 From Nov. 8 until Nov. 14 (next Friday), COWG author J.A. Charnov's Kindle e-book, Cascadia's Curse, will be on sale for only $0.99 (regularly $4.99). Please visit the Kindle store to purchase:http://www.amazon.com/Cascadias-Curse-J-Charnov-ebook/dp/B00K9SUN3C/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1415839148&sr=1-1&keywords=cascadia%27s+curse
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 Kai Strand celebrates the release of the 3rd book in her Weaver Tale series, THE LUMPY DUCKLING.
After years of watching her best friend, Lumpy, get teased for his weight and looks, Wheezy makes a wish that changes everything. Early feedback for Lumpy: This is a wonderful story of loyalty and friendship. It also shows how one’s fears and insecurities sometimes sabotage the good things we have in our lives. You can learn more about The Lumpy Duckling and Kai's other books on her website:www.kaistrand.com 1. Remember you are interviewing them as well as them interviewing you. Sometimes we get so excited at someone's interest we really don't see that they might not be the best fit for us in the long run. So take a deep breath and take a look at them and whether their agency or company is a good match for you. My agent once pitched a story of mine to a publisher and we were ready to sign when a senior editor wrote a two page letter expressing concerns about my sample chapters. He'd never read anything I'd written but I could see from his letter that if I went with them it would be a tussle. I'm grateful to him that he wrote the letter. We found another publisher and that book has been my biggest seller.
2. Know what you'd like in an agent or editor or publisher before you go in. They'll respect your point of view and likely be able to say right away that, "we don't really publish memoir or "we haven't had a lot of success with speculative fiction." 3. Do some research about who you'll be pitching to. I remember one disaster pitch where the agent asked why I'd decided to meet with her and I said I liked her name! Which I did! But that was beside the point. I should have known what authors she represented and what publishers she'd been successful with. This was in the 1980s. A lot of that information can be gotten on line but I could have done better homework. It's great if you can name an author they handle that you think you write like or a book they may have published that you particularly resonated with. You can even say "Here's how my story is a little different" so they can see the uniqueness of what you're pitching. In many ways, you are asking them to take you on and that means not taking someone else on so helping them see the value in your story or your ability to promote your story can be what puts you over the top. 4. Have a one sentence tag line for your story - novel, memoir etc. It's the elevator sentence where you have one floor to answer the question "What's your book about?" before the person gets off the elevator or their eyes glaze over. 5. Be enthusiastic but not so enthusiastic they want to suggest a valium before you continue. Passion for that story is so important which is why face to face contact means so much. You may well have a life-long or career long relationship with these people so getting a good feel for them and if they can share your passion for the story will mean a great deal. My agent and I have been together longer than my first marriage! 6. Don't expect the editor or agent to take home your one sheet or even sample chapters. They'd have a stack to fly back with. Rather, a good goal is to get them to give you their card and say "I'm interested. Send me your first three chapters" or "I'd like to see the manuscript. Put my name on it when you send it." 7. If they give you their card (and you can leave yours) and they ask you to send a MS or whatever, then do that! Within two weeks! If you're not willing to do that then you're not ready to pitch. I had a young friend who pitched. The editor said "Send it to me." It was a children's book. The editor gave my friend her card but my friend NEVER sent it to her! Why? She told me she didn't think the editor was really interested and she had a few more things she wanted to do before sending it etc. etc. etc. Well, next time she complained to me about how only celebrities are getting children's books published I told her to go to her local children's section of a bookstore and take a look. One of those authors could have been her and the only difference is that they took the risk and sent it in. As the song goes, "You can't walk on water unless you're willing to drown." 8. If you don't get an offer to send a MS or you don't have a good feel for the match, don't think of your pitch as poorly done or that it was a waste of time. I pitched a number of editors and agents before someone took notice and at each one I learned something both about the industry and about my ability to synthesize my pitch and about my story. One editor I met with wasn't interested in my story but at breakfast the next morning she asked me to sit with her and helped me identify a number of "tensions" in the novel that I'd failed to consider. It was better than a critique and I'll always be grateful to her. (That book won a Wrangler!) 9. It's also fine to share with them previous work you may have gotten published, blog followers, how you might help promote, what your "story" in promoting might be. Some people call it their platform but I like story. They might say "western fiction really isn't selling these days" and you can say things like "Craig Johnson's Longmire series has been very successful" or Sandra Dallas has been writing historical and western fiction throughout her career and she's a NY Times bestseller. And you can even explore what the themes are in western writing that you think readers will resonate with like family unity, belonging, discovering wisdom in landscape, coming of age. The more we make universal the themes set in the West the greater will be our options for publishers. 10. Wallace Stegner, a Pulitzer prize winner who wrote of and in the West once said "It is not an unusual life curve for Westerners - to live in and be shaped by the bigness, sparseness, space, clarity and hopefulness of the West...." Personally, I think a story that reflects that understanding is what readers everywhere are seeking. And your story may be just the work to bring that wisdom well beyond the West. And PS Have fun!!! You'll see these people throughout the conference and remember they're hoping to find the next best Sandra Dallas or Tony Hillerman too. And they likely don't know anyone at the conference so being a colleague can make their stay better for them and who knows, they might remember you for a project later and give you a call...it's said that publishers publish people they know. So get to know one! A conference is a great place to do that. Jane Kirkpatrick, Author and Speaker Sign up for Jane's newsletter, Story Sparks, at www.jkbooks.com  Ava Wilson's New Release: HIGH DESERT ANGEL, third book in the Rosalie
Evans, Bookseller series, follows Ivy Reese from her mother's remote ranch near Fort Rock, Oregon to the killing fields of the Pacific during WWII. Available on Amazon.com in paperback and kindle Order a signed copy from website: www.avawilsonauthor.com By Guild member Diana McCollumIncrease your web presence: 1. Create a testimonial page on your website 2. Retweak the SEO on your site 3. Ask fans to post their reviews on your Facebook page 4. Ask fans to post their reviews on Amazon 5. Ask fans to post their reviews on Goodreads 6. Sign up for Twitter 7. Clean up your social footprint 8. Create an author FB page and use it instead of your profile 9. Sign up for Google Authorship 10. Offer bloggers advanced reading copies 11. Go on an online book tour 12. Create a book launch team 13. Host Q+A sessions on Google+ 14. Create Facebook Friday videos 15. Register as an author on Amazon 16. Register as an author on Goodreads 17. Create a book trailer 18. Get a new Author Website 19. Create a hashtag for your next book Build your fan base: 1. Start a FB campaign to increase your fans 2. Start a Google Campaign to increase traffic to your site 3. Start a controversial web series 4. Link up with other writers for your controversial web series 5. Start weekly twitter chats with readers 6. Keyword your blog posts 7. Create a monthly newsletter 8. Create an affiliate program 9. Host guest bloggers 10. Become a guest blogger 11. Create business cards with your web address on them and hand them out 12. Put your photo on your business card for stronger branding 13. Start commenting on other blogs (early and often) 14. Host regular author hangouts on Google+ 15. Host regular author interviews on Google+ 16. Record your Google+ hangouts and put them on YouTube 17. Get social media coaching Cultivate Community: 1. Create an online community with a forum 2. Say thank you to readers with special incentives for being a fan 3. Ask your reading community to design merchandise for your store 4. Create a fan page for your main character (works well if they are in a series) 5. Ask fans to create their own book trailers and post them online 6. Offer core fans advanced copy of future books 7. Ask fans to post pictures of “character spottings” 8. Offer “extra features” on your website 9. Use Twitter hashtags 10. Poll your readers and listen to what they say 11. Answer all your blog comments 12. Engage with your fans on FB 13. Ask your fans to post pictures of them reading your book Make some extra money: 1. Repackage old blog posts and sell them as an e-book 2. Join an affiliate program 3. Speak on the core topic of your book 4. Become a content writer 5. Host paid webinars 6. Freelance with niche magazines 7. Sell ads on your website 8. Sell ads in your newsletter 9. Write a new ebook tailored to your fans 10. Mentor another writer 11. Become an Amazon Affiliate (and use MyBookTable) 12. Offer customizable ebooks for readers 13. Sell your book on your site, not just Amazon Tweetables: · The @AuthorMedia crew just gave me 89 free book marketing ideas. Watch out world! –click to tweet. · My sales should spike soon. I’m going to try out some of the book marketing suggestions from @AuthorMedia. – click to tweet. · 89 Book Marketing Ideas That Will Change Your Life. Try one today! – click to tweet. · Have you tried any of these marketing tips from @AuthorMedia? They look great! – click to tweet. · Dang. I needed book marketing ideas and I found 89 of them via @AuthorMedia. - click to tweet. · If you write books, you should look at this list ASAP. Unless you are my competitor. –click to tweet. · Need some book marketing ideas? One of these ideas should do the trick! – click to tweet. Build your brand offline 1. Write a Press Release 2. Ask to be interviewed by your local paper 3. Ask to be interviewed by the paper your book is set in 4. Ask to be interviewed by the local radio host 5. Ask to be interviewed on the local morning show (read this article first) 6. Partner with a band that has the same cause as you 7. Go on a physical book tour 8. Start thinking local 9. Sell themed merchandise (Think “Team Edward” shirts) 10. Rent a billboard 11. Host a book release party 12. Link with an activity that supports your cause and sell your book there 13. Create a viral video about a scene from your book Find a Place To Give a Book Reading: 1. Your local coffee shop 2. A hospital 3. A retirement community 4. A rehabilitation center 5. A local church 6. A locally owned bookstore 7. The library (try the five closest to your house) 8. The local community college 9. A school 10. Wherever the main setting of your book is 11. Google+ 12. Videos you upload to Facebook 13. Goodreads Discover where to donate your book (and make new fans): 1. Women’s shelters 2. VA hospitals 3. Homeless shelters 4. Children’s hospitals 5. Retirement homes 6. The five closest libraries to your house 7. The library in your hometown 8. Summer camp 9. Community libraries at coffee shops 10. The local community college library 11. The libraries in the town where the book was set in 12. BookCrossing.com 13. Local B&B’s 14. Local motels 15. Prisons 16. Church libraries 17. Rehab centers 18. Cruise ship libraries 19. Doctor’s offices 20. Community centers 21. Senior Centers Become an expert: 1. Listen to the Novel Marketing Podcast. 2. Become a HARO source 3. Get active on LinkedIn 4. Write Op-Ed pieces on the core message of your story 5. Write freelance pieces on the core message of your story and pitch to niche publications 6. Give lectures on the core message of your story 7. Host webinars with other experts 8. Create a series of web-videos interviewing experts on the core message of your story 9. Make sure your author about me page is interesting and relevant 10. Create a Meetup group Have any book marketing tips you’d like to add to the list? Leave them in the comment section. Need help implementing some of the ideas? Author Media can help.  In the middle of a cold and damp March night, two sisters are jolted awake by the piercing alarm of their emergency alert radio. A tsunami warning has been issued after a powerful earthquake occurs nearly two thousand miles away in the Aleutian Islands. Emily and Laura flee their rural home on the Oregon coast and are among the first to arrive at the official evacuation assembly area.
There the crowd of coastal residents and visitors grows larger by the minute. Soon the sisters are surrounded by too many obviously ill-prepared people, many of whom believe that it will turn out to be just another false alarm, as so many other warnings had proven to be in the past. The well-supplied sisters decide to leave the throng and risk driving up into the mountains where they think they will be safer not only from a potential tsunami, but from empty-handed people if worse comes to worst. They are soon followed on the narrow, steep logging road by a few others who have their own reasons for leaving the area. But before the next day is over, even Emily and Laura will find themselves in a desperate fight for survival. E-Book is available for purchase under pen name J. A. Charnov here on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00K9SUN3C Congratulations, Julia!  Meg Gray Meg's latest novel, "The Bridesmaid" is in the Quarter Finals of Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Award contest which began with 10,000 entries. There are only 500 entries remaining in the competition right now.
Way to go, Meg! Read the article here:
http://www.bendbulletin.com/home/1762504-151/bend-author-makes-sci-fi-waves#  Lindy Jacobs, the 2012 Recipient of the Guild Elmer Awards, calls Mike Rettig (en route to Christmas vacation with family in Idaho) to notify him he had been chosen to receive the 2013 Elmer Award. With Guild Treasurer, Pat Wilson, winner of the 2011 Award nearby. Literary Harvest Director, Mike Rettig, is the fifth winner of the annual Elmer Ward that honors a single member who demonstrates through their service and spirit the “glue that holds the Guild together.”  Mike Rettig accepting his Elmer Award at the January meeting in Bend.
 Congratulations to the top three winners from this year's Literary Harvest:
First Place: Cameron Prow with her Memoir "Someday Came" Second Place: Denice Hughes Lewis with her Fiction "The Kite Builder" Third Place: Katherine Benson with her Memoir "Burial at Sea" Rounding out the top ten (with a tie for tenth place) in the order in which they delivered their readings were: Julie O'Neill, Lisa Nordell-Detres, Susan Frank, Ginger Dehlinger, Susan Noyes, Sara Rishforth, Mary Pax and Johanna M. Premble. A special thanks goes out to the judges Paty Jager, Kristen Hall Geilser and Kristi Miller as well as the efforts of the Literary Harvest Committee: Mike Rettig (chairman), Paty Jager, Mary Krakow, Ruth Colter, Lindy Jacobs, Mary Pax, Dennis Strachota, Julie Drey, Cameron Prow, Anita Lanning, Cindy Murphy and Jo Ann Senior. Thank you to all those who submitted their writings and to all those who attended this standing room only event. It was a huge success and you all made it possible! |
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