Tag: publishing

Diary of a New Writer – 10 Blah, blah, blogging!

~ Meg ~ 43 Comments

(For other entires in the Diary, check here)

That’s my workspace in the photo.  I use a standing desk because sitting all day is really bad for you.  Anyway, that’s besides the point…   Why do writers blog?  Isn’t that a waste of time that could be spent writing your actual novels, short stories, poems, whatever?  Nope and here’s why:

When you start writing, your blog IS your body of work.  You have what, one book you’ve just self-published?  Your blog introduces you to the world.  With the ability to link to all manor of social media, you are connecting to not just your potential readers and book purchasers, but  editors, publishers and agents.  Remember my friend Kevin that used to work for the big publishing house (that shall remain anonymous!) in New York?  He said they find new authors on Amazon all the time.  Not only that, but even writers publishing on free sites like Wattpad have been discovered.  Check out this article:  One Direction Fan Fiction Writer Gets Six Figure Book Deal.  Isn’t that crazy?

For maximum exposure, link your blog to all the social media sites WordPress makes available.  In the left column here in the new editor, is a sharing button that will automatically send your blog posts all over the place.  Besides that, you should also set up an author page at Amazon.  They have a nice little walk through that helps you every step of the way and guess what?  You can link your blog to that too!  But you have to do it through Amazon.  It’s not hard; trust me, if I can do it so can you.  Also, Facebook let’s you create a dedicated author page.  That way new readers can “like” your page and it won’t get mixed up with your personal stuff, cat videos, drunken office party photos… you know what I mean!

What should your blog contain?  That’s entirely up to you, really.  However, I’ve tried to follow this path.  I’m a writer so my blog needs to focus on writing related subjects.  I always joke that my head is exploding with ideas so my blog is full of short stories and my serial fiction piece.  Perhaps you want to reserve your creative juices for the novel you’re working on.  That’s fine.  Maybe your blog could share some of the research you’re doing on your subject.  Or you could share a writing tip or two.  How about something that helped inspire your story?  Tell us about an author you admire, how their writing influenced you.  What about some of the obstacles you’ve overcome in order to write?  How do you get past writer’s block?  Any and all of those things are great material for your blog and unique to each writer.

Another thing to consider is that in the chance that a potential agent or publisher stumbles across your blog (hopefully!), you need to treat it kind of like a resumé.  That doesn’t mean it has to be stultified and seamlessly professional.  It should reflect your personality, so be funny, outrageous, provocative and controversial if that’s your thing!  Just make sure that whatever you post is what you want the world to see.

I think this goes without saying, but use the blog to connect with other writers.  Like I mentioned last week, no one will understand your feelings like another writer.  When writers share their thoughts on their blogs, it only helps the readers understand the lengths we go to in order to write.  Taking that one step further, we as writers should be actively responding to and engaging with our readers.  Answer their questions, ask them for feedback, go to other blogs and leave thoughtful comments there.  Be part of the community!

I hope you’ve enjoyed Diary of a New Writer because that’s the end!  Not the end of my story, though!  I will continue to post about my journey but I just didn’t want to continue it as this series.  After all, eventually I will no longer be a new writer!  And Diary of a New Writer – 78 sounds ridiculous!

 

 

Diary of a New Writer 7 – You got to move it, move it!

~ Meg ~ 59 Comments

(Rather than ‘reinvent the wheel’ on the subject of publishing, I’ve included several helpful links.  Also here are parts one through six.)

Now that I had polished up my novel, proof read, made corrections and bribed my beta readers with wine and Wegman’s gift cards, it was time to put this thing out there!  Again, I was confronted with two choices:  try to find an agent and publish in the traditional way or self publish on Amazon and Smashwords.  (Smashwords will let you publish your e book on sites like iBooks, Kobo and Nook.)  Let’s be clear, neither one is right or wrong, better or worse for writers.  However, I bet if you took a poll of all the Indie Authors out there, 90% of them (I made that up) would have the same or similar experience as me.

Finding an agent to represent me sounded like a good idea.  It would take away the pressure of marketing the book.  Everything I read about self publishing told a similar story:  you need to work very hard, tirelessly, in fact to get your book noticed among the thousands of other works being published every day.  I just wanted to write.  By now, I knew I wanted to make Three Empty Frames the first in a series of novels.  Having an agent handle all the sales and marketing would free me up to do that.  I googled “finding a literary agent” which led me to Writer’s Digest  and querytracker.net.  I found the names of some agents, wrote a query letter and started sending them out.

How does one write a query letter, you ask?  Here, read this: How to write a query letter.  Also, make sure you are following the guidelines for submission to your agent.  Not everyone asks for the same things.  Some might want a whole chapter, some just the first 5 pages, etc.  Also, this should be obvious but, don’t waste time sending letters to agents who don’t represent writers in your genre.

Now for the bad news.  It may take 6 weeks to 3 months for an agent to even respond to your letter.  When and if they do, it may go something like this:  “Thanks so much for sharing your work with me.  I believe it shows great potential, however, it’s not quite the right fit for me.  Good luck in your endeavor!  Regards, Agent X.”  To be fair, these agents are being bombarded with manuscripts all day, every day.  Frankly, if you haven’t caught their attention in the first paragraph, you’re toast.  Perhaps this does not discourage you.  Plenty of famous authors got rejected over and over before they finally got recognized.  Here’s a list:  50 Iconic Writers Who Got Rejected.

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I couldn’t take it.  I found myself nearly on the verge of tears every time I got one of those sweet little “thank you-but” notes.  (Ok, truth be told, I only sent out about 6 query letters.  That’s how fragile my ego is.)  Besides, this book was sitting there finished.  I wanted it out there already!  I am not a patient girl.  That’s why I finally went with option number 2:  self publishing.

Does that mean I can’t still query agents about my book?  Nope, I can still do that.  In fact, I should still do that!  There used to be a stigma attached to self published authors, but no more!  If you’ve managed to actually sell some of your books, you can include your sales figures in your query letter.  Assuming *cough* they are impressive enough to attract an agent!  Anyway, I’ll tell you all about my experience with Amazon and Smashwords next time!

Celebrating just a little!

~ Meg ~ 33 Comments

An awesome thing just happened and I thought I’d share.  I got an e-mail letting me know that the first royalties for the sale of my book were being deposited into my account!  Now, obviously I knew that I’d sold some books, there are reports that generate that information for you on a regular basis.  But here was the proof!  The actual amount is small, my book has only been out a short time and it hasn’t gained much attention, yet.  I have to say that even though it’s not much, it’s still the sweetest money I’ve ever earned!

So for all of you writing your first book, struggling with the editing, agonizing over the cover design, take heart.  It will be so worth the effort when it’s done and you earn your first dollar (or pound, or Euro, etc)  Now I’m going to open myself a beer!  And yes, I know it’s only 8:30 in the morning!