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Fiction, Food, and Foolishness
BOOK RECOMMENDATION
Lately, it seems I’m reading just as many books on the craft of writing as I am novels. I wanted to recommend a book I just finished. It’s From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction.
It’s written by Robert Olen Butler, Pulitzer Prize winning author in fiction. This is the description of the book from Amazon.
Robert Olen Butler, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, teaches graduate fiction at Florida State University — his version of literary boot camp. In From Where You Dream, Butler imagines the process of writing as emotional rather than intellectual, and tells writers how to achieve the dream space necessary for composing honest, inspired fiction. Proposing that fiction is the exploration of the human condition with yearning as its compass, Butler interprets the traditional tools of the craft using the dynamics of desire. Offering a direct view into the mind and craft of a literary master, From Where You Dream is an invaluable tool for the novice and experienced writer alike.
Even though I found parts of the book a little “far out” I’ve got to say the chapter entitled The Anecdote Exercise, is sensational.
The book is a series of intense lectures known as “Boot Camp.” In the chapter I mention, he takes written work from his students and goes sentence by sentence and teaches them how to flesh out every detail.
Two weeks ago when I checked Amazon, the price of the book was close to $50.00, but today, I checked and it’s less than $10. I don’t know what happened there, but as soon as I get done with this post, I’m going to order it.
Since I didn’t feel like spending $50 on a book I wasn’t sure I’d like, I went to my local library. They didn’t have it, but borrowed it from another library for me. That’s a really good deal. It cost me a buck fifty to get the book and now I know it’s one I want in my personal library.
It’s worth the read, because he approaches writing a little differently than most. At least I thought so.
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WHAT THE HECK IS SEO?
What the heck is SEO and what does it mean to me? SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and this is Wikipedia’s definition: SEO is the process of improving the visibility of a website or web page in search engines’ natural or un-paid search results.
For instance, my website, www.anneverett.com has a blog, pictures, events calendar, and info about me and my book. So, what if you’re looking for a book that is a humorous, romance mystery? How the heck will I ever get you to my page?
If you know my name or the title of my book and you type either one into the search bar, BAM! I’ll come up all over that first page, but what about all those people looking for humor books, or southern books, or Texas books? That’s where the SEO comes in and it all has to do with KEYWORDS.
As an author, I want Texas, humor, southern, connected to my website and book in order to be listed on the first page in the random search. Does that make sense? It’s very important to have the right key words connected to your site/book or product/business, etc.
Okay, where do you find these key words? Do you just come up with some on your own? You could, but how do you know they’re good key words?
For example, let’s take the word romance. My book is a romance mystery, so that should be a great key word for me, right? Nope.
Romance is searched approximately 13,600,000 times each month, which gives my book a competition of 363,000,000 of coming up on the first page of the search. WOW!
You want your key words to be low in random searches, allowing your book/website/business/product a better chance of appearing on the first page, or at least on one of the first three pages. I’ve heard people will only look at the first three pages of a search, so if you’re not there, you will never be seen.
According to www.searchengineland.com search engines “crawl” web sites, going from one page to another incredibly quickly, acting like hyperactive text scanners. They make copies of your pages, which get stored in what’s called an “index,” which is like a big book of the web.
When someone searches, the search engine flips through this big book that it has created, finds all the relevant pages and then picks out what it thinks are the very best ones to show first.
Check out the link below. Here you can type in a description of your book and it will choose some keywords for you. As an example, I typed in southern humorous romance mystery. The list I got included: humorous book, comedy, southern, humor, humor book, humorous books, laugh-out-loud, good humor books, southern humor and a few more. Once the word list appears, it will have the word low listed by the selections. That means your competition is low and those should be good words for you.
www.searchengineland.com/the-giant-list-of-keyword-tools-41678
Now, once you have your words, how do you use them? Use a couple of them in everything you write. For instance on Twitter and Facebook, I post a Talkin’ Twang quote. When I do, I hash tag a couple of my keywords at the end of the quote.
Talkin’ Twang for today: You can tell the minute a man touches you if it’s for his benefit or yours. #southern #humor
When I thank someone for following me, I say. Thanks for following a #Texas girl…or #southern girl.
If you blog or post other places and they have a place for tags, try to use some of your key words. Of course they need to be relevant to your post.
You can also link other sites to your site and that will also help to get people there.
Gee, and you thought writing the book and getting published was the hard part!!
Man, so did I!
FACEBOOK AND TWITTER: ARE THEY WORTH IT?
I’m talking from a promotion point of view. According to some marketing information I’ve read, they rate way down on the scale of promotional value. Now, that’s not to say don’t do them. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m just saying, be realistic about your expectations.
Just because you build your friends and followers to a multitude of thousands, the truth of the matter is they will not translate into sales. If they did, then someone with 62,000 followers on Twitter would have 62,000 books sold the minute it hit the shelves.
I don’t have many tweet followers, not even a thousand, and of those, I know of only one book sold.
Facebook is a little different. I attended a seminar on marketing a few months back and heard Rusty Shelton speak. (He’s terrific by the way, and I’d recommend you follow him on Twitter @Rustyshelton) Anyway, he described Facebook like a family reunion, where everyone there already knows and likes you, whereas Twitter is more like a cocktail party. You walk up to someone and speak to them for a few minutes, then move on. At only 140 characters, that’s about all the time you have. Don’t turn them off by trying to sell them something!
Take into consideration, every person on Twitter has an agenda. They are all selling something just like you. I think I mentioned in my last post not to promote your book over and over again on Twitter…or anywhere else for that matter. Nothing turns me off more, than to see a tweet, or email constantly saying…buy my book…buy my book….buy my book.
My author friends and I have discussed this and they do the same as I when we see those…delete…delete…delete.
Instead of hawking your book like a carnival con man, tweet something of interest, tweet something funny, tweet a recommendation of someone else, and interesting article you’ve read, a blog you like, etc. Those considering following you will look at your bio and that’s the place you need to mention your book, blog, or whatever you want to put out there.
It’s fine to tweet or Facebook an event, like a book signing or some type of earth shattering news like you’ve just received the cover for your new book, or it’s just been listed on Amazon, or hit bookstore shelves. Those are newsworthy.
So why bother, you ask? Good question. The truth is there’s a lot of great information on twitter. Also, you can build your SEO by hash tagging there. So, just tweet your heart out, but don’t expect to set the world on fire with sales.
TO MARKET, TO MARKET
BEFORE submitting your manuscript, you should have a marketing plan in place. I know, that sounds crazy, but it’s true. You need to look beyond your first publication. I’ll bet you already have tons of ideas for the next book. Heck fire, you might already have it written! Your publisher may even ask what your long range plan is, so be prepared for that.
I got accepted by a small press, Briona Glen Publishing in New Hampshire. My vision for my book was one of their submission requirements. What? My vision? I just wanted to get published and make enough money to get a facelift! Oh, and go on Oprah, of course.
Since I didn’t think they would appreciate my petty, selfish plan, I came up with something more serious.
First, I wanted my book to be written well enough to deserve publication. However, having a book published certainly doesn’t guarantee success. I think you could ask any popular author about their achievements, and they would all say marketing/promoting their book played more of a part in their success than the actual writing. Let’s face facts, you can have a well written book, but if no one ever hears about it . . . well, you’ll only have a well written book . . . sitting on a shelf gathering dust.
Second, Ann Everett is a pen name. I chose it for two reasons. Ann is mine and my daughter’s middle name. Everett is my husband and son’s middle name. Yes, in Texas, we’re so vain, we name our children after ourselves. Since my writing style has been compared to Janet Evanovich, choosing Ann Everett, also worked out nicely for me to be on bookstore shelves next to her.
I said my style has been compared to her, but it ends there. Her series character, Stephanie Plum is single. My character, Tizzy Donovan, is a widow and single mother. Stephanie can’t decide which man she wants, Ranger or Morelli. Tizzy hasn’t been with a man in almost five years! Stephanie never has any money. Tizzy has plenty. Plum’s story takes place in a city, mine in rural Texas. Stephanie is a bond enforcement officer, but never has bullets for her gun. Tizzy works in a bakery, has a gun, and knows how to use it. Many differences, but the crazy, over-the-top humor is similar and I certainly don’t mind being compared to a best- selling author!
Lastly, and this is the most important part, I pitched my book as the first in a series of three, with a cookbook between the second and third installment. Why a cookbook, you ask? Well, in the novel, the bake shop is named Sweet Thangs and owned by sisters Pattiecake McAlister and Sugarpie Monroe.
When I submitted the manuscript, I didn’t realize I had a marketing plan, but I did! Three humorous, romance mysteries, with a non-fiction book thrown into the middle.
Briona Glen saw that as smart, because fiction and non-fiction market in different ways and they believed fans of the novels would want to buy the cookbook and cooks would most likely want to buy the series.
It’s too soon to tell if the plan works. The second novel, YOU’RE BUSTING MY NUPTIALS, is due for release in August 2012, the cookbook, SWEET THANGS, probably late 2013. See what I did? I just promoted both books!!
If the plan works or not, at least having it in place in the beginning allows me to market the upcoming novels and cookbook (like I just did) right along with my first book, LAID OUT AND CANDLE LIT.
At signings, I have fliers advertising the release of the second book and a handout of a recipe which will be included in the cookbook. I Facebook recipes. I blog recipes. I sometimes serve a recipe at a book signing. All gimmicks, but part of the plan.
Blogs, websites, Facebook, Twitter, etc. are all part of marketing. You need to have those in place as well, BEFORE your book comes out. However, don’t use those places to promote your book over and over, with tweet after tweet. Use the social networks to help establish your name. Taking part in some of the discussions, tweeting each day, staying connected to your FB friends, and listing your website, will help you do that.
So, take a look at your novel. Do you have something in it you can market other than just the story? I have a friend who incorporated horse show competitions into her book. Think of all the horse related clubs and organizations where she can market.
Perhaps one of your characters does volunteer work for a particular organization or is a member of a special group or one who does DIY projects. You could market by tweeting or blogging helpful hints.
I have another friend who centers his mysteries on the Sweet Adeline’s. He’ll be able to attend SA conventions and join their on-line groups to sell his books.
Do you have something in your book you’ll be able to capitalize on? If you do, you may already have a marketing base and not know it.
Bottom line. Get a plan. When your book launches, you’ll be ready to hit the ground running.
BUCKET LIST??
As we get older, many of us make a bucket list. Actually, I’ve made lists all my life. Grocery lists, cleaning lists, social event lists, school lists…and the lists go on and on!
Lists are important. Just today I saw an article on the cover of a magazine that read, “Thirty Things to do Before You’re Thirty.” I’m a little late for that one to do me much good.
As a writer, I have lists for story ideas, character descriptions, gags I want to include in the next book, and names I want to use.
This is what I know. I’ve made lists for so long, I can’t function without them. Naturally, I have a list for subjects I want to blog about. (I made that list just today)
A few days ago, my daughter came for a visit and told me about a list her daughter, Clara, had made.
Clara is five. She told her mother she had three things on her list and once she learned those three things, she’d know everything.
Number one—learn how to climb a tree.
Number two—learn to ride a skinny bike
Number three-learn how to open door knobs that
have those plastic things on them.
(child safety locks)
Clara’s list got me to thinking. Her list consisted of things she WANTED to learn.
Most of my lists are things I’m obligated to do, even the writing lists. I love to write, but once I got published, it became more of a job than a joy…at least some days it is.
Do you make lists? Wouldn’t it be great if we had a list of only three items and once completed, we’d know everything? What three items would it be for you?
BEAUTIFUL FOOD
Recently, my sister and I hosted a wedding shower for our niece. We took traditional dessert recipes and presented them in a different way. Not only were they beautiful, but they were also delicious.
We chose three of our favorites which will be included in our upcoming recipe book, SWEET THANGS. It will be chocked full of nothing but desserts. The three shown here are: German Chocolate Cake, Key Lime Pie, and Sugarpie (my sister, Carol’s) locally famous cheesecake.
Ann Everett, Best Selling Author
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{I hope you enjoy this sweet, short-story romance!}