Authoring Onward

It’s a shiny, new year, and you probably have some new writing and personal goals to go with it. Yay! Jump into those goals, but remember to do so in a sustainable way. In fact, sustainable is my word of 2022. (Yes, I did the cheesy thing and picked a word of the year.)

If you’ve eaten the cheese too, let me know your word of the year in the comments.

And if you’d like to take an inventory of where your time is going here at the start of 2022, consider joining Laura Vanderkam’s time tracking challenge with me. It starts next week.

Announcement!

New for 2022, in addition to the solo episodes and interviews, I’m doing some critiques (first pages and/or book sales pages) and strategy sessions on this podcast and its sister show Let’s Start Writing. If you’d like critique of your work or your book’s sales page or a 15 minute publishing/promotion strategy session on the show, then fill out this interest form here.

The Messy Author Planner 2022 is now in hardback.

I am loving finally having a hardback copy of my planner. Paperback available as well. Grab your copy here, sit down with a big cup of your favorite beverage, and start planning.

Sometimes in writing and podcasting, you just have to roll with the punches… so there won’t be another episode for December. But I’m excited for what 2022 has in store. Authoring Onward will be back in your podcast player the first week of January!

Happy holidays!

Connie

What do I love as much as Christmas trees, tinsel, and eggnog?

Planning, of course! And a shiny, new planner.

Drum roll, please…

…

It’s here! The Messy Author Planner 2022 is here in paperback and (sadly delayed) hardcover (as well as a paperback undated version)! I’m so delighted. Wanna look inside?

This page is from the 2021 version. 2022 is similar but numbering starting on a different day of the week.

And in its honor, this week is my annual planning episode! Have a listen and hear about SMART goals, reevaluating plans, and more!

Some other awesome podcasts I mentioned on the show today:

Best of Both Worlds

Before Breakfast

Wish I‘d Known Then for Writers (I’ve been a guest here in the past! Sara and Jamie are awesome!)

The holiday season is upon us, and it can be a time as stressful as it is joyous. Huh. Kind of like the writing life. So, while the weather gets chilly, let’s chill out from all the anxieties authors can have.

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This week, Amber Henry came back on the show to go more in-depth about how she organizes pop-up shops where she sells her books and which benefit many local entrepreneurs in her community. We had a great chat.

We referenced a few prior episodes that you might want to go back and listen to after this one:

Amber’s first episode

Bookselling at shows and mindset shifts with Clare C. Marshall

Live Author Events with Tonya Duncan Ellis

Lessons from Comicpalooza: Tabling and Handselling your Books

Quick reminder: No podcast next week! I’ll be back on December 1st.

About Amber:

Amber Henry has always been writing. Starting with sad poetry in high school, plays and scripts in University and a dating column for a BC humour magazine in her 20’s. After adventuring in Ireland for a few years, where she met her husband, they settled in Yellowknife, where Amber finally decided she was brave enough to share her writing with the world.Her works include: A Ptarmigan in a Birch Tree and The Becoming (pen name Lilith Thorn). Her newest children’s book, Northern Princess, is now available for preorder.

This week, I chatted with author Amber Henry about the different ways she gives back to her community. We talked about school visits, giving while protecting your boundaries, looking for the need where you already have connections, and more! I hope our chat can give you ideas of ways you can contribute to your own community.

About Amber:

Amber Henry has always been writing. Starting with sad poetry in high school, plays and scripts in University and a dating column for a BC humour magazine in her 20’s. After adventuring in Ireland for a few years, where she met her husband, they settled in Yellowknife, where Amber finally decided she was brave enough to share her writing with the world.Her works include: A Ptarmigan in a Birch Tree and The Becoming (pen name Lilith Thorn). Her newest children’s book, Northern Princess, is now available for preorder.

P.S. Snag a NaNoWriMo special Get Unstuck coaching session while you still can! My calendar is filling up!

It’s November! And this month’s theme is giving thanks and giving back. Today I run down some ways I’ve volunteered in the past and ways I plan to give back this year. What have you done to give back to the writing community or your community at large? Comment below, so we can all get ideas.

Links mentioned in the show: Little Free Libraries https://littlefreelibrary.org/

My NaNoWriMo Get Unstuck Coaching Sessions: https://calendly.com/connie-36/30-minute-get-unstuck-coaching-session

This week, I have returning guest Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail (see her previous episode here). We talk about all things writing scary stuff, creating ghostly characters, our own childhood fears, and more! Snuggle up with a warm apple cider and a cozy blanket for our spooky chat!

About Danielle:

I’m an author, connector and storyteller who is obsessed with hidden histories and ghost stories. I love getting lost in research, travelling, and going on adventures with my family. It makes it all the sweeter when I’m reading fireside (or seaside) in my Nova Scotia/Mi’kma’ki home.

Website

Buy a copy of “Ship in a Bottle”

More from Connie:

Looking for editing or author coaching in November or December? Spots are filling fast!

A Cauldron of Deceptions: A Cozy Mystery Anthology out now!

It’s a mini-episode today!

Welcome,

October is such a busy month. I’ve got a soon-to-be-launched anthology coming up, my son’s fall festival is tomorrow, requiring me to locate and fix the Halloween costumes that have already been strewn around our house, and my daughter is starting Nutcracker rehearsal already! So today is a quick episode, but for this time I’m celebrating spooky season by talking with y’all about creating new danger as you continue to write and publish. One key for me helping myself feel the fear.

I have a new villain and new conflict every single novel because I write cozy mystery. And when you think about it, cozy mystery as a genre is a bit of a head trip. Could there be a killer lurking in your local PTA or down at the senior center on quilting night? In the cozy world, there could!  And yet it is just so quaint and charming, so full of quirky people, that everyone stays and loves their town despite the ever-growing murder rate. It’s a mix of danger and comfort. As I’ve mentioned on a previous episode, cozy mystery allows us as readers to play with concepts of death, danger, and violence in ways that make them feel smaller, more manageable. That’s one of the psychological needs that these stories fulfill.

But as I construct this delicate balance over and over with every story, sometimes I find myself leaning too hard into the cozy cuteness of my story worlds or the clever plot twist I’ve just thought up.  And so I find it helpful sometimes to stop and focus on the fear, to make sure I’m feeling that part too. And whatever your genre, you need that fear as well. October is a great time to devote a short writing session to focus on the scares.

You might not be able to conjure up a perfect stormy night for your writing session. Indeed you might not have the time or energy to write during the evening hours, whatever the weather, but you can create some spooky ambiance for yourself. Close the curtains. Light a candle or two. Try some spooky ambiance Youtube videos, with music or sounds that you can have on in the background. I like this one, this one, or this one. Set a timer and start writing.

You don’t necessarily have to write a scene, though you can if you like. I like to do some thinking on paper this way, getting into my characters’ heads and writing things that won’t make it into the book, but will help me when I write scenes later.  How must they be feeling as the tension rises throughout the story? How does their discomfort manifest in their thoughts, their actions, and their physical sensations?  Think from both your protagonist’s and antagonist’s perspectives. Brain dump all their worst fears and really feel them.

Then, ding. The timer is done. Phew! It was all in your imagination. Right where it should be. Turn up the lights, change the music to something cheerier, and relax until your ready to draft again and add all that spookiness you created to your story.

Consider this a bit of a teaser, next week I’ll be talking writing spooky scenes more in-depth with returning guest and author/editor buddy Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail. Maybe keep the lights on while listening to that one.

Ready for an edit on your book? Looking for some coaching on finishing that book or self publishing? Get booked now!

Last week, I did a deep dive into the results from my recent KU free days promotion, and I promised to keep y’all updated. As of now, I’ve almost earned back my ad spend on this series. Only $38 to break even. Now, I’ve noticed the money trickling down day by day as I get further away from the promotion, so that big boost may be wearing off now. I’m still confident that this was a good call. Even if I never earned back that $38, it’s a small price to pay for the lessons I learned from this particular marketing push, not to mention the new reviews and ratings I got on all three books.

Now, let’s move on to our October theme of the spooky side of publishing. Today, I’ll go over some common fears writers have about the publishing space and whether these fears are well-founded or overblown.

* Someone will steal my work.

This is the most common fear among the newer authors I see. It comes in three forms, and it’s largely not something you need to spend lots of time thinking about. Let’s analyze.

               Stolen ideas

               Sometimes writers, particularly those who may be just now authoring and not yet moving toward the onward stage, fear even describing their ideas, sometimes even ducking out of pitch contents or promotional opportunities. I won’t say stealing ideas never happens. Sometimes it does, but you know what’s a whole lot harder than coming up with a great idea? Executing that great idea into a great book. There’s a big barrier to swiping ideas and it’s a whole lot of work. Don’t let this fear stop you from workshopping an idea with a trusted critique group or writing coach or entering a Twitter pitch contest. You don’t have to let everything out and tell the whole world your whole plot, but don’t let this fear hamper your growth or opportunities.

Plagiarism

               People passing off someone else’s writing as their own also is a thing that sometimes happens, but it is rare. You know what’s even harder than writing an excellent book? Publishing and marketing it! This is not a scam for the quick-fix scammer. There’s a huge learning curve to publishing. Just make sure the people you hand over your manuscript to are folks you trust. Know your critique partners. Vet editors or formatters or agents well. Look for testimonials from past clients. Ask past clients questions if you want. As a freelance editor, I’ve signed more than one NDA, though they aren’t really necessary for me. If I ever swiped a manuscript, my editing biz would be in the toilet. And I also have no interest in leaking content or ideas from a book prior to publication, though I love to know when clients do publish so I can brag about their awesome books online. If it makes you feel better, though, you’re well within your rights to ask for an NDA.

Pirating

               Now this one is very likely to happen. And it’s also impossible to prevent if you publish your book in any form. And for that reason, I don’t think you should let it take up too much of your headspace. Every time a group of authors gets a book pirating site taken down, it seems like three more spring up in its place. I’m grateful for the folks who take the time to fight these entities, but I personally don’t have time to search out and send a cease-and-desist letter to every pirate site I can find one of my books on and then follow up and then… It’s a lot of work, and I don’t think the folks who are getting pirated books would actually pay real money for my work anyway.