The Open Author

(Cross posted here) Writing a book is hard. Writing a good book is even harder. Writing a good book and getting published is crazy wild hard as a really hard diamond hard.

These are the steps you must follow:

1. Learn the craft (estimated time, 10 years)
2. Write short stories
3. Send short stories to magazines
4. Get short stories published
5. Write a book (probably several month/years)
6. Go to conferences
7. Network
8. Find an agent
9. Try to convince said agent to read your stuff
10. Repeat steps 6-9 about a million times without losing your ego, mind, or self esteem
11. Sign with agent
12. Wait for months/years while agent shops your book to publishers
13. Sign with publisher

I’ve simplified the process, and probably left off a bunch of steps, but those are the basics.

But as I’ve mentioned on this blog before, thanks to technology we’re seeing new models emerging. These new models aren’t shortcuts to publishing; it still takes as much work as before. But the good news is if you put in the time, and master the craft, you’ve got alternative ways to attract attention. It is especially important to note that the new models are very much driven by merit. So if you really are a good writer, you’re going to have an advantage.

One of the emerging models is the Free model. The basic idea is to give away your content, and make money in other ways. Musicians do this by giving away their music and then charging for concerts and CDs–yes, people will still buy CDs even if the music is free. Artists may do this by giving away digital images of their work, and then charging for a paper copy of their book.

But this model has never worked very well for authors. People just don’t want to read in front of a computer. They want to do it in bed, or on the bus, or in their fortress of solitude.

But now we have the Kindle, the Nook, the iPad, the Sony Reader, and things are swinging in our direction. Now we too can give away our content, and make money in other ways.

How does it work? I’ll tell you…but in a future post. It’s late and I tend to be a boring person, so I’m calling this post finished (or am I just trying to hook you in?). Give me a few days and I’ll a) outline how an author can give away content and still make a living, and b) show you a handful of authors who are already doing this.

By the way, this model is a great way for an author to break into the market, but it’s also very effective for established authors to boot.

I’ve been involved in an interesting writing experiment recently. Let me asplain.

Sometimes it’s helpful to describe your book using similar titles. So you might say, “This book is Gone With the Wind meets Harry Potter.” Sounds like a winner, right?

Well, if I had to explain my latest work in progress it would be 12 Angry Men meets World War Z. If you haven’t seen the movie 12 Angry Men before, then you need to stop reading this post right now. Well, not right now, because then you won’t know what to do. Here is what you should do. Go to Netflix, sign up for Netflix, rent 12 Angry Men, wait by your mailbox until it arrives, and then watch it. It’s such a great movie I’ll have to devote an entire post to it sometime.

World War Z is also a good book. It’s a book about a zombie apocalypse, and while my book doesn’t have any zombies, it does have a similar way of telling the story. In World War Z instead of a protagonist or a rowdy but lovable group of sidekicks who stick together and sooner or later come in possession of an axe (there are ALWAYS axes in zombie books), the book reads like an NPR radio program. It is a series of interviews with people who survived the event. Each one tells their story, and by the end you undertand what happened holistically, not just to a group of people. It’s a very interesting way to tell a story.

So going back to my writing experiment, the general plot is a catastrophic event has occurred and anything electrical has been fried. Cars, computer, TVs—none of it works anymore. There is no way to ship goods, no way to communicate with other people, and society begins to fall apart. But before that happens, a group of 800 people leave Utah in an old fashioned wagon train, headed east.

However, I’m not telling the story in the usual way; I’m presenting it as a transcript of a court trial. The trial happens after the wagon train arrives at their destination. One member of the train committed a grievous crime against another, and as witnesses are called to testify, the story unfolds to the reader. The events of the trek are built through the testimony of the various members of the wagon train.

I call it an experiment because I don’t know if it will work. Since it’s a court transcript, the entire 17,000 words so far are 100% dialogue. There is not ‘he said’, or ‘she gazed out over the prairie’ anywhere in the book. This brings up an interesting dilema with regards to “show don’t tell”.

Show don’t tell is something most authors are familiar with. Usually telling is bad and showing is good. This is an example of telling:

“You’re an idiot,” he said, angrily.

I’m telling you that the character is angry, but it’s not a good way to write. Sure, you know he’s mad, but there is a better way. Perhaps something like this:

John gripped the back of the chair until his fingernails dug into the hard wood. He could feel the blood rushing to his face.

“You’re an idiot,” he said.

It’s much better to show. However, what do you do when all you have to work with is dialogue, I can’t do either method! I can’t even say that somebody is mad, I have to show emotion simply through the dialogue itself.

I don’t know if I can pull it off, but if nothing else it’s been very good practice. I’ve been forced to really try to inject emtion into dialogue.

After the Storymakers conference, I couldn’t help but start thinking again about all of the changes taking place in the world of technology, how directly those changes relate to us in the publishing world, and how often we as authors are completely oblivious to these changes.

So, what to do? Why…start a blog, of course. Here at Chicken Armpits I talk about anything and everything. My kids, my school, my books, my rash, my…wait, I don’t think I’ve mentioned my rash before. Just forget about that. It’s nothing…really.

So, I’m starting a blog where I’ll only talk about technology and how it directly relates to the publishing industry, particularly authors. So…if you are a fellow author, or you’re interested in that topic, please feel free to follow me over at marionjensen.com

I attended the Whitney Awards last night. It was a fantastic event, and a good time was had by all involved.

During the course of the evening, Dan Wells introduced David Farland, an author who received a lifetime achievement awards from the Whitney Committee.

Dan explained that when he was younger, he wanted to be an author. He described that by the time he reached college the public school system had all but beaten that dream out of him. But Dan was lucky enough to take a class from David Farland, and the first thing Dave told his class was, “You can make a living at this.”

I love it when a character’s voice takes over and he says something that surprises you. The scene I was working on has a superhero confronting a citizen in a supermarket. The exchange made me smile. From Chapter 19:

“Can I help you?” Benny’s dad asked. Benny had noticed that whenever his dad wore his super suit, his voice changed just a little. He spoke in a booming, authoritative way. “Up to no good, are we?”

“Uh…” said the man. “No sir. I’m just buying some fruit—a kiwi.” He held up the small brown and green fruit in an effort to prove his point.

“That’s a pomegranate,” said his father. “And everybody knows pomegranates are vegetables.”

Benny couldn’t help but chime in on the conversation. “Actually Dad,” he said, “I think it is a kiwi.” Benny had learned long ago that since his family only ate a few types of food, they weren’t too well versed on fruits and vegetables.

His father ignored Benny. “It might be a kiwi,” he said to the man. “Or it might not be. That little fact is up in the air at the moment. But either way, you don’t fool me. I think you’re up to something. You look a little shady to me.”

“I’m not shady,” said the man nervously. “Really. I’m very…unshady.”

Rafter’s father walked around the man, looking him up and down. “Look at those clothes—a bit on the dingy side. And that beard? Very scruffy. And what about that hat? That’s a shifty hat if I ever saw one.”

“My mother knitted me this hat,” the man said defensively. “For my birthday.”

Benny’s father squinted his eyes and glared at the man. “Your mother is a shifty knitter.”

So I’ve been bombarding everybody with my Almost Super book, but this post is a welcome reprieve. I’m holding a contest, but for something completely different. It’s about a writers conference at which I’m presenting this June.

The Teen Writers Conference is in it’s second year, and last year was a hoot. The conference is for anybody age 13-19. You can read more about it here.

If you are a teen, or know a teen, who loves to write this is a great place to learn, network, and drink from drinking fountains.

If you would like to be entered, or enter somebody else, simply e-mail me at marionjensen at gmail dot com. I’ll announce the winner in a few weeks.

That is all.

Hi there. My name is Marion. And I can’t self-promote.

I just can’t do it. At my book signings people would come over to my table and I’d find myself saying, “Actually, this book is in the library, you can just check it out. That way you know if you like it before you buy it.”

I have a hard time telling people that they should read my book. I feel like an Amway salesman. I get all awkward every time my book is discussed. People get tired of me, I’m sure, because when I ever bring up my book I add all these qualifiers to it. “Yeah, it’s a book based loosely on my childhood. You might like it, but you might not, too. And that’s ok. I mean, I don’t want you to feel any pressure just because we know each other doesn’t mean you are obligated to read it. At all. I promise. In fact, it’s probably better that you don’t read it just because then things will be awkward. But if you do want to read it, I can borrow you a copy, so you don’t have to buy it, because you might not like it. But then you might feel more obligated to read it, or worried that I’m going to test you on it, which I won’t. Really, I promise. I mean if you really want to read it, you can, but I will never ask you in the future if you’ve read it, or give you a test. If it makes you more comfortable, you can just take it for a while, bend a few pages, get it a little dirty like you have read it, and then…I’ll just stop talking now. How about this weather we’re having, crazy, right?”

I usually can say that in about 8 seconds without taking a breath, and all the while I’m making calming motions with my hands, just to show you that I’m not crazy.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. I’m asking for your help.

You see, I’ve had 44 people pledge money on Kickstarter.com to buy my book. Over 150 copies have been bought. That is a lot of pressure. But if I don’t reach the goal ($5,500–the cost of a print run), then the money isn’t funded, and nobody gets books. And now I really want those 44 people to get their books, in spite of how awkward it will be for me when I see them in the future.

So, I’ve heard that book contests are all the rage. I’m all about rage, just ask my kids. So here is the deal. If you post the gadget shown below anywhere on your blog (it can be in a post, or in the sidebar) and send me a link to it, I will enter your name in a drawing to receive a free signed copy. I’ll give away 10 of these babies, so your chances of getting it are good (I’ve only got 17 followers (although you don’t have to be a follower to share the link), and there is a good chance some of them won’t be able to figure out how to get the Widget to work on their site (I’m certainly not talking about you)). I’ll also personalize the book if you want. In fact, I can even pre-bend the pages so that if we meet at your house in the future, and I pull the book off the shelf, you can just pretend you read it (I won’t quiz you).

Sound like a plan? You can get the widget on this page. It’s the link that says “grab the widget”. Also, if you tweet or post the link to facebook, let me know and I’ll enter your name a second time.

Thanks, all. I couldn’t do it without your help. We’re more than 25% of the way there, so I think we can do this thing.

The Widget