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Find Your Topic, Not Your Voice

“Communication | ArtPrize 2010” by Fellowship of the Rich is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Today’s post is by author Catherine Baab-Muguira (@CatBaabMuguira). Her book, Poe for Your Problems, releases in September 2021.

In setting out to become a writer, you must strive, above all, to discover your unique voice. At least, that’s become the conventional wisdom, taught in MFA programs as well as in more casual settings, from writers group meetings at Starbucks to free classes taught in the stuffy backroom of your local library. Yet there is so much wrong with this advice that, if you spend even one full minute giving it serious thought, your eyes will roll heaven-ward all on their own like Where even to begin?

Still, we must begin somewhere, so here goes.

How can you know what your tone will be when you don’t yet know what your topic is?

Where exactly do we think voice comes from if not from subject?

Which is the right cart and which is the right horse?

Sure, your unique sensibility may account for a large part of your hot takes, but would you write about muffins and genocide the same way, or Fords and fjords? And are we really so sure that voice trumps all other aspects of a piece of writing?

Finally, who is responsible for advancing this damnable, now-inescapable sick logic, and what is their address, because I’m thinking I might like to T.P. their house?

Maybe that seems a tad aggressive. But you have to consider the real damage this advice has wrought. All over the world, people’s drawers bulge with unpublishable novels, essays collections and memoirs in which there’s plenty of voice, yet no story, no real through-line, no sense of one’s audience beyond the assumption that they’re there. That’s the problem. This overemphasis on voice puts the focus on the writer and what they want to say and how they want to say it, ignoring more pertinent questions. Namely, considering how there’s Mare of Easttown to binge on HBO, why should anyone spend hours poring over your writing instead?

It also ignores the credentialism involved with the few novels and works of nonfiction that get acquired, more or less, because of voice alone. Publishers are a lot less apt to value your unique voice if that voice doesn’t come with degrees from Harvard or Iowa, or if you’re not reading this article while lounging on the terrace at Yaddo. It’s just a fact. There are exceptions, of course. The overall picture is, however, about as clear as any close-up of Kate Winslet, though not as pretty.

I rant like this from firsthand experience, from the wish I could time-travel back about 15 years and tell myself all this. My own writing breakthrough, the one that got me a book deal after a dozen years of trying, came from focusing on topic ahead of voice. Your writing struggles and goals may well be different. You are probably miles ahead of me, much less dense and much quicker to learn. But considering the prevalence of the conventional wisdom, let’s turn it on its head a minute.

What if you were to put the primary focus on your topic?

It might just help you land a book deal, climb some lofty bestseller list, scale those Everest-like Amazon ranks—and what’s more, the process is simple, no matter if you’re writing fiction or nonfiction.

Pick a topic that fascinates you, or learn about a topic until it fascinates you.Lead with research. Google your subject to see what’s out there. Begin to gain a sense of whether an audience already exists.Bring that topic to the world.

This strategy can lead to more interesting writing, and interesting is what you need to be, considering you and I and everyone else we know are all working inside a full-fledged, entertain-or-GTFO attention economy. Few of us occupy such exalted positions that we can take audience for granted. This is all the more true if your goal is to eventually sell a book—again, fiction or nonfiction—because first you must prove to agents and acquisition editors that there’s a crowd of people eager to pay for it.

Your topic could, for example, take any of the following forms:

Things that interested you as a childIdeas you can’t get out of your headPlaces that have become your personal obsessionsOr some such B.S.: weird jobs, strange headlines, cultural trends, etc.

And your audience may pop up in such places as:

Facebook fan groups dedicated to your subjectPublications and other outlets (from podcasts to YouTube channels) dedicated to your subjectReddit boards about your topicOther writers who’ve covered this same subject, plus their audiences.

That’s to name just a few potential sources. The crucial thing about the exercise is that you start to accrue some data. You begin to think in terms of appropriate comps, i.e. other works like your potential work that have found an audience, maybe even seen some substantial success. Another benefit: You may also connect with a community devoted to your topic, which can help you lead a less lonely writer-ly existence, and maybe help you build a platform, too, once you start contributing to that community.

We could spend all day arguing about the reasons the emphasis on voice persists—how it’s easier to teach writing at the sentence level than at the story level, and how most people in a position to teach classes—especially college classes—come from prestigious backgrounds, the kind that encourages the New Yorker to pile praise atop their supposedly transcendent prose, never mind if the novel is meandering or the essays are kinda pretentious, kinda boring. The rest of us are unlikely to be given such leeway.

The good news is this lack of leeway can become a strength for you and me, rather than a weakness. Embrace it, and you might just grow into a more competent, entertaining writer. Most readers don’t give a crap about fancy prose—it’s far from their foremost concern. This has been true since humans were telling stories in caves, and it’s even more true today, when you as a writer aren’t just competing with literal Neanderthals but the best TV ever made, as well as Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and millions of already-published books. So, topic over voice, friend! Content > tone! Subject ahead of approach!

Besides, when you get your topic right, all your obsessive weirdness comes to the fore, starting to work for you for once. You enter flow, and suddenly, the awful pain of writing drops away. You fly, weightless, freed for a GD moment from the grind, and the prose pours out of you, your voice just showing up on the page like some welcome, expected guest, or like a free dessert. It’s freaking magic. Or at least worth trying, anyway.

The Art of the Moment Memoir

“Firecracker Freeze Frame” by rjsteih is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Today’s post is excerpted from We Are the Words: The Master Memoir Class by Beth Kephart (@BethKephart).

There are many ways to think about memoir, many categories, classifications, taxonomies. Family dysfunction memoirs. Medical memoirs. Trauma memoirs. Food memoirs. Nature memoirs. Coming-of-age memoirs.

Here are a few others.

The Brand Memoir: the name precedes the story

Think of Gabrielle Hamilton’s Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef. Or Shoe Dog: A Memoir of the Creator of Nike by Phil Knight.

Or Rising to the Challenge: My Leadership Journey by Carly Fiorina.

Each author was famous for something else before they entered the realm of bestsellerdom.

The Headline Memoir: the book can be summarized with a single sexy sentence

“A daughter’s tale of living in the thrall of her magnetic, complicated mother and the chilling consequences of her complicity,” pretty much sums up Adrienne Brodeur’s Wild Game.

And even though Tara Westover’s Educated is a very long book, it is a volume easily contained by this single sentence: “A coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one’s life through new eyes, and the will to change it.”

Likewise, Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance was promoted with these words: “A probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class through the author’s own story of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town.”

Headline stuff. Movie plot stuff. All right there at a glance.

The Journey Memoir: the author sets out on an actual adventure

Along the way, the author might also take a journey into herself. My favorite of these is Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family, which sends the author back to his childhood home of Ceylon so that he might learn of the family that shaped him.

Mary Morris’s Nothing to Declare: Memoirs of a Woman Traveling Alone also fits neatly into this bucket—a book that takes Morris through Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala so that she might begin “to overcome the struggles that have held her back. By crossing new boundaries, she learns to set frontiers for herself as a woman.”

The Reflection Memoir: to deepen one’s understanding of the greater world and the private self

I think of Anna Badkhen living near the Senegalese port of Joal to navigate “a time of unprecedented environmental, economic, and cultural upheaval with resilience, ingenuity, and wonder.”

Also There Will Be No Miracles Here, where Casey Gerald offers the “testament of a boy and a generation who came of age as the world came apart—a generation searching for a new way to live.”

And of course, Between the World and Me, which finds Ta-Nehisi Coates engaged in work that pivots “from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for a son.”

The Art of the Moment Memoir

And then there is what I’ve come to think of as the Art of the Moment memoir—work in which the moments themselves (and the way they are arranged) are of primary importance and intrigue.

I think of the quilt of memories, thoughts, and moments set down by Jean-Dominique Bauby in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

I think of Bough Down, by Karen Green, whose small texts and images capture the immediacy of grief in the aftermath of a husband’s suicide.

I think of The Folded Clock by Heidi Julavits, which chronicles, in non-chronological fashion, her daily life and thoughts.

I think of writers who understand that our lives are lived moment by moment, and that our art is what we make of the moments going by.

Holding onto the moment

All writers of memoir must ultimately possess the ability to artfully render the moment. To apply wonder, mystery, or deep seeing to an instant in time. To explore the familiar or ponder the unfamiliar. To ask a question and suggest an answer. To liberate curiosity, to mark a memory, to keep one. The range of subject-matter possibilities is endless, as Brian Dillon, in his book Essayism: On Form, Feeling, and Nonfiction, reminds us:

On the death of a moth, humiliation, the Hoover Dam and how to write; an inventory of objects on the author’s desk, and an account of wearing spectacles, which he does not; what another learned about himself the day he fell unconscious from his horse; of noses, of cannibals, of method; diverse meanings of the word lumber; many vignettes, published over decades, in which the writer, or her elegant stand-in, described her condition of dislocation in the city, and did so blithely that no one guessed it was all true; a dissertation on roast pig; a heap of language …

How do we keep those moments? How do we hold them in place until we are ready for them? How do we keep our senses on alert?

Seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, feeling, knowing is not just a talent or a predilection; it is a discipline. The tool of the trade can be a diary or journal or notebook.

You might think of the notebook, as Lydia Davis does, as a kind of externalized mind. “My journal as my other mind, what I sometimes know, what I once knew,” she writes, in Essays: One. “I consult my other mind and I see that although I do not know a certain thing at present, I once knew it; there it is in my other mind.”

Or you might share Patti Smith’s experience, as a notebook being the home to endless variations of the same paragraphs. From M Train: “Then there are the scores of notebooks, their contents calling—confession, revelation, endless variations of the same paragraphs—and piles of napkins scrawled with incomprehensible rants.”

Or maybe the notebook you keep is home to an implacable I, in true Joan Didion fashion. From “On Keeping a Notebook”:

But our notebooks give us away, for however dutifully we record what we see around us, the common denominator of all we see is always, transparently, shamelessly, the implacable “I.” We are not talking here about the kind of notebook that is patently for public consumption, a structural conceit for binding together a series of graceful pensées; we are talking about something private, about bits of the mind’s string too short to use, an indiscriminate and erratic assemblage with meaning only for its maker.

When I was a child I kept a diary of sorts—blank books the pages of which I waterlogged with watercolor, then wrote into the ripples the starts of lavender poems.

When I was a young woman I began diary-ing the words collected from the writers who had used them—Ben Fountain’s draggled and furze and logy; Patricia Hampl’s hieratic and vatic; Alan Bennett’s equerries and chivvied and glabrous; Annie Dillard’s apostatized and thigmotropic.

When I wasn’t well for a long time, I kept a diary thickened with quotations from architects, designers, builders, as if they could speak for me, my mood, my quest, and for that period of time, they did:

“When we build, let us think that we build forever.” (John Ruskin)

“We could speak of every project as if were an unfinished love affair: it is most beautiful before it ends.” (Aldo Rossi)

“Should we not try to find our own style?” (Karl Friedrich Schinkel)

I have diaries that record the making of my stories, and diaries that started with the hope of making a story, with admonitions to myself, which were not heeded: “Not style, voice. Not voice, story. Not story, but an existential blast. What alive is. What losing is. Why the word that keeps bleeding is desperate.”

What happened to that story? How did I lose the tail of my own desperation?

And I have photographs, I should say, because I think this is important, thousands of photographs, that keep my seeing intact until I find my pen and my journal and layer in, practice, write again, improve the words. A few videos that help me track the movements of a moment. A few audio clips of necessary sound.

There are no diary rules, but there is, here, a suggestion: That our seeing, our hearing, our smelling, our tasting, our feeling, our knowing, our arts of our moments will be sharper, truer, more alive when we have a journal of some kind nearby, a place that marks the spot, the mood, the moment.

Amazon / Bookshop

I’m looking or listening so that I might somehow record this, you might say to yourself, and because you have entrusted yourself with that responsibility, because a pen or paper or iPhone Notes or the iPad or a typewriter await you, you are naturally going to work harder at seeing and hearing. You are going to extend your pause. You are going to ask yourself questions. You are going to watch those rooks and wonder, indeed, what the word is for that dark symphony of wings. You are going to enter into a moment so that you might raise it up to language and to story when the time is finally right.

Note from Jane: If you enjoyed this post, be sure to check out We Are the Words: The Master Memoir Class by Beth Kephart.

The Most Significant Choice Of Your Writing Career

“Unlearn & rethink” by Jonas B is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Today’s post is by author, editor and coach Jessica Conoley (@jaconoley).

The most significant choice of your writing career happens long before your story makes its way into the world. This choice impacts every single aspect of your career, and it is a choice you make over and over and over again. This choice could leave you a husk of a writer, ravaged by the publishing industry, bemoaning the success of everyone else around you; or it could propel you to the next stage of your career and embolden you to try things you’d never thought possible. The funny part is this choice has nothing to do with the act of writing, but everything to do with words.

The most important choice you will make in your writing career is how you choose to talk to yourself about said career.

And for 99% of writers I know, the default setting of this conversation is: doubt, worry, and frustration. Fears on repeat include: Why would anyone ever buy my book? My story isn’t important. I’m never going to get an agent. I don’t know how to do this. Somebody already wrote a story like mine…

When we’re Uninitiated and breaking into the industry, we all have these thoughts, and we often feel powerless. But that feeling of powerlessness dissipates when you master your interior dialogue. You go from being a pawn in a multi-billion-dollar industry to an active player with a say in how your career unfolds.

You can change your default mental settings, and as you rewire your brain you may even learn to enjoy the current stage of your writing career.

But the jump from Why would anyone read my work? to My work is great is not natural. If you try to go directly from the former to the latter, you’re probably going to feel delusional, as opposed to empowered.

Rewiring progresses quietly, in stages. Mindset milestones include: That will never happen to me. Maybe that could happen to me. I can do this. I’ve already done it.

Here are a few exercises for both inside and outside your brain to lead you from That will never happen to me to Maybe that could happen to me.

Inside your headAcknowledge how you think is a choice. Negative narrative is on auto-pilot by now, but someone had to turn on the auto-pilot function and that someone was you. Are you ready to turn it off? Does that idea terrify you? What about those negative thoughts are you holding on to? The choice is yours, all you have to do is make it.

For me, clinging to negativity offered a sense of security. I knew how to be an aspiring writer. But owning the fact I was a working writer put me out of my comfort zone. It forced me to realize people may actually read my work and that triggered a fear of judgment on about ten-billion different levels. But stasis equals death doesn’t just apply to our characters. And it’s only by making a choice to think and therefore act differently that I was able to move forward.

Notice when you’re having a crap-tastic garbage person way of talking to yourself moment and shut it down. Take a deep breath, and say out loud with your voice-box, “I choose not to participate in this conversation.” Add a physical movement, like snapping your fingers, as well. If you’re in public and catch yourself thinking negatively, you can use the physical movement to interrupt the negative pattern. That way people aren’t staring at you for uttering, “I choose not to participate in this conversation” when you haven’t been conversing.Replace trash talk with a new line of dialogue. Once you’ve asserted your choice to disengage from self-trash-talk a few times, take it a step further. Replace your negative monologue with a question of possibility. I like Why not me? If somebody else has done it, there’s no reason I can’t do it too.

Rewriting your brain is hard work. It is physically exhausting to create new neuro pathways. That old wiring for negative thinking will always be there, so rewiring is something we have to practice as frequently as we practice our writing craft. And, just like mastering our craft, adjusting our thoughts and tweaking our mindset is never done—but with practice, your transition time from self-doubt to self-empowerment increases exponentially.

You can do some serious rewiring work on your own, but it has even more impact when you step outside your own brain.

Outside your headRewrite your narrative. Drag out your favorite-colored pen and a piece of blank paper. Write your question of possibility (Why not me?) eighteen times. Say it out loud eight times. Then fill up the remaining blank lines on the paper with a good old creative writing exercise where you indulge in all the sensory details about the moment you finish your manuscript, or get the call from your dream agent, or sign that three-book deal. Be brave enough to write it now, so you’ll be brave enough to live it later.Enlist your writing support triangle. Tell them you want to be a mentally healthy, published writer. Ask them to call you out. When you talk about your career like a heap of garbage, have them ask your trigger question. Hearing “Why not you?” from your support team brings it to a whole new level of possibility.Set up a writing career log to celebrate your accomplishments. This is an ongoing list of all the things you’ve accomplished in pursuit of your writing dreams. (I know, I know, you’re all I don’t have any accomplishments, but you do. The fact you’re reading this article confirms you are taking positive steps toward your dream.) My list includes the date and a brief line about what I accomplished. Sample items include: read a craft book, sent my first query, started a new draft, got feedback from my critique partner, got my first rejection, etc. And don’t forget to give yourself credit for rewiring your brain. Each line on that log is a positive step forward. Read it, breathe it, love it. You’re doing this.

Are Fictional Characters Protected Under Copyright Law?

[image error]“Holmes!!…” by dynamosquito is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Today’s post is from intellectual property attorney Kathryn Goldman (@KathrynGoldman) of the Creative Law Center.

Jack Ryan, the analytical, yet charming CIA analyst, made an appearance in federal court in Maryland earlier this year. The heirs to Tom Clancy’s literary legacy are fighting over him. Unlike in the movies, he’s not in a great position to fight back.

It all started when Clancy signed the publishing deal for The Hunt for Red October where Jack Ryan made his debut in 1984. In a departure from common practice, Clancy transferred his copyright in Red October to the publisher. A few years later, Clancy realized his mistake and was able to negotiate return of the copyright for the book. He immediately transferred the reverted copyright to his company.

Here’s the crux of the current court battle: When Clancy mistakenly transferred his copyright in the book Red October to the original publisher, did the copyright to the character Jack Ryan go with it? Or did Clancy retain the character copyright? In normal practice, the sale of the right to publish a copyrighted story does not stop the author from using its characters in future works.

If Clancy retained the rights to the character when he signed the initial publishing contract, then the rights that reverted from the publisher would not have included the copyright for the character. The reverted rights Clancy turned around and transferred into his company would not have included the character rights. All of which means that the character, Jack Ryan, is part of Clancy’s estate and not controlled by the company he set up.

Jack Ryan is a valuable character with his own copyright separate from the copyright in the book. Everybody concerned, the owners of the company and the heirs to the estate, wants a piece of him, or all of him. And it’s not clear where Mr. Ryan currently resides.

Fictional characters are not listed in the copyright statute as a separate class of protectable work. There’s no application at the Copyright Office for them. But over the years, the law on character protection has evolved.

Courts have held, in certain circumstances, that fictional characters are protectable in their own right.

This is important because characters with independent copyright can be licensed separately from the stories in which they originally appeared. It’s another way for authors to divide their rights to create multiple income streams. That’s the beauty of copyright. It’s divisible. An author can keep some rights and license others. It’s what Clancy did and his company/estate is still doing with the Jack Ryan franchise.

Not every character can be protected by copyright. Stock characters cannot be protected—a drunken old bum, a slippery snake oil salesman, a hooker with a heart of gold, a wicked stepmother, a gypsy fortune teller, and so on. They are essentially ideas for characters, vague and lightly sketched. Copyright does not give anyone a monopoly on ideas. Protecting stock characters would prevent as yet untold stories from being told. Depriving the world of new stories is exactly the opposite of what copyright is intended to promote—the creation of more stories, more art.

A character must be well delineated to be protected.

It must have consistent and identifiable character traits and attributes so it is recognizable wherever it appears. Think James Bond and his distinctive character traits: his cool demeanor; his overt sexuality; his love of martinis “shaken, not stirred”; his marksmanship; his “license to kill”; his physical strength; and his sophistication. Bond is protected by copyright. The Bond character is identifiable regardless of who depicts him.

Defining the well-delineated character can be difficult. Characters that are central to a story tend to change. They evolve. They are built up throughout the book until they are fully formed in the mind of the reader. Without character transformation there is no hero’s journey, no story. Characters can become more delineated and more protectable over the course of a series of books. Bond developed over the course of 14 books written by Ian Fleming and continues to develop on film.

Characters that are less developed are less likely to be protected. Those characters are less expression and more idea. There’s a gray area that needs to be navigated when balancing the protection for original characters but leaving character ideas in the public domain free for all to use.

Public domain characters cannot be protected

But new characters created from public domain works can be protected. Consider Enola Holmes, the younger sister of Sherlock. The Sherlock Holmes stories have been slipping into the public domain for years now, to the chagrin of the estate of Arthur Conan Doyle. The creative elements of Sherlock Holmes stories that are in the public domain can be used by others to build new stories.

Enola Holmes was introduced to readers in a series of young adult books written by Nancy Springer. Enola does not exist in the Conan Doyle canon; she was created by Springer. She has distinctive traits (high intelligence, keen observational skills and insight, skills in archery, fencing, and martial arts, an independent thinker who defies Victorian norms for women) that combine to make her well delineated and protectable.

Another wrinkle: “The story being told” test

The “well delineated character” is the most widely accepted legal test used to decide whether a fictional character is protected by copyright, but it is not the only one. The other is “the story being told” test. Sam Spade is responsible for this test.

Dashiell Hammett created Sam Spade when he wrote The Maltese Falcon. Hammett licensed the exclusive rights to use the book in movies, radio, and television to Warner Brothers. Hammett later wrote other stories with Sam Spade. Warner Bros. complained that it owned exclusive rights to the character and Hammett couldn’t write about him anymore.

Ironically, the court protected Hammett’s right as the creator to use Sam Spade in future stories by deciding that the character was not protected by copyright. Sam Spade is just a vehicle for telling the story and is not the story itself. He is the chessman in the game of telling the story. It was the story that was licensed to Warner Bros., not the chessman.

A character is protected under the “story being told” test when he dominates the story in a way that there would be no story without him. This test sets a high bar for character protection. To protect the character, the story would essentially have to be a character study. The Maltese Falcon is not a character study of Sam Spade.

An example of character protection using the “story being told test” is the Rocky franchise. A screenwriter wrote a story on spec using the characters Rocky, Adrian, Apollo Creed, and Paulie. The work was considered to be an infringing use of the characters. The characters were protected because the movies focused on the characters and their relationships, not on intricate plot or story lines. The characters were the story being told. The writer could not avoid the infringement touchpoint of substantial similarity when he took the characters and used them in a new storyline.

In summary

Fictional characters can lead a new and independent life completely separate from the original work in which they appear. They are an additional creative asset in a writer’s intellectual property portfolio. There is no straight forward way to register for character protection with the Copyright Office other than as part of the larger work. Authors will be well served to think about protecting the rights in their characters when signing publishing contracts and licensing agreements.

The Peer Review Process: What Sets University Presses Apart

“89/365: Judgment” by SarahMcGowen is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Today’s post is excerpted from THE BOOK PROPOSAL BOOK: A Guide for Scholarly Authors by Laura Portwood-Stacer (@lportwoodstacer). Copyright © 2021 by Laura Portwood-Stacer. Reprinted by permission of Princeton University Press.

When an author submits a book proposal to a university press, in a best-case scenario the acquiring editor will think the project is promising and want to go ahead with peer review of the proposal and some or all of the book manuscript. At some publishers, acquisitions editors present projects they are excited about to other press staff and are then approved by an internal committee to proceed with peer review. At other presses, editors can proceed with peer review at their own discretion. Peer review is a practice that distinguishes scholarly presses from other types of publishers, so it’s key for authors to understand how it works and what expectations will fall to them as a result.

If you make it to the peer review stage, your editor will ask you to provide the materials they need for review. Many presses will move forward to peer review with just a proposal and sample chapter or two; some presses prefer to wait on peer review until the author provides a full or nearly complete manuscript, especially for first-time authors.

When your materials go out for review, particularly if you’ve submitted a full manuscript, your editor may stipulate exclusive submission, meaning that they will require you to (temporarily) pull the project from consideration elsewhere if you have submitted the proposal to multiple publishers. The exclusivity usually goes away once you get the reviews back, meaning that if you don’t like what the reviewers or editor want you to do with the manuscript, you can then try your luck with a different press to give yourself some options. Note that up until the moment of peer review or contract, you are free to be in talks with editors at multiple presses in order to identify the best home for your book. As long as you are transparent with everyone that that’s what you’re doing, there is no problem with this at all. If an editor thinks your project is particularly appealing and recognizes that they will have to compete with other publishers for it, you’re in a strong negotiating position and they may agree to waive exclusivity during the peer review process.

During peer review, your editor will ask expert scholars to evaluate your submitted materials and return their thoughts in the form of written reports. Unlike peer review conventions for scholarly journals, peer review for books is not anonymous in both directions. While you won’t know the identities of your reviewers (unless they reveal themselves in their reports), your reviewers will have access to your name and CV, because in addition to assessing the content of your submission materials, they will also be commenting on your scholarly profile and perceived authority to write the book you’re proposing. Reviewers will also be asked to comment on their perceptions of the market for your proposed book.

The return of the reader reports will likely be a big moment of decision for the acquiring editor. These are some possible scenarios:

The reviews come back largely positive and the editor decides to seek approval from their publisher’s internal committee and editorial board to offer you a contract.The editor thinks the criticisms in the reader reports are minimal enough that they can be addressed through a response letter from you. The editor has faith that you will assure the editorial board that you can fix any significant problems in revision and gain their approval for a contract before another round of review.The editor doesn’t think the reader reports are strong enough to get approval for a contract, but they still believe in the project. They may seek additional reports or ask you to revise the manuscript or proposal and resubmit for a second round of review.The editor finds the reader reports negative enough that they don’t feel comfortable moving forward. In this case, the project will be rejected and you’ll move on to any other presses you may be considering. (You might first decide to revise your proposal based on the reports before submitting to additional publishers, but that’s up to you.)

This is a moment for you to make a decision as well. Do you like the direction the editor and reviewers want you to take the manuscript? Are you confident you can address the requested revisions? Have you felt respected and informed throughout the acquisitions process so far? If you have hesitation about any of these questions, you may want to communicate it to the editor. You should know that peer reviewers don’t have the final say on publication; that will lie with your editor and the press’s editorial board. A brief phone call can be extraordinarily useful for getting clarity on what your editor honestly thinks of the peer reviews and how the editor envisions the project moving forward. If you aren’t feeling reassured after talking to your editor about the reports, you might decide to pull the project from this press or temporarily put it on hold while you seek responses from other editors and presses.

If the acquisitions editor feels confident in your project and your ability to turn in a satisfactory finished manuscript, they will present the project to an internal staff committee—made up of editors, marketers, and salespeople—for approval. If the editor’s presentation goes well, the editor will either be approved to offer you an agreement to publish your book or to take your project to the press’s faculty editorial board for their approval. (Some presses don’t need editorial board approval to issue contracts; at those presses your project won’t go before the editorial board until you submit your full manuscript.)

At a university press, the editorial board is made up of faculty from across the institution, most of whom won’t be experts in your area, let alone your subject matter. Your editor will be providing the editorial board with sample materials from your book along with the peer reviewers’ reports and your response to the reports, and then making a presentation where they defend your book’s intellectual soundness, contribution, and fit with the press’s publishing program. Your editor’s enthusiastic support for the project and capacity to defend it using the information you’ve provided in your submission will count for a lot. Understanding that your editor will be making these presentations about your book is key, because your proposal is your chance to give them all the information they’ll need to pitch your book successfully when it gets to this stage. Also keep in mind: If you haven’t submitted a full manuscript yet, your full manuscript will likely also go through a peer review process before your book is given the final green light for publication.

While peer review is a significant aspect of the scholarly publishing process—it’s what sets university presses and other academic publishers apart from the rest of the publishing world—remember that individual peer reviewers don’t decide your book’s fate with the publisher. The input of experts in your field does matter to the decision of whether or not a press wants to take on the publication of your manuscript, yet the word of any given peer reviewer is not the end of the story. Your editor will have gathered reviews from at least two different scholars, and if their assessments contradict each other or are otherwise ambiguous, the editor may have sought at least one additional reviewer to come on board, maybe more. The negative opinion of one reviewer is not necessarily a death knell for your project. Even if all the reviewers agree in their criticism of the submitted materials, that doesn’t mean your project is doomed, as long as your editor still believes in it. If your own response helps your editor demonstrate convincingly that you can satisfactorily address the concerns voiced by the reviewers, your project may still be in play.

Amazon / Bookshop

I advise approaching your “response to the reader reports” as something more along the lines of a “revision plan in light of the reader reports.” Your peer reviewers’ suggestions can genuinely improve your book if you synthesize them thoughtfully. Your job in presenting your revision plan isn’t to rebut the points the reviewers made, or to prove that your submission materials were perfect all along; your job is to show that you will use the reports to strengthen your project into something that represents a smart investment for the publisher. Providing a concrete, reasonable plan for revision—without coming off as defensive or ego-driven—is the way to convince the decision-makers that you’re a good bet.

Note from Jane: If you enjoyed this post, be sure to check out The Book Proposal Book: A Guide for Scholarly Authors by Laura Portwood-Stacer.

Post Book Launch Depression Is a Thing

“No Mail Today” by Ivy Dawned is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Today’s post is by Rachel Michelberg, author of Crash.

In the two months since I gave birth to a book, I’ve discovered that post-partum publishing depression is a thing. Even when the baby doesn’t cry at all.

I’m not sure what I thought would happen after my memoir was published. Did I expect Oprah or Reese (or at the very least their people) to come begging to feature it in their book clubs?

Would Terry Gross reach out to my publicist for a Fresh Air interview?

Was the red carpet supposed to be rolled out especially for me to waltz down toward my acceptance of the Booker prize? (I know, the Booker is for fiction and I wrote a memoir, but a fantasy is a fantasy.)

Nah. Except for dreaming about a Netflix miniseries, my hopes are tamer, more subdued. I’m a singer and actor in my other life. I know how unlikely fame is, even for the most gifted among us; as Thomas Edison said, success is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. My expectations—I thought—were in check.

So why am I feeling so generally bummed out since my memoir Crash was published?

The weeks and months preceding my publication date were exciting—a welcome diversion from the getting-close-to-the-end-of-the-pandemic boredom and antsy-ness. Since my publicist is on the east coast, I loved waking up to several emails from her in my inbox to peruse while drinking my coffee. 

Are you available to do a podcast for a nationally syndicated show? NPR wants to interview you (regional, not national, but I’ll take it).

Please take a look at the updated press kit—it incorporates the quote from your fantastic Kirkus review! 

It was all so thrilling (an oh-so-familiar feeling) as if April 27th was another opening night. I even had the requisite jitters.

When I was being rational (which happened on occasion), I knew that the actual day of publication would be far less exciting. It was a Tuesday, a regular workday. There’d be no exhilarating applause, no flowers, no cast party. To fill the inevitable void, I took the day off teaching (knowing I couldn’t possibly focus on my students) and arranged a lunch date with my daughter and some friends. My publisher, She Writes Press, posted a congrats notice on Facebook. There were some nice texts (“Happy Pub Day!” “How does it feel to be a published author?”) and a few congratulatory phone calls. It was a strange day. After eleven years of the writing and editing process, a year and a half of preparing the manuscript, planning the launch, building a publicity team and plan, the silence was deafening. Give it time, I thought. After all, most people haven’t even received the book, let alone read it.

My nerves increased exponentially before my Thursday launch event two days later, surprising me—a seasoned performer. I was so nervous I truly felt like throwing up. What the hell? It felt like a one-woman show, and I’ve always preferred the camaraderie and comfort of ensembles over solos. It would be me mostly alone onscreen, with 140 of my closest friends out in the ether.

But what’s to fear? Am I a mess because I’ve written a deeply personal, vulnerable account, revealing embarrassing stories to former synagogue congregants and current students? Or because I’m afraid I might be sued by the antagonists in my story? 

Either way, the book was out in the world now, never to be retracted. It could be a hit—or a flop.

Fortunately, the launch was a huge success. The sponsoring bookstore was pleased with sales, accolades were bestowed, my publicist was happy. I got those flowers (Richard, my husband, has been well trained.) A celebratory dinner with the whole family toasting me was enjoyed.

My baby had been birthed—with a healthy Apgar score.

Richard and I took off for Sonoma for a few days. Despite advice to the contrary, all the wine tasting in the world couldn’t keep me from checking for reviews. The Amazon and Goodreads tabs remained permanently open on my desktop. I refreshed obsessively, becoming a kind of star junkie. As each one came in—many more complimentary than the last—I rejoiced. The few that weren’t so stellar didn’t exactly plunge me into the depths of despair, but my mood was certainly dampened. “What you’re feeling is so normal!” my writerly friends and coaches soothed. “You’re having a bit of withdrawal. So many writers experience that after publishing!” Misery loves company and I did feel bit better. For a few hours.

As the blog tour wound down and the reviews became more of a trickle than a gush, there were days when nothing happened. When the Amazon and Goodreads scores seemed frozen, I panicked. Imposter syndrome would move in like an unwelcome houseguest. Who do I think I am, an author? Please. At times I felt as if I’d never written a word, let alone a book. Then my phone would chime and there would be a text: “Just finished your book. I couldn’t put it down, stayed up way too late reading. SO good!!” and I’d be flying high again.

I’m learning to accept that—as much as I hate roller coasters—I’m on one.

Crash won an award for memoir…up!

3-star review…down.

Is it possible to enjoy the ride? That answer is still unclear. What is becoming clearer is that the message of Crash is resonating, even if Spielberg hasn’t called (yet) wanting to buy the movie rights. My readers are telling me that my story about the realities of caregiving is having an effect on them. It’s opening a conversation that needs to happen.

In her recently published book, Where Do You Hang Your Hammock? Finding Peace of Mind While You Write, Publish and Promote Your Book, Bella Mahaya Carter writes:

Ultimately the success of your book isn’t up to you or your publicist, even if you both do everything in your power to promote it well. Beneath the dream for fame and fortune lurks a greater yearning: to matter. To be loved. We all matter, and we are all loved. Thinking otherwise is a common, conditioned misunderstanding about who we really are.

Amazon / Bookshop

Unquestionably, this experience has been a reality check. When I dig deep, when I ask the critical question I posed to myself multiple times during the writing process: “Who am I kidding? What I’m really feeling is…” The conclusion to that question is: I want to be relevant. To be noticed. To matter. When I allow the number of reviews—or the sales numbers I get from my publisher—to determine my relevance, then that’s a problem.

I need to let my book baby grow at her own pace. And not let her little trips and falls pull me down, or even let the awards and accolades mean that I matter. Because eventually she will mature and spread her wings anyway.

In the meantime, I’ll try to tolerate—if not enjoy—the ride.

Where My Money Comes From

“money” by TheAlieness GiselaGiardino²³ is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

While I’ve often revealed at conferences and workshops where my money comes from—complete with pie charts—I’ve never laid out in writing, at this site, what my earnings looks like. It is perhaps an overdue look, since I reach more people through this blog than I do through speaking engagements.

My 3 key categories of earnings

Most of my income arises from three types of work:

Consulting one-on-one with writersTeaching in-person and onlinePaid writing (newsletters, articles, books) and indirect income from free writing (advertising and affiliate income through my website and newsletter)

Since I started full-time freelancing in 2015, these categories have always remained central, although the mix and character of the work shifts.

What my top-line income looked like in 2016

Here’s what was happening in each of these categories.

Online teaching (26%): This includes (1) multi-week workshops I was offering directly, (2) multi-week workshops I was offering by guest instructors (I kept a cut of registration fees), and (3) webinars I taught for other companies, such as Writer’s Digest. While it looks like a healthy percentage of my income, my profit margin was low on courses taught by others.Query-synopsis editing (24%): In 2016, I started attracting a steady stream of clients who were seeking help with their queries and synopses for submission to agents and editors.Consulting (17%): I do two types of consulting: book proposal consulting and one-on-one consulting. It’s all done on an hourly, flat-fee basis, trading money for time.Paid newsletter (12%): In late 2015, I launched a paid email newsletter (The Hot Sheet) with Porter Anderson. This was the first year we had a full year of subscription income, which we split down the middle after expenses. (The profit margin is excellent, about 90 percent.)Freelance writing (7%): This included varied opportunities, including features for Writer’s Digest magazine. I also initially counted The Great Courses income under this, because it literally required me to write 100,000 words in three months. (I had to write the script for the course, then deliver on camera.) Affiliate income (6%): I’m an Amazon affiliate and also started affiliate arrangements around 2016 with Teachable and Bluehost. I don’t work for this money; it’s passive income.Book sales (5%): This is all income from Publishing 101, which I self-published in late 2015.Conference speaking (3%): Some people think I get paid the big bucks for speaking. I do not. It represents the smallest of my revenue streams in 2016. But speaking (especially in person) is important for visibility and trust. It’s also critical for me to remain in touch with real writers’ everyday concerns, plus I get to hear and learn from other experts in the community.

If I combine these into my three main areas of income:

41% one-on-one work (consulting and editing)30% writing (affiliate income goes in here since it’s powered by my writing and blogging)29% teaching and speakingWhat my top-line income looked like in 2020

You’ll notice one big change here!

Here’s what was happening in each of these categories. And note that 2020 was the first full year that my husband joined the business as a full-time employee.

Online teaching (48%): In fall 2019, I began hosting my own webinars because I now had someone who could help with post-production and customer service. Some webinars I teach myself and others feature guest instructors. This move proved fortunate when the pandemic rolled around. I keep 50 percent of the net for webinars taught by guest instructors. I still continue to teach for a range of organizations and companies, so that’s still included here as well.Query-synopsis editing (12%): I stopped taking on this work in the middle of 2020 to open up more room in my schedule for writing work. I still offer a query letter master class, though—that income now falls under online teaching.Consulting (16%): In 2020, I was still accepting one-on-one consulting clients and book proposal clients. In 2021, I now accept only book proposal clients in an ongoing effort to pull back some of my time for writing (or at least make consulting time more profitable).Paid newsletter (16%): I am now the full owner of The Hot Sheet. While this percentage doesn’t look much increased despite me now taking 100% of the net, it’s not because the subscriber base didn’t grow. Rather, it’s a reflection of how much the other areas of my business have grown—namely online teaching. Also, if this were a profits chart, not a top-line revenue chart, the paid newsletter would represent a bigger proportion of the pie.Book sales (3%): This is income from Publishing 101 , my Great Course, and The Business of Being a Writer .Conference speaking (3%): This includes some virtual conferences and would’ve been more had it not been for the pandemic. (I’m not complaining, though! I needed to get off the travel wagon for a while.)Advertising (2%): I recently started accepting advertisers in Electric Speed, my free newsletter.Affiliate income (1%): Amazon has reduced its affiliate marketing payouts over time, and I’m more often linking to Bookshop—which simply doesn’t bring in as much income. (But one feels better linking to it.) I’ve also stopped actively engaging in or seeking affiliate marketing, not because I’m against it, but frankly I have a lot of other things I’d rather do.

If I combine these into my three main areas of income:

51% teaching and speaking28% one-on-one work (consulting and editing)22% writing (advertising/affiliate goes here since it’s powered by my writing)

Yes, I realize this adds up to 101%. What can I say? My spreadsheet rounded things up.

What I’m most happy about is the downward trend in one-on-one work. I’ve always been fearful about walking away from consulting and editing. At the beginning it was my biggest category of earnings and it can be hard to turn down people who offer money upfront in exchange for time.

But as most entrepreneurs learn, there’s only so far you can go by selling your time for money. Plus, I’d rather devote more of my energies to writing work. The teaching and speaking is great and I don’t see giving that up—it tends to inform the writing as well.

Questions? Let me know in the comments.

Writing From the Spinster’s Perspective: Q&A with Donna Ward

Today’s post is by memoirist and Brooklyn-based writing mentor Virginia Lloyd (@v11oyd).

Donna Ward is an Australian writer whose first book, She I Dare Not Name, has just been published in the US. She’s founded a literary journal, a small press, and worked as an editor. As someone who has been a traditional publisher and is now a traditionally published author, Donna brings a fresh perspective to the business of publishing.

VIRGINIA LLOYD: In She I Dare Not Name you have explored a subject that could be considered one of the last nonfiction literary taboos: the meditations of a woman growing older unattached to a partner or children. Why did you write this book?

DONNA WARD: I never thought about writing from a spinster’s perspective as taboo. For me it is a forgotten perspective, a way of life that was inadvertently cast to the margins in the nineteen-sixties when the Sexual Revolution crashed into the Feminist Second Wave. During those tectonic shifts these two paradigms came upon the word spinster, found it abhorrent, and chose the word single to describe anyone not living a traditional family life.

The intention was admirable—to rid spinsters of the stigma inherent in the word. Even though men chose single life in droves, conversations about being single became a conversation about women. The choice not to marry, or to leave a marriage, requires a woman to provide for herself and any children she might have. This compelled, quite rightly, extensive overhauls of legislation concerning marriage and divorce, finance and banking, employment and social security, to support families as they rapidly transformed into myriad forms.

Little wonder then, when, in my forties, I searched for a conversation on my single life and found little literature on it. And take note, back then, I was single, not spinster. I, too, had cast that word to the horizon.

My single life was a hard and bitter conversation to have with friends and with my therapist, since we were all woven in the belief that a woman beyond a certain age, still uncoupled and without children, must be psychologically damaged, sexually deviant, intemperate and socially defiant. My friends assumed I chose my life, despite the family catastrophes of which they spoke being the result of falling in love, or a fateful roll in the hay.

Nevertheless, when I confessed I hadn’t chosen this, my friends, therapist, even I, believed my situation the result of an unconscious flaw to which I must attend. No recognition of my heartfelt decision against having children without a partner. My fault, then. Not, as I now know, the outcome of innocent mismatches and unacceptable offers. Fate, if you like.

Life, I discovered, unfolds into spinsterhood the way it unfolds into family making. Sometimes it is chosen, more often, like coupling and having children, it is the outcome of a mix of accidents and decisions.

Back in the nineteen-nineties the literature I did find was overwhelmingly American. Although I felt a certain simpatico when reading Bachelorhood: Tales of the Metropolis, by Philip Lopate, a wet cold slunk through the gaps between our cultures. It was then I discovered that the life into which I unwittingly stumbled was, in fact, invisible.

I embarked on writing my life to make it visible, so we will never forget what it is to be a woman without a partner and children living in a word inhabited by a multiplicity of families.

Why did you choose to write creative nonfiction rather than fiction?

It was never a choice. I can’t write fiction to save my life. I did write a short story once, but it was so close to the life of a friend of mine I had to get permission when it came to be published. Of course this may change, everything does, after all. But this book was never going to be fiction.

It began as an awkward pop-sociology text. An attempt to prove spinsters exist, are socially marginalized, economically vulnerable, and misinterpreted psychologically. In the process I stumbled across a very real prejudice against spinsters exposed in research questions and methodologies. A bias toward traditional marriage, coupling and parenting was prevalent in research outcomes, psychological theory and practice. I believed I was not academic enough, for the task, and the task required academic rigor. I gave up.

I was about as far as anyone can get from the centre of civilization when the light struck me. Albany, on the southern coast of Western Australia. I was visiting a friend who took me to see Helen Morse performing the monologue of Joan Didion’s book, The Year of Magical Thinking. A thought slipped down the shaft of light—I could write it like that.

Didion inspired me to write a book that tells life as it is, not underpinned by ideology or theoretical frameworks, not through a lens which translates life and makes it palatable, but with a clear lens. She inspired me to tell the unflinching truth.

I set out to write a book that revealed me as a woman whose marital status, or lack thereof, is not the sine qua non of her sanity, though the absence of children does say something about the hurdles she must jump to be included in society. I set out to explore the web of prejudice against women living this life. I wanted to grab the reader by the collar and say: This life exists. This is what it is like. If your friend, colleague, or daughter lives this life, include her in yours. And, remember, she’s doing it on a single income in a dual income economy without the benefits of family backup or financial assistance.

What were the key structural questions you faced when wrestling with your material? What was your biggest challenge in writing the book—and how long did it take you to write it?

I always say the book took me two years and all my life to write. But, apart from having to live my life to write about it, I had to learn how to write the way Joan Didion wrote A Year of Magical Thinking.

I read everything Didion ever wrote. I wrote personal essays of my own, over and over. I went to writing classes, I had my work edited, some of these were published. And, to be honest, I forgot about writing the book and focused on the art of essay writing. I developed my own way of weaving personal stories to unpack a beautiful idea.

When my friend, Susan Wyndham, the former literary editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, encouraged me to write a book, I found I had a stack of raw material with which to craft a book that, by its very form, replicates the patchiness of living life, similar to an enormous portrait comprised of a thousand thousand tiny portraits of the same person.

So, with beginner’s naïveté, I threaded the linear story of my life through a set of essays that consider meaning and purpose, the mystery of existence, the mythology of romance, dating and love, the crush of exclusion and prejudice, the grit and ecstasy of solitude, living in the time of catastrophic weather, through the gaze of a spinster. I’m sure you see the folly of my ways. There were days and nights when my vision blurred and my brain hurt.

My biggest challenge came once I’d found my stride. The original essays were different in voice and structure. I employed an editor to help. They were much improved, but not yet perfect. We agreed that if the book should ever come into the light, the publisher’s editor would advise. And that is what happened. My editor simply said, Some essays are memoir and this is overwhelmingly a book of meditations.

I slapped my forehead with the palm of my hand. Obvious. Brilliant. Solved. I sat down, re-wrote and re-threaded the book. That part was easy.

Congratulations on being a first-time author over the age of 60. What publishing advice would you give to other aspiring authors of a certain age?

The first thing I ever wrote was the story of Dad pouring hot water into my pale blue plastic cup. I told him hot water melts plastic. He laughed. The cup, of course, caved in and contorted with the heat. I was furious and grief stricken. My love for that cup was visceral.

I was about twelve, relationships were taut. Rather than confront Dad, I wrote the story of it. I sat with the story until I fell into it and could describe every inch and second of it, got the feelings just right. Engrossed in writing I became aware of my imaginary audience. I was obligated to tell the story so they understood what happened, understood the insight I had that day—fathers can dismiss their daughters even when the father is a scientist and the science of the situation is undeniable.

When I sat back and looked at the story it was only one page long. Compact, contained. Bearable passion. But did it get the message across? I was unsure.

A few days later I walked into the kitchen. Mum was there.

I read your story. It’s silly what Dad did. I will buy you another mug, she said.

My passion took wings.

I don’t remember the replacement mug. I lost the story somewhere down the years. What remains is the writing of it.

Last year, during lockdown in Melbourne, I read Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha again. At the end of his life, Siddhartha meets the Sadhu who invites him to sit by the river. All these years I thought that scene was about letting the river carry me through life—twirling in whirlpools, surfing rapids, slipping over waterfalls, loose as a water snake. Last year I realized the message is to sit beside the river until the river flows through you.

This is what it is to live, and this is what it is to write. It takes a lifetime to live a life, it can take a lifetime to write a book. The writer must sit beside the story until the story flows through them. Only then will it carry the writer to the end.

As the founder and editor of a literary magazine, and then as an independent publisher, you have made the uncommon transition from publisher to author. What did you learn from being on the other side of the publishing fence—and what could publishers learn from your experience?

Nothing focuses the mind like editing another person’s words. To climb inside their voice and rhythms, examine their grammar, even if eccentric, to ensure the writer’s meaning flows off the page into the reader’s soul, is the art of editing.

There’s a story that Michelangelo said he saw the angel in the marble and set it free. I think that’s apocryphal. Nevertheless, it perfectly captures the art of the editor. The editor sees the startling idea in the manuscript and shows the writer how to set it free.

So often I don’t know what I am writing about. I have a sense of it, and a sentence leading me into it. As I go words and phrases fall out like Hansel and Gretel’s crumbs. These hint at where I’m going. I write and write until I stop. I’m cutting the stone from the quarry. When I have the stone I begin to set the angel free. Editing taught me this.

Nothing focuses the mind like being a publisher. The publisher must feel the ears of readers awaiting these words. No matter how beautiful a manuscript, how exquisite, if a publisher can’t taste the readers’ breath, they are not the publisher for the book.

The writer must find the publisher who intimately knows the audience for their book.

When I write I listen for the reader until I can sense their sighs, their eyebrows cock, their sharp surprise. If they evaporate I stop. I wrap everything in a file and tuck it away.

I return to begin again. Being a publisher taught me this.

Originally published in Australia, your book has just been released in the US. Why does US publication remain a cherished goal for writers who live outside North America?

To be honest I never thought my book would attract an American readership. My book was released in Australia in March last year, as the pandemic spread around the world. Globally publishers pulled back, and many simply closed for business. I felt lucky to have an Australian audience.

And then there was Zoom.

To my utter surprise, Jody Day who established Gateway Women, the international network for childless and childfree women, discovered my book. She did a wonderful Zoom interview with me and bingo! I had an American readership. It’s taken a while to release it into American bookshops, and we’re releasing into the UK in November this year.

Amazon / Bookshop

But to your question about US publication being a cherished goal for writers outside North America. Apart from the considerably larger market, and the consequent ability to earn enough from book sales to support the writing life, I believe there is something in American waters that breeds exceptional writers. I do have European and Australian writers who I admire and whose work influences me, but something in America births brilliance. Publication in America makes me feel that for a moment I stand in a room beside genius. And, if I stand quietly enough, still enough, a sliver of genius might slip into my own art—if I’m lucky.

The (Copyright) Trouble with NFTs

Everydays: The First 5000 Days by Beeple (2021)

Today’s guest post is by intellectual property lawyer and novelist Brad Frazer (@bfrazjd).

We have an original oil painting hanging over our fireplace in the basement. We commissioned it many years ago from a young local artist whose work we enjoyed. The painting is probably worth less today than when we bought it in the late 90s.

On the back of the painting is an envelope, taped there by the artist. Inside is a handwritten “certificate of authenticity” signed by the artist indicating that he in fact did paint the picture, a whimsical scene of a stylized living room that was meant to be hung, well, in a living room. That certificate is the only proof of provenance we have should that artist suddenly become famous.

If instead of actually committing oil to canvas, however, the artist had created the work purely and only in a digital form, he could not have attached his physical certificate of authenticity to the work. Thus, when he emailed me the JPEG or PNG of the image for me to presumably print, frame, and hang over my fireplace, all I would have to prove provenance is his email indicating that the attached was his original work of authorship. And I might not even have such an email!

So, what to do to establish provenance of wholly digital works of art? NFTs! These digital certificates of authenticity, minted and recorded in the blockchain, certainly have their utility in terms of establishing provenance, but as a copyright lawyer, I frankly stand all amazed at the hoopla surrounding non-fungible tokens.

Why? Well, whence does a work of art derive value? Provenance, yes, but more accurately, scarcity. It’s Econ 101 all over again. If there’s only one The Starry Night, never to be re-created again by Van Gogh, and the provenance is not in question, that work of art is worth tens of millions of dollars. If there were fifty or a hundred The Starry Nights, however, all identical to the original and all painted by Van Gogh, the value of that masterpiece would certainly decrease.

So now consider a wholly digital work of art, a work that may be infinitely and easily copied and re-created by everyone who sees it on the internet simply by right-clicking on the image and selecting “Save As.” Or “Print.” Or “Email.” Or “Publish to Facebook.” Again, and again and again. There is thus no inherent scarcity to wholly digital works of art.

And this is true even if the artist has minted an NFT to go along with it because all an NFT is is a digital form of provenance. Admittedly the unique, immutable non-fungible token itself may have value as a novelty and because there is only one, but I worry about the general public’s perception that the NFT somehow establishes the value and creates scarcity of the underlying work of art.

And so now enters our old friend copyright law. With or without an NFT, the only way an artist can stop the unlawful reproduction of a digital work of art is by using copyright law, as is true for any work authored in, say, the last 100 years. For today, U.S. copyright law does not recognize an NFT as that “thing” that will get you admission to federal court to sue for copyright infringement. Unless a digital artist has registered her copyrights in her portfolio with the United States Copyright Office, she has no legal remedies against illegal copying of her digital works, NFTs notwithstanding, and this means she has no real effective mechanism to create scarcity of her work by controlling the supply.

So until Congress rewrites 17 USC Section 411(a) or the U.S. Supreme Court revisits its recent Fourth Estate decision (holding that the plaintiff must have a copyright registration certificate in hand to maintain an infringement action in federal court), an NFT is not equivalent to a copyright registration certificate issued by the Copyright Office. Thus, cutting-edge digital artists are left with a legal remedy hundreds of years old to create the requisite scarcity to drive value in their digital works, even if the artist has minted an NFT for the work.

I guess I understand the novelty of NFTs, but at the intersection of economics and copyright law, I am flabbergasted at the extreme values currently associated with these blockchain curiosities when the underlying digital works of art gain no protection against copying through their existence.

Think of it this way: an investor paid $69 million for the NFT minted in connection with Beeple’s digital work of art Everyday: The First 5,000 Days, but unless and until Beeple obtains a copyright registration certificate on that work, someone could, for example, print 1,000 T-shirts with exact copies of 5,000 Days on them and sell them on Etsy with relative impunity. So, Beeple, if you’re reading this, have your lawyer register your copyrights in all of your digital works whether they have NFTs minted or not. This is the only way you can go to court, get an injunction against an infringer, and create scarcity in your digital works of art.

How to Develop a Marketing and Promotion Plan as an Indie Author

Photo by Monstera from Pexels

Today’s post is by author Emma Lombard (@LombardEmma).

Disclaimer: I’m in Australia and my publishing and promotion choices may not be available or right for you, but they’re the right path for me as a historical fiction series author. I am not paid to promote any of the services, companies or resources in this article.

I’m going to be honest, my initial foray into researching self-pub author publication and marketing threw me into a tailspin of information overload. There are so many paths and options to choose—but that’s the whole beauty of self-publishing, isn’t it? The following article was born of several author acquaintances asking me what paths and options I chose to launch my debut historical novel, Discerning Grace.

Before You Begin

Join the Facebook group called Wide for the Win.

No, seriously. Stop reading and go join them. It’s a brilliant free resource.

Even if you hate Facebook or don’t use it that much, you really should hop back on there just for this group. They really are that good! They share a boatload of intimate strategies about self-publishing. Search the Tree of Knowledge first. Read everything there before you even think about asking questions on the main feed.

If the Tree of Knowledge is too tricky to navigate—it’s huge with zillions of threads and conversations—you can always buy the Wide for the Win ebook. It’s the brain child of Mark Leslie Lefebvre (from Draft2Digital) and Erin Wright (head honcho of Wide for the Win Facebook group). The information is much more structured and easier to navigate.

Setting Goals

I had to decide what I wanted from the first six months of my authoring journey: to be in the best-seller charts, to have thousands of downloads on a freebie, to garner early reviews, to grow my newsletter subscribers, or to roll in money like Scrooge McDuck?

I’ve picked two early goals: garner early reviews and grow newsletter subscribers.

My first-year goalsPublish Discerning Grace (Book 1) in all formats (ebook, paperback, large print, audiobook)Get as many reviews for Discerning Grace (Book 1) as possible, on all storefrontsGrow my newsletter subscriber listPublish Grace on the Horizon (Book 2) in all formats (ebook, paperback, large print, audiobook)

See how I don’t even mention $$$ or sales numbers in this first year? That’s not my goal (yet).

My second-year goalsPublish Grace Arising (Book 3) in all formats Grow my newsletter subscriber listRun a BookBub 99c promo with Discerning Grace (Book 1) with the idea of achieving sell-through to Book 2 and Book 3Publish the trilogy box set (all 3 books in one)Run another BookBub promo on the box setTest paid advertising on Facebook, Amazon, and BookBub

Only after I’ve achieved these goals am I going to worry about money and sales numbers or paying for advertising. And only then will I work my strategies to grow these numbers into something that makes me a living (that’s a whole different topic for a different article—and for when I’ve crossed that bridge).

Now that I’ve laid out my goals, I’m going to stick to them. Of all the research I’ve read, it seems that most indie author careers only take off after 5 to 7 books. With only my first trilogy planned, I have a loooooong way to go, but having this knowledge also prevents self-flagellation in these early days. I’m running a marathon here, not a sprint.

Important: I Chose to Publish Wide

I am publishing wide, which means I am not prioritizing Amazon as an exclusive publishing platform over any other storefront. It just so happens to be one of my storefronts where my books are available. Here are the distributors I’m using.

Ebooks: distributed through Draft2Digital (which distributes to Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, plus loads of other smaller international online storefronts, as well as libraries).Paperbacks: printed and distributed through IngramSpark (which distributes to Amazon storefronts in many countries, Barnes & Noble, plus smaller international online storefronts, and libraries).Audiobooks: produced and distributed through Findaway Voices linked to my Draft2Digital account but is a separate company (which distributes to all the same storefronts and libraries as Draft2Digital that also accept audiobooks, plus a few extra)Google Play: I’m only direct with this storefront because Draft2Digital doesn’t distribute to them

Some may think I’m nuts for not publishing directly to Amazon because Draft2Digital will take an additional 10% of my royalties (as it does from other retailers too), but the way I see it is if I was prepared to let an agent and a traditional publisher do the legwork, I would have been sharing a boatload more in commission. So, I personally don’t have an issue with giving Draft2Digital their dues for uploading to all the storefronts on my behalf.

I chose this route because self-publishing requires learning a lot (no, seriously, A LOT!) of new technology. My brain could only handle learning the dashboards of these four publishing/distribution companies to start with (preserving my time and sanity).

I was also cracking under the pressure of just THINKING about fixing a launch date with so many unknown variables ahead of me. So, I decided on a soft launch to take the pressure off myself. It’s for this same reason that I didn’t set up pre-orders and don’t ever plan on using them. I’ve seen too many tears from authors when it goes wrong. I’m not comfortable adding a potential problem to my plate.

Also, you know the saying, ‘Don’t keep all your eggs in one basket’? Using different publishing platforms ensures that if one company goes belly-up (or even has technical glitches), my books will remain in circulation in the other formats.

Marketing Plan and Results: My First Three Months

As you will see from the Wide for the Win group, there are actually dozens and dozens of ways to successfully market your books. I have chosen the paths of least resistance. It may cost me a little more in money, but it saves me a bunch of time and anxiety. It is also why I ended up choosing to do a soft launch instead of a hard launch for my debut novel, Discerning Grace.

What is a hard launch?A hard launch is when you pick a specific date to launch your book baby—and then work like crazy to build as much hype as you can before that date. It involves creating a detailed marketing plan that starts months in advance of your launch date. For an experienced marketer or existing influencer: it’s a brilliant challenge to put your skills to the test; for a newbie, not so much.When it’s planned well, with a huge network of support behind you, a hard launch can (but isn’t guaranteed to) push you into bestseller status. Indie author Nicholas Erik shares how a romance author hit the USA Today bestseller list (source: The Hot Sheet by Jane Friedman)—personally, I’m exhausted just reading this. Whew!If your plan succeeds, reaching more readers quickly should theoretically translate into great sales right out the gate (though not necessarily, as Nicholas Erik’s article shows). But it takes an extraordinary amount of planning and networking—months in advance.If your third-party vendors cause a delay, there’s a risk that the book you’ve promised your readers won’t be available on your launch date. Even with a well-laid plan, if some disaster strikes news headlines on your launch day/week, this can impact your launch (*cough cough, pandemic anyone?).What is a soft launch?A soft launch means quietly publishing your book and ironing out the wrinkles before you go in for the hard sell. There is no pressured approach to upload your book links to all your platforms and sites. It enables spreading out your marketing after your book is published instead of stacking it all before launch day. For me, this is much less stressful, with fewer potential pitfalls, and fewer people to rely on.Without a fanfare announcing its arrival, you can ensure your book has published properly on your favorite publishing platforms before telling readers that it’s available. It’s also a calmer way to gather reviews for your book before launching into paid advertising.The downside: You’re unlikely to hit those bestseller charts—but realistically speaking, other than a great feather to stick in your cap, what purpose does it actually serve? Do you judge a book by its bestseller status? You’ll get lower uptake on sales, including less visibility to start with, but there are ways to build this as you go (e.g. paid newsletters, cross promotion with other authors, paid ads). Accordingly, you’ll see lower initial income that won’t improve if you don’t take further steps to market and promote your book after it’s published (and keep the effort going)Month One Plan.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-color:#aaa;border-spacing:0;}.tg td{background-color:#fff;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#333; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg th{background-color:#f38630;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#fff; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg .tg-cb0x{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-b0o4{background-color:#FCFBE3;font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-zd1e{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;;font-size:15px;font-weight:bold;text-align:left;vertical-align:top} Company Cost Aim Result By the Book Newsletter
(my own author newsletter)
Announce Book 1 available on all storefronts and libraries Free Book Reviews
Blog Posts • Fantastic book reviews across all store fronts
• Blog articles & interviews
• Social media exposure The Fussy Librarian
(with BookFunnel freebie) USD44.00
One-time paid newsletter burst To grow newsletter subscriptions 600 new subscribers

Why I chose The Fussy Librarian over other paid newsletter companies: They are the only paid newsletter provider I found who let me use a BookFunnel freebie for my book giveaway. Other paid newsletter providers require your book to be free on retailers.

Important: You cannot set your book for free on Amazon if you distribute to them through Draft2Digital. Also, the amount of headaches I see daily from authors battling Amazon to keep their books set at free for promotions was another factor that dissuaded me from publishing directly with them.

Month One Results

This sales report chart is produced by ScribeCount. It does not include paperbacks from IngramSpark or ebooks from Google Play—these features are still coming to ScribeCount.

Month Two Plan.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-color:#aaa;border-spacing:0;}.tg td{background-color:#fff;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#333; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg th{background-color:#f38630;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#fff; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg .tg-cb0x{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-b0o4{background-color:#FCFBE3;font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-zd1e{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;;font-size:15px;font-weight:bold;text-align:left;vertical-align:top} Company Cost Aim Result BookFunnel
Historical fiction author promo USD100.00
annual subscription To grow newsletter subscriptions 300 new subscribers AllAuthor
Cover competition USD59
6-month subscription • Build buzz about new book
• Use handy promo tools like Review GIF Maker • My cover came 6th out of 300 entrants
• Lots of enthusiasm on social media and in newsletter
• Smart GIFs for social media Written Word Media
NewInBooks USD299
One-off • Exposure
• Be included in curated email
• Interview • Nothing measurable
• Great interview for my website
• Wouldn’t use again Month Two ResultsMonth Three Plan.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-color:#aaa;border-spacing:0;}.tg td{background-color:#fff;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#333; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg th{background-color:#f38630;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#fff; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg .tg-cb0x{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-b0o4{background-color:#FCFBE3;font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-zd1e{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;;font-size:15px;font-weight:bold;text-align:left;vertical-align:top} Company Cost Aim Result The Coffee Pot Book Club
Editorial review GPB122
One-off • Give my book legitimacy from reputable co.
• Get quotable sentences for marketing • Brilliant editorial review (good for fragile newbie author ego)
• Excellent marketing quotes The Coffee Pot Book Club
Blog tour organiser GPB150
One-off • Book reviews
• Blog posts • Quality book reviews left on all storefronts
• Social media exposure
• Social proof book and author name (Google search for book & author name put me on first 7 results pages last I checked) The History Quill Book Club
(Uses Amazon affiliate link) Free (in beta) Tailored book discovery emails to readers of historical fiction Spike on Amazon Draft2Digital
Mother’s Day Kobo promo Free*
Only accessible through Draft2Digital Find new readers Spike on Kobo Books2Read
New Beginnings promo Free*
Only accessible through Books2Read Find new readers Sales across international storefronts Draft2Digital
Memorial Day Kobo promo Free*
Only accessible through Draft2Digital Find new readers Spike on Kobo indieBRAG
(Book Readers Appreciation Group) USD75
One-off Recognized mark of excellence within the self-published book industry • DISCERNING GRACE was awarded a B.R.A.G. Medallion
• Social media promotion
• Quality recognition

* You have to apply using this Request for Promotion Consideration form to receive promotional opportunities through Draft2Digital—it doesn’t automatically happen just because you’re published through them.

Fun Fact: You can only apply for Apple Books promotions if you’re published through Draft2Digital—you can’t apply for promotions when published directly with Apple Books.

Month Three ResultsWhat Happened After 3 Months

My sales graph for Discerning Grace for the first three months specifically doesn’t show any sales numbers or royalties. This is because part of the wide mindset is to aim for growth, no matter how slow. It just has to be steady.

I sold double the number of books in the third month than I did in the first. Note that each storefront provides their data on different days, so ScribeCount can only show you what info they’ve received. Some storefronts have data available the next day, others have a week or even a month’s delay in reporting. It’s also why I don’t get too hung up on the numbers side of things (in the Wide for the Win group, this appears to be everyone’s headache). I’m focused on the overall growth and achievement of my initial goals.

Month Four: Plan in Progress.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-color:#aaa;border-spacing:0;}.tg td{background-color:#fff;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#333; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg th{background-color:#f38630;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#fff; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg .tg-cb0x{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-b0o4{background-color:#FCFBE3;font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-zd1e{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;;font-size:15px;font-weight:bold;text-align:left;vertical-align:top} Company Cost Aim BookFunnel
Scandalous Lords & Ladies promo Already subscribed To grow newsletter subscriptions The History Quill
ARC review service USD187
One-off Book reviews Draft2Digital
Swoon-worthy romance sale Apple Books promo Free
Only accessible through Draft2Digital Find new readers Months Five and Six: Plan in Progress.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-color:#aaa;border-spacing:0;}.tg td{background-color:#fff;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#333; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg th{background-color:#f38630;border-color:#aaa;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;color:#fff; font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;overflow:hidden;padding:10px 5px;word-break:normal;}.tg .tg-cb0x{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-b0o4{background-color:#FCFBE3;font-family:Georgia, serif !important;line-height:18px;font-size:15px;text-align:left;vertical-align:top}.tg .tg-zd1e{font-family:Georgia, serif !important;;font-size:15px;font-weight:bold;text-align:left;vertical-align:top} Company Cost Aim Draft2Digital
Independence Day Kobo promo Free
Only accessible through Draft2Digital Find new readers Discovering Diamonds
Historical fiction book discovery service Free Book reviews InstaBookTours
Book tour organiser Free (in beta) Book reviews Book Love Tours
Book tour organiser GBP170
One-off Book reviews Fussy Librarian
(with BookFunnel freebie) USD57
One-off To grow newsletter subscriptions Voracious Readers Only
Book discovery service 6-week Free Trial
(with an option to subscribe for USD20 per month thereafter) Book reviews

I’m pleased considering I haven’t laid out any big bucks for paid advertising yet. Publishing wide definitely takes constant promotion but it’s heartening to see it all laid out on the page like this to realize that the effort is helping me achieve my initial goals so far.