Thinking about Image

Like many parents, I spent my Christmas in the kitchen. I do not mind being the chef in my house. It may have taken me ten years to learn how to roast the perfect turkey (the answer, as it is so often, is more butter), but watching my family devour a good feast is one of my greatest pleasures in life.

I also, as you might guess, enjoy eating even more than I enjoy cooking. I have a tendency to be on the heavy side. Sometimes, I am ten pounds overweight, sometimes I am thirty pounds overweight. It depends where I am moderately active or extremely active I am at a given time in my life.

The thing is, I am generally healthy and fit and a little extra weight does not bother me for one reason. I seldom think about what I look like.

I don't know how much I am about to confess is typical of girlhood/womanhood and how much is just me being neurotic, but I learned very early in life that I was not blessed with that most important female attribute, beauty.

Writing that sentence triggered a lot of bad and bitter feelings the moment I wrote it. Obviously, I am not completely healed or accepting of the life I lead with the face I've been given.

Still, I have cultivated some other attractive qualities. I'm funny, I'm smart, I'm a good cook and I'm a very, very good friend. Expertise with make up is not something I've ever mastered, so I generally don't bother. When there is an ocassion though, I do dress very well. I'm tall, I have big boobs, great hair and a disarming smile, so I can work with what I've got when I need to.

I'm just not always certain when I need to.

I stay home and write in my pajamas a lot. I teach in jeans and running shoes because I have to move from teaching assignment to teaching assignment.

This morning, though, I had to face reality. I had to ask myself this question: Would I sell more books if I were more attractive?

What provoked this question? A blog post about my America's Next Author win. You can see it here.

They've used a video I shot as an acceptance speech for another writing award a few years ago. I was so excited about making a video with my kids and sending it off, that I did not think about slapping on some make up or testing which camera angle suits me best. As a result, I am even plainer and paler in the movie than I am in real life.

I may have messed up "my professional image" because I did not show enough care in creating a media product.

Should I try to counteract it? Do readers really care what writers look like? All of us build our impressions almost instantly, regardless of how intellectual or bookish we might be.

I'm thinking of an experiment.

Right now, I need to sell 11 more eBooks on Amazon.com to get a $100 royalty cheque and another 15 downloads on Kobo to get them to pay me. I just started on Ebook Mall, but I can get paid $50 after just 21 sales there.

I think I should get a really hot author photo taken. You know, the kind where the writer (OK, me) is hair straightened and made up until she cannot recognise herself. Then, I'll take one of myself with my tablet camera as soon as I get out of bed in the morning. I'll use the photo I have posted now as a control. I'll post one photo at each venue to see which version of Kate sells more books during the month of February.

What do you think? Should I try it?