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A ‘Logic Model’ for Author Success
“Managing our career.” “Managing our expectations.” “Managing our resources and time.” All these “management” terms being applied to the writing life — with good reason — can make it sound like we...
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Provocations in Publishing: “Engineering Serendipity”
Coined by the British aristocrat Horace Walpole in a 1754 letter, [serendipity] long referred to a fortunate accidental discovery. Today serendipity is regarded as close kin to creativity — the...
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On the Road: Face-to-Face in a Virtual World
Photo by Jeff S. PhotoArt Today, we’re thrilled to have Jenny Milchman with us. Her journey to publication took thirteen years, after which she hit the road for seven months with her family on what...
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The False Divide Between Book Promo and Author Promo
Imagine this: After years of drafting, critiquing, revising, submitting and watching rejections pile up, you’ve finally landed a publishing deal and your book is coming out in several months. Over...
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Why Your Book Deal Is Just the First Step
Photo by Jeff Noble Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke, authors of Your Perfect Life (Washington Square Press) have been best friends for twenty-five years and survived high school and college together....
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To Promote or Not To Promote: An Existential Question
It’s no secret that publishers do little these days to promote most books but that there’s an infinite number of steps authors can take to fill the void, from DIY to hiring an outside publicist. Nor is...
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Networking for Writers
Photo by Michael Heiss Today, we’re thrilled to have Margaret Dilloway with us. She’s the author of the upcoming novel, SISTERS OF HEART AND SNOW, (Putnam, April 2015) about two estranged sisters who...
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How To Fire – and How Not to Fire – Your Publicist
picture by Nic McPhee Publicist. It’s like a dirty word. In fact, I’m calling it today’s Dirty Word of the Day. Once, I needed help with an author contract and reached out to a woman about hiring her...
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The Dozen New Digital Rules Authors Need to Know
“Choosing anonymity is choosing irrelevance.” Eric Schmidt, Google’s Executive Chairman, author of The New Digital Age. Today’s guest is Carole Jelen, an author, former publishing editor, and literary...
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9 Easy & Inexpensive Ways to Promote Your Audiobook
Photo by The Preiser Project. Back in July, I wrote a post about my reluctant journey into the seemingly overwhelming world of audiobook production and the lessons I learned along the way. I shared my...
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Take Charge of Your Author Business: 5 Aspects to Consider
photo by Éole Wind We’re thrilled to have Joanna Penn back with us today. She’s an author, speaker, and entrepreneur, and was voted one of the Guardian UK Top 100 creative professionals 2013. Her...
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What You Pay for When You Hire a PR Firm
Let’s say your book is coming out in several months, and you fall into the camp of those who want to put some time and resources into promoting it. Knowing that that your publisher can’t commit to...
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What Your Writer’s Resume Says About Your Chances for Recognition
Lately, a new mantra has caught on: “There’s no better time to be a writer.” Not only has self-publishing helped open the doors to so many aspiring authors, but the online world has created more...
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Beware: The Shady Side of New Publishing Opportunities
Once upon a time, there was vanity publishing. Remember? Those were the days when self-publishing had a very bad rap. Not so much because the books’ quality was shaky (though that tended to be true),...
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The Art of the Comp
From Flickr’s TheBusyBrain Today’s guest is Greer Macallister, a poet, short story writer, playwright, and novelist whose work has appeared in publications like The North American Review, The Missouri...
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The Hacks for Hacks Guide to Writing Awards
Warning: Hacks for Hacks tips may have harmful side effects on your writing career, and should not be used by minors, adults, writers, poets, scribes, scriveners, journalists, or anybody. Let’s talk...
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How to Nurture Your Fan Base
Warning: Hacks for Hacks tips may have harmful side effects on your writing career, and should not be used by minors, adults, writers, poets, scribes, scriveners, journalists, or anybody. Fans are one...
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Musings on Genres, Shame, and Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?
Genre Wheel from Good Reads Wheel-A-Thon I don’t tell my ‘academic’ colleagues that I write fiction. I don’t talk much about my non-fiction writing to my fiction-writing community. I LOVE e-readers...
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Should You Be Blogging? Eight Searching Questions to Help You Decide
Today we’re excited to have Robin Houghton with us! She has over two decades of experience in marketing and communications, formerly with Nike, then running her own business Eggbox Marketing since 2002...
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The Evolution of an Author Website
When I started out as a serious writer, back in the mid-1990s, I didn’t even own a home computer. I wrote in longhand and word-processed after hours at work. Once I had my first publishing contract I...
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