New writers Blog

It’s taken two years and two books to get around to writing this blog.

There will be bit’s I have missed, or not covered in much detail, but it may give you a few points and tips to help you on your literary journey. Everyone in the industry will have their own opinion on the best way to do things and will offer pearls of wisdom and do’s & don’ts based on the experience they have had. These are mine!

Do I feel like a writer? That’s a hard question, some feel it when their first published book arrives, others when they make a sale and others when they have hit the golden ticket and found themselves a publisher happy to pay them. For me, it was the third book festival I attended. The first two I had organised, the other I attended as solely an author and it was a tremendous success selling out of one title. It was only seven books, but could have been more, potentially, but I did score a book club choosing my book so that equated to a few extra sales. Now, as I write this, I am doubting myself, can I only class myself as an author if they come back for another of my books? But they are different genres so would this happen anyway? This is the uncertainty of being an indie author. And then there is the debate of do you use ‘self-published’ or ‘indie’ to describe yourself as an author? I quite like the term ‘indie’ author, but there are some in the industry who do not know or understand the term.  And with self-published do you go to Amazon or IngramSpark or other sites such as Lulu. Then there is the debate that ‘self-published’ books are of a lesser quality and standard than traditional published manuscripts, which I guarantee is not the case. But, saying that, there will be a pile of poop that is self-published, because anybody can, and equally, I have read traditionally published books that have weak story arcs and under-developed characters but have still been accepted by agents. Then there is the third option which is to use a vanity publisher - this is where you pay a publisher for a print run of books but they have not been edited etc, it is merely a way to produce your book.

This is some advice I was given at the beginning of my writing journey, which I am passing on:

·        Read. Read as much as you can and as varied as you can

·        Don’t worry about rejection. It will happen. It’s like gold dust finding an agent willing to give you a chance.

·        Write. Enter competitions. There are loads of competitions every year around the world. Some have fee’s and some have prizes, some are open competitions, and some are specific to genre’s.

Here are some of the stumbling blocks I encountered.

The mr/Mr debate. Here a web user (PaulQ) sums it up perfectly -

As a polite form of address to a superior, "sir" is not capitalised:
Thank you very much, sir/ma'am. Or. You are damn right, sir/ma'am. Or. I like your idea very much, sir/ma'am.
But as a title "Sir" and "Lady", is always capitalised, as are Mr., Mrs., and Miss (and Ms)
"I wish you were as rich as Sir Paul Q/Lady Thorpe."
"I wish you were as rich as Mr. Brown/Miss Ankita/Mrs. Patel/Miss Eyre/Ms Blackwell."

I was always unsure on mum and dad but Quora advise - You should only capitalize "mum" and "dad" when they are used as a name. Whenever they are preceded by "my"   they should not be capitalized. For example, when writing "I love you, Mum," you would capitalize "mum" because "Mum" is used as a name.

This is a confusing one -  ‘ or “ for character speech. I find that is differs for author preference. I cannot find the original source but when I asked this question, I was told that “means the direct speech between two or more characters and ‘was when one character was recalling something said, for the benefit of the reader. I have seen ‘ used for all speech but I am old school and was taught to use “ speech marks when a character is talking. Personally I use “ for talking and ‘ for when a character is thinking something. I like it that way as it helps the flow of the story and differentiate when my characters are talking something as opposed to saying it out loud. BBC Bitesize says - Direct speech is carefully structured to help the reader follow the conversation. Every time there is a new speaker in the conversation, a new line is used. Each new section of dialogue is like beginning a new paragraph, so in a printed novel you will see that each new line is also indented - this is when a line starts further in from the margin. Each new line of direct speech should also start with a capital letter. The part I am still debating is should the said be a lower or upper case? “I can’t see anything,” said Molly. This seems to defer per author and seems to be personal preference.                                   A reporting clause after the direct speech tells the reader who is speaking. The last line above misses the reporting clause because the reader can see that the character Molly is replying to George. Once a conversation gets started, it’s fine to drop the reporting clauses.

www.gsbe.co.uk says regarding direct speech and reproduced text:

      ‘I don't understand’, said Pat, ‘why we need passports to travel to other
      EU countries.’

The actual words spoken by Pat comprise direct speech and must, therefore, be marked off from the rest of the sentence by quotation marks.

But quotation marks are not used with indirect speech (speech that is reported rather than quoted)

      Pat said that she did not understand why we need passports to travel to other EU countries.

The same rule applies to reproduced text. If a writer wishes to use the words of another writer, or even her own from another source, the passage
is enclosed in quotation marks. Short quotations of up to forty words usually appear in the same paragraph in which they are announced –

      Albert Einstein once said, ‘The ideals which have always shone before me
      and filled me with the joy of living are goodness, beauty and truth’.

The physical size of your book and print size inside is something to think about. I prefer the size 6 x 8. The inside I use the font Calibri with a font size of 11. Personally, I don’t like books with fonts that are really small, it gives me a headache. For submissions to agents they prefer double spaced with 1.5 line spacing. Books are generally printed without these amendments, but that’s what proofing is for. With people leading busy lives short chapters can help.

Here’s an English lesson for you –

There are four main types of writing: expository, persuasive, narrative, and descriptive.

§  Expository – Writing in which author’s purpose is to inform or explain the subject to the reader.

§  Persuasive – Writing that states the opinion of the writer and attempts to influence the reader.

§  Narrative – Writing in which the author tells a story. The story could be fact or fiction.

§  Descriptive – A type of expository writing that uses the five senses to paint a picture for the reader. This writing incorporates imagery and specific details.

Once you have written and published your book here are some things you should do next –

• ·      Register your books at www.nielsenbook.co.uk -  Nielsen Book provides a range of services to the book industry internationally, aiding the discovery and purchase, distribution and sales measurement of books. We are proud to run the ISBN and SAN Agencies for UK & Ireland as well as providing search and discovery services for booksellers and libraries. Our electronic trading solutions, including Nielsen PubEasy, help everyone involved in the book supply chain trade more easily. 
• ·         Make a book deposit - You’re legally obliged to send a free copy of your print book to The British Library within one month of publication. The address is: Legal Deposit Office, The British Library, Boston Spa, Wetherby, LS23 7BY. In addition, there are a number of other legal deposit libraries including Oxford’s Bodleian Library, Cambridge’s University Library and one library each for Scotland, Ireland and Wales. You’re not legally required to send a copy of your book to any of these unless requested to do so, which is unlikely. The rules regarding the deposit of ebooks vary from country to country. For example, the Libraries and Archives of Canada and the National Library of New Zealand require both print and ebook to be deposited, whereas the US, UK and Australian national libraries don’t require an ebook if a print copy has already been sent.
• ·         I also give a copy of my book to the local libraries.
• ·         Register with the British Library - www.bl.uk/plr - Under the PLR system in the UK, payment is made from government funds to authors, illustrators and other contributors whose books are borrowed from public libraries. Payments are made annually on the basis of loans data collected from a sample of public libraries in the UK. The Irish Public Lending Remuneration (PLR) system covers all libraries in the Republic of Ireland and operates in a similar way. To qualify for payment, applicants must apply to register their books, audio-books, Ebooks and E-audio-books. Applicants can find the relevant information required to register their titles, for example the ISBN and what format the book is, on their Royalty statement.
• ·         Register withwww.alcs.co.uk - you could be getting royalties. They make sure you receive the money you’re entitled to as a writer when someone copies or uses your work. We collect money from all over the world, then pay it to our members.

Marketing is one of the hardest elements you will come up against when promoting your book. I haven’t found any winning combination yet but being friendly and open at book events seems to bring people to your table. I try to make my stall as appealing as possible to as many people as possible. I have promo items relating to the books to get people talking. For example, I wear a top hat and I have Victorian scalpels and old coins that I use for my book Jill which is based on Jack the Ripper. I also promote Devon Libraries with leaflets and a fellow author was having a book event the following week, so I advertised that for him. Sweets – free tasty sweets are great, and theme the if you can e.g. eggs at Easter.

Getting a write up in your local paper is great coverage, if you can get them to print an article.

Local radio stations are usually happy to speak to guests, check and see if they have any slot dedicated to book hours. 

Be brave and get yourself out there - go to fairs, do book events. 

Use social media - Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit.... there's probably more to try!

Here are some things to think about info on marketing from the boys and girls at BooksgoSocial –

1.          The title – make it catchy and engaging
2.          The cover of the book should fit the genre as well as be appealing.
3.          When listing the title use specific words in the title relating to the book’s topic. 
4.          Key words – these need to sound natural and should feature on book cover and in the title. Sites like Amazon are wise to key word stuffing so keep them relevant.
5.       The Book description – Make it a very interesting first sentence. State what age the book is aimed at and the benefit of reading your book. A good description will be a strong call of action to make people read your book. 
6.         Amazon algorithm – 99p start price will help the amazon algorithm to pick up book sales and gain a ranking. If you start to gain sales and rankings in categories Amazon will promote.
7.          Listing on Amazon - The category you are in depends on the ranking so use a competitive and non-competitive category to be a best seller – research what is best selling in those categories.
8.         Team up and develop partnerships with other authors to share books and reach further audiences but we careful, you can put in a lot of work for others who do not reciprocate the arrangement.  

My last bit of advice is don’t give up your day job, not just yet and HAVE FUN. 

Tell your story your way. 

Don’t fear rejection and if you do get yourself an agent and a publishing contact CONGRATULATIONS but please check the small print, you won’t be the owner of your work (but the promotion and marketing will be on you) for the period of the contract.

Join groups and development circles. Many are free and friendly and can help with tips and support, and you can use them to sound out ideas. 

Thank you for reading my first blog, I hope you found it useful. Sorry for any error's, writing with dyslexia is a challenge (which will be the subject of my second blog, coming to you sometime in the future!!)

If you want to check out my novel writing, you can find it here: www.amazon.co.uk/-/e/B076HQZ2DM

KEEP WRITING    ♦   KEEP READING