RSS

Tag Archives: NaNoWriMo

Finding Publisher – A simple guide to getting (your kid) published, even if you really shouldn’t

As an amazingly successful published author, I am recognized as an expert on the subject and often asked how one should go about getting published.

By my kids.

Everyone else? They just tend to roll their eyes when I talk about getting published.

If they even notice I’m talking.

But, in case someone out there is looking for advice on how to get published, here is my simple guide.

How simple, those of you with short attention spans ask worriedly?

Simple enough for a pre-tweener.

As proof for the above statement, I am using my pre-tweener kiddo’s experience following my sage advice to illustrate my approach.

Step 1: Write a book. I can’t help you with this one, except to say form words with letters and sentences with words and paragraphs with sentences. The more pleasant and easier on the eyes the paragraphs, the better.

Don’t forget the spaces between the words and sentences (but NOT between the letters!).

Fortunately, Step 1 turns out to be the easiest part of the process.

Those fat blue drops? Tears of joy I managed to get this project completed to the kiddo's satisfaction.

A surprisingly large number of best-sellers start out as staple-bound, hand-drawn paper books

It smells fine, so these contents must be brilliant! Whew!

Flipping open a homemade book is like slicing the author’s brain in half and seeing the either brilliant or gangrenous contents within.

Step 2: Write a query letter. This involves doing market research so you can argue convince the publisher you’ve selected to print your book that people will actually buy it. I know, this sounds like something the publisher should be doing, but apparently they are lazy.

Don't worry about spelling errors in your query letter. Publishers know you're too busy focusing on the book to waste a lot of time on the query letter.

While the penmanship is not great, this *is* the preferred stationary of editors and publishers everywhere. Also, plaintive requests to print your book on the outside of the envelope always helps improve the odds.

As a bonus, you can falsify your data and the lazy publisher won’t bother to check.

If dealing with a small child, you will most likely be asked what to put in the query letter. Ah, the innocence of youth, asking that age-old question as if there’s an answer. I simply told my spawn to say why someone would want to read their book. A translation of his letter (pictured above) appears in the Details section if you click on it. I think he put it exactly how the rest of us authors wish we could put it.

Now I know, you’re thinking, “Why bother with a query? My book is amaze-balls and I had to buy a home security system just to ensure the manuscript wasn’t stolen after I wrote it. Why not just send the publisher the only copy of my book and be done with it?”

Good question. And for the most part, you’re absolutely correct. But there are two points you overlooked: publishers are lazy (see above) AND they have terrible office security systems. But the sheer awesomeness implied by your query letter will excite the publisher out of their apathetic state and give them time to upgrade (or install) a suitable security system in their office.

Or they might ask you to send the manuscript directly to a bank for safe-keeping in a vault.

This is the true purpose of the otherwise tedious query letter – to learn the appropriate secure address to send your manuscript to.

Step 3: Wait for the offer letter. Don’t worry, you’ll get an enthusiastic and generous response almost immediately. Books are in high demand, and publishers can’t wait to crank out more. As an author, you’re a valuable asset in high demand! Prepare to be on Easy Street (near the intersection of Unbelievably Effin’ Wealthy Lane), living the high life! You probably won’t even have time to run to the nearest corner convenience store to get a slushy. That’s how fast the turnaround time will be!

Publishers are sh*t-eating mo-fos who deserve to die the most outlandish, B horror movie way possible, caption notwithstanding.

You will never receive a form letter from a publisher. Even in the unlikely case of a rejection, they always hand-craft the nicest, most details rejections, nudging you into the right direction should you wish to make some edits and try again. The publisher’s response is always the highlight of my submission process.

Step 4: Upon receiving a request back from the publisher to see your full manuscript, send it. Then sit back and wait for the proof copy to show up on your doorstep, along with the check for an advance so large it dwarfs the GDP of third-world countries like Sweden and Belgium.

It only took ten hours of sweat equity and ~$12 on my part to make a beautiful book that filled my kiddo with the sort of joy one won't experience again until their second marriage.

Not only is the print quality on this CreateSpace proof better than the original, but it’s also slightly larger. And at this age, the kiddo approves of larger.

You haven't experienced true joy until you've seen your kiddo flipping the pages of his/her own published book.

This binding is less prone to rusting and looks WAY better than the stapled version. And the paper feels more solid too. Less likely to dissolve in water.

And wa-la! You are done. You are now a bona fide published author with all the associated bragging rights that come with that.

Yes, you can corner coworkers, guests at parties, Nanowrimo participants in coffee shops, even complete strangers on the street, and sing the praises of your book and your writing prowess, all in the name of encouraging them to buy a copy of your book.

Step 5 (optional): You can also do as the kiddos below did, and flush with pride and confidence, start your next book.

When I say predators, I'm speaking metaphorically. Except when it comes to that dog that keeps eating their homework. I hate that dog.

And here we have two young authors in their native habitat, writing away while their parents watch over them, keeping an eye out for predators that might eat them or tattoo artists who might give them age-inappropriate tattoos.

Environmental destruction aside, this did keep the kiddos quiet for a couple of hours. Two blissful, screaming and punching and crying free hours. (And the kiddos were quiet too.)

Excited kids without a clue as to how the process really works are book-generating machines. There will not be enough trees in the forest to keep up with their paper needs. Thanks for destroying the environment, you jerks. Personally, though, I blame the parents.

FOOTNOTE:

Yes, the kiddo did come to me asking to have his book published, and yes, I did make him write a query letter. I wanted to properly prepare him for the horrid, thankless reality of being a writer.

However, I fear I may have undermined that message with my ‘response’ to the query letter and making a physical copy of the book for him (via CreateSpace).

What do you think? Did I do the kiddo wrong? Keep in mind that said kiddo was jumping, dancing, and running around the house with pure joy when that proof copy found its way into the kiddo’s hands.

For any parents out there thinking this might be fun to do for their kids, here’s the process I followed:

1) Wait for kiddo to write the book and then come to you, demanding it be sent out to a publisher to be printed. This will most likely happen in the middle of reading said kiddo a book s/he likes. In this case, it was Yobgorgle by Daniel Pinkwater.

(Interesting aside: it was another Pinkwater book, one of the Blue Moose series, that put the idea of getting a book published in said kiddo’s head. I think Pinkwater owes me, big time.)

2) Pretend to mail the book to a publisher. If you have qualms about this, but encourage belief in Santa or the Tooth Fairy, then lose the qualms.

3) Spend those precious few spare moments when you aren’t working, the kiddo(s) aren’t around, and the spouse isn’t on the computer to painstakingly disassemble kiddo’s book, scan each page, and then import into a word processing document.

4) Realize you should have downloaded the CreateSpace template for the book (and cover) BEFORE you imported the scanned pages into your document.

5) Realize that the scan resolution you used (600dpi) is way to frickin’ high to generate a manageable word processing document (unless you have a terabyte of RAM and an OS that can address all of it).

6) Resize the images down to something manageable.

7) Export your kiddo’s book to PDF format if using CreateSpace. This is a CreateSpace requirement. Modern versions of both Word and LibreOffice have an Export to PDF option.

7) Discover that your kiddo’s six page book isn’t long enough for the 24 page minimum required by CreateSpace. Get creative. I separated pictures from text, put them on opposite pages. I also wrote crazy author, illustrator, and editor bios, and manufactured some ‘deleted’ scenes.

8) Upload your book to CreateSpace. Wait an hour for the upload because you didn’t downsize the images enough. Then realize you need a proper cover with something to go on the back of the book. Wait for the panic attack to subside and slap something together. Unless your kiddo is in high school, they aren’t going to care that much about the back of the book.

If they are in high school, put something jaded and ironic on the back.

Oh yeah, and download the cover template BEFORE creating the cover. You will need your favorite PDF-reading image editor. I use Gimp 2, but Photoshop probably works as well. You will be using multiple layers, with the cover template as the bottom-most layer. Ultimately, nothing from the template should be visible in the final image.

Save two versions of the cover – one in the native format that preserves all the layers, and one that is a flattened PDF.

If your image editor won’t let you save/export as a PDF, save as a normal image and then open that image with something that does allow such an export. I use the free program Irfanview.

9) Get an email back from CreateSpace within 24 hours stating that your manuscript and/or cover has formatting problems. Don’t open this email when your kiddo(s) are around. Wait until they are somewhere they can’t hear you swearing. Then do your best to understand what the cryptically described issues are and fix them. Then upload everything again.

If you didn’t save a layer-preserving version of your cover, this is the point where you decide the whole thing is pointless and the kiddo(s) should be sold off for medical experimentation. Why? Because you’ll have to start the cover from scratch.

10) Step 9 will most likely happen several times before success is yours. Once it is, order the proof copy. CreateSpace allows you to preview the book online as well – do that first to make sure everything looks right. I spend about $4.50 for the 24-page book and about $6.50 on the cheapest shipping rate. Despite the predicted delivery date, I received the proof copy in three days. Apparently no one sends mail any more, so the post office has nothing better to do than rush the few packages they do get to my house.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on 5 June 2016 in NaNoWriMo, Parenting, Writing

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Yet Another Damn Nano Blog

Well, it’s November and I find my tweet feed inundated with blogs about Nanowrimo.

You know, the ones where the authors reveal their clever secrets to getting through nano and winning.

Well, if I have to read them, then dammit, I’m gonna write one. So here it is:

Yet another damn blog about nano.

You want to know the trick to winning nano?

It’s easy.

Write, you idiot.

Sit your butt in a chair in front of your writing instrument of choice and put words down, one after the other. Keep doing this until you hit 50k.

And don’t whine about how hard it is while you’re doing it. Or how sore your wrists are. Save that for Ernest Hemingway.

Who will kick your ass for complaining, by the way. And I will watch, laughing. And post the video of your ass-whooping on YouTube.

Stop angsting over how poop-tastic your plot is. Or fretting about how fecally-challenged your characters are.

Writers write.

So write, dammit.

Nano is all about a first draft, not a freaking polished novel. Show some discipline and push out those words. Worry about the quality when you start editing. (And if you just asked, “What’s editing?” hold still – I’m sending Ernest Hemingway over to say hi. With his fists.)

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a novel, er, excuse me, a first draft to write.

And now, a word from our sponsor: me!

Marlowe and the SpacewomanClick here to check out my forthcoming book, Marlowe and the Spacewoman, coming out January 9th, 2012 (Balloon Ascension Day)!

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on 2 November 2011 in Other Blogs

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

In These Hard Times, Sacrifices Must Be Made

So last week I blogged about my time management issues, and how I needed to make some changes.

Sadly, this week some of them have come to pass.

I have NOT quit my job or abandoned my family.  The missus disabused me of the former idea, and the onslaught of hate mail directed at even the notion of it disabused me of the latter.

(I suspect the missus might have organized some sort of bot email campaign on that second one, but I can’t prove it…yet.)

I’ve left the indie press I co-founded.

I won’t be MLing NaNoWriMo.

I loved being an ML.  It was a lot of work, consumed a lot of time, and occasionally threw sharp rocks at me from out of left field, but at the same time I found it very rewarding.  I loved the energy, the community, the sense of being in the middle of the ebb and flow of it all.

(And my ego loved getting the ‘atta boy’ emails from my nanos.  My ego did not love the low number of those ‘atta boy’ emails, but hey, what can you do?)

I’ve done Nano for nine years.  NINE YEARS!  I’ve been an ML for seven.  So for me, nano IS MLing.

I’m really going to miss it.  But as much as I hate giving it up, I just don’t have the time. Like that Cat’s Playing In The Dreidel song (or something along those lines), I don’t want my kids to grow up as heartless, empty shells of human beings because dear ol’ dad decided to rule with an iron fist over his regional nanos rather than rule with an iron fist over them.  Dictatorships tend to be inherited, so I need to focus on the family.

And you know what, seven years is a long time under my benevolent dictatorship (well, OK, I’ve actually been a co-ML for seven years, so I can’t claim all the despotism for myself…dammit).  This is a good thing.  Bring in some new blood, some fresh ideas.  Kick the old dog into the animal shelter so a younger dog with new tricks can show off.

All to the benefit of my dear regional nanos.  I hope they appreciate what that old dog has done for them as the shelter technician euthanizes it.

(The other solution was to neuter the old dog and end the cycle that way, but seeing as I’m the old dog, well…that idea just didn’t sit with me as well as being put to sleep.)

As Captain Kirk said in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, “Galloping around the month of November writing novels is for the young, Doctor.”

(I may have taken a few liberties with that quote.)

I do plan to participate in Nano this year, but just as a writer. Which reminds me, I really need to start outlining this year’s book.

Now Star Trek III: The Search for a New Co-ML begins.  No persons containing unstable proto-matter need apply.  That’s all my region needs right now, a co-ML who unexpectedly explodes.

(And for you trekkers out there, here’s an interesting link about the early version of the TNG writer’s bible.  I have no idea if it’s authentic or not, but it’s an intriguing read: http://bit.ly/rlUSNh )

 

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Why I’m In Such A Hurry To Find A Parking Space

I wanted to blog about the unenviable state of parking lot etiquette in the United States.  It’s a crisis of horrific importance that needs to be addressed, honestly and dispassionately, but it turns out I don’t have the time.

And that, unbelievable as it may sound, is an even bigger problem than the shameful behavior displayed by Americans in parking lots (I’m looking at you, a-hole at IKEA this morning).

I am faced with a time-management crisis.

I work full-time.

I have two toddlers and a wonderful wife who has worn her sanity to the bone dealing with those toddlers while I’m at work.

I’m a writer.  As such, I have critique groups, writing to do, a small press I’ve founded, and for the last seven years, I’ve been a NaNoWriMo Municipal Liaison.

I am addicted to reruns of T.J. Hooker, and have to watch at least one episode every night.

I won’t even bring up the lawn I have to mow and maintain.

(Curse you, Kentucky bluegrass!)

It has recently become painfully apparent that I can’t do all of this.

Quitting my job seemed like the obvious first choice for a solution.  But the missus was quick to point out some of the disadvantages: no income, no health insurance, and even worse, I’d lose an 8+ hour window each day where I don’t have to deal with my spawn, who seem to relish sucking the marrow out of people’s sanity bones.

(Yes, it’s a real bone. It’s in your arm somewhere, near the funny bone, I think.  Look it up.)

The missus can be a real killjoy sometimes.

Which led me to my second idea – ditch the killjoy and the tykes.  But there was just something about that idea that felt wrong.  I haven’t quite put my finger on what exactly it was, but the closest way to describe it is a horrible, burning void-like emptiness in my soul that manifested immediately after I considered this option.

Dashed inconvenient, that.

And as is obvious to anyone who has experienced the delight that is a William Shatner performance, T.J. Hooker is staying on the agenda.

With those three options off the table, I’ve sort of painted myself into a corner.  The area where I need to make a sacrifice appears to be my writing.

Oh, I won’t stop writing.  The kids still have a (reasonably) early bedtime, and some nights they even go to sleep when put down.  So I can, in theory, squeeze some words in there.

(That said, in the twenty minutes I’ve been (trying to) work on this entry, I’ve had to deal with crying babies twice, and they were put to bed three hours ago.)

Some of these writing commitments are huge time-sucks, and I’m not sure how I’ll address that, given the rapidly shrinking amount of time I have for writing.

OK, that’s a total lie.  I know exactly how I’ll have to address them.  I’m just not happy about it.

I’m going to have to choose.  I’m going to have to make cuts and sacrifices.  And unlike our current national debt ceiling crisis, there aren’t any tax revenue options on the table that can be used as offsets to help me scale back the cuts.

(Damn, I miss the days of the writing time surplus.  Curse my shortsightedness in not stockpiling some of those precious minutes then, when they were readily available!)

So I have to take a long, hard look at my craft and the activities that surround it.  Where can I eek out more efficiency?  What can I do to strip out the cost of fraud?  How do I determine which writing activities provide the biggest return on the time I invest in them?

It’s going to be ugly.  There will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth.  And once I’ve calmed the toddlers down, I will most likely cry too.

Maybe the pharmaceutical companies will come up with a pill for horrible, burning void-like emptiness in the soul.

A writer can hope, right?

What about you writers out there?  How do you fit the literary compulsion into your life?  Have you had to make cuts to this most beloved of entitlements?  Once the kids grow up, can you reclaim that time, or does it just get worse and worse the older they get?  Is selling your kids off for scientific experimentation still an option these days?  If so, how much does a two year old go for?

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on 20 July 2011 in Angst, Life, Other Blogs

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

 
%d bloggers like this: