesauri
and in their research have come up with 5 ways to help your favourite authors.
In the Craft Section,
Character development a two sided sword- Jami Gold -Bookmark
What are those strange pinch points? C S Lakin- Bookmark
A writers guide to editors- Ruth Harris -Bookmark
Turn cliches into reader surprises- Zoe McCarthy
Botched beginnings- common first page killers- Kristen Lamb
In the Marketing Section,
How to optimise your book description and Email sign upforms- Jane Friedman Bookmark
Facebook advertising- Joanna Penn- Bookmark
How to find and select a cover designer- Janice Hardy
Making our books visible on Google- Elizabeth S Craig –
Bookmark
Website of the Week
The Alliance of Independent Authors (Alli) has been posting
video and audio from their fringe events at London and BEA. This is a great
resource. Here are just two excellent postings Mark Coker on using pre orders effectively and Kiffer Brown on the 7 must haves for self publishers. Trawl
around their site for other great resources
To Finish,
Sometimes you need to stop and reassess what you are doing
and what you want to achieve. Kate Moretti has a great guest post on Writers in
the Storm about Cutting through Busyness to get to writing. This is excellent
advice here for the writer feeling overwhelmed with what they didn’t tell you
in the fine print.
Maureen
@craicer
Pic: from inside a Romeo and Juliet - Choose Your Own Adventure... by Ryan North.