It’s Christmas morning. I didn’t expect to give you a blog today—thought I’d be too busy. But Lily (my cat) and I woke up early (must have heard the tiny reindeer hooves outside the window), so I have time to write this before heading over to my family’s house with my homemade cinnamon rolls.
I want to write this morning about the prospect of having your blog noticed by a publisher. I hear over and over that publishers keep an eye out for interesting blogs that would make good books and are actually offering contracts to bloggers. That’s what I keep hearing.
Last night I finished reading a book I got as an early Christmas present. It’s The Daily Coyote by Shreve Stockton. It’s the story of how the author raised a 10-day old orphaned coyote successfully to adulthood. Charlie still lives with her and his best friend, Eli the cat, in Wyoming. It was toward the end of the book that I discovered Shreve was wooed by publishers who had stumbled upon her blog, The Daily Coyote. Several of them offered her book deals. She chose to go with Simon and Schuster.
This morning, I attempted to locate some additional stories around the blogger becoming an author scenario. Here’s what I found. The movie (and book) Julia and Julia started as a blog, as did the book Past Secrets, Stuff White People Like and several food blogs. One blogger was approached by National Geographic with a book deal. She shopped her blog around and ended up choosing another publisher.
Food blogs are especially popular with publishers who are seeking new book projects.
Do you maintain an interesting blog? Are you getting the publicity that could put your blog in line with major publishers’ radar? It wouldn’t hurt to put more effort into your blog if you are, indeed, interested in finding a publisher—or having a publisher find you.
So this is my big WOW holiday gift to you this year. Stop hiding away your wonderful story or book idea. Start blogging about it in an organized, interesting manner. As I said, reach out for publicity in all of the most obvious and not so obvious ways. If you truly do have a knack for writing and you have a good story, valuable information or a new twist on something we all enjoy reading about, you just may lure in a publisher.
In the meantime, if you actually have a book in mind, don’t wait for a publisher to show up. Establish a blog and maintain it. But also get busy writing a book proposal. Flesh out your idea, reveal your marketing plan… Study the publishing industry. Evaluate publishers, select a few that are appropriate and go for the gold.
If you need help with your book proposal (most first-time authors do), consider signing up for my online book proposal course. http://www.matilijapress.com/course_bookproposal.htm
Merry Christmas Everyone
Great post! It seems more blogs are getting picked up by publishers today than at the so-called height of the blog-to-book trend in 2009. Publishers want to find book ideas that are a sure thing, and a blog with a big following of readers or subscribers is just that.
I suggest to my blog readers at http://www.howtoblogabook.com that they evaluate their blog or blogged book just like they would a printed book before they start–against online and offline competition. They also need to come up with a promotion plan. And, they use what I call the proposal process during this evaluation so they accumulate all the info necessary for a proposal. They can then go ahead and write a business plan for themselves and/or a proposal. I suggest getting that proposal written so they are ready when an agent or publisher calls–or when they want to go calling.
By the way, my blog got picked up after my agent peddled it to a publisher, so it is also a blog-to-book success story…one of them many. However, I actually blogged a book from start to finished. Many people simply book their blogs, though (repurpose their posts into a book).
Thanks for the great post.
Hi Nina,
Thanks for your input. It’s good to hear from someone who has walked the walk. Wishing you continued success.
Patricia