Adam Croft's Blog, page 20

Turning your writing dreams into reality

For many writers, the thought of writing and being an author is a dream long before it becomes a reality. Sometimes it can be years between the initial desire to put pen to paper and it actually happening.

And, when it does happen, we are often disappointed when the reality of things doesn’t quite match up to how we saw them in our dreams. I think this goes a long way to explaining just why it can be so difficult to go about turning writing dreams into writing reality.

After all, when you only have the dream of being an author, nothing can go wrong. That novel you dream of writing will always be just how you imagine it, because that’s the only way it exists. It stops you from making all those mistakes we all naturally make once we actually start getting down to the business of writing – but it also stops those ideas from properly existing in the first place.

The trick here is to utilise those dreams to help you when it comes to putting ideas into practice. This isn’t always easy; in dreams, your ideas can be whatever you want them to be, whereas in reality, they can only ever be what you make of them. But you could still make them stinking good.

If you start to see those ideas and dreams as an aim and a guide rather than something that you absolutely must achieve, they start to become more helpful – and more achievable. You’ve already got your desired end result in mind, so now is the time to start taking practical steps towards it: setting definable goals and making progress one step at a time.

Along the way, think about what your aim is. What are you trying to achieve or say through your writing? The end result might not entirely match what you originally imagined, but it could achieve the same effect – or it could be even better. Dreams are great; they give us ideas and they give us something to strive for. But if all we have are dreams of writing, we’ll never know what we can actually achieve, and that could be so much better than what we imagine.

So keep those writing dreams and nurture them – and don’t forget that while the reality of them is often different, it can also be better.

3 things that are easy about writing – and 3 that aren’t

It can often be tempting to focus on the things that are difficult about writing, because those are usually the things we need to work and, often, spend the most time on. However, in the interests of balance, it’s also worth remembering the things that are easy (or at least not so difficult) about writing. So here are 3 things that are easy about writing – and three things that aren’t.

Easy – writing any old words on a page

With the possible exception of the very start of a novel, it isn’t usually all that hard to get some words on a page. That’s the good news. Even when you’re not feeling inspired, there is always something – anything – that you can write. It might not be ideal, but as has been said many times before, it is much easier to edit rubbish than it is to edit a blank page.

Hard – writing good words on a page

While writing might not be that hard, good writing definitely is hard. Making your initial draft better is well-known as one of the most challenging aspects of writing. At least once you’ve got that first draft done, you’re already part of the way there.

Easy – having ideas

In many ways, having ideas is easy. They might not be the most developed or cohesive ideas in the world, but they’re not hard to come up with. Take thirty seconds right now. See how many different things you think of, however random or crazy or brief.

Hard – developing ideas and sticking with them

Now for the hard bit – developing those initial ideas and turning them into something useable. This is where much of the work comes in, and it can affect the outcome of an entire novel. The other hard bit is sticking with an idea right until the very end.  It doesn’t matter how much you love the idea, it can still be tough to see a project right through to completion.

Easy – spotting errors

Ah, editing. That lovely time when we read through our work and spot all the mistakes and plot holes. For all the talk about how testing editing can be, this part of it is generally not that hard. Writers are usually critical of their own work, and so spotting errors is quite easy to do.

Hard – fixing errors

It is, however, harder to fix those errors than it is to spot them. This is why so much of good writing is about re-writing. Cutting and changing writing can be challenging and time-consuming, but hopefully the thought of how good it will be once it’s done will be just the boost you need to get through to the end.

Launching your book – a checklist

There’s a lot to think about when launching a self-published book. To help you make sure you’ve got everything covered, here’s a checklist of some of the most important things you need to think about. Feel free to add your own ideas and suggestions in the comments.

Is the book launch-ready? This doesn’t just mean having a compelling, well-written book. It also means making sure it’s been properly proof-read, formatted and designed before you launch it.
Sort out a marketing plan. Promotion can be time-consuming at the best of times, but if you’re launching straight into it without any clear idea of how you’re going to do it, it’ll fast become complicated. The points below should give you some idea of the kind of things to include in a marketing plan.
Figure out your pricing. Will your book be free or have a price tag attached to it? If the former, how long will it be free for? If the latter, how much are you going to charge? How will your decision affect your marketing?
Make sure your book is as available as it can be. Remember it’s unlikely you’ll be launching it in just one place – there are multiple platforms and retail options to utilise.
Sort out a press release announcing the launch.
Consider giving away some preview copies of your book so you’ll have some reviews ready for the main launch.
Think about the giveaways you might like to run.
What local events could you run? Are there any local bookshops or reading groups that you could use to help launch the book?
Don’t forget to consider both online and off-line launch strategies.
Update your website to include the upcoming launch and, after the launch, update it again to reflect the book’s release.
Write some blog posts about the launch.
Try and get a guest spot on other blogs to help promote your book in the days/weeks before and after its launch.
Have you created your Amazon author page and/or updated it to include details of your latest release?
Get in touch with friends and family and ask them to help promote your book (and remind them to buy it).
Think about creating a book trailer to launch alongside the book itself.
Don’t forget to update your ‘to do’ list regularly so you’re always on top of your launch activities.

5 reasons time away from your writing could improve your work

In writing, there is often nothing better than simply sitting down and getting things done. Sometimes, however, we can benefit from a bit of time away from our work – and the break could even help to make things better. Here are five reasons why.

The benefit of hindsight

Sometimes things seem like a great idea at the time. With the benefit of hindsight, however, you can see them more clearly – and they’re not always so great. It might not be fun when you stumble onto the realisation that your brilliant-sounding subplot isn’t so brilliant in practice, but it’s an important realisation to have. That little bit of distance from our writing can help us to see it more clearly.

Time to think of fresh ideas

When you’ve been working on a writing project for a while, it can occasionally start to seem a bit stale, and the great ideas you had at the beginning don’t seem as wonderful. A bit of time away from your writing will give you the space you need to think of new ideas and angles that you can bring to your work, and will hopefully help keep the enthusiasm burning right through to the end.

A chance for others to read it

Just because you’re not currently working on your writing doesn’t mean someone else can’t be working on it. It’s fairly common for writers to take a break between finishing a draft and embarking on the editing process, and it makes sense to use that time to get a professional editor – or even just a friend with a critical eye – to go over your work so that by the time you go back to it, you’ll know exactly what you need to work on.

See if it stands up to the test of time

Another benefit of taking a break is to see if your writing stands up to the test of time. You might have thought that a scene was hilarious when you first wrote it, but is it still funny a couple of weeks later?

Absence can make the heart grow fonder

I think all writers have been there at some point – an idea you used to love has turned a bit sour, you’re fed up and still nowhere near finished. Maybe taking a break will be the jolt you need to make your mind up once and for all. This can be risky as you might decide not to go back to that particular idea at all, but the time apart could also remind you of the good things about it that made you want to write about in the first place.

4 reasons why self-publishing will continue to grow

Independent publishing is not just popular with authors – it is increasingly popular with readers too. I believe that this is a development that is here to stay, and that it will continue to grow in popularity. With this in mind, here are four reasons why independent publishing will continue to grow in both popularity and strength, particularly among readers.

Pricing strategies

One big advantage that independent publishing has over traditional models is its pricing. Simply put, self-published books are typically cheaper than books that are traditionally published. We can’t forget that success is dependent on readers being willing to buy books. And, generally speaking, cheaper books (as long as they are good, that is) are more attractive.

Choice for readers

Another reason self-published books should continue to grow in popularity with readers is that they offer more choice. This is something that I’ve touched on before in this blog – self-published books aren’t dependent on a publisher thinking they are worth being read. People can make their minds up for themselves.

Business savvy

Independent publishers are also increasingly savvy about the business side of things; not just the pricing of books but aspects such as marketing, networking and longer-term planning. And, in many ways, the self-publishing industry is ahead of traditional publishing in terms of engaging with new technology and ideas. This gives it a good base from which to grow in the future.

Improving quality

Finally, to put it simply, self-published books are getting better. The industry used to take a lot of abuse for below-par, but the quality of the books out there is vastly improved and is now generally very high. Independent publishers are knowledgeable about the need for editors and proof-readers and cover designers, and it seems that the high quality of the books is not going unnoticed by readers.

Book marketing – all in or pick your battles?

When it comes to marketing your self-published book, there are so many different options open to you that it can be tricky to know exactly which way to go – do you try and cover as many marketing bases as you possibly can, or do you take a more selective approach to proceedings? There are arguments in favour of both approaches, so let’s take a look at some of the best.

All in

Reach a wider market

One of the main reasons for going for the ‘many and varied’ marketing approach is that it can enable you to reach a wider market. When the success of your book is dependent on you making sales to as many different people as possible, exploring as many avenues as you can find makes sense – including both online and offline marketing options.

Find out what works for you

The other big reason for trying a wide range of marketing strategies – at least to begin with – is that it offers a chance for you to find out what works, and what doesn’t. This is particularly important when you’re just starting out in independent publishing as there is definitely a process of learning when it comes to marketing. While you can learn the theory in advance, there is also something to be said for trial and error. You might have some failures as well as successes, but it should all help you create a more successful marketing strategy for the future.

Pick your battles

Don’t let your marketing idle

Even though exploring different marketing options is sensible, if you don’t think you’ll really make much use of a particular option it’s worth thinking about whether it’s worth it in the first place. After all, an idling blog or Facebook page isn’t going to do you much good, so it makes sense to think about where to focus you resources.

Play to your strengths

This is a particularly important point if you are doing the vast majority of marketing on your own – you need to play to your strengths. When you only have limited time available to dedicate to your marketing, you’ll want to make sure it’s doing your book as much good as possible, so think about what you can do well (you can always source professional help later on if you want to cover more bases).

Marketing depends on your market

Another reason to think about honing your marketing is that the marketing you do will depend on the market you are trying to reach. This is why researching the kind of readers who might like your book is so important when you’re developing a marketing strategy – you need to make sure you’re reaching them and engaging with them properly rather than just diving straight in and hoping for the best.

Too Close for Comfort featured by Apple Breakout Books

I’ve just received an email to let me know that my début book, Too Close for Comfort, has been selected by Apple as one of their Breakout Books for 2013. Despite being released two years ago, the book continues to be hugely successful in Apple’s iBookstore.

The Breakout Books feature has been celebrated since its launch, and has been covered recently in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

“The criteria for inclusion is largely customer-driven – selected titles exhibit strong reviews and ratings, and have shown exceptional sales performance.”

The Breakout Books feature is right at the top of Apple’s iBookstore and is featured heavily on iTunes. For Apple to be celebrating independent authors in such a prominent way just goes to show – yet again – the dominance independent authors are now enjoying over the traditional publishing market.

It’s hugely encouraging to see yet another of the world’s largest bookstores coming out in support of independent authors and I think this marks the beginning of what is going to be another massively successful year for independent publishers.

Oh, and seeing as we’re on the subject… I thought now might be a good time to announce that April will see the release of the third edition of Too Close for Comfort, a new-and-improved anniversary edition, celebrating two years since its explosive emergence into the market which spawned my life as I now know it. There’s even a brand new book cover which forms part of the new cover styles for the Knight & Culverhouse series. A celebratory anniversary edition of Guilty as Sin will be released in the summer.

Learn more about this Breakout Books promotion at the Smashwords Blog.

Barnes & Noble suffers e-reader losses

Barnes & Noble, the largest bookseller in the US, has recently announced that it has suffered losses in the arm of its business that includes sales of its e-readers and e-books. The company has significantly invested in this part of its business in recent years and so the figures are sure to be disappointing – especially as they include sales from over the holiday period.

There is even suggestion that the company might start to withdraw from certain aspects of this side of its business, and focus more on building deals with other tablet produces over content they control rather than focusing on their own Nook tablet.

One of the reasons given for the losses suffered is that while tablet sales grew over the holiday period, people chose to go with other providers – Barnes & Noble have found it difficult to extend their market outside of their existing customers. With this in mind, a renewed focus on content rather than physical devices seems to make sense, although what action the company is planning to take is not yet clear.

In the meantime, you can read more about this story here and here.

 

German book retailers launching new e-reader

Here’s a bit of news that will be of interest to anyone who’s keen on their e-readers: the e-reader marketplace is about to get a new addition with the upcoming launch of a new device from German book retailers.

The new e-reader is called the Tolino and it’s set to go on sale from 7 March. It’s seen as something of a rival to the Kindle from Amazon as well as Apple’s tablet. E-book sales currently account for just over 3 % of the German market (compared with around 10% in the US), but it is a market that is growing fast.

Last year, Amazon had sales of around $8.7billion in Germany, which works out at around 20% of the book market. This increasing dominance seems to have rattled other German book retailers, and is one of the reasons they have joined together to create the new Tolino e-reader.

The Tolino is set to have around 300,000 books available for download, and should be able to store around 2000 books. It’s set to be sold for €99.

You can read more about this new e-reader here.

The downsides of being a writer

I love being a writer. I’m sure all of the writers reading this love being a writer. And so we should. It’s great. Fantastic. Like any profession, however, there is sometimes a downside to writing for a living. For instance…

It is very easy to never leave the house. Many writers work from home and, thanks to the wonders of the internet and word processing, you can easily end up staying in the house. All the time.
The block. The panic when you have a deadline looming but no idea what to write is practically unparalleled.
You end up spending a lot of time on your own. Don’t get me wrong, this can be great, but you can also go a little bit stir crazy from spending so much time with just your own thoughts (and your characters) for company.
Plot holes. We’re not always sure how they happen. Everything made sense when you were planning and writing the first draft, but now you’re editing it and there is a massive hole right there in the middle of your plot. Grr.
The fear of being terrible. I think this is a fear that never leaves, no matter how successful a writer you are.
We don’t actually care that much about the downsides. We don’t care that we haven’t left the house in a week and haven’t seen our friends for ages, or that writing sometimes makes us want to bang our heads against the wall in frustration. It’s still brilliant and we wouldn’t change it for anything.

What do you think? Is there a particular downside to writing that gets you?