My Sunday

What did you do yesterday? I spent the day making myself crazy (which isn’t a terribly far walk).

I maintain three websites. My own. One for a friend. And one for the company that my husband and I own. It was that company one that was and still is driving me crazy.

After many hard drive crashes and many years, it has become so convoluted it’s unmanageable. I don’t know why but whole folders replicate themselves. Instead of having two templates, I have three copies of those two templates in various hidey holes on the site.

During the breakdown of the site, which you can see in this picture, I discovered spam has been deposited in two folders. Hundreds of spam from places like Abercrombie Fitch and Naked Women for You.

What you see in that picture took me hours. I call it the tree layout of the site.

Now I think my only choice is to recreate the entire site, somehow delete everything that’s online and put up the new version. Then figure out how to stop spam. It’ll take me days if not weeks to do that. In the meantime, the site has glitches that I can’t correct. Grrr.

I’m seriously going to look into taking Dreamweaver classes. I taught myself Dreamweaver. Clearly, I had a crappy teacher.

Websites

I’m going to be posting on Stephen Tremp’s blog, Breakthrough Blogs, late tonight through Thursday. I’m talking about websites and I hope you’ll stop by to talk about your website, how you set it up (or had it set up) and what works for you.

I’m not an expert on websites, but have created and maintained mine for years. At one point, I even slashed it from many pages to around 10 or 15. I also created a website for a friend, and I created and maintain the website for a company I’m co-partner in.

Each page on my site has purpose, and I’ll be talking a bit about that idea. I think authors need to have a website, either a standalone like I have, or one connected to your blog. I like the standalone idea so that you can have as many pages as you want or need.

Having a website (and a blog and a Facebook, etc.) is a way of getting your name out to the public. It’s also a way of creating your platform.

So zip over to Stephen Tremp’s blog late today, tomorrow or Thursday and share your thoughts about websites and the kind of pages you have on your own website.

Never Pee in the Water, Agents Might be Surfing

All of us, bloggers, tweeters, facebook frienders, goodreads reviewers, linkedin connectors, tend to think we’re talking only to a small group of friends or interested bypassers. We forget that our tweets and comments are out there for the world to see and read, forever, even if you delete your website or blog. That can be a bad thing.

It can also be a good thing. GalleyCat recently reported on a good example.

In two weeks and 314 tweets, the Fake AP Stylebook Twitter feed has earned more than 43,000 followers. Now, the creators have signed with an unnamed agent.

The website pays homage, in a funny way, to “The AP Stylebook.” The two founders, Mark Hale and Ken Lowery queried a book proposal to three agents and ended up choosing Kate McKean of the Howard Morhaim Literary Agency. McKean is no stranger to the Internet.

McKean is the agent for several bloggers with print aspirations, including the authors of TheLongThread.com, UnecessaryQuotes.com, and the I Can Has Cheezburger crew.

So remember this little tale and Never Pee in the Water, Agents Might be Surfing.

A Shift in Promoting

I can almost guarantee that every writer who regularly stops by, reads and comments here on Straight From Hel knows something publishers either don’t or aren’t supporting. Care to guess?

The future of book promotion is online and by the author.

You already knew that, didn’t you? That’s because you’re in the trenches, working to get your name and book in front of the public’s eyes. You’re building a website, a blog, a Facebook presence, and a LinkedIn account with umpteen-hundred connections. You’re tweeting and befriending and guest posting as yourself and as your characters.

Jesse Kornbluth shouts out to publishers, in hopes of waking them up to what authors are already doing and to what they, the publishers, need to be doing, in a Publishers Weekly article called “Authors’ -- and Publishers’ -- Shifting Responsibilities.”

Here are some snippets of what he has to say -- and as I said at the top of this post, some of it, you already know and practice:

Book publishing has been trying to commit suicide for all the decades I've been writing, and now it's finally getting some traction on that project.

Authors are beginning to grasp that the job description of “writer” has changed. Writers may be artists. They are also brands.

More typically, publishing contracts are for one or two books; in that truncated relationship, a publisher can only do so much for its writers. The heavy lifting of a career will fall to writers and their agents, or it just won't get done.

So unless they are geniuses—and recognized as such—writers who want attention for their work need to cultivate some 21st-century media skills. They should be camera-ready, because they'll want to make YouTube videos. They should know their way around social networking sites. They should have some experience with book clubs, and they should be willing to spend as much time there as they used to spend on book tours.

My vote is for the publishers of books that stand a chance to succeed to attach $5,000 to $10,000 to the advance, money the writer can use only for digital marketing expenses and Web site enhancement.

It's equally sane to demand that writers take major responsibility for their careers.

I think up and coming writers already know most of this. The responsibility has shifted to our shoulders. It’s a burden we don’t necessarily want to carry, but times have changed.

Kornbluth had some recommendations for publishers, ones authors may or may not like:

Meanwhile, like everyone else, I have a laundry list of changes that publishers might make in the interest of their survival. Some of my thoughts are obvious and universal: a massive scaling-down of the number of books published, more aggressive editing of what does get released, and a shattering of the template that says a new book must be bound between hard covers.

While all this may not be new news to you, it does indicate a possible shift in not just the thinking of the publishing world, but the reality.

New Website is Up, Sort Of

Last Friday, we talked about writers having a website to put information on to showcase their work or sell their books. Some people have websites, some don’t. Most of those who do seemed to feel it was important so that when readers want to find out more about them or their books, they’d be able to find them easily. Quite a few of you said you hosted your webpages and your blog both on WordPress. A couple of visitors said they needed a website, but didn’t have one yet and asked where I registered my domain name and who hosted my site.

All in all, I thought we had a great discussion. And I learned from the comments that were left.

In the post, I mentioned that I was doing a re-work of my site. Partly because it was white lettering on a black background, which I’ve heard people say is hard on their eyes. Partly because I was just tired of it. And I said I thought I’d have it up by today.

It took many more hours than I had expected, but the new version is up. There are still some glitches. The book cover for my book won’t show. I need to work on the spacing on some pages. And I’m going to take down my picture - good gracious, my face is huge! But I flat ran out of time to do more, so I’ll work on it bit by bit this week. So, for now, it’s a work in progress. If you drop by to see it and want to make suggestions, I’d be happy to hear them. And if there’s something on your site that you think I should do on mine, tell me and leave your URL in your comment. I’m in the mood to try to make my site much better than it has been. And I appreciate all suggestions.

Websites

A question for all the writers: Do you have a website?

A question for all the writers who have a website: How long has it been since you updated it?

Call me goofy (actually, call me Helen or Hel), but I think all writers need their own website. How are your readers going to find you if you don’t have your domain name website up on the Internet? They google your name and, voila, your website pops up. But if you don’t have a website, then maybe your blog shows up. A blog is good for daily postings and up to the minute updates on your life and writing and whatever your niche is. But it’s not the place readers can turn to in order to find out all about you and your books. That’s why you need a website.

I began building mine long before I was published. I do occasional updates. That’s one of the things that made me think of this post - I’m in the midst of a major update. I’m totally changing the look of my site, adding pages and new information, new pictures and more.

Even I was tired of looking at my site. The new one will have all the information from the old pages, plus a page for my books. And I know some of you will cheer at this: I’m getting rid of the white lettering on a black background. I’ve spent weeks surfing sites and figuring out what I liked and what colors appealed to me.

Right now, my old one is still up. I’m hoping to have the new one up by Monday. (So, come back next week to take a look at it and tell me if you like it more than the old one and what I need to do to it, in your opinion.)

Now, here are some questions for you to consider and possibly answer in the Comments section:
Do you have your own website?
Does it need to be updated?
What information do you present on your site?
Did you do the site yourself or have someone else do it?
How much research did you put into designing your site?
What is the primary purpose of your site?

Book Promotion on the Web

J. Courtney Sullivan wrote an essay for The New York Times last month that is definitely worth reading. When I read it, I copied the url, wrote “Wow,” and saved it so I could share with you.

It’s about author websites and trailers that are becoming more and more professional. And, as you might guess, those websites are becoming hugely expensive.

AuthorBytes, a multimedia company started in 2003, has built sites for more than 200 clients, including Paul Krugman, Chris Bohjalian and Khaled Hosseini. They cost from $3,500 to $35,000 — with writers paying about 85 percent of the time. The staff of 20 even includes three employees whose entire job is updating.

Sullivan says some book videos are “laughably bad.” But calls others “impressive, full-scale productions.”

Naomi Klein’s nearly seven-minute companion film to “The Shock Doctrine,” directed by Alfonso Cuarón with a full crew and shown at the 2007 Venice and Toronto International Film Festivals, has been downloaded more than a million times. “The film was a thing unto itself; it didn’t feel like an advertisement,” Klein said in a telephone interview. “But it was part of a viral phenomenon that made the book a best seller.”

Let’s face it, even $3,500 is a lot of money for most writers. Forget a production costing $35,000 -- unless you have a big-pocketed and generous publisher or you have a caviar promotion budget.

But it will cost you nothing to read Sullivan’s piece and click the links to see the websites and videos. It might give the rest of us ideas to adapt to our popcorn budgets.

Bookmark It!: The Rejector

Who would have a blog called The Rejector? An agent, of course -- or in this case, "an assistant at a literary agency." Very interesting. Straight forward. Definitely worth bookmarking.

Here’s what The Rejector says in her description:

I am an assistant at a literary agency. I am the first line of defense for my boss. On average, I reject 95% of the letters immediately and put the other 5% in the "maybe" pile.

She’s been blogging since 2006, so you’ll have plenty of archived posts to read. She blogs about just about anything from metered mail to book tours. Keep browsing and you’ll find out she hates stationery envelopes. In another post, she tells you the difference between backlist and frontlist.

There are other interesting posts, including one where she defines financial setups for:
The Great Novelist
The Bestseller
The Mid-List Author
The One-Book Author

You’ll find posts about the Kindle and personal posts that have nothing to do with writing.

All of the posts make it worth bookmarking and checking it out.

Bookmark It!: Tru Crime Library

Do you write True Crime, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller? Then you’ll probably want to bookmark Tru Crime Library.

You can research serial killers, gangsters, notorious murders, terrorists, even the criminal mind. Want to know more about the famous Son of Sam? You can study that case, and more, here on Tru Crime Library.

You might find a real criminal to pattern your antagonist after, or get ideas of motivation for your bad guy.

Be careful though. This site isn’t for the squeamish. And you might not want to read the stories alone in the house before going to bed!

Bookmark It!: The Best Reviews

Like to do book reviews? If you write reviews for Amazon or GoodReads, for example, why only post them there?

Or maybe you’re looking for a review for your own book.

There are online sites that host book reviews. The Best Reviews is one such place. And it has reviews for just about every genre.

Biography/Memoir – 69
Children’s Books – 36
Contemporary Romance – 3762
Historical Romance – 2142
Horror – 220
Literature and Ficiton – 1525
Mystery – 4149
and thousands more in various categories (even 2 Westerns)

You can search by genre, author and reviewer. So, take a look and bookmark it!

Bookmark It!: Linda J. Hutchinson

Linda J. Hutchinson writes a broad spectrum of things from nonfiction articles to book reviews. The thing that won her a spot on my Bookmark It list is what she’s written on her website.

First off, check out her “For Writers” link. She starts off the page by giving some advice – realistic advice, not fluff. Then she lists books she recommends, conferences and even where to go to get business cards and even free promotion.

Then move on to her “Links for Writers” page. Lots of links. Not organized. Not alphabetized. But you’re bound to find some useful stuff there – freebies, organizations, classes, computer help, contracts, legal, dictionaries, and more.

She has a lot to explore, just on those two pages, so give yourself plenty of time to browse.

Bookmark It!: MedlinePlus

Got a character with a medical problem? Or maybe you need to give a character a medical problem? And you don’t have a sister who’s a doctor that you can turn to for answers. Check out MedlinePlus.

You can count on getting good information from the US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health, whether it’s a medical term you need defined or a whether it’s the possible symptoms of someone who’s eaten potpourri. Maybe you’ve got a detective who’s got bursitis in his right hip and doesn’t like doctors. What might he do to treat it?

Got a medical question – or your character does – Medline Plus is a good place to start your research.

Bookmark It!: Roberta Isleib

Roberta Isleib, author of two different mystery series, is the president of National Sisters in Crime. She also has a site worth bookmarking.

Check out her page on Getting Published. You’ll be able to read her advice on Finding an Agent, Writing a Synopsis and Avoiding Fiction Mistakes, among other things.

She also has some excellent Links for Writers.

If you’re an author putting together your own site, then look at her Press Kit to see how you could build your own.

And lastly, give yourself time to read all her books – because she’s coming to Straight From Hel next year for a visit.

Bookmark It! Bookslut

Okay, today’s post title was just that – a title, not a statement.

If you’re looking for a blog that focuses on writing, but is different with a variety of good posts, then take a gander at Bookslut.

Sometimes Bookslut does interviews. Sometimes the blogger (mostly Jessa Crispin) just gives you a link within a snappy sentences. Sometimes she relates a book to her own life or viewpoint. Sometimes she meanders. Sometimes she cuts to the heart.

But she always tells you how she sees it. And she doesn’t pull punches.

Bookmark It! for Writers

This week’s Bookmark It! site is actually a blog post. John Kremer sent out a challenge – come up with 101 ways for authors to market their books.

Author Joanna Campbell Slan took up the challenge. Slan is the author of Paper, Scissors, Death, available this September. She lists 101 Ways to Market Your Books on Kremer’s site.

Some are obvious:

Get the best cover possible.

Some less so:

Print marketing information on the inside of that over-run cover and use it like postcards, especially to market to booksellers who want to see the cover before placing an order.

Some cute:

Carry my book with me and read it while I'm waiting in public transportation.

Some sneaky:

Swap with an author friend: I put up her info on Wikipedia and she does the same for me. We both mention our books.

Check out the entire list.

Bookmark It! for Writers

Here’s a site, Common Errors in English, that explores language errors – not so much errors in grammar, but rather errors in usage. Like abstruse and obtuse. Know the difference? If you don’t you can check the site to see which one you should use in which situation.

The site is maintained by Paul Brians, Professor of English at Washington State University. You can buy the book, if you want, but he generously makes this available online, along with other useful resources.

Did you ever stop to wonder whether your character is bartering or haggling in the open-air shop in Mexico?

Been perplexed whether you should use “If I were…” or “If I was…”? Look it up on his site. You may be surprised by his answer.

Is “snuck” the past tense of “sneak”? Or is it “sneaked”?

Common Errors in English is this week’s Site to Bookmark. (Thanks to Cathy Wallace for sending this to me.)

Informative Site for Writers

The site I’m focusing on this week is called “The Haunted Computer.” It’s author Scott Nicholson’s website. Nicholson has published novels, short stories, poetry and non-fiction magazine articles. He’s been a reporter, a radio announcer and a painter, among other things. And ya gotta love a guy who likes both David Bowie and The Smashing Pumpkins.

I’ve never read any of his books, but I chose this site to talk about this week because of all the resources he has for writers.

Take a look at his “Articles” page. He has a long list, including such topics as “Talking Points: Dialogue,” “The ‘N’ Word: Dealing with Rejection,” “Fishing for Ink: Getting Noticed by the Media,” and “Nurture Your Inner Hack.”

Then, if you want sample press releases so you can see how they’re done, turn to his “Press Kit” page. Then, finally, visit his extensive “Links” page.

Definitely a site worth browsing.

Web Rings

Web Rings are not new. They’ve been around for years. They were the precursors to things like clickable widgets, like the one on this blog. But being not new is not the same thing as worthless.

The idea behind a web ring is to connect your site to a circle of similar sites. All the sites on the ring have something in common. As a writer, you might want to join a ring that is composed of other writers of your genre, or maybe if you write about golf, you could join a ring of golfing sites. What you're trying to do is get new "traffic" to visit your site -- people who otherwise wouldn't know your URL. They go to one site and then click on the ring icon and are whisked to you.

How do you find these rings? Check the organizations you belong to and the Internet groups you frequent. Go to author sites, click on the ring icon and see if you'd fit in with the group. Don't forget about niche rings, ones that would fit your subject matter, whether it's medieval weaponry or kangaroos.

Once you find a ring you want to participate in, how do you join? Most rings will have a way of clicking to join. It may be a matter of clicking the logo for the ring, or sometimes you'll click a word like "Join." More than likely, you'll have to not only give the URL to your site, but a justification as to why you would fit in with the group. Then, you'll probably have to be approved.

Once you're invited to join, you'll be given directions how to post the ring html code on your web site. Usually, putting the logo up on your site is easy. The ringmaster will provide the html and instructions. If you don't maintain your site yourself, get your webmaster to do it for you. Sometimes, though, it can be a pain. You may have to manipulate the code. More than likely, though, if you have problems, there'll be a contact email for help.

You're not restricted to one ring. You can join multiple rings. Obviously, the more rings you belong to, the greater the chance that a visitor will circle around to your site. I've seen a few people who've gone overboard, though. Their site is a long page of ring after ring.

Once you've joined a ring, don't just totally ignore that little logo on your page. Check it out.

Make sure it’s working. Make sure the sites participating in the ring are ones you want to be associated with.

Rings are one way to market your site (and thus everything on your site, from books to schedules to services you provide). They get better results than those annoying banners that pop up on some sites. Hopefully, if a visitor "rings" to your site, they'll like what they see and bookmark your page. If not, maybe they'll catch you on the next trip around.

Blog Book Tours

It seems to me that blog book tours are becoming more popular. Either that, or I’m just becoming more aware of them. A blog book tour is when an author visits a series of blogs, either doing interviews or writing posts, as a way of promoting their book(s). Like taking a virtual book tour.

A blog book tour sounds easy. Just sit in your PJs and type on your computer. But, of course, it’s not that simple. Sure, you don’t have to get in your car and drive or go through security to get on a plane, then live out of a suitcase as you go from city to city. And, naturally, it is less expensive than an actual tour.

But that’s not to say it’s easier.

We’ll start with a simple visit to a blog. If it’s an interview, then usually the owner of the blog will send questions ahead of time. That gives the author or interview subject time to answer the questions and edit their answers. Then, for example, in the case of my blog, the author has a last chance to review the post before it goes up. Once I’ve added the intro and close to the post, I send it to the author for a final look before it’s posted.

That’s not too bad. You have time to consider the questions and perfect your answers. But what about with a Q&A that’s much closer to “real” time? For example, an interview that takes place on a discussion board where questions are coming in during a set time period and the author doesn’t get the chance to review them ahead of time. The question comes in; the author answers. It’s rather like questions being fired at you by reporters, or if you’ve done a lot of bookstore talks, questions from the audience. Very little time to edit or form eloquent sentences. And…those words are pretty much there forever. Up on the Internet, saved on people’s computers, shared with others.

But let’s say you’re not doing just one or two interviews or posts. You’re doing a “real” tour, with many stops along the blog road. You’re even posting the blog stops on your site so your readers can take the tour with you. In that case, you really have to plan ahead. You have to come up with subjects to talk about – different at each stop, informative, entertaining, and always, always, promoting your book. Readers aren’t going to take the tour with you if you keep repeating yourself. You have to plan your talks so that each one adds something, each one will be new for your readers (and for the readers of the individual blogs you’re visiting). This is a little different from going on an actual tour where you’re not likely to have the same audience members in City B that you had in City A, so you can repeat yourself. This takes more pre-preparation.

Plus, it takes work on your own website. If you’re going to refer to your book for examples, you hope the readers will have bought your book ahead of time. But, chances are, a lot of them won’t. You don’t want to lose those visitors. In fact, you want them to go out and buy the book after your “talk.” So you put excerpts from your book on your website so you can refer readers to those snippets. It helps them relate to what you’re talking about in your post. They’ll read those snippets and, hopefully, think the book might be really interesting and go buy it. Plus, it gets them to your website where they’ll look around and see what other books you have out.

But this big tour takes work. Ahead of time. And let’s say you have a tour all planned out with ten stops. And you’ve written “lessons” for each stop. Then a blog owner asks you to stop at his/her blog. Now, you gotta go back and add a new lesson, something different, yet related.

Sure, you’re still sitting in your PJs, but even a blog book tour can be time consuming and a lot of work. And it’s harder to track sales. But it sure is cheaper. And you have the possibility of connecting with more readers than on an actual tour. And … you don’t have to comb your hair or suck on breath mints.

Technology Snafu

I would scream, “I hate technology,” but that would do no good. If I thought it would, I would run around the room waving my arms while I screamed.

Alas, I’m doomed to try different things, hoping either something will work or I won’t screw things up too badly. (Envision the village idiot locked in a pitch-black room while a siren alarms “fire!”) Or I call in my youngest child to do it for me. Unfortunately, she doesn’t live at home anymore.

So, I’m on my own most of the time.

For a while I was having problems with my website. It disappeared. No idea why, or I should say, no idea what I did. (Idiot bangs into a wall.) Talked to experts online, fumbled around myself. (Idiot crashes into another wall, breaking big toe.) Daughter steps in, finesses her way through the foreign language that is computer-ese. Website back up and running.

Totally lost email. Managed to get dribbles back. (Idiot sits in middle of room and pats self on the back.) Realized I need a host that offers tech support. This one does not. Daughter helps me sign up with a new host.

I manage to go to my domain registrar and redirect site to new host. (Cheering in the dark room.) Site is up and I think it’s moved to the new host. “Think” is the operative word here since I’m not sure. Managed to fumble my way to my new webmail box. It’s working. One legitimate email and 52 spam. But it’s working. (Idiot dances.) I think getting mail in the new web box (even spam) means the site has been correctly directed to the new host. Haven’t a clue how to create new boxes, so I go to the website and change all links for email to the only web box I have: helen@helenginger.com.

Now I need daughter to unlock the door and show me how to create more eboxes. Until then, I’m just dancing in the dark.