Breathing Water

I finished reading Breathing Water by Timothy Hallinan this week. Some books I can breeze through - for various reasons. It might be an author I like or a protagonist I love to follow or a genre that’s light and doesn’t take concentration to keep up with, and so on. Breathing Water is labeled as “A Bangkok Thriller,” and therein lay the problem for me. Perhaps I should say “within me.” It wasn’t a problem with the writing. Hallinan is definitely a good writer and he clearly knows the ins and outs of Bangkok, both the landscape and the politics. He has an interesting way with words and will inspire you to pay attention to your own words when you write.

This paragraph from the inside cover will give you an inkling as to why I hesitated to read and why it took me a while to finish:

Set in the Thailand of today’s headlines -- a nation of unrest, political uncertainty, corruption, and tradition, where the future looks dangerously precarious -- Breathing Water is the story of a deadly game in which the stakes are enormous and life is literally cheap.

I read that and put down the book, thinking, I don’t want to go there. I picked it back up, though, and began to read. Unless you’ve been to Thailand or lived there (I haven’t), I dare say this will plunge you into a dark world with strange traditions and scary situations. It will also introduce you to survivors and heroes. And, until the end, you will be wondering who will live, who will die, and who will be lost to the streets and corruption.

If you like thrillers that take you to dark places and into situations that make your stomach hurt, give Breathing Water a try.
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FTC Disclaimer: If I remember right, Hallinan’s publicist sent Breathing Water to me. I definitely appreciate it, especially since it was autographed, but nothing was said about doing a review. I have got to start writing down who sends me books. Sometimes I know they’re coming. Sometimes they just show up in my mailbox. I open the mailbox, find a book, do my I-got-a-book!-dance, spend fifteen minutes explaining to the neighbors that, no, I’m not having spastic convulsions, take the package in the house, rip it open, hug the book, and read the inside cover. That’s pretty much my routine - or it used to be. Now, I wait until I’m almost back to the house and out of sight before I begin my gyrating dance. The next book I need is one on getting yourself out of a straightjacket.

From Adults to Teens

Anybody else notice that it seems more and more “adult” authors are now starting to write teen or YA novels? John Grisham, Candace Bushnell, Rick Riordan, and now Harlan Coben, to name a few.

And article in The Independent highlighted Coben’s turn to the younger crowd. As a writer of “adult” books, mostly suspense novels,

Coben has written 19 books, 47 million copies of which are in print worldwide.

And now he’s starting a new YA series, which will feature some of the characters in his adult series.

If I were a YA author, I might be a bit stressed at these best-selling authors turn to “my” territory. But as someone studying the publishing world and stats, it seems like a good idea. If you can connect with teens and young readers, you probably can hold onto them as they become adult readers. Plus, you open up a whole new world of readers.

What is your take on this?

Your Online Presence

We’ve talked before about building your author platform, which in today’s world involves a strong online presence. We recently discussed Facebook (and my efforts to create a profile and understand Facebook). I started a series on Building Your Platform over on a blog I contribute to, The Blood-Red Pencil (although I’m thinking about stopping that series since that blog is supposed to focus on editing and I don’t think the readers there are especially interested in platforms).

And, of course, I am not the only one interested in Building a Platform. Most of you who are authors or are working toward being published are interested in this topic, since it’s vital to your career as a writer. I know some of you are feeling like I am - overwhelmed at the idea.

Not long ago, The Philadelphia Inquirer had an article devoted to this very topic and it focused on some of the authors at The Free Library of Philadelphia’s book festival…like Jim Zervanos who is underwriting his own pretty much physical (as opposed to virtual) tour. Over 11 months, he’s gone to conferences, book festivals, and writer’s workshops (including paying to have an exhibitor’s table). He’s spent $10,000. He’s not a writer with a big publisher, but one with a “tiny” publisher. He’s out there working and trying to sell his book.

Although the publishers will tell you that marketing your book is a co-op between you and the publisher, the truth is that more and more the author must do the heavy lifting and pushing. Ben Laurro, founder of Pure Publicity, says that authors have to find new methods to market their books because book stores and libraries won’t get you where you want to be.

"Facebook and Twitter have become powerful avenues to reach readers," he says. "The media wasn't the same as it was even two years ago . . . [and authors] need to realize that we need to reinvent the wheel."

Jonathan Maberry, author of The Dragon Factory said:

 "It's such a large part of the marketing plan. It's huge. . . . You can't really get anything done in publishing without social media."

He and some other writers created a Philly-based literary collective where they meet to discuss the publishing industry and have worked together on projects that help local causes (and at the same time, get their names out to the public and give them a platform for speaking engagements).

It’s an interesting article, so click over and read it if you have time. Before you go, I’m wondering if any of you have become part of or created a coalition of authors to discuss the industry and strategize on ways to work together to promote your books. I have groups of writer friends that I socialize with, but we don’t discuss writing. I think it would be interesting to have a “business” group of writer friends. Do you have one?

J.A. Konrath

If you’re active in the blogging world, you’ve probably heard of J.A. Konrath, even if you’ve never read one of his books. He’s a whiz at marketing his books and is very open and sharing with other writers. Jeff Rivera did an interview with him this week over on GalleyCat.

I think you’ll find it interesting, so after you read these few snippets, link over.

The easier you are to find, and to remember, the more books you'll sell.

A friend of mine, Carl Graves, does my indie covers. Carl charges between $300 and $1000 per cover, depending on the amount of work that needs to be done.

I'm currently selling 180 ebooks a day on Kindle. My ebooks are also available on Nook and iPad through Smashwords, but I don't have those sales figures yet.

I've sold 40,000 ebooks since last April….I uploaded them using Amazon's Digital Text Platform (dtp.amazon.com) and charged $1.99.

I'm earning more money on a $1.99 ebook than I earn on a $7.99 paperback.

In real life, I've signed at over 1200 bookstores, and have spoken at hundreds of libraries, schools, conventions, and book fairs.

It’s a very informative interview.

Konrath has built up his reader base, through both physical tours and a strong virtual presence. Are you doing both?

Establishing Mood

Think of the words you use and how you string them together. Fast, choppy sentences tend to rev up the tension. Longer, complex sentences slow things down.

Is her dress blood red? Or rose red? Do the stars twinkle like 4th of July sparklers? Or blink like a million ogling eyes?

Use the senses to set the mood. Two characters on the beach begin to kiss. How do things smell, taste, feel, sound? Remember, you're establishing an atmosphere.

Does John nuzzle Allana's neck, breathing in her lilac perfume, then kiss the salty sweat at her hairline? Does he feather his fingers along her arm, drawing goose bumps?

Does John nuzzle Allana's neck, breathing in her bologna breath as she sighs, then spits hair and sand as he tries to kiss her earlobe? Does he go to caress her arm, but rams his elbow on her hair, yanking her head to one side and spilling the pitcher of ice tea across his sunburned back?

A woman has had a long, arduous day at work. She draws a bath, pours in foaming oil. She touches the bubbles as they build. They're soft, like whip cream. She steps into the tub and slides down until the bubbles tickle her chin. How does the bath smell? Cherry? What kind of cherry? Is it a cherry-Coke float? Cherry cough syrup? Cherry sour balls eaten in the darkness of the movie theater? Grandma's hot cherry pie?

Each one brings up a different image, sets a different mood.

Choose your words, your sentence construction, your details so that they set a mood. Each scene has an atmosphere.

This is not to say that if your book is meant to be humorous, then every scene must be funny. There will be an ebb and flow. You don't want your novel to be monochromatic. But all the scenes together establish the overall mood of the book. Use your words--you are a writer, after all--to create the atmosphere of your book's world.

Do you have an example of how you used words to set the mood?

Newspapers

How many of you subscribe to a newspaper? How many of you read the newspaper?

I haven’t subscribed for years. The local paper, the Austin American-Statesman, seems to be hurting. They often throw free sample papers on our driveway (and others). I assume they’re hoping I’ll find it so interesting that I’ll subscribe.

Not gonna happen. I can thumb through it in probably fifteen minutes and spend most of that on the comic section. I find it much easier and faster to target-search for news. Most of the time, I click on “Latest Headlines” on my browser. If I want to know what might be on TV, I have the TV listings bookmarked; one click and I’m there. Want to find out the weather? It shows up on the browser when I connect to the Internet. If I’m searching for news on the publishing industry to blog about, I don’t turn to a print newspaper that’s at least a day old. I Google search and find things that are minutes old.

I used to scour the newspaper. That was years ago, though. I wonder how newspapers are surviving, since I doubt I’m alone in the abandonment of newsprint. I also think the “get it right now” mentality is contributing to the rise of e-books. Why get dressed, get in your car, and go to the bookstore… or even go to your computer, click to a virtual bookstore, order a book and then wait for it to be mailed, when you can click on your eReader, download a book and begin reading within minutes?

There are still those that love reading the newspaper (not me) and those that still love print books (me), but times are changing. New generations are growing up without newspapers and even print books. I think newspapers are fading faster than books.

So, how about you? Do you still read the newspaper?

Report from London Book Fair

The Bookseller, in a report on the London Book Fairs, said publishers must become more adaptable. But…they’re not all in agreement.

 George Lossius, c.e.o. of Publishing Technology, said publishers must be "much more fleet of foot in a world of mobiles and laptops"…

David Miller of Rogers, Coleridge & White … said it was time to stop focusing on digital royalties and instead look at platforms and business models.

On the “new” side, Fionnuala Duggan of Random House Digital, introduced “The Nigella Quick Collection App.” This “app, produced inhouse, has a voice control function to navigate recipes, making it a hands' free cookbook, and integrates social media.”

There were several other announcements in the article.

The voice control app, to me, was intriguing. When I’m cooking and trying to follow a recipe, I tend to make a mess, so a voice control function would be great. I’m also thinking that cookbooks would be ideal for the iPad, with its color function.

Anybody downloaded a cookbook on your iPad? What about a voice control to navigate recipes? Would that appeal to you?

Facebooking

Facebooking may not be an actual word, but it’s what I’m trying to do. Remember yesterday’s post when the literary agent advised that authors should be on “Facebook, Twitter, Red Room, Ning, etc”?

I’m on Twitter, but not the others. (Never even heard of Red Room.) So, I signed up for Facebook. The next morning I couldn’t even find myself (have since figure it out). But others somehow found me. Some I asked to befriend. Some have not befriended me - like my own kids (which is understandable). Some just found me and requested I befriend them. How did I know that? The next morning I opened my email and found two pages of emails from Facebook.

Clearly, I’m a total newbie and have only a few friends - unlike the published author whom I requested to befriend and who emailed back that he couldn’t friend me because he’d reached his limit of 5,000 friends.

I still need to figure out the pages thing and maybe upload some pictures (need to crop them down before that). It seems I also need to create lists, whatever that is.

I’m also working to update the look of this blog and my website. I’m satisfied with the new look of Straight From Hel, but not with my website. I tried to match the colors to those in the new header, but it feels too stark or glaring to me. This is my second attempt at the colors. I think I’ll try softer colors or reverse the bright blue and the green…or something.

If you’re on Facebook, you can find me, hopefully, under my name: Helen Ginger. If there’s a direct link to my home page, I don’t know it. Yet.

What are you doing to promote yourself online? Are you twittering? Red Rooming? Ninging? Facebooking?

An Agent Speaks

Over on the GalleyCat blog, literary agent Nicholas Croce says what you and I already know. We’ve talked about it here. But it’s nice to see an agent agreeing with us.

 …I'm looking for books with solid back-list potential, or, in other words, ones that have inertia and continue to sell steadily long after their initial promotional push. I'm also keeping an eye out for growth areas in ebooks and other platforms.

Croce also says writers must research the different genres and know what readers expect when they pick up a book. And here’s another area I know you and I have talked about here:

 On the promotional side, start blogging and social networking. More than ever authors, new and established, are depending on the Internet to reach out to readers through blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Red Room, Ning, etc.

What does he think editors are looking for? He has a wide ranging list, from paranormal, to character-driven fiction with a commercial angle, to a crossover of YA and adult.

To read his full list, as well as how to query him and what to send in a query, link over to GalleyCat’s full interview.

What about you? Are you working on putting yourself out there so when your book is published, you’re set to market it?

Publishing Stats

Publishers Weekly put out some interesting stats on books, including stats on self-published books. Here are a few:

A staggering 764,448 titles were produced in 2009 by self-publishers and micro-niche publishers…

Taken together, total book [traditional and non-traditional] output rose 87% last year, to over 1 million books.

Other major categories where output rose included children's, up 6%, to 32,348, biography, up 8% to 12,313, and religion, up 6% to 19,310.

… the largest producer of nontraditional books last year was BiblioBazaar which produced 272,930 titles, followed by Books LLC and Kessinger Publishing LLC which produced 224,460 and 190,175 titles, respectively.

You might also be interested in learning that “traditional” books slipped. While the non-traditional titles increased to 764,448, “traditional” titles slipped from 289,729 in 2008 to 288,355 in 2009.

I, for one, don’t take this to mean that traditional books will fade out of existence. We’re in a flux period here where new eReaders are popping up and people are racing to try new things. Ebooks will continue to increase in sales, but I don’t see print books disappearing, at least not in my lifetime. And who knows what new ways the future will bring to read and experience books!

Handcuffed by the iPad?

Publishers Weekly had an interesting article, written by Cory Doctorow, yesterday about the iPad. It’s a bit long, so click over to read the full thing.

Basically, Doctorow talks about Apple’s “absolute dominion” over the iPad. Of course, a first reaction would be, duh, Apple makes the iPad, but Doctorow’s complaint is that Apple prevents competition. Again, your reaction might be, duh, Apple wants you to buy their eReader, not someone else’s. Before anymore “duhs,” let’s look at what Doctorow says is Apple’s attempt to shackle its readers to the iPad.

The iPad uses a DRM system called “code-signing” to limit which apps it can run. If the code that you load on your device isn't “signed,” that is, approved by Apple, the iPad will not run it. … DRM enjoys an extraordinary legal privilege previously unseen in copyright law: the simple act of breaking DRM is illegal, even if you're not violating anyone's copyright. In other words, if you jailbreak your iPad for the purpose of running a perfectly legal app from someone other than Apple, you're still breaking the law. … That means that no one can truly compete with Apple to offer better iStores, or apps, with better terms that are more publisher- and reader-friendly.

Isn’t this pretty much what the Kindle does?

Doctorow says he’s taking a stand against Apple’s practices by not selling his “e-books in any store that locks my users into a vendor's platform.” He’s including the iPad and the Kindle in his stand against “lockdown shenanigans.”

I’ve said here before that I wish there was one platform for e-books that would work on any eReader. That would make it easier for readers to purchase e-books and, I would think, easier for publishers to make the books available to all eReaders. Seems to me, it would be more effective to start a movement to demand this, rather than demonizing any one reading appliance.

Creating Conflict

Every story needs conflict, not just mysteries or thrillers. Romances need conflict, so do Sci-Fi novels, even Humor pieces and Mainstream. Not all of it, in any genre, is physical. Conflict can be psychological, mental, the tug and pull of opposing ideologies, man versus nature, man versus woman, man versus animal, man ... boy, man is contrary, isn't he?

As you write, and especially as you re-write, you need to be aware of the conflict in your story. Rarely do authors have to lessen the conflict. Usually, the problem is revving it up.

As you work on your story, here are some things to keep in mind:

As much as possible, keep the action on stage. As readers, we don't want to be told what happened. We want to see it occur. Whether that conflict is a physical fight, an argument, a debate, sexual tension, or whatever, let us live it along with the characters. Maybe it's hard for you to write about the subject or maybe it's difficult to get the dialogue right ... all the more reason for you to put it on stage.

As the story progresses, the problems facing the characters, especially the protagonist, should get tougher and tougher to solve. The tension should wind tighter. The conflict should become more important. Obviously, some problems will be resolved along the way, but don't be too quick to get your protagonist out of trouble. Just when he or she gets out of one situation and takes a deep breath, put them in another.

To do this, look at each scene and ask yourself, what could go wrong here? What is the worst thing that could happen? What would this character NOT want to happen? Then do it. Put your character in an even worse situation. Give him a conflict that he didn't expect. And when he maneuvers his way out of it, do it again, each time upping the stakes.

Go through your novel. Make sure every scene has conflict. One way to manage this is to look at each character as an individual, with his or her own story. No matter what the situation, no two people want the same thing. Whether the conflict is overt or hidden, it's there. Each character has an agenda, a backstory that affects the way they talk and think and react.

Your novel will also contain more conflict than just what is going on between the protagonist and antagonist. Layer the conflict. Doing that will make your secondary characters more interesting. It will enrich your story, give it depth.

Make your story more of a "big" book than just a one-dimensional plot. Build up, spread out, intensify the conflict. Just because your book is Mainstream, don't think it doesn't need or have conflict. Life would be pretty dull without conflict. And life is what you're writing about.

Do you try to keep your characters on a roller coaster ride? Do you take your readers along on the ride?

Are Your Words Yours?

For those of you who tweet, are your tweets covered by copyright? You’d probably say, yes. But if that’s true, then are you violating copyright when you retweet the words of others?

You may have heard of the book, Twitter Wit. The editor worked with Tweet authors, asking them to submit their best Tweets for the book. Those tweeters who were included went out of their way to help promote the book and it was a hit.

Now there’s a new book, Tweet Nothings. It’s not getting those favorable reviews. It, in fact, is being torn apart. Why? Because no one consulted the authors of the tweets included. Some of those who were included in the book are calling foul and lambasting the book on Amazon reviews. The editor has issued an apology letter (after the book was published, though). Instead of all the tweeters getting out there and promoting the book the way they did with Twitter Wit, the tweeters in this book are creating havoc.

The publisher, Peter Pauper Press, has ceased selling the book and promised not to resume sales until everyone quoted in the book is satisfied.

That may take a while since some are thoroughly outraged.

Are your words yours no matter where they appear? How about on Twitter, where you agree that Twitter can make such Content available to others? You can find more on this at TechDirt, Kung Fu Grippe, and Amazon.

What do you think?

Pursuit of Honor

Pursuit of Honor came out in 2009. The author, Vince Flynn, keeps up with the times. In the beginning of his Mitch Rapp series, it seemed that most of the action took place in faraway lands. Mitch took the game to the homelands of the terrorists. In his more recent books, Pursuit of Honor included, the terrorists are on American soil and trying to create havoc.

Pursuit of Honor starts with a bombing in D.C. where 185 people are killed, including high ranking people in the government and CIA employees. Mitch and a colleague step into harm’s way to find the perpetrators. For their efforts, they’re villainized by the politicians. They’re not likely to find themselves in front of a Congressional hearing, though. The CIA has already sent them to find the perpetrators and take them out.

There are a couple of things going on in this book. Rapp has to decide whether to “out” a fellow agent and suffer the consequences if he does. He also has to find the terrorists before they attack again. The question is, what country have they run to? Or are they still in the U.S., hiding and waiting to attack again?

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know I like Vince Flynn and the Mitch Rapp series. Pursuit of Honor is a fast read with lots of action to keep you turning the pages. You may not agree with some of the things Rapp is compelled to do, but you’ll probably feel a bit safer at night, just believing that there might be people like Rapp who are dedicated to the security of the U.S. and its people.
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FTC Disclaimer: Just about with all the Vince Flynn books, my husband bought this one and passed it on to me. He bought it in hardback because he didn’t want to wait for paperback. More than likely, he bought it at an airport bookstore when he realized he needed something to read on the trip. Which is why he needs an eReader of some sort. He could download books and have them lined up to read and not have to scour the airport stores which only sell the big name authors. Nothing wrong with big name authors; I’d like to be one. But there are a lot of authors he doesn’t try unless I pass their books on to him. All the airports have the same books. It’s like vanilla ice cream in every story in every city. I like vanilla, but every once in a while I’d like something new and adventurous like wild raspberry toffee. Seems to me the FTC could do something about that. Selling books is a Trade, as in FTradeC.

Self-Publishers Online Conference

Last year was the premiere of the Self-Publishers Online Conference (SPOC). I didn’t attend it, but it sounds like a conference that if you self-publish or are thinking about self-publishing, you might want to check it out.

The dates for this year are May 12 - 14.

 According to the press release:

There is no charge for a Basic Attendance pass. Attendees can wander the virtual exhibit hall, take part in online conversations, attend informative teleseminars, participate in Q&A roundtable discussions, and discover helpful information about writing and publishing quality books.

The difference between the free admittance and paid is this:

A free Basic attendance pass gives participants live call-in access to the teleseminars and a log in for the exhibit hall and seminar handouts. Paid Standard and Premium passes offer access to the seminar recordings and a wide range of bonus materials.

There is a list of 15 experts who will be offering info and advice, from John Kremer to M.J. Rose to Kate Bandos and Dan Poynter.

You can find out more at the Self Publishers Online Conference website.

I’m wondering if anyone knows about this conference, attended it last year, or plans to sign up for this year’s event.

Succeeding as an Author

I read an article in the Huffington Post by Penny C. Sansevieri called “Why (Some) Authors Fail.” In it, she lists 8 reasons why, she feels, some authors fail. I saw those same 8 reasons and felt authors could turn them around and use those reasons to learn how to succeed.

You can link over to read the full article, but here is her list of 8 things that can cause you to fail, with my own very short synopsis of what she says about each.

1. Not learning enough about the industry
    Get to know the market you’re in

2. Not Accepting Feedback
    Don’t be so wrapped up in your ego that you aren't willing to listen and learn.

3. Not Surrounding Yourself with Enough Professionals
    You need professionals you trust by your side giving you advice, wisdom, and direction.

4. Not Doing Their Research
    Don’t wait to learn the ropes after your book is out - it’s too late then

5. Measuring Their Success in Book Sales
    Book sales are not the only measure of success

6. Not Understanding How New York Publishing Works
    Know what's selling, what's not -- who's buying, who's closing their doors.

7. Playing the Blame Game
    Investigate what happened and take a critical look at the results.

8. Believing in the Unbelievable
    To be successful you need to be relentless

Penny C. Sansevieri is the CEO and founder of Author Marketing Experts, Inc.

iPad: Opening New Markets?

Will the iPad open new markets that the Nook, Kindle, and other eReaders have not been able to do? BusinessWeek thinks the iPad will change Japan’s book pricing.

Japanese publishers do not allow price discounting. They set the price and it sticks. E-books are popular in Japan, “estimated by Nomura Holdings Inc. to be four times those of the U.S.” If they can read English, someone in Japan could have a Kindle and buy books in English, but not Japanese.

Sony Corp. and Panasonic Corp., Japan’s two biggest consumer electronics makers, have scrapped their e-reader business in the country and Amazon.com Inc. has yet to offer its Kindle in Japanese.

According to the article, Japan is nervous about the iPad. It offers more than just the ability to read e-books. It has color and tons of apps that do more than offer books.

Like in the U.S., sales are slipping in books and magazines. Now iPad comes along with the capability of combining text, video and audio, and it’s intuitive with a touchpad. The Japanese are used to reading on their cell phones - they started the books by texting phenomenon. For the most part, they’re not looking for eReaders that just allow you to read. The iPad is the first to offer more.

Some publishers in Japan are concerned about how the iPad might affect pricing negotiations. This seems to be the first e-Reader which might get a stronghold in Japan, open the market, and have a definite impact on the publishing industry there.

Mermaid Tales: Pigs and Piglets

Been a while since I told y’all a Mermaid Tale. Today, I thought I’d tell you about Ralph the Swimming Pig.

Google Aquarena Springs and odds are a picture of or story about Ralph the Swimming Pig will pop up. He’s even been on TV. Now, when I say “he,” I don’t mean he as in one pig. There were lots of Ralphs over the years. There were always two on the grounds at all times. If you were a visitor and you visited Ralph in his home, you saw Ralph. There was another Ralph hidden away in another home behind the one on display. We called one Ralph and the other one…Ralph. Why two Ralphs? Because the pigs were not allowed to swim two shows in a row. It was in their star contract. Mermaids and Glurpos (more about Glurpos in a future post) had no such clause.

Did Ralph do synchronized ballet? No. Did he eat an underwater picnic? No. Did he blow air rings? Nah. Did he actually swim? Yes.

Each year, we’d get a new batch of possible Ralphs. Little baby Ralphs that we kept in the girls’ dressing room in a big box with towels for them to lay on.

In case you’re wondering, baby pigs are soooo cute. They really are. Little white piglets with pink snouts. They’re so adorable, you just want to pick them up and hug them. ‘Course when you do, you learn they are also hard as rocks. They are not soft and cuddly. But they are cute. To this day, I still love baby pigs.

Why did we get them as piglets? Because they have to be trained to swim. Training takes a while since they’re not exactly natural water lovers. You start when they’re little and get them into the water, holding them with one hand to help them float and learn to use their legs and feet (paws, hoofs, whatever) to swim. You entice them with a baby bottle of liquid piglet food. You keep working with them until you no longer have to hold them up. You just show them the bottle and they’ll swim wherever you lead them. And they get bigger. And bigger.

When they’re quite big, you teach them to dive. Okay, dive is a wishy-washy term. Ralph didn’t dive like the human divers who climbed to the top of the volcano and dove as the submarine was sinking. Ralph would be led through the volcano out to the water-level platform by, usually, a Glurpo. One of the mermaids would be in the water with a bottle. She’d hold up the bottle and Ralph would leap into the show tank and follow her. She’d make a couple of turns around the tank then lead Ralph out of view of the submarine to the shallow area where Ralph would walk out on the shore, be put back into his comfy home to get big pig food, oink at kids coming by to look at him, and wait until it was his turn to be in a show and get the yummy bottle food. All in all, Ralph had a pretty cushy life.

Eventually, he’d get too big or old and be retired and a new Ralph would take his place. When Ralph retired, he moved to a beautiful farm with lots of mud, green grass, water so he could relive his glory days, and tons of corn on the cob desserts.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Hey! It’s what we were told.

(Before you ask, that’s not me in the picture with Ralph.)

Am I the only one who thinks piglets are cute?

Seeing Into the Future

Back in December, I think it was, I followed a series on year-by-year predictions of the future of publishing. Then, over the holidays, I totally lost track of it. Now, I’ve come across another site making predictions. Luckily this guy, Michael A. Stackpole, does it all in one post and his predictions are primarily for the year 2011.

Stackpole starts by mentioning the predictions of another book industry consultant, Michael Shatzkin, who sees a serious disruption in book distribution as early as November, 2012:

 …once ebook sales hit 20-25% of book sales, print run numbers will fall to a point where the current consignment system for sales will break down….Ebook sales will create smaller print runs, driving up the unit cost, forcing higher prices which, in turn, will kill sales. Game over.

Stackpole agrees with the analysis, but not the date.

I think it will be sooner: June 2012, and the most serious blow will be struck in December, 2011, when a second wave of tablets becomes the hottest holiday gift item….

The first and most critical point [Shatzkin] missed was Apple's announcement on 8 April about the iPhone OS 4.0. With this new revision, later generation iPhones and iPod Touches will all get a version of iBooks, Apple's book-reading software. This will add over fifty million ebook readers to the market, with readers being able to order books from anywhere at any time. This will be a serious blow to brick-and-mortar stores, eroding their sales more quickly than imagined.

Stackpole also foresees authors themselves contributing to the change because it is so easy for authors to create and market ebooks, plus they can make more on those books than the ones the publishers are offering. Like me, he doesn’t see this as an end to print books, but he does see a giant shift, unless publishers quickly change their business model.

As for me, I see this shift already occurring. I see it here in the comments on Straight From Hel. I see it in friends and clients who are bypassing traditional publishing and publishing ebooks themselves or going through niche publishers to do it for them. I see it in the popularity of ereaders and the hoopla over the iPad, students reading textbooks on ereaders, colleges giving students ereaders to use, parents buying ereaders for their young children, people downloading books to their cell phones.

Do you see such a change? Are you part of the change?

Book Publicity

This past Friday, I blogged about a NY Times piece on illegal downloading of ebooks, a problem the book industry is having similar to what the music industry went through. I received an email from Simon Owens who writes the blog, Bloggasm. He invited me over to read a post he did where he interviewed several book publicists about whether ereaders like the iPad and Kindle will change book publicity.

The most interesting thing, to me, in his post came in the last paragraph:

These days, [book publicist Stacey] Miller identifies niche communities related to book topics and encourages authors to enter the comments section and become part of the discussion, linking back to their own book pages in the signature. In other words, book publicity is moving beyond the traditional reviewers and directly to the readers themselves.

What Miller is saying is that the physical city-to-city book tour is out except for the big-name authors. The most common way to publicize your book is the blog tour. BUT, the newest way to promote your book is to do your research and find the most active blogs where readers are talking about your genre of book, get involved in those blogs by leaving comments and joining the discussion, and promoting your own book by leaving a link to the page or pages on your website where you list your books. This is the method this book publicist tells her clients to self-promote.

If you decide to do this, don’t expect a fellow commenter to click on your name which takes them to your profile where they have to scroll through your likes and dislikes to find your blog link which they’ll have to click and go there then search on the blog for your website where they’ll have to then find your book page or the page for your latest book and click to it. Miller says to include the link to your book page in your comment.

I’m not promoting my books, but I do leave a link to this blog after my name when I comment. If you don’t know how to do that, email me (mermaidhelATgmailDOTcom) and I'll show you how.

7th Heaven

7th Heaven is another in James Patterson’s “Women’s Murder Club” series. (There was a short-lived TV show based on the series.) I’m happy to report that Patterson is finally crediting his co-author on this series, albeit in teeny lettering. In this case, his co-author was Maxine Paetro.

I haven’t read the full series, but this is the seventh. Each title has a number. There was 1st to Die, then 2nd Chance, and so on. (The alphabet was already taken.) 7th Heaven has been out a while. I read the paperback. When it first came out, it was a best-seller. No surprise. Patterson has a humongous following. And it’s good. It’s a fast read with twists with women characters in the lead. They’re friends who help and support each other, and that’s a nice turn in a mystery suspense.

I didn’t see any new ground being broken in this book. It follows a tried and true formula, but it’s one you can follow along and enjoy. From book to book, you get to know the characters and feel comfortable with their individual quirks and personalities, although I admit the reporter gets on my nerves a bit.

Since I did watch some of the TV series, I still have an image of the protagonist from that in my head, so it bugs me that she’s a blonde in the book. I still see her as a brunette.

All in all, 7th Heaven is a fun read. If you’re looking for characters you can become comfortable with and who play off each other and a storyline that will carry you through the pages, then I recommend 7th Heaven.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FTC Disclaimer: This was passed on to me by my husband and he did not ask me to give it a positive review. My husband likes Patterson, not that I don’t, mind you. He’s just not an automatic pick-up for me. I don’t mean “pick-up” as in a pick-up in a bar, of course. I don’t go to bars. Okay, I do, but only to pick-up said husband and a drink, which is a problem for me since I never know what to order. I usually fumble around trying to come up with a drink that sounds fruity or chocolaty and end up ordering a rum and Diet Coke. There should be a strawberry-chocolate drink called 7th Heaven. I’d recommend that, for sure. Maybe I’ll invent that. What kind of alcohol would go well with strawberries and chocolate?

Illegal and Unethical?

Remember years ago when music lovers created huge websites where they traded music files. People downloaded thousands and thousands of songs for free and the music industry suffered a blow it’s not even today completely recovered from.

The same thing is happening to the book industry today. There are sites, a lot of them based overseas, where e-books are posted by folks who offer them for free to others to download. Some are e-books they bought then uploaded; some are print books they’ve scanned.

The Ethicist for the NY Times, Randy Cohen, addressed the issue as to whether this is illegal when a reader wrote in to say s/he bought Stephen King’s new book in hardcover form since the publisher held the e-book so that there would be higher hardcover sales. Then when the e-book came out s/he downloaded it from a pirate site. S/he wanted to know if that was okay since s/he had paid for the hardcover.

Cohen’s answer?

An illegal download is — to use an ugly word — illegal. But in this case, it is not unethical. Author and publisher are entitled to be paid for their work, and by purchasing the hardcover, you did so. Your subsequent downloading is akin to buying a CD, then copying it to your iPod.

You might not be surprised to hear that publishing exec’s don’t necessarily agree with Cohen. According to The Consumerist, here’s what one exec said:

"Anyone who downloads a pirated e-book has, in effect, stolen the intellectual property of an author and publisher. To condone this is to condone theft."

The Consumerist also noted that a reader commented over on TechDirt, where this was under discussion, and said:

 …you have to pay to watch a movie at the theater or attend a concert, and then again to own that movie/concert on DVD or CD, so you should pay for both print and digital versions.

Others disagreed.

What about you? If you bought the book in paperback or hardcover, is it then okay to pirate an e-copy?

Diane Fanning

 Diane Fanning writes true crime books and mystery. And she’s really good at both. You might have caught her on TV programs like 48 Hours, 20/20, and Forensic Files, the blog, Women in Crime Ink, her personal blog, or at book signings or speaking engagements. She not only writes nonfiction and two mystery series, she’s a strong promoter, which authors have to be if they want to continue writing and selling. (We’ve talked a lot about that here on SFH.)

You might be thinking, well, it’d be fun to switch around. Write a true crime this year. A mystery next year, then a different mystery the next. That’s not Diane. She puts out multiple books each year - and when a true crime is gone to print, she’s not through because in a year or so she’ll most likely have to do an update on the book.

Today, she’s going to talk about her split personality. How she can switch from doing hours and days of hard-core research on horrific crime to making fiction characters come alive in readers’ minds.

Please welcome Diane Fanning.

SPLIT PERSONALITY

Maybe it’s because I was born on a cusp. Or maybe because my moon is in Gemini. Or maybe, simply, because I’m just not right. But I find myself very comfortable leading a double life.

I feel at home assuming two writer identities—one in non-fiction as a true crime writer, another in fiction as an author of mysteries. I seldom get confused about which hat I am wearing except for the times, like many writers, I forget that my fictional characters are not real people.

 My dual authorship, however, seem to befuddle a lot of folks. It is most evident at the release of a new fiction book. Now that MISTAKEN IDENTITY, the third in the Lucinda Pierce mystery series, is available on-line and in brick-and-mortar stores, I find myself explaining my dual writing roles quite often.

A lot of people make the assumption that because I have started writing fiction, I will stop writing true crime. In fact, I regularly get email from my True Crime fans pleading with me to continue writing those books. At this point in time, I have no intentions of abandoning that genre. Working in two worlds, teaches me something new nearly every day and makes me feel complete and fulfilled.

The first lesson I learned was that writers need to be voracious readers of every genre. I learn something about the craft from every book I read, no matter the genre or area of focus. A writer can pick up a useful tool from a nonfiction book about butterfly migration that can be used to add uniqueness and complexity to a fiction endeavor. Although constrained by reality, you can learn much about plotting and character development in a novel that can be applied to true accounts to keep the reader turning pages. Most important of all of these lessons, in my opinion, is the value of suspense.

Anything and everything that you read needs a strong element of suspense—something that keeps your reader turning the page because you’ve raised questions in your readers’ minds and made an unspoken promise to provide answers. Take a simple children’s book like ARE YOU MY MOTHER? by P.D. Eastman. Despite the cute drawings and continuous repetition, the book contains a very existential question about identity. And Eastman promises an answer by the time the book ends.

Another benefit of having a split personality as an author is that it fulfills so many of my loves and needs in life. Writing non-fiction gives me the pleasure of digging with abandon into infinite piles of documents, musty newspapers and vignettes of history—I’ve loved research since my first high school term paper. Certainly there are some opportunities for research in writing contemporary fiction but you must always be on guard to not let it consume your writing time. With a True Crime book, the research is the life blood of your work.

Additionally, in writing non-fiction, I have to speak to a lot of different people in diverse walks of life for assistance in the research aspect, for interviews, and for observation in various settings—there is simply no end to the one-on-one contact. And, in general, I really like people and enjoy the social interaction in the work sphere.

Finally, with True Crime, I know that I can make a concrete and positive difference in people’s lives. There is nothing more fulfilling than a mother telling me that one of my books saved her daughter’s life or getting an email from a domestic violence center who finds one of my true accounts important and an essential read or knowing that one of my books helped obtain a new trial for a wrongfully convicted woman. It doesn’t get much better than this.

Fiction writing, however, satisfies different needs. At times, I crave solitude and there is nothing more solitary that working week after week crafting and polishing a novel. It gives me a break from reading autopsy reports, looking at crime scene photos, crying with victims’ family members. It’s an escape to a welcoming world where I as a person cease to exist.

Writing fiction also provides an outlet for limitless expressions of creativity. In my non-fiction world, I am tied to facts, constrained by circumstances, bound tight by the truth. With fiction, the facts are of my choosing, the circumstances of my making and the truth only what I say it is and nothing more. If I don’t like the bad news in chapter four, I simply re-write it. If I don’t like my main character’s new best friend, I cut her from the manuscript. If someone is really getting on my nerves, I bump them off using any method I want without causing any grief to real people.

With a foot in fiction and another firmly planted in non-fiction, it might sound as if I am straddling a great divide. But to me, it feels like one place—a world of my own. I cannot imagine living anywhere else.

Thank you, Diane!

Diane’s latest book, Mistaken Identity, is now available online and in your favorite book store. Here’s the cover blurb:

In a cozy suburban home a woman’s body has been carefully laid out on a bed. She looks perfect, except for a single gunshot wound to the head. In the bathroom a bloody male corpse, missing both its head and its hands, is in the tub. When the victims’ thirteen-year-old son reacts to the deaths in a strange way, claiming his father is immortal and has sold his soul to the devil, Homicide Investigator Lucinda Pierce suspects that this family has something to hide.


Lucinda must uncover the secret that holds the key to the investigation, but news from her home town brings back painful memories and she must first overcome her emotional wounds, if she is to solve the case.

The comment section is open for you to ask questions or tells us about your own split personality.

Split Personality

Tomorrow, author Diane Fanning will be here. Diane is not only a friend and a best-selling author who’s published in multiple genres, she’s had a fascinating career as a writer. If she’s ever in your town talking about writing or her true crime books, go listen. I heard her speak at the University of Texas on serial killers and she has stories that will make you triple check the locks on your doors.

She writes -- in addition to true crime -- mystery. She has two mystery series, one starring police detective Lucinda Pierce and one with officer Molly Mullet. Tomorrow, she’s going to talk about what it takes to write both nonfiction true crimes and fiction mysteries.

Authors often struggle to get one book out each year. Diane puts out multiple books each year. She has at least two scheduled this year. The latest is a Lucinda Pierce mystery called Mistaken Identity. With that many books due, Diane has to work on both nonfiction and fiction at the same time. To do that, she has to have, in a way, a split personality. One which lives in a world or research, details and reality. One which thrives on imagination.

She’ll tell us how she handles both. Be thinking about what questions you might want to ask her.

While you're thinking, here's the trailer for Mistaken Identity. 

Silver Linings

There are silver linings in our lives. They’re not often life-changing, but they can be. Seems to me, they’re most often small things. Things that make you smile on days when smiles seem to have lost the directions to your mouth.

I’ve had a few lately. You probably have, too, if you’ll pause to think back. Maybe you pulled the clothes out of the dryer only to discover a nice clean, dry twenty dollar bill. Maybe an agent rejected your query, but included a few notes on what you could do to improve your approach.

Last week, I reviewed Susan McBride’s book The Cougar Club. Afterward, she emailed to offer a free signed copy of The Cougar Club to a commenter. It made me happy that she did that. I hadn’t expected it. It was a silver lining. Today, I’m announcing the winner. There were 48 entries and the name I drew was:

Marisa Birns

I’ve received some Awards lately from other bloggers. Thank you so much. All of you. They are unexpected silver linings. The latest one came from Talli Roland and is indeed a silver lining since it’s called the Silver Lining Award (and got me thinking about such small gifts that come when you’re not expecting them). I’m supposed to pass the award on to five other people. Here are the ones I nominate for the Silver Lining Award:
1. Laurita 
2. Jenn McKay 
3. Shannon O’Donnell 
4. Kathy 
5. Joanne 

Have you ever been a little down or just going through your normal day and suddenly discovered a sliver lining behind the ordinary clouds in your life? Ever got one of those positive rejections? Heard from a long-ago friend? Visited a blog that made you smile for the first time of the day?

Writing’s Not Enough

Yesterday, I read a post where the author said she did not tweet or promote because she’s too scared. She hates doing it and she has nothing to say ‘cause she never leaves the house. She writes. That’s it.

My first thought was man, that’s sad. Hardly anyone is likely to read her words. She may build up an audience through blogging, but in today’s world that’s not enough. In today’s world you have to put yourself out there.

Recently, writer Matt Baume did a wrap up of a talk by literary agent Ted Weinstein, who definitely agrees that you have to do more than write the great book.

Here are some nuggets from Baume’s post on the talk:

The facts are simple: “As a percentage of the population,” he summed up, “a much smaller percentage is going to be able to make a living.”

“The people who are going to succeed,” he says, “are the people who treat their careers as a profession and are businesslike and aggressive.” His clients aren’t just writers; they’re successful brands.

The point is that being a writer means more than just writing.

“How much time should a writer be devoting to writing versus marketing themselves?” I asked Ted. “It’s always been 50/50,” he answered.

“Stop thinking of yourself as an artist,” he emphasized as our fast-paced conversation wound down, small birds encircling my head. “You’re a businessperson. And the business is you.”

You can link over to read Baume’s full post called “Lit Agent Ted Weinstein: Successful Authors do More Than Just Write."

What about you? What are you doing to set up or treat your writing as a business? How much time do you spend promoting your books or yourself?

Happy Easter

I hope everyone is busy today with family, friends, good food, laughing, hiding eggs, and nibbling chocolate. Whatever faith or non-faith you are, I wish you peace and joy and love.

We’re keeping it simple here in the Ginger house. We’re having:
Breakfast:
Good Morning Casserole

Dinner:
Ham
Baked Potatoes
Breakaway Bread (my son’s favorite) 
Deviled Eggs (my daughter’s favorite)
Vanilla Mousse Cheesecake (never tried before recipe)

Remember, this is the last day to leave a comment and be entered in the giveaway for a copy of Susan McBride’s The Cougar Club. You can also leave a flash story with the words “cougar” and “bride” or “McBride” to earn an extra entry in the drawing.

Hope your Sunday is a good one.

Here’s a question for you:
Have you ever written a holiday scene in a book or short story? What was its purpose? Happy Easter everyone!

Not Necessarily Bad News

Good news about ebooks does not necessarily mean bad news for print books. They can both survive. Having said that, Daily Finance recently pointed out that the January sales statistics show that “e-book sales climbed to $31.8 million -- a 261% increase from the previous month, and less than half the total sales recorded for adult hardcovers, which dropped more than 8% over December.”

 It won’t last forever, but while it does, some big name authors are trying to make the most of it. Crime and horror novelist, J.A. Konrath posts on his blog about his work getting his books and short stories out to readers at very low prices.

As of March 4, he'd sold 29,224 e-books in a year. At the 35% royalty rate Amazon (AMZN) offered authors who published their works expressly for Kindle, that meant Konrath earned some $120 a day, every day, by doing almost nothing. "If this trend continues as is," he wrote on A Newbie's Guide, "I'll earn $43,800 this year on previously published short stories and novels that NY print publishing rejected."

He, however, does not see ebooks waning. He, in fact, sees them exploding.

He has no doubt that "by the end of the year, I'll be making 5k per month on Kindle. And that's probably a low estimate."

He’s not giving up traditional publishing, though. And he’s not the only one turning to e-publishing. Some are even dropping their print publishers. John Edgar Wideman dropped Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and moved to Lulu.com.

The article has success stories, but I think it’s important to keep in mind that these authors already had readers and, in the case of Konrath, do a ton of promotion.

Whether you read ebooks or not, whether you like ebooks or not, if you write, you need to keep up with ebook news. It’s not only interesting, it’s important. And even if you only publish in print, it will affect you.

A Cougar Tale

Last Saturday, I reviewed the book, The Cougar Club, by Susan McBride. Y’all may remember that I selfishly said I would keep the book because Susan autographed it. Well…no, I haven’t changed my mind. I’m still keeping it.

But Susan McBride is not selfish. She emailed me to offer a copy to one of you. So, here’s the deal. I’m running a contest over the weekend and the winner of a copy of The Cougar Club will be announced Monday. For each day you stop by and leave a comment, you’ll get one entry into the drawing.

On all three days, any comment will do. However for any of the three days, if you can tell a short Cougar Tale, you get a bonus entry. Your tale must include the word “cougar” and either “bride” or “McBride.” I’m not entering (I’m not THAT selfish), but here is a sample I wrote:

The cougar reclined in the crook of his ancient tree and used his teeth to dig small pearls and white beads from under his claws. He stared off into the distance, in the direction of the nearest village. Ordinarily, he didn’t like change, but the village had added its first restaurant. The cougar decided he liked that. People came and gaped at the golden arches, gathered ‘round the small tables and celebrated reunions, weddings, and harvests. They liked the good food. So did he. He pulled on a piece of lace stuck between his molars. The McBride had been delicious. Tomorrow would be the grand opening celebration with village leaders grinning and backslapping. The cougar licked his lips and looked forward to a McMayor.

The contest is now open. Leave your comment. If you’re the winner, I’ll email you and ask for your address, which I will send to Susan and she, in turn, will send you a copy of The Cougar Club. Good luck!

A New Publishing Venture

Our guest blogger for today is Karen van der Zee, the globetrotting author of 34 romance novels published by Harlequin Books, many of them set in exotic locations. As Miss Footloose she writes about her (mis)adventures living in foreign countries on her blog LIFE IN THE EXPAT LANE.

I’m excited to have her here today because she’s part of a new venture in publishing and she’s offered to tell us about it. So, I’m going to turn over Straight From Hel to Karen, aka Miss Footloose, so she can talk about A Writer’s Work.

Wonderful to have you here, Karen!

A NEW PUBLISHING VENTURE: A Writer’s Work

 It’s a jungle out there in the book publishing world and it’s becoming ever more difficult to navigate for writers. Okay, I can see you all rolling your eyes. Yes, we all know this. We know about e-books, about e-readers, about self-publishing, about Print on Demand and all the many off-shoots, tangles and parasites. But I had to start somewhere to tell you about a new venture in publishing that is of benefit to both writers and readers: www.AWritersWork.com, an authors-owned site that offers books in e-book format at relative low prices.

AWW was recently launched by a group of multi-published authors, yours truly included, who were aware of the many changes in the publishing business and wanted to hack out a trail through the jungle to have a more direct and flexible way to deliver their work to their readers. The new technology made this possible, if not an easy safari. Getting the site off the ground was quite an adventure and the leader of our launching tribe, Patricia McLinn deserves laud and praise for all her efforts.

And how does this work, you ask? Well, here are the basics:
The AWW site itself is designed to be self-sustaining, not to make profit like commercial e-publishers. After expenses for the website and costs associated with selling, income from sales goes to the author. This is good for the author, obviously. It’s good for the reader because we can now keep prices lower than the ones on the sites of commercial e-book publishers. To keep the quality of the books high, participation in the site is by invitation only, and only commercially published authors are considered for participation. All authors retain the rights to their work. All works are protected by copyright laws.

What you’ll find on http://www.AWritersWork.com are books in various genres and categories – romance, suspense, women’s fiction, short-story anthologies, non-fiction and more. You’ll find newly released back-lists, as well as original fiction and non-fiction.

AWW is a work in progress. More authors have expressed their interest and the site will grow and more books will be offered as time goes on. For more information visit www.AWritersWork.com.

Thank you so much, Karen.

 Not only is Karen one of the founders of A Writers Work, she has two of her own books on the site: The Price of A Man, a lighthearted romance novel, and You’re Moving WHERE?! , non-fiction tales of the author’s (mis)adventures living abroad. Both are AWW original publications.

I know some authors have gone with a service to get their e-books out and some have done the process by themselves. Creating e-books is very daunting to me. I would need someone to hold my hand and walk me through it.

What about you? Leave a comment, especially if you’ve gone through publishing your own e-books. And feel free to ask Karen a question about A Writers Work.