DPP Newsletter, Edition XI

THE AUTHOR’S ADVOCATE
The DPP Authors’ Newsletter
EDITION XI
January 25, 2006


"Writing is easy. You just sit down at the typewriter and open a vein."
Red Smith


YOU ARE YOUR OWN BEST MARKETING REP!

I not only use all of the brains I have, but all I can borrow.

Woodrow Wilson


Pick My Brain

Please! Let me know how I can help you. You Are Your Own Best Marketing Rep! will continue as an ongoing column in the new formatted newsletter you will begin receiving in February. I want to be the best resource for you in this area as I can be, so please send me any questions you have or suggestions for ideas that you would like information about to nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com


Author! Author!

Check Out…

http://www.nytimes.com/books/specials/writers.html
This is a complete archive of the Writers on Writing column, a series in which writers explore literary themes.

http://www.barbarademarcobarrett.com/writersonwriting/index.html Writers on Writing is a weekly radio program hosted by journalist and author Barbara DeMarco-Barrett. Each Thursday at 5pm Pacific, writers and poets join her from the studios of KUCI fm, on your radio in Orange County at 88.9 and simulcast worldwide at www.kuci.org

For Thoughts, Ideas, and Inspiration


PUBLISHER’S PROMPT

Writing Prompt

Use the word or the idea of the word “Heart” or “Hog” to inspire a poem, song, or short story.

If you decide to play with the prompt, and you’d like to share it, please send it to me (nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com) and I will post it in the following week’s Authors’ Advocate. You can find my response posted on the blog http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/

Site-ings

Society of Children's Book Writers & Illustrators
http://www.scbwi.org/

The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, formed in 1971 by a group of Los Angeles based writers for children, is the only international organization to offer a variety of services to people who write, illustrate, or share a vital interest in children’s literature. The SCBWI acts as a network for the exchange of knowledge between writers, illustrators, editors, publishers, agents, librarians, educators, booksellers and others involved with literature for young people. There are currently more than 19,000 members worldwide, in over 70 regions, making it the largest children's writing organization in the world.

THE SUN MAGAZINE (in print)
http://www.thesunmagazine.org/

Writing Guidelines
http://www.thesunmagazine.org/writer_guidelines.html

Unfortunately, you're not likely to find The Sun at your regular newsstand. Many distributors won't carry it because it's not "commercial" enough: we don't carry advertising; and we regularly print pieces that are too risky, too personal, too sad, too something. Yet somehow the magazine finds its way into the right hands; readers who appreciate writing that doesn't talk down to them or up to them, but meets their level gaze.

The Internet Writing Journal
http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/

Submissions:
http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/guidelines.htm
The Internet Writing Journal® ("The IWJ") is seeking original articles. Please read the guidelines carefully before submitting. Remember, we only publish nonfiction articles -- please do not submit poetry or fiction! We recommend that writers read articles published The IWJ to get an idea of our editorial style and the types of articles that we publish. Click here to see a list of links to prior articles. We look forward to seeing your submission!

Writers Write
http://writerswrite.com/
Your one-stop resource for information about books, writing and publishing

WHAT’S GOING ON AT DPP…

The Newsletter

We’re Continuing to Change…

As of February 1 we’re:

1) Changing formats
2) Changing our name from The Authors’ Advocate to News Bytes
3) We’ll be publishing bi-weekly (last week I had written “bi-monthly” – that was an error. You will receive the newsletter every two weeks).

Our Websites

We are still in the midst of reconstructing all three of our websites to make them more informative, user-friendly, and more interesting to peruse. As soon as they are complete, we’ll invite you to check them out (of course, you can check them out now if you want to get a good image of “before” and “after”).

Fun Facts

January:

A Room of One’s Own Day, January 25: For anyone who knows or longs for the sheer bliss and rightness of having a private place, no matter how humble, to call one’s own. [© 2003 by WH] For info: Thomas and Ruth Roy, Wellcat Holidays, 2418 Long Ln. Lebanon, PA 17046. Ph: (717) 279-0184. Email: info@wellcat.com Web: www.wellcat.com

Author Birthdays (January 25-31):

Jan. 25: Robert Burns, 1759; Somerset W. Maugham, 1874; Virginia Woolf, 1882; Edwin Newman, 1919
Jan. 26: Phillip José Farmer, 1918
Jan. 29: Anton Chekhov, 1860; Germaine Greer, 1939
Jan. 31: Zane Grey, 1872; Norman Mailer, 1923

All of the above was taken from Chase’s Calendar of Events, 2006©


Write on,
Nicky

You Are Your Own Best Marketing Rep!

Teamwork allows common people to attain uncommon results.

Anonymous

From Here to There: Local Action

Self-promotion is great. Self-promotion with help is even better. Let me help you promote your book in your locale.

Networking has been an on-going theme in almost all of the past week’s marketing tips…and it continues to be in this week’s tip. We’re just broadening your network.

Put on your hunting and gathering cap and don your self-promotion scout uniform!

Starting locally, gather up as many names and places as you can. Start this week and make this an on-going task on your “to do” list, timeline, or calendar. Names, places, and sources -- people who own coffee houses, or businesses that might have some kind of connection to your book. Names of local community news people- journalists and local papers, radio personalities and the stations they broadcast from, local cable television hosts and the stations they telecast from. Gather contact information (especially email, and especially email if you live outside the U.S.) for each of these people and places.

Send the information to me and I will get busy contacting the names/places you researched in order to assist you in garnering more publicity for you and your book.

Together, let’s get you and your book exposure. Let’s get you sales. Between us, let’s “attain uncommon results”.
Please send any/all information to me at nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com

Publisher's Prompt

Use the following, January 18 prompt from “Prompts & Practices” by Judy Reeves to begin, end, or use in the middle of a piece.

“It was noon and nothing is concluded.” (after Donald Rawley)

She sat at her desk, staring blankly at an even blanker computer screen. She had been sitting that way for almost fifteen minutes. Somewhere between what she thought was a good idea and plunking out words on the keyboard for four hours, she decided it was all a waste and deleted everything from the word document she had begun at half past seven.

She had been taught never to delete her work. That even if what she had written seemed all for naught, there might be a seed of a beginning, or a sprout to a middle or a perfect flower of an ending. She cursed that instructor in this moment for putting all those gardening metaphors in her mind. She decided to take a head hoe to them and get rid of all that she had planted. With one click she was able to make her digital harvest disappear.

So she sat, as she knew Hemingway once had, at her desk, for the set amount of time she had prescribed for herself. The clock at the bottom of the monitor turned over to 11:51 AM. Nine more minutes to go. She could sit and stare at the screen, envision what she would like to write, or maybe simply restart writing whatever came into her head.

She sat and stared at the screen.

After what seemed like hours, the monitor clock struck 12:00 PM. It was noon and “nothing is concluded,” she thought.

With a sigh, she rose and pushed her chair in under her desk, stretched, and decided to go out in the back yard and look at the nasturtiums.

DPP Newsletter, Edition X

THE AUTHOR’S ADVOCATE
The DPP Authors’ Newsletter
EDITION X
January 18, 2006

"I never think when I write; nobody can do two things at the same time and do them well."

Don Marquis

YOU ARE YOUR OWN BEST MARKETING REP!

Teamwork allows common people to attain uncommon results.

Anonymous

From Here to There: Local Action

Self-promotion is great. Self-promotion with help is even better. Let me help you promote your book in your locale.

Check the Blog for more on From Here to There: Local Action…

http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


FEATURED AUTHOR-Of-THE-MONTH…

Innerview

IAN MCKINLEY

What came first (in terms of your interest): the science or the science fiction?

Actually, I’ve been fascinated by both for as long as I can remember.

What is your ideal writing environment?

Somewhere sunny & warm and far away from my normal workplace. Extremophile was mainly written in Bermuda. I have just finished drafting a sequel – in the Bahamas. Almost all of the text was hammered into my laptop as I lay in a hammock overlooking the sea.

Describe your writing routine…if you have one.

I write fiction in intense month-long blocks (“holidays”). I like to start early, with a mug of strong coffee to kick the brain cells into life. I usually write solidly for 5 hours or so, with pauses only for more coffee and to change CDs. The rest of the day I do normal holiday things – swimming, snorkeling, scuba – but gradually get more and more saturated with plot development as time passes. Luckily, I have a long-suffering wife who puts up with this!

Is there a difference between how you approach writing your science books and articles vs. how you approached your fiction work?

I write technical stuff constantly, often with several different projects running in parallel. Generally, I outline the entire structure at the start and then gradually expand it, section by section. As this work often involves collaboration with co-authors, there may be several steps of iterative reworking before the final product is ready for publication.

The fiction is completely different; I start with a basic concept and then just let it develop. When I start, therefore, I have no idea what will happen in the middle, much less the end. When I get a complete draft, I send it to friends for review comments but, basically, I just work linearly from the beginning to the end, with only minor polishing thereafter.

What do you do when you aren’t feeling inspired or motivated to write?

So far, I have never suffered from writers’ block when working on fiction. The opposite, in fact; I often find it hard to stop when I find a key to some twist of the plot.

On the technical side, I regularly “hit the wall” and run out of ideas on a particular topic. Here I can usually just put the offending job to one side and get on with something else until inspiration returns. I work on the boundary between such a very wide diversity of technical disciplines (geology, microbiology, archaeology, radiochemistry, …) that I can always find something to do.

What authors inspire you most?

My writing is influenced predominantly by cyberpunk authors – Gibson, Sterling, Stephenson, etc. Otherwise, I was always impressed by the authors who rattled cages by breaking taboos and questioning social mores – especially if this was done within a powerful story; examples such as Vonnegut, Heinlein, Moorcock, Delany and Farmer. It is difficult to prove, but I have always suspected that the books and films portraying the horrific aftermath of a nuclear conflict did much to mobilize public pressure for a peaceful end to the Cold War.

“Extremophile” is your first novel. What motivated you to write it?

I have always enjoyed writing for non-technical readers, but was frustrated by the limited audience reached by non-fiction. Fiction is a much more powerful medium and, despite the fact that the quality of background science in much of it is fairly appalling, this tends to form public opinion on key issues. This set me a challenge – could I produce popular fiction with a solid, but unintrusive, core of technical information relating to some of the major issues of the coming decades? This was the drive to get me started, after that I found that the process was so much fun that it was easy to keep going.

Extremophiles are used to create an elixir of youth. If there were such a “potion”, would you, yourself, take it?

It would certainly be difficult to refuse, wouldn’t it? I think almost anyone would feel this way – which is the basic problem. I believe that over-population is the root cause of most of the global problems that we now face. Just think how much worse things would get if longevity was available to all – or even if known to be available only to a select few. It’s worth taking a little time to think about, as medical science is developing explosively at present and the concept is not as far-fetched as it may sound.

Ian Mc Kinley holds a Ph. D. in chemistry from Glasgow University. He has a professional background in nuclear waste management. A Scot who has lived in Switzerland for 20 years, he has been involved in a diversity of work related to nuclear waste management, including archeology, geology, microbiology, engineering and public communication. He has co-authored three technical books, as well as hundreds of articles in a variety of publications. Extremophile is his first novel. You can also read McKinley’s piece on The Science Behind the Fiction published in the Author’s Advocate, Edition VIII, posted on the blog: http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


PUBLISHER’S PROMPT

Writing Prompt

Use the following, January 18 prompt from “Prompts & Practices” by Judy Reeves to begin, end, or use in the middle of a piece.

“It was noon and nothing is concluded.” (after Donald Rawley)

If you decide to play with the prompt, and you’d like to share it, please send it to me (DigitalPulp Pub@aol.com or nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com) and I will post it in the following week’s Authors’ Advocate. You can find my response posted on the blog:http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/

Site-ings

The Writersbuzz.com
http://thewritersbuzz.com/

The Writer’s Buzz is a community blog whose main focus is to help new and established writers announce their books to the public. Writing your book is the easy part; getting it into your readers’ hands is more difficult. Our goal is to help you gain the readership your book deserves.

WritersServices: The Website for Writers
http://www.writersservices.com/index.htm

This site contains "how to's", articles and information, editorial services, showcasing, and more.

AAA Creative Writers Service
http://p.webring.com/hub?ring=creativeservices

Unique Internet connection to creative professionals and resources that constitute media, such as newspapers, magazines, radio, or television, in an effort to help a variety of fiction, and nonfiction writers, polish and publish their projects.

Writing Contests
http://www.writers-editors.com/Writers/Contests/contests.htm

Listing of various writing contests with inexpensive entry fees.

WHAT’S GOING ON AT DPP…

The Newsletter

We’re Continuing to Change…

As of February 1 we’re:

1) Changing formats
2) Changing our name from The Authors’ Advocate to News Bytes
3) We’ll be publishing bi-monthly instead of weekly

Our Websites

We are in the midst of reconstructing all three of our websites to make them more informative, user-friendly, and more interesting to peruse. As soon as they are complete, we’ll invite you to check them out (of course, you can check them out now if you want to get a good image of “before” and “after”).

Fun Facts

Pooh Day: A.A. Milne’s Birth Anniversary, January 18 The English author, especially remembered for his children’s stories: Winnie the Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner.

This Week’s Author Birthdays:

A.A. Milne, January 18, 1882
Edgar Allan Poe, January 19, 1809
Edith Wharton, January 24, 1862

All of the above was taken from Chase’s Calendar of Events, 2006©

Write on,
Nicky

You Are Your Own Best Marketing Rep!

Once you’ve done the mental work, there comes a point you have to throw yourself into action and put your heart on the line.

Phil Jackson

Getting into Action!

“Your plan will never be perfect or complete. Get over it and go forward,” instructs Lee Silber, author of Self-Promotion for the Creative Person.

If you read last week’s marketing tip (posted here on the blog, January 2), you may have taken the suggestion of connecting a networking source (or sources) with an idea (or ideas) to create a new marketing idea (or ideas).

Now it’s time to put that idea (or ideas) into action.

Action steps can include creating a “to do” list, a time-line and/or calendar. By writing down what you want to do, need to do, and are going to do, you begin the process of committing to a program of action for yourself.

Time lines and/or calendars help prioritize and organize when you are going to follow through with each of your ideas. These tools help you create goals and deadlines that will keep you on top of self-promoting your book.

You might want to include in your time line/calendar the date you want to begin implementing your marketing ideas, and any subsequent dates when you want to follow up with the idea and (if there is one) a date of completion.

For example:

To Do List Items:

1. Create email flyer re: book publication and where book can be purchased
2. Mass email flyer to friends, family & other contacts

Time Line:

January 9-15: Create e-flyer; Check email contact list and add necessary addresses
January 16: Send email en mass to all contacts
January 17-24: Revise flyer…add/delete information, change look of flyer, etc.; Research new contacts.
January 25-31: Send new flyer out again to all contacts.
February 1-7: Assess progress. Is this strategy working well? How can I revise it to get more out of it? (i.e., can you attach a “personal” email along with this, asking for support to pass the information along, adding reviews of the book); How often do I want to/need to send out continual eflyers.
February 8: Write down new plan of action for e-flyers; Create new goals/dates/deadlines.

I know this is pretty simplistic information. But simple = doable, and doable means you can get something done. Hence: action. And forward action, as Lee Silber suggests. So I’ll leave you with the great words of Nike – “Just do it!”

Publisher's Prompt

January is a month…

Use the above to begin (put in the middle of, or end) a thought, poem, short story, or song.


January is a month of anticipated beginnings….which sounds exciting.
And daunting.
And too expecting.
Three hundred and sixty-five days laid out before me,
A whole calendar to fill,
And fill it will.
My goal: to stay in the moment.
For all 525, 600 of them.

Newsletter, Edition IX

THE AUTHOR’S ADVOCATE
The DPP Authors’ Newsletter
EDITION IX
January 9, 2006


"...Biting my truant pen, beating myself for spite:
Fool! said my Muse to me, look in thy heart and write."

Sir Phillip Sidney, Astrophel and Stella


YOU ARE YOUR OWN BEST MARKETING REP!

Once you’ve done the mental work, there comes a point you have to throw yourself into action and put your heart on the line.

Phil Jackson

Getting into Action!

“Your plan will never be perfect or complete. Get over it and go forward,” instructs Lee Silber, author of Self-Promotion for the Creative Person.

Check the Blog for more on Getting into Action…

http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


FEATURED (Non-DPP) AUTHOR FOR THE WEEK…

An A-Musing Author

Jill Badonsky

Innerview

What is your ideal writing environment?

A cottage with a fireplace, a comfortable chair and a view… which is the place I take my writing retreats. If I can’t go there then writing in bed with my laptop is my next choice and then in cafes with loud espresso machines, reminding me when I write steam comes out of my mind.

Describe your writing routine…if you have one.

My most predictable routine is 1). Coffee 2) Meditate 15 minutes (I have a meditation that taps into my creativity) 3) walk for a half hour in nature with my writing in mind 4) write anywhere from 5 minutes to 6 hours depending on my schedule that day.

What do you do when you’re not feeling inspired or motivated to write?

If I’m not feeling inspired I walk or workout, then sit down and play with words. Or I read an author who inspires me, listen to music that does the same, or return to a work I’ve written that I really like and see if it feeds my juices. Sometimes I just pour into writing using the writing prompts I use in classes…unfinished sentences, repetition or stream of consciousness starting with.. I’m not inspired right now but…

What authors inspire you most?

I’m inspired by Bill Bryson, Anne Lamott, Douglas Adams, Karen Jones, Isabelle Allende.

What were the biggest challenges you faced in writing, publishing, and marketing your book, The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard)?

Writing Challenge: The inner demon telling me my stuff wasn’t any good.
Publishing: Waiting a year and a half for the book to come out.
Marketing: President George W. Bush. He started the war in the Middle East two weeks before my book tour. Scheduled interviews, book signings and publicity were cancelled and overshadowed by the war during an author’s most crucial kick-off campaign- the first two months. After that the publishing house abandons you to the next group of authors.

What has been your greatest reward since writing and publishing the book?

Biggest reward: All of the people who email me or show up at workshops and tell me they love the book and that it has helped them. And the friends I've made as a result of the book - they're my tribe.

What has been your biggest challenge in terms of self-promotion?

Not getting enough visibility with one shot and the feeling of overwhelm with how much needs to be done.

What approach to self-promotion has been your best vehicle?

Workshops, talks, training people to use my book for classes and coaching. Magazine articles have helped too as have hooking up with other authors and people who run creative websites with a lot of visibility.

I know it’s hard to pick just one, but which Muse (from your book) is your favorite…or which one do you find yourself utilizing the most?

I don’t like to play favorites because when Muses get mad they withhold ideas. However I think I use Albert, the Muse of Imagination and Innovation the most. He gives lots of tools that make writing easier and fun.. he provides perspectives, attitudes, personas and trigger words that give a writer a starting place or a fresh angle from which to venture.

Got an inspiring quote you’d like to share?

"The mind I love must still have wild places, a tangled orchard where dark damsons drop in the heavy grass, an overgrown little wood, the chance of a snake or two, a pool that nobody's fathomed the depth of--and paths threaded with those little flowers planted by the mind." -- Katherine Mansfield

Jill Badonsky, M.Ed., is a creativity coach, workshop leader, artist, and marketing consultant who is the founder and director of The Muse Is In, an organization devoted to coaching, teaching, facilitating, and marketing workshops and retreats for reawakening creativity. She wrote and starred in a one-woman show, I Can’t Handle Reality, But It’s Really the Only Place to Get a Good Cup of Coffee, and writes a monthly column on creativity for Blessings, a San Diego newspaper.

The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard) is an entertaining, inspirational, and practical handbook for the twenty-first-century seeker. Combining the whimsical and spiritual appeal of Sark with the concrete step-by-step approach of The Artist’s Way, The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard) presents a fresh approach toward accessing your creativity, and is designed specifically for our frazzled and time-sensitive era. Creativity coach Jill Badonsky takes the nine classical Greek Muses and updates them for our time. Along with a little help from their no-nonsense bodyguard, Arnold, they personify ten principles designed to overcome creative blocks and embrace the wonders of self-expression.
You can read more about Jill Badonsky’s book at http://www.themuseisin.com/book.html


PUBLISHER’S PROMPT

Writing Prompt

January is a month…

Use the above to begin (put in the middle of, or end) a thought, poem, short story, or song.

If you decide to play with the prompt, and you’d like to share it, please send it to me (DigitalPulp Pub@aol.com or nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com) and I will post it in the following week’s Authors’ Advocate. You can find my response posted on the blog:http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


Site-ings

Writers Weekly
http://www.writersweekly.com/
This site touts itself as “the highest-circulation freelance writing ezine in the world.” The site offers information about jobs, classes, news, and articles that are of interest to writers.

The Write Market
http://www.writemarket.com/
This site features articles, contests, resources, links that might be of great interest to you.

Writerfind Jobs
http://www.writerfind.com/freelance_jobs/
This site offers global freelance and telecommuting jobs for writers.

Writers Events
http://writersevents.com/
This site offers a calendar for all writers and publishers. It posts daily, weekly, monthly or annual listings of promotional events, meetings, group activities, and speakers. Writers Events has been designed to be quick and easy to use by those looking for 'What's on in Writers' events online and by those wanting to promote their Writers events online.


WHAT’S GOING ON AT DPP…

The Newsletter

We’re Moving…

To Wednesdays! Subsequent newsletters will be sent out on Wednesdays, beginning next week, January 18.

We’re Changing…

Formats! Beginning with our first February issue (Wednesday, February 1), you will be receiving this newsletter in a new and improved format.


Fun Facts

Book Blitz Month: (Jan. 1-31) Focuses attention on improving authors’ relationships with the media in order to create a best-selling book. Free book PR evaluation available. For info: Barbara Gaughen, Media 21, 7456 Evergreen Drive, Santa Barbara, CA 93117. Ph: (805) 968-8567. FAX: (805) 968-5747. Email: bgaughenmu@aol.com Web: www.goodmorningworld.org

National Clean Up Your Computer Month: (Jan. 1-31) Dedicated to the education of computer users with simple tips and methods to increase the efficiency of their systems. For info: Denise Hall, 24797 State St., PO Box 658, Elberta, AL. Ph: (251) 986-6650, FAX: (251) 986-6652 Email: denise@specterweb.com Web: www.specterweb.com

This Week’s Author Birthdays:

Jack London, January 12, 1876
Andy Rooney, January 14, 1919
Ernest Gaines, January 15, 1933

All of the above was taken from Chase’s Calendar of Events, 2006©

Write on,

Nicky



Nicole (Nicky) Pitman
Authors' Advocate
DigitalPulp Publishing
(760) 327-3181
nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com

You Are Your Own Best Marketing Rep!

All our ideas come from the natural world: trees equal umbrellas.
Wallace Stevens

Two-Steppin’

Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups

Candy always gets my attention, so I thought it might get yours as well. If I have gotten your attention, take a moment to think about Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.

Remember that old commercial- One person bumps into another, and one of them says, “Hey, you got your chocolate in my peanut butter!” And the other says, “You got your peanut butter in my chocolate!” And then the little jingle started: “Two great tastes in one candy bar- Reese’s Peanut Butter cups”?

So you remember the commercial, and now you’re probably thinking, what in the world does that have to do with marketing?! Actually, it has a lot to do with marketing- and thinking about marketing differently. Or thinking about ideas differently...As in putting two ideas together to create one new, fabulous marketing idea!

Let’s go back to Networking, the marketing tip from November 28 (in the, oh, not-so-long-ago year of 2005). The little catch-phrase I used in that tip was the Beatles’ “I get by with a little help from my friends”. I also threw in the idea of thinking about “friends you haven’t yet met”.

Networking is probably the most essential ingredient when it comes to self-promotion. But if you couple networking with another idea, you’ve got yourself a dynamite meal (or a whole new candy bar- however you want to look at it)!

Networking + Marketing Idea= Successful Self-Promotion

This is two-steppin’ at its finest. Think of all the people you know. Perhaps you have many of them in your email contact list. That’s a great start- friends, family, colleagues. What about other people you know- entrepreneurs, merchants, coffee house owners, editors of newspapers & magazines (online or traditional), someone at the local library or college, people who work at theatre companies, or people you know who know these people? Make a list (or merge the list[s] that you already have with a new list).

Then, make up a list of ideas for marketing your book. Here are five:

1) Public readings of your work

2) Articles and essays about the kind of writing you do or about your book itself

3) Flyers (paper)

4) Flyers (email)

5) Hosting a party, tea, coffee klatch, dinner with your book as the theme or showcase

Next, match up one or more people from your list with one (or more) of the ideas.

For example: perhaps you, or someone you know, knows the owner of a coffee house, or someone at the local library or college. You could match that person (or people) to the idea of a public reading of your work, and at the reading pass out flyers about you, your book and where to buy it.

Or perhaps you could host a party, or have a friend host a party to celebrate the publication of your book. The party could have a theme, you could talk about your book, do a reading from your book, and pass out flyers with information about you, your book, and where it can be purchased.

Or maybe you know someone, or are willing to go meet someone, who is part of a theatre company that is doing a play that has some kind of connection to your book- its subject matter or the genre. If they’re willing, you could create paper flyers that fit into the production’s program that promote you, your book and how to buy it.

Of course, an email flyer is a fast, easy way to go without ever leaving your house. Create one, send it to your entire email contact list and ask everyone to pass it on to as many people as possible. Voilá!

Keep mixing and matching up people with ideas and see what you come up with- there are endless possibilities.

I am sure that some of you may have thought of these ideas already and, perhaps, have already implemented them. But if you haven’t, give it a go. Who knew that by mixing chocolate with peanut butter you’d get one of the most popular-selling candy bars of all time!

Publisher's Prompt

Getting Physical

*(This prompt is from Roberta Allen’s book The Playful Way to Serious Writing)

Set a timer for 10 minutes. Write about someone real or imagined who has one or more of the physical characteristics listed below. How has one or more of these characteristics affected this person’s life?

A Birthmark A Club Foot A Double Chin A Crooked Nose Ingrown Toenails Wispy Hair Pimples Wrinkles Tattoos Large Pores A Shaved Head Sideburns A Potbelly Freckles A Snub Nose Stained Teeth A Flat Butt Flabby Arms Dimples Thinning Hair A Mustache A Face-Lift An Overbite A Large Butt A Hooked Nose Pockmarks A Scar Fat Thighs False Teeth Big Breasts Bitten Nails A Beard Frizzy Hair Crooked Teeth A Beer Belly A Muscular Chest Thick Lips

Rose

She couldn’t go out. Not with a face like that. She stared at herself in the mirror. Hating her face. Loathing her self. Pissed off at her parents for the stupid DNA they passed on to her.

Why couldn’t she look like Samantha Markley? Why couldn’t she have clear, beautiful skin that was deplete of a blemish? Ooooh- she hated Samantha Markley in this moment! She hated everything!

She stared harder at the mirror, as if doing so would make all those thousands of pink and reddish marks go away. Of course they remained. Taunting her. Letting her know she’d never look like Samantha Markley.

How was she supposed to go to school? How was she supposed to go to Tate Rossmore’s party later tonight?

“Rose,” her mother called from downstairs. “You better hurry up or you’re going to be late for school again.”

Rose. What a flippin’ name, she thought. Too bad they didn’t add an “s” on my damned birth certificate- that would have matched my face perfectly!

Newsletter, Edition VIII

THE AUTHOR’S ADVOCATE
The DPP Authors’ Newsletter
EDITION VIII
January 2, 2006


"How can anyone do better than that- after all, I wrote it myself."
Molière


YOU ARE YOUR OWN BEST MARKETING REP!

All our ideas come from the natural world: trees equal umbrellas.
Wallace Stevens

Two-Steppin’

Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups

Candy always gets my attention, so I thought it might get yours as well. If I have gotten your attention, take a moment to think about Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
Remember that old commercial- One person bumps into another and one of them says, “Hey, you got your chocolate in my peanut butter!” And the other says, “You got your peanut butter in my chocolate!” And then the little jingle started: “Two great tastes in one candy bar- Reese’s Peanut butter cups”?

So you remember the commercial, and now you’re probably thinking, what in the world does that have to do with marketing?! Actually, it has a lot to do with marketing- and thinking about marketing differently. Or thinking about ideas differently...As in putting two ideas together to create one new, fabulous marketing idea!

Check the Blog for more on Two-Steppin’ (and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups)…

http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


FEATURED AUTHOR-Of-THE-MONTH…

Author! Author!

Ian Mckinley

The Science Behind the Fiction

Science fiction authors are a motley crew, which includes a small number of professional scientists but also many others with no particular background in science or technology. There is certainly no correlation between the quality of the literature produced and the technical background of the author – for every example of individuals who excel in both fields, there are dozens of SF masterpieces produced by non-scientists and rather dreadful efforts by highly qualified boffins.

Personally, being involved in the rather esoteric area of assessing the safety of repositories for radioactive waste, you could consider that most of what I write in my day job is a form of fiction – discussing and evaluating what would happen to such stuff over the next million or so years. Over the last thirty years, I’ve produced mountains of paper for textbooks, technical literature and articles for more general audiences. With this background, why write a science fiction novel? And, even if a novel, why in the gritty, grungy niche of cyberpunk?

Well, undoubtedly I get pleasure out of writing fiction and I greatly enjoy reading some of the imaginative and exciting books which cyberpunk has spawned, since kicked into life in the ‘70s and ‘80s by William Gibson, Bruce Sterling and the rest. Despite that, there is also a serious reason, which harks back to a common response I get whenever I talk to non-specialists about radioactive waste. Almost everyone has an idea about what radwaste is – but it seems to come from films (Robocop seems particularly notable), novels and, increasingly, comics, manga and anime. The green, glowing sludge that guarantees a horrific death – or transformation into a bizarre mutant – is a far cry from the mundane reality. The biggest risk associated with the material I deal with is dropping the heavy packages onto someone! It’s worrying when politicians try to pass the buck on difficult decisions, by asking the general public to decide on highly complex issues like the future of nuclear power. How can they do this when they haven’t the foggiest idea of what is involved?

This is my own specialist area, but I also see similar effects if I discuss even more critical technical issues which will have major effects on our society over the next few decades – like climate change, economic unbalance, runaway developments in biotechnology. Films such as Blade Runner and Total Recall have more of an impact in building mental images of what the future will be like than the entire outpourings of academia and the “popular science” literature. Many technical communicators find this frustrating and complain about the portrayal of science in arts and the media. However, this is the real world. If you believe sincerely that there are important messages to be made – as I do – then maybe more of us have to forget about conventional approaches and try to penetrate the media that has a real impact.

The important thing, of course, is the story. The plot, setting and characters have to grab the target audience – any messages lurk in the background, at an almost subliminal level. You can’t lecture, talk down to your readers or attempt to force your own opinions on them. You can, however, introduce some issues, which may well be the defining problems of the mid-21st century. If, at the end of the book, readers are left pondering some question that hadn’t occurred to them previously, it has been a great success. This will only happen, of course, if the book is read and enjoyed – so back to the importance of the story – and the marketing of the end product.

“Extremophile” looks at longevity. I introduce the extreme variant of an effective cure for aging – but this is just one end of a spectrum of developments, all of which are moving ahead rapidly at present. The promise of a longer life – that’s got to be a good thing, surely? Sounds great, until you think of it in the context of a world already strained to breaking point by overpopulation and facing up to the additional pressures of climate change and rising sea level as a result of global warming. Immortality may be the dream of the rich, but could end up the nightmare of the governments and other organisations trying to provide a reasonable standard of living to the poor. Think about it! You may worry today about GM crops and cloning – but these may well not be where the huge, global problems arise in coming decades.

So, back to cyberpunk; dystopic futures with lashings of strange sex and gratuitous violence. Is this really what we have in front of us? I suspect so. In many communities, the definition of what is “acceptable” sexually has evolved dramatically in the last 50 years and there is no reason to think this will change in the future – especially in the light of probable medical developments (cures for AIDS and other STDs) and the access to alternative lifestyles provided by the internet. Violence in society is more easily predictable, as this correlates well with social inequality – particularly when those at the bottom of the heap are constantly exposed to the excesses of those at the top. The changes in the world during the coming century will – in the absence of a complete rethink of international politics – inevitably lead to an even greater and better publicised gulf between the haves and have-nots. Does this worry you? It certainly should!

The future is a very frightening place, particularly because it is being defined by decisions made today without a thought for long-term consequences. If science fiction – even the darkest cyberpunk – can introduce a degree of caution, which then avoids some of the scariest possibilities, then it has served very well indeed. Grandiose aims for a new author, don’t you think? Maybe, but you have to remember the inherently chaotic nature of society; nobody knows what will be the equivalent of the beat of the butterfly’s wings which will eventually result in a social phase transition years afterwards. Well, I’m giving it a try and, although I’ll never know if it has done any good, I’m sure that it’s better than just sitting around complaining. And, if anyone enjoys reading my books, that makes the entire effort worthwhile regardless.

Ian Mc Kinley holds a Ph. D. in chemistry from Glasgow University. He has a professional background in nuclear waste management. A Scot who has lived in Switzerland for 20 years, he has been involved in a diversity of work related to nuclear waste management, including archeology, geology, microbiology, engineering and public communication. He has co-authored three technical books, as well as hundreds of articles in a variety of publications. Extremophile is his first novel.


PUBLISHER’S PROMPT

Writing Prompt

Getting Physical

*(This prompt is from Roberta Allen’s book The Playful Way to Serious Writing)

Set a timer for 10 minutes. Write about someone real or imagined who has one or more of the physical characteristics listed below. How has one or more of these characteristics affected this person’s life?

A Birthmark, A Club Foot, A Double Chin, A Crooked Nose, Ingrown Toenails, Wispy Hair, Pimples, Wrinkles, Tattoos, Large Pores, A Shaved Head, Sideburns, A Potbelly, Freckles, A Snub Nose, Stained Teeth, A Flat Butt, Flabby Arms, Dimples, Thinning Hair, A Mustache, A Face-Lift, An Overbite, A Large Butt, A Hooked Nose, Pockmarks, A Scar, Fat Thighs, False Teeth, Big Breasts, Bitten Nails, A Beard, Frizzy Hair, Crooked Teeth, A Beer Belly, A Muscular Chest, Thick Lips

Use the prompt. Don’t use the prompt. If you decide to play with the prompt, and you’d like to share it, please send it to me (DigitalPulp Pub@aol.com or nicpit@digitalpulppublishing.com) and I will post it in the following week’s Authors’ Advocate. You can find my response posted on the blog:http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/


Site-ings

Robert Ringer: A Voice of Sanity in an Insane World
http://www.robertringer.com/index.html

There’s a great article on the home page right now entitled Beware the Discouragement Fraternity, Part II that tells the stories of how books, once discouraged by publishers and agents became best-sellers.

Dowse/Paying Ezines
http://www.dowse.com/ezine-markets.html

Good list of details and links to paying ezine markets for speculative fiction, science fiction, fantasy, horror, slipstream, and mystery fiction writers online from Bonnie Mercure.

WHAT’S GOING ON AT DPP…

The Bookstore

We’re Open!

Check out your book at the DPP Store (http://www.dppstore.com/) as well as our other DPP authors’ offerings. Tell your friends! Tell your folks! Tell everyone you meet to visit (and shop at) the store!

Postcards

They’re coming…

I know some of you are quite anxious about receiving postcards to announce and promote your book. We are too! We are sorry for the delay, but you should all be receiving your postcards by January 20, so sit tight and I’ll send an email to let you know when they’re on their snail-mail way to you.

DPP Blogs

Genene runs this blog: http://dpppress.blogspot.com/

DPP Press is geared towards our publishers, but you may also find some good information and fun postings by Genene, so check it out!

Catherine runs this blog: http://dppebookstore.blogspot.com/

Catherine runs the DPP Bookstore, among wearing many other hats (i.e. being the DPP “IT” girl, as in I.T.- she is a technological wiz!). For bookstore flashes, and Catherine’s musings, this is a fun blog to visit.

And, of course, my blog: http://digitalpulppublishing.blogspot.com/

Have you all been visiting the blog? That’s where you can find the full posting of each week’s marketing tip, the newsletter is also posted there, as well as my response to the writing prompt. Please feel free to comment and be part of the blog.

Also: if you haven’t started your own blog, and you’d like to- go for it! You can do it for free and it’s pretty easy at http://www.blogger.com/. Below are step-by-step directions that should get you through, if you get confused with the blogger.com directions. Let me know if you have any problems.

How to create a blog:

Go to http://www.blogger.com/

On the right side of the screen is a big box that gives direction
Go to the big orange arrow – create your blog now and click on it

You will enter a Create an account screen
Choose user name Maybe your name
Enter a password Pick one you can remember
Retype password Be sure to be exact
Display Name The name you want people to see
Email address The email where you want messages

Accept

You will enter the Name your blog screen
Blog title Maybe your name
Blog address Maybe your name
Word verification Enter the funny little letters

Continue

Choose a template
Pick from examples Click the button for the pattern you like

Continue

Start Posting

10. Create a post
Title Welcome
Body Whatever you want to say
Allow comments/not Invite comments or block them

Post

View

Happy Blogging!


Communication

One of the biggest parts of my job here at DPP (and one of my favorites), is working as the liaison between our authors (you) and the company. I know that every once in awhile you’ll send an email that I do not respond to automatically. This has typically been because I don’t know the answer to the question you are asking and must find out from one of our other DPP staff members or I need to research it.

From here-on-out, I will respond to your email as soon as I receive it, and either give you an answer immediately, if possible, or let you know that I am “researching” the answer and will get back to you as soon as I have one.

This newsletter is one way to communicate. I will let you know when we will be out of the office for any particular length of time, so that you will know if you call or email during that time, we are not ignoring you- we simply haven’t yet received your communication.

Our typical office hours are 9:00 AM – 4:30 PM, Monday-Friday. If you need to reach us by phone, those are the hours to do it. Email 24/7, of course.

Once again, I’d like to encourage you all to make suggestions about the newsletter, marketing tips, and blog. I am working to provide you with as much good information and encouragement as possible, and your feedback helps me do that.


“Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it [write].”

(I took a small liberty with the last word in the above Oprah Winfrey quote)

Happy New Year!

Write on,

Nicky