Finding a Writing Guru -- A Necessity if You Want to be a Writing Success

Unfortunately, success all too often depends on marketing.

Yeah, all the marketing gurus, keep telling me I need to play in all sorts of social media puddles. But, keeping up with GoodReads, Goggle+, Facebook and other social media feels like the death of me. At the end of the day, I'm panting from scurrying around the web ... and still have a bunch of places I should post ... or something-or-other. I'm beginning to think marketing gurus don't have a life, or at least a creative writing life.

Does that sound anything like your marketing life?

If so, I sure hope you like promoting your books more than I do.

My biggest failure? Commenting on blogs. All too often it's one of the things that gets left undone ... though there are quite a few I check on regularly ... No, it's not rebellion on my part. It's just that it's usually late at night by the time I read them, and I'm thinking of the nice paper book that's laying by my nice comfortable chair. If I get downstairs soon enough, I might even get a purring cat on my lap.

Some Writing Gurus I read -- and listen to -- more than others.

The Passive Guy at The Passive Voice is my "main man." Recently, I read this little item that motivated me to post some blog links this blog around. Did you know that "Self-Publishing is Dumb?" So, says the Passive Guy. The discussion is more about literary vs genre fiction than self-publishing per se. -- My opinion: any publishing venture is dumb if the practitioner doesn't know what they're doing. Which is why writers should read blogs to learn from others' experiences.

I think I learn more from The Passive Guy than almost any other publishing guru. Maybe because he isn't pushing his own products as he doles out advice. He's got another blog about the importance of value in the publishing equation you might find interesting.

Other blogs can be just as interesting and helpful. At Leigh's Wordsmithery I found some interesting market information. One of which I plan to submit to since I had already started re-editing the piece before I read the blog.

Lastly, how about a bit of fun?

 Margo Berendsen posted some writerly pins about editing on a recent blog. I share !!illustrating the writer's condition on my Facebook author page, but I don't know how to transfer pins. [I've still tons to learn about playing on the computer.]
 

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I'm still begging for reviews for The Ghost in the Closet. The book is free on Smashwords until May ... if you would be so kind. Hint. Hint.

And Ta-Dah!

A Cover Reveal for a Free Short Story that's in Process.

[No, it's not the one I'm thinking of submitting.]

 

I don't know if I'll be using this cover or one still in process. For free stories, I usually get two cheap covers and chose the one I like the best.

Plot Points

The Read:  Plot points, big and little, need to be embedded a story -- fiction or narrative non-fiction.  I think plots work as a compass to keep us on track to where we need to end up.  Think of a hook dragging the writer through the story.  If we're lucky, the happenings will hook readers into our tale and keep them there.  Woe be to the writer who can't stay interested in the book they are trying to write.  They will gnash their teeth mightily. 

Now that I've played Cassandra, all gloom and doom, I'll move on to admire Charlaine Harris's nimble exercises in keeping the action in Dead and Gone moving.  No secret that Harris is one of my favorite authors.  I started the book sometime over the week-end (Sunday?) and expected it to take as long to read as Pure Blood.  Only, I was more than half-way through it as of Tuesday, making me wonder why the novels I like the most finish the quickest.  

Dead and Gone is the ninth in the Sookie Stackhouse series [in mass paperback, at least].  I picked it from the pile to comment on because I'm watching the True Blood DVDs.  Only the two don't compare too well.  So, I'll gnaw on the plot points.  By the first fifth of the book [some 60 pages],  Sookie contends with the weres of America coming out, finds herself married to Eric [the New Orleans vampire], and having her sister-in-law [Jason's wife and a werepanther] crucified with silver nails.  A third of the way into the book, Sookie discovers her life's in danger because her great-grandfather (a faery prince) is in the middle of a fae war.  Also, somewhere in that mix, the FBI has shown up to determine whether Sookie's powers are real enough to recruit her.  Yeah, Harris ties it all up in a smoothly flowing story.  --  My mouth hangs open in admiration.  I'll try not to drool in front of you.

In the middle of all this, I went out and bought Dead Until Dark, the first in the series after spending a half hour last night looking for my Charlaine Harris pile.  (I was certain they were behind the Laurell K. Hamiltons, but they weren't.)  It'll be a couple days before I finish the DVDs, and then, I might have something to say about the differences between the two formats.  [Actually, I stayed up late last night and finished them.]

Web Notes:  Technically, I'm commenting on printed material, but since the editor is Chuck Sambuchino of Guide to Literary Agents  [ http://www.guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog/ ] , I'm going to mention the Writer's Digest Get an Agent.  Haven't looked at too much of it yet, except for the 21 agents panting for new clients.  --  Just my luck.  Very few of them were interested in MG/YA or fantasy.

The publication offers lots of tips to digest, if not implement.  Revising your manuscript.  How not to start your book.  [Probably the next thing I read after failing to get Maren out of the blocks.]  Successful Queries.  Lots, lots more.  Much of the information can be gathered free by reading agent blogs, but I think it's nice to have it contained in one publication.

This blog.  I'm always amazed at the number of non-Americans taking a look at what I write.

Progress:  Gave up on Maren and consigned her to My Documents ... maybe after some fermentation, she'll reappear in another form.  At least, a different story.  I still like her and the new villains.

Emma.  Still, thrashing over a query.  Or, is that twisting in the wind? 

Kaffy Anne.  Pulled her from limbo where she's been languishing for a couple years.  From the looks of it, it's 2/3s drafted with lots of notes for the subsequent chapters.  Got a couple chapters read yesterday, and it wasn't too distressing to read even though it was written before Britt and the gargoyles.

Trivia:  After laying in a stock of sheep sh*t bags ... we went looking for the kind of parsley the old man likes.  The flat leaf kind since he thinks it's best, but that may be a Greek prejudice.  --   I like it too since it has more flavor.  Gives more snap to my mom's German noodle dishes.