Future of Books and Emerging Authors

The future of books... but first:

This week Australian Women Online feature an article on Emerging Australian Women Writers, by journalist Belladonna Took. I am very humbled and excited to be included in this article with talented emerging authors, Kymberley Gaal, Emma Gibson and Karen Tyrrell. If you'd like to read the article, click here.

I signed up for 'Book Camp unconference' a little uncertain of what to expect. I mean, what's an UNconference? The theme of the day was to question and discuss the future of books and emerging authors and technologies. I like to question and discuss, so I was up for it.

The day was hosted by author Simon Groth from if:book and we were asked to volunteer to lead sessions. I love this upside down module. 

Looking at the model of the traditional book, what it has now emerged into and where it could go was something most participants were curious about. The traditional pathway of author to publisher to reader or even author to reader may change. The reader is not necessarily the best client for your product. One scenario raised was with choose-your-own-adventures that are locality-based. This method was trialled at an Adelaide festival with posters and QR codes. This storytelling involved the 'reader' to walk the streets of the story while finding the codes for the next part. In this example only about ten people finished the story. If your goal is to do something different, experimental then there's no problem, but if you're wishing to earn an income from your skills... well, you can see the problem with only ten potential customers, but it's important to acknowledge many authors require an income from their skills. This requires rethinking the author to reader model. You could consider a commercial or government client, such as the Department of Tourism. They would have the capacity to market this type of activity to readers/visitors. Or, you could make location-based stories containing QR codes that provide information on the localities, you wouldn't have to be present in the location (I see this being a good alternative for famous locations like the Eiffel Tower, The Great Barrier Reef, etc).

Craig Mod led a discussion about the affect of digital on our sense of living. The point was raised that if we do not post our experiences on social media in many ways they don't count as real, they become disconnected with our understanding of experience. We live in the instagram era, as soon as we see, do or taste it, we upload a pic.

The issue of quality from self-published authors and service providers was enthusiastically discussed. The days of appreciating free crap is over. Readers want product that lives up to the promises.

And the thing that stuck with me most was on the necessity of social media for authors to reach readers. There are many examples of great authors that sell millions of books with no online presence. It was generally agreed that if you are an amazingly talented author, you don't need to interact with the public. Lucky for me I actually like social media!

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Indie Publishing - what you need to know

Make sure you have a critical eye review your work before you self-publish

The Queensland Writers Centre (QWC) put on a lot of great workshops and seminars, and today I attended 'Going Indie' hosted by a panel of experienced authors on the industry of self-pubblishing.

This was a great talk and there were a lot of tips, opportunities and concerns about the indie publishing industry raised. The speaker panel was made up with Sally Collings, author/editor/publisher, Graham Nunn, poet & blogger and Alan Baxter, author & karate instructor. There was a lot covered, but here's a short overview of the main points I picked up:

• Indie publishing, generally means independent of big business.
• The term self-publishing is not representative of the output professional writers produce. There is nothing 'self' about this process, the title suggests going it solo. I have to agree here. I fumbled through producing my own e-book, when I published the Australian edition of the paperback of My Zombie Dog, I utilised professional editors, graphic artists and printers. I consider Book Cover Cafe to be my go to team for the production of my books.
• Indie publishing can offer a faster turn around time from manuscript to printed book. This does not mean the author should rush the process. It's tempting to get your work out there quickly, but quality is more important than speed.
• Quality also costs. Think of your book as a start up business, you'll need capital. This is why some authors will persist with the traditional route, it is a relief to have someone else fund your idea, but then they will own a big chunk of your asset. The alternative is paying a professional team to assist you putting together your product and you pay for the printing. This does mean your share of the return will be higher.
• Choose an editor you can trust and believe in. 
• You are your own gatekeeper now. Just because you don't have a publishing house rejecting your work, doesn't mean you shouldn't reject it if it's not quite ready. Put out the best quality you can.
• Becoming an indie author does not mean turning your back on traditional publishing, different projects may call for different avenues, you might self-publish one project and accept a contract on another. Readers care about the product and the author, not the publisher.
• Having specific goals is important. Do you want to share samples of your poetry for free? Then maybe ebooks or photocopied pamphlets are the easiest, cheapest ways to do that. Set yourself goals to achieve, whether it's to produce a certain number of finished manuscripts in a year, or to build your connections in the industry or to learn more about publishing.
• Don't be shy. Writing communities are extremely welcoming and supportive. Start connecting with other bloggers and writers, you'll learn a lot about the industry. Join a writers group or start one up yourself, and attend industry seminars and workshops at your local writers centre.
• Contribute to the community you want to belong to. Buy and read in your genre, support other indie authors, read the publications that host the competitions you want to enter.
• Devote time to your craft every day.
• Get plenty of critical feedback.
• Build a visible presence online. You need a good solid website as a landing place for readers to find you.
• Once online, don't hard sell. If all you do is shout 'buy my book', you'll soon turn away your online buddies. Have something to offer back, even if it's just support for other authors.
• Don't limit your format. Graham Nunn has had his Haikus published on cans of lemonade in Japan and on Chinese fortune cookie inserts.

The main problem raised for Australian indie authors was distribution. It's extremely difficult to get your book into book stores. But as the industry of indie publishing grows, so may the reception from retailers. Exciting times.

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Themes of Friendship

Friendship is a strong motivational device for fiction. If you're writing YA fiction or have young characters in your novel, chances are you'll include a theme of friendship and what it means to you. Peer groups are said to have more influence in teenagers' lives than family (for more info on that visit Peer Pressure).

There's been a lot of great friendships in fiction, look at the trio in Harry Potter, Frodo and Sam in Lord of the Rings, or the touching protectiveness of Katniss with Rue in The Hunger Games. Of course, friendships aren't always positive, Truman Capote had a very disturbing bond with the killers he wrote about in In Cold Blood, and the friendship between George and Lennie in Of Mice and Men was just sad.

In Undead Kev, I'll have a theme of friendship that explores loyalty and responsibility. There's many different sides of friendship and many ways you can use it to drive your narrative, some possible themes to mix in are:

• Jealousy
• Loyalty
• Trust
• Dependence
• Attraction
• Betrayal
• Responsibility
• Death

And of course many more! Do you have a theme of friendship in any of your stories? Did you find it predicted your character's behaviour? Today I'm taking part in a writing challenge over at Romantic Friday Writers to come up with a short story for the prompt: Oh how I hate my beautiful friend! I've brought back Rosie for this one, she can be a bit foul mouthed sometimes, but I bleep her out. 

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Hats and their Characters

It's a writing exercise - take me seriously!

Had a great time at Vannguard Writers yesterday. Our group tried out a writing exercise with props. I'm lucky Dad is mad as a hatter and has all the hats to prove it. I gathered a collection of some of his more unique hats, adding them to my trinkets and secret items. No way was my budding author of a father missing out on this, so he came along too.

We had army hats, french hats, cowboy hats, police hats, old lady hats, gangster hats, tram conductor hats, sporting hats and even a Viking helmet. 

I also spread out on the table many little trinkets like trophies, medals, crosses, wands, glass, old keys, children's broken toys, event tickets, foreign money, obscure messages scrawled on notes, carefully recorded scientific formulas, photos and many more everyday and unusual items. Then the writing exercises began:

My dad Smithy, his hat and his trinket... wait... how'd you get a gun in here?

Build a mystery character

Members broke into pairs and chose a hat. They were asked to come up with a character that would wear that hat. Several times I had to remind the participants to stop plotting; this exercise was about character not plot. The groups were asked to choose one item/trinket off the table for their character. It's natural to want to jump ahead and try to come up with a story so you're read to write, which is why I decided to mix it up a bit.

It's now that I tell the writers their character is not going to be the protagonist of their story, but a dead body found by the main character. I ask them to explain the circumstances of the discovery of this body and to try and make the trinket item a clue.

My partners in crime, Robert and Dean, came up with a young man wearing a stylish fedora, but with broad shorts. He was a goofy character last seen alive at a beach party. Nobody there knew him. Our protagonist was walking his spaniel on the beach before work when he stumbles on the body. He finds in the boy's back pocket a key. Our spooked protagonists recognises the boy as one of the teens he was arguing with the night before because their music was too loud on the beach out the front of his home. To make things more difficult for our businessman, he rushes home, calls the police and of course the body is gone when they turn up. He's having a bad enough day, but it gets worse. His teenage daughter did not come home last night and when the police track down the identity of the missing corpse-boy, they inform him the young man is wanted as a suspect in a string of kidnapping murders involving teenage girls. Now our protagonist has a reason to act. He realises he forgot to mention the key and now he has a clue to track down the location of his daughter before it's too late.

We also had some interesting plots about a Chinese peddler killed in the gold rush and an ex-pat living on a Thai plantation killed by a Brazilian spy with his own binocular chord.

Donate a character

The next exercise had us each picking our own hat and a trinket. We had to come up with a profile and background for that character, finishing off with: His/her most treasure possession is... (the trinket item).  I'm a little bit evil, so I mixed it up again and our homework this week is to choose someone else's character to write about. We ended up with a comical homeless woman who makes dolls out of plastic bags, Thor the Skullcrusher Viking, an arrogant French Legionnaire who ogles women, a very touching digger reminiscing about the war, a charming historian with a sense of humour and a phoney Confederate soldier.

Thor's all smiles now, but wait till you see him swing that axe!

It was a fantastic day, I don't think I've ever laughed so much. I have no idea which character I'll write about yet, but I know I'll have a clear picture of them when I do, all thanks to my brilliant friends from Vannguard Writers. Wednesdays with my group have become my favourite days.

Our cast of writers (sadly a couple could not make it)

Do you belong to a writer's group? Are you trying to create one? Just wish someone would invite you to one? I'd love to hear your experiences with writing groups, maybe we can help other writers unsure of where to begin.

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Insecure Romantic Writing in 3 Pages

I am a prolific writer.

Um, not always.

Actually that first line is an affirmation I repeat when I meditate. I know I CAN be a prolific writer, I've had days when I poured out pages and pages of work. I even managed the 30,000 words in 3 days challenge. But then life starts seeping back in. During those times I struggle to write anything. One suggestion I've come across many times is to write morning pages. 

When you wake up, you write three pages, free-writing style. It doesn't matter what you write, it can include grocery lists, dreams, grievances or story ideas. The idea is to dump all the clutter in your brain, so you're free to write. 

In my morning pages I've come across a character called Rosie. Rosie is in her late 30's, single, overweight and has a bit of an attitude problem. She pops into my morning pages with snarky snippets of her life.

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How to Write Better Stories

What really drives your story?

I'm going to share with you a secret that will knock your socks off. This tip will make your plot richer and deeper and... more meaningful. Okay, when I say secret, it may be that I'm the only one that didn't know about it before. But I'm still excited, it's made a world of difference for my writing. Alison Goodman, author of the well known series Eon, revealed this writing technique in her course on narrative structure. Goodman passes on this golden advice from Robert McKee, who outlined the method in his book on writing screenplays, Story. 

The importance of character motivation in fiction is obvious. Characters must want something real bad, this is their goal. Your character might even have more than one goal. They should have an existing goal before we meet them, you know - they want to travel the world but they've been stuck in a small town since they were born, they want to meet their prince charming but only meet pigs in the strip club they work in, or they want to be a rock star but their parents expect them to become a priest. This goal drives a lot of the protagonist's decisions. In Warracknabeal Kids, Harry Conner's existing goal is find his mother, or at least uncover what happened to her. But then something happens...

We have the sneaky old inciting incident. The moment that things change for the protagonist and their everyday life is shaken up in some way. The inciting incident may provide a new goal for your character. My inciting incident involved a fire and the discovery of a body. Now Harry has a whole new mystery to solve. 

I always thought the protagonist's goal drove the narrative. But that's a limited view. There's something missing here. If you want to have a character with realistic depth then they need more than motive. They must posses an underlying need.

This need is something your protagonist won't be aware of. And here's the kicker, it's this need that will drive your story, everything in your novel should in some way address the character's need. 

I was floored by this news. I always thought Harry NEEDED to find out what happened to his mother. She disappeared and left him alone with a father who can't connect with Harry. But when I explored the fact that Harry can't know what he really needs, I realised... Harry NEEDS to connect with his father. These two people need to find a way to be together, because Harry's mum is gone, but his dad is here.

Suddenly my narrative developed a new thread and theme. A stranger comes to town, and he was important to the story before, but now he is important to Harry as well. The charismatic stranger encompasses all the traits Harry wishes for in a father. 

Your character's underlying need should contradict or conflict with their goal or desire. The character who wants to travel the world, might really need to recognise the value in belonging in a small town and the satisfaction of living up to your responsibilities. They might NEED to stay.

When your story reaches its climax, your character should be facing a serious dilemma. It is at this time they need to make a difficult choice. Go for the goal or the need? This dilemma is resolved when your character manages to acknowledge their need and unify the goal and need. That is, either they will find a way to have both, or they will release their grip on one and be satisfied with the other.

Knowing about my character's need to connect with his father has added a theme of fatherhood to my mystery novel. Other characters in the novel either compliment or contradict this theme. The theme touches everyone in this town in some way. 

I've fallen even more in love with my novel and my very flawed characters. So here's what I want you to do right now, start brainstorming your character's need. You might not hit it straight away, keep going, you'll feel it like a punch in the stomach when you get the right one.

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Creating a Writer's Website

The wonderful Linda Jackson from Writers Do Laundry, Too has interviewed me! Head on over, and you might pick up a free copy of My Zombie Dog.

Most writers understand the need to have a strong presence online (or 'build a platform'). As a writer, where should you be online?

I believe this comes down to choice and market. There are so many social media sites now, you can settle into the ones that feel right for you. But, you also want to consider your readers, where do they hangout online?

A website is a good start. This is a page where your readers can find you if they search. It can also host all your contact information, so readers can then connect with you on Twitter or Facebook, or wherever you provide links.

I have a dear friend who is very talented with Graphic Arts and Design. Rhonda from Mercieca Designs, created a special website for me. You can find Rhonda at her blog Toxic Designz:

Your website can contain blurbs for your books, or even sample pages, as well as links to make it easy for readers to purchase your products.

I've had this blog for a few years and so there's not much chance I'd relocate or walk away from it. However, if I was doing my time again, I'd have my blog hosted within my website. This way you could have yourname.com/blog rather than yourname.blogspot.com. My blog would also be easier to find, the way I have this blog set up, it's called Wagging Tales, the web address is clancytales and the name I promote is charmaineclancy. It's a wonder any of you turn up here at all! (I'm very glad you did).

Before you rush off to hire a graphic designer, or attempt to put your own site up, make a list of all the information you want to have included. Then group that information into logical 'pages'. Also shop about, look at other author's websites. Try seeing what writers in your genre use. Mystery and thriller writers often use blacks or reds in their design, whereas children's writers use cheery colours like yellow, blue or pink.

Make it professional. Your site represents you as a writer. Whether you want readers or potential publishers to view it, you want them to see that you are serious about your craft and work, even if your site has a fun or comical theme.

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