Month: October 2011

Promo Push

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

So, Sapphire comes out a week from today!

You can even preorder it from Carina (for epub format) or Amazon, if you’re a Kindle fan like me.

It’s exciting, yes, but complicated by the fact that I’m flying to Puerto Rico on Sunday the 23rd for the day job and I don’t know what kind of internet access I’ll have. So, this last weekend I played forward-balancing. I had a list of 13 things I needed to do for the release. Carina alone has about four things to write/fill out for the release day. Which is great – don’t get me wrong – one of the things I love about Carina is their commitment to marketing their books. Still, it was a lot to do, with that and filling out interview questions and writing guest posts.

On Saturday night while we watched movies, I played arts and crafts with bookmarks. Ribbons and shinies. I fell asleep in my chair while cutting ribbons into bookmark-length pieces. (This may have had as much to do with the Jamesons I’d been drinking as much as me being tired, before you feel sorry for me.) I woke up, my hand still clutching a fistful of sapphire-blue ribbons.

It seemed like a metaphor for something.

At any rate, the ghosts of me should be all over the internet even while I’m in a Spanish-speaking US territory asking them about “agua” over and over. You’ll see my lovely and dedicated friends making noise for me.

What would I do without all of you?

Each one of you gets a blue ribbon. Maybe even with a sparkly on the end.

I know – don’t say I never gave you anything! 😉

The Wages of Professionalism

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

I wonder why I only get these eerie iridescent colors at sunrise and not at sunset? Something to do with the air being cooler? Doesn’t seem logical, but there it is.

I’m sure there’s an explanation for it and I just don’t know what it is. Some things there aren’t sound reasons for. Like a lot of publishing.

Yesterday, Angela James posted a very interesting piece to the Carina Press blog about how the acquisitions team works. And why that team rejects about 40% of what their editors recommend for acquisition. See, Carina uses freelance editors. You pitch to them, send them your work, maybe revise and resubmit. The editor can reject the stauthor history, marketability, editorial needs of book and why they did (or in some cases did not) love it. For established authors, we look up sales figures, both from Carina Press, if they’re a returning author, and via Bookscan, if they’ve published elsewhere. We discuss what we know of the author’s writing and sales history, what they’re like to work with, how popular the genre is, merits of the manuscript, how much work it will need, and how it fits into our program.ory at any point during this process, but if she decides yes, then she has to write up a report for the acquisitions team to convince them to accept the work for publication. (They also write up reports for the rejected works and Angela often tweets those reasons, which can be educational.  She recorded ones from the other day here, if you’re interested to see.)

What’s interesting about the breakdown of that 40% rejection from the acquisitions team is all the information they take into account. Among other things:

  • author history
  • marketability
  • editorial needs of book
  • sales figures, both from Carina Press, if they’re a returning author, and via Bookscan, if they’ve published elsewhere
  • author’s writing and sales history
  • what they’re like to work with
  • how popular the genre is
  • merits of the manuscript
  • how much work it will need
  • how it fits into Carina’s program

Regular readers know where I’m going with this. Yeah, it’s the piece that none of us wants to think about. We want each new story to be judged on its own merit, as its own bright and shiny individual thing. It might be, but there is a constant running through this: the author. We cannot afford to be difficult to work with.

I know, I know – you’re pointing to certain Famous Authors renowned for behaving badly. But they make TONS OF MONEY. Which excuses all most sins. Being an artist is never an excuse to be unprofessional. Not with deadlines, not with how you handle edits, not in elevator gossiping. Just never. Because we live in an age where there really *is* a permanent record. Nothing ever dies on the interwebs.

Another Carina Press editor and author, Rhonda Stapleton, posted a story on her blog the other day about how she had to reject a manuscript that she really enjoyed, because Carina is not handling that genre. She was sorry to do it – until she saw that the author in question posted snippy comments about the rejection. Which left her feeling like she’d dodged a bullet. Who wants to work with someone who’ll snark about you behind your back?

No one. And that’s who we’ll get.

For Your Immediate Attention

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

The moon put on another gorgeous show this morning, so you get full moon pic, redux.

Before I had my website redone, I posted my blog on Blogger. Funny how I phrased that, like my blog is this abstract concept that floats in space until I find a place to park it. At any rate, this website uses WordPress. Apparently with WordPress comes huge amounts of spam commenting. Now my website designer uses Akismet to block the bad comments, but they all go to this spam folder.

I can’t help looking.

See what they do is say flattering things about you and your blog, then slip in a link to another site. Or blatantly pimp some device. Zune is big for this. No, I have no idea why. Most are in the slightly distorted English featured in Nigerian bank emails. This seems to be its own language now, which I propose we call Spamglish.

So, some just seem to be admiring comments, relying upon the user link for clickage:

Recently, I didnt give so much thought to writing comments on blog entries and have left comments even less. Checking out your insightful page, will probably encourage me to do so more regularly.

Your place is valueble for me. Thanks!…

Some act like they’re giving substantive feedback, which is never related to the topic:

A powerful share, I simply given this onto a colleague who was doing slightly analysis on this. And he the truth is purchased me breakfast as a result of I discovered it for him.. smile. So let me reword that: Thnx for the deal with! But yeah Thnkx for spending the time to debate this, I really feel strongly about it and love reading extra on this topic. If potential, as you develop into expertise, would you thoughts updating your blog with more particulars? It is extremely helpful for me. Big thumb up for this blog submit!

I was reading something else about this on another blog. Interesting. Your linear perspective on it is diametrically contradicted to what I read to begin with. I am still pondering over the various points of view, but Im tipped to a great extent toward yours. And irrespective, thats what is so super about contemporary democracy and the marketplace of thoughts online.

My spouse and i felt very ecstatic that Chris managed to finish up his investigations via the ideas he received from your very own web pages. It is now and again perplexing to just find yourself giving away ideas that some other people could have been selling. And we also see we have the website owner to thank for this. The explanations you have made, the easy web site menu, the friendships you help foster – it’s many sensational, and it’s really helping our son and the family feel that that issue is amusing, and that’s wonderfully serious. Thank you for everything!

Others just blatantly pimp something:

How to get a six pack fastWill show you how to get a sixpack fast

Or are weirdly random, probably cribbed from posts they actually pertained to:

Sooo cute I cant believe those are made of eggs. Thanks for sharing the info. Ill also make stuff like those.

Ralph, Im wanting into your concern. I know whats causing it, its only a make a difference of finding a viable solution.

Those  are easy. It’s the ones that I *want* to believe, that fluff my vanity, that are the hardest to delete:

This is very interesting, You’re a very skilled blogger. I have joined your feed and look forward to seeking more of your magnificent post. Also, I have shared your website in my social networks!

Hey, it could be true, right?

This one is the one that I’ve hesitated over. I’ve kept it in the spam filter for several days now. It’s not in Spamglish, but it does share some features in common with these others. And Akismet did call it spam. I even looked at the link and it looks like vacation photos. But I’m wary that it’s a trap.

I don’t normally comment on blogs.. But nice post! I just bookmarked your site

All of these, by the way, were in the filter this morning (except the last one). That means 13 came in over night.

At least they’re entertaining to read!

Rude Awakenings

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

Harvest Moon sets just at sunrise this morning – just lovely.

Have I ever mentioned that our dog, Zip, is pretty much completely deaf? Yeah… He’s an older dog now and it happens. Most of the time it’s not that big a deal. He’s a border collie, so he responds well to hand signals. And he’s generally pretty well behaved. Because he can’t hear, he’s less sensitive to being disturbed by outside noises. So, no more pacing at night or running to the window to see who’s going by.

However.

He dreams like a son-of-a-gun. Couple this with no sense of his own sound-production….

That’s right. 4am he had a bark-attack. Full volume, right next to the bed.

Oh. My. God.

I sat up bolt upright. The kitties went sailing. You know how in stories people say they feel like their hearts might burst? Yeah, that. Nothing like a huge adrenaline kick yanking you out of a deep sleep in the early morning.

I could swear I have an epinephrine hangover today.

Who’s Your Audience?

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

On Saturday, my mom mentioned that they were heading out to a fun local bar to watch the Aggie’s football game. Now, this is the woman who advised me that I could find the perfect man by trolling the aisles at Tattered Cover bookstore during a Bronco‘s game. It used to drive her crazy that my stepfather, Leo, would loll around all weekend long watching football games. And basketball games. And baseball games. Leo passed away a few years back and now my mom is remarried – this time to, Dave, a Texas A&M graduate. When she told me about the plan for the game, I said, “I wonder if Leo ever realized that all he had to do to get you on board with football-watching was to take you to a fun bar?”

“Even if he had,” my mom replied, “he would never have paid to watch a football game.”

It occurred to me that Dave is a wise man, who knows his audience well.

I read an interesting review the other day of Margaret Atwood’s new essay collection, meant to be an examination of fantastic stories. (Caveat: I have not read the collection myself and am relying on the reviewer’s assessment here.) Margaret Atwood has always been a favorite author of mine and I’ve admired her ability to straddle genres. It’s always been my impression that people are somewhat bemused by her science fiction books (Handmaid’s Tale, Oryx & Crake, The Year of the Flood), sprinkled amidst the “literary” ones (Cat’s Eye, Robber Bride, Lady Oracle). The reviewer confessed disappointment that she really had little illuminating to say about the genre for anyone who is a dedicated SFF reader. He suggests that those who pick up the collection only as Atwood fans who otherwise don’t read much SFF might get something out of it. And I thought, yeah, but I bet most of the people who aren’t SFF readers won’t pick up this book.

Writers and, more to the point, publishers and marketers, often ponder who the audience for a particular work will be. As a newbie writer, I really hated that question. It was very difficult to imagine who my readers might be, besides “someone like me” (my standard answer) or people who already loved me and thought I was wonderful. I think this is something you get better at knowing, the more you publish. Meeting readers goes a long way towards this. You discover who these people are, who don’t know you but love your stories.

I’ll give you a hint: they’re not like me, either.

In many ways, I still believe that writing the story should be all internal, about what the story and I decide it should be. But there’s a point at which you have to bring your critical eye and think about who will be reading this. Will they understand that reference? Will they squick at some dark detail? Deciding what to do from there is part of the acquired skill of being a professional writer.

Sometimes it means paying out a little bit, in whatever currency that might be, a bit of sacrifice, a little pain, in order to achieve the greater goal.