Archive for December, 2009

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

What Are Your Book Promotion Strong Points?

Monday, December 21st, 2009

Are you outgoing? Do you make friends easily? Are you an advertising whiz? Do you have great communication skills? Maybe you love to travel, you’re good at small talk or you have some impressive connections. Do you write killer press releases? Are you highly organized? Maybe you have exceptional computer skills.

Although book promotion seems to require a variety of skills and talents, it’s rare that an author would come into this realm with all of the desired attributes. Not every author is a marketing expert or an accomplished public speaker. I know several published authors who can’t or don’t want to get out in public even to promote their books.

The fact is that it’s too easy to get a book published today. Even folks with minimal writing skills and no marketing savvy can become authors. But only those with something more on the ball will experience success with their books.

This blog post is for the unskilled, untrained author. I want you to examine your strengths and your opportunities and use them to get your book noticed. For example:

• Maybe you can’t get out much, but you have time on your hands. Use that time to devise and implement promotional activities on behalf of your book. Develop a website, get involved in websites and organizations related to the theme or genre of your book and participate! Study appropriate magazines, ezines and websites and arrange for book reviews. Learn how to write a good press release and send them to appropriate newspaper columnists (gardening, parenting, spiritual, health/fitness, sports, senior, children, pets, ecology, etc.). Columnists are always looking for interesting news items related to their themes.

• If your strong suit is your ability to communicate, get out and meet people at book signings, book festivals, appropriate club/organization meetings, etc. And engage in public speaking. You might also enjoy and benefit from participating in online discussion groups and on bulletin boards/forums.

• If you’d rather write—develop a newsletter and/or write stories and articles for publication in appropriate magazines and ezines. Use the bio at the end of the pieces to promote your book!

• Maybe you are an idea person. Use your skills to develop promotional concepts for your book. Be creative! If you can come up with the ideas, but aren’t good at carrying them out, partner with someone who can implement them or who can nudge you toward your goals. Maybe you have a book on building miniature trains. You might plan a meet in your community for train enthusiasts, get together with others and set up a booth at the county fair this year, design a specialty book section at your website or become a regular at the monthly swap meets in your area.

• If you have a marketing background, use it to get your book noticed. Create ads and brochures, send them to your mailing and emailing lists, post them in strategic places related to the theme/genre of your book, place ads in appropriate publications/sites, if you have the money to do so. Professionals generally don’t suggest that authors pay to advertise, but there are instances where it is reasonably priced and effective. Be discerning.

Which category do you fit into? Can you see how you can utilize what you have in order to promote your book rather than trying to follow someone else’s program? Of course, I’d like to hear from you on this subject.

Question of the day: What are your strong points and how do you use them to promote your book or your freelance writing work?

Contact me here: PLFry620@yahoo.com

Visit my website: http://www.matilijapress.com

Posted in Book Promotion | No Comments »

Emotions Versus Business Savvy in Publishing

Sunday, December 20th, 2009

As authors, we typically pour a lot of emotion into our book projects. Sure you hear/read me say that authors must take the emotion out of the publishing equation and go into publishing as a savvy author rather than an emotionally desperate one. But I also believe that emotion has its place in a publishing project. I mean, how are we going to keep it at bay?

If we aren’t excited about our projects in the beginning, where’s the motivation to continue with them?

Researching and writing a book is often a long and arduous undertaking. If we didn’t feel some measure of pleasure in doing so, we wouldn’t keep at it.

There’s a definite thrill in finishing a book—having worked through all of the obstacles and challenges to the end of the project.

We experience a sense of satisfaction—maybe even delight—when we finally make some wise and informed choices with regard to our publishing options.

Few of us can contain our joy when we hold our finished books in our hands for the first time.

Our first few sales make us feel validated and, quite frankly, a bit exhilarated.

When we get good reviews, we’re certainly grateful and feel emotionally rewarded.

And the delight just goes on and on throughout the life of the book. Each review and sale creates some excitement in us. Every book order placed gives us a boost. And this is okay. Humans are made to experience emotions and creating, following through and succeeding with a publishing project can certainly spark a variety of them. Enjoy the feel good feelings as you progress with your book project. But, when it comes to making those all important publishing decisions, set the feelings aside and use your research skills and your business savvy.

Start your research with my book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html

Question of the Day
Yup, this is new. If I get enough responses to this question, I will write a blog using your comments. Comment in the “comments” area or email me at PLFry620@yahoo.com. Put in the Subject Line: “Question of the Day.”

Q: Have you found it difficult to separate your emotions from your business savvy when entering the world of publishing on behalf of your book project? What were the results? I’d love to hear your story.

Posted in Publishing | No Comments »

How to Meet Writing Deadlines

Saturday, December 19th, 2009

Are you ready for Christmas or will you be shopping and wrapping at the last minute as usual?

If you procrastinate this time of year, you probably have trouble meeting your writing deadlines year round. And if you’re like most procrastinators, you really would like to change. It would make life less hectic.

But do you have it in you to change? Are you actually capable of or wired to calmly work toward a deadline without the drama? Can you organize your time and your life in order to accommodate a new way of being? I guess it depends on your motivation and what’s in it for you. If calm and peace isn’t your atmosphere of choice, then there may be no hope. If your habitual tardiness is linked to your attempt to be noticed or to gain power, then forget it.

Some writers love the excitement of rushing upon a deadline and finishing it barely under the wire. I have friends who use their bent toward procrastination as a way to get sympathy and other kinds of (often negative) attention. There are people who seem to live their entire lives showing up late. They just can’t (or won’t) get organized. But if you want to do better in 2010—you want to enjoy a more peaceful existence without the constant commotion—you wish to stop disappointing and irritating colleagues, co-workers, friends, family members and editors by always showing up late—here are a few tips and tricks that might help.

• Use lists. If you write it down, you are more apt to follow through. Plus, it frees your mind when your tasks are committed to paper—you’re no longer required to try remembering everything that needs to be done.

• Break big projects into smaller tasks. Rather than look at your assignment as a major project wherein you must research and write a complete article by mid month, view it in segments.

• Plan to finish the assignment early. Forget about the deadline date. Establish your own date and focus on finishing then.

• Make friends with the clock.

When you are planning to meet with an editor or a friend, rather than just letting things happen as they might—which is what you would typically do—thus, showing up late, actually plan a time to arrive. Learn how to use your friend, the clock, to help you change your tardy habits.

Here’s how I mange my time so that I can meet my commitments. Let’s say that I have a 9:30 a.m. meeting and I get up that morning at 7. The drive will take me10 minutes in heavy traffic (I plan for the worst case scenario). That means I must leave the house no later than 9:20. I note what I must and what I’d like to do before for the meeting: shower, dress, straighten up the house, eat a bite of breakfast, feed the cats, make some calls and gather some paperwork for the meeting, for example. I would also like to write my blog, respond to the email that came in overnight and ready some books for shipping. Now, I will give each task a portion of the time I have allotted that morning.

I don’t just start moving through my morning and let things happen as they might. For example, I won’t start making the bed and then pick up a book from the nightstand and start reading it nor will I go out to get the paper and get in a long conversation with a neighbor or get suddenly distracted by a stack of bills I left on the desk the night before.

No, I have a mission. I have an obligation to be on time and there are certain tasks I want to finish before I leave, so this is my focus.

First, I figure my priorities—taking a shower, feeding the cats, getting dressed, eating something, packaging the books to be shipped, responding to important emails and preparing for the meeting (although, I probably would have done that preparation the night before). If I have time left, I might write (or at least start) my blog, straighten the house, make the calls and play with the cat for a few minutes. At any rate, I will be driving out of my driveway, hair combed, lipstick in place, briefcase in hand at 9:20.

Can you see how I prioritize? When there is a particularly tight time crunch, I will allot each priority task a segment of time in writing. For example, I can generally shower, dress and be ready to leave in 20 minutes. It takes me approximately 5 minutes to ready a book to be shipped, 10 minutes to prepare and eat a bowl of cereal and fruit (I can feed the cats while fixing my breakfast). I can generally straighten the house and deal with litter boxes within about 20-30 minutes. And my blog generally takes 30 to 45 minutes to write. Those calls I wanted to make might take me 15 minutes and checking all of my email could delay me by 15 or 20 minutes.

Do you see how when you know how much time you need to spend on each task, you can actually pretty realistically schedule so that you are always on time.

Are you generally prompt or do you struggle with punctuality? Do you easily meet deadlines or are they a real problem for you? I’d like to hear your story and learn your tips and tricks for meeting those all important deadlines.

For more tips, tricks and solid advice, resources and information, read The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. I’m also starting two online courses in January. See my blog post for December 18 for details. http://www.matilijapress.com

Posted in Writing | No Comments »

How to Prevent Publishing Disasters

Friday, December 18th, 2009

I met two more authors this week who are unhappy with their pay-to-publish companies and their books aren’t even out, yet! Both of them have my book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. And both of them told me that they read my warnings about some of the pay-to-publish companies after they’d signed contracts.

This is not to say that I bad mouth certain pay-to-publish companies or even all of them. But I do issue a strong warning for new authors advising, encouraging, admonishing them to go into a contract with a pay-to-publish company ONLY after they have done the following:

• Study the publishing industry.
• Know all of their options and the possible ramifications of their choices.
• Understand their responsibilities as a published author.
• Have a publishing or literary attorney look over any contracts presented.

As writers, we move into the unknown area of publishing, the first time around, much too quickly and eagerly. We don’t stop to make the shift—the transition—from writer to businesswo/man. We enter into publishing with the heart and expectations of a writer rather than the business sense of a savvy, informed author. We make decisions based on emotions and intuition rather than education and knowledge. And we get ourselves all tangled up in some of the most awful, disappointing, costly, situations.

Do you have a book manuscript almost ready for publication? Then you’ve come to the right place at the right time. Here’s what you need to do next.

Study the publishing industry
Read my book, The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book (by Patricia Fry). Order it through Amazon.com or here, http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html. It’s also in many libraries.

Read books by Dan Poynter, Brian Jud, Marilyn/Tom Ross and other long-time professionals. If you are considering a pay-to-publish company DEFINITELY study Mark Levine’s book The Fine Print of Self-Publishing. Levine rates, ranks and exposes 45 of these companies.

Join organizations such as SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network) http://www.spawn.org, Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA) and Small Publishers Association of North America (SPAN).

Attend writers’ conferences and listen to webinars and teleseminars presented by experts and professionals in the field of publishing. (SPAWN offers free teleseminars for members.)

If you decide to go with a pay-to-publish company or you’re presented a contract through a traditional royalty publisher, have an attorney look over the contract before signing it.

Another way to protect yourself from nightmare situations in publishing is to hire an editor for your book (you’re going to need one, anyway) who knows his/her way around the publishing industry and can educate and guide you.

FYI, I do this sort of work and I have stopped numerous clients from making disastrous and costly mistakes.

Any questions? Contact me at PLFry620@yahoo.com

Posted in Publishing | No Comments »

Use Your Resource List to Sell More Books

Thursday, December 17th, 2009

We talked not too long ago about adding a list of resources to your website in order to attract potential readers who are seeking additional information on your book’s subject or genre. Some of you know that I have accumulated a list of around 200 resources for authors and freelance writers at my personal website, http://www.matilijapress.com

Here’s a sampling of the 33 categories on my resources page: Books for Freelance Writers and Authors; Magazines, Ezines and Newsletters; Publications for Screenwriters; Services for Authors and Freelance Writers; Sites for Children’s Writers; Sites for Fiction Writers; Markets and Jobs for Writers; Newspaper Directories (for sending out press releases); Grammar and Writing Sites; Legal Help for Authors and Writers; Publishing Resources; Book Review Sites; Warnings for Writers; Grants for Writers; Find a Printer and even Writing Opportunities for Young Writers.

Check out my resources page and let me know if you see anything missing—anything you would like to see there that isn’t. http://www.matilijapress.com/forwriters/resources.html

How does one develop a resource list of this size? For me, it involved years of research. Many of these resources appear in my writing/publishing-related books. I did the research for the books and then transferred them over to my website for an even wider audience.

Of course, things change—books go out of print, newsletters come and go, sites close down and so forth, so it takes some diligence to maintain a resource list like this one. The beauty of it is, you can keep a website resource list more up-to-date than one that is in print.

So how do you go about finding the resources for your website—or for your book, for that matter? This question takes us back to research.

• Go through every book on your shelf or desktop on your book’s topic or genre in search of the resources those authors recommend. And don’t forget to add the books you trust most to your resource list.

• List the appropriate newsletters and websites you rely on the most.

• Note all of the best websites you’ve used over time to help you through the work on your project.

• Go in search of additional resources online and at your library/bookstore.

• Open your eyes, ears and mind to resources you see listed in your favorite newsletters and in your online discussions, etc.

• Document those resources you use daily (or even occasionally)—the new link you use to locate material for your press release, the publisher you heard of that is seeking manuscripts in your book’s genre, the informative blog you stumbled across, a report on a new scientific study, etc.

Check each and every resource before posting it. You want to make sure it is still live and that it is still relevant to your audience. Consider this, if it is relevant to you, it is probably something your readers want and need.

If you want more visitors to your site, offer them more. A resource list is an excellent place to start. Good luck with yours. Let me know if you need additional guidance and report back when your resources list is up and I’ll announce it in my blog.

Patricia Fry to Teach Two Online Courses
I’ll be starting two of my online courses after the first of the year. Space is limited, so sign up early. Starting January 5, 2010, I’m teaching the Successful Book Proposal Course. This course runs 8 weeks (or work through the course faster, if you like). Learn more about what to expect here: http://www.matilijapress.com/course_bookproposal.htm For $200 you get one-on-one guidance through the process of writing a complete book proposal during the 8 weeks, only.

On January 12, 2010, my online Book Promotion Workshop begins. This workshop runs $200 for 6 weeks. Learn more about what it involves at http://www.matilijapress.com/course_bookpromotion.htm

SPAWN members get $25 off each course.

Start the new year on the right path with your book project, sign up today for the course of your choice.

If you are interested in the freelance writing workshop, let me know. If I get enough interest, I’ll teach it early next year, as well.

PLFry620@yahoo.com

Posted in Book Promotion | No Comments »

Promote Your Book Through Your Newsletter

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

Do you produce a weekly, monthly or quarterly newsletter designed to promote your book(s)? I guess some of you use your blogs as a substitute for a promotional newsletter. And that’s okay. But it would be better if you did both! Why?

There are still potential customers who are not going to visit a blogsite regularly. And a newsletter is a good way to reach and remind folks of your book and other products and services. This is still a great method of keeping your name and the name of your book in front of potential readers.

So what goes into a newsletter? It should be more than an advertisement. It should inform, educate and entertain readers. Include material that your potential audience craves, is interested in, needs or that makes him/her think, ponder, smile or want to improve in some way. Strive to gain your potential readers’ trust and you will sell more books. Someone who learns from and/or enjoys your promotional newsletter will most likely want to read your book and purchase copies for gifts.

With this in mind, what exactly should your newsletter contain? If you’re promoting a nonfiction book, consider the following:

• Present an article on a cutting edge experiment, or report on a recent scientific discovery related to the focus of your book.

• Share anecdotes related to the topic of your book.

• Note current testimonials about your book.

• List a few resources.

• Write about some of your recent speaking engagements.

• Post an interesting editorial (which might include some of the above).

• Announce a contest—give a $100 to the 100th person to purchase your latest book, for example.

• Run an interview with an expert in your field.

• Pitch your book—maybe offering a discount during the month of December, for example.

• Announce new books/products/blogsite, etc.

For a book of fiction, your newsletter might include:

• An excerpt from your book.

• Your appearance schedule.

• Anecdotes reflecting readers’ experiences with your book.

• A challenge for readers—give a writing prompt, ask them to write in with the number of times you mention a particular character in your book or quiz them on an aspect of a particular scene in the book, for example.

• Treat your newsletter readers to a short story—yours or one by another writer.

• If you have a pet, a child or an otherwise interesting life, share some of your experiences each month. Maybe you’re an avid hiker, you train horses, you perform in community theater or work at Food Share. Share an anecdote about those experiences and try to connect it to the theme or your book or your writing life.

• Pitch your book—offer a discount during a certain period.

• Announce new books/products.

You are a writer. Why not promote your book using your special talent—writing? Maintain a blog, sure, but reach a wider audience by also producing a newsletter. And let us know how that goes. Those of you with newsletters, we’d love to hear from you. Is it a worthwhile venture? Give us some of your newsletter tips.

As predicted, my books are selling this month. I’m hauling loads to the post office just about every other day. Thank you! Thank you! If you haven’t placed your order for The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book, the book that many authors consider their bible, there’s still time to receive it for studying during the long holiday season. Read it now and by the New Year, you’ll have the knowledge, direction and guidance that you need in order to succeed with your book project. http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html Perfect bound book $19.95.

Order Catscapades, Tales of Ordinary and Extraordinary Cats within the next few days and receive it in time for Christmas giving. Three of these comb-bound books went out the door yesterday. http://www.matilijapress.com/catscapdes.html Comb-bound book $14.00. Ebook $8.50.

Posted in Book Promotion | No Comments »

Research is Ongoing for Authors

Monday, December 14th, 2009

Some of you have learned this truth already—that research is forever if you are an author. Others are in complete denial about this fact. You’re sick and tired of research—enough, already!

You had to research while writing your fiction, nonfiction or even children’s book. (I spent 5 years researching and writing The Ojai Valley, An Illustrated History.) You were in research mode while trying to find an agent and/or publisher. If you self-published, your research involved how to set up your company, locating a cover designer, understanding the Library of Congress and copyright stuff, etc. Now you just want to sell books, right?

I just finished writing/compiling the monthly SPAWN Market Update, for the member area of the SPAWN website. And my theme for authors with books to promote was RESEARCH and RESOURCES.

I urge you, as authors, to continue searching for the best book promotion opportunities and to explore and experiment to discover what works for your particular project. This takes constant focus and…yes, research. If you were to read an issue or two of the SPAWN Market Update, you would discover several book promotion ideas and resources. If you follow some of the resources, you will surely discover specific opportunities for promoting your book to a new audience in new ways. If you read the SPAWN Market Update as well as, say, the Book Promotion Newsletter, Brian Jud’s newsletter and A Marketing Expert Newsletter, for example, you’ll be exposed to even more ideas and specific resources. Continue visiting my blog OFTEN and others on your RSS feed or Favorites list and you’ll be exposed to even more ideas and resources. This is a good thing!

But, if you don’t take the time to do the work, you will not reap the benefits. If you don’t read the January issue of the SPAWN Market Update, for example, you won’t learn about an easy and effective way to bring more—many more—of your particular readers to your website. And we all know that the more of the right kind of people who visit, the more books you will sell.

By “right kind,” I mean your particular readers—those who seek out books like yours: mysteries, romance novels, works related to PTSD, child sexual abuse, cooking without sugar, etc.

In 2010, contribute to the success of your book by getting back into serious research mode. Start by vowing to read my blog every day. Spend some time at my website (I have some great articles there and a fabulous Resource List). http://www.matilijapress.com.

No matter what stage you are in with your publishing project, order my book today: The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html (Thank you to all of those who have been ordering it through Amazon, buy the way—but it is okay to order from my site.)

Join SPAWN and you’ll have access to the Market Update and SPAWNDiscuss, where we have some lively discussions related to writing, publishing and book promotion. Freelance writers are welcome, too. http://www.spawn.org. Join NOW as membership dues go up January 1, 2010. We just did our first teleseminar (for members only) on how to create buzz for your book. We’ll be offering the recording (for members only) at the SPAWN website soon.

And don’t just buy, subscribe and join—also SHOW UP! It does no good to rescue a puppy if you never feed it or show it love. And it will do you no good to buy, subscribe or join if you don’t participate and partake of the offerings.

Questions? Contact me at PLFry620@yahoo.com.

PS This is post number 650!!! Wow!

Posted in Book Promotion | No Comments »

Do You Write Good Story Endings?

Sunday, December 13th, 2009

I had an interesting challenge over the weekend. My niece, Maria, asked me to critique a couple of her stories. One of them was a class project and she got an A+ on it.

Maria asked me to be honest (has she ever known her auntie to lie?). She is actually an excellent writer for any age. She is 12.

How do you critique the work of a young writer? Your first priority should be to encourage him or her to keep writing, so you want to avoid discouraging words. I also felt it was counter-productive to nit-pick. Fine-tuning can come later. So I looked for the piece of advice or critique that could most significantly help Maria to improve her stories. Here’s what I focused on—her ending. She writes a rather tantalizing beginning (she makes you want to keep reading). The meat of her stories is strong. Her endings are nice, actually. Where I think she lets her reader down is somewhere between the middle and the end. I advised her to practice winding down—transitioning from the active, “happening” middle to the conclusion so she doesn’t end so abruptly.

Knowing Maria, I’m pretty sure that she quickly tires of the story. She wants to end it and move on to something else. In my brief critique, I suggested that she spend more time fleshing out that section between the middle and the end. In one story, she left conflicts unsettled and she passed right over her excellent opportunity to offer a lesson or help readers reach a conclusion.

Do you end your stories properly? Do you bring your stories full circle? Do you resolve conflicts and allow lessons to be learned where appropriate? Do you ease your readers into your magnificent ending or do you just sort of leave them dangling in outer space?

Leave your comment at this blogsite.

When is Self-Publishing Self-Publishing?
Here’s the link to the publishing options article Bobbi Florio Graham, Dan Poynter, Susan Daffron and myself (Patricia Fry) contributed to.
http://www.simonteakettle.com/options.htm

If you are confused as to what self-publishing means, what “self-publishing” companies do, etc. you might want to refer to this article. For one thing, we’ve attempted to rescue the term “self-publishing” from those pay-to-publish companies and attribute it back to where it belongs—indicating that an individual produced his/her book through his/her own publishing company.

You have not self-published if you don’t own the ISBN and the only way you own an ISBN is if you purchase it under your publishing company name.

Read the enlightening article and let me know if you have any questions. PLFry620@yahoo.com. Also, do yourself a favor this holiday season, join SPAWN. Remember dues go up January 1, 2010. So act now. http://www.spawn.org.

Be sure to check my array of books at http://www.matilijapress.com. You may want to put a couple of them on your Christmas list.

Book me to speak to your group this year. PLFry620@yahoo.com.

Contact me about editing your manuscript. I give FREE evaluations—email me your first 20 pages. I edit nonfiction, novels and young adult manuscripts. I just finished editing a detailed tour guide. I must say that novels and interesting nonfiction books are much more fun to edit. PLFry620@yahoo.com.

Posted in Writing | No Comments »

Webinar/Tips Sheets/SPAWN Has Needs

Friday, December 11th, 2009

I attended my first webinar yesterday. It was great. Sandra Beckwith of Build Book Buzz talked to SPAWN members about book promotion. Those members who couldn’t listen in by phone, can hear the entire presentation at the SPAWN site. This is just one perk of membership in SPAWN. And don’t forget, our membership dues go up January 1, 2010. So this is a good month to join at the $45/year rate. http://www.spawn.org

Even though I participated in one, I’m a little confused about what a webinar is. It had nothing to do with the web. It was simply a telephone conference call.

One thing I learned more about during the conference was how valuable a “tip sheet” can be. I write tips sheets as part of my blog and my articles alllll the time. But it didn’t occur to me to pitch the tips as “fillers” for newspapers and magazines.

What is a tip sheet? A short list of four to eight tips that are designed to teach, inform or entertain, for example. I could choose a handful of my tips for writing a more powerful book proposal, how to build promotion into your book, ways to get freelance writing work in this recession, how to use your blog to promote your book, etc. and send them out as filler material to newsletters and magazines.

You could create tip sheets related to your book on selling a house in this market, family budgeting, parenting the autistic child, the history of the locomotive or creative photography for new parents, for example.

SPAWN member, Bobbi Floria Graham gave SPAWN a nice plug in her article on “Self-Publishing Resources” published in the Freelance Writer’s Report, December 2009 edition. She tells readers that if you are planning to publish, it is wise to join organizations like SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network). Bobbi is a wealth of information and she participates regularly in our SPAWNDiscuss group. I love it when I see SPAWN in the news. Thank you Bobbi.

Speaking of SPAWN, we’re in need of a new Membership Director. You must be a member-in-good-standing. This means, if you aren’t already a paid member, you must join SPAWN. Your membership dues will be comped for every year you are a board member after that. Talk to me about additional perks of membership in SPAWN. And consider the prestige of being a SPAWN board member.

Patricia@spawn.org or PLFry620@yahoo.com

If you value the enormous amount of information you receive FREE here at my blog site every single day of the year, you will definitely benefit from membership in SPAWN.

Posted in Book Promotion, Writing | 1 Comment »

What’s in the Head of an Author?

Thursday, December 10th, 2009

Have you ever wondered what makes different writers choose different genres? Why does one writer embrace fiction as his medium, others lean strongly toward nonfiction and still others only want to produce books for children? And then there are those who are stuck on horror writing, humor, spiritual works or strictly business books.

I’m not a psychologist or a philosopher, but it’s always fun to observe people and try to get into their heads.

It seems to me that those of us who stick to nonfiction are basically more organized and precise. We have trouble veering far from the truth. Some of us have a desire to teach, to lead, to change minds, even. We’re generally good at prioritizing, multi-tasking and we’re a very curious bunch. Truly diverse nonfiction writers tend to see stories/articles/books in every situation. I think that when we try to write fiction, it is more factual than fiction written by the true storyteller/novelist.

Novelists may have a lot more going on in their heads—imaginary stuff. They find it easy to fabricate and some of them become expert at weaving stories around nearly any life circumstance. Fiction writers typically have active imaginations, of course. But ask them to write their bios or a description of their books and they can become lost in the woods.

What is the make-up of a children’s book author? I think they probably have talking pigs, ferocious dragons and fair princesses living in their heads 24/7. I’ve met many of these authors who also have a strong desire to connect with and to teach children life lessons as well as character values.

Certainly, I’ve only barely touched the surface of what’s in the head of authors. I’m going to leave it to you to add to this. What type of writer are you? What inspires or motivates you to write in this genre?

Visit my website at: http://www.matilijapress.com

Posted in Writing | No Comments »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »