Finish Everything – Yes or No?

Many writers have a tall stack of uncompleted projects. Or a bulging Pendaflex file. Or files on their desktop or in folders buried on their hard drive. The question is what to do with all these ideas.

Are all ideas meant to be finished? Should some languish for months and years? Should some be tossed? Good question.

One perspective is that in order to succeed, writers need to learn to finish projects. It’s important to learn to complete what you start. Too often we start projects and lose interest. Editors and agents want to know that you’ll finish the project to get to acceptable book or article. Your spouse or friends want to see something completed too.

Many writers are good at starting projects – but spotty at finishing them. Remember that any project worth doing, should be done well.

So when should you quit a project? Here are my thoughts:

• If it is too big for you at this stage and would pull you away from other timely projects.
• If you have a project with a deadline, everything else needs to come second.
• If you have lost interest in the project.
• If it is too far beyond your capabilities.

Take your time. Go after the projects that have a chance at getting published?

Throw Your Spaghetti!

This is a guest post from Joanne Kraft and used with her permission from a post a Inspire Writers.  

Parents are known for their one-liners, and mine were no exception. “Do it once, do it right, then forget about it.” Wise words imprinted on my heart as my military father explained how to mop the kitchen floor.

Now, with four children of my own, I’ve discovered there are a few one-liners I’ve batted around long enough to stick with my four kids as well. My personal favorite?

Throw your spaghetti!

I use this saying to encourage family and friends to knock on every door in their path, and walk through and follow-thru when that door opens.

This saying originates from the traditional Italian way of testing pasta. The cook throws a handful of spaghetti noodles against the wall and if a few strands stick the pasta’s ready. If the noodles fall to the ground—the pasta remains in the boiling water.

Here are a few life examples of what “Throw Your Spaghetti” looks like:

While attending a writer’s conference, I was surrounded by hundreds of wannabee-authors like myself who dreamed of a coveted publishing contract. When I had the chance to talk with some of them, I was amazed by their talent, awed by their creative ideas, and immediately anxious about ever being good enough.

One of those gifted writers spoke with me, “I just got back my edited manuscript. It’s full of red ink. The editor suggested I talk with another publisher.” She moped.

“So, what are you waiting for? There are lots of publishers here you could talk to.” I reminded her.

“I don’t know. I really had hoped this editor would want it for her publishing house. I’m thinking it’s not meant to be for me.” She mumbled.

“Are you kidding? You have a gift, and you’re going to let a rejection from one publisher hold you back from your dream? C’mon get out there and meet with everyone you can. Throw your spaghetti!”

My college-aged daughter called to share, “Mom, I just found out about another college that offers a fellowship for creative writing. But, the problem is, I’m not sure if I should stick to my number one school choice in Iowa, or try for this one too?”

“Honey, there are no guarantees you’ll get into your first choice, so I’d apply for both. Throw your spaghetti!”

I’d flown cross-country to attend a women’s conference in the hopes of sharing my book idea with a few publishing houses. By divine miracle, my late registration didn’t hold me back from appointments with publishers.

I called my husband to share my progress. “Paul, I just met with a gal who taught a workshop about pitching my book idea. She said what I have isn’t good enough for a book.”

“I’m sorry, who told you? Did God tell you that?” Sarcasm oozed over every syllable.

“No, God did not tell me that!” Irritation got the best of me.

“Well then, I suggest you keep your appointments with the publishers and pitch your book idea. Throw your spaghetti!”

He was right. I kept both of my appointments. Each publisher gave me the green light to send in my full book proposal. Months later, those same publishers emailed rejections. But, I did what I do best—I threw my spaghetti and submitted my work over and over again.

What manuscript have you buried for lack of follow-thru? What gift have you ignored because you believe you aren’t good enough, pretty enough, or smart enough? Start working on your follow-thru, and perseverance, and throw your spaghetti.

Oh, and that book idea I was telling you about? You can find it on Amazon.

What holds you back from trying one more time?

Who encourages you to throw your spaghetti?

 

Joanne Kraft is a recovering too-busy mom and the author of Just Too Busy–Taking Your Family on a Radical Sabbatical. A writer and sought-after speaker, Joanne’s articles have been published by In Touch, Thriving Family, ParentLife, Today’s Christian Woman, and P31 Woman. She’s appeared on CBN News, Focus on the Family’s afternoon show – Your Family Live, Sacramento & Co., and The Harvest Show.

Finding Time to Write

We live in a busy world and finding time to write can be difficult. For most of us, finding time to write is a balancing act unless you are:

1. Retired
2. Married to someone who works so you don’t have to
3. Rich
4. A full time writer

I fall in none of the four categories. In fact, I work full time and with my commute, I am gone 12 hours a day – nine days every two weeks. My time to write is evenings and weekends.

Most of us have to balance work, commute, families with young children, caring for a family member, activities of children, community and church ministry commitments, and more.

What helps me might help you. Here is how I manage:

1. I have an iPad2. This allows me to plan using mind mapping apps and write using writing apps. The iPad2 is instant on and off when I open and close the cover. I can use it anywhere. When I am in a WiFi location, I can email files to my home computer or laptop or visa versa. The iPad2 helps me be productive anywhere and anytime.
2. I use several thumb drives. I have a 1Gb, a 4Gb, an 8Gb, and a 32Gb. The 1Gb is for work files. The 8Gb carries most of my project files. This allows me to work on personal things during my lunch hour at work.
3. I make writing a priority. Especially when I have deadlines. Yes, I know, there are times when I procrastinate. There are also times when I need personal time, family time, or health time (for golf). But when necessary, I know I have to write.
4. I use note cards and Post-It Notes. If you could see my office, you’d see my desktop is covered with 3×5 cards with note on them, and Post-It Notes with more notes. The same goes for my desk in my work office. In fact, here’s a photo of my office.

I hope you find time to write – and make time to write. To often we leave projects on the table, never to see the ink on a page. Unless you make time, it may not happen.

Getting on Kindle

Today’s authors need to be open to putting their stuff into Amazon’s Kindle format. Let me share my example.

Years ago I published a small booklet, Parent’s Guide to the Emergency Room.

It was based on my experience working for over eight years in two hospital emergency rooms. During those years, I had a lot of experience with parents and their children. Some of these were positive, but many were negative.

If you’ve never been to a hospital emergency room, you have no idea what to expect. It’s even worse when you’re there with your child. And it’s even worse if your child is in pain. I knew parents could benefit with tips on what to expect, how to prepare before an emergency happens, information about the emergency room and who all the people are, what to know before you check out, helping a special needs child, and much more.

I saw this as an idea for a simple booklet. So I wrote the Parent’s Guide to the Emergency Room. I printed it in a 20-page booklet, 4 x 9 inches. I found a guy to do the cover illustration, laid it out in InDesign, and sent it to the printer. I sold some and have given many away to parents I knew.

Fast-forward to the digital revolution. I decided to put this out on the Kindle. I revised the content, adding a bunch of new material – it’s 4839 words. The cover was reworked for the digital size Amazon wants. Then I had eBookConversion.com do the conversion from a Word file into the Kindle format. They also did an ePub version for iBookstore and others, but I’ll implement those later.

I created a Kindle Direct Publishing account (it was easy), and uploaded the information. You add the title, a description, authors and illustrators names, cover image, price, and the content file. Within 12 hours, my eBook was available. Amazon even added their “Look Inside” feature.

Here’s the link to Parent’s Guide to the Emergency Room on Amazon. With the “Look Inside” feature, you can see the table of contents.

I decided to start the eBook at $0.99. That means I’ll make $0.35 for each one Amazon sells. Sure, it’s small change, but I after a while, when the eBook has some reviews and sales increase, I can play with changing the price to $2.99, and I’ll make $2.09 each.

So what does all this mean?

We as authors can go directly to Amazon and publish our material – without a publisher. Amazon is our middleman. It still requires a quality and well-edited book. It requires a high-quality cover. And it requires us to market the book. But, and this is important, we are in control.

Many authors are sitting on unpublished manuscripts. Some are sitting on books that have gone out of print and the rights have reverted back to them. You can decide to convert these into Amazon’s Kindle format, and make them available to readers. You can make more money than you would with a mainstream publisher. Yes, you are in control.

In addition to the Kindle version, I am taking the revised file and will print 200 copies with the new content and cover. I’ll send some of these to children’s hospitals and other possible sources of special market sales. After all, I sold 7500 copies of my Happy Feet booklet to the Avon Foundation. Maybe I can do the same with my ER booklet.

My next Kindle project is my Happy Feet booklet. It’s another small print booklet. I should have it up by the end of January.

What will be your Kindle project?

Full disclosure: The Amazon link above contains my Amazon account information and if you click through and buy a copy, I make a few pennies.

Is Your Manuscript Ready to Send?

Manuscripts are fickle things. We start a manuscript and from that point forward, we are forever changing it. Adding sentences, paragraphs, extra words, Then we make more changes. Then at some point, it’s done. But before I send it off, I make sure it is as good as possible. I hope you feel the same about your manuscripts. Here are three things to consider:

1.  If you are still leaving two spaces between sentences, you need to change. Now. Always have just one space between sentences. If you are using Word, use the “Find and Replace” to change occurrences of two spaces to one. In the Find box, hit the space bar twice and in the Replace box, hit the space bar once. Then either go one by one or use Replace All. Make sure you double-check your document.

2.  Always use Spell Check to go through your document.

3.  Another good trick is to read your manuscript aloud. Focus on the words. By reading it out loud, you’ll catch bad wordings, run on sentences, things that don’t make sense, incomplete sentences, and more.

Editors, publishers and agents expect a clean and polished manuscript. Make sure yours meets their expectations.

A Home for Your Used Books

If you are anything like me, you have shelves of used books. I have, if I had to guess, close to 500 books of different genres. Some are well read, some partially read, and others seemingly untouched. Softcover, hardcover, and a variety of size and page counts.

The thing I love about books is they are always valuable. To someone.

A while back I decided to start an Amazon Merchant account. It took only a few minutes and was easy to set up. Once done, I started to list a few of my used books. You open your account, put in the ISBN number, and are presented with a screen where you can identify the condition of the book, your price, quantity, description, and the shipping method. I always pick Medial Mail.

The book is then listed, until someone purchases it. As people search Amazon for titles, they have the option of checking out the used book of the same title as the new ones. If they decide to buy a used one, say yours, you are then sent an email about the sale.

You then print a packing slip, package the book, and send it off. About twice a month, Amazon sends you the money directly to your back account. On a typical book sale, Amazon takes a $3.50 commission and gives you a $3.99 shipping credit. If you list a book for 10.00, you’ll get $10.49 and from that pay shipping. Media Mail runs between $2.50 and $3.00, depending on the weight of the book and where it is being shipped.

If you think that’s not much, remember it’s a book that has been gathering dust on your shelve. In October and November I sold 16 books. In the first seven days of December, four more have sold. That clears space on my shelves, and gives me some extra spending money.

So my question is, what do you do with your used books? I find new homes for mine.

Getting Your Story into Magazines

The following post is excerpted from John Kremer’s Book Marketing Tip of the Week email newsletter. John is the author of the longstanding and popular marketing book, 1001 Ways to Market Your Book. Having met John at a conference years ago, I continue to follow him and get his newsletters. Here’s his piece:

Sideways Publicity: Getting Your Story into Magazines

Here are four sideways secrets to getting publicity in major magazines. I call these sideways techniques because they aren’t the direct approach of sending query letters or making phone calls.

1. Writer’s Guidelines – Check out their websites. Many of these sites include submission or writer’s guidelines that provide exact instructions on how to submit to the magazine or online website.

 2. Tweet - Almost every major magazine is now including submissions from readers via Twitter and Facebook. If you follow their tweets and Facebook posts, you’ll find many opportunities to get noticed by the editors and associates.

3. Comment on their stories and blog posts. They pay attention to comments. Again, almost every magazine website includes many of the articles from the latest magazine issue – and most allow and even encourage their readers to comment and interact. 

4. Blog - Join their social networks or blogging communities. About 10% of magazine websites include the opportunity for readers to blog and/or to participate in a social network. 

In my Online 411 email newsletter, I’ll be featuring opportunities under each of these 4 options. You can sign up at BookMarket.com to get these insider tips. 

You’ll also find many magazine publicity opportunities by following my blog posts and updates at www.magagenie.com.

Social Media is the Secret

John Green’s next novel, The Fault in Our Stars, is already a runaway success – even though the book is still unfinished and almost a year from release (tentatively May 2012).

Nevertheless, the book on July 1, 2011, was the single best-selling book on Amazon.com and No. 2 on BarnesandNoble.com.

Green, 33 years old, lives in Indianapolis, Ind. He is a New York Times best-selling author who has received numerous awards, including both the Printz Medal and a Printz Honor. He is the co-creator, with his brother, Hank, of the popular video blog Brotherhood 2.0, which has been watched more than 30 million times by Nerdfighter fans all over the globe.

Green’s unusual pre-publishing success is being attributed to his savvy use of social media to promote the still unwritten book. He has 1.1 million followers on Twitter, 560,000 subscribers on YouTube and hundreds of thousands more on Tumblr, Facebook and a forum called YourPants.org.

Green has been aggressively advertising the $9.89 proto-book, offering every pre-release buyer a signed copy.

He has read the first chapter of the book live over the Web, encouraged his followers to try their hand at designing a cover for the book and even asked them to vote on the color of Sharpie pen he should use to do the wrist-cripplingly huge numbers of signings.

Source: The August 2011 issue of the Southern Review of Books. The Southern Review of Books is an online newsletter for publishers, authors, book lovers and booksellers.

As of today, the Amazon Best Sellers Rank is #273 in Books and #52 in Books for Teens. So what can we learn from this? The importance of social media in helping a book become successful.

In your book proposal, make sure your marketing section contains information on a social media plan. Mine do. Your’s should too.

The First 50 Pages – a Review

Jeff Gerke, author, conference speaker, and owner of Marcher Lord Press, has a new book fresh off the presses, and it’s a winner. Jeff’s book is The First 50 Pages: Engage Agents, Editors and Readers, and Set Your Novel Up For Success.

First impressions are vital and the opening scenes of a novel are crucial if the reader is going to stick around until the story’s end. What writers do in these opening pages, and how they do it, is a matter that cannot be left to chance. Whether a writer wants to craft a strong beginning right from the start or they have a complete manuscript and are ready to start sending it out for publication, the beginning of their novel plays a key role in their story’s success. This helpful guide walks writers through the tasks their first 50 pages must accomplish in order to avoid leaving the reader disoriented, angry, or, worse—so disengaged that she puts the book down before ever seeing its beauty. The First 50 Pages shows writers how to begin their novels with the skill and intentionality that keeps readers’ eyes glued to the page. [from Writers Digest]

Here the link to Amazon for The First 50 Pages. I got my copy today. It will complement my copy of Jeff’s previous book, The Art and Craft of Writing Christian Fiction.

Publisher: Writers Digest Books (November 2011)
Paperback: 240 pages

Book Club Members Increasingly Using e-Readers

Do you own an e-Reader? An iPad, Kindle, Sony e-Reader, or Nook? Or maybe you use your smartphone instead.

Some 21 percent of reading group members are now reading all or most of their selections on e-readers, up from 11 percent in 2009, according to a Reading Group Choices survey. Groups representing more than 200,000 members were surveyed online and via a traditional mailing in the first three months of the year. Of reading group members reading e-books, 59 percent use Amazon Kindles, 26 percent use Barnes & Noble’s Nook and 20 percent use a tablet. In 2009, only seven percent used the Nook.

Romance, always a popular e-book category, is most frequently read on e-books by book group members: 60 percent of romance fiction read for the book groups is bought as e-books. One difficulty that may hold back e-book usage by book group members: many publishers’ backlists are not available as e-books. Reading Group Choices owner Barbara Mead commented: “The use of e-books in concert with printed books only serves to reaffirm book clubs’ passion for literature. And e-readers are a great investment for avid readers who are consuming books well in excess of their reading group selections or for book club members with a dwindling amount of free shelf-space.”

Whatever you write, take with your publisher about making the book available for the e-Reader market. If you are working on a book proposal, make sure the marketing section mentions using the book in e-Reader format. This market is not going away.

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