Nancy J. Cohen's Blog: Nancy's Notes from Florida, page 113

Religion as Inspiration for Writers

Keeper of the Rings, my fourth science fiction romance, was inspired by the Jewish New Year. As the shofar, a ram's horn, is blown on this holiday to celebrate the new moon in the seventh month and the creation of the world, so is the sacred horn blown at the annual Renewal ceremony on the planet Xan in my story. But something goes wrong in my fictional tale and disrupts the harmony.

Not so the service I attended earlier today. As I sat listening to the soaring music, a sense of comfort and peace washed over me. I'd heard these same tunes every year for decades now, and they still inspire a spiritual uplifting. However, as a writer, this is where my imagination took flight several years ago.

My backlist title, Keeper of the Rings, was originally published by Dorchester and written as Nancy Cane. Recently, I've revised it and converted it into digital format, so the story is still fresh in my mind. I thought back to that other Rosh Hashanah service which inspired Keeper of the Rings.

"What If" —These are the words every writer thinks. What If… I was so devoted to my religion that I became a follower, like a nun? What If… in my world, everyone worshipped the same god, Lothar, and the religion was called Sabal? What If… I'd joined the inner circle known as the Caucus to learn the truth, because I suspected the ruling priests were keeping information from the populace to maintain power? What If…everything I knew about my world turned out to be false?

Leena, my heroine, joins the religious body to clear her father's name after he has been discredited and to discover what the priests are hiding. She learns something is dreadfully wrong at the Renewal ceremony when it's time to blow the shofar…uh, I mean the horn:

Leena held her breath. The sound of the horn was more than a symbol for ushering in the new year. It summoned Lothar, and when he awoke, he reset the climatic cycles of Xan for another year. Without his beneficence, her world would revert to the wild, untamed fury of the past. No one ever wanted that to happen. It would mean the end to civilization as they knew it. Renewal was the pinnacle of all the seasonal holidays.

"Show us the horn," Dikran shouted as he faced the rear.

Karayan and Eznik drew the doors apart, and a collective gasp went up from the congregation.

Emptiness yawned from within the richly lit interior.

"Dear deity," Leena whispered. Where was the sacred horn?

Dikran had a stunned look on his face, while the other members of the Synod wore horror-stricken expressions.

Yep, you guessed it. The horn has been stolen. Thus begins an adventure mixed with mystery as Leena, an archeologist, is assigned the task of locating the missing artifact. You can learn what happened to it along with Leena for only $2.99:

Kindle

Nook

Smashwords

Backlist Ebooks

See? You never know when inspiration will hit. To a writer, nothing is sacred.

L'Shana Tovah! Have a sweet and healthy new year.

Cooking Class

Last night we attended a cooking class for the first time in years. It was held at our Publix Apron's Cooking School on the second floor in a room specially designed for cooking demos. Four chefs took turns at each of the dishes, while the others assisted. We sat at white-clothed tables with regular place settings and wine glasses. They hold other classes where you can participate in the food preparation, but this one we got to sit back and enjoy.

The first course was a homemade Caesar salad. It tasted deliciously of anchovies. It took the chef less than 30 minutes to do the dressing and put the salad together. On the side, the other chefs had dished out prepared salads onto plates for each of us. We enjoyed this starter with a fruity white wine. About 20 people sat in the classroom, where flat-screen TVs mounted on the walls allowed us to see the action from any angle.

Next came sautéed shrimp over wilted mustard greens. I can't say that I enjoy mustard greens or kale; I'd substitute spinach. But sautéed with diced onions and mixed with parsley and tomatoes, the mustard greens came out a tasty choice. The shrimp, smothered in butter and white wine sauce, was finger-licking good. A dry white wine accompanied this course.

The main entrée was grilled sirloin with warm potato salad. I almost enjoyed the latter more than the meat. Flavored with bacon, and including onion, garlic, red pepper, and parsley, the small cut potatoes turned out moist and flavorful. We learned how to grill sirloin steaks, something I wouldn't normally do at home but a good choice for meat-lovers. The red wine was a pinot noir.

Probably the best part was the dessert, peach cobbler and homemade buttermilk ice cream.

While I would more likely buy vanilla ice cream at the store or use Cool Whip, the peach cobbler is on my list to make at home. It was relatively simple and oh-so-sweet. I was smacking my lips afterward wishing for more. My diet self was happy I couldn't have seconds. Sorry, but I was too busy digging into this treat to take a picture.

Now that we've been introduced to the Publix cooking schools, this visit won't be our last.

Planning a Promo Campaign

You've had a book accepted by a publisher or have decided to publish it yourself as an indie author. Once you pass the editing stages and the book is in production, what next? You plan your marketing campaign, that's what. Do you have a niche audience, as in a particular topic or setting addressed in your story? Did your research and writing process suggest any possible blog topics? Jot these down.

Next make a list of what you plan to do and how much money to reserve for your promotional budget. Consider cross-genre marketing when making your plans.

 

ADVERTISING

Do you want to do any print or online ads? If so, determine where you'll place those ads and how much each one will cost.

 

BLOG TOUR

Determine who you want to approach and send out queries. Or hire a blog tour coordinator. Make a list of proposed topics if you haven't already done so. When you have spare time, write the blogs. Also solicit interview spots. Make a schedule with all your online guest appearances and post it on your website. Consider having a prize drawing from all blog commenters during your virtual tour.

 

BOOK CLUBS

It may be useful to write up a page of discussion questions for readers groups & book clubs. Tell your publisher these are available and post a note on the book's page of your website. Mention that this discussion guide is available in your fan newsletter.

 

BOOK GIVEAWAYS

If you get author's copies of your new release, you might consider giving some away at reader sites like Goodreads and Library Thing, besides offering them as your own contest prizes. Some writers groups like ITW and MWA offer book giveaways from members also.

BOOK TRAILER

If you wish to do a trailer, begin by reading my blog (scroll down until you find it) on how to create one yourself, or hire one of the many companies online who will do this for you. You may want to jot down the plot points you'll want to get across in the video and hunt for images or decide what type of images will work with the text.

CONFERENCES

Which conferences will you attend to promote your new release? Sign up early to get on a panel and prepare the materials you'll want to bring. Postcards or bookmarks? Giveaways? Business cards with book cover?

CONTESTS

Will you run your own contests or hire someone to do it for you? How about joining one of the online group blog scavenger hunts? What would you like to give away as prizes? Make a plan for the next few months and post your latest contest on your website and blog.

NEWSLETTER

Are you signed up at one of the newsletter mass mailing sites like Vertical Response? If not, you might want to do so now and upload your mailing lists. If you're already onboard, this is a good time to weed out those bounces and unsubscribes. Pick a template that you can reuse so each time you're ready to send out a mailing, you can just switch out the material.

PRINT MATERIALS

Once you have your cover art, you can design bookmarks, postcards, flyers, and business cards. Decide what you'll need and where to obtain it and get cost estimates.

REVIEWS/ARCs

Does your publisher provide advance reading copies of your upcoming release? Whether he does or not, you'll want to solicit advance reviews. Make a list of genre reviewers and bloggers and see who's amenable to reading your work. ARCs can also be giveaways and contest prizes.

WEBSITE

Update your site with the new release info, add the book trailer link, put up an excerpt. Make sure your online press kit and sample interview are up to date. Every time you add a new speaking engagement or guest blog date to your schedule, update your appearances page. Check out other author's websites for ideas on what to include in your own pages.

WRITERS GROUPS

Do your professional writing organizations offer opportunities to announce your new releases, post a video, do an author interview? Check out paid sites too, like Authors Den  and Savvy Authors, where for a small annual fee, you can have your own page. Or join Speak Without Interruption or Cybervillage Authors and post blogs.

Where will you find the time to accomplish all these tasks when you have to write the next story? Make your writing a priority. Work on promo activities only after you've finished your page quota for the day.

By planning your campaign as soon as you sell a book, you'll save time later on that becomes more valuable as the demands of your career increase. In fact, think about marketing as soon as you start writing the story.

Turning Books Into Apps

An app can be a useful tool for writers. Why create an app for your reader community? Several reasons may prompt an author to consider doing an app and offering it to readers. In a recent symposium in the Author's Guild Bulletin, titled "Books, Apps & Multimedia: The New Digital Landscape", these reasons are discussed in detail.

App developers can work two ways. One may charge up-front costs. Another company might charge nothing in advance but split the revenue with you. You'll need to find the one that's right for you. Check out the apps of a developer and decide which functions you want your app to do. Also, carefully check which rights you'll retain. You want to be able to make film or audio deals later on aside from the app. Also, will the developer link to different retailers? How do they promote their apps?

Don't confuse apps with enhanced e-books. Apps are software, while an enhanced e-book is a book with audio and/or video content. For example, the former is sold on iTunes, while the latter is sold in the iBookstore.

Here are some of the pointers from this article to help you determine if creating an app might be a useful tool in your promotional arsenal.

Various kinds of content can be included in an app, such as photos, video, audio recordings, and links to other sites.
You can keep track of reader interactions with the app to see what interests them.
The app can serve as a companion to your series, offering new exclusive content.
Including share options to social networks on the app will help spread the word.
An author can send messages to app subscribers alerting them of upcoming events, new releases, etc.
A community discussion group on the app can stimulate readers to share opinions.
An app can be constantly updated with new material. You can add interviews and reviews, excerpts from works in progress or the next book in a series, short stories or articles written just for the app.
Make sure the app has a buy link to your book.

Once you've created your app, you'll need to decide on pricing. Will the app be free as an enticement to buy your book? Or will it cost a small amount and act as a companion to the series? You'll also want to have a marketing plan in place for getting the app noticed once it's available. Consider getting a sponsor, as in a company who compliments something in your story (i.e. a dog mystery writer partners with a pet food company). Creating the app is one task. Marketing it is the other.

And while we're on the subject of new technology, do you know about Kindlegraph for readers, who want a signed copy of their e-book? Or have you heard about how a reader who has a question while reading your Kindle book can send you a message via Twitter? Read about it here (http://yhoo.it/pBj3Bn) and here (http://amzn.to/pG9gSx).

With all these great new technologies out there and new ones arriving every day, it gets harder to keep up. Just remember this motto: The Writing Comes First.

Happy Labor Day Weekend!

Marco Island and More

With the threat from Hurricane Irene gone from South Florida, we ran off to Marco Island for two days of fun in the sun. The Hilton offers the best rates and has great food, a beautiful pool area, free beach chairs (but there is a fee for parking, use of wi fi Internet in rooms, and beach umbrellas), a business center with free computer use, and friendly staff. The rooms are comfortable, many with lovely views.

    

     

 

We like the café and the lounge in the hotel. Here are other restaurants we'd recommend: Snook Inn, Pelican Bend, and Capri Fish House. They're all great for seafood.

      

Then on Saturday, I attended a meeting over on Florida's west coast. The Southwest Florida Romance Writers meets regularly in Estero, located between Naples and Fort Myers. Whoever wants to meet for lunch first gathers in the Bistro downstairs at the Miromar Design Center. The meeting with a speaker begins at 1:00 on the third floor. Member Michael Joy shared some tips he'd learned during a residency in a Master of Fine Arts program. I enjoyed his teaching technique as much as the tools he mentioned on creating realistic dialogue.

Writers are very generous in sharing what we know. Attending local meetings, reading online blogs, going to conferences, and entering writing contests offer a tremendous amount of valuable information and feedback. In Florida, we have branch chapters of RWA, MWA, and Sisters in Crime. This year the Ninc national conference in October will be held in St. Pete Beach. It's New Rules, New Tools: Writers in Charge, an essential and dynamic topic. And in case you didn't already know, Sleuthfest will be moving to Orlando in March 1-4, 2012 so you can bring your families along.

Whether you escape for a carefree weekend or to a writing workshop, it's always good to have a change of pace. Where is your favorite two or three-day getaway?

Daily Writing Quotas

If you want to maintain productivity as a writer, you have to consistently focus and produce new pages. How do you accomplish this when there are so many distractions waiting to happen?

Set your goals. How many pages can you write per day? Per week? In a month? What's your final page count to be, and how long are you giving yourself for reaching it?

My daily page quota is 5 pages a day at a minimum. Usually, I go to work first thing in the morning and try to get these pages done before business hours and the distractions of phone calls, appointments, etc. Perhaps you work at a day job or have child care obligations. What's the best time for you to be productive? How many pages can you realistically manage to get done during those hours? When you finish the daily allotment, you can write more if you're still going strong, or you can use the time for research and promotion.

My weekly page quota is 25 pages. This means I only have to work 5 days a week at a production rate of 5 pages per day. However, this doesn't always happen. Some days, I have things to do and get nothing written. Other days, maybe I'll write two pages. As long as I make up for lost time by the end of the week, I'll meet this quota, too.

Then there's the monthly quota. I set for myself 100 pages from beginning to end of the month. For a 100,000 word book or 400 pages by the old standards, that means it'll take me four months to write a book of this length.

That doesn't count in vacations, revision letters from editors, proofreading edited books, public appearances, or other time you must take off from your forward progress. So besides your monthly quota, add in extra weeks to write the book to count for unexpected time loss. Figure in your vacations, weekends away, appointments, and other events that will interfere when you set your final goal, which is finishing the book. Goal A is the first draft, when the actual writing is completed. Goal B is for the finished product when your work is ready for submission.

Here's my example:

Daily: 5 pages
Weekly: 25 pages
Monthly: 100 pages
Word Count: 100, 000
First Draft Completion: 4 months: July, Aug, Sept, Oct. Finish by Thanksgiving (allowing a few extra weeks for vacations and other disruptions).
Revisions: December
Submission: January

This is a pretty tight schedule, although compared to some other prolific authors, it's lengthy. If you have a one book a year contract, then you can take your time. If you're asked for a deadline by your agent or editor, make one production schedule for yourself, and then tack on extra time for the official deadline so you don't free scrunched. The most important factor is to set realistic goals that you'll be able to meet on a consistent basis.

So what works for you?

Movies vs Books

Do you prefer to watch a movie first and then read the book, or vice versa?

I've done it both ways. Here are some movies I've watched that have spurred me to get the book: City of Ember, Legend of the Seeker, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, and the Alex Rider teen spy series, beginning with Operation: Stormbreaker. Even my husband has enjoyed these books, most of which are YA novels.

Legend of the Seeker, on the other hand, is based on Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth epic fantasy series (see Wizard's First Rule to get started). After seeing this show on TV, I was delighted to learn there were twelve books waiting for my reading pleasure. It didn't matter that Disney altered the storyline to suit their audience. Both were equally enjoyable in their own right. Terry Goodkind is about to release a new book about his beloved characters. I can't wait to read it.

Now we've discovered I Am Number Four after renting the DVD. This is book one in a proposed series, and a movie sequel is already planned. I recognized the hero of this film as being the same actor who played the lead in Alex Rider. Coincidence, huh?

Harry Potter stimulated me in the opposite direction. I read all the books, then devoured the films. I'd say the same for Jane Austen movies. I love those classic romances. Who hasn't watched Pride and Prejudice multiple times? Ditto for films based on Charles Dickens titles. And another remake of The Three Musketeers will soon appear on screen.

There's one novel I am not rushing out to read, and that's the one based on Castle, the witty TV show starring Nathan Fillion as a bestselling mystery writer. I can pass on the book supposedly written by his character because I'm not fond of movie or TV tie-in stories. I'd rather read original works by an author, where the world building originates in his imagination. Thus I'm willing to read books after watching a film based on the work, but I won't run out to buy a book solely derived from the movie.

What about you? Do movies excite you to read the original book, or would you rather read the book first and then watch the film?

Hold Me! Thrill Me! Writing Contest

"HOLD ME! THRILL ME!" Writing Contest 

Sponsored by Southwest Florida Romance Writers

ALL ELECTRONIC!!

http://www.swfrw.org/2011_contest.php

DEADLINE: Entries must be submitted and payment received by midnight September 1st, 2011

ELIGIBILITY: Open to all unpublished authors: Romance Writers of America members and non-members. International entries are welcome in English.

ENTRIES: The first 20 pages of an unpublished manuscript featuring romantic elements. Contestants can enter an MS in each category, but no more than one MS per category.

FORMAT: Only files in Rich Text Format (*.rtf) will be accepted. RTF is an industry accepted format supported by all major word-processing software. Check

the Help Menu of your word processing software for how to use 'Save As' to create an RTF document. Manuscripts must be double spaced, have one inch

margins, and use Times New Roman or Courier. Entries that do not meet these formating requirements will be returned.

FEE: $25

CATEGORIES & FINAL JUDGES:

Contemporary: Amanda Bergeron, Avon

Historical: Elizabeth Bistrow, New American Library

Paranormal: Meredith Giordan, Berkley

Romantic Suspense: Alex Logan, Grand Central

Young Adult: Kristin Rens, Balzer & Bray

AWARDS: (in addition to getting your MS in front of a top industry editor)

1st Place $50 and a Certificate of Achievement

2nd Place $20 and a Certificate of Achievement

3rd Place a Certificate of Achievement

Enter Now!

http://www.swfrw.org/2011_contest.php

Golden Palm Writing Contest

***Permission to forward granted & encouraged***

Golden Palm Writing Contest

We're low on entries!

There are only a few days left until the August 15th Deadline to enter the Golden Palm. We have a fabulous lineup of final judges so don't miss out!

Categories and Final Round Judges:

Short/Long Contemporary: Megan Long, Harlequin Superromance

Single Title: Whitney Ross, TOR Books

Mainstream with Romantic Elements: Elaine Spencer, The Knight Agency

Historical: Elizabeth Bistrow, New American Library

Paranormal/Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Time Travel: Deb Werksman, Sourcebooks

Erotica (*new this year*): Kelli Collins, Ellora's Cave

Fee: $20 for FRW Members, $25 for all others

Entry: Maximum first 25 pages. ALL ELECTRONIC SUBMISSIONS

Sponsor: Florida Romance Writers

Eligibility: The Golden Palm Contest is open to any writer who has never been contracted in book-length fiction (40,000 words or more) with any publisher.

For more information, go to http://www.frwriters.org/contests.htm

Disney's Magic Kingdom

My husband and I are Disney addicts. Every so often, we have to get our fix of Mickey Mouse or Living with the Land ride or Star Tours at Walt Disney World. This past weekend, we visited the Magic Kingdom and turned right past Main Street toward Tomorrowland. We headed to our favorite attraction, the Carousel of Progress.

I suspect this is the oldest attraction in the park, originally appearing in the old World's Fair. The revolving showroom takes you on a twenty minute experience into the past, beginning in the early 1900's, to look at man's progress over time. I love how the people of each era thought their time was the best. Family dynamics change along with technology until we reach the modern age and beyond.

Also in Tomorrowland, we boarded the People Mover, a sedate ride on an open-air tram. It whisks you around an elevated track so you get a glimpse of the various pavilions to visit later.

You can have the thrill rides; we've done them all and don't need to experience them again.

Over by Fantasyland, past the race cars, we stopped opposite the old-fashioned carousel to view the placards announcing upcoming additions. I'm excited for the new changes! Here's what to expect:

Map of Fantasyland Additions

Be Our Guest Restaurant

Castle under construction

Mural Showing Changes

Another view of construction area

Seven Dwarfs Mine Train

Tales with Belle

I can't wait to try the new restaurant when it opens.

Oops, then it started to rain and we left. We didn't get to go into the Haunted Mansion or Pirates of the Caribbean or any of the other attractions we like. But we have annual passes, so we can easily return.

Are you a Disney fan? What's your favorite attraction in the Magic Kingdom?