How Do You Count Success?

Around the publishing blogosphere this week...

Ah Bologna! The biggest children’s book fair in the world. (Secretly every children’s writer wants to go…)
Bologna is about to get bigger! This years themes African American culture, women, and handwriting.
Check out Porter Anderson’s run down on what’s new to the fair.

It’s writing convention season in the Northern hemisphere… so you need to know what to pack.
Check out this list of must haves from Gail Carriger- (don’t forget foot lotion!)

Bustle decided we needed to be reminded of the book scandals so far this year… We are in the seventh week
and we have had five scandals in publishing… Are we in a depraved industry or finally at the point where we are
calling out BS?

A scandal that wasn’t mentioned was The Authors Guild report on author incomes and their downward trend
that came out in January. This caught some people by surprise. (Who knew there wasn’t any
money in publishing?) However there were plenty of people who disputed the figures. Orna Ross,
Director of Alliance of Independent Authors made some interesting comments about using money to
figure out if you were successful. (Some genres had a problem with that…)

A friend told me about an email last month from a company offering to write her autobiography as she was a
busy scientist. She must be famous. We laughed, but it is a serious matter. These scams target the clueless
about publishing. Be a great friend, alert people to scams. (If you want to laugh, check out their emails along
with their spell checker and understanding of science papers… ;)

I was interested to read Agent Janet Reid’s answers to a question about what to do when your
publisher looks like they’re going belly up… This reminded me of Kris Rush’s blog on IP a few weeks ago
and if you haven’t read it… YOU MUST! (- and the comments).  Kris is back with an interesting view of
the Consumer Electronics Show and new media. Remember, once upon a time eBooks were NEW.
(And look how they changed publishing.) Kris points out some new ideas
to be aware of. (Check your contracts… beware of rights grabs for media not invented yet.)

Last month I mentioned that Mike Shatzkin, publishing futurist and commentator, had been down under
and visited our fair shores. Mike took the time to speak to people in the book industry here about
what the big problems are.Here is what he found out and what publishers can do about it.

Jami Gold has been looking at Social Media platforms… which do you use and why?
Jami has some good advice for which ones would best suit you.

If you are an Indie publisher you will have come up against this important question… Go wide or Select?
Here are the pros and cons. Meanwhile Richard Charkin charts his Indie publisher journey so far…
who knew it would start with 1000 emails...

The WriteLife blog has compiled their best sites for authors 2019… There are the tried and trusted ones…
and some new kids in the mix.

In The Craft Section,

How to write a Macguffin- The Maltese Tiger- Bookmark

Creating authentic villains- Kyla Bagnall- Bookmark

The 6 figure master fiction plot-Janice Hardy - Bookmark

How to create a wiki to support your world building

What to watch out for in spell checkers - Alli Blog

Look forward not backward to pull your reader in- September Fawkes- Bookmark

Pay attention to trends- Scott Eagan

In The Marketing Section,

How to get 10x the eyeballs on your next post- Writetodone

How to use Goodreads for authors- Dave Chesson- Bookmark

How to work with street teams for a successful campaign- Angela Ackerman - Bookmark

How to keep your newsletter from sucking

10 reasons why people leave your website- infographic- Barb Dozdowich

Run your own online book tour

To Finish,

It’s great to check in with Catherine Ryan Howard every now and then.
It shows how far a life can change in a decade in publishing. Catherine has just
published her 72 easy steps to get an Edgar nomination. If you are a thriller/ crime writer,
these are big genre awards! Practically an overnight success story!

Maureen
@craicer

In my monthly newsletter, coming soon, I round up the best of the bookmarked craft and marketing links as well as some other bits and pieces. When you subscribe you will also get a nifty book crammed full with marketing notes. If you like the blog and want to shout me a coffee- hit the coffee button up top. Thanks.

R.I.P Opportunity... The last message... My battery is low. It is getting dark.

15 years of exploration on another planet... originally designed for 90 days.  

An OUTSTANDING achievement for the Rover Robot Team!

Pic : Flickr Creative Commons Thomas

Being Authentic

April slunk in along with the Easter eggs so it took a while before anyone noticed it. 

Amazon announced it was closing down Kindle Scout. This was unexpected and as industry pundits have said it was always an experiment anyway.

What wasn’t an experiment was a Twitter thread detailing the two different conferences that authors experience when they go to RWA, the biggest writers conference around. If you are a Writer of Colour what you experience is vastly different. 

A few months ago I linked to a plea by a British Independent Bookseller to have an organisation that could have the same marketing clout as the big chains. The House of Lords said tell us more and so this week publishing executives spent a few days informing the Lords just what makes a level playing field. A literate population is essential.

Attendees at Bologna Children’s Book Fair were talking about literacy too and the rise of Audio Books for children. With the increasing popularity of in home smart speakers, the big children’s publishers are adapting books into interactive experiences that 'Alexa' or 'Siri' can use to entertain your child.

Recently Steena Holmes sent out a plea to authors about finding your authentic fans and sticking by them. This is an interesting post and one to really think about if you find yourself in a marketing daze.

Have you ever had to give a performance of your work to an audience? Yes, it can be nerve wracking. Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz has 10 tips for taking your page to the stage.

This week Amy Collins has an interesting post about One Big Don’t. It is an important read for authors who are Indie publishing. If this is you... take the time to read it... and do your research.

Also in the Don’t category was the Twitter thread where a male author decided to take issue with the #ownvoices movement saying he was quite capable of writing from a woman’s interior viewpoint. Unfortunately when excerpts of his work were posted in the comments they didn’t prove his point. Woman wrote descriptions of themselves as they thought a male writers would write... also including famous male writers turgid descriptions of women and then the New Yorker published an op-ed. This is why Point of View matters so much in writing.

In The Craft Section,

3 creative writing exercises from Roz Morris... then get a whole heap more from Reedsy

Writing romantic and fight scenes- they are the same... NowNovel- Bookmark

4 ways to simplify your writing process

Writing is rewriting- tips to help you-Bookmark

When is it time to say goodbye to your Work in Progress and give up on it.- Anne R Allen- Must 

read!

In The Marketing Section,

Book Marketing Mistakes- Reedsy- Bookmark

31 Book Marketing tips- Bookthority- Bookmark

How your author platform  affects sales- Rachel Thompson

How to embed social media posts- Frances Caballo- Bookmark

How to get also boughts- Written Word Media- Bookmark

Mining your old content

To Finish,

Nathan Bransford has been struggling with concentration. He decided to fix it once and for all and discovered some good tips.

Last week I linked to an infographic that helped you brainstorm a book idea. This week what are you going to call your new Indie Press?

So coming soon from Black Fuzzy Turtle Press- the compulsively readable thriller about a lovesick ghost’s dream to explore their eating disorder....  

somewhere in a multi-verse near you...

Maureen

@craicer

I round up the best of the bookmarked craft and marketing links as well as some other bits and pieces in a monthly newsletter. When you subscribe you will also get a nifty book crammed full with marketing notes. I promise to be early this month...
 

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons / Mike Lawrence CreditDebitPro.com

It’s That Time Of The Year

Ah Bologna, Bologna... The biggest children’s book fair in the world. This generally kicks off the start of Book Fair season.  Everyone is looking for the next greatest thing. The Bookseller reports the top news of the fair as well as the shock announcement of the demise of the 2nd biggest children’s publisher in Australia. For our own corner of the world the brand new One Tree House Publishing firm has picked up best Oceania publisher from Bologna after less than a year in business.

Coming hard on the heels of Bologna is The London Book Fair.  Alli- The Alliance of Independent Authors have pivoted their online conference away from a LBF concurrent fringe event into something a little bit different. Their conferences are always packed full of great info. Make sure you sign up.

Publishing is all about marketing. Jamie Engle has a guest post on Janice Hardy’s blog about how to analyse your book for better market value. This is important as a publisher can quickly go out of business if they don’t read and fill the gaps in the market.

Kenilworth books published a must read article about the role of the author in the chain of the book. Often publishers seem to forget that without the author you would not have a product. Isn’t it time the authors got some better royalty rates?

It’s been a horrible week for Facebook. However the talk in publishing is that FB isn’t going to be going anywhere as they have 2.2 billion users. However FB is changing its focus to facilitate more genuine sharing amongst its users. Groups are one of the best features of FB and publishers have finally got some ideas on this and how to make money from them.

There is so much information on the internet that it does get a bit tedious to be constantly fielding the same questions about publishing. Susan Kaye Quin’s heartfelt post about being your own genius has been doing the rounds. We all studied and researched and experimented and worked things out for ourselves. We share our thoughts coz we’re good like that but... 

Two great marketing posts caught my eye this week. How to get five star reviews- from Writer’s Digest and How to get also boughts- The holy grail of Amazon success from Written Word Media. If you are Indie publishing these are must reads.

Ruth Harris has a monthly guest post on Anne R Allen’s Blog. This month Ruth talks about Summoning The Muse. How you can get your subconscious working for you when writing.

In The Craft Section,

6 Writing exercises to help start or finish a novel- Indie reader- Bookmark

Using punctuation to greater effect- Joanna Penn- Bookmark

Deepening story theme- Jami Gold- Bookmark

5 rules for spring cleaning your manuscript- Tara Sparling

Frequently asked writing questions- K M Weiland

Best Books for Writers- Ann Handley

In The Marketing Section,

99 Twitter icebreakers

Pre order strategies and 9 Amazon secrets- Penny Sansevieri- Bookmark Both

Book Marketing ideas – Reedsy- Bookmark

How to create pre order buzz for your book – Rachel Thompson- Bookmark

Creative ways to boost reader engagement- Bookbub- Bookmark

Content Marketing promotion- Joanna Penn

To Finish,

Stuck for an idea? Use this infographic to help you get an elevator pitch from which to start your epic novel.

I’m off to write the compulsively readable thriller about a lovesick ghosts dream to explore their eating disorder....  It’s going to be a best seller I’m sure!

Maureen

@craicer

If you want a round up of the best of the months bookmarked craft and marketing links  then subscribeto my monthly newsletter. You will also get a nifty book crammed full with marketing notes.
If you enjoy this blog share it with your writing friends- A nice Easter gift...

Pic Flickr Creative Commons – Jules Morgan

Keeping Up With Book Trends

I have a confession... I’m getting addicted to podcasts.

I started out with just one... then I added another and now I have eight podcasts I try to listen to regularly. I thought I could give them up. When I accidently put my phone in the washing machine and had to replace it I told myself not to load any podcasts on my phone. I lasted one week. 

This all leads me to the Spa Girls. They have been sharing some great podcasts from The Smarter Artist Summit. Trudi Jaye interviewed some great thought leaders in publishing. Tune in while driving, or doing the dishes, making a meal, having time out...

DiAnn Mills recently published a guest post on Suzanne Lakin’s blog about writer courage. Did you even know that you have to be courageous to write? 15 ways to strengthan your courage to write.

Rejection- Every writer will deal with it at some time. What makes rejection worse is that writing is such a personal act it feels like we have been rejected as a person. It is hard to distance yourself from the writing. Mona Lisa Foster has a great series on rejection. Rejection is an opinion not a death sentence.

In publishing news this week... Smashwords announced that they have partnered with Findaway voices audio platform.  Findaway is getting bigger. Audible may start losing customers especially as Findaway doesn’t lock audio book contracts  for seven years....

The other book aggregator, Draft2Digital, has been adding some new features as well. Author Pages and Book Tabs are their latest tweaks to a website that is getting lots of praise in the Indie publishing marketplace.

Bookbub is also making changes. You can now recommend books to your followers or groups... sharing the book love of your author friends.

Sam Missingham is a London based book marketer who has quite a following in the UK book scene, She recently started a marketing service for authors and one of the first things she did was to ask Traditionally Published authors if they paid for book marketing. A surprising number did. Is this the way of the future? Sam writes about the responses from the traditionally published authors- why they are picking up the ball from the publishers.

This week I was asked if I had heard anything regarding Bologna Children’s Book Fair. I went for a hunt and found the regular roundup of Agents discussing what they predict will be big trends. Bologna is a rights fair. Will we see another breakout hit? Nothing has come along lately... Agents are wondering whether Young Adult is on the wain...

In The Craft Section,

Word count guidelines by genre- Anne R Allen -  Bookmark

Show don’t tell- podcast – Joanna Penn, (always good!)

Creating a fantasy race- fantasy fiction

The magic fix it scene- Manuscript Shredder- Bookmark

How to write a character that can carry a series- Rebecca Langley- Bookmark

Have you chosen the right main character- Kristen Kieffer- Bookmark

A lesson in deep POV- Sue Coletta- Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

5 ways to make your SP book look professional

A primer on book reviews- Joel Friedlander- Bookmark

4 ways to make time to blog- Rachel Thompson- Bookmark

How to lower FB ads costs- Amanda Bond - Bookmark

Book publicity is not just about sales- Penny Sansevieri

To Finish,

Book Covers. The most important marketing tool you have. But book covers are subjective, they go in and out of fashion. It is always wise to keep an eye on what is trending in your genre. Calvin Emerson of 99 Book Designs, a book cover designer, talks about what is trending in book covers this year.

Maureen

@craicer

My monthly newsletter is coming soon, I’ve been busy reading... If you want a round up  of the best of the months bookmarked craft and marketing links then subscribe. You will also get a nifty book crammed full with marketing notes.
If you enjoy this blog share it to your writing friends, or you can shout me a coffee by hitting the coffee button up top. Thanks
 

Pic Flickr Creative Commons - Summer

Who's Counting...

Ten years ago this week I started this weekly blog. I had no idea what I was doing but decided to learn as much as I could about this writing industry. 

I have seen so much change it’s hard to remember that I started blogging just as the first Kindle was launched. That one device started a revolution. Books became digital products and went from being read on dedicated Electronic Readers to Smartphones. 

Publishing went through a huge revolution along the way. Ten years ago I couldn't have predicted the loss of established publishing companies and book stores. Now 70% of all books are being bought online and we see the rise of Independent writer publishers. Over the years collaboration amongst other writers for education and publishing opportunities have been vital to understanding this brave new world we are working in. From writing in isolation to being globally connected to writing tribes via Facebook and Twitter to virtual publishing houses it has been a fascinating ten years.

I have been following Joanna Penn’s writing odyssey with three other writers in New Orleans and reflecting on the nature of collaboration. Joanna likes to look at her career in writing in Olympic bites, every four years, to remind herself how far she has come.

Hot off the press about to start their journey is a new publishing house for children’s fiction in New Zealand. One Tree House. This is a welcome addition to the shrinking children’s book publishing island. Hopefully this is the beginning of a great trend.

Bologna was a busy fair according to Publishers Weekly. There wasn’t a break out hit this year. But everybody wanted feel good stories. I wonder why?

Penny Sansevieri has an interesting article on break out bestsellers and what you need to do to reach the dizzying heights of Number One.

Joanna Penn looks at deep diving into analytics to find out how to improve your sales on Amazon. This is an interesting read.

There is a new writing craft Storybundle out. Kris Rusch has put it together and there are some good books on offer in there. I’m still working my way through the great Storybundle from Christmas. If you are on the lookout for good textbooks on writing then take a look.

Over the last two days writers have been quietly seething on Twitter with the hashtag #ThingsOnlyWomenWritersHear. It’s funny and sad at the same time. Diana Gabaldon reported that her publishers said they couldn’t put her degrees in her bio because it would intimidate her readers... umm

Chuck has written an entertaining list of 25 things he has learned in five years and twenty books. (That is a huge workload...) Warning it is Chuck so go in braced and be prepared to laugh..

Erinna Mettler has an interesting article on working with the crowdfunding publisher Unbound. Ten years ago I couldn’t have seen this kind of publishing platform.

In The Craft Section,

The ultimate world building list of resources

5 quick tips for editing

7 ways writing communities can go wrong- Elizabeth Buege

How to write love triangles – Roz Morris -Bookmark

Are you choosing the right protagonist? -  K M Weiland-Bookmark

Give your characters the courage to change- James Scott Bell- Bookmark

Tracking progress while revising- Pubcrawl-Bookmark

Using Twitter for research- Becca Puglisi 

In The Marketing Section,

A plan for finding new readers

5 easy tips to grow your tribe

What are your subsidiary rights?- Janet Reid-Bookmark

Book Cover design- Reedsy- Bookmark

Two Great posts from Frances Caballo How to get your emails opened and

How to get Amazon to notice your book – Bookmark.

Making yourself the brand- Draft 2 Digital

5 ways Instagram can help writers

To Finish,

Have you ever been in the situation of not having the cash to buy the shiney new book but wanting to support the writer and/or illustrator. Debbie Ohi has a lovely list of things you can do to support your favourite writers besides giving them chocolate... (Chocolate is always welcome tho...)

Maureen

@craicer

Thank you to all my regular readers. It has been a wonderful ten years. I have learned so much. Thank you to all those who have shouted me a coffee... (virtual or real!)
If you want to get a collection of the best of my bookmarked links plus other goodies make sure you subscribe to my monthly newsletter.

Buying the Bestsellers

This is the week of the Buy.

Amazon bought Souk. Why should the average writer care? Souk is to the Middle East what Amazon is to the West. Digital books are only 1% of the market. They only have to go into China to get total world domination...

Kobo, the Canadian digital device and bookseller has bought Shelfi. Why? For the tech developers apparently, ( or is it because they have a perfect understanding of buyer’s reading habits.)

Microsoft unveils a digital bookstore. Why? Because everybody else has one... (I wanna bookstore... Google and Apple have one and Amazon has a big one....) Meanwhile a savvy bibliophile wandered into an Amazon bookstore and saw that they don’t sell books like other booksellers. They group them differently.

How is your reading this year? Elizabeth S Craig decided to put a reading plan into action this meant having another identity on Goodreads.

The Writers Guild Association home of script and screenwriters looks like it is gearing up for another strike. Negotiations have broken down between the studios again on what they pay the writers. Why are the content creators the last in line to get paid?

There are rumblings in the universities. Should academics publish their own textbooks? There was an interesting panel debate at London Book Fair on this.  Is the traditional academic publishing world finally getting the shake up of self publishing. The days of the $400 text book may be numbered.

Bologna is on! Bologna is the world’s biggest children’s book fair. At this time all the children’s writers get a case of travel and book envy. Publishers Weekly has a quick run down on what everyone is looking for.

James Scott Bell has a great article in Writer Unboxed asking is your writing big enough? You know those sweeping sentences that go on for half a page and your eyes and attention remain riveted to the page, even while you subconsciously know that no editor these days would let a writer ramble on but the writing is soo good and you just can’t help reading on. I have shelves full of writers that were sparing with a full stop but they could sure tell a story. They were prolific and belonged to the pulp school of writing. Anne R Allen wonders if the constant pressure to write and repeat is a good idea. What about those writers who write slowly?

In The Craft Section,

5 underused settings in Spec Fic

Story structure purpose for readers- Jami Gold - Bookmark

Let’s talk verbs

How to edit your story

Creating a strong moral premise- Jeff Lyons- Bookmark

Theme examples from literature- Now Novel

3 steps to engaging readers

10 things to remember about sequels- Janice Hardy

Red flags in editing why your MS gets rejected- Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

3 Book marketing skills -C K Syme

9 things authors need on their landing pages- Bookthority-Bookmark

50 ways to market your book without going crazy

Author bio’s a help or hindrance- Anne R Allen - Bookmark

Amazon keywords to double your readers- Penny Sansevieri- Bookmark

Book description A/B tests Bookmark

An old world concept made new

To Finish,

This week Marie Force wrote a fantastic article on chasing the best seller lists and how she realised that she needed to change her focus. Kris Rusch talked about the bestseller lists and who you are writing for. It is a fabulous article and a must read.

Maureen

@craicer

My monthly newsletter is going out soon. If you want to get a collection of the best of my bookmarked links plus other goodies in your inbox you can subscribe here.If you want to shout me a cup of coffee hit the Kofi button. Thanks to all those who have fed my caffeine habit.

Pic Flickr Creative Commons / Moyan Brenn /Tuscany Market