Braaaains

- Stacy

Totally AWESOME zombie movie on SciFi right now. As I watch them devour braaains on mute, because yeah, gross, and I’m too tired to change the channel, some thoughts on my day.

Drove up to Salt Lake with  in what we thought would be light snow, which turned out to be a small, gentle snowstorm and lots of slush and ice on the roads. Oh, it was beautiful. But it was also annoying to drive in. Was going to drop in on a friend up there, but she was snowed in up in Park City, so we’ll catch up later. We did make it to the King’s English bookstore for the first time, and what an awesome children’s room they have! I think every time I go to Salt Lake it’ll be a required stop. It was fun to see signed copies on display from so many of my friends who are local authors, and even a book edited by real life and blogfriend Cheryl (Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, which I’ve been DVRing and have wanted to pick up the book). And the snow coming down lightly in front of the store all lit up in the early evening was quite pretty.

We were getting hungry so we ate at Mazza, a really great Middle Eastern restaurant that my friend Cindy introduced me to last spring when I was out here for World Horror. On to Whole Foods, the nearest one of which is up in that area, to get stuff I can’t find in Utah County (whither the good yogurt smoothies without high fructose corn syrup??) and then it was back on the road to hope we made it back to Happy Valley without incident. It had snowed even more, so I was gripping the wheel a little tight, not because I didn’t think my trusty little CRV couldn’t do it, but because I really need to replace all my tires and probably should have let yedijoda drive her even trustier Pilot.

We had anime night later this evening. We’ve been watching the fan-subbed version of Vampire Knight, the manga of which is out in English here in the States but is far ahead in Japan–and the anime hasn’t been licensed here. I’m hoping it will be, though, because it is GOOD,  and I want. The manga is published here by Viz, and if you want to check it out it’s in any bookstore. Similar vampire story to Twilight, but with a really interesting twist: the humans and vampires live in close proximity in a private school, with Day Class students being protected by Yuki Cross and Zero Kiryu, the academy’s guardians, because the Night Class is all vampires. Here’s where the superficial similarities with Twilight come up: those vampires, for some reason, think that Yuki’s blood smells *really* good. Great mystery, great storytelling, and a vampire story I can really get behind. Fascinating characters. Complex, deep storytelling.

I’ve been thinking about Twittering all day, and really, I prefer the long version. Blogging is pretty short when you compare it to a conversation in person, but it’s pretty deep when you compare it to a tweet. Right as I was heading out on my afternoon adventures in snow driving, I happened upon a conversation on NPR’s Science Friday talking about Twitter and other forms of social networking as marketing tools and policy influencers. I do agree that a conversation can begin through the medium, and it’s another way to keep in touch and share interesting ideas, but mostly I’m pretty meh about Twitter so far. Those of you who t
witter, why? What’s the appeal? I’ve had limited conversations with teens I know and it doesn’t seem to be a big thing with them (a very limited sample) the way FB is. What’s your reading on the teen barometer in your area?

It’s the little things

- Stacy
  • Got a package in the mail this morning. Two, actually. It’s always so fun to get a package. One from my sister, one from my Grandma, both Christmas presents. Dilemma: do I open them? It’s so tempting! But the temptation eases when I see that Grandma has also included my Girl Scout cookies, which I bought from my cousins’ daughters and planned to get from her when I went home for Christmas. Yum!
    Sadly, it’s looking like my car won’t get me home next week. I was looking forward to the trip, but I need new tires and driving from Utah to Illinois requires crossing Montana, and I just don’t like the idea of getting stranded in nowhere, Wyoming in the middle of winter, especially during the week that what few businesses would be open would probably be closed for the holidays.
  • Twitter is fun so far, but if you’re on there and I haven’t added you to follow, let me know, because the adding mechanism is weird and I’m having a hard time finding people.
  • Seattle has been slammed by a snowstorm/ice storm just when I needed to get a hold of some
    people there while they’re at work. Argh. But I did always like the random days off when the tiny bit of snow (and often massive amounts of ice) shuts everything down.
  • I’m driving to Salt Lake City this afternoon via Park City to see if I can make my car make that noise it’s been making, so I can show it to the mechanic and he can diagnose it. If you’re in PC or SLC and want to meet for hot chocolate, let me know.

Further back in the not-so-way-back machine…

- Stacy

This link is over a month old, and but Booksquare’s Kassia Krozser speaks directly to what we were discussing a couple weeks ago about reaching our readers through online efforts.

Specifically, Kassia is talking about social networking vs. viral marketing. Our teen readers and their little siblings are as much naturals at the social networking thing as my generation of kids was at picking up Pong and the Apple IIe. It makes sense to them, having these kinds of conversations about whatever strikes their fancy–including books. And they’re savvy enough to know their spam from their real conversations. As she notes, readers don’t want to rehash the cover copy. Despite the seeming shallowness of online communication–it’s rather short and swift, after all–the depth that can come from these short conversations goes far beyond a sound bite.

So how does a publisher or an author start a conversation with teens via
social networking?

One thing I’ve found is that as I network on Facebook and Livejournal, this very blog, with adults who are social-networking savvy, the word of mouth of something that is of genuine interest to those I talk to gets passed on. We all know how fast a meme can spread, how linkage gets passed from one blog to the next. Right now there’s a list of science fiction and fantasy reviewers that’s being passed from blog to blog so one blogger can index all the reviewers out there, and it spread like wildfire–I’ve seen it on Wands and Worlds (I think?), Gwenda Bond (maybe? aw, it was somebody on my friends’ list feeds!), and several other blogs, who saw it on blogs I’ve probably never seen, etc.

Those adults will be read by the teens they know, who, if they find the conversation interesting, will share with their friends. Obvious, I know, but my point being that I think it starts there–friending libraries on MySpace and making sure they know about local booksignings through social networking, friending libraries on Facebook if they’ve gotten that far (I haven’t started looking for libraries on Facebook, so if you know if they’ve gotten into that the way they have MySpace, let me know; personally, I find MySpace annoying and rarely check in on it). Teen librarians are great at passing the word on to their teens about events and information that is interesting and useful to their particular community.

Also, I find that often authors themselves have more interesting conversation starters than publishers do, because they have a personal connection to the material that the on-message publishers don’t. This isn’t a bad thing! It’s just that it demonstrates the importance of the author’s efforts in reaching readers via social networking, because they can do what a publisher or even individual editor often can’t: offer that personal perspective, the behind-the-scenes look into the head of the creator that readers will find fascinating. It’s like seeing the making-of video, all those extras on the Lord of the Rings DVDs.

Anyway, just go read the post, because she has a lot more to say on it than I do. Go!
 

And then there’s the writing end of things…

- Stacy

James Owen just pointed me in the direction of his post from a few days ago, A Career as a Novelist–In Layman’s Terms, a metaphor which those of you who are still in the throes of writing your first book will sympathize with–and those of you with published books will probably have experience with in the way James does. I read it in quick passing and was nodding the whole way through, and in taking a second look I thought perhaps others might nod as much as me. And if you aren’t nodding from prior knowledge, let this be a lesson: writing is work. Getting that writing contracted to be published is more work. And then, you have an editor that you work with
(muahahaha), and then there’s the work of marketing. It’s almost like, I dunno, a real job.

And of course, thinking of the whole process in terms of The Fellowship of the Ring makes it even more interesting. 🙂

Also related, over at , Seanan McGuire discusses the timeline of a book–which involves a lot of work, and a lot of waiting. Great reading.

More on marketing

- Stacy

I’m afraid that even before I left Mirrorstone, I wasn’t reading my friends page daily, because there are just so many things to keep track of, and if even half of my 73 friends were to post daily, that’d be a lot of reading. But I really want to know what everyone is up to, so I’ve been going back into the archives to play a little catch-up.
Almost a good week ago now, Agent Kristin posted about the book launch party of a client of hers, who happens to also be a TV producer in New York City. Marianne Mancusi then lists several really great tips for authors for their own book launch parties. Remember our discussion about marketing your book? She has some great tips for announcing your launch with an email blast inviting pretty much everyone you know, whether they’d be able to make it or not, to your book launch. Not to mention a
whole pageful of other great tips. Here’s a small taste:

Consider co-hosting the party with another author. One, it’s more fun to plan a party with a partner and two it takes off some of the hosting pressure the night of. You can also potentially double the guest list, increase networking opportunities, and introduce a whole new audience for your books and theirs.
…
Follow up. Over the next week, email your guests and thank them for coming. Especially the new people you met at the party. If you have a photo with them in it, send it with the email. And speaking of photos – upload them right away and put them on your blog, MySpace, Facebook, whatever. People who attended want to see themselves and people who didn’t get to go want to live vicariously. But you lose your momentum if you wait a few days.

Her tips on venues, invitations, gift bags, working the room, and so on are spot on, and she’s got some really creative suggestions that could bring the price of a launch party down for authors, who usually don’t have piles of cash sitting around.
I would also add that if you’re publishing a book for teens or kids, to think about adapting her tips to a kid-friendly environment and to invite readers in your target age group–even if it’s just all the kids you know. Or perhaps to do an adult-centric launch plus a teen-friendly launch. The goodie bag idea could be targeted for teens with just a little tweaking: items like free introductory yoga classes and self-tanning lotion would transfer well. You could probably get local sports and recreation outlets to include a coupon, not to mention local teen-centric outlets at the mall. You could also think about offering up a gift card to a local shop for a nominal amount as a drawing for those who attend (and might be able to get that local shop to sponsor it). By focusing on teen readers, getting teens (or kids) to read, and combining that with any local appeal your book might have, or topical interest, you’ll be able to create a fun, unique event with some media appeal. I’m thinking particularly of the Percy Jackson parties that were thrown at local bookstores before the Percy Jackson books were really big–I saw news reports of the author getting kids involved because of their interest in Greek myths.
So go check out her post, and see if you can find ways to adapt her tips to your own book!

On buying books: hardcover vs. paperback

- Stacy

Cherie Priest posted today about her new release–happy book birthday, ! Her post relates to several things I’ve been hearing lately, so I thought I’d put them all together in one goulash of a post.
Laurie Halse Anderson () and other authors are encouraging people to give books for Christmas and other holiday gifts. As their graphic says, books are "Longer lasting than a fruitcake, cheaper than a flat screen, and more fun than a partridge in a pear tree." Consider in your holiday gift-giving to give books.
As you’re considering this, I’d also like to point out that a lot of authors are having a hard time this time of year. Sales dropping off directly affects their income, and many authors have to cut back on things like health insurance, home repairs, and other vital necessities. Scalzi has posted a fundraiser for one such author who was in danger of losing her house–thankfully, people banded together and raised enough money not only for her mortgage payment, but also to help fix her sewer system, which was badly in need of repair. (People are so good to each other in hard times! I recognize that’s not always the case, but when it is, it’s amazing.)
So when you go off to buy a book, seriously consider whether you can fit a hardcover book (or two or three or more) into your budget. Hardcovers are often the place that publishers judge an author’s sales, not to mention that sales within the first few week’s of a hardcover book’s lifetime will determine whether that book stays on chain bookstores’ shelves–which determines whether that author will earn out their advance, be able to pay the bills, etc. etc.
If all you can afford is a paperback or checking the book out from the library, that’s okay. Most authors I talk to would rather have someone read their book than not! But if you do have the money in your budget and would like to support the author being able to write more books, think about getting the hardcover.
For more information on how a hardcover vs. a paperback affects an author’s bottom line, see Brandon Sanderson’s post on the subject. A small sampling:

Well, lets look at the 20,000 people up above who bought that paperback book. If half of them checked it out at the library, and the other half bought the book from Amazon in hardback, the hardback would sell 10,000 copies. (And libraries would order more, but that’s another story.)
Anyway, assuming the royalty for that hardback jumps up at 5000, those same twenty thousand readers have spent roughly the same amount of money as they otherwise would have, yet they would have paid the author $28,000 instead of $10,000. Plus, instead of two worn paperbacks, they have a very nice hardback that will last them for a while. 28k isn’t a huge amount of money, particularly once agent fees and taxes come out, but it’s the beginning of a livable income. Add on some foreign sales, and things start to look bright–particularly for a writer, who is likely doing what he or she loves to do.

Note that Brandon uses some simplified numbers, and doesn’t take into account that publishers *do* give bulk purchasers like Amazon a discount (though they still pay the author the same royalty)–oftentimes, independents can buy a book off Amazon for cheaper than they can get it from the publisher–but he makes some good points. This is where Indiebound comes in–getting a hardcover
from the independents supports a much more sustainable business model, in stores where you can find salespeople who actually know the books they’re selling. But that’s another discussion altogether, and I digress.
Anyway, just some food for thought about possibly making our money stretch further and supporting the artists who make the books we love at the same time.

Let’s play the Glad Game

- Stacy

I wouldn’t really describe myself as an optimist, but I’m not pessimist, either. Tonight I was on a nostalgia trip, and TCM obliged me with both The Parent Trap and Pollyanna. And I think that we can all learn something from Pollyanna, learning to look for the things to be glad about when you’re in a situation that might not be so happy.
So, publishing friends, let’s play the Glad Game! What good news is there as we approach some troubled times? I have a lot of things to be happy about personally, but I think that there’s a lot of good out there professionally too. For example, look at how many teens are out there passionate about reading. Retail sales may be down overall, but ours isn’t the only industry dealing with that, and being able to interact with the teens I know (and the cousins who are on the verge of leaving their teens) and see how passionate they are about the books they’re reading makes me remember that this is why I’m in this business.
Sales make sure I have a job, that’s for sure (and that can be read ironically right now, since I don’t have a full-time job, but even
so…) but none of us got into this business for the money. The money just makes sure that we can get the right books into the hands of kids and teens to get them excited about stories and reading.
What do you have to be glad about?