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November Writing Challenge Day Three: Your Subject and Your Theme
In yesterday’s post I asked the final question, “What message do you want your readers to gain from your book?” What is the one, most important idea or theme you want your readers to take away with them when they read the final page? I find that many people confuse subject and theme. How does…
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November Writing Challenge Day Two: First Steps
So you’ve decided to participate in the Open Door Publications’ November Writing Challenge. You are enthusiastic and ready to sit down and punch out your first 1,000 or so words. But wait! Don’t start writing yet. If you want to make this month-long challenge as worthwhile as possible, before you start writing willy nilly, you…
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What Are You Doing for NaNoWriMo?
It’s November and time for NaNoWriMo, that hideously named but well-intentioned event: National Novel Writing Month. The event, which is international despite its name, began in 1999 in SanFrancisco, with just a handful of writers. You can read more about the history of the month at nanowrimo.org, so I won’t bother to give more details…
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How (Not) to Have a Successful Book Launch
I have a lot of authors ask me about how to host a successful book launch. They know that Open Door Publications has held a number of highly successful launches for our authors’ books. But I have to confess we’ve also had a few flops. Events where the people just didn’t show up. So, while…
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Instead, it’s being read & cherished!
By Jodi O’Donnell-Ames I first wrote the story, The Stars that Shine, in 1997. I was 28 years old and living the best and worst time of my life. It was the best of times because my husband Kevin and I were young and in love and the proud parents of a delightful five year…
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Common Proofreading Finds
By Vivian Fransen Best performed by “a fresh pair of eyes,” proofreading is a task that involves doing a careful readthrough of a document and flagging any errors and inconsistencies in spelling, grammar, punctuation, and capitalization. When you’re on a tight deadline, it’s tempting to skip the proofreading stage because you don’t want to bog…
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A Classic Scare
What’s the scariest book you’ve ever read? I mean the book that kept you sleeping with the light on, the one you stayed up all night reading because you knew that if you didn’t finish you would have nightmares. In today’s world where Halloween haunted houses pop up in every town and horror movies make…
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What Does It Take To Publish A (Successful) Book?
I’ve been saying it for several years now: It is easier than ever these days to publish a book. In fact, literally anyone can publish a book today and sell it on the internet. It doesn’t even take any money. My cats could publish a book! But would anyone read it? So what does it…
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Changing Your Inbox Settings on Gmail
I woke up a week or so ago to learn that Gmail had changed the way I view my mail. Now, instead of all of my mail appearing in one place, my inbox had been arbitrarily categorized by Gmail into “primary,” “social,” and “promotional” categories. I did not get a say as to which mail…
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The Right Place to Write
I recently heard a radio report on “the new home office,” and since we had just moved and were in the process of setting up my own new office, I was very interested to hear what others were doing. One of the people interviewed had just spent $25,000 on her new office. Any of you…
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Making Lemonade from Those Lemons
“Come speak at our organization. We usually have about 60 people.” That’s the invitation one of my authors recently received. She eagerly agreed to speak at the event, ordered some additional books to sell – 60 people, surely she should have at least 30 books on hand, she thought. She spent some additional money on…
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Summertime is a Great Time to Market Your Book
“Summertime and the living is easy.” So goes the first line of the great George Gershwin song. Authors may think that summertime means relaxation time – a time to take a break from all that annoying book marketing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Summertime is a great time to market your book. Have…
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Want to Finish Writing Your Book? Slow Down
While 80 percent of Americans say they want to write a book, most never will. Are you one of the many who plan to write a book, or finish a book – someday. What’s holding you back? I just received an email from a friend berating herself for not finishing the manuscript she started over…
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Developing Your Author Platform
By Sonja Hegman Your author platform is the single most important thing you can create for yourself. And I’m not kidding when I write this: You must start promoting at least a year ahead of your book’s release. This might sound ridiculous, but starting the buzz early will give you a better shot of getting…
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Turn Off the News – Now
Last week we spent glued to our television sets, caught as surely as a fly in a spider’s web as we watched with a mixture of horror, compassion and fascination as the most real of all reality shows played out before us on television, climaxing in a dramatic Friday night primetime gun battle, seen live…
