It’s the first week, of the first year of a new decade and one of your resolutions is to complete your book on the paranormal or supernatural.
You may have been here before. But it just didn’t last. The experience has made you a little bitter about writing projects. They’re easy to start, but hard to finish, you think.
If this sounds a little like you, here are a few tips you can use to make sure you stay resolved throughout the year.
The inner editor is the writer’s best friend.
And worst enemy.
When your inner editor is working for you it can help you craft tight, accurate writing. When it turns on you, it can paralyze you and dry up that flow of inspiration. Some writers call this analysis-paralysis.
This two-face can twist around at any time and during any point of the project.
Before you start a writing project, your inner editor may laugh at your chosen subject and deride its chances of success. As you write, it may turn the word “mad”… to the word, “angry”… and back to “mad” again… and then back to “angry”… until you finally give up.
You may dwell on a punctuation dilemma: is it a semi-colon, or a comma?
Here’s how you can quiet this voice and make friends with your inner editor again.
Ignore it
It may take some willpower, but tell that critical inner voice to shut up. Even if it’s for only a little while.
Test it
If you begin to doubt whether a writing project has any chance of success, bring in some trusted friends and pitch them the idea. Input from a few editors sometimes drowns out that persistent inner voice of dissent.
Laugh at it
Kid yourself about the constant criticisms. And then push on with a word-count goal.
Laugh with it.
Make a game out of your self-criticism. Can you write an entire page without going back and re-working your writing? Can you write a hundred words without editing? Can you complete that novel despite those constant barrage of comments that it’s no good?
Work with it
Set aside a certain time or word count. After that point, let your editor go through the text you just wrote and go wild with the editor’s pen.
The balance between editing and writing is tenuous, but it’s a balance that can be managed.
Book events help build relationships--and sales--for authors
Publishing is increasingly a relationship-building business.
A book-signing tour is just one of the strategies that authors use to build buzz and sell books. For the first-time author and the self-published author, these events are absolutely critical.
It sounds easy: you just bring a pen and a few pithy sayings–and you’re ready to go, right? Actually, you can make these events more successful and build better buzz with just a little extra leg work.
Here are tips to make sure your book signings are successful.
Get the parameters
Most book signings include a little chat about the book or a reading from the book. Find out how long the organizers want you to talk and sign. You can ask them what would interest the the attendees the most.
Prepare and prepare some more
Depending on how familiar you are with public speaking, you’ll need to prepare your talk. It might mean a rough outline. It could be a complete speech. Make sure the talk matches the expectations of those who are holding the event.
Arrive early
Leave a little time for unforeseen events that could throw you off your schedule. Trust me: you never know when bad directions, a traffic jam, or a million other things will crop up. Make sure you have directions and a cell phone and alert the organizers the instant you run into something that could delay your start.
Don’t forget extra books.
A successful book signing might cause the bookseller to sell out. Keeping a few dozen copies on hand can lead to more sales!
Say thanks!
Thank the people for showing up and the organizers for holding the event. Courteous authors are often invited back.
Follow it up
Finally, the massive applause that ends your book signing shouldn’t be the end of your connection. It’s the beginning. A thank you in person might suffice, but send them an email or mail a letter of thanks.
Using the “Magic Hat,” I’ve selected two winners who will be entered into the Hatchette Book Contest.
Congrats to Lisa Garrett and Rhonda Struthers. Your names have been forwarded to the contest headquarters.
Best of luck.
And thanks for everyone’s participation.
Hopefully we can do it again!
Whether you’re writing supernatural fiction or paranormal non-fiction, you need a steady stream of writing ideas. We all have our lines of inspiration–things that get you excited about firing up the laptop and starting to tap those keys.
The hard part, though is to have those lines of inspiration open at will. Inspiration can strike at odd moments and at times when it’s impossible to follow the muse.
Can you the look on your boss and co-workers’ faces when you announced you have to leave the staff meeting because you have the sudden urge to write a book?
Rather than risk unemployment, you can create an idea book.
Grab a notebook. Your choice, but something portable is best. (You’ll take this everywhere you go.)
Designate this your idea book. Don’t clutter it with personal finance entries, or to-do lists (you can have a separate notebook for these functions.)
Keep it next to your bed. Write down dreams and ideas you have when you sleep.
Take the notebook with your everywhere you go. When you have a random book-related idea, jot it down. Don’t edit your entries. The rawer, the better.
Review your notes on a regular basis. You can check it out once a month, or once a week. Look for themes and connections. Can any of these ideas be the basis for a new project, or help out a current one?
Some folks are more computer-savvy. Creating a separate file for your idea book is fine. It often lacks the dynamism of that pen-to-paper feel, but as long as it works for you, go for it.
When it comes to spectacular supernatural writers, some of the best are at Hachette Book Group. Now Hachette is looking for some spectacular readers.
Hachette Books is sponsoring a contest and I’m adding two lucky Supernatural Writer readers to the list.
Send an email to info(at)supernaturalwriter.com. I’ll select two readers to be entered in the contest. You might be able to pick up some of the coolest–and spookiest–new titles from Hachette Books.
The Heretic’s Daughter By Kathleen Kent
Sins of the Flesh By Caridad Piñeiro
When Ghosts Speak By Mary Ann Winkowski
BoneMan’s Daughters By Ted Dekker
The Historian By Elizabeth Kostova
Plus, you’ll have the chance to receive:
Bonus Galley: The Bride Collector
And 20 Random winners will be selected to receive a galley of Ted Dekker’s next
book, THE BRIDE COLLECTOR.
And… I’ll toss in a copy of How To Make Money Writing About The Supernatural to one lucky winner.
Note: I’ll be accepting entries until midnight Oct. 27 and will send the winners’ names and addresses to Hachette for the final contest. Best of luck! And thanks to all of you who entered.
Mel B. @ Flickr
First impressions are the most important ones. If you’re pitching your paranormal writing project, your query letter is that firm handshake and pleasant smile.
Whether your letter is aimed at a publisher or a magazine editor, here are some tips for a great query letter:
Grip ‘em Early. That first sentence should contain a hook that seizes the reader’s interest.
Add details. Don’t forget to add word-count estimations, genre, and key selling points of the book.
Don’t grovel or brag. Editors have told me that the surest way to have your query letter tossed in the circular file is to write a query with needless praise or posturing. Editors are like everyone else; they want to work with cool people.
Pitch yourself. Add a concise blurb about your writing career. (Just don’t get too long-winded.)
Proof. Double-check your letter for grammatical and stylistic errors. Tighten those sentences. Then, have a friend read it.
You might think that with all the shows on television that paranormal research has hit a saturation point. But, interest in the supernatural is spreading beyond the niche market.
With the release of the movie Paranormal Activity, this interest looks to be spreading into the mainstream. Paranormal Activity tells the story of a couple who experience unexplained phenomena in their home. They decide to investigate by mounting a camera at various locations in their home.
The movie–which has been compared to a Blair Witch-type story–was originally planned in just a few theaters. Now, demand, propelled by a grass roots campaign, is pushing the movie into more theaters.
You can read a review here.
It’s obviously well done and the filmmakers know a good story. But it has greater implications.
What this should show for those interested in writing about the supernatural, is that demand continues to be strong. And that strong material is always in demand.
If you’re about to embark on a writing project, consider it a journey. And like any good vacation or trip, you’re going to clear some time on your schedule and grab a seat on a plane.
Finding your writing space is integral to completing projects. Space, in this sense, is both temporal and spacial.
Writing Time
Find what time of the day suits your writing practice best. While most people are morning writers or night writers (not Knight Riders), there are also lunch writers and afternoon writers.Establishing a time to write depends on when you feel like writing. When does that inspiration hit? When do the words flow best?
A lot, though, depends on your schedule, though. You might have to be a after-I-put-the-kids-to-bed writer, or a 15-minutes-before-I-start-to-work writer. Some would-be writers believe that if they don’t have eight hours to plow through their prose, they can’t be a writer. That’s wrong. If you only have five minutes a day, take it. It may mean that it takes you longer to complete a project, but you’ll be surprised at how much material you can accumulate with steady, passionate (but short) practice over time.
Writing Space
Once you have time to write, find a place to write.
It could be a quiet corner in your house. It could be your home office. It could be on your deck or porch. And, thanks to wireless internet technology, it could be on a crowded street corner.
Some writers like crowded, noisy space. Some need complete quiet. Make sure you consider these factors as your deciding where you want to carve out your writing space. As with writing time, experiment with a few spaces. Loud. Cluttered. Quiet. Neat. (And maybe a combination of a few!)
And let the journey begin…
If you write about the paranormal or supernatural, autumn is the best time to arrange public speaking events.
During the fall, libraries, book stores and community groups like to tie their meetings in with the spooky theme of the season. (Setting up book talks is just one of the subjects covered in How To Make Money Writing About the Supernatural.)
These sessions can be really well attended. Here’s one example:
Chad Lewis, who has written a series of books on the paranormal, had a successful talk at the Coralville Public Library in Iowa City about Iowa ghosts. Chad wrote The Iowa Road Guide to Haunted Locations, among other classic paranormal titles.
The session was so successful (with about 120 people attending), that it garnered some media coverage.
Here’s a great review on Lewis’s talk in the Iowa City Press-Citizen.
While any time is a good time to promote your book through public events, make sure you check with groups in late summer to arrange a date on their fall calendars.