down the writer's path

TLA Conference, booksignings, writer's magazines, and cntests

My marketing experiment for Exploring Texas History: Weekend Adventures continues, but life goes on and so does this blog. Next week I'll be attending the annual Texas Librarian Association conference (TLA) in Austin. I have at least three scheduled booksignings. As a member of the SCBWI-Houston Speaker's Cooperative, I'll be there with a group of published writers from Houston's local SCBWI chapter. We have a booth in the exhibit hall. You may wonder why we are going. Well, this is a gathering of librarians, library supporters and vendors--and readers. Many books are bought by librarians. My first travel book was a big favorite,and I anticipate the new Texas book to be a big hit. I also have Divided Loyalties out and a second teen novel, Video Magic, scheduled for release at the end of summer. So this is a good year for me to make my first visit to the conference.

Don't worry. I'll have a variety of postings next week including a new guest interview. In the meantime, Check out the two main commercial magazines for writers, Writer's Digest and The Writer, and see if you're interested in either of these two contests.

• For the second time in three years, The Writer magazine has won a gold medal for Editorial Excellence in Folio magazine's prestigious annual competition. Read the full article for more information.

• Writer's Digest is now accepting entries in the 74th Annual Writer's Digest Writing Competition. Compete and win in 10 categories. More than $30,000 in Cash and Prizes. Deadline: 5/16/05

• Writer's Digest is now accepting entries in the 13th Annual International Self-Published Book Awards. More than $10,000 in prizes! Enter the only competition exclusively for self-published books. Deadline: 5/2/2005

Update on Amazon.com Exploring Texas History marketing experiment

The Amazon.com marketing experiment for my new book, Exploring Texas History: Weekend Adventures, continues. During the first 24-hour period the first ranking I saw was #89,254, which is much better than usual two million or so number an author generally finds. During the day the number moved to  #34,947 and reached #14,177 last night around 9:00 pm central. This morning the number dropped to #70,294. Obviously there has been sales activity, something I can verify from the number of private emails I've received.

According to the trackbacks, the marketing experiment has been listed on three blogs: Wayne Hurlbert's Blog Business World; Heather Ames's Blog Trek; and Temple Stark's site. Temple is the music editor over at Blogcritics.org. So it looks like there's the beginning of what many call viral marketing now at work. My thanks to my fellow bloggers for the kind mention of my book and of this experiment.

Be sure and check out Georganna Hancock's Writer's Edge and mystery novelist Barbara Klaser's Mysteries of a Shrinking Violet. They're regular readers of Down the Writer's Path and do a great job with their own blogs. And if you're one of the politically incorrect, be sure and stop by David Nalle's The Elitest Pig. He's a fellow Texan and reviewer for Blogcritics.org and quite a prolific guy.  Houston blogger Andrew Ian Dodge stopped by yesterday, and I had an opportunity to check out his Dodgeblogium and learned about the Storyblogging Carnival. I just noticed there's an interview with Temple Stark over at Blogcritics that you might want to check out.   

The best information I've found so far on how Amazon.com calculates their sales ranking numbers and what it actually means is done by Morris Rosenthal. I can't say I totally understand it even with his in-depth analysis but I'm working on it. He takes into account the major changes made by Amazon back in October of last year. Feel free to offer any illumination on the Amazon numbers. What I do know is there have been some actual sales generated by this experiment and, despite the dip in the numbers, I'm hoping to see an increase as the day progresses.

My thanks to everyone who has stopped by, made a comment, posted a note to their blog, and bought a book. I plan to continue the experiment through Friday, though in the blogosphere sometimes things take on a life of their own. In this case, it's my fervant hope that evolution takes place and I'm able to touch a wider audience than I had thought possible. (For more information on the experiment check here.) 

A writer, Amazon.com, a new book out, and a marketing experiment

Having a new book come out causes all kinds of activities. A week or so ago I received my author copy of the new travel book, Exploring Texas History: Weekend Adventures, scheduled for a May release date. Book in hand, I went to the computer and signed on to Amazon.com, typed in the book's title and found the book. All's well. A week or so later I was working on some pre-publicity stuff and happened to type my name into Amazon and discovered the new book didn't show up. Typed in the title, found it. Then I realized, to my horror, that my name had been left off Amazon's author listing.

Now listen, that is a major shock to a writer's fragile system. One reason I was worried is because that probably meant the information keyed into Books In Print was incorrect and I was not listed there. And that would mean that anyone trying to buy my book using my name would not be able to find it on Amazon or at any of the bookstores. Horrors! Another reason it caused some anxiety is because that meant I would have to find out how to correct the problem via Amazon and my publisher. Anyone having anything to do with publishing knows that speed is not necessarily one of the game's major characteristics. With thoughts of soon-to-be released promotional material bouncing in my head, I finally found a place on Amazon.com to make a content request and did so. Their note said they would try to make the changes within five days--note the word "try."

I emailed my editor and prayed.

Today, much to my delight, I discovered Amazon.com lists my name as co-author.

Peace reigns once again in Vikk's realm of publishing.

Now, you're probably wondering what the experiment is all about. Well, if you've happened to click through the title or the amazon link on the left (Yes, I know my name doesn't show up on the link--drat), you might have noticed that this is still a virgin book for Amazon. It is so new we don't even have any sales ranking numbers. (These are important figures to the authors, though they don't necessarily prove anything stupendous for the writer with regard to trying to figure out actual sales due to the strange way the ranking is done, but they sure make us feel good when we see a sudden surge in the ranking from sales.) So you have an opportunity to help establish a sales surge and a high ranking for our book if you were to order a copy, and you'd provide a rollicking good couple of days for me and my fellow author as we watch the ranking move up and up and up.

I also noticed it's offered at a 32% discount and it hasn't even hit the store's shelves yet. I think that's cheaper than I can get wholesale. :) Ah, the book businesss and the joys of being an author.

Yes, I know, this is flagrant BSP but I'm a struggling writer; did I tell you I've lost my job and will be out of work at the end of the week? And haven't I told you promotion is a huge part of being a published writer in today's world? You might also note that you can order the book through my links in this post, or through the link on the right side or even through the Amazon shopping portal that takes you straight to your personal shopping cart and allows you to easily shop for more books. :)

Feel free to let pass this on to friends and family alike, and always remember to support your friendly authors and fellow bloggers . . . and join me in this experiment to play with my new book's Amazon ranking. :) Did I mention that having a huge number of sales that occur within 24 hours makes a HUGE impression on the sales ranking figure?

What does the Digital Future hold for writers?

Since I began writing fifteen plus years ago, technology has exploded. I remember typing my short stories on the revered IBM Selectric. Back then, if you decided to make a change on page 2 of a 15-page short story, you'd have to retype 14 pages if the text moved to the next page. I also remember doing the cut-and-paste method of revising. Using scissors, I'd cut out paragraphs or sentences and move them here and there, then tape them in the new section to block out the story before I'd begin the retyping process. Today, technology is more complicated but in many ways the writer's life is so much easier. Certainly, technology has made the process of revision much easier and less daunting. Over the years we've gone from floppy disks to CDs to these wonderful portable mini-drives like those made by Scandisk. Moving material from one computer to another and archiving work is getting easier and easier.

Today it's to a writer's advantage to try to be technologically savvy. Several months ago, I saw one of those monthly in-depth author interviews on the first Sunday of the month on C-SPAN and watched as they filmed the author downloading an interview he had taped directly onto the computer. He didn't have to transcribe. My co-author would have loved to have had one of those things when we taped all the interviews for the first travel book. (She had the job of transcribing them.)

I confess I'm a l little late in finding out about this particular series, about 4-5 months late, but if you tune into C-SPAN tonight at 6:30 pm Eastern, you can catch the last in the series of discussions hosted by the Library of Congress's John W. Kluge Center. The series has been examining how the digital age is changing the most basic ways information is organized and classified. The goal has been to educate the public on what the digital age means to their lives. Events have included a featured speaker, followed by a panel discussion, and a question and answer session with the audience at the venue, and C-SPAN television viewers. Viewers are invited to email questions to the experts.

Tonight features a talk by Neil Gershenfeld, director of the Center for Bits and Atoms at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Gershenfeld is the author of "When Things Start to Think." His new concept Internet Zero (0) proposes a new infrastructure for the existing Internet that would give an IP address to all electronic devices - from light bulbs to Internet addresses and URLs - and interconnect them directly, thereby eliminating much intermediating code and server technology. His topic is "From the Library of Information to the Library of Things." I thought It might be nice to be ahead of the curve for once, so I'm going to try and watch.

There are several other programs C-SPAN is re-airing that writers might find interesting. If you're scrolling through blog after blog but still haven't decided whether you want to do one, or if you are blogging, you might want to check C-Span Tuesday night at 6:30 pm Eastern for the Digital Future show on Web Logs and Knowledge. The forum talked about the gathering and dissemination of information through Internet web logs, or “blogs.” Among the issues they addressed were the accuracy and speed of information retrieval, public access to digitized information, various sources of information on the Internet, and the potential impact of the media on news reporting. Following their remarks they answered questions from the audience.

Following that forum, at 8:00 pm Eastern, you might want to stay tuned for the discussion about archiving material in the digital age. As writers we do plenty of research, so the subject may be of interest. Brewster Kahle, digital librarian, director and co-founder of the Internet Archive, talks about capturing material on the Internet and the challenges of selecting pertinent content. Mr. Kahle first developed the idea and tools to archive the Web and explains the process of digital archiving, and why it's important to everyday use of the Internet. The talk is called "Universal Access to Knowledge."

Other sessions that will be aired this week are:

Digital Future: The Experience of Reading on Thursday, March 31 at 6:30 pm Eastern where Professor David M. Levy talks about the shift in the experience of reading from the fixed page to movable computer screens and the impact of the shift on language. Mr. Levy was the author of Scrolling Forward: Making Sense of Documents in the Digital Age, published by Arcade Publishing. Following his remarks he and other panelists discuss the potential changes in language and communication resulting from the digital age, methods of expression through computer technology and the Internet, as well as the role of institutions and individuals in embracing new information technology.

That event is followed by a session all writers should be concerned with: Digital Future: Copyright Issues. Lawrence Lessig, professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of the Stanford Center for Internet and Society, and author of Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, published by Basic Books, talks about the issues of copyright and "copyleft." He was the inventor of the revolutionary concept and application of Creative Commons, which encouraged the use of copyrighted material under specific conditions. Additionally, panelists discuss more broadly about intellectual property issues, on-line technology, and monitoring use of material on a global scale. They also answered questions from the audience.

Reading, copyright issues, archiving information, blogging, and the future of the Internet are all subjects of vital concern to writers. If you get a chance, tune in. If you feel like it, return and give us some feedback.

Mystery Short Story Contest Deadline Approaching

If you have a mysterious bent, you might consider entering the Mystery Short Story Contest sponsored by the Southwest chapter of Mystery Writers of America (MWA) and Murder by the Book, Houston's celebrated mystery bookstore. The entry must be postmarked by April 23, 2005. The $100 prize will be awarded at the Hardboiled Heroes and Cozy Cats 2005 mystery writing conference being in held in Houston on June 17 and 18. Writers do not have to attend the conference to enter the contest. The contest fee to enter is $15 per story. You can receive an optional written critique of stories for an additional $25. For complete details on the contest and the conference, check the MWA/SW website.
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Book Review: How We Die: Reflections on Life's Final Chapter

No matter the subject or genre, an author with a command of the language and a gift of storytelling can make a book sing. One such writer is Sherwin B. Nuland, a surgeon and National Book Award winner. My introduction to his writings came years ago when a friend gave me a copy of How We Die: Reflections on Life's Final Chapter.

With the constant media coverage of the Terry Schiavo case and the non-stop dialogue regarding right-to-die issues, it was only a matter of time before my experience reading Sherwin B. Nuland's 1994 National Book Award winner How We Die surfaced. I imagine, given the current national debate, I am not alone. Make no mistake, this is a powerful book. Nuland provides a frank discussion of how we, meaning our bodies, die.

In 1994, I spent Christmas weekend on a death watch. My best friend, having been diagnosed with multiple cancers, had, on that Friday, begun the descent into renal failure and the final stages of his life. A close friend, also a nurse with ER and hospice training, stopped by the hospital, pulled his chart and explained what was happening and what I could expect. She then gave me a copy of How We Die and explained that my friend was on "comfort care" and was listed as a DNR (do not resuscitate). She thought the book would help me through the coming hours.

All I can say is that it was a god-send. Although Nuland, a Yale physician with a great gift of language, didn't pull any punches, I found the book a comfort because it did, indeed, help prepare me for what was to come. When my friend's breathing changed, I understood where he was in the process. When those final moments arrived, I was able to meet his gaze at the moment of death and not flinch.

Did reading the book spare me any grief? No. But it did help me understand what had happened to my friend and to his body. Nuland talks of a cancer cell as being in an arrested teen hormonal development stage; it’s ravenous and single-minded. For the first time I truly grasped exactly what was happening to my friend's body. How We Die is not written in a dry, clinical style but, instead, is written compassionately with personal stories and examples. Nuland does not hold back. He tackles heart attacks, cancer, Aids, Alzheimer’s, assisted suicide and euthanasia. He relates stories that deal with the illnesses and deaths of those closest to him and of those who were his patients.

Nuland’s command of the language and his gift as a great storyteller, provide him with the necessary skills needed to write a book that is intended to bring the reader face to face with death. It's been eleven years since I've read How We Die. With parents who are approaching ninety and as an only child, I am once more moving into a phase of life where these issues become very personal. If you are curious about these issues or you are coming face to face with friends and family members who are struggling with these issues and the various illnesses that wreak havoc on the body, Nuland's bestseller How We Die could prove to be a good and necessary read.

(Note: this review has been posted to Blogcritics.org.)

So you want to write a bestseller

Hope springs eternal . . . for all writers, whether large or small, and with each newly published book the resurrected hope for a bestseller reappears. I confess it would be "loverly" if one or more of my teen books or travel books would rise to the top of the bestseller lists and with two new books coming out this year I have my fantasies.

Some of you may have similar hopes for achieving bestsellerdom. Jacqueline Blais and Anthony DeBarros wrote an interesting article for USA Today on how a book becomes a best seller. It looks like my best shot is the "slow but steady" method. Of course, that requires a lot of people to buy my books over a long span of time. The additional stats offered in the article is interesting, too.

My favorite tip at the end of the article is John Grisham's: "The best advice I ever got was to write at least one page a day. Until you write a page, nothing is going to happen."

With more than 100 million of his 18 books are in print in 26 countries worldwide and in 23 languages, he surely speaks with some authority. While I may not even have one million books in print, I definitely agree that nothing will happen until you pick up the pen or pencil or hit the keyboard and type. Talking and thinking about it won't make it happen. If it would I'd have even more books published. Writing is not easy. It's physically, emotionally and mentally demanding. Showing up at the keyboard on just a regular basis, let alone a daily one, can be difficult.

Writing is also rewarding. The daughter of a friend of mine received a copy of Divided Loyalties, my teen novel, for Christmas. She came up to me a few weeks ago and said she loved the book and wished I had more for her to read. (Naturally I told her Video Magic will be out at the end of summer.) Since she's right in the targeted range of the audience I'm aiming for, her comments really gave me a boost. Later her mother told me that she had the book on her nightstand and had read it at least four times. Learning that something you've toiled over and written is so treasured by someone is a great boon . . . and pretty much indescribable.

Some things never grow old

There are some things that happen to a writer that never seem to grow old. Yesterday I found one of those package notices in my P.O. Box. I wasn't expecting anything, so I was surprised to receive a large, heavy box. Then I saw the sender's information and realized I'd received the author copies to my new travel book, Exploring Texas History: Weekend Adventures. The book has a May release date and should be available in April. I knew I would be receiving the copies soon, but not this soon.

It is difficult to describe the feeling you get when you pick up your first copy of a bound book and actually see the thing that has been in your mind and on so many manuscript pages finally in its final form. It's still a really cool experience. Elaine, my co-author had the same feeling. It's also a major prod to get started on promotions.

A writer's plague and pushing through the story

After my last big push to get my second teen novel finished, I ended up having several days of muscle spasms and inflamed shoulder, back and neck muscles. While I don't have the wrist problems that plague many writers, I do run the risk of muscle spasms when I overdo it at the computer. Although I did manage to write my personal best number of pages per day, and I was able to write and revise for several days after that, after I completed the project and sent it on its way the physical problems took hold. There comes a point when I have to disengage from the computer keyboard all together in order to give those muscles a rest and time to heal.

I'm still having some problems but not as much as before, so I thought I'd try to blog. If you're wondering how many pages I wrote in one day, the answer is sixty. The last time I pushed like that I managed to do around fifty pages. Do I recommend anyone doing this? Not particularly, but there are interesting things that happen along the way when you do stay with the story over that long a time. The more I wrote, the deeper I delved into the story and its characters, and the more the story flowed.

Taking the Donald Maass intensive writing workshop a couple of weeks ago probably went a long way toward my being able to do this. I used my teen novel as the selected work for the workshop. Every morning from 9:00 am -- 12:30 pm we did exercises with the plot and characters that added layers and deepened our understanding of the story. So I held the evolving book in my head and worked with it daily for more than ten days before I began the marathon writing. The story and its evolution during the week became stronger. In essence I front-loaded my subconscious with all the information and held it back until that weekend, so the story burst out much like the rush of water from a broken dam. My job was to catch the words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs as they came.

I have to say the book is much stronger after going through the Maass workshop. I ended up adding new scenes and starting others from scratch.  It was a total re-visioning of the story. And that sometimes happens. Sometimes you get a story right the first time around and all that your revisions accomplish is a refinement of the original first draft; but there are other times when you might have to completely start over and throw out fifty, sixty, or eighty percent of the completed work. Every story is different with its own nature and its own demands. One of the hardest things to learn is which is which. I'm still trying to figure that one out.

Sorry folks, but I am back now

Hello,

Sorry to be so in getting back here. I had trouble connecting to the Internet when I was in Florida for the Donald Maas week-long intensive workshop, and when I got back I discovered that my novel had to be turned in to the editor the first part of this week instead of April 1. I've been on a marathon writing spree. I finished everything up and sent the file tonight.

The good news is that with the sending of the manuscript I have finally crossed off the last of my multiple deadline projects that have really kept me buried for the last two years. It's amazing how much the absence of a heavy deadline schedule can lift one's spirits. The last nine months have been difficult because several deadlines converged. The result is that I am now deadline-phobic. Do not EVEN tell me I have to have something ready or be somewhere by a specific date and time. I am looking forward to living without any contracts hanging over my head like so many guillotines ready to fall.

Mark, thanks for contacting me and prompting me to get in gear with the blog. I've been on a marathon writing spree since noon Sunday and simply didn't have time to check emails or raise my head for a looksee.

I have decided to take a year off from contracted work with built-in deadlines. My creative well is, well, it's empty and dry. I need to relax and wait for the rain. That doesn't mean I won't be writing or blogging, just that I won't be writing to any contracted deadlines.

The flipside to all of this is that my second teen novel, VIDEO MAGIC, will be out at the end of August and EXPLORING TEXAS HISTORY: WEEKEND ADVENTURES will be in the bookstores in April or May.

So that's where we are. I have a number of writers lined up for interviews and plenty to blog about so please hang in there. The posts will begin again.