Opportunity Knocks by Malcolm Campbell

Thomas Alva Edison said, “Opportunity is missed by most because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”

As writers we cannot afford to miss chances to promote our work. We diminish the value of every word we write when there is no effort made to put those words in front of someone else. So why should we ignore those opportunities because it looks like work when we’ve already done the hard work of putting words on paper?

Grab every chance you can to post a blog, guest blog on someone else’s blog, sign a comment, Tweet a new achievement and network both online and in the real world. If you are lucky enough to belong to a community of writers that constantly share information, then welcome their emails, tweets and spoken statements, they are saving you valuable hours of research. By all means reciprocate and share the things that you’ve come across as well.

Grabbing possibilities and opportunities can be both tiring and fulfilling. Recent opportunities that have come across the internet (often via writer’s groups) have included: Blog Jog Day where blogs link to one another and visitors get to travel from one to the next; gatherings where promotional items have been requested for gift bags; BookBuzzer widgets where folks get to sample your novels online before buying; and even game sites where book covers are used instead of game pieces and readers get to (pretend) “cast” well known actors as characters in your novels. All unique, all thinking out of the box, and all with far-reaching and lasting effects.

Some of the more common and yet still effective opportunities to promote your writing is through blogging and social networks. Don’t be a wall flower. If you have a blog, post regularly – and if you don’t have a blog, WHY NOT? Ask your online friends if they accept guest posts on their blogs – or if they would submit a guest post or interview for your blog. The main goal is to drive the traffic to your blog or web-site up because YOUR NAME and TITLES appear on your sites.

Social networking on sites like Facebook, MySpace, Friendster or other more specific forums may seem to be a waste of time to some – but think again. Used wisely, the interaction from posting comments and OCCASIONAL promos will, once again, increase the name recognition. Make sure that you don’t abuse the relationships you make on these networks, show just as much and even more interest in them than you expect for yourself.

Getting publicity through newspapers and other media, and using targeted marketing to increase exposure is a lot easier than most people realize. A fellow VHP Author, Malcolm Campbell, recently related his efforts to publicize his book, The SunSinger and support for a national park. He blogged about the history of the park, always making sure to use specific key words in the “tags”, sent press releases to the regional newspapers, and sent postcards to regional bookstores and interest groups. More importantly, Malcolm publicly linked his book’s story and the history of the park to generate even more interest. An excellent lesson is seizing every opportunity.

Sometimes it is very scary to tackle the opportunities that appear before us – and of course how do we know that the effort involved will have any real pay-off in the end? I wish I had a crystal ball to help me pick and choose where I should invest my energies. The truth is that I don’t think we can really tackle every opportunity that passes before us and certainly not everyone will bear the same fruits – but I will be damned if I’ll let them all get away. Imagine life as a crowded train station with several platforms and trains coming in all at once. It’s impossible to jump into every train car, but if you aren’t willing to try for at least one you are never going to get anywhere. (ok, maybe I am not so good with analogies…)

Carpe Diem!

*****

Chelle Cordero is blessed to be a full-time writer and a self-proclaimed hopeless romantic. She has eight novels published with Vanilla Heart Publishing, short stories in three anthologies and numerous articles in various North American newspapers and magazines. Chelle also teaches an online writing course available through Kindle subscription.

Four Reasons to Go Independent by Smoky Trudeau

You’ve written a book. Congratulations! It’s a big job; most writers give up on their novels about the time they reach chapter seven. Sticking it out to the end is an accomplishment to be proud of.

Now what do you do?

Writers are often shocked to realize writing the words THE END doesn’t mean their work is done. There are still things they need to do in order to make their dream of being published authors a reality. And there is a right way and a wrong way to do these things.

Here is where many writers flounder. Blame Hollywood—television and the movies glamorize the writing life. On film, Joe Writer finishes his novel, submits it to Major Publishing Company, gets offered a $50,000 cash advance, and is flown to New York to meet with his editor and polish the book. Once the book actually is released, he gets sent on a whirlwind book tour around the country, with stops at The Today Show and Oprah.

Reality check: the majority of new books published each year are published by small independent presses, not the major publishing houses. And small presses don’t normally have the resources to offer any cash advance at all, let alone one in the tens of thousands of dollars. Editing services are limited, once again due to budgetary constraints, and while many small presses are happy to help their authors find venues to do a book tour, you’ll have to foot the travel expenses yourself.

So why bother publishing with a small press? What’s in it for you, the author?

(1) First and foremost, you stand a much better chance of getting your book published. Major publishers rarely take a chance on unknown authors. For independents, unknown writers are their bread and butter.

(2) Independent presses are more personal. You’ll get to know your publisher, and they’ll get to know you.

(3) Many indies are reluctant to work with agents, so that cuts out the middleman—and the 15 percent of your royalties they’ll take before you ever see a check. No agent means you get to keep 100 percent of your hard earned royalties.

(4) Because they are small, an independent press is much more likely to work with you to get exposure for your books. One book fails for a major press and it’s not a big deal. One book fails for an independent, and it is sorely felt on their bottom line.

In my next post, I’ll talk about etiquette for authors: the right way—and the wrong way—to query a publisher.


Smoky Trudeau is the author of the newly released Observations of an Earth Mage, a collection of photos, essays, and poems celebrating our beautiful planet earth. She is also the author of two novels, Redeeming Grace and The Cabin, as well as two books for writers, Front-Word, Back-Word, Insight Out: Lessons on Writing the Novel Lurking Inside Your From Start to Finish, and Left Brained, Write Brained: 366 Writing Prompts and Exercises, all from Vanilla Heart Publishing. You can learn more about Smoky at www.smokytrudeau.com, or at her blog on Xanga, http://authorsmokytrudeau.xanga.com. You can also look her up on Facebook.

It's Just a Romance Novel by Victoria Howard

Well, yes and no. It all depends on whether you read category or single title romance.

Confused? Then you’re not alone.

Category or, as it’s known in the United States, ‘series romance,’ are books that are released in order and by month. Each category has a distinct identity, which is based on the level of sexuality, the degree to which the story is realistic, and the type of characters and settings. They may be part of the Harlequin Historical, Presents, Tender, Blaze, or Contemporary series or Mills and Boon Nocturne, Medical or Intrigue series. They are written to strict guidelines with limited word counts of anything between 50,000 to 60,000 depending on the series. They have a limited shelf life, usually three months, and a number of titles are released in each series every month.

The primary focus of the category romance is the relationship between the man and the woman, and the novels must have an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending.

Category romances are widely regarded as clichéd, often unrealistic, poorly written, disposable stories that set out only to fulfil women’s fantasies.

Single title novels are all about the one man-one woman journey, just like category romance novels, but they have a longer word count—anything from 80,000 to 150,000 words. They also include more subplots, so the story is not just about the man and woman falling in love, more secondary characters and sex.

Despite the name, single title novels, are not always stand alone novels. Some authors prefer to write interconnected books, such as Elizabeth Lowell’s Donovan, or Rarities Unlimited series.

Single title romances remain on the bookseller’s shelf for as long as they are in demand. On average authors write and publish one single title book a year.

The definition of a romance novel is not limited by plot devices, time frame, setting, or length alone. There are many subgenres.

Contemporary novels are set after World War II.

Chick Lit has elements of romance and are about the main character, her friends and her life.

Historical novels are usually defined as being set before World War I.

Paranormal, futuristic, fantasy, science fiction, contain such things as vampires, ghosts, space travel, etc.

Regency novels are set in England in the period 1811-1820.

Romantic suspense, contain mystery and intrigue.

Erotic Romance novels contain explicit love scenes, but the hero and heroine must have an emotional connection, which is the difference between pure erotica.




Victoria Howard is the author of two romantic suspense novels, The House on the Shore, and Three Weeks Last Spring
http://www.victoriahoward.co.uk/

Thinking About a Blog? by Chelle Cordero

Blogging is a terrific way to mouth off about a variety of subjects and if you scour the internet you'll see plenty of examples of unchecked blogging. Unfortunately for some, the things that get posted on a blog will hang around forever.

Of course some of the words in a blog can also do a lot of good. Authors can use blogs to promote their books and even themselves as writers. Posting excerpts, back stories and commentary which relates to a book's subject will go a long way towards marketing. When the blogger regularly posts then his or her readers know to keep coming back. Allowing readers to post comments - and answering each comment - will help to maintain interest.

Some blog hosts will invite others to guest post. Guest posts may be part of a virtual blog tour (a series of online appearances often used for book launches) or random pop-ins. Particularly when a blog host welcomes someone to their site it's a good feeling when they feel the time and space was well spent.

If you are lucky to land a guest spot don't leave the burden of publicity on your host - it should be a shared venture. Invite traffic to the blog - use emails, post the guest spot on your blog, social network sites, Twitter and mail forums. Ask people to leave comments; lots of comments will help the blog pop up in search engines and will increase traffic. Friends can do a lot to help by stopping by blogs and leaving comments, Tweeting the blogs and telling your friends to stop by.

There's a definite advantage to visiting blogs as well, even if you aren't doing it as a favor for someone else. Use a search engine to find blogs that attract readers in the genre you write in and visit the blogs yourself. Take time to read the most recent posts and sign in to leave comments. Flattery is good if it's sincere, but nasti-isms are unnecessary; your comments should sound smart (as if you really read the post), open the door to constructive discussion and reflect well on you.

When you leave a comment also leave a signature; at the very least your signature should include your name and website address. Other blog visitors will see your comments and if they seem interesting may want to see what you are all about. Publicly following blogs may also bring you increased traffic to your own sites.

Be a social butterfly - blog and invite readers to visit, visit other blogs and introduce yourself and always spread the word.

Oh, one more thing - please leave a comment.

~Chelle Cordero
http://ChelleCordero.com

Ask Editors for Writing Assignments by Malcolm Campbell

What happens when the editor of Fir Tree Magazine receives an unsolicited article manuscript titled "How to Get Barnacles off Your Boat”?

Whether he laughs, cries or uses industrial-strength profanity, the result's the same for the writer: a form rejection slip.

A publication’s submission guidelines tell prospective contributors to read the magazine first. Get to know what it does and how it does it. Many writers skip this step because it takes time. Yet, if you submit an article that demonstrates that you know little or nothing about the magazine, the editor might also doubt the credibility of your article itself.

Instead, write a query letter or e-mail describing your idea rather than writing the article and sending it in blindly. Show the editor how the article will meet his readers’ needs, what you plan to cover, and why you are qualified to write it. Online and printed magazines often place editorial calendars for the coming year on their websites; consult this for themes and subjects on tap for the year.

Asking for an Assignment

Most editors depend on a trusted, dependable group of staff writers, guest experts, and often-used freelancers for most of their material. They don't sit around waiting for somebody they've never heard of to send in exactly the thing they are looking for at the exact moment they need it.

Once you read the editorial calendar and learn that Fir Tree Magazine is planning a series of articles on the identification of flat needle conifers this fall, it’s obvious why the barnacle article is a bad fit.

When you pitch an on-target article idea to an editor, he immediately sees that: (a) you’re approaching the magazine as a professional, (b) you aren't wasting time researching and writing something the he may not use, (c) you’re asking "what do YOU want in your magazine" rather than assuming he will like something randomly sent in.

You want the editor to say, "yes, write the article," while offering guidance that helps ensure the it has the right approach. If you've proposed an article about pine needles and cones, the editor might say, leave out the cones, we're already working on that one. The editor also might suggest a slightly different focus or a longer article than you initially planned.

The first time an editor says, "yes, send me your article," he will probably stipulate that you are sending it in on speculation, that is, without a guarantee that it will be used. Once an article or two is published, the editor will see that you can deliver what he wants. Then, the next pitched article may result in a more formal assignment.

One Day, the Editor Might Contact You

In time, the editor might start pitching ideas to you: "We need an article about the Douglas-fir. How would you like to send us about 2,000 words on the largest examples of this tree in Oregon and Washington?"

Now you're where you want to be.


Writer's Market and Funds for Writers are among the sites you can consult for market listings.



Malcolm R. Campbell is a contributing writer for Living Jackson Magazine and the author of two novels, "The Sun Singer" and "Jock Stewart and the Missing Sea of Fire."

A Writer’s Life: Living Amongst “the Others” by Chelle Cordero

~~~Every now and then I feel like an alien living in my home. Often misunderstood, mostly tolerated and usually hidden away. When family members are asked what I do, their voices tend to lower, they avert their eyes and finally, after shuffling their feet, whisper in a clandestine tone – “She’s a writer”. Their words are spoken in the same clandestine tone you might whisper of the black sheep of the family who is currently serving time in prison.

~~~Non-writers just don’t understand that a writer must write in order to breathe. This is not something we simply choose to do, this is something we must do. I will sit for hours at my desk in front of my computer screen and pummel my keyboard. If the power goes out, I emit a terrifying yowl as if someone were cutting off my fingers. My characters become as real to me as the nephew I send a birthday card to.

~~~I will find myself immersed in emotion as I put tearful words into the dialogue, I will laugh uncontrollably as I type a conversation between humorous characters, I will ponder for hours as I help a heroine through her dramatic dilemma. The words on paper, or on my computer screen, are no longer mere letters – they are thoughts, actions, deeds, misfortunes, passion, pleas and life and death deciding moments.

~~~I become fully entrenched in the lives of my fictional characters and the line between my day to day existence becomes fuzzy. Just one more thought before I get up to tend to some droll household chore – just one more thought turns to pages. I dream for my characters, I try to think like they do, I worry about them and sometimes I even become them. Other writers understand this obsession – non writers do not.

~~~The excitement over a book signing, even when the sales are disappointing, the thrill of seeing your name emblazoned on a book cover jacket and the joy of reading words you once imagined now immortalized in black and white are all things a writer can appreciate. We are willing to put hours of our lives into sitting and typing while we are never sure that the finished product will actually pay off. Offers of publication, distribution and virtual tours may seduce us out of our savings.

~~~The employee who appreciates regular bi-weekly direct deposits into their bank account doesn’t understand how we can manage on infrequent royalties, long overdue invoice payments and, shudder, occasional kill fees. The “others” wonder how we can stand to just “give it away” when we submit to free-ezines and non-paying web-logs just to get our names out there. And of course no bank will understand that a contributor copy of a magazine is indeed payment.

~~~The public image of an eccentric writer with a feather boa around her neck investing her mammoth royalty checks and being ferried to television appearances to promote the latest novel between spa visits may very well be a splendid fantasy; it sure isn’t real. And writers understand that. We know that the work just begins after we have typed “the end”. We actively search for agents and publishers, we partner with our publishers to market and promote, we maintain web-sites and solicit interviews to keep “the buzz” going.

~~~Some of us may have to work at other jobs in order to support our writing habit – some may be fortunate enough to have forty or more hours a week to put into our writing. No matter what our circumstances may be, we need to be creative when we write and we need to be pragmatic in our business. Right brain thought comes to a screeching halt in order to allow for the left brain sensibility. We cringe when our writing is called our hobby, we feel like screaming when we are asked “are you ever going to get a real job?”

~~~So we will all just muddle along writing and pouring our hearts into every word. We will get our hopes up each time we submit a query and we will stop breathing for as long as it takes to open the returned SASE. Our spouses and kids will stand at our office doors and shake their heads as we tap-tap-tap obliviously. We’ll feel accomplished when we manage to string one-hundred words together in a project that will ultimately need seventy-five-thousand. It will be an honor beyond anything else we’ve done to sign a book or to receive a fan letter.

~~~…and a writer understands.

~~~~~~~~

Chelle Cordero is blessed to be a full-time writer and a self-proclaimed hopeless romantic. She has eight novels published with Vanilla Heart Publishing, short stories in three anthologies and numerous articles in various North American newspapers and magazines. Chelle also teaches an online writing course available through Kindle subscription.

Write Like An Earth Mage by Smoky Trudeau

My latest book, Observations of an Earth Mage, is a collection of essays, poems, and photographs on nature. I am, at heart, a nature writer.

But you don’t have to be a nature writer to need to know how to write about nature. It’s the rare novel that doesn’t at least have some element of nature in it, and writers of all genres need to know how to write about it convincingly, even writers who never get closer to nature than their local city park. Of course, there’s not enough room in a blog column to teach an entire course in nature writing, but here are some tips to make sure your scenes evoke Mother Nature in her finest light, as well as some exercises to get your creative juices flowing:

Use specific, descriptive language. Descriptive, specific language is what distinguishes beautiful prose from the mundane. While this is true for every element of fiction writing, nowhere is it more true than with setting description. Yes, I could have written the sentence, “It was foggy at the river,” as the opening to Chapter 22 of my novel, Redeeming Grace, and readers would have gotten a general idea of the setting. But I didn’t write that. I wrote, “The cool, early autumn air hugged the still-warm sandy shores of the Choptank, enveloping the river in a surreal, steamy fog. Water droplets clung to each blade of grass in the yard, dangling precariously like a precious crystal earring from a dainty lobe. The air smelled sweet, a sticky mixture of fish and pine.” Specific, descriptive language turns a bland sentence into words worth savoring and creates a three-dimensional, color picture in the reader’s mind.

Engage the senses. When you take a hike in an apple orchard in full bloom, you smell the blossoms. When you walk along the ocean shore, you hear gulls overhead and waves crashing on the beach. Make sure your readers can smell, hear, or even taste your nature descriptions. In my novel The Cabin, I could have written: “Corrine walked into the forest,” and left it at that. But I didn’t. What I wrote was, “The first thing she noticed was the smell. It was the same scent she had breathed in every time she walked in the forest, but this time, she could break down the individual essences perfuming the air: rotting rhododendron blossoms mixed with moss-covered granite and cold, crisp water. She had never noticed granite had a scent—like the air during a thunderstorm, vaguely electrical—or that water could smell cold.”

Don’t get carried away with this, of course. You don’t have to engage all five senses at once! But don’t rely only on the visual.

Use unexpected, surprising phrasing and metaphors. A good trick here is, when describing an inanimate object in nature, such as a rock, liken it to something animate. You might write something like, “The granite rock was like a gray whale in the middle of the meadow, swimming in a sea of big blue stem and purple coneflowers.” The rock is inanimate; a gray whale is animate. Doing the opposite works well, too: when describing something living, like an animal or a flower, liken it to an inanimate object: “The flock of Canada geese overhead looked like the Blue Angels doing maneuvers at an air show.” Another trick is to compare something small to something large: “When the hiker wandered too close to her babies, the mother marmot charged like a rhinoceros.”

Do your research. I recently read a lovely book that was set in what today is Turkey several thousand years BCE. The main character had a pet cockatoo. What’s wrong with that? Cockatoos are from Australia. There would have been no cockatoos in Turkey five thousand years ago. If you are writing a nature scene in a work of fiction, please remember to ensure the plants, animals, and weather phenomena you write about actually exist in the place you are writing about. Don’t have grizzly bears attacking tourists in Shenandoah National Park; don’t put triggerfish in the Great Lakes, and don’t set white Christmas stories in Sydney.

Beware of purple prose. Purple prose is prose that is so over the top, so flowery, it breaks the flow of your essay, story, or poem by drawing attention to itself. It often is exaggerated, overly sentimental, and evocative beyond the call of duty. To avoid falling into the purple prose trap, evoke only one or two senses at a time. Use only one metaphor to describe something, not five. In short, don’t get mushy.

Practice, practice, practice. Learning to write about nature (or anything else, for that matter) is no different from mastering any other art form. Picasso’s first painting probably wasn’t a masterpiece. Chopin had to learn to play a scale before he could compose and perform his piano masterpieces. Rudolph Nureyev took dance lessons before he became a world-class ballet dancer. Anything worth doing is worth learning how to do well, and that means practicing!

Ultimately, the best way to learn how to write about nature is to spend time in the woods, on the prairies, at the seashore, or in the garden. Nature is as close as your backyard or city park. Second, read nature writing. Read modern day nature anthologies, like my Observations of an Earth Mage. Read the classics, like Thoreau’s Walden or A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold. Read nature poetry. Read novels where nature plays a thematic role, like Moby Dick. Then, go to your keyboard and write!

Smoky Trudeau is the author of the recently released Observations of an Earth Mage, a collection of prose, poetry, and photographs celebrating the beauty and splendor of the natural world. She is also the author of two novels, Redeeming Grace and The Cabin, as well as two books on writing, all from Vanilla Heart Publishing. An ardent outdoorswoman with a deep reverence for nature, she lives in California with her husband, daughter, and a menagerie of animals, both domestic and wild, in a ramshackle cottage in the woods overlooking the San Gabriel Valley and the mountains beyond. When she isn’t working, Smoky spends her time hiking in the mountains, camping in the Sierras, splashing in tidepools, and fighting the urge to speak in haiku.

Finding Time to Write by Victoria Howard.

The question I get asked most often when giving talks to readers' groups is 'how do you find time to write'?


In this day and age it's easy to feel overwhelmed by everyday life without the added pressure of writing a book or short story. So just how do you apply the BOSFOK (bum on seat, fingers on keyboard) principle?

The answer is by scheduling the time you have.

Don't try and fit your writing into your 'spare time.' There's no such thing, especially if you work full time in order to support your family. Study your schedule and designate time when you can concentrate on your writing, but don't be too ambitious. For example: If you are a morning person try getting up half an hour earlier and using that time to write. Some writers prefer to work of any evening while the rest of the family watch TV, others dedicate weekend afternoons as their time to write. Choose whatever works best for you, and stick to it.

1. Use a timer when doing research--it's very easy to become distracted, especially when searching the Internet. A timer will help make your time at the computer more productive.

2. Limit the amount of time you spend answering and sending emails (unless they are to your editor), and reading on line newspapers and blogs.

3. Think about what you're going to write BEFORE you sit down in front of the computer, perhaps while ironing, or mowing the lawn. When you do sit down at your desk, you'll have the next few pages worked out, plus you will have freed up time in which to write it.

4. Make use of downtime--those tedious journeys on the bus to work or sitting around waiting for appointments. Carry a notebook and write while you travel or wait. If you spend a lot of time in the car driving from place to place, invest in a voice activated voice recorder.

5. While you're watching your children play in the park, work out the next scene or think through a problem. When you sit down to write, the words will generally flow.

6. If your children have an essay to write use the time they are sat quietly to work on your novel.

7. Don't try and write while the TV or radio is playing in the background, it will only distract you.

8. Instead of taking an hour to eat lunch, use part of the time to write.

9. Invest in a netbook computer--most are no bigger than a sheet of A4 paper, are lightweight and relatively inexpensive.

10. Use an answering machine to screen calls during your 'writing time.'

11. But most of all, set yourself a writing goal. It could be something as simple as entering one writing contest in the course of a year. And remember; if you write 250 words a day--the equivalent of one page of A4, in a year you will have written 365 pages or approximately 90,000 words--enough for a full length novel. Whatever your goal, stick to it, as it will take the pressure off.

Time management is all about common sense. It's a matter of understanding your commitments and knowing how you work best, and using that information to achieve your goals.



Victoria Howard is the author of two romantic suspense novels, The House on the Shore, a finalist for the 2009 Joan Hessayon Award, presented by the Romantic Novelists, Association, and Three Weeks Last Spring, a 2009 Pushcart Nominee.