Take A Chance

 

 

In Publishing News this week,

Publishing Perspectives reported on the exit of Andy Ventris, London Book Fair’s new director. He was tasked with getting LBF back after covid… but only directing one fair and then leaving was not foreseen by anyone. 

 

The Germans are serving up NFT’s with their premier non-fiction prize. This is a tentative step by the book industry to admit that NFT’s might be something to keep an eye on. However, if you want to get into NFT’s you need to know a little bit about cryptocurrency and this week has not been good in the cryptocurrency world.

 

Melodie Campbell has a guest post on Anne R Allen’s blog on why writing in a series is a good idea. It’s all about money… 

 

Jennie Nash has shared an excerpt from her book, Blueprint for Non-Fiction on Jane Friedman’s blog. Do you know your internal why and your external why? They are different and both are important.

 

Kris Rusch has the second in her current series on Why Writers Fail. This week she is delving into why established writers fail, it is all to do with FEAR.

 

On the Writers Fun Zone blog, D F Hart has a guest post on accounting for authors. This is a fascinating post – I know it doesn’t sound like it, but it is. This is a romance/crime writer with an MBA explaining how to look at the numbers in your writing business.

 

Sticking with numbers, Mary Moore has an interesting post on word count goals in the three act structure. This also applies to memoir and non-fiction.

 

This week Sandy Vaile tackled the four essential elements you need to nail to have a workable novel.  Sandy dives into explaining transforming ideas, story purpose, and driven characters along with conflict!

 

In the Craft Section,

How to outline a memoir- Reedsy- Bookmark

Archetype and Story structure K M Weiland- Bookmark

Stand out Characters- Angel Ackerman

2 great posts from Colleen Story- How to get back into writing and How to get over the feeling that your 

story is stupid

Plot Twists- Jerry Jenkins- Bookmark

 

In The Marketing Section,

Content Marketing- Grindboss- Bookmark

Savvy copywriting-Angela Booth

Author websites in 2022- Alliance of Independent Authors- Bookmark

How to pitch a story- Now Novel- Bookmark

18 Book Marketing tips – Sandra Beckwith – Bookmark

Why branding confuses you- Rachel Thompson 

 

To Finish,

Lately, I’ve been checking in with writing friends, long phone calls, and texts along with in-person hanging out at Book launches. I am blessed to have some great writing buddies who can pick me up, sort me out or just provide a listening ear when I’m angsting about something. This great post from Cindy Sproles explains why you need good writing friends. If you find yourself sitting in a conference somewhere feeling lost, take a chance, and reach out to someone. It might be the best thing you ever do for your writing.

 

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 of marketing notes as a thank you. 

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

 

Pic

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

 

Lending A Helping Hand

 

This week in publishing news,

The Los Angeles Times published a big article on the #Disneymustpay saga with quotes from the action team and a deep dive into the way Disney interprets contracts. I’ll bet there were fist pumps everywhere…also a lot of L A creators and lawyers checking over contracts. Hometown karma for Disney.

 

Instagram is flirting with NFT’s. This story from Techcrunch is interesting because Instagram is opening up a marketplace that a lot of people have access to. If you aren’t sure about NFT’s yet, keep an open mind and read the article. When we all live in our virtual reality life it might be handy knowledge.

 

The Society of Authors in the UK has a campaign running for the reform of hybrid publishers. There are legit hybrid publishers out there and there are some shady ones, very shady ones. Check Writer Beware if you want to be really sure about how your publisher stacks up.

 

Meanwhile, across the pond, The American Library Association is fighting back against all the book banning that has been going on. They have collected a formidable group of organisations to help them highlight this growing problem. I was shocked when I realised that ¾’s of the books banned were from marginalised writers. I didn’t realise it was so high. 

 

The New Publishing Standard always has an eye on what is happening around the rest of the world. This week they published an article about Sweden’s very high take up of audio subscriptions. 

 

Juliet Marillier has a great article on Writer Unboxed this week on supporting other writers. She lists a few ways you can do this. One of the easiest is to write a review as everybody knows that each review is gold. Juliet has a few other ideas to add and there are more in the comments.

 

Kris Rusch has an interesting article this week on How Writer’s Fail. As I was reading it I was thinking that optimism is a key ingredient for being a writer. You have to be optimistic to start writing, to continue writing, to finish, to revise, and to keep writing in spite of everything trying to stop you. Nurturing this mindset is the biggest and best thing we can do for ourselves and others. 

 

Colleen Story has a great website, Writing and Wellness. Here are two posts that nurture writers if you need a mental hug. Quotes to encourage you to keep going and Ways to make your writing mornings more awesome.

 

In The Craft Section,

Plot vs Story- September Fawkes- Bookmark

Can a writer quote song lyrics?-Anne R Allen- Bookmark

The difference between plot and story and why you need both- Heather Davis

Ten tools for writers – Kathy Steinemann

Bad Book Descriptions- Book Riot

 

In The Marketing Section,

How to write an author bio- Beth Barany- Bookmark

Can you revive a dead book- Dave Chesson  Bookmark

Book Launch Calendar- Scribe Media

Creating your copyright page – Alliance of Independent Authors – Bookmark

How to work with your graphic designer- Colleen Story

To Finish

The dream team of Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi are celebrating this week. It is ten years since they launched the Emotion Thesaurus. This blue book has been bought by writers all over the world and translated into other languages. Along the way, it has been joined by other books in the series. They reach out to help writers every single day with their resources. Angela and Becca have put together a fantastic prize pack of resources as a 10^th anniversary celebration. Enter to win or send a message of congratulations for a top notch resource. 

 

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 of marketing notes as a thank you. 

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

 

Pic:Photo by Hanna Morris on Unsplash