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kaliiwashere · 6 years

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Marvel Movies

Need to purchase X-Men t-shirts online? Whether or not you could have a love for The Avengers, Incredible 4, Thor, or X-Men there are lots or t-shirts and other merchandise to own. My childhood included a love for 60s and 70s Marvel and DC comics, and my ability to draw originates partly from finding out the tales I learn in those days. We worked for a year together on the piece to plan and draw it. Toy corporations like Hasbro and Kenner used to supply hundreds of Batman motion figure than is launched yearly with some variation in it. Transformers 2, the science-fiction film is the latest sensation, and is probably the most awaited film of the year. Let's take the movie Avatar for instance. From time to time I went back to the sport to take a couple of extra screenshots to increase a plot. Inside a few minutes, I started making comedian strips. Unlike his other comic strips, in Battling Boy, the hero is a child, who is on a mission to save lots of town.

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It may haven't been planned quite a few this week's comics occur to take care of fathers and sons. That might not sound strange however when you think about classic comics there are few prominent father figures. Some of the most prominent super heroes do not have dads. Superman's father is dead, ditto for Batman, Uncle Ben could be the closest thing with a dad Peter Parker ever had and that we are all aware so what happened to him. I'm not even going to go near Silk Spectre's daddy issues. Is there an underlying reasons why most superheroes will also be orphans? Superhero costumes are as countless because amount of superheroes themselves. However, some are definitely more convenient than these. For example, an outfit for Kratos, the flesh-rendering character through the iconic game God of War, is certainly easier to dress up than the Mjolnir suits from Halo, or perhaps the Iron Man suit. The former only mandates that you have very good condition, and have sufficiently huge amounts of body paint available. Meanwhile, an intricate Iron Man suit doesn't only set you back several hundred, otherwise several thousand dollars, it is usually extremely bothersome to put on and remove.

Immediately after newspaper comic strips like Mutt and Jeff was reprinted as books and the publishers did start to experiment with periodic books, which were sold for 10 cents with the newsstands. The pre-superhero comic strips was mainly pulp stories of detectives, adventure, criminals and exotic travel. The very first costumed hero ended up The Phantom, which became available in 1936 wearing black mask plus a purple costume.

Nor is independent comics only for novices. Longtime creators including Mark Waid and Paolo Rivera supply before year announced their want to start working on creator-owned titles, though not every one of them will do independent work exclusively. The independent world allows all creators the choice to profit or fail using their characters. Robert Kirkman believes the longer term is based on some sort of where comic strip creators utilize the Big Two being a professional step, a learning center to practice their talent before switching towards the (possibly) more profitable opportunities in neuro-scientific independent comics owned by creators. As the indie market grows, we are able to determine if his vision becomes the industry standard. 22. Black Bolt: One from the strongest beings in the Marvel Universe and yet he never uses his true power for concern with the destruction it could unleash. The merest whisper from Black Bolt could level a mountain therefore the ruler in the Inhumans has imposed upon himself a moratorium on speaking. Black Bolt still gets angry. The reader is aware that solutions that he wants to yell but he doesn't. The self-control that it takes for Black Bolt to stay silent only makes him seem more noble

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pixelgrotto · 7 years

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I believe in video game stories I quite like experiencing a story through the format of a video game. I’d even go so far as to say that aside from reading, it’s probably my preferred method of digesting a narrative. (I’m not as big on TV or movies - shocking, I know!) I think a lot of this appreciation comes from the fact that as a long term PC gamer, I was exposed to many point ‘n click adventures at a young age. These were games that fancied themselves as controllable books, with “author” names frequently placed front and center on the box art. The Secret of Monkey Island was specifically a Ron Gilbert game, King’s Quest VI a Roberta Williams jam. And boy, did growing up with these games give me an appreciation for the excitement that interactive storytelling could generate. After my six-year-old self had successfully guided Alexander of Daventry through the catacombs on the Isle of the Sacred Mountain and defeated the minotaur keeping Lady Celeste hostage, I was a fan for life. (Note: Clicking that link and watching the whole scene might induce eye-rolling, since it seems dated in this day and age, but trust me, King’s Quest VI is still an awesome game.) But not everyone had the same experiences as I did growing up. For a prominent segment of the population, story in games doesn’t really matter, and it never did. In fact, it seems that every other month on NeoGAF, a new thread will pop up on video game stories, and inevitably it’ll spark a debate where a whole mess of posters echo things like “90% of all game stories suck” or “story in games doesn’t matter to me because if I want story I’ll watch a movie or read a book.” Then there are hot takes on the pitfalls of game storytelling by Twitter personalities and academics that occasionally appear in mainstream outlets like The Atlantic. Case in point - one that started a controversy last month with its clickbaity headline “Video Games Are Better Without Stories.” I rolled my eyes when I read The Atlantic article, mostly because it’s written by an academic who’s previously written stuff in a similar vein that I didn’t agree with, like “Video Games Are Better Without Characters.” The internet arguments that emerged surrounding his newest piece made me pay a little more attention this time, though. In a nutshell, Ian Bogost’s thesis is that the systems within a game should come first, and the ability of players to manipulate these systems to manufacture their own narratives is where the medium’s true strength lies. In other words, emergent gameplay trumps traditional storytelling.

This isn’t necessarily a bad point. After all, some of the most prominent and popular games in this day and age either keep plot in the background or totally ignore it in favor of focusing on mechanics that give power to the players, letting them create their own stories that stick out in their head more than any pre-engineered script could. Dark Souls does this well, with unforgiving combat and an atmosphere that makes everyone playing it feel like they’re stuck in their own personal hell. The newest Zelda game, Breath of the Wild, does it too, keeping story to a relative minimum and encouraging players to experiment with Link’s items and abilities instead. And then you have competitive games like League of Legends and Overwatch, which leave their story components out of the mix completely. But despite all of these titles not placing story as their biggest priority, it’s kinda obvious that large segments of their fandoms feel differently. Just type “Dark Souls story” into YouTube and you’re assaulted with a staggering number of videos, and the encyclopedia of fan-assembled lore on the Dark Souls Wiki page is a force to be reckoned with. Breath of the Wild has inspired spectacular discussion on where it falls in the wonderfully convoluted timeline established by Hyrule Historia. League of Legends has a whole website devoted to its lore, and Overwatch has comics and animated shorts that fans gobble up with frightening veracity, often while begging Blizzard to release some sort of campaign revealing more background behind the Omnic Crisis. If anything, this unquenchable thirst for lore shows that despite gameplay coming first when it comes to interactive entertainment, at the end of the day, human beings still love a solid story that contextualizes gameplay, and game designers who want to create big narrative-driven experiences shouldn’t cease their efforts. Emergent gameplay is great, but going by Ian Bogost’s suggestion that games should SOLELY focus on this assumes that 1) all players want the sort of system-heavy games that he prefers (SimCity, for example), and 2) that the “traditional” route of telling a story within a game can never compete with film and literature.

I find the argument that games can never move or shake you in the same way that movies and books do to be awfully defeatist. It’s also an unfair comparison, since games are a much younger medium that face the challenge of conveying a plot around characters that can be controlled. Books and movies don’t have to deal with this, and endlessly asking questions like “where’s the Citizen Kane of video games” is both using a (frightfully overrated) yardstick from one medium to unfairly judge the efforts of another, and ignoring the unique strength that games do bring to the table - the ability to generate investment and immersion by making the player feel like he or she is an integral participant in the plot rather than a mere observer.

The sensation of feeling like I was part of the action is what gripped me to King’s Quest VI as a child. It’s what grips me to the best story-driven games out there, the ones that realize that they have this strength and capitalize upon it. The potential that games have for immersion is unsurpassed, and while it’s true that the medium is capable of producing plenty of schlocky, C-grade plots, the same could easily be said of books or movies, especially when you consider all the young adult fiction and superhero films that pass for quality entertainment in this day and age. Those who think all video game stories are garbage are more often than not cutscene skippers who are simply too impatient to give games a chance, biased individuals who are too used to experiencing stories in more passive forms of media or quite simply people who need to play better games. Because once you start judging the medium on its own terms and take the time to do some digging, there are many fine stories to be found out there - The Witcher games (which are arguably a tad superior to the books that spawned them), Deus Ex, the Quest for Glory series, the Gabriel Knight games, the Monkey Islands, The Last Express, Planescape: Torment and even a little game from Taiwan named Detention which could have been an indie movie, but arguably was more effective in reaching a wider audience on Steam.

Games don’t necessarily need to bring narrative to the forefront, as successes like Overwatch prove. But I’m glad that certain titles and developers do seek to accomplish this goal, because there are fans out there who believe in interactive stories and want to see this medium continue conveying bigger and better tales. I’m one of them, and I won’t stop being one of them. I’m a product of Alexander of Daventry, Geralt of Rivea, Guybrush Threepwood and all the other great characters inhabiting high quality video game narratives, and their stories are going to stick with me as long as I live..no matter what opinions pretentious contrarians publish on the internet.

Header image of Geralt with a book is from a larger wallpaper available on CD Projekt Red’s website. You can see the big version here.

#pixel grotto #musings #video games #king's quest #the witcher

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writingguide003-blog · 6 years

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22 Writing Experts On Overcoming Their Greatest Writing Challenges

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22 Writing Experts On Overcoming Their Greatest Writing Challenges

I won’t lie to you.

Writing is a tough, demanding and lonely craft.

You’ve got to think of an idea, figure out if it’s worth writing about and then get the words down on the blank page in a room, by yourself.

Even when you’ve got this part of the creative process under control, it’s still your job to turn up and write every day, to publish your work and to find an audience.

The journey of every writer is marked by creative, personal and business challenges just like these.

I wanted to find out more about these types of challenges and how today’s professional and successful writers overcame them.

So, I asked 22 top authors and fiction writers one question:

What was your greatest writing or creative challenge and how did you overcome it?

This is what they said.

Doing The Work

Rachel Aaron – Author of Nice Dragons Finish Last, 2k to 10k, and The Legend of Eli Monpress

I’d say the biggest writing challenge I’ve faced was actually the book I just finished.

It was a sequel to a very successful first book. I went into the project thinking I knew exactly how it would go, but every time I tried, it didn’t feel right.

I banged my head against that book for a year trying to hammer it into place, but it was never right, because (as I finally discovered) I was trying to make it into something it would never be.

It took me an embarrassingly long time to admit I was the problem, but in the end, the only way forward was to swallow my ego, cut myself free, and start over with an entirely new idea.

This is a terrifying thing to do when you’re already months behind.

Plus, I’d already written and trashed over two complete novels worth of writing. That’s enough failure to make anyone hate their book.

If I gave up, though, I’d be abandoning my fans and a series I really did love before months of dead ends soured me on the whole thing.

Starting over and pushing through that project was the most difficult and humbling experience I’ve ever had as a writer, but I made it, and even better, I made it with a novel I’m very proud of.

I think when I look back on my career, I’ll consider refusing to give up on this book or to publish something I couldn’t be proud of as one of the watersheds of my progress as a writer.

Awful and humiliating as the failures were, pushing through them forced me to grow as a writer and as a professional in a way the successes never could.

I wouldn’t wish a hell book experience like this on anyone, but I think I came out stronger for it, and for that alone, I’m grateful.

Marion Roach – Writing coach and teacher, specialising in the personal essay and memoirs

My biggest writing challenge is the same today as it was for the first piece I wrote when I worked at The New York Times, the same it was for all four of my books, and for every radio essay, magazine piece or op-ed: Making that extra phone call.

Stopping one call, fact-check, or piece of reporting short of what is needed is a hallmark of a lazy writer.

But it’s also the hallmark of a busy life, and we cannot let one influence the other, since while being busy is a cultural reality, it is no excuse for turning in a piece that is anything but as good as it can be.

These days, I write a great deal of memoir, a genre that has an unimaginable (to me) and wholly inaccurate reputation for being easy.

“You don’t have to check your facts,” people tell me, admitting that they didn’t do so. “You’re just depending on memory,” someone will suggest, “so how hard can it be?”

I solved this problem years ago by simply moving the landline phone next to the computer. This is where many writers keep their lucky pencils, worry beads, or photos of a dream house in Tuscany.

For me, that clunky old phone is an amulet as well as a nag, and it serves me every day as I move into that lovely end zone of a piece, when I make the mistake of thinking I’ve got it nailed and then remember that maybe, just maybe, I don’t.

Not quite yet.

The biggest writing challenge I’ve faced is myself. I got in my own way for YEARS!!

Making excuses, placing blame, ignoring my writing dream, letting fear get the best of me.

I’ll never forget the day I finally started to take my dream of writing a novel seriously.

It was a Saturday, and I had the whole day available for writing. But I kept coming up with things I needed to do first, things that were “so much more important” than writing my novel.

And then I found myself with a clean apartment, no dishes in the sink, washed laundry and nothing to do but write.

So I decided to get out a sponge and then get down on my hands and knees and scrub the bathroom floor. (And I HATE cleaning!)

In that moment I knew I had to decide if writing a novel and being a successful writer was truly important to me. I decided that it was, so I began to drop the excuses, flip around the fears and commit to taking action on my writing every day.

I didn’t write every day at first, but I did work on something writing related (story planning, character development, etc).

It took time to get rolling, but 7 years later I’m finally about to publish my debut novel, and I’ve made a career out of being a writer.

Amazing things can happen when you get out of your own way.

Self-belief

David Gaughran – Writer, blogger and indie author thought leader

There is a necessary dichotomy in every writer’s brain: we need a certain level of self-belief to put our work out into the world, but also a healthy dose of self-criticism to ensure its quality.

Dealing with this is the biggest writing challenge I’ve faced. And it’s one I still face, every single time I sit down to write.

The solution (like the problem) is in your own head. You don’t need that critical voice when writing the first draft.

In fact, you should ignore it, because it can make you freeze up completely. If you start being critical about your opening page, you’ll never finish that first chapter, let alone the book.

You need to vomit up the words until you hit The End.

Then you can be critical.

Everything can be fixed in the second draft… except for a blank page. So switch off that critical voice.

Give yourself the freedom to get the bones of your story down on the first pass.

You can worry about putting flesh on those bones later. Because once you have that first draft done, nothing can stop you.

Kevin T. Johns – Writing coach, podcaster and author

The greatest challenge I have had to overcome as an author is the realisation that the financial return will never equal the investment in time, effort, energy, heart, and soul that goes into creating a book.

Simply put, books are a terrible business to be in.

The way I’ve come to terms with that sad fact is by acknowledging that I’m not a writer because it is a smart business decision.

I’m am a writer because I can’t not be a writer.

Marcie Hill – Freelance writer and blogger and self-published author

My greatest writing challenge was confidence. Early in my career, I was afraid to call myself a writer because I was transitioning from a career I hated to my passion. To overcome this challenge, I wrote consistently and started to BELIEVE that I was truly a writer.

The second case of lack of confidence I experienced was my fear of writing about controversial issues, such as race in America and the media’s negative portrayal of black people, that are near and dear to my heart. I’m still sometimes challenged with this, but when I have to speak up, I’m unstoppable.

My final and worse case of lack of confidence occurred when it was time to charge for services. It took years to get over this. Now, I let people know the value of the services I provide and charge accordingly.

Jen Talty – Romance author and publisher

There are so many challenges to writing and I think the first thing most of us will think of is handling all the rejections.

However, for me it was simply finding the time to write when my all three of my kids played travel hockey and we averaged 170 games a season in two countries and three states.

My first couple of books I wrote at the ice rink between practices and games.

Alex Lukeman – Author of the best-selling PROJECT action and adventure series

It’s difficult to pick out one “greatest” challenge when it comes to writing, especially if you write for a living as I do.

Writing for a living presents an ongoing series of challenges.

There are hundreds, thousands of articles and books about writing that address various challenges.

Things like getting through writer’s block or finding an agent/publisher or plotting or characterisation.

All of that is useful up to a point but always you are faced with the fundamental challenge of being a writer.

To put it simply, it’s the will to create and believe in your ability to create something of interest. Standing in the way is the hard reality that writing is difficult work.

No one tells you what to write. You have to make it up as you go along, out of nothing. You have to allow your imagination to step out and take control.

You have to get it down, one word, sentence, paragraph, chapter at a time. That brings you face to face with what I consider to be the greatest challenge and I face it with every book.

There always comes a point where I think ‘This isn’t very good or worse, this is lousy.’

Sometimes it is and I end up throwing out days of work.

The biggest challenge for me is to know it’s not the end of the world and that sooner or later my muse will return with a better result.

Believing that is the key to meeting the challenge.

James Scott Bell – Award-winning suspense author and writing coach

My biggest challenge came at the very beginning of my writing journey.

I knew I wanted to write, but had been told for years that you either “have it or you don’t” and that you can’t learn to be a great writer.

I didn’t think I had it, but when I determined I had to try, I went out and started studying and .

I kept writing and applying what I was learning, and then one day I had an actual epiphany.

Lightbulbs started flashing. It was realising that scenes should have an objective, obstacles, and an outcome that is usually a major setback.

From that point on my plotting was strong. I started to sell. And got the confidence I needed to go on.

Ian Sutherland – Cyber and crime thriller author and Twitter expert

One of the things I’ve been wrestling with over the last couple of months is, what is my identity?

Am I a fiction writer? Or am I a nonfiction writer? Or am I both?

My website right this minute is a bit of a hybrid.

I’m actually working on that behind the scenes, so I’m going to make sure that my main website that you see from all of the stuff to do with and my fiction work is just about that, and I’m probably going to set up a second website for the because the audience there is other authors.

Getting Published

Gary Smailes – Freelance writer, editor, researcher and historian

The way I often explain this new publishing approach to non-writers is with a restaurant analogy. In the past a publisher might have been happy flipping burgers and selling to the masses.

Now everyone is able to open a burger joint. Publishers now need to be different, better… they are no longer looking for grill cooks, they are looking for Michelin star chefs.

This is a golden age for writers and the impact of Amazon self-publishing platform will continue to echo over the coming years.

But one thing that has already changed is what it means to be a ‘writer’.

Gone are the days of a writer’s only path to success being through the slush pile. If a writer now wishes to side-step the gatekeeper and go it alone, it is a very viable option.

So, what’s the ‘the biggest challenge facing a writer’?

For me, is it the challenge of a writer deciding what type of writer they wish to become.

There’s no harm is being a grill cook, writers can make good money and have the freedom to plot their own publishing journey, but is that what a writer really wants?

Or are they seeking something different, do they need the prestige that comes with being ‘picked by a publisher’?

Are they looking to become that Michelin star chef with all the highs and lows it brings?

Or is the writer looking for something different and new? Technology and the internet are allowing writers to constantly reinvent what it really means to be a ‘writer’.

Only by making and embracing the choice that faces them will writers have a shot at success.

K.M. Weiland – Fantasy writer, blogger and mentor for authors

Being published. No, seriously! Being published and read by others is amazing in countless ways.

It has made my life and my writing richer. But it also makes writing harder.

Once you realise you’re no longer writing just for yourself, but that every word you write is being read (and judged—for better or worse) by others, it’s hard to keep that thought out of your head while writing.

The pressure is on, and it can be crippling. I went through a sophomore-novel stage where I found myself over-thinking my first drafts to a ridiculous extent.

The result?

My writing suffered, and I stopped having fun.

As much as I love and appreciate my readers, I remind myself every day that I write, first and foremost, for myself. I write because I love it—because I have stories bubbling up out of me.

I focus on that and not on what readers may or may not want, and my writing is always the better for it.

I love Anne Lamott’s quote in Bird by Bird:

“I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises.”

Terah Edun – New York Times & USA Today Bestseller

My biggest writing challenge is navigating the demands of self-published market as it changes year-by-year. I overcome each day by learning from close friends, networking with marketing experts, and pushing forward to continue writing the books I’ve always loved to read.

Handling Ideas and Plot

Roz Morris – Fiction writer, editor, speaker and writing coach

My biggest challenges are always creative – how to do justice to an idea.

I’ll start with an exciting idea – for instance, what if I turn the classic reincarnation story on its head?

Instead of sending a character to examine her past life, what if she suspected she had a future life and somebody was receiving her as the past?

That’s how was born. These ideas arrive full of freight – although, like dreams, they keep it locked away.

My writing process is part research and part search; a labyrinthine route of interpretation and guesswork to discover what it means.

I write reams of notes; long, secret essays I may never read again.

The chances are, I’ll find them absurd, wrong or naive. But as I keep visiting the book and sharing my thoughts with the page, I begin to understand what my gut is telling me.

My Memories of a Future Life became an exploration of despair – a person who had lost faith and hope in her own life.

The challenge is always to release the potential in an idea.

It’s tough, but once it’s done, it’s so rewarding.

A.G. Riddle – Self-published and traditionally published science fiction author

Choosing which story idea to pursue.

I finally just went with the idea that fascinated me the most–without worrying about how big the audience was for the story.

I think you have to be passionate about your story first–it comes through in your writing and that’s what readers love.

Douglas E. Richards – New York Times and USA today best-selling science fiction author

Plotting has always been my biggest writing challenge, but, alas, it is one I have yet to overcome.

My writing style is fairly unadorned and cinematic.

I want readers to always be thinking, “this passage is so engrossing, I have to know what happens next!” In order to accomplish this, I take great pains to deliver intelligent, tight plots with complex mysteries at their centers and plenty of twists and turns.

Before I begin each new novel, I probably spend a month just trying to figure out the overarching direction I’d like it to take.

But even if I think I have a reasonable idea of the actual plot, I’m only fooling myself, because no plot survives engagement with the page. For me, writing a novel is like putting together a 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle.

Until you’ve laid some of the early pieces, you don’t have any idea what you have to work with, so you can’t possibly know where later pieces might fit in.

This is very scary for me, because I’m never able to figure out the endings of my novels until I’m at least halfway through them, and most times I’m convinced that doing so is impossible—until I finally have a eureka moment (after I’ve pulled out handfuls of hair and my stress levels have climbed into the stratosphere).

Robert McKee – A Fulbright Scholar and the most sought-after screenwriting lecturer around the globe

Too often writers spend all their time worrying about marketing themselves. If they would just pay attention to the work, if they put their energy into turning themselves into the best possible writer they can be…to do that, they have to cultivate taste.

The difference between an amateur and a professional is that amateur writers love everything they write, they keep every scrap and every page thinking that some day somebody is going to want to do a PhD thesis on them or whatever delusion they live in.

Professional writers hate everything they write because they have the highest possible standards. They know that 95 percent of everything they do is crap. They are only capable of excellence 1 or 2 percent of the time. They know they have got to get all that crap out, read it and go “That’s just bad writing, cliched writing.”

They know they have to destroy it all in order to get to that precious few moments of real creativity when they are writing at their best.

(Professional writers) hate everything they do because they have high standards. What I see so often in my work is that people have no standards. Or, their standard is what was just published last year, or what was just produced last year. They want to copy that with a slight variation. They want to write the way they think they’re supposed to because they have no real standards.

So don’t worry about marketing. If you write really well the first person you show it to will become your champion.

Philip Kleudgen – Blogger and entrepreneur

The biggest challenge in writing for me is always getting started. It can take hours or in some cases even days to decide on a topic I want to write about.

Once I decided that everything else falls in place. I start researching the facts, collect contributions and links and it’s like a puzzle that shows a beautiful image in the end.

If I am REALLY not in creative mode I sometimes do a filler post consisting of quotes or images only.

This buys me some time before the next epic piece must be written.

The way I try to overcome this is by writing articles in clusters.

That means after finding the topic I will write a blog post, guest posts and maybe even start an ebook about the same thing. This helps a lot to be more productive.

Finding ideas is mainly a process of reading industry blogs, do random Google searches or play around with ubersuggest.org to find fresh content. Talking to other people and interacting in the comment section of any given website or on Twitter also can help.

Marketing Your Work and Finding Readers

Ashley Farley – blogger and best-selling self-published author of Her Sister’s Shoes

I’m sure you’ve heard this time and again, but social media is the biggest challenge I face as an indie author.

There are countless opportunities for an author to interact with readers and other writers online. Too many, in my opinion.

As an introvert, I find the process overwhelming and way too time-consuming when all I really want to do is write novels.

When I found myself close to a mental breakdown last month over all the responsibilities of launching my latest novel, I had a little heart-to-heart with myself and decided I would restrict my hangout sessions to the networks where I feel at home.

Isn’t that the way we choose to socialize in person? I’m concentrating on Facebook, which is where most women my age hang out, and on Goodreads for the same reason.

I also recently joined the Women’s Fiction Writers’ Association as that seems like my kind of cocktail party—low key, girl to girl talk about women’s fiction.

Mostly, I’m trying to approach social media as fun instead of work, which is helping enormously.

– Author of the John Milton series of thrillers

Finding readers for my work. The way to solve it – hard work, invention and a willingness to learn.

Mailing lists are critical, and then finding readers to fill them.

When you have that sorted, graduate some readers to a street team and work together to solve the visibility problem with early reviews and buys.

And, over all of it, treat customers as readers and be flattered when they get in touch. Answer every email personally and those readers become fans and, sometimes, friends.

Dean Wesley Smith – USA Today best-selling science fiction writer, novelist and editor of Smith’s Monthly

I spent seven long years not selling and rewriting and polishing and writing slow and following every other myth I had ever been taught about writing.

I was just about to give up when I started reading how real writers did it, and then I found .

I decided to follow those business rules without missing.

All five of them. (I wasn’t selling, so I had nothing to

lose.)

I started selling almost at once and have never looked back and never stopped following those five business rules. But I really regret those seven long years of following the myths of writing.

Terri Woods – American novelist and author of True to the Game

I have faced two very big challenges.

The first is being successful as an independent author and independent publisher. Mainly because it’s okay for you to self-publish a book, but its not okay for you to make a lot of money from it.

So, if you can publish the book and become a self made millionaire, that’s called being ‘divergent’ and if you are me, that is a problem, so much that I was denied the right to do business and I wasn’t allowed shelf space, and was threatened with imprisonment all because I was selling thousands and thousands of books every month.

It got so ugly, folks were not allowed to buy or even order my books from certain bookstores.

Then, the other challenge for me is that I am black and as a black writer with NY Times Best Selling novels, I haven’t been given, and in some cases, not allowed the same opportunities in the market place as white authors with books of less selling potential.

And forget about your NY Times best selling novel being turned into a major motion picture or television series if your African American, your readers are NOT going to see their favourite characters to come to life, because that’s totally not going to happen either.

It’s sad, but the marketing dollars just aren’t given to African Americans and they never have been.

So, these issues have presented themselves to be extremely challenging for me as an African American writer and as the owner of an independent publishing company.

However, these challenges do not prevent me from dreaming, from believing in myself, from believing in my work, and these challenges will never stop me from reaching folks that are willing to support me and read my books.

The Real Work of a Writer

Professional writers don’t quit when things get hard. Even when they’d rather do anything but write, professionals concentrate on improving their craft, on getting the words down and on shipping their work.

They do it because it’s their job.

It’s your job too.

You can use any of the solutions put forward in this post to overcome some of the challenges you’re encountering on the blank page.

For this post I interviewed mostly fiction writers.

Prefer to learn more about non-fiction writing?

Don’t worry.

Check out my follow-on post published recently on Boost Blog Traffic:

Get your 101 writing prompts today

Need help getting started writing? Use these proven writing prompts. I’ll also send you practical writing advice and more as part of my newsletter.

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22 Top Writers On Their Great Writing Challenges (And How They Overcame Their Demons)

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avaliveradio · 6 years

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FlashBack Friday Indie Music Playlist and Music Business News

Revisit some of your favorite indie artist tunes from 1 year ago today on this special Flashback Friday. Hosted by JACQUELINE JAX.

Listen to the show :

The Anchor Fm page: https://anchor.fm/ava-live-radio/episodes/FlashBack-Friday-Indie-Music-Playlist-and-Music-Business-News-e2rdsk

iHeartRadio station page : https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-AVA-Live-Radio-Musi-29336730/

The Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2toX0f3dPmI8gmUSOKZicx

FEATURING

A Wild Frontier – Almost Time For Christmas Rock, Alternative Rock, Indie Rock A Wild Frontier is excited to share their new Holiday single, “Almost Time For Christmas” with everyone. Following the release of their debut record earlier this Spring, they have released an acoustic EP, and now this Holiday treat. For fans of Weezer and early 2000’s alternative pop, A Wild Frontier delivers a fun, uplifting song about the holidays. They are currently finishing recording their follow up record and plan on releasing it in early 2018, stay tuned! LINKS: https://www.reverbnation.com/awildfrontier/song/28700225-almost-time-for-christmas https://open.spotify.com/album/4gvdtwisW5QNyoM47FSZoD http://www.twitter.com/AWildFrontier http://www.facebook.com/AWildFrontier http://www.instagram.com/AWildFrontier

Tim Johnson- Gone I started playing guitar in 1989. Wrote my first song “The Direction That I Took” in 1995 when I was only thirteen years old. After that, the songs started pouring out of me. I lost count somewhere around 300. I am now 34 years old and I have developed a style. I fit about 15 originals into my list of favorites. Starting with my first single “Gone”. My style is a blend of Rock, Southern Rock, Alternative, and Country. Some of my influences include, Cole Swindell, Jason Aldean, Seether, Chris Cornell, and Alice n Chains to name a few. https://www.reverbnation.com/timjohnson5/song/27856407-tim-johnson-gone-mastered-28mar17

Juneyt – Tesla Since moving to Canada from Turkey, Juneyt has built a large, dedicated following through his regular, electric performances throughout the Kitchener-Waterloo GTA area and beyond. https://www.reverbnation.com/juneyt/song/10638460-tesla

TODD BARROW – Outlaw In Me Genre: Country/Alternative Country The artist was discovered by his close Sonny Burgess (CMA) who was mentored by Charlie Pride and other legends. This led to working with winners circle music publishing with over 80 songwriters around the world. Since that time he continues to perform for many big shows and events. He works hard to produce the highest quality country music out there! Now get ready to listen to his new country release, “Outlaw In Me.” LINKS: : https://open.spotify.com/album/OD8pEnXiP9Ghkq0q1 https://geo.itunes.apple.com/us/album/outlaw-in-me/1318561219?i=1318561851&mt=1&app=music http://www.twitter.com/barrowtodd http://www.facebook.com/cowboyrockandroll http://www.instagram.com/ToddWayneBarrow

Tiona Campbell – Jesus and Coffee Genre / Sub-genre : Singer – songwriter Small Town girl,Tiona Campbell, was born and raised in East Texas. She grew up listening to Amy Grant, Mariah Carey and all kinds of country music. She loved to sing and spent a lot of time singing in her room, her daddy’s pick up truck and church. After she graduated High School she immediately got married at the age of 18, had kids and put music to the side. About 17 years later now living in Houston, TX she heard the Holy Spirit say ” write a song ” This lead her to Sarah Kelly, 2 time Grammy nominee, music school in Sept 2015. She learned how to write songs, play piano, and record demos. Only 1 year later she released her first single “Irrevocable ” on iTunes and Spotify in August 2016. The Holy Spirit told her to also share her journey and within 1 year she had over 8,000 followers on Instagram. She has played all over the Houston area such as Dossey Doe, Red Brick Tavern, Huti’s and is a worship leader at her home church Champion Life Center. She also performed her new song “Jesus and coffee ” t his August 2017 on Ealing Broadway street in London, UK. Tiona has performed in front of : -Brad O’Donnell, head of A&R of Capital Christian Music Group -Mike Clink, American record producer -Tobyn Hyman, talent producer for the show The Voice She had a LIVE interview with AVA Live Radio and her single “Irrevocable ” was featured on AVA Live radio as well. Her brand new EP “One of a kind” was just released Aug 1, 2017 on iTunes and Spotify. So what happens when you relinquish all control, step out in faith and obediently follow the Holy Spirit on a completely different path for your life? What does it truly mean to put yourself out there and try something new, despite feeling foolish, in order to see where God is leading you? Join her on this crazy ride and together let’s find out what happens when you surrender to the Holy Spirit and discover Gods plan for your life. https://youtu.be/4KTG_2GIwQc www.twitter.com/tionashari www.facebook.com/TionaCampbell www.instagram.com/tiona_music_journey_ www.tionacampbell.com

Lovey James – Tricks Master Pop Dance Fresh off of being a Top 20 Contestant on FOX’s American Idol, Lovey James continues to shine as one of America’s premier young performers. At a very early age of 6 years old, she was already performing for audiences in her hometown, Portland, OR, and all over the U.S. Now at 18 years old, Lovey continues to command the stage with her contagious upbeat energy and powerhouse vocals.She is currently wrapping up her first self-titled album with reputable music producer, Steve Sundholm who has worked with many A-list talent artists like Carrie Underwood and Hall & Oats. Her album launches this upcoming April and she is beyond excited to share it with friends and family alike. It bridges classic dance pop with vibrant soul. https://www.reverbnation.com/loveyjames/song/28166473-tricks

Dar.Ra – Phenomenal Genre / Sub-genre : Rock Dar.Ra is a really unique songwriter and producer who makes an Amazing blend of Rock and Soul Music (21st Artists Hollywood) Dar.Ra has been in the industry for a while with hits in the UK and Australia, signed to EMI,Festival and various dance labels over the years, remixing Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Tears 4 Fears, Savage Garden, and writing for Rachel Brown (Faithless, Groove Armada) plus having music on various Hollywood films like ‘Snakes on Planes’ films starring Hilary Duff on ABC TV, Match Of Day (BBC TV) and US Documentary City Of Hope. His first solo album Soul Hours was released in 2010 and made album of the week of Spain’s Heart FM, as well as received support from BBC Radio, playing to over 1 million people on air within a live show. He also has a well received book out called ‘Road Tales’ which has been getting brilliant reviews and is based on people Dar.Ra met while being the road from the late 1990’s to 2008.

https://youtu.be/y84XieBPrew www.kushadeep.co.uk www.facebook.com/kushadeepmusic www.twitter.com/kushadeepmusic

DOCTOR G & FUNKFUSION – VICTIM OF THE SYSTEM Genre: FUNK,HIP HOP New release from Doctor G raising awareness to an important issue that is occurring in our society today. The artist has gained recognition for past controversial song releases such as “Don’t call me Nigga” and is known for his honesty and promotion of social change. SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/album/1QCkOZUw3oTj2VKFIfIFbI?si=BEfqZVGwRxGWNKcwmRD24A SOUNDCLOUD: https://soundcloud.com/doctor-g-funkfusion/victim-of-the-system BAND SITE: http://doctorjsg.wixsite.com/greathouserecordsinc FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Doctor-G-FunkFusion/125424470831273?ref=hl INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/doctorgfunkfusion/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/FunkFusionBand

Ricky Davila – Insanity Genre: Pop/R&B/Soul Ricky Davila is a Singer-songwriter and Recording Artist from Philadelphia, PA best known for his powerful vocals and soothing timbre. Ricky’s first ever recorded and written song ‘Insanity’ is a about a love that goes passed its breaking point and is also the lead single of his debut EP ‘Brain Activity’. Let his voice take you on a journey. Let his voice be your guide. Reverbnation link: https://www.reverbnation.com/rickydavila/song/25087719-ricky-davila-insanity Spotify link: https://open.spotify.com/track/5F8Z6Dtr3g4pu5znReUUY7 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RickyDavilaOfficial Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rickydavila\ Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/TheRickyDavila

#Ricky Davila #popmusic #flashback friday #DOCTOR G & FUNKFUSION #Dar.Ra #hip hop music #Rock Music #Lovey James #pop music #Tiona Campbell #singer songwriter #TODD BARROW #country music #Juneyt #Tim Johnson #A Wild Frontier #Alternative Rock

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silicagalley1-blog · 6 years

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Case Study A Journey from Self-Publishing to Hybrid Success

Case Study: How Self-Publishing Led Author Jonathan French to Hybrid Success

Jonathan French’s approach to self-publishing played an important role in how editors and agents perceived his book, and persuaded French to reevaluate his perspective on how authors can, and should, break into print.

author photo credit: Monica Nwaigwe

On a Sunday night in October 2016, Jonathan French stepped into the spotlight on the small stage of the Highland Ballroom in Atlanta. He sat on a wooden bar stool, turned to page one of his epic fantasy novel The Grey Bastards, and captivated the room.

French evoked crisp, cinematic images of Jackal, his half-orc protagonist. Flanked by two half-breed comrades, Jackal prepared to face off with an arrogant cavalry captain: a human who would learn never to provoke a Grey Bastard. On stage, French proved to be a gifted storyteller controlling the pitch and tone of his voice like a seasoned raconteur. At the end of his reading, the crowd applauded with an enthusiasm that had been absent during his introduction. Little did French know that his career was on the edge of a breakthrough.

French completed his first novel, The Exiled Heir, in 2010. At the time, his wife worked as a ghostwriter and beta reader for a midlist thriller novelist. Her position put him in contact with some good-to-know folks. “I did the traditional pursuit first because I wanted to see if we could make that work,” French explained. He pitched to agents and editors at writers’ conferences and even captured the interest of a few agents, but failed to secure a deal.

In 2012, after a solid coaxing from a well-trusted friend, French self-published The Exiled Heir. “Sales weren’t phenomenal,” he confessed, but by then, he was fully committed to finding success as an independently published author. French made himself visible the best way he knew how: by attending conventions and book festivals across the country.

He started earning supplemental income from the sale of his books and joined indie publishing panels as a guest speaker, fervently expressing the need for authors to write quality books and invest in professional packaging to compete in the marketplace. He went on to write The Errantry of Bantam Flyn, a sequel to The Exiled Heir, and a brand new first-in-series novel, The Grey Bastards, which turned out to be a game-changer.

French entered The Grey Bastards into the Self-Publishing Fantasy Blog-off (SPFBO), an annual contest hosted by grimdark fantasy novelist Mark Lawrence. Similar to the Self-Published Book Awards hosted by Writer’s Digest, the concept for SPFBO is simple: provide a platform where indie writers can be seen and heard by community influencers. Lawrence recognized that established authors face less of a challenge promoting their books than new or self-published writers do, so he wanted to level the playing field.

The lack of visibility was a struggle French knew all too well. “I was doing some things right, but I was not able to do enough on the side of it, to where my signal was outdoing any noise,” French said. “I wasn’t hitting that critical mass of readers.”

Over the course of the contest, The Grey Bastards climbed the ranks with stellar scores from influential fantasy book bloggers. According to French, something odd happened halfway through the judging process. “I get this email with the subject heading ‘Hi, from an Editor.’ That was all it said,” French recalled. “The signature line was Penguin Random House.”

Julian Pavia—editor of The Martian by Andy Weir, Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline, and City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett—discovered The Grey Bastards through SPFBO and loved it. “I’d vaguely followed the contest in its first year and had checked out one or two [writers] of that first batch of finalists,” Pavia said, “so I already knew it was finding talented writers. As I saw how the judges were responding to The Grey Bastards, I was intrigued enough to pick it up.”

French’s approach to self-publishing played an important role in how Pavia perceived his book. When looking for talent, Pavia, who casually browses blog reviews, contests, and the also bought section on Amazon, said, “I mostly just want to feel that an author’s made an effort to put together a real product, [and] that they hold themselves to a high standard. That was definitely the case with the package Jonathan had put together… it’s important to get the little things right.”

coursework help expressed a desire to have the book formally pitched to him. “Within four days,” French said, still astonished by the rapid response and genuine interest in his book, “I’m getting emails from agents who are not only interested, they’ve read it [Grey Bastards] within that short amount of time and know it backward and forward.”

In the end, French chose to be represented by Cameron McClure from the Donald Maass Literary Agency. Although French is not the first self-published author McClure has taken on, he is the first for whom she secured a two-book deal. On pitching the story, McClure says, “The Grey Bastards opens with a very strong and distinct narrative voice that I knew would make people sit up [and] pay attention.”

The experience persuaded French to reevaluate his perspective on how authors can, and should, break into print. “I admit it,” he said. “I was that guy that used to go to cons, railing against the gatekeepers, then I started dealing with these people, and it was like, I’m wrong—at least about the people who really know what they’re doing.”

Going forward, his advice to writers is one that nurtures an open mind and a hybrid approach. “If you find success in one and never want to cross [over] to the other, fine,” he said. “But if you do [cross over], each side is making you better at the other. Being a self-published author makes me a better traditionally published author, and now I’m hopeful that what I learn being a traditional guy is going to make me a better self-published guy.”

Learn more about Jonathan French at www.jonathanfrenchbooks.com.

Find success in self-publishing at indieLAB.

If you’re confident in your craft and are ready to explore self-publishing options, or are looking for ways to earn a living with your writing beyond book sales, indieLAB is the conference you’ve been looking for. indieLAB—the newest conference from Writer’s Digest—is curated especially for entrepreneurial authors, freelance writers and independent publishers seeking to develop a publishing strategy, build a platform, grow an audience and get paid for their work.

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topicprinter · 6 years

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Ray Dalio is a particular man. He founded Bridgewater, the world's largest hedge fund, which manages over $150 billion.As of right now, Ray is worth more than $15 billion, and also the author of Principles, the NYTimes best seller.But this story isn't about Ray - it's about how Principles became a book in the first place. It's a story about generosity and taking what resources you have to seek a more enriching life.PrinciplesRay gained fame after the 2008 market crash; he had shorted the market and made a killing.Following the market crashing and Ray's windfall, people hounded him to understand how he did it. People wanted to know the fundamentals on how Ray operated.Listening to the people, Ray wrote Principles.When I say write, I mean he wrote out his thoughts in Word and posted it online as a PDF. The information was substantial and novel. Quite a few would go so far as to say it was incredible.But: the production quality did not match.meh looking PDFYou know how an indie film can become a darling with the critics and subsequently a cult classic? That's what Principles became.The original PDF was a file you had to go looking for. The URL was something akin to bwater.com/file_upload/principlesdraft3.pdf and no official site or page existed. It was never marketed or promoted, but the wisdom contained within made it a viral hit. Eventually, over 3 million people would download that PDF on word-of-mouth alone.One of those readers was Phil Caravaggio. A man who would call that PDF extraordinary and life-changing would do something extraordinary himself.Meet Phil CaravaggioIf you open up Principles, you'll see this at the front of the book:acknowledgement"Whatever beauty you see in the book's design was the result of Phil Caravaggio's generosity and talent. After I put the original version of Principles online as a PDF, he came to me as a stranger bearing the gift of a gorgeously designed print edition, created with the help of the artistic book designer Rodrigo Corral."Phil is the co-founder of Precision Nutrition, a well-respected nutrition company that operates in three areas:Nutrition coaching via habit formationNutrition certification for health professionalsSaaS software that helps health professionals manage their clientsPhil's co-founder Dr. John Berardi is a leading figure in the health and fitness space - he advises companies such as Apple, Nike, and Equinox, and has worked with clients such as MMA fighter Georges St-Pierre.Their partnership is a marriage of complementary skills. John is the face and brings the nutrition knowledge, and Phil brings the underlying business and processes savvy.The company exemplifies bootstrapped success - 16 years old, reliable mid-8 figures revenue, and I often cite them as an example of "professionalism" (something severely lacking in the health and fitness space).I consider myself fortunate to count both Phil and John as my friend.Phil is the co-founder of Precision Nutrition, a powerhouse in the nutrition space.Never resist a generous impulseOne of Phil's favorite saying is "never resist a generous impulse."So back in 2014, Phil comes across a video featuring Ray (How the economic machine works). Blown away at the information presented, he goes seeking more information on Ray and comes across his PDF.Three pages in, Phil thinks to himself: "This is one of the best things I've ever read in my life."By the time he finishes reading, Phil has realized he's stumbled upon a goldmine of knowledge. Most people writing about business have never done what they're talking about, and here's this guy who, in the midst of running this business at the highest level, documented how they did it.For most people, this would mean sharing it on social media. For the more enamored, this may mean writing an email or article about it.Phil decided to leverage his assets and go one step further.So Phil goes out and hires a proofreader. He tells him to go through the PDF and to clean it up; the goal here was to clean it up a bit to make it timeless.Phil then turns to Rodrigo Corral, a famous and renowned book designer who has designed award-winning books for peeps like Jay-Z, Chuck Palahniuk (he of “Fight Club”), and more.Together, they produce the original book form of Principles.I'm kind of hand-waving over all of this, but it was hard work. Phil didn't just hand it off to them and let them run with it; he was actively engaged in cleaning it up and putting it all together.Originally thinking it would take a few months, it took Phil nearly a year to get a finished book in his hands.Phil found Principles so life-changing that, as an expression of thanks, he had it cleaned up, designed, and put together as a book.The easy part over, a bigger challenge awaited Phil: how the hell does he get the book in front of Ray Dalio himself?Phils spends months and months trying to find someone that might have a connection to Ray.Finally, after eight months, he finds a connection:Someone (Person A) who had applied for a job at Precision Nutrition heard of Phil's project. Via LinkedIn, Person A found another person (Person B), who had worked with someone (Person C), who had gone to school with someone (Person D), in Ray's office.(I had to letter the people so you'd see how stretched out and tenuous the connection was).To re-state: Phil Caravaggio → Person A → Person B → Person C → Person D (connection) → Ray DalioPerson D gets connected to Phil, and not knowing what to think, asks if they can meet in Connecticut.So Phil flies to Connecticut and meets her in a garden center that has a coffee shop.(I just want to pause and note the absurdity. Here's Phil flying to CT to meet some lady who has no clue who he is so that he can give her a book to give to Ray.)The person informs Phil that she cannot promise anything; she can get Ray to see the book, but what happens after that is entirely out of her control."That's fine; cool" says Phil. He just wants a shot to get the book in front of Ray.She then wanted to why what Phil was trying to do. Was he a publisher? What was his angle?"No, it's just a gift. This is the God's honest truth - it just really meant something to me."Phil wants to build a sizeable company, and how better to do it than receive mentorship from someone who has already done it?But that was a secondary concern. The primary goal was to show appreciation to someone who had fundamentally changed his outlook. It was about not resisting a generous impulse, no matter how crazy it seems.Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months, and Phil hears nothing. Phil assumes nothing will happen.I have to note again - I know Phil. We hang out regularly, and he'd previously told me that I needed to read Principles. At no point in time does he tell me he's made a physical copy of this. At no point does he tell me what great lengths he's gone to into spreading this book. At no point in time does he ever show even a modicum of bitterness...He keeps hammering away at me: "you need to read this book."One day, Phil is vacationing in Italy. His phone rings; caller id says the call is from Connecticut, and he picks up the phone to hear Ray's executive assistant on the other side. The reception is really weak, and as Phil tries to find a better connection, Ray gets on the phone.Ray was over the top complimentary. About how it's amazing and how beautiful it is. He tells Phil that he wants to do something with it, and Phil offers to help. Ray takes him up on it, and Phil and his wife fly down to Connecticut.And that is how Phil Caravaggio played a part in helping Principles go from a simple PDF to a legitimate NYT Best Seller.Bestseller bookPhil wanted to show his appreciation for something he valued highly; instead of thinking "this is crazy," he made it happen.But what about ME (aka you)?You may be reading this and think "well good for Phil - he has time, money, resources, and connections - and I have none of those."100% true.(Well 99% - as the CEO of Precision Nutrition, he was incredibly busy and short on time.)Phil spent over $50,000 converting that PDF into a book (his logic: if you're going to do it, do it right).That's not something I could afford to do without mulling it over.With that said, I did spend over $7000 making the NYC Chocolate Chip Cookie Off happen.You may see these numbers and think "hey asshole, I don't even have that much in savings, much less throw it into some other side project."It's not about the $50000. Or the $7000. It's not about the time or the people we know.The point is that we both used the skills and assets we had available to ourselves as leverage to make something we cared about happen.I mean, Phil had to go four-levels deep to find a way of just getting something to Ray... not even an actual introduction! And even that took months and months.We worked within the realms of our means.For example, anytime I come across something interesting, I share it. Not only that, I almost always reach out to the author (via email or twitter) to let them know how much I enjoyed it.That's me not resisting a generous impulse.Read a great book that you think someone will enjoy? Send it to them! Ryan Holiday and Shane Parrish have both talked about how often they buy books).It's not about the money; it's about the thought. A $10 cocktail or a five dollar chocolate can be very meaningful.> If it's within you means: never resist a generous impulse.A case study: #cookielifeThe entire #cookielife and subsequent charity food off madness started because I told my friend Kara "this cookie is amazing and you need to try it so I'm going to buy you one."I didn't just say it; I insisted we go and that it would be my treat.We went to Le Gourmand, and I spent a grand total of $6.00 to purchase two cookies.To use Phil's phrase, "I didn't resist the generous impulse" (mine: "this cookie is delicious and others need to experience the deliciousness").Subsequently, that lead to over 200 cookies sent to me via mail, over $50000 raised via charity food offs (in just 2017 - we should double that in 2018), and countless friendships and amazing memories formed...All from spending $6.00 (in Canadian dollars!) over two years ago.People come across my love for cookies and think I've got some ulterior motive; that my affinity for cookies is some exercise in personal branding. But then they meet me and then they understand - I just love sharing stuff I like. Cookies. Chocolates. Food. Dinners. Books. Stories. Connections. Random gifts.Hell, I just spent $300 taking a buddy's book (that had a positive impact on me) and getting a beautiful leatherbound version made of it.All because I ran across a company that does it, and thought to myself "man, [redacted] would look awesome as a leatherbound book."I got leatherbound booksIt's never about a master plan. It's never about "what will I get back?" It's about (and this will sound cliché and very life-coach-ish) giving back and making a positive impact.You don't need to have a grandiose plan to "change the lives of millions of people". You don't need to be some inspirational and aspirational figure that everyone adores and loves. Just a bit of generosity goes a long way.My buddy Nate (who has worked for Precision Nutrition) wrote about Phil and the genesis of the book and he summed it up perfectly:For me, it means trying to live every day with what the hippies and self-help gurus call an "abundance mindset." It means pushing away the feelings of insecurity, competition, fear, and scarcity, and embracing the fact that there's enough for everyone to go around. The pie is big enough for everyone to have a piece. And the only true way to get ahead is to give. Because the more I give, and the more gratitude I show, and the more I try to help, the happier I am.(One day I'll be half as eloquent as Nate.)It's not about karma. It's not about a balance sheet investment - "give, and you'll get 10x back." And it's not about showing off your generosity.It is about sharing whenever you want, and letting anything you get out of it be a byproduct, not the expected result.Never resist a generous impulse.

#/r/entrepreneur #reddit

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char27martin · 7 years

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You’ve Got Mail: What Writers Need to Know About eNewsletters

Journalist Ann Friedman started her e-newsletter, The Ann Friedman Weekly, after she lost her magazine job. Formerly the executive editor at GOOD, she was navigating the world of freelancing and looking for a way to keep her name fresh in editors’ minds. Not only has it since helped her land many assignments, but the newsletter—which contains curated articles she finds interesting alongside her own original pieces, as well as GIFs and the “occasional product endorsement”—has developed an impressive following of more than 25,000 subscribers.

Friedman isn’t alone. Writers of all stripes are now turning to this once written-off tool as a device to reach readers as directly as possible—right in their own inbox. And for those who make it a priority, providing consistent, quality content to their subscribers, a newsletter can pay major dividends.

This guest post is by Dinsa Sachan. Sachan curates an e-newsletter packed with international science and culture news. Subscribe at dinsasachan.com/nucleus and follow her @dinsasachan.

Why To Launch an e-Newsletter

If you’re a freelancer, an e-newsletter can announce your latest bylines to your audience. Many journalists use it to keep friends, family and dedicated readers up to speed on their work.

For some writers, the newsletter is the new blog. (Though the two can also work in tandem—many bloggers use newsletters to help circulate their posts.) Ariane Resnick, author of The Thinking Girl’s Guide to Drinking, set up an email list because a blog seemed like an ineffective use of her time. “I was looking for a way to offer advice and recipes,” Resnick says. “But I don’t enjoy blogging: You create content, put it out, and no one might see it.” She is also using the newsletter to expand her brand. “Rather than just being considered a chef and a nutritionist, it’s been helpful to show people that I have more to offer in the general lifestyle realm.”

Fantasy novelist Suzanne Johnson says her monthly newsletter—which includes blog posts, giveaways and news about her most recent releases—has been her most effective marketing tool. “There are thousands of books published every month,” Johnson says. “So how do you find true readers and how do you keep them engaged between books?”

A newsletter is a more targeted marketing tool than a blog because readers are able to opt in (or out) of their own volition. Even if your audience is small, those who subscribe are doing so with a built-in interest in your work. They’re your biggest fans, your best customers. Author Jessica Scott, who writes contemporary fiction, recently started selling her indie books on Amazon, iBooks and other platforms. Every time she sends out a newsletter (which features early news about new books, teasers of latest releases, and the occasional “random bit of information”) she sees a 30–40 percent bump in sales. When entertainment and travel journalist Valentina Valentini started sending out her e-newsletter featuring her clips, she was flooded with pitches from publicists: “[They] wrote to me saying, ‘Oh I didn’t know you wrote for so and so. That would be great for this client I have.’”

While most offer their newsletter for free, some have even managed to convert it into a revenue stream. The Ann Friedman Weekly makes money in two ways—through subscriptions and classified ads. When readers subscribe for $5 per year, they receive additional, exclusive content. The e-newsletter also features four to five classified ads, for which Friedman typically charges between $50–100. “It’s very difficult if you’re a freelance writer to have a revenue stream that you control,” she says. “I take a lot of career security in the fact that this is a thing I built. Even if it’s not a ton of money, it’s income I can count on.”

[Get your creative juices flowing by trying this 12-Day plan of simple writing exercises.]

How to Hook Subscribers

While it can be tempting to start off by adding everyone in your address book to your subscriber list, Friedman warns against it. “It’s terrible practice,” she says. “The only person I added was my mother.” Instead, to garner subscribers, add a subscribe button to your website, and promote the newsletter as relentlessly as you can on your social media accounts. (You can even designate “Sign Up” as a call to action at the top of your Facebook page.) It’s also smart to send polite email invites to trusted writer friends and editors—without being too pushy, of course. And don’t forget to plug a link into your email signature.

Once you’ve begun to build a list, your e-newsletter must provide some kind of inherent value to keep subscribers engaged. What you choose to include will depend on the type of writing you do, as well as what you plan to achieve.

Scott offered six chapters of her new release as a freebie to her subscribers. In her September 2016 newsletter, Johnson enticed her readers to preorder a copy of her upcoming novel by raffling off a Kindle Fire. Readers could enter the drawing by preordering the book or sending her a postcard. She also routinely offers subscriber exclusives, such as deleted scenes or a sneak peek into a new cover.

In anticipation of her new parenting book in 2018, independent journalist Katherine Reynolds Lewis is using her e-newsletter to build her platform as a parenting expert. Her January newsletter began with a personal note, which she followed up with some book recommendations and curated articles on parenting.

An important note: If you want a loyal readership for your e-newsletter, you must send it regularly. Friedman is fiercely punctual with her weekly send. In the last four years, she has only missed four weeks.

[Do you underline book titles? Underline them? Put book titles in quotes? Find out here.]

What to Watch For

Keep in mind that you’re not sending out a company newsletter, so don’t make it sound like one by using a stiff voice. Employ a casual, professional tone—one that implies a level of intimacy. “A big mistake is to see the newsletter just as a vehicle for selling,” Lewis says. “It should really be a vehicle for engagement.”

Second, recognize the importance of tracking statistics—seeing who’s opening your emails (and who’s not), and what subjects are most popular with your readers (based on click-thru rates). Most newsletter services charge based on total number of subscribers, so make sure your list is fine-tuned to include only your target, active readers. After Scott’s list grew to 21,000 subscribers, she used analytics to see how many of them actively engaged with her newsletter, and ended up cutting her base by almost half.

Finally, don’t set up an e-newsletter if your heart isn’t into it. “If you’re a writer who thinks about this as a chore, it’s not going to be [a good use of your time],” Friedman says. But for those who do invest the energy, an e-newsletter can be an essential piece of your authorial platform.

ORDER NOW: The Brainstorm New Ideas Value Pack is designed to help you succeed with proven tips on structures, hooks, characters, dialogue, viewpoints, settings, and more. Only available online here at the WritersDigestShop.

This post is edited by Writer’s Digest Managing Editor Tyler Moss. In addition to working with new submissions and a regular stable of freelance contributors to WD, his own freelance credits include Conde Nast Traveler, The Atlantic, Outside and New York magazines.

Follow Tyler on Twitter @tjmoss11.

The post You’ve Got Mail: What Writers Need to Know About eNewsletters appeared first on WritersDigest.com.

from Writing Editor Blogs – WritersDigest.com http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/youve-got-mail

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mylincolncole-blog · 8 years

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Print on Demand: Createspace, KDP Print, IngramSpark, and More!

You finished writing...Not comes the hard part...

You put in the months of hard work and wrote something great. Well done and congratulations, and now you want to show it off to the world.

But the world can be a scary place for new authors looking to make a name for themselves. There are hundreds of companies out there looking to charge you money for various services, many of which you can perform on your own.

For example, you can post your book on KDP and sell it on Amazon for free. It will only take you a short amount of time to make an account and do this, and when you're done you'll be able to say you are a published author. But, from personal experience and talking to a lot of people over my career, I can say that there is nothing quite like holding a paperback copy in your hands.

Sure, people are reading your words in eBook, but what you really want is that dead tree to hold onto and admire. Printing a paperback can be one of the most rewarding parts of the entire writing process.

I, personally, release all of my books in eBook, Paperback, Hardcopy, and audio formats.

What options are there?

When it comes to finding the right system for printing your books, you have some tough decisions to make: should you go with a vanity press and print out a bunch of copies, or a print on demand company that will only create copies as books are ordered? There are advantages and disadvantages to either approach.

If you plan to sell and give away a lot of copies, then you're going to want to get those copies as cheaply as possible. You can save pennies on each copy by printing a run of books at all once, but then you run into the downside of having to store those copies and how to ship them when people order them.

Print on demand, on the other hand, has a very low cost of entry. In fact, it is possible to publish your book in paperback and have it up for sale on hundreds of websites entirely without spending a dime. The downside here is that, since the books aren't already created, when people order a copy it might take them a couple of days to actually make the copy before they ship it.

On top of these differences, each different company that offers a service like this has minor differences and variations to their process that impact their overall value.

CreateSpace

This is an Amazon company. It falls under the umbrella of services they offer, and as such many people will recognize it for what it is if your book says it is distributed by Createspace.

This is a good thing because it has powerful branding, but it can be seen as a negative as well: many booksellers don't like Amazon on principle (they think it is destroying the industry) so there can be some negative reactions to using it. The other downside is that it is a staple process for self-published authors, so not only will you be flagged as an Amazon author, you'll be flagged as self-published.

Will this lose you sales? It depends. Many authors never really sell a lot of paperback copies, and even when they do they often sell them through Amazon. However, if you are more established and really want to move the needle in the paperback market, then this option has some severe limitations.

Some of its benefits are that you can order author copies cheap, offer discounts (though only through the CreateSpace store, which kind of sucks), and set up and distribution are incredibly simple.

IngramSpark

Ingram is huge in the publishing world, a major global distributor. ImgramSpark is a branch of their LightningSource distribution platform and is keyed toward Indie Authors and Print on Demand services.

Authors used to be able to sign up for LightningSource instead if they really wanted, which was basically an identical service with some technical difference, but now everyone is funneled here.

Which isn't to say this lacks anything LightningSource has: Spark is a great platform and has evolved and grown throughout the years. It's fairly easy to set up a new book (though not as easy as CreateSpace). It's biggest advantage, however, is that when you sell books internationally and outside Amazon you still make the full value of your sale in royalties, which can be a huge difference if you sell a lot of copies.

KDP Print

This is a new program offered by Amazon where you can sell your books directly on the Amazon platform alongside and linked to the Kindle version. You can even import from CreateSpace onto this system.

It is pretty much identical to CreateSpace except it is somewhat limited in features. It is new, still in Beta, so they are working on the kinks and bugs.

For the most part it is interchangeable with CreateSpace and will eventually have some new perks and benefits.

Lulu

This is a more full service platform, and will serve as a stand-in for a lot of different companies. Lulu is easy to use and works fairly well, and its better for authors who want to work with a company the entire way and centralize a lot of their process.

Other Options

There are tons of ways to get books published, including a lot of companies similar to Lulu, and many of them offer some little perks or benefits. However, keep in mind that any of them that ask for a lot of money upfront usually aren't worth it, because with a little bit of extra work you can do almost anything for free, or at least a lot cheaper than they want.

Remember: these companies are there to make money off of YOU, not your readers.

Item 1: Setup/Adjust Pricing

With all of these platforms, you need to have your own well-formatted cover and interior file, though if you make the same book in both places the files can be nearly identical. Createspace is free to setup a new title, as well as modify the interior and cover files when you want to make changes. IngramSpark has a $49 fee to create a new title, as well as a $25 fee to update the files individually if you ever want to make changes (for formatting, edits, etc.).

There are discounts and coupons you can get (IngramSpark often offers between 10%-100% discounts for initial setup to bring new people in) but they aren't always available. And, even then, if you make eventual changes you will still need to pay for them.

KDP is probably the easiest platform to set-up, because since you probably already have your ebook on the platform, you can import most of the information over to use as a paperback. They also have a clever cover builder to generate a cover, though you'll probably want to build your own down the line.

Item 2: Quality

All companies print books on demand, which means they will source books when necessary and then ship them directly to customers. Ingram has suppliers all over the world, and CreateSpace has suppliers in the US and UK. You can't control the supplier in either case, which means they will choose who prints/ships based on proximity and cost.

However, anecdotally (and consistently) it seems that there is a much greater variance between CreateSpace distributors than IngramSpark. Many people have reported bad prints, missed pages, entirely wrong interior files, and other problems from CreateSpace. Some of their suppliers are worse than other, and some are downright terrible, which means there is a randomness to it that can be detrimental.

Side by side comparison of them at their best, Ingram takes this category with a slight edge, but they win hands down when you factor in that it could take several tries for CreateSpace to get you a good copy.

KDP uses the same service as CreateSpace, which isn't too bad, and they do seem to be doing a better job now of making the books better. I used Lulu once to print a batch of books since they were cheaper than Ingram, and I found out they were just that: cheaper. They looked and felt crummy, and you could see right through the pages if you held them up to light. I'll never use them again.

Item 3 - Distribution and Pricing

Both companies let you set your own price, and you can charge hundreds of dollars per book if you want. You shouldn't, but you can. With Ingram, you can even set regional pricing on your own, as well as percentage discounts for buyers, which gives you even more control.

CreateSpace has an option called expanded distribution which enables your book for distribution beyond their initial three platforms. What they don't tell you is that they use LightningSource as their distributor, so if you use that option, you'll be using Ingram anyway.

The other thing they don't tell you is that they use Ingram, but poorly and everyone loses out. To explain what I mean, let me give you a rundown of how bookstores purchase books:

Let's say your book costs 10 dollars. When a bookstore buys it, there are two major features they look at: their discount, and whether or not it is returnable. With Ingram, you set your discount between 30% and 55%, and it is completely up to you. With CreateSpace, you have no control over it.

Bookstore owners usually like books to be in the 45%-55% range discount (i.e. they pay $4.50 for your book and make $5.50 in revenue which could be good profit). They also want it to be returnable (for 90 days they can send it back if they feel like it won't sell).

Ingram gives you three options for returns: none, mail, destroy. With both options for actual returns, you will have to cover the cost of printing the book and returning the book, but if you choose destroy they will simply throw your book away and you won't have to pay shipping to get it back. If a book isn't returnable, bookstores are less likely to take a chance on it.

CreateSpace sets these options as non-returnable and 35% discount for stores (so they pay $6.50 per copy and make less profit). These aren't great terms, so bookstores are less likely to want to carry your book if you use Expanded Distribution.

They also take their cut directly out of this. If you set those terms on IngramSpark, you would get around $3.00 royalty per copy sold, but with CreateSpace you get about $0.95 cents.

At this point Ingram clearly seems like the winner in this category, but there are a few nuances to keep in mind: first off, having control over your global pricing sounds cool, but in practice you need to sell a LOT of books for it to pay off. If you're only selling a few here and there then it isn't nearly as valuable. Second, CreateSpace is definitely Amazon's Preferred Vendor, which means Amazon will always source from CreateSpace. What's more, they will stock your CreateSpace book in warehouses so that when people order they can get it quicker and see the 'In Stock' tag on your product page.

However, I've had luck using Ingram setting higher discounts and getting Amazon to discount further. If you sell your book for $10 and set a 50% discount, Amazon might actually sell it for $8 giving readers the impression that it is marked down in price, which can help with sales. Since you make more money through Ingram anyway, this can be a viable strategy to modifying your product page to be more enticing.

Item 4: ISBN Distribution

All companies offer the ability to buy an ISBN directly on the website during product creation, and their pricing is fairly comparable. CreateSpace and KDP will allow you to use a free ISBN if you want and they will be your 'publishing company.' Many authors don't like this because it screams 'self-published book' but it is a completely viable way of publishing a book without spending any money at all. They used to have another option buy a cheap non-transferable ISBN as well, but they dropped it.

Either way, CreateSpace and KDP still have more options and is the winner of this category. Though, if you are actually planning to publish more than one book, I would highly recommend buying directly from Bowker and owning your ISBN rather than using either company. You can get ten ISBNs for the price of two there, and you can buy larger packages to save a lot of money down the line.

Note, this only applies to US users, because in Canada and elsewhere there are free or cheaper options for getting ISBNs.

Item 5: Options and Ease of Use

Most of these companies are easy to use, though the CreateSpace UI is more intuitive and KDP is easier still, so they have the upper hand here. However, Ingram has more overall options, including the ability to make hard copies. This is a huge plus in their favor, because even though paperbacks legitimize a book, there is nothing like holding a hard copy of your work in hand with a dust jacket you can take off and admire. Lulu is also easy to use, but again I cannot recommend them because of their downsides.

What should you do?

All of these companies are great for publishing a paperback copy of your book. CreateSpace wins out as being easier to setup and get started and the preferred Amazon vendor, as well as having better options for ISBN, and Ingram wins out as the better distributor and giving you more control over pricing.

There is, however, an alternative to picking either of these individually, and that is to use two as distributors. If you buy your own ISBN through Bowker, you can load the exact same book onto multiple platforms. Make sure not to turn on the expanded distribution option in CreateSpace (since they use Ingram anyway).

With this method, Ingram will distribute your book globally, and Amazon will source from CreateSpace or KDp. You'll no longer get the huge cut out of your profits when selling books outside of Amazon, but you will also get the benefits of having an Amazon preferred setup where Amazon will always keep your book in stock, even if they've never printed a single copy.

I do this with paperbacks of my fiction novels, and I wait until a 'free' promotion before loading onto Ingram to keep costs down.

My recommendation?

If you only plan to sell on Amazon, just use the KDP print option or CreateSpace. If you want to sell globally and use a few platforms, then use IngramSpark. If you are a power user and you want to really sell your book, then use KDP Print to source for Amazon and IngramSpark for global distribution, and simply use your own ISBN so that wherever people buy it they get the same book.

There are a lot of different options out there for printing your books on demand, and not all of them are equal. Hopefully, the information I've given you here will help you make an informed decision.

If you have something to add or think I'm wrong about my analysis somewhere, then sound off in the comments below! Let us know what you do to print!

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