Professional Look for Authors

Do you set up at art shows, Holiday bazaars and other public functions? This is where the professional look is very important. You probably consider how you will dress to be comfortable and attractive, but you must also consider how your books are presented. Your winning smile won’t always detract from a folding table with a haphazard stack of books. Cover that table with an attractive cloth (a bedspread or table cloth will do).
Add a neat arrangement of your books and have your flyers and handouts in enough abundance that people won’t hesitate to take one.

Other suggestions:  

• Have a large poster done of your book cover. Put that on an easel near your table. If you have several titles, do a collage of them for your poster. 
• Set out a bowl of wrapped candies (don't let children have any without approval from their folks!)
• Develop a prop that represents your book 
• Add a bouquet of flowers or Mylar balloons to get people’s attention 
•  Have a professional signboard behind your site or at the table edge with your name and online contact information
• Set extra chairs nearby to encourage people to sit and talk with you—having bodies near your site draws the attention of others. 
• Design and wear a name tag that identifies you as the author; I have many times had people look at my books, and when they read my name tag say, "You wrote these?" 

Finally, stay on your feet. If you’re sitting when someone approaches, stand up to greet them—let the prospective customer know you’re interested in them.

Plan Marketing Now

If you have a new title in the works, or back listed books that need to be pumped, get your marketing for the entire year planned now. Begin with lists of where and why your titles would have value and generate interest. Include online sites and also the brick-and-mortar world.

Online, book events can be lucrative, from joining blog carnivals, giving interviews, and promotional coupons. It's essential to determine the sites best for your title (and if you have several titles, the sites could be different for each). If your title has a historical or holiday connection, don't wait until a few weeks before the optimum date to line up an interview or promotion; set it up months in advance.

The same is true for street-side promotion. Involve yourself in regional Literary Fairs now, even if they're scheduled for November. Contact your library and get dates for author events. Also check for a "Friends of the Library" type organization. They often sponsor author and book festivals. They have to know about you before you would be invited.

Bookstores? Go for it!
Author events at bookstores should be planned now—get your calendar filled! The chain bookstores might have to be convinced to take you on, if you aren't a "national brand"; but indy store managers, on the other hand, like to get regional authors to generate hometown business. Independent bookstores are most approachable. Be certain to have a marketing packet with you—your book cover, reviews, purchase information—and walk in, find the manager, and say you want to have an author event at their store. They often have dates open. Some will run an ad in the local paper, but you might have to do that yourself. Be certain to advertise your signing in the small and underground newspapers. Most college towns have many of those. Get on a local radio talk show to hawk it.

If your title is available in print and also as an eBook, Be certain your titles are part of the Google Ebook store; that would appeal to the indy bookstore that are participating; remind them it is a good way to highlight the store's new features.

Don't forget libraries
Book events at libraries work best if you have a presentation. Have you developed a talk from the research you've done for your books? Or could you give a presentation about getting published, or effective writing for your type of book? Write up a promo blurb for your talk. Make it professional, just as you would a book promotion piece. Then contact the education director of your library and tell them about it. Offer to give the talk with a book signing after.

Time to Update Important Books

How old is your dictionary? If it's more than three years old, you might want to upgrade. The eleventh edition of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary was published in 2004, revised in 2006, and again in 2008 (it's available on CD, and is automatically on all Kindles) with hundreds of new words added. Websters is also in it's eleventh edition. Do you have Chicago Manual of Style, or Strunks The Elements of Style? Recommended for serious writers.

Remember, your library can be virtual—with the myriad ebooks, APIs and downloads for you computer, you can have volumes at your fingertips.

Digital Camera Benefits for Writers

If you have a digital camera, you have a good tool to take quick notes when you don't have time to write. Snap photos of the scene that blossoms an idea. Some cameras even have a voice-over feature and you can dictate a short note. A picture of a scene or place can set the mood for your poem, short story or portion of a novel. Having the visual record will keep the idea fresh for you, even when you can't start writing for several hours--or days. You could even insert the picture in your word document for inspiration.

For nonfiction, the advantages are endless, but especially don’t forget to take a photo of information plaques. Capture the date, time and place of the event with a snapshot of the event poster.
Not to worry if you forgot the camera. Almost all of today’s cell phones have cameras built in, so most people have this visual tool in their pocket or purse. With use of a miniSD card, or by e-mailing the images to yourself, you will have your special notes.

It costs very little to snap a picture, but the benefits are great.

Black History Month Author #5

Here are two people often overlooked in references to Black American authors. I find their lives quite fascinating.
Jessie Redmon Fauset (1882–1961), born in New Jersey, graduated Cornell University 1905 and was the first African-American woman Phi Beta Kappa. She is the author of four novels, and has more than 70 other published works, many first appearing in The Crisis (a journal at the heart of the Harlem Renaissance) for which she served as Literary Editor.
Learn more about this inspired American woman at African American Literature Book Club and Good Reads
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Alain LeRoy Locke (1885-1954) is considered the philosopher of the Harlem Renaissance. Born in Philadelphia, Locke graduated from Harvard University in 1907 and was the first black Rhodes Scholar. He studied at Oxford and the University of Berlin, then received a Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard in 1918. He edited and wrote numerous articles, anthologies, and books about black life and culture. Locke taught at Howard University in Washington, D.C., for nearly 40 years.

Young Writer Wins Awards

This is Cool

Eight-year-old Brooklyn Wright has written another book The Adventures of the Earth Saver Girl. The book took the second place 2010 National Award for Litter Prevention from Keep America Beautiful and this month Brooklyn received the Captain Planet Eco Superhero Award. She's up for two more awards, too.

You can see Brooklyn's first book (completed when she was six), here.

Black History Month Author #4

Octavia Butler (1947 - 2006) has been an inspiration for me to try new things, to follow my own path. I'd always hoped to meet her. In 1995 she said, "I'm a 48-year-old writer who can remember being a 10-year-old writer and who expects someday to be an 80-year-old writer...." Unfortunately, that didn't come to be.

Her writing has always been considered "cutting edge". Along with winning Hugo and Nebula awards, she was given a McAurther Foundation "Genius Grant" in 1995—the first science fiction author to receive this. She was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in June, 2010. Learn more about her at Answers and see her titles here.

True Crime Top 30

The True Crime Books Reviews site is taking reader votes on their top 30 picks of TC books for 2010. I rarely read this genre, and was surprised/pleased to see two authors I know.

Phyllis Gobbell (A Season of Darkness) and I have been friends for several decades, and Amanda Lamb (The Evil Next Door) I met (in cyberville) just recently.

Congratulations to both of them.

Fluke Opportunities

Six rounds down and four to go in the National Finals Rodeo. This might not seem related to writing and books, but...Rodeo has been very good to me.
Back in the 1990 when I lived in Tennessee, I freelanced in action photography and writing (huh, I still do). I shot saddle club shows, 4-H shows, hunter-jumper and dressage competitions. I had horses, one I was training for endurance riding. Another was a good "ranch horse," and since he seemed pretty smart, I senet him off for extra training. The horseman training my gelding to be a header (rodeo term) suggested I take pictures at his ranch for a charity team-roping competition. 5-time NFR All Around Cowboy Larry Mahan would be there. 

"Oh yeah!" 

Not only did I have fun meeting and chatting with Mahan, but I realized these competitors were anxious for pictures of their sport. I also realized I enjoyed the quick shooting, fast moving team roping much more than the horse-club shows and hunter-jumper gigs I'd been doing. 

Next thing you know, I was a card carrying in-the-arena rodeo photographer. My photos and many articles were published in the rodeo magazine (International Professional Rodeo, not PRCA) and they called me to cover the regional finals and write a few spotlight pieces. That was my weekend work. At this same time, I was an assistant editor for a national sports publication where I learned to "write on the fly" and work with Quark layouts.

These two involvements sparked a great deal of what I do today, and it started when one of the area rodeo companies asked if I would help them produce a program for their next season. Hey, why not. I wasn't sure all that would entail, but I agreed. I didn't actually aid them, though. I did the whole dang thing! Ninety percent of the photos were mine, I shot products for advertisements, I wrote 98% of the text; I designed the cover and layout, and oversaw all the production. "Do a brochure, too," they requested. "A tri-fold." So I did. This in the days of four-color separation and graphics programs that contained only a smidgen of today's capabilities.
The work was a real challenge, and I realized this new experience was something I enjoyed.

The year of the rodeo publication, I relocated to Montana and although I continue to shoot action photography, rodeo isn't a big part of it. But I bought my first dot com and published a web site that's still around. It included a rodeo sub domain (that I've since abandoned). At the turn of this century, there weren't many rodeo sites, and my photos gained popularity on the Web. I enhanced the rodeo terms I'd written for the Lone Star program and put them online. Not only have I sold photos from this site to a few international magazines, but the Idaho High School Rodeo Association bought one-time rights to my "terms" page to include in their Rodeo Queen pamphlet. I also used my rodeo knowledge to give color to sections of my contemporary novel Blood and Bond. It's not a rodeo story, but several scenes take place in that setting.

All of this spurs me to make note of the NFR (and the IPRA finals in January). I like rodeo, and the fluke opportunities that got me involved have blossomed into a many positive enterprises.

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A note to writers just starting out: Don’t turn down any chance to try something different. You never know where it will lead, and if nothing more, the experience can possibly be used to enhance your writing projects.

Early American Writer

James Fenimore Cooper is one of America's first novelists. In his first series, The Littlepage Manuscripts, Corny Littlepage was the hero of the Satanstoe. Other books in the series, (written in two years!) are The Chainbearer and The Redskins. All the novels deal with the anti-rent controversy of the mid-1840s.

Cooper's strong political feelings in favor of the landed gentry progressively colored each book until the last is considered more of a diatribe than a novel. Since he favored the "landed gentry" they obviously favored him, by publishing his books that espoused their needs with no care to the essence of a good novel. (Even then, it paid to have connections!).

Cooper's best known and hallmark Leatherstocking series wasn't named for a character. The protagonist was Natty Bumppo--a"natural man." The five books tell Bumppo's life from his youth (Deerslayer) to his death (The Prairie). The Leatherstocking series also includes The Pioneers(1823), The Last of the Mohicans (1826), and The Pathfinder (1840).

Cooper was a family man; he married Susan DeLancey in 1811.

Mark Twain's Year

Did you know?

The year 2010 marks the 175th anniversary of Samuel Langhorne Clemence’s (Mark Twain) birth, the 125th anniversary of Twain’s pinnacle work Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and the 100th anniversary of his death.


Various celebrations are listed at Hannibal MO website.