Story; Ears, Eyes, Heart.

Have you ever felt like your head had been taken over, hollowed out and then filled with cotton wool? I have been going around in a foggy daze for about a week. When life throws lots of big events your way it’s hard to find time to write or even generate much energy to create anything. (My cooking suffered as well.) This week we celebrated a family wedding and then got the news that a revered book colleague had died. For several days I drifted around the house never being able to settle. Life is a series of stories told through heart beats.

Many writers will beat themselves up for not creating something every day so it was with relief that I read Janice Hardy’s brilliant post why you shouldn’t write every day. Not only did it give me permission to rest my mind but it made me feel more positive about getting back into the writing grind.

Dan Blank took a close look at how Traditional Publishers marketed their books at Book Expo and drew some interesting conclusions for Indie Publishers. You don’t really need a fifty foot banner to draw attention to yourself.

How many of you listen to audio books? If you listen to podcasts you are more likely to listen to audio books. Can you guess the demographic that most listens to audio books? Publishing Perspectives has a great breakdown of the latest figures from this fast growing book market.

In a game changer for the audio book market which has been dominated by ACX, (*coughAmazoncough*) Draft2Digital has rolled out an exciting new service and it’s worldwide and non exclusive!

Book Marketing Tools has a great interview with Mark Dawson on Facebook ads. (He is often referenced as the Facebook ad guru.)

Editor, Sue Copsey has a fabulous post on what she sees when she gets a manuscript. Voice and heart makes a Manuscript stand out.

Frances Caballo has an interesting article on The Book Designer about the 5 necessary skills a writer must develop. While you are over on Joel’s site check out the new book design templates he has recently added.

Kris Rusch continues her Branding series. She has such interesting articles. This week she looks at brand image. You are what you write, aren’t you?

5 ways to write a perfect first draft by Katie Weiland examines the mental work your subconscious is doing. You may be writing a near perfect first draft and not recognising it

In The Craft Section,

5 ways to hook your readers-Janice Hardy

Filter words and phrases to avoid- Kathy Steinemann- Bookmark

Indicating the passage of time – Jami Gold Bookmark

Story Genius- Joanna Penn and Lisa Cron- Bookmark

Tips for historical novelists- Lucienne Boyce

Develop your writing intuition- Angela Ackerman- Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

Timing for book launches

How to choose kindle keywords- Bookmark

How to create and market your platform for free- Melissa Flicks- Bookmark

A tool to create Facebook viral videos - Bookmark

Grow your fan base with a bookclub- Digital Book World

Improve your query letter- Jane Friedman - Bookmark

To Finish,

Last week I gave you a link to the Alliance of Independent Authors website where there is a load of great content from their Indie fringe conference. There are heaps of videos to sample. Alli have their own YouTube channel so hop on over to see all the  short Publishing 101 videos Paul Teague has been putting up. Here is one to get you started. 

R.I.P. John McIntyre: Book Ambassador and Hero

My monthly newsletter is a bit late this month. It will be going out soon. If you want to get the best of my bookmarked links and other goodies you can subscribe here. Come and join our happy band.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic Flickr Creative Commons /David Locke (Totally cute dog.)

Navigating the Writing Road

This week was Book Expo.

What used to be the biggest Book Fair in America has been slimmed down. The fair was split into a Book Con and a Trade Book Fair.  Porter Anderson rounds up the key takeaways from the Book Expo conference on Wednesday. A big focus was children’s publishing and library trends.

Not everybody was impressed with the new look Book Expo. Independent publishers were being shunted off to the side and all the innovative Book Marketing companies are starting to court the Traditional publishers. Brooke Warner of She Writes Press examines Book Expo from a small publishers point of view.

Alongside Book Expo was Indie Author Fringe. This 24 hour conference was put together by the great folks at Alli - Alliance of Independent Authors. The conference theme was book marketing and there are some standout presentations up on the Alli blog. I have been dipping into them all week. Just chock full of brilliant advice. For a taster check out Chris Well's presentation on Media Kits for Authors.

Joanna Penn has a great interview with Nick Stephenson on managing time and it is really worth taking some time to listen or watch her podcast. There are so many ways to automate what you do.

Another great podcast to drop into is SFF Marketing. Lindsay Buroker and co hosts Jeff Poole and Joe Lallo  talked this week about all the hot tips Joe learned from Book Expo on Book Marketing.

Bookbub also pulled together a great roundup of 7 marketing takeaways from Book Expo.

Jami Gold has put together a great roundup table of contents for all her indie publishing series of posts. This has been a mammoth series over two years. It is more than a 101 course... more like a Masters degree.

Kris Rusch continues her branding series with a great post on Brand Identity. If you have been wondering how to straddle genres or just what exactly is author branding you need to check out this article.

With the introduction of Amazon Charts there has been some discussion about the worth of bestseller lists. Amazon breaks up their charts by Most Sold and Most Read, they are not the same and there is no distinction on genre. (New HP Covers anyone?) Polygraph Lit Magazine’s new imprint, Pudding, takes a look at gender bias on the bestseller lists and in MFA programmes.

Publishers Weekly interviewed the outgoing chair of the Independent Book Publishers Association about his radical idea for Bookstores.Why don’t they have Book Espresso machines and other goodies... They could be a hub for the community... and sell ... BOOKS.

If you have ever thought about owning your own bookstore... It is now possible with Aerio. Have a curated list of books on your own website and get an affiliation cut if anyone buys a book from you. Judith Briles tells you how to do it.

This week I have been hearing about the rise of audio books and how this section of the industry is taking off. Savvy authors out there are holding onto audio rights. But now the big publishers are waking up to this gold mine. Michael Sullivan posted a breakdown on his wranglings with his Traditional Publisher Del Rey and why they are parting ways. Audio rights was the break point. This is a must read for any traditionally published author.

In The Craft Section,

Making unlikeable characters likeable- September Fawkes- Bookmark

Three types of Character Arcs – Sara Letourneau - Bookmark

Are you a writer or a storyteller- K M Weiland- Bookmark

Hiring an editor-Anne R Allen- Bookmark

Stop info dumps before they start- Jennie Nash

Collaboration mistakes to avoid- Joanna Penn and J Thorn- Bookmark

Create Awesome Female Villains- Sacha Black

In The Marketing Section,

Best categories for book sales on Amazon- Bookbaby- Bookmark

Newsletter surveys- Kate Tilton

The ultimate cheat sheet on queries- Bookmark

No one is born famous- Penny Sansevieri

Marketing your books as a group (another author collective idea)-Bookmark

Q and A on Kindle worlds and fan marketing- Aleatha Romig

Tips for selling more books on Amazon- Written Word Media

To Finish,

Navigating your way through all the advice on writing is almost a fulltime job. But have you thought about the journeys your characters are taking on the page. Writer Unboxed examines Google Maps and how you can plot out your characters journey in real time.

Maureen

@craicer

In my monthly newsletter I round up the best of the bookmarked craft and marketing links as well as some other bits and pieces.  Get a nifty book crammed full with marketing notes when you subscribe. Thanks for hitting the kofi button this week. I’m living on caffeine as mother of the bride.
 

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons Mike Tually