Getting Creative

Last week I was urging people to look for the silver lining. A lot can happen in a week. 

Sadly, I am seeing many people in the arts industry who have had their jobs disappear, launches canceled, speaking gigs (that pay the rent) postponed or stopped. Then I saw booksellers struggling and the layoffs of staff have begun.

Some great booksellers are keeping their staff on full pay and giving them vacation time. Others are coming up with innovative ways to stay relevant in the community. A friend who does a regular storytime in a children’s bookshop is now doing an online version for the store. (They also have a mobile EFTPOS machine so they can go out to cars with your phone in order.) Other bookshops have started a delivery service. 

Now is the time to get creative to weather the Covid 19 storm. 

With the canceling of so many festivals, some kid’s authors got together to hold an online book festival for kids. Check out how they are doing it and share the idea around.

Penguin Random House, Scholastic, and others are relaxing their licenses so teachers can use their books and crafts in videos for children who are unable to go to school. Authors who have their own licenses for this may be able to offer something similar. 

Librarians overseas, are arguing that now is the time to relax the fair use rules on copyright. This is tricky as authors should still be paid for their work. It is their livelihood.

Amazon is priority shipping- anything not a priority for Covid 19 is getting delayed. Unfortunately, books are not seen as a priority. However, that doesn’t apply to KDP print and ebooks. (silver lining)

In the middle of all this Macmillan ended its library embargo. Everyone told them you don’t mess with librarians, but they had to find out the hard way.

Kristine Rusch talks about Black Swan events and how the world and business change forever at these times. This is an interesting read and something to ponder on as we look at our author business. Dean and Kris are also offering big discounts on all their courses for authors who are stuck inside. 

Nate Hoffelder is noting that most of the Book Fairs are talking postponement. He has a blog post on what to take if you are planning to go to a fair as soon as everything gets back to the new normal.

Orna Ross of the Alliance of Independent Authors has a very useful article on how Indie Publishing might be able to weather the Covid 19 storm.

In The Craft Section,

4 tips for creating Villains- Sacha Black - Bookmark

5 tips for writing therapy scenes- Jennifer Lane

4 reasons why sprinting is the new writing- Sacha Black

Ways to add depth to settings- Jordan Dane- Bookmark

Taking the first step towards writing- Shanna Swendson- Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

How to make your book marketing more effective- Rachel Thompson- Bookmark

Packaging your book- Keywords, metadata, and selling points- Nicolas Erik- Bookmark!

New free epub creation tool- Yay.

Increasing discoverability- Facebook Goodreads Twitter- Ingram blog

Change your author blog into a website- Nate Hoffelder- Bookmark

To Finish

In this time of uncertainty with the news constantly changing around us it can be tempting to lock ourselves away and go back to comfort food, books, etc etc. If you know anyone contemplating plans to write that picture book, ‘because it’s easy to write a kids book’ send them over to read Melinda Szymanik’s blog- The picture book gospel. 

Now is the time to be kind and to think outside of the box, to get the word out about books and reading. Write reviews, talk on social media about favourite books, share your process, invent words games, social distancing doesn’t mean social isolation. Writers are already ahead of the rest of the world in these skills. It’s time to show them off.

Maureen

@craicer

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If you like the blog and want to shout me a coffee, hit the coffee button up top. I appreciate the virtual coffee love. Thanks.

Pic: Flickr- Creative Commons – Bill Smith- Girl Scout cookies 

Looking For The Silver Lining

This week the publishing industry was trying to catch up with all the cancellations as the Covid 19 virus is now a global pandemic. Publishing Perspectives announced a roundup today of what’s been canceled. 

Meanwhile over on Amazon, there have been scams taking advantage of people’s fear. Let’s rip off some scientific articles dress it up with a salad of opinion and badly formatted or just scanned pages of tips and sell it to frightened people. 

If you are thinking it’s all a big conspiracy theory and the virus isn’t that bad you need to read this detailed article on the statistics of the pandemic thus far. 

I was hoping to find some silver linings I could share with you this week. This became especially important for my mental health as I investigated the contents of our emergency bag and discovered expired food. Hmm. What would a writer need to get through some forced isolation time? A separate workroom from children and spouses for a start. (The laundry- I’m always in there.) Lay in a stock of pain killers, cough medicine, your favourite chicken soup, wine, chocolate, pens, and paper and get in a stack of books from your local bookshop.

When you are all settled in, channel Mary Shelley. She wrote Frankenstein during a pandemic. You too could write a novel that changes the literature landscape. 

(N.B. You might have to handwrite it just like Mary if the internet goes down because everyone is working from home.)

This could be a great time to do some computer spring cleaning says Litreactor- Have you ever spent twenty minutes going through the files of your manuscripts trying to find the latest version where you didn’t make that stupid change that resulted in the hero heading to Antarctica? Clean up your hard drive.

The Portalist caught up with some pandemic apocalypse writers and asked them why people were searching out their books. First of all, Chuck Wendig apologized for writing a book about a pandemic in an election year….

If you were planning on attending a book fair or conference that has just disappeared there is light on the horizon. The Alliance of Independent Authors online conference is still on. Attend virtually and soak up all the great information for free this weekend.

A ray of sunshine amid the gloom for UK writers. Their government is dropping the VAT on books.

Go Into The Story has a link to an interview with the screenwriter of Emma- Eleanor Catton

Kris Rusch examines the double-dealings of Hachette this week when their staff walked out to support Ronan Farrow’s protest over publishing Woody Allen’s memoir. It’s ok to enforce these clauses of non-compete to authors but not when the shoe is on the other foot.

In the Craft Section,

39 writing tips to take seriously- Zoe McCarthy- Bookmark

Test your story concept- Scott Myers- Bookmark

What’s the right pace for your story?- Jami Gold- Bookmark

Killer plot twists- Tom Corson Knowles

Children’s writer's biggest challenge- Sherryl Clark- Great Read!

In The Marketing Section,

Blogging consistently helps readers find you- Rachel Thompson

Bookbub reviews- an alternative to Goodreads – Anne R Allen- Bookmark

Book sales techniques- Sarah Bolme- Bookmark

7 expert tricks to improve author newsletters- David Gaughran -Bookmark

Grow your email list with a quiz- Author Media

Prepare for public speaking like a pro- Chrys Fey

Making an editorial calendar- Willow Woodford- Bookmark

To Finish,

One of my young friends suffered a concussion at work and she was at a loss as to what to do for the compulsory week off. She couldn’t look at screens or bright lights. Audiobooks I said. It’s a form of reading with your ears. It takes you right back to reading with Mum. The light switched on, and we went on to talk about Stephen Fry’s superlative reading of the Harry Potter series. There are reading snobs out there who say that reading anything outside of the printed page is wrong… however, science now backs up that audiobook listening is reading. 

Yay for Science! 

Maureen

@craicer

Do you want the best of my bookmarked links in a handy monthly newsletter?

When you subscribe you will also get a nifty mini book crammed full with marketing notes as a thank you. 

If you like the blog and want to shout me a coffee, hit the coffee button up top. I appreciate the virtual coffee love. Thanks.

Pic: Flickr- Creative Commons - Sean Freese