Can Promo Really Help? by Christine Duncan

I saw a post on Facebook the other week from a publicist responding to an author. I never really saw the author’s original post but I gather from the answer that he/she was lamenting because his* book was coming out this fall in the middle of a recession.
No one would buy it.
The publicist’s response was somewhere along the line of with the right advertising, books will still do well.
Maybe. In the best of all possible worlds.
Frankly, I’m thinking twice before I buy a .35 chocolate covered cherry when I stop by the 7-11 to pick up the newspaper on Sundays. (I have to buy the Sunday paper–the TV guide is in it and my husband and son are addicted to that thing. The candy–eh, I don’t need the calories anyway.) Advertising is NOT affecting my buying habits right now. If I can’t find a book at the library or in the rare really-gotta-have-it mode, at the used bookstore, I’m not buying right now. It doesn’t matter if you are throwing in freebies; it doesn’t matter if it is something I’ve been lusting after for years. I did go to see Harry Potter at the theater though it had NADA to do with advertising–at least, this year.
So here’s my question, what are you doing to get your book sold and do you really think it’s helping? Sending your book off to Oprah? Selling the book out of your cubby at work or maybe on some downtown street corner? How is it different than what you did before for promo?
Do you think publicists help?

*Okay, enough of this PC pronoun stuff I’m going with the Trad male pronoun. You feminists in the crowd can keep in mind that I am a woman myself. A lazy woman, but definitely female.

The millionth word

Well, according to the Global Language Monitor , English now has over a million words. Others are saying that it is more, some less, but one thing we all have to admit, the English language is a living, breathing thing. Like most living things, it is changing every day. Ever since the Bard started coining new words to meet the requirements of his plays, writers have been adding new words into their books.

More power to them. As a Sci fi writer, I made up some words to show my characters were from a different place. I even did up a glossary in my fact file so I wouldn’t forget how I spelled them last time. Even in main stream writing though, new words are born every day. Take the term metrosexual - Mark Simpson created it when writing an article. He needed a quick way to describe a straight guy that dresses like a gay. You have to admit, it sounds a lot better and it invokes a great image. And that is the point. Language is there to help us convey our thoughts to someone else. So long as it is doing that, I feel it is valid. New words like this even have a name neologisms ( that was my new word for the day).

So will we ever see a novel written in SMS speak? y not, info is convyed u get point & it shld b OK. In fact it was a consistent rumour that even if you rerragne ltters but the frist letetr and the lsat are in the rihgt sopt, you can stlil raed it.  Now I think that is going a little far, but the idea that we should let the words flow, feel free to create and transform language and concentrate on painting the scenes we are portraying as fully as possible.

http://the-writing-bug.blogspot.com/2009/04/know-rulesthen-know-when-to-break-them.html seems to say it all for me. Especially as she says it is OK to write vampire stories. Whew, that’s OK then, I don’t have to take my series off the shelves.

Professional or amateur?

My husband’s family are all into hobbies, railways, models, dolls, the lot. I mean really into it, they removed walls to put in more display cabinets. When I asked Keith what should I write about this week, he said, “Writing – the cheap hobby of the economic downturn.”

He was teasing but he’s right, it is a cheap hobby. Still, just like any other hobby, you can get carried away. It’s just so easy now.

You can micro blog through places like Twitter. There’s blogging like WordPress, forums, fiction groups that do tag team writing like ASR http://boi.alt-starfleet-rpg.org , ezines, Facebook and MySpace, wikis and a thousand other ways to get your words out there. It seems everyone can do it and a lot of us are. We are living in a world where people share information at an ever increasing rate. So where should we draw the line between a writer and someone that just types a lot?

You know, I don’t think there needs to be a line. Just like astronomy, some of the best finds are from avid amateurs.

Someone writing about their passion is always worth reading. Take my mother-in-law. Types away about dolls, writes the occasional article for her local doll club, tests out new crotchet patterns for doll clothes and puts them together with a few pictures. Amateur right?

Wrong.

World-wide author Marjory Fainges. She did so well out of it, now my father-in-law writes too. And you want to know what is really interesting? Marjory was published internationally by Kangaroo Press/ Simon & Schuster. When her Encyclopaedia of Australian Dolls went out of print, she chose to release it, not in hardcopy but on CD. Made at home, she can produce a CD version herself and post it around the world for a fraction of the cost and send people updates as she researches for the next edition. It is a constantly evolving reference that the doll world is greeting with open arms and open paypal accounts.

So when is she “professional”?

What is your passion? Maybe it’s worth writing about. And maybe your blog can go from hobby to career.

Could be better, could be worse.

. Today I’m going to write as a reader, not a writer. I read a lot. And there are some things I would like to see in a book that I don’t often see in modern books.

1)The handsome, intelligent hero falling for a plain, ordinary (even plump!) girl because she has a fascinating personality– and NOT because she looks good with her glasses off and her hair down. And I’m not talking about the kind of girl that thinks she’s plain but is actually secretly fancied by everyone (yes, Stephanie Meyer/Bella Swan/Bridget Jones, I’m looking at you!). I mean the woman no-one fancies, but the handsome hero falls for

2)A proper science fiction story that also has a loving, romantic intense love story. War of the Worlds comes close, with the hero’s love for his wife, but most sci-fi books either ignore love altogether, or write about it awkwardly, almost flatly (I’m not counting Imzadi because that grew out of an onscreen ship)

3)An ‘unsolveable riddle’ that is actually very very difficult. Yes, I mean you, Dan Brown. Why does a renowned symbologist take approximatively 20 pages to work out ‘A Pope’s tomb’ means Alexander Pope? How about Robert Langdon cracking the Voynich Manuscript then? That I would pay to read! (As opposed to getting it out of the library) P.S. Moments after I wrote this, I went to the XKCD comic site only to find they’ve cracked the Voynich Manuscript.

4)A murder mystery I DON’T solve ten pages before the hero does.(It can be done. I never guess the killer in Agatha Christie books)

And just in case you think I’m going on a bit of an anti-book rant, here are three books I’ve read and enjoyed recently.

The Girl in the Blue Dress – a sort of fictionalised account of the marriage of Catherine and Charles Dickens – here called Dorothea and Alfred Gibson. It’s touching, moving and insightful. It helps if you know something of Dickens life and works, but is perfectly enjoyable without. A wonderful read.

Angels and Demons. I’m not a Dan Brown fan – I hate all his other works. But I enjoyed this. Partly because Robert Langdon is Dan Brown’s best character by miles (and even better now I have Tom Hanks interpretation of him in my head), partly because I’m fascinated by the Illuminati and art history in this. The riddles aren’t great, again (something the film wisely plays down), but it’s basically one long chase sequence through the landmarks of Rome, and I love chase sequences against the clock. And the scene in St Peter’s Square at the end, with the helicopter, is spectacular, on both the page and the screen

Domino Men, by Jonathan Barnes. This is … odd. A sort of alternative history fantasy. The House of Windsor and a secret group at war over a hidden secret with each other. It’s strange, and funny, and scary all at the same time. Jonathan Barnes, unfortunately, writes young female characters very badly – they’re all described by looks alone, and seem to have no personality, but the rest of his characters are wonderful. The whole thing is heavily laced with Dickens references, and has another spectacular – and chilling ending.

So there’s my point. There’s plenty of things about the books I read to annoy me (and I’m relying on you, Dear Reader, to fix those. And me too, of course), but there’s always another wonderful book round the corner.

Library = Treasure House

. Sorry I’m late – a sort of spontaneous party sprang up after work and carried on to very late….

Anyway – libraries. I used to work in a library.(Whenever I say this, people always say ‘It must be nice to read books all day’. If only – we weren’t allowed to read the books at work – even if we stuck on a desk in an empty room with nothing to do – we were just supposed to stare ahead into space until called for. Books were like cornflake boxes – store, shelve, hand out, but never tamper with the seal)We, as the front line staff, were called into a meeting about the future of libraries, and asked what we thought our customers wanted. More computers, a Translation Unit, coffee shop, what? I put my hand and said ‘Well, what the customers are always saying they want are – more new books.’ The manager sniffed in a contemptuous manner, gave me a disappointed look, and said ‘Well, yes, apart from that’

Libraries are dying. Liverpool, last years City of Culture, is closing many of it’s smaller libraries. Many of the books I want to read – not obscure titles – can’t be found in my local library – and that’s a big main library. Perhaps the only way to save them is to move the focus from books – to becoming a social hub, to providing internet, and services and coffee. After all, books are so cheap now, you can pick them up for a penny on Amazon. And authors only get around 12pence for every book borrowed.

And yet…We still need a place for books. Where a child can sit down and reach onto a shelf, and pull out The Wind in the Willows, or the Sword in the Stone. Where a person can browse, wandering amongst shelves and shelves of books, searching for that one that catches their eye, that special book. Where the classics all sit there, waiting to be discovered, side by side with those modern blockbuster novels everyone is talking about, and the quiet little books that will never be a massive movie, but can still change your life. The internet is a wonderful research tool, but it gives you only drips and drabs of information – to get the full story, you need a book – a huge £25 book you can never afford, a strange obscure little book you’ve never heard of, sitting in your library waiting to be found.

As Detective Robert Goren once said ‘I’m going to use the best research tool I have – my library ticket’

Or to quote Malcolm Forbes ‘The richest person in the world – in fact all the riches in the world – couldn’t provide you with anything like the endless, incredible loot available at your local library

We still need a place that opens up the entire world of books to everyone -FOR FREE. Your local library is not just a place for internet use and tramps to sleep. It’s a treasure-house, and should be treasured. So I urge you – don’t let them die out. Protest every closure. Speak out in support. Instead of buying a book,and selling it on when you’re done, go to the library.

Remember that thrill when you first got your library card, you walked into that room full of books, and you said to yourself, in wonder ‘I can read ANY of them – ALL of them? – and I don’t have to pay?’ That thrill is still there.

Save your library. Use it.

Querying and selling your work

Well, it’s official – my vacation is over.  While the weather is still very much summer – 38 degrees here in Sydney - the return of my students today marked the end of my vacation.  

Along with my break from the kids and blogging – I’m now faced with a return to querying and trying to land an agent/publishing deal. 

This is only my second attempt at selling a manuscript.  This time last year, I attempted to sell my fiction manuscript Plan B to the American agents.  No success there.  In fact, by about mid year, I reached a point where I stopped querying because I’d had enough rejection.  Yes, I know…rejection is part of the journey – I get it – but there’s only so much rejection this little black duck can take.   The net result of all that rejection was positive, I realised I needed to do more work on the MS, which is still in progress.  Thankfully I scored a couple of writing wins towards the end of the year which have boosted my confidence and willingness to try again. 

Along the way I co-wrote a non-fiction how-to/job success manual (which I fully believe will sell) so that’s what’s on the sales agenda now.  

I plan to blog-ument my querying and sales journey each week.  I’m going to share the process I use to select publishers, how many queries I make and the responses I receive.  I’ll also share the other side of it – the emotional journey.  I plan on being open and honest about how I’m feeling throughout the sales process.  I’m doing this as a form of rejection therapy and in the hope that my honestly will help others who are going the through the same gut wrenching process.

Buckle up kids, think it’s going to be a bumpy ride.