Holly Robinson's Blog, page 15
November 12, 2014
Begging for Blurbs? Here’s How
document.write(z);
There is probably no more humbling experience than pimping a book for blurbs. Most writers are cut out to be solitary creatures who hunker down alone at desks and kitchen tables in flannel shirts and sweatpants, making up stories or researching nonfiction books. We aren’t sales people or American Idols, skilled in the arts of cold calling and shining in the spotlight.
Yet, once a book is finished and ready for publication, the next step involves reaching out to other writers and begging for what amounts to endorsements:
“Forget Stephen King! This is the book that will make your hair stand on end and keep you up all night.”
“A tender, compelling portrait of a woman who goes too far for love—a roller coaster of emotions you won’t soon forget!”
You know. That sort of thing—proof to the reading public that your book is worth their precious time.
There is no easy way to ask for blurbs, but take comfort in the fact that every writer has to do it. Now that I’ve just gritted my teeth and gone through the process for the fourth time, for my novel HAVEN LAKE, I thought it might help newbie writers to think about these strategies when it’s your turn:
1. When you’re looking for someone to blurb your book, try friends first. Yes, it’s fine if the person blurbing your book is a friend. It’s not false advertising if your friend genuinely does like your writing.
2. If you don’t have writer friends, the next best thing you can do is contact writers whose books are similar to yours. This may seem obvious, but forget asking Stephen King for a blurb if you’re a romance writer—readers of his books probably wouldn’t like yours. Instead, seek out authors who write books that you’ve actually read and admired. Their readers would probably like your book, too.
3. To contact writers you don’t know, try them directly first. If you can’t contact a writer directly through his or her web site, try Twitter or Facebook. If that still doesn’t work, look in the acknowledgments pages of the writer’s most recent book, and you’ll usually find the agent’s name and editor’s name there. Contact those representatives and ask them to put you in touch with the writer.
4. When you do contact someone for a blurb, don’t grovel. Just ask. Remember: every writer has been where you are and has had to ask other writers. We all understand how weird the process is. If you’re contacting a stranger, let that person know why you want him or her to blurb your book—hopefully it’s because you have read their work and genuinely admire it.
5. You don’t need to limit your blurb requests to other writers. If, for instance, you’ve written a book of military history and you know an Army officer, that person could write a blurb that potential readers would take seriously. You can also send advance copies of your book to popular bloggers.
6. If you get rejections along the way, don’t take them personally. Most writers will do it if they have time and if they’re interested in the book you’re writing.
7. All it takes is two or three blurbs for each book—after that, you can add the blurbs you’ve gotten for previous books to your new one. Pretty soon, you’ll have a couple of pages of endorsements, and you’ll be in the position to read and blurb books by other authors. Remember, too, that what goes around, comes around, so be generous when it’s your turn. Never forget the other writers who gave you a helping hand.
November 5, 2014
During National Novel Writing Month, One Novelist Contemplates the Point of Writing Fiction—and How to Pay the Bills While Doing It
document.write(z);
A few days ago, Bob Clary, the Marketing Manager at Webucator, asked if I’d be interested in writing a blog post about what keeps me writing fiction, and novels in particular, in honor of National Novel Writing Month. That led me to think about how I started writing fiction long before NaNoWriMo existed, and how the idea of writing an entire novel in a month seemed ludicrous to me when I first heard about it.
Now, though, I’m a fan. Why? Because NaNoWriMo gives writers a community as well as a deadline, and those are two key motivators when you want to complete a novel.
It took me over twenty-five years to publish my first novel. Despite having an agent who believed in me, I wrote many novels that were rejected before I finally self-published my favorite out of some combination of desperation and determination. I found the Indie publishing world to be an exciting and generous place and was prepared to do it again, especially when I realized I could make a little money that way. However, nanoseconds later, my agent called to say that he’d sold my newest manuscript to an editor at Penguin Random House.
I have now published two novels with Penguin and have a third scheduled to launch in April 2015, with a contract for a fourth book right on the heels of that one. I’m happy to share my experiences with other writers out there who might be dreaming of one day seeing their own books in print—especially those of you taking on the challenge of writing a draft in November. Here are my answers to Bob’s questions:
What were your goals when you started writing?
When I first began writing fiction, I had no goals beyond entertaining myself. Seriously! I was a biology major on my way to medical school (or so I thought) and I needed an elective, so I took creative writing. I was immediately hooked, and all I wanted to do with my spare time after that was write fiction. I wrote short stories and tried to get them published in literary journals. I succeeded a few times, but never, ever, did I imagine making money from my fiction. Nor did I think I had it in me to write an entire novel. I had never even met a novelist at that point in my life. A year after graduating from college, however, I decided to go back to graduate school for a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing. There I met actual living, breathing, fiction writers who not only wrote novels, but sold them! Those mentors inspired me to do the same.
What are your goals now?
The nice thing about being a novelist is that it’s not a limited career—we’re not ballerinas or ball players who will age out of the game. My goals as a writer now are simply to keep writing better books. I hope my novels will make readers laugh, cry, think, and come away with fresh perspectives. I don’t ever consider money when I’m actually in the process of writing fiction. It’s still very weird to me that someone is willing to pay me to make up stories!
What pays the bills now?
I’m extremely lucky, in that I have a husband whose job provides us with a steady income and health insurance. I’m an equal contributor to the household finances on an annual basis, but because I work as a freelance writer, my income is sporadic. Some months we’re flush, while others are pretty tight if a client doesn’t pay on time. I would say that, at this point, writing fiction provides me with about half of the income I need for our household to stay afloat. (Bear in mind that we have five children, with one still left to put through college.)
Assuming writing doesn’t pay the bills, what motivates you to keep writing?
I find nothing more satisfying than inhabiting a world that I create, inhabited by complex characters whose conflicts I can make bigger or smaller as I choose. I have a rich emotional life both on and off the page. I wouldn’t want it any other way. I think I would find it impossible to stop writing.
And optionally, what advice would you give young authors hoping to make a career out of writing?
That depends on what you mean by “career.” If it’s money you’re after, then you can earn a good salary as a writer if you go after diverse jobs, as I do, and don’t mind thinking of yourself as a technician who is paid by the hour or by the job. For instance, in a single month I might be working on a novel, a magazine article, a college marketing brochure, and a ghost-written memoir for a celebrity.
If you’re trying to make a living as a fiction writer, I certainly know a great many self-published writers who are able to do that—typically the ones who write mysteries or romances in a series. Literary writers, or even commercial writers like me, have a tougher time making a solid income from our fiction. Do whatever it takes to support your fiction writing habit, whether that means working on your fiction during intensive weekend retreats, in the evenings while holding down a full-time job, or through arranging part-time work and living more frugally so that you can devote half of every working day to writing fiction. Follow your passion. Write what intrigues and entertains you, and take every opportunity that comes your way, whether that’s an editor’s rejection letter that includes suggestions for revisions, or a contest that might earn you a place in a magazine and recognition by an agent. The only sure way you will not succeed as a writer is if you give up.
November 1, 2014
Art vs. Commerce: Can Traditionally-Published Authors Keep Up with Indie Authors?
document.write(z);
My head is spinning after reading the latest letter by Editor-in-Chief Kevin Larimer in Poets & Writers magazine. Larimer makes some fair points in his piece, called “It’s All about the Writing,” saying that most of us don’t write for the money, but because we love writing. Then he takes it one step too far, practically sniffing as he says, “without that book deal, without that money, we will still write. And most of us—not all, but most of us—do not ‘write for the market’ (whatever that might actually mean).”
I’m sorry. What did you just say?
Of course most of us don’t write for money, but that’s only because there’s not a lot of money to be made by writing. The publishing industry is creaking along, and most of the outlets for essayists and journalists have dried up as print publications have gone online. If you do want to make a living as a writer, you’d better be diverse, flexible, and, yep, willing to write for the market, or you won’t sell anything. Those in self-publishing know this better than anyone, because they’re marketing their own books.
Those who don’t write for the market? They’d better have “real” jobs to support themselves, which means that they’re typically teaching or working nine-to-five jobs, then writing at night and on weekends.
I couldn’t sell my fiction for a long time, but I had a background in biology, so it was easy to market myself as a science writer. I morphed into a magazine writer after selling an essay to a national women’s magazine and then branched out to write articles and columns for magazines as well. That led me into ghost writing—for doctors and other science professionals first, and later for celebrities who wanted to write their memoirs. All fun work, but I did it to support my fiction, which didn’t pay anything. Even when I “sold” short stories to literary journals, I got paid in copies.
I did finally sell a novel to one of the big publishers twenty-five years after I started writing fiction. By now, I’ve written nine novels and am about to publish my fourth, so I know the real magic happens during the revision process. If I can get the words on the page, I can fix them. But, this time around, I have an insane deadline: six months to write this book and get it to my editor.
A book advance and a tight deadline are great problems to have. I’m not complaining. Before selling my first novel, I self-published a novel through CreateSpace for less than $2000 and sold enough copies to make my money back, plus a bit more.
Two weeks after I’d self-published that book, my agent sold the novel he’d been shopping around. Suddenly, I was catapulted into the category of “hybrid” author, straddling the worlds of Indie publishing and traditional publishing.
Which did I like better? Um, both.
I will not extol the virtues of Indie publishing here. Nor do I need to bother listing the virtues of traditional publishing, except to say that both methods are exciting, potentially put your books in the hands of readers and can possibly make you an income. (The key word here is “possibly.”)
The thing I’m wondering as I scramble to meet this deadline is whether traditionally-published authors can keep up with Indie authors, and whether we should even try. In other words, can you have both an artistic career and a commercial one?
My self-published writer friends tend to work very differently from the friends I have who write for traditional publishers. Here is a typical phone call between myself and bestselling Indie author Toby Neal, a mystery writer who sets her crime series in Hawaii:
Me: “Hey, can you talk?”
Toby: “Sure, I’ve made my word count for the day.”
“Word count” is a critical daily goal in the Indie publishing world. Indie authors who self-publish romances and mysteries in series are the ones making the most money. They churn multiple books out every year and can get them to market at top speed, assisted by a flotilla of freelance editors and designers. At the London Book Fair this past spring, for instance, eight self-published authors renting a single booth had sold 16 million books between them. They’re making bank.
Meanwhile, at the most recent Newburyport Literary Festival, I attended a panel discussion with literary greats who had all been Oprah authors. In response to an audience question, they said each of them takes between four and ten years to write a single book. Their publishers presumably add on another year or two as the books go through the process of being edited, copy-edited and designed.
Obviously, writers lucky enough to have been discovered by Oprah (back when she did that sort of thing) don’t have to worry as much about putting books out quickly as the rest of us do. They’re household names and have made the leap to bestseller lists. Plus, writing literary fiction is widely accepted as a more intensive, time-consuming endeavor than writing plot-based romances, crime novels, fantasy, or the kind of emotional family mysteries I write. Literary fiction tends to be more often reviewed and awarded prizes than other genres, too, despite the fact that many literary novels sell only a few thousand copies.
Most novelists with traditional publishing houses must augment our living by working at something other than making up stories. Yet, the pressure is on traditional publishing companies—and therefore on their writers—to keep pace with self-publishing. Recently, my editor said that my publisher was interested in pushing up the deadline on my next book—hence my tight deadline—and wanted me to think about it. “No pressure,” she said.
But of course there was pressure, as I wondered whether I really could write two novels in one year. If I did, would those novels be as good as the ones I’d taken longer to write?
From the publisher’s perspective—and, okay, from the writer’s, too—having books come out with shorter periods of time between them is a great thing, because the readers of your previous books will presumably remember your name long enough to buy your new one. Books don’t take as long to produce, thanks to new technologies, so publishing two books a year by the same author instead of just one is doable—provided the author doesn’t suffer from writer’s block or take a wrong turn with the plot or characters.
That’s the tricky thing about any artistic endeavor, and maybe that’s what Larimer really meant: once you start trying to produce for the marketplace, there can either be great exhilaration as you get into the zone and begin happily, breathlessly creating, or there can be a crash-and-burn as you realize there’s no way to make the project fly in time for the deadline.
Novels are not cars to be assembled. You can’t write them if the muse isn’t with you, and the muse doesn’t always come when you call her. Yet, if you want to make a living as a writer, you must find a way to go to the muse if she won’t come to you.
October 23, 2014
What’s So Hard about Writing a Novel? Everything.
document.write(z);
There is always a point, about 250 pages into writing a novel, where I want to set fire to it.
I have done that in the past. Twice. Thankfully, by now I’ve learned that the whole point of writing a first draft is to get it on the page so you can fix it.
Here’s what happens: I write a synopsis for each of my novels because my editor asks for one. A pitch is tough to write—even a Stephen King or Virginia Woolf novel would sound ridiculous and implausible, boiled down to ten pages—but, once I have it, I understand the point of the book. Then all I have to do is write it.
I keep thinking that this process should be easier for me now that I’ve written nine novels and am about to publish my fourth. (Yes, if you’re counting, I have scrapped five novels, two of them into blazing fires.) But it isn’t easier at all, and I can tell you why: even with a synopsis, you have to feel your way blindly through a book.
Sure, you know the characters and major plot points. But how do you get from one plot point to another? What do the characters’ voices sound like? How many points of view should you use? Those are all questions that take a while to answer.
A first draft feels—and often looks—like I’ve upchucked onto the page. (Sorry to all of you out there with delicate stomachs.) There are chunky adverbs and stringy sentences, unsavory images and chronological spills. Even worse, there are often entire chapters that you have to mop up and toss.
Take the novel I’m writing now. At first I had four points of view. Then, after 200 pages, I realized that I needed to scrap one of them because it was robbing the book of its tension. Just yesterday, I also saw that I have to restart the book at a different point, because the way I’ve begun it now is just plain boring.
Yep. I said “boring.” That’s where I came very close to setting the manuscript on fire.
And then, partly during a phone conversation with a friend, partly while I was walking the dog, and partly while I was standing in the shower, I thought of two new plot points AND a different way to start the book. I was practically rubbing my hands together with glee when I sat down to write this morning—only to discover that there was a reason I couldn’t use THAT beginning, because too much would be revealed too soon.
Crap. Back to the drawing board. See how much fun it is to write a novel?
I am telling you this because, when I began writing fiction, I eagerly waited as my agent sent my first novel to, oh, about twelve editors. All twelve rejected it, but three of those editors suggested a rewrite. And you know what?
I didn’t do the rewrite. Impatiently, I simply began another book. A better book, I thought. And maybe it was. But that novel, too, got rejected. So I started a third.
I should have rewritten that first novel, because the real magic in every book happens during revision. You need to get that messy first draft done so you can play with it, trim it, shape it, or even turn it inside out. And that can take as much time, or more, than blowing through that exhilarating first draft.
So take another look at that book you’re about to toss. Try it from another point of view. Start the book with a middle chapter instead of the one you’ve got now. Break up the chapters in a different way. Chop up the writing or expand it. Play, and let yourself be surprised.
You might have the book you want to write in front of you. You just can’t see it yet.
October 15, 2014
How to Succeed in Publishing? Find a Community of Writers
document.write(z);
Long before I published my first novel, I tried to join a neighborhood fiction writing workshop, only to be told by one member, “Sorry, come back when you get published. We can’t accept novices.”
Yeah, that stung. So did the remarks by one of my first writing workshop teachers in my MFA program: “You write with the depth of a television commercial,” he said, to which I had a normal reaction: I cried.
Meanwhile, my short stories were getting rejected even by journals with subscriber lists smaller than my Christmas card list, and my brother said, “You’ve got to learn to pander to the tastes of housewives if you’re going to sell anything.”
Even after Random House published my first book, during those scary weeks when I had to pimp myself around for blurbs, I faced a few smack downs. Several writers said they were too busy to read it and blurb it. One writer said he thought it sounded like a stupid memoir. Ouch.
I’m confessing this to let you know that there are definitely a few haters in the writing community. You’re bound to meet some of them. However, as Taylor Swift’s new song “Shake It Off” goes, your best bet is to ignore them, “’Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play. And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.”
When you get smacked down, jump up and keep going. To succeed in publishing, you need a lot of cheerleaders and helping hands. You must keep looking until you find your community. Then keep growing it.
Eventually, I answered an ad in a bookstore for a writers’ group, and they were the perfect fit: people out of college, all of us parents with small children, all of us seriously trying to write our first novels. We were together for many years and the critiques and deadlines kept me going. That writing workshop teacher in my MFA program was a loser, but I also found Jay Neugeboren, a professor who gave 110 percent to every writer in his classes and mentored us not just in the craft of fiction, but in how to keep steamrolling ahead, submitting stories and novels until somebody out there said yes. He, along with my best friend from grad school, Susan Straight, led me to my current agent.
Along the way, in person and online, I have continued to meet wonderfully generous writers—both traditionally-published and indie—who have reached out not only when I asked for help, but often before, generously coaching me in everything from scene structure to how to blog.
There are nice writers out there with big hearts. You just have to find your people. Once you do, your community of writers will get you through the dark days, when you think you can’t possibly do another revision or query one more agent or, God help you, hear one more rejection from an editor. That community will be your safety net if you fail and will serve as your springboard to success, too, cheering on your book launches and helping you promote your work in person and online. You will do the same for them.
More and more, the key to success in any business is networking, and writing is no exception. Recently I have been teaming up with other fiction writers to do events, because it’s easier and more fun to gather an audience at a bookstore or library if you present with a partner or a panel. I’ve also joined a cross-genre panel called Nevertheless Writers—a group that consists of five different writers from five completely different genres, fiction and nonfiction—to speak at schools and libraries about writing and publishing.
Yes, those panels take place on weeknights when I’m tired. Yes, we often do them for free. And, yes, sometimes there might be only ten people in the audience. But we love building community and spreading the message that writing can be a solitary pursuit only some of the time. The rest of the time, writers need each other to perfect our craft and bolster our confidence at a time when it seems that art is the last thing in the world anyone is worrying about.
So find your community, join the fun, and ignore the haters. Shake it off.
October 9, 2014
In Praise of Copy Editors, Publishing’s Unsung Heroes
document.write(z);
“I crossed out ‘Tuesday’ because later you say it’s Wednesday.”
“She’s fifty-nine here and fifty-eight on page 102. Which one?”
“If he Googles the land line, why is she answering the call on her cell phone?”
I’m going through the copy editor’s remarks on my new manuscript—the one that will be published by Penguin Random House as HAVEN LAKE in April 2015. And, once again, I can’t believe all the mistakes I made in this book—even after eight or nine revisions, two of which were done in collaboration with my savvy, brilliant editor.
Writers and readers sometimes wonder why it takes so long to publish a book with a traditional house. Here’s why: every step of the process takes time.
First, you send your novel to an agent, who (you hope) likes it enough to shop it around to various suitable editors. An editor buys it (you hope) and goes through the manuscript, suggesting revisions in an editorial letter. You address her queries and suggestions, and then you send the revised manuscript back to the editor. The editor then reads through the new draft and sends it back to you with (you hope) fewer suggestions, catching a few fine points here and there, praising you or telling you to rework certain sections. You do all that and send it back.
Four books ago, I thought the next step would be publication, but oh no. The next step is copy editing, and here’s where the party really begins: a copy editor is someone who takes out her bright lamp, microscope, and fine-toothed comb. She nit-picks through each one of your pages, catching time transitions that don’t make sense, erroneous spellings, accent marks if one of your characters happens to speak a foreign language, word repetitions, name changes or hair color changes you forgot you made, etc. In other words, the copy editor is a fierce, mistake-seeking hound, nosing around in every dark corner of every paragraph to make sure you get things right.
Thank God.
Copy editors are worth their weight in gold, yet hardly ever garner a mention. So here it is, a shout-out to you, copy editors around the world: we writers and readers are so lucky to have you smoothing sentences and paragraphs and chapters. Thank you for all of your hard work.
And for those of you who are self-publishing books, some advice: if you have any extra funds, do yourselves a favor and hire a copy editor. Your books—and your reputation as a writer—will be better because of it.
Now back to my manuscript and the copy editor’s bubble comments in the margin:
“It can’t be Saturday here, because you said it was a school day earlier.”
“Same words in previous sentence. Change here?”
As John Cleese of Monty Python would say, “My brain hurts.” But it’s so worth it. No manuscript will ever be perfect. But, thanks to copy editors, we can get closer.
October 1, 2014
Story, Setting, and Emotion: Why Places Matter in Fiction
document.write(z);
Tomorrow I’m headed to Prince Edward Island for a long weekend. This is no easy feat. From my house in Massachusetts, it takes a full eleven hours to drive to PEI in the Canadian Maritimes, where my family owns a farmhouse built in 1900 that looks pretty much the same as it always has. It will be tough to go up for just a few days instead of several sun-drenched summer weeks, but this time my trip is all about researching a setting for a book.
Our house has the peaked roof and simple lines of most of the Victorian era farmhouses on Prince Edward Island, and it’s surrounded by potato fields that flower white in the summer. The road is edged with bright lupine in spring, in astonishing Disney purples and pinks. In the fall the fields are tinged in red and gold and the flowers are scarlet and orange.
The beach is just a mile away, down a red clay road like so many other red clay roads on PEI that lead to secret coves. The beaches on the south side of the eastern tip of the island are soft and white, while the beaches on the northern side are red. There are red cliffs on both sides, dropping in dramatic folds to the Northumberland Straight on the southern shore—across which you can see Cape Breton Island on a clear day—and the Gulf of Saint Lawrence on the north. At the tip of the island, just a few miles from my house, the Gulf meets the Strait near a lighthouse with a decent cafe, and no morning is better than the ones that start with eggs and bacon and strong Northside tea as you watch the surf crash below those cliffs, with occasional seals bobbing about with the cormorants diving for fish.
This part of Prince Edward Island is far from the “crowds”–which, believe me, are nothing like you see on Cape Cod or even around Maine’s coastal towns in summer—who gather to worship at the shrine of Lucy Maud Montgomery, creator of Anne of Green Gables. That red-haired orphan is the subject of the longest-running musical on the island, and draws Japanese tourists by the busload, for some mysterious reason, mostly women, most of them donning hats with red braids attached to have their photos taken.
My house on PEI is an hour away from Charlottetown, too, the birthplace of Canada’s Confederation, a charming town of brick and cobblestones that boasts an astonishing array of restaurants, musical venues, and art galleries. But we see none of that where I go to write.
No, where we are, there are the potato fields in front of the house and to one side. Behind the house is another farm with sheep grazing in the fields. How could I help but make one of the characters in my next book, HAVEN LAKE (April 2015) be a shepherdess, after all of those hours of sitting on my deck and watching the sheep do their thing?
And now, after over twenty years of spending vacations on the island, I am writing a book that is set partly there, and partly in Massachusetts. I’m excited but terrified.
To me, settings are far more than just places in books. I view settings as essential components of every novel, because so often places convey the interior landscapes of the characters and deepen the reader’s experience. In my first novel, THE WISHING HILL, I set some of the action overlooking an old snuff mill where one of the characters worked long ago. The antique building’s Gothic lines, rusty water wheels and stained clapboards seemed like the perfect metaphor for an unrequited love. And in my second novel, BEACH PLUM ISLAND, I used Plum Island as the setting because a barrier island—battered as it is by wind and rain, snow and tides—changes shape constantly, just as our lives change shape according to the external forces we experience as parents and lovers, mourners and creatures who inhabit the earth only temporarily.
Now that I’m looking at Prince Edward Island not just as a sanctuary, but as a setting for my next novel, CHANCE HARBOR, this trip will take on a whole new meaning for me. I’ll be trying to view the island through the eyes of my characters—the colors and cliffs, the lobster fishing and Northeasters, the lighthouses and vast empty beaches will all have meaning, depending on the turmoil I decide to put my characters through. The eastern tip of this island, which really does feel like the end of the world, is the perfect setting for these characters, who are all reinventing themselves in some way, having to let go of their old lives and forgive the people who betrayed them as they move forward.
Should be fun, but daunting. I want to do this island justice, because this magical place is as much a part of my own inner landscape as it will be for my characters.
(Thanks to my friends Toby Neal and Susan Soule Shulins for their PEI photos!)
September 24, 2014
Yes, My Daughter Is in West Africa. Yes, I’m Scared.
document.write(z);
People who know me call me adventurous. I have climbed the Andes, hitchhiked around Spain and trekked the Himalaya through thigh-deep snow in March. But those people haven’t met my daughter. Compared to Taylor, I’m a TV-surfing couch potato.
I’ve encouraged and embraced Taylor’s adventures vicariously, from the year she learned to scuba dive in Indonesia to her work with the U.S. Forest Service on a remote Alaskan island. Nope, I didn’t like getting those emails reporting that she had nearly gotten the bends under water, or hearing about her close encounters with grizzly bears, but I always believed that Taylor was sensible and smart and would find her way home.
This, though, feels different. This past weekend, Taylor left as a Peace Corps Volunteer—part of her master’s degree program at Oregon State University—destined not for South America, where I thought they would surely send her because she speaks Spanish, but for Senegal, West Africa. As in, the part of Africa where the World Health Organization is predicting that there will be 21,000 people afflicted with the Ebola virus before it’s fully contained. (If, that is, they can contain it at all.) The Peace Corps pulled its volunteers from the three West African countries with the most cases—Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea—but, since Senegal has so far seen only one patient with the virus, the organization is continuing its work there.
Good for them. I just wish my daughter weren’t one of their volunteers.
Taylor, though, could not be dissuaded from going. She believes in promoting sustainable agriculture efforts worldwide and is invested in learning more about population ecology and agroforestry. Nothing could prepare her better for a career in that arena better than working on projects through the Peace Corps. Plus, everyone she knows who has been in the Peace Corps says the same thing: It will transform your life.
Good for her. But I just want her to come home.
Often, however, we mothers have to step aside and sweep our fears under the rug. I believe, with all my heart, that the Peace Corps is absolutely right to continue their projects in Senegal and other African countries. Those countries need international assistance now more than ever.
And I do know that Taylor will come home transformed, because her world perspective will be both broader and deeper. In return, perhaps the people she meets in Senegal will know more about people from the U.S.–an essential cultural exchange, since we are all sharing the same fragile planet and its limited resources.
I am proud, terrified, joyful and amazed by my daughter all at once, every day. I wish she would come home right now, but I hope she stays in West Africa. If she does, the Peace Corps and her work in Senegal will shape her into the person she is already becoming: a woman who not only wants to do well in life, but one who is committed to doing good in the world. A daughter who fills her mother’s heart with love.
September 15, 2014
Marketing Your eBook? 5 Surefire Strategies
document.write(z);
Recently, a friend asked if I had any foolproof strategies for marketing ebooks. My first response was less than quotable: “Um, no. I just try everything.”
But, as I looked back at the past year and dug a little deeper into the various marketing strategies I used, I realized that I did, in fact, discover some things that worked better than others. And the best part? They were easy and free! Here they are, in case you want to try them yourself:
PUBLISH MULTIPLE BOOKS. It’s very clear that ebook sales for my first two novels, SLEEPING TIGERS and THE WISHING HILL, jumped when I published my third book, BEACH PLUM ISLAND, clear evidence that you can ramp up your audience reach as you put more books on your virtual shelf.
THINK BIGGER THAN YOUR OWN WEB SITE. Yes, it’s helpful for a writer to have a web site, to blog, to be on Twitter, to do meet-and-greets in bookstores, book signings, etc. But I see the most sales in ebooks when I write something that is then picked up by a popular online site like The Huffington Post. It’s also important for authors to write guest posts for sites that draw a big audience of ebook readers, like IndieReader, Venture Galleries, and Shelf Pleasure. If you do a lot on Twitter and blog regularly, consider joining a Triberr group, which is essentially a gathering place for bloggers interested in reading and disseminating each other’s work.
TRY BLOGTALK RADIO. Authors should definitely consider blogtalk radio shows. A lot of blogtalk radio shows have solid followings, and people who follow them download the podcasts and listen to them on the computer or while they’re at the gym, using their iPhones or whatever. Listeners can immediately click on a link to buy your ebook if they like the show. e.
TARGET SPECIFIC MARKETS. In addition to targeting popular book-related web sites, it helps ebook sales to reach out to specific target audiences who would be particularly interested in the themes in your books. For instance, BEACH PLUM ISLAND revolves around half sisters and a second marriage, so I made myself accessible to stepmothers by writing guest posts for web sites like The Evil Stepmother Speaks and StepParenting with Grace. When my next novel, HAVEN LAKE, is published, I’ll contact web sites targeted at veterans, PTSD survivors, etc., because that’s a theme that runs through the novel. I’ll also do the same with web sites that draw knitters and people raising sheep, because guess what? Fiber arts and sheep farming are also featured in the novel!
KEEP ROLLING AND BUILDING A BIGGER SNOWBALL. Finally—and this is probably the most essential strategy—authors should realize that the days of a single book launch event (or even a week of launch events) are over. With social media, you can use a snowball marketing approach. Keep rolling out your words and ideas, and the readers will come!
August 27, 2014
What I Learned On My Fifth Summer College Tour: A Mom’s Survival Guide
Like most parents with juniors and seniors in high school, I’ve spent some of my summer touring colleges. This was my fifth time around, so I thought it was time to pass on what I’ve learned.
Does It Really Matter Where Your Child Goes to College?
In our experience, not so much. We had three children graduate from private schools—one Ivy, two middle-reach schools—and one from a large State university. All four of our graduates landed jobs and are supporting themselves. Three are working in their chosen fields.
Without exception, our children were hired not because they had degrees or graduated from a particular school, but because they had done other useful things during their college years. Press your children to take advantage of field work, internships, co-ops, part-time jobs, and any other sorts of opportunities that translate into work experience on a resume. For instance, one of our sons earned a film studies degree, and is now working as an art director in Hollywood because he had a summer job as a carpenter. His tool belt helped him land entry level positions and move up quickly from there because of his degree. Another son, an English major, wrote copy for web sites while in school. He was immediately hired by a big PR firm to develop digital copy for company web sites.
And by the way? The child who went to the large (and affordable) State university received the most job-related opportunities after graduation. She’s now in grad school but has easily found work along the way because of her hands-on experiences. Relax. Your kid doesn’t have to go to an Ivy to succeed.
Let Your Child Drive
I mean this both figuratively and literally. Literally, let your child drive the car at least part of the time. Your child is about to feel—and be—independent. Driving will allow your child to “feel” how far away a school is, what the surrounding area is like, etc. That’s all important information. It’s also crucial for your child to drive the college tour process, helping you plot out your journey. The initial list of schools to tour should be your child’s. (Ideally, your child will have generated that list with a guidance counselor who has given him or her a realistic expectation of what qualifies as a “reach” or a “safety” school based on your child’s high school record.) Then you can add a few.
Don’t Judge a School Until You’ve Seen It
Every college will trumpet about “hands-on experiences,” “personal attention,” “topnotch faculty,” and their U.S. News & World Report status. That’s fine, but see the schools for yourself. A lot of teenagers don’t really know what will “feel” right until they actually stand on different campuses. Try to walk around in the city or town the college is in as well as touring the campus. Trust me. Your child will know if a school fits.
Ask Questions
When it’s question-and-answer time on an admissions tour, don’t be afraid to ask questions that might embarrass your kids, like what the freshman advising system is like, the student retention rate, what percentage of students do internships and coops, what the career development office does during the years your child is there, what social activities are offered on weekends, etc.
Eat Your Way Across the Nation
Since our youngest is a boy, I packed lots of food in the car this summer. Yet we stopped every two hours to eat in restaurants anyway. Why? Because eating on campus or in restaurants in a school’s geographic area is a way for your child to visualize what it would be like to live there. Most schools will let you eat in their dining halls, so be sure to do that as well.
If You Miss a School on Your List, It’s Okay
There are only a certain number of days in your vacation, so you might not make it to every school on your child’s list. That’s fine! Encourage your child to apply anyway. If he or she is admitted, you can go to one of the “admitted students” days, where the college will try to woo you with food and information. Many colleges also arrange overnights for prospective students.
No Matter What, Don’t Panic
I’ve had children balk on tours and demand to leave “because the kids here are all posers.” I’ve had children say they’d slit their wrists if they had to attend a certain school, then choose that school and be happy there anyway. One of my daughters told me that a certain dormitory “is begging me to throw myself out the window.”
Two of our children decided to transfer after they’d spent a year or two at their top choice schools and discovered they didn’t like them. They both ended up in better schools—sometimes admission to a top-tier college is easier if your child has already earned good grades at another school.
My point is this: no matter what choice your child makes, don’t panic. Take a close look at the financial packages—be sure there aren’t a lot of loans embedded in the package, and definitely calculate in the cost of two or three roundtrip airline tickets per year if the school is far away—and then, if the school your child chooses is affordable, go for it. Never mind if you don’t think it’s the right fit, or if you really wish you had a good excuse to spend Parents Weekend in Vermont (where I took this picture while waiting for my son to check out a skate park near the University after our tour) instead of New York City. The most important thing is that your child is happy with the choice and ready to embrace the experience of college.
