Can you afford Oysters?

Every few months there seems to be another revolution in the publishing industry. Startups come and game change for a while and then a Big Fish snaps them up.

This week Oyster – the subscription reading service, got snapped up by Google.

Laura Hazard Own has a good analysis of recent history and a pointer to where next it could all go.

With Scribed the only other subscription service outside of Kindle Unlimited providing competition, is Google finally making a play? Mike Shatzkin uses this week’s news to look at the viability of ebook subscription models and what about Apple...

Oyster’s team were very good at Mobile Reading Apps and none of the Big Fish have made a move in this direction so far... So Google has ‘acquihired’ Oyster and their mobile reading technology. There may be big moves in mobile digital publishing ahead. But the subscription ebook model may be going bad...

In amongst the dredging for Oyster news... The Author Earning team of Hugh Howey and Data Guy did some analysis of their own on author incomes. After seven quarters they have enough data on what individual big authors may have been earning... It makes fascinating reading.

Jane Friedman has put together a great series of charts on the publishing industry and an eye opening interview with Richard Nash. He is in demand to talk to conferences about the future of the book. This is a must read for authors! In the future all your income could well come from personal appearances, the wine you select... the endorsements you have... not from your book.

In the Craft Section,

To prologue or not to prologue- Kristen Lamb

Fast writers and slow writers.- Eizabeth S Craig

What thriller authors can teach you

Writing Prompts- (Bookmark)

Essentials of Pitching – Ava Jae (Bookmark)

What type of secret does your character keep

Finding fresh ideas

In the Marketing Section,

Writing back cover copy

50 ways authors can kickstart their publicity –Molly Greene

How to get your Indie book translated – Anne R Allen (Bookmark)

5 ways to jumpstart creative thinking- Bob Mayer

Selling books at Conventions - Patty Jansen

7 rules to be successful as an author- The Book Designer

How to market to a niche audience (Bookmark)

Connecting to readers -C Hope Clark

Website of the Week

K M Weiland is one of those go to writing craft bloggers. This week she shared her publishing year breakdown. This is a great snapshot of what Indie Authors need to do.

To Finish,

This week in the Ask Polly section of The New York Times was a plaintive letter asking Polly if the author should just give up on writing. The reply was quoted all around the blogosphere. Go on and read the pearls of wisdom in this wonderful piece.

Tinderbox is about to strike! Lots of crazy last minute conference details to do until it goes BOOM. I wish I could clone myself... then I could get everything done and attend every workshop!

 Maureen

@craicer

Pic from Flickr Creative Commons - Jeremy Keith

Writing Costs

This week two critiques of James Patterson’s Master class in writing bounced around my Twitter feed. One was from The Observer and the other from Writer Unboxed.

James Patterson is a prolific bestseller who has a team at his publishers devoted only to his work. This year he started a fund for booksellers to encourage reading. Our local children’s bookseller was a lucky recipient. So a master class from him was always going to be interesting. It’s a huge bang for your buck. ($90US) I can’t help thinking that other writing craft gurus will have to lift their game.

The other topic to get bounced around this week was the cost of publishing.

Joanna Penn has a critical analysis of her own writing business and six figure income. Kate Flora has a critical analysis of how much it costs to write traditionally. (i.e. with a Trade publisher.)

Nick Stephenson is also talking about the cost of self publishing but he sees it as a value....

Last week I linked to Steve Hamilton's fight with St Martin's press Kristine Rusch has an excellent post on this and the fact that had he done it in 2005 his career would be over… but authors who have done it have some tricks up their sleeves…. 

Porter Anderson takes a look at balancing Trad and Indie publishing interests. Whether you come in on one side or the other or are firmly hybrid, there is a lot of discussion in what way a writing career can go now. Porter mentions Deborah Cooke’s recent essay, What I miss about Traditional publishing, (very interesting) as he compares the two camps. Jaye Manus takes issue with some of Deborah’s ideas especially where she says that Indie publishers need someone to say NO that is not a good idea.

Elizabeth S Craig has a great post on publishing podcasts... She talks about her favourites and finds a few more from her readers.

Anne R Allen has an excellent post on social media... she is not a fan of email newsletters. She talks about the best way you can promote.

Have you heard about ageism in YA? A young writer points out that teens aren't being listened to...

In the Craft Section,

What 4 agents are looking for in memoir- Alan Rinzler

Why your characters are boring

Character psychology- 9 common errors- Kassandra Lamb

5 reasons internal dialogue is essential

Revision techniques- Janet Fox (Bookmark)

Plotting essentials checklist

Planning your plotting – Janice Hardy

In the Marketing Section,

13 reasons why your novel query was rejected- Anne R Allen

Looking good on a web cam – Rachelle Gardner

How to market your books when you have a pen name.

Writers- using a project management approach.

Molly Greene has two great posts- 45 ways to sabotage your social media success and

Why readers download books-(Bookmark)

To Finish,

Whether you are Trad or Indie inclined you still need to write a ripping good yarn. So here is the word from Bob Mayer – Finding the shiver effect!

maureen
Pic From The Fabulous InkyElbows

Hailstorm

I’m sitting in a warm house listening to classic jazz and being completely distracted by the hail hitting the windows. I am supposed to be on a writing retreat. That’s where you run away to a distraction free zone and wrestle with your manuscript. As I write this Stormy Weather is playing on the stereo… and out the window. Honestly you would think I was writing fiction.

It has been a little bit stormy out in the publishing blogosphere this week.

There have been storms of internet bad behaviour over at Goodreads… which follows the Twitter storm over E L James last week.

Anne R Allen has a great blog piece where she talks about the rise of the bullying culture among readers, authors and reviewers and what we can do about it. She quotes Anne Rice, who this week declared she ‘was fed up with censorship by troll.’

The Alliance of Independent Authors is promoting their ethical author manifesto and it has a clause about not engaging in troll behaviour along with other good acts of authorship.

Writer Beware has an interesting post on Amazon reviews. Amazon has been tightening up the reviews it posts because of sock puppetry and one star bullying behaviour but they may have gone too far in the zealousness. It all hinges on their data mining… and boy do they know a lot about you.

(Sorry just had to take a break to dance around to Louis Armstrong’s Aint Misbehaving.)  

Mike Shatzkin takes a pot shot at the WSJ and the Guardian. This week they will both be publishing the first chapter from Harper Lee’s new book, Go Set A Watchman. Aside from the 1950’s era of journalism involved, Mike thinks they and Lee’s publishers have completely missed the point in getting readers for this book.

Nathan Hull of The Bookseller is lamenting the way the rest of the world is looking to the US subscription model woes as a reason not to go the subscription way. Subscriptions can work for authors and publishers if they realise that Europe is not the US which is still operating on a paper and print mentality.

Jane Friedman  always has interesting things to say. Here she looks at the P and L sheet publishers have to fill in before they decide to publish. Authors should also be aware of the Profit and Loss Sheet and how it impacts them.

In the Craft Section,

Two great posts from Janice Hardy –  Five edits to strengthen your writing and Setting mood and tone in your scenes.

What is your Narrator viewpoint?

Different types of tension- Ava Jae

Five important ways to add symbolism- K M Weiland

Seven tips for adding humour – Rhoda Baxter

73 ways to make a difference in your writing

In the Marketing Section,

If you are thinking about audiobooks in your writing future check out this interview by Joanna Penn with Jeffrey Kafer.

If you are interested in the latest cover designs, Shelftalker has rounded up this year’s trends in Y A. Hands are in…

For the design types… a discussion on the latest typography offerings for digital books.

Molly Greene on the 99c ebook sale.

How authors can use Mailchimp and the best ways to use Goodreads.

When your cover gets copied – what you can do about it. (Writers helping Writers)

Website of the Week.

Bob Mayer always has interesting things to say. This week he has a great post on outlining your novel. And for those people thinking about going to a conference in the near future here is his slideshow on how to get the most out of a conference.

To Finish,

Wimbledon is on this week. They are sweltering in the heat. Publishing Perspectives has an entertaining look at what it might be like if publishing was like Wimbledon.  

Back to wrestling with the manuscript...

Maureen

@craicer

Flagging Down Karma

This week the power of group/mob behaviour was in full view around the blogosphere.

And it wasn’t pretty!

E L James had a torrid time on an ‘Ask E L James’ Twitter chat that her PR people should never have enabled. Mob behaviour was in evidence when she was publically vilified at a live event. You can hate the stories... just don’t read them, but don’t attack the author. They are a human being. Porter reports on the fallout and how Chuck Wendig coped with it.

For the anonymous haters who hide behind computer screens and avatars to say hate speech- there will be KARMA.

This week Apple’s appeal against their sentence of collusion with the big publishers got thrown out. (See Karma...) Fortune magazine details just our cozy the deals Apple and the publishers made. It is not pretty reading.

Scribd, the ebook subscription company, has come up against the voracious romance reader and decided that limiting their subscription is the way to go. There are howls of protest from readers who are instantly penalised for reading too much and from writers who find their books have just disappeared. The Bookseller looks at the issue and what might be a solution.

Writers trying to get their head around the new Amazon subscription service pay per page read would do well to check out Susan Kaye Quinn’s comparison breakdown. Susan’s straight forward analysis clearly shows the writer just what a pay per page means as opposed to a borrow. Math wins and so do some writers.

Fake online reviews are still happening and some authors are being burned by negative review campaigns. Amazon is rolling out some new algorithms to clean this up. Porter talks about what can be done, should be done, is being done about sock puppetry.

In the Craft Section,

3 small changes that will transform your writing

Revising without tears (Bookmark)

Don’t trim words- Chop them out.

The writers skill- Stephen Pressfield

The secret behind making me care about your characters- Chuck Wendig (usual warnings)

Why starting with action messes up so many beginnings- Jami Gold

6 writing techniques

How fiction writers can ramp up tension and pacing- CS Lakin (Bookmark)

Truth and Fiction- Girl Cliques- Becca Puglisi (Bookmark)

In the Marketing Section,

Behind the scenes making a cover- Dane Low

Podcasting tools

Book marketing checklist –Tim Grahl (Comprehensive)

3 questions for indie authors

Social media for authors

Book marketing plans – (Bookmark)

Special forces tools that help writers-Bob Mayer

Book Market results- Nicholas Rossis (Fascinating! Bookmark)

Website of the Week

Grammar – You can’t ignore it. There are some great websites out there to help you write more better (spot the deliberate grammar mangling.) Check out the Grammarly blog for nifty tips and great articles.

To Finish,

Jane Friedman has an interview with Nathan Bransford on her blog. Nathan has been it all... an agent, a writer, a reviewer.... He is in a unique position to comment on today’s publishing industry.

maureen

@craicer

Pic: From Grammarly blog on writing retreats.

Challenging Contracts

This week my Twitter feed is still full of the Kindle Unlimited pay per page write ups from media... So much angst out there.

What does it mean? Kindle Unlimited is a subscription service- like a library. Authors who have their book in KU (which is exclusive) used to be paid per borrow. Now they will be paid per page read. If you write short stories- great. If you write page turning epic fantasies of encyclopedia proportions- great. If you write boring rip offs of turgid junk - not so great. This comment seems to sum it up - They are paying us to write well.

 The Authors Guild fair contract campaign is gathering momentum. Take a look at what the Authors Guild are asking for... Are you shocked that authors don’t get these rights in their contracts? After years of reading Writer Beware posts... I think its about time Publishers were being called on this.

This week Taylor Swift called out Apple for not paying artists on free trials of their music streaming service... and Apple backed down. Phillip Jones from The Bookseller notes what Taylor has done for the music industry and asks do we need Taylor to come over to publishing because there are a few things...

Molly Greene has an interesting post on estate planning forthe self published writer. Even if you are traditionally published you need to think about your literary estate. Have you got any ideas on what might happen to your work? If you have a shonky contract your publisher may be able to do anything....

 Anne R Allen writes some good solid advice. Here she outlines the six bad reasons to write a novel and also the six good reasons.

James Scott Bell has the ten things you need to know about the writing life. This is a print it out and stick it on your wall kind of post!

Janice Hardy has an Indie Author business series happening on her blog. This week Marcy Kennedy is looking at competitive analysis in the business plan. This is a fascinating dig deep look at your genre and what works…. (Bookmark)

Recently Susan Kaye Quinn was interviewed by Lindsay Buroker for the SFF Marketing podcast. This was a wide ranging interview just stuffed with great questions and answers about what works and what doesn’t for marketing online. This is well worth a watch! It is long so set some time aside. I’m really looking forward to chatting with Susan at our conference in October.

In the Craft Section,

Are you scared of plot?

What type of secret does your character keep?- Angela Ackerman

Writers rituals and why they work

Using Back Story effectively- Kristen Lamb

Seven sneaky ways to bring your dialogue alive- (I do this all the time)

Will readers find your protagonist worthy?- Angela Ackerman

Getting what’s in your head down on the page- Janice Hardy (Bookmark)

In the Marketing Section,

5 book promotions that really work- Molly Greene

Public speaking tips

The top 10 resources for self published authors

Building a literary community- Joanna Penn

Indie authors offline marketing strategies

Seven reasons why authors fail to publish-Michael Neff (Bookmark)

To Finish,

All writers go through the feeling like a fraud syndrome, sometimes every day. Bob Mayer has some questions for you to ponder about how far into The Imposter Syndrome you are and tips for getting over it.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Flickr/Creative Commons -Nobmouse

This Diverse Business

This week the NZ children and Young Adult Book Awards finalists were announced and in a new move The Children’s Choice finalists, voted on by NZ kids, were added. The kids choice and the official judges marched in step for about half the time and then diverged so altogether there is a much wider sampling of books. This is great because it shows the depth and the breadth of the amazing writers and illustrators in our country. They are still looking for sponsors. So if you know of anyone....

Publishers Weekly have taken a close look at the figures from AAP and sales were ... up. Leading the charge, Kids books at a wopping 20%. Yes they could be said to be saving the publishers bacon.

This year there have been several campaigns about publishing diverse books. Leading Agent Sarah Davis talks about what books are crossing her desk and how the publishers are now calling for diverse books.

Porter Anderson follows along on this theme with a look at gender in publishing. What’s fairness got to do with it. There seems to be a lot of women in publishing until you get to the board room.

Still in business... How European VAT is affecting selfpublishers.

Kristen Nelson talks about whether subscription services are good for authors ... and the rise of the author space in offices. (Fantasy... the New York office loft with some writing buddies.)

Which brings me to... Author collaboration. How to go about it. Triskele books has a tool kit you need to Bookmark! I’ve said it for years, Authors need to look at this model to make an impact!

Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi are going from strength to strength. Here they announce their new venture to go with all those cool writing thesauri ... Software. They are such cool and savvy writers!

Kris Rusch has a new project- Women in Sci Fi especially the forgotten women. I fell in love with Sci Fi when I was a teen and discovered Andre Norton. And it blew my mind to find out she was a woman. Kris looks at her legacy and the history of how these writers became forgotten. This is an amazing post!

In the Craft Section,

Breaking the 10,000 words a day barrier.- Lyndsay Buroker

7 mistakes to avoid when writing about the military.-2 Navy guys (Military mistakes always causes the book to be thrown out in my family.)

Metaphor writing exercises

How story structure relates to our lives.

Theme and Intent- getting these right. –Bob Mayer

Fun literary devices- Janice Hardy

Twice the writing in half the time

6 tricks for building a strong writing habit.-Ali Luke

In the Marketing Section,

Are you using pinned tweets- (this opened up a whole new world for me.)

Molly Greene has two great posts- collaboration with authors on boxed sets and

How to make an author video. (Bookmark both)

Is your website up to snuff.

The Creative Penn interviews Mark Dawson- On writing fast. This is a great interview.

My book is being pirated what do I do- (Bookmark)

How to find the right critique group-Jane Friedman (Bookmark)

Website of the Week

Chuck Wendig has made the occasional appearance on my blog for a few years now. He is a best selling children’s and adult Sci Fi writer. He is NSFW and some of his metaphors will stay with you all day. He is entertaining but also tells important truths on writing. Here are his most frequently asked writing questions and his very truthful answers-Be Warned.

To Finish,

Planning conferences is hard work. I’m happy to say we have finally reached the important programme day a week after we wanted to. It’s tricky juggling the right speakers who will inspire, challenge, teach, and up-skill writers and illustrators across all stages of the profession. I think our team have done a fantastic job. I wish I could split myself into three because I want to attend everything.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: The Grand Dame of Sci Fi- Andre Norton 1912-2005

Disruptors

Comparing yourself to others can suck joy out of creating. Find your own pace, savor the journey. pic.twitter.com/Xvxoq9autp
— Debbie Ridpath Ohi (@inkyelbows) April 29, 2015

Digesting the London Book Fair and Indie ReCon generally takes a good month. So much information about writing and publishing  in big bites means you can quickly get full of rich information. Sometimes that means putting nice links aside to digest later.

Createspace has a quick overview on what were some good takeaways from London Book Fair and Young Adult author, SK Holder also has a list of great info learned at the Author HQ Hub. (This is a new venture for London, actually encouraging Authors to the Fair.)

Indie ReCon has posted the panel video How Self Publishing Is Changing Traditional Publishing, held on the last day of their conference. This is a fascinating look at the industry in the middle of change. Well worth grabbing a coffee and taking time to watch.

Publishing Perspectives has a model they suggest publishers should be looking at. Louis CK.

But he’s a comedian I hear you say. Yes but he has taken control of his own content and is using it in new ways. Now if Publishing Perspectives is urging publishers to look at this model...what about writers?

This leads in to the wonderful Roz Morris and some very important words of wisdom for the Author publishing in 2015. (BOOKMARK)

Dario Cirello opens a little can of wriggly things when he did a guest post about crowd funding and patronage. Do you agree or disagree with using crowd funding for your writing project or are you skeptical? The conversation is in the comments so make sure you read them.

Mike Shatzkin takes a look at the next Amazon contract negotiation with the last of the big 5 publishers. It will be the meeting of the behemoths of publishing. Who will blink first? How will it change the industry as a whole? A lot of jobs will be on the line when RandomPenguin and Amazon sit down to parley.

In breaking news, Booktrack (that little Kiwi startup from a few years ago) has some nice big news for authors. (Yes, someone wants to pay us.)

In the Craft Section,

Janice Hardy talks about creating depth with mini arcs. (great post)

Elizabeth Spann Craig’s handy checklist - Is your book ready for publishing.

Bob Mayer has a no holds barred post on traits you must cultivate to be a successful writer.

Chuck Wendig also has THE post on stupid writer tricks. (BOOKMARK)

Jody Hedlund has a great post on using your setting effectively. (BOOKMARK)

5 mistakes to avoid with personal pronouns.

Here is a little challenge for you. Describe your current MS in 10 syllables. Make it a DEKAAZ poem. Circus Mystery: Clowning around with codes. (Yes I cheated. It’s all in the pronunciation.)

In the Marketing Section,

Molly Greene has 5 Self Publishing lessons (and a great comment stream.)

Publishers Weekly has the Google Ads 101 guide.

Joanna Penn has a huge post on why she has just changed book titles and covers. (BOOKMARK)

Creative Indie has 7 Design Tips for Book Covers.

The Book Designer has 7 tips for effective Metadata (BOOKMARK)

Tim Grahl has THE Book Marketing Check List.

Social Media Dashboards for Authors.

Marketing tips using Pinterest.

3 secrets to school visit success.

How to partner with your local bookstore- Do you know what it is like on the other side of the counter. (Interesting Read)

Website Of The Week

David Gaughran, besides being a digital publishing guru, has made it his mission to educate writers about the horrible traps out there for newbie writers. Especially those publishing packaging companies that promise you everything... just sign over your first born child. His article, this week, on the many faces of Author Solutions makes sobering reading and is a must read. (Even if you know about them, you will still be surprised at how far their tentacles spread in the publishing world.)

To Finish,

We all love a good infographic and Jane Friedman has put together  a great one on the various ways we can publish now.

After 100 years of business as usual we are now living in a constant state of disruption in the publishing landscape. We must be making up for lost time.

maureen
@craicer

Messy Details

Twitter is always interesting for the pithy quote on a current news situation.

Clarkson and One Direction: two devastating blows to publishing in the same day
— Philip Jones (@philipdsjones) March 25, 2015

This Tweet comes from the Editor of the UK based Bookseller magazine. On one hand it acknowledges the celebrity nature of publishing current trends, (this enables those other books to be published.) On the other it shows when events/people get messy in public, sales of books plummet.

In other messy publishing news, my Twitter feed is filling with comments about the new censorship app, Cleanreader, which you may download to your reader of choice and run those pesky books through. It will take out and replace all those horrible naughty words that authors unwisely decided to use in their stories.

Joanne Harris (Chocolat) takes issue with the extreme nature of the ‘clean’ being perpetrated and the complete lack of understanding by the App developers of the authors position. (You can imagine Chucks Wendig’s reaction.)

Equally messy is the position of a large Book Festival who have trade space being used by a predator concierge company owned by Penguin Random House. The festival report that they can’t get out of it because then PRH may withdraw their support. It is not a new position in publishing as Dave Gaughran points out.

Publishing is always looking for what the next big trend is, so one eye is always being kept on the tech sector. This week, Joanna Penn gave a guest article on Virtual Reality becoming the next big thing in publishing. Heady stuff. 
As I was trying to imagine it, up popped these two articles. Picture Book Apps and the vanishing author... with some timely comment and then Publishers Weekly highlighted what Mary Hoffman (author of Stravaganza series) is doing with a multiplatform VR App for kids. Definitely a trend to watch.

Jane Friedman has a guest post from an author who has partnered with a small press. He extols the virtues of working this way.

Bob Mayer looks at the basics for being a successful author now.

Mike Shatzkin has some starter thoughts for publishers to be thinking about on their author websites. (Authors might be thinking somewhat differently tho.)

In the Craft Section,

Smart tactics for describing a character in 1st person POV.

What does your character want? (Great post)

A first chapter checklist

Using growth hacking to write faster.

Building your own world.

Character Talents and Skills (from the Angela and Becca’s new Thesaurus)

The five best online tools for outlining your novel.

How to get that book written this year.

Critique Etiquette - (Bookmark)

In The Marketing Section,

Two interesting articles from the Book Designer blog - The ultimate guide to Twitter for writers and Quick Book Marketing tips.

In the spoken word realm, Audible wants writers to work exclusively for them... think radio serial style.

Podcasting and Indie Writers.

Hot book marketing tips for Indies.

Jane Friedman has distilled her Social Media philosophy and it makes for interesting reading. Are you being genuine in your outreach?

Website of the Week

I enjoy dropping into Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s blog. She writes with passion about the need for authors to keep educating themselves in the industry. This week she highlights how your attitude to writing and publishing can see you have a short career or a long one.

To Finish,

If you are on Twitter you will sometimes see conference takeaways being tweeted. This week the Pubsense conference looked at publishing in the future. The #pubsense15 Twitter stream was full of good comments.

Bookbaby decided to put up a nifty video using Neil Gaiman’swriting advice... Lets take it right back to the reason we write in the first place.

Maureen
@craicer

Saints and Sinners

The publishing world woke up yesterday to the news that Mal Peet had died suddenly. There was a collective Whaaat Noooo gasp around Wellington. Mal and Elspeth had stayed here two years ago when Mal was Writer in Residence at Victoria University. He made an impact from the first day and was always affable and approachable, charming us and being charmed by us. He teased us... gently. He was a brilliant Young Adult writer  and the sadness over his passing is for ourselves and the world because there will be no more Mal Peet books. Our thoughts are with Elspeth. (What a wonderful team those two made...)

Earlier this week my Twitter feed was being burned up by responses to an article written about MFA programs by an ex MFA teacher who decided it was time to write his feelings about being a teacher of an MFA program. As Chuck Wendig (usual warnings) exploded over the dismissive tone he used in his article... I was thinking, yes but he did have a point here or there, which Chuck concedes. (However his rant is more entertaining than the original article.)

Anybody venturing into the wonderful world of publishing should always find out as much as possible. Yes Book People are wonderful people but there are sharks out there, like any other industry and regularly dropping in to Writer Beware is a good habit to get into.

This week Victoria shines a light on contract clauses that make your hair curl and the latest news about Author Solutions.

If you are a newbie you won’t know that Author Solutions is the subject of a class action suit. As this outfit has a wonderful chameleon reputation running ‘concierge’ services for some of the biggest publishers out there, they look bone fide and their tactics are anything but. Dave Gaughran has the latest twist in the plot of who is the next big publisher to swim with the sharks.

Chris McVeigh has written a heart felt post about the disconnect between publishing industry professionals and authors and the state of publishing industry today after a recent trip to London. Chris has his own solutions to fixing this disconnect, which is very real and what I hear on an almost daily basis.

One author who has stepped into the disconnect and carved out a different model is Bob Mayer. He is interviewed by Reedsy about his work and his publishing house Cool Gus. Bob and his team (Jen) work with other authors to publish their books under a collaborative model. He has a really interesting publishing model and he’s a great writer.

If you write for children you will know that print is still king but there are different e-book

/app models being trialed all the time. Jane Friedman has a magnificent interview with two children’s book agents where they talk about e-books for children. Is it going to be like the adult take up?

In the Craft section,

Oh the goodness of Jami Gold who has some brilliant worksheets for writers on her website...

And a halo goes to Janice Hardy who has started a month long series of story structure analysis posts.

K M Weiland has a wonderful post on passive voice...

The awesome Jenny Crusie has a next level post on ‘agency’ something that Chuck is very in to. That's when you unleash your characters.

The Crimson League has a post on killing your characters needlessly...or how not to do this.

How to write productively – sometimes it’s the simple things.

The most important thing an author should know...

In the Marketing Section,

Jane Friedman and Christina Katz on building better author bio’s and making use of them.

How to Hack Amazon effectively for authors.

21 Book Marketing tips.

If you are thinking about book trailers Joanna Penn has interviewed a book trailer making expert so this is chock full of tips and then talks to Debbie Young about getting your book into bookstores and libraries.

Making the most of your publicity – tips from the agent.

The art of ARC-ing. What to do with those Advance Reader Copies...

Website of the week

It’s more of an infographic.... but this is THE infographic of Book Genre’s.  Any genre with examples...Check it out.

To Finish,

This week we launched the first news about Tinderbox2015 - The National Conference of NZ Children’s Writers and Illustrators. It’s happening October 2-5^th in Wellington this year. It aims to ignite sparks, shed light on new practices, and nourish and energise authors and illustrators. Tinderbox 2015 will be a hands-on conference, with workshops and panels, both experiential and inspirational, it's not to be missed.  We are thrilled with the enthusiastic response already and hugging ourselves because we know what is coming... tho we are still working out some details... hehehehehe. You can go on to our exclusive mailing list at 2015tinderbox at gmail dot com or head on over to our Facebook page, Tinderbox 2015. Our website will be up and doing soon.

In the meantime you can speculate as to what this might mean... and an innovative real-time, collaborative project that will run alongside other sessions....

maureen

@craicer

pic from Flickr/Creative Commons – Caroline Wickham