TRY PORT MOODY'S CRITIQUE GROUP ON FOR SIZE

Every summer the Port Moody Writers' Group continues to operate for a few that can't bear to stop attending. However, this is also a time when spaces become available as some long-standing members take vacations.

If you have a desire to try us out or want to experience a critique group for the first time, the summer is an excellent time to do so. You only have to try it for one month of four morning sessions costing $41.00. It's a bargain and guaranteed to improve your craft and understanding of writing.

The group is multi-genre—fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Emerging and experienced writers are welcomed and always supported. The groups have been part of the City of Port Moody recreation department for about forty years and this summer are facilitated by Julie H. Ferguson (www.beaconlit.com), a published nonfiction author, freelance travel writer and photographer.

Deets:
Thursdays; 9:30am to noon at the Kyle Centre, behind the old Port Moody City Hall off St. John's Street.
Choose July or August, or both.
July – starts on 4th, ends on 25th. Course #48504
August – starts on 8th, ends on 29th. Course #48505

Call 604.469.4561 and quote the course number to register. We can't wait to get started and meet you!

Related article:
Port Moody Writers' Groups: An Astonishing Record of Success:
http://www.thev3h.com/2012/11/port-moodys-writers-groups-an-astonishing-record-of-success/

WHY DID AMAZON BUY GOODREADS?

Like many authors who have relied on creating buzz from reviews on Goodreads, I was alarmed with the news that Amazon had bought the mega-social site for book lovers. Why? What does it mean? What are the implications?

Amazon's quest for control has always worried me—the company seems to gobble up the lesser, but threatening, companies, and they disappear into a black hole. Indie bookstores, Borders, small publishers, and now the commentators are saying, Barnes and Noble. Indie authors have hated how the cost of shipping their books to Amazon to fulfil their sales means they lose their profit if they don't use CreateSpace. But despite all this, indie authors have swallowed the bitter pill and listed their titles on Amazon because they must be seen in the online catalogue that is the biggest in the world.

I have long enjoyed Goodreads because of its independence. I list my titles there, engage in the social side of the site and forums with readers and other authors, and review most of the books I read there. I pray that I can continue to do this without interference.

So why has the merger occurred? My reading on the issue would indicate that the venture capital investors in Goodreads were ready to reap their rewards. As no big publisher or consortium was interested, and they should have been, GR was ready to sell. Amazon was happy to buy and remove a possible threat that might have expanded into a competing online e-bookseller, selling books for platforms other than Kindles. Also GR has 16 million reviewers whom Amazon wants for their recommendation database, according to The Authors Guild in the US.

The implications? GR says it will continue as before. Amazon vows to let it be. But for how long?

I certainly can't predict what will happen next, but worry that the GR reviews will be chopped, deleted, and some never to be seen again. And, if all the reviews stay, who will bother to read them if they don't trust what Amazon posts. As Scott Turow wrote today,"As those in advertising have long known, the key to driving sales is controlling information."

Hmm! Unsettling to say the least ....

Related article:

• Authors Guild Calls Amazon/Goodreads Deal a 'Devastating Act of Vertical Integration'

I'M A HYBRID

No, I'm not a car, but a hybrid author, the name recently coined for those who write some books for a traditional publisher and self-publish their other titles.

I was a very early adopter of the idea, long before this adjective came into use. In 1999 after two books on Canadian submarine history were already published, I began to self-publish books for writers, teachers, and one for professional speakers.

In Y2K I had failed to sell the full-length manuscripts for writers to a publisher—too small a market in Canada, I was told. So I divided them into six mini-guides of about 55 to 85 pages without spines. I produced them on a high-end printer that could print them in booklet form in my office, designed my own covers, and sold them on my website and at events where I spoke. They were a hit at $10.00 each and I could barely keep up with the sales.

I have always thought doing both was a sound business practice as a writer and taught aspiring authors to hedge their bets by considering the possibilities of the two approaches to publication, especially for nonfiction authors. In 2008 I self-published a 174 page book (right) using a short-run printer for Canadian writers yearning to get published, which also sold well. But the electronic revolution took off, and when this title needed revising a third time, I self-published it as an ebook only. That was a very good move.

From 2006 to the present, I have continued to have my Canadian history titles published by Dundurn in Toronto, and in 2014 they are re-releasing my first book again.

Lately I've been reading about authors who are taking similar approaches for both fiction and nonfiction. Some have even managed to retain the e-rights of their traditionally published print books so they can self-publish them. Others, who once espoused the older route, have now switched to self-publishing all their titles.

While the publishing industry is in such a state of flux and authors are getting published anyway they can, I'm betting there will be many more hybrid authors.

Now I'm not alone and I have a name.

FIVE KEY STEPS TO WORKING WITH EDITORS

FIVE KEY STEPS TO WORKING WITH EDITORS

by Debra Purdy Kong, mystery author

A few years ago, a panelist at the annual Bouchercon Mystery Conference told the audience that he didn’t keep written profiles about recurring characters in his series because he knew his fans would correct him if he got it wrong. I was stunned. I’m not only an author, but an avid reader. If I find inconsistencies in a character’s eye color or height, for example, I won’t stick with a series.

Editors know that thorough substantive and copy editing is crucial. Every writer should know this too, whether self or traditionally publishing, writing nonfiction, stand-alone novels, or a series. Why put months, or even years, of work into writing a book, only to come up short by glossing over the last vital step? Publishers, editors, and writers want the process to run smoothly, but problems do arise. Adequate preparation will go a long way to prevent a difficult, time-consuming, and costly experience.

Those of you who are self-publishing will save a lot of money by doing your own preparation rather than expecting an editor to sort through key issues, and who knows your book better than you? As for you editors, with this information on hand, you’ll catch errors more easily, gain a quick, clear overview of the book, and avoid misunderstandings.

 These steps will help both writers and editors catch errors:

 This map, illustrates the relationships between each of the main characters in the novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• Compile a list of all characters in the book with desired name spelling, physical descriptions, and relationship to the protagonist or other main characters.
• Compile a list of geographical locations (also with intended spelling) indicating which locations are real or fictional
• Prepare a list of special terms or made-up words
• Build a timeline of major events in the book
• Provide physical descriptions of main characters.

For those writing a series, you’ll need to describe where the book fits into the series.

There are different ways to create lists, however Excel works well for me when preparing a timeline. I head the first three columns Character, Purpose, and Relationship to Protagonist. The fourth is labeled Chapter One, sub-headed with the time and date. Below Character, I list primary and secondary characters as they appear in the book, then note something about their purpose under the chapter they appear in. The great thing about Excel is that it’s user friendly. You can easily manipulate rows and columns to insert or delete material.

Writers out there are probably groaning by now, since this preparation takes time, but it’s worth the effort. When my editor first asked for a list of characters and a timeline, I was intimidated, however it wasn’t long before I discovered three unnecessary characters and illogical timing for some events. When you’re working on a series, those lists become an invaluable resource to help you and your editor remember things.

List compiling will be easier if you start during earlier drafts. By the time your manuscript is ready for a final edit, discrepancies in eye color and height won’t be an issue. After all, who wants to be the writer who relies on readers to catch errors?

© Debra Purdy Kong 2013

Debra Purdy Kong is the author of Alex Bellamy white-collar crime mysteries Taxed to Death and Fatal Encryption. Her newest series features transit security cop, Casey Holland in The Opposite of Dark, Deadly Accusations, and upcoming Beneath the Bleak New Moon. More info about Debra can be found at www.debrapurdykong.com

TMAC'S PRO-D FOR TRAVEL WRITERS

The Travel Media Association of Canada's BC chapter put on a superb day-long professional development seminar on Saturday, March 2, 2013. Held at the conference centre at River Rock Casino Resort in Richmond, BC, much of what I learned was applicable to freelance writing in general. So here in a nutshell are my highlights:

1. I was fascinated by what Dave Olson, a director of Vancouver-based Hootsuite, had to say. Condensed down, he urged us all to use Twitter to do our pre-trip research by connecting with local experts at our destinations. Hashtags are the answer to success here and should include place and your interest. For example, #Portland #Craftbeer. You need to manage the responses into "streams" on Hootsuite using one stream per hashtag. Once you have collected a few locals who're interested in your quest, invite them to meet you in a group after you arrive. Dave suggested we ask them to bring images to show us and interview them to record their wisdom. Local experts bring authenticity to your articles, blog posts, images, tweets, etc. @DaveOHoots.
2. Claudia Cornwall, ethics instructor at SFU, defined the three ethical areas of concern to travel writers—bias, deception, and conflict of interest. Writers can be edgy and pro or con, but not libelous. No-one should give false credentials; lie in their text; or make reservations under assumed names. Freelancers can face many conflicts: Should we omit negative experiences; should we accept fees for mentioning properties, tour companies, etc; should we ask for $$s to write about the above, were a few mentioned and discussed. Claudia also urged us to be aware of cultural and ecological sensitivities when we visit and then write about a destination. She also reminded us that in the USA, disclosure of hosted trips is a legal requirement, but not in Canada. Even so, we must always disclose what we have received.
3. One small point brought forward much discussion. When travel writers tweet on trips, should they use hashtags and @...? E.g: #Jamaica, #visitsaskatchewan, or @WestJet. Would that be considered "Promoting"? We learned that many in the travel industry track those hashtags and @s closely. When I asked two PR companies and one tourism board what they want me to do, they said, "Yes!" They definitely want me to identify them and the places I tweet about using # or @ on Twitter. Indeed, they and their clients expect it.

I spent the rest of the morning learning how to create videos using iMovie, which I won't go into here. Suffice it to say, this session was well done by Randy Gibson. One valuable tip I learned, was to always shoot video horizontally.

After lunch was a series of round table discussions with experts that provided me with little new info and a highly popular breakout: How to Publish Your Own Professional Books using Blurb.com. I did not attend this presentation as I have been using this excellent service since it began, have published ten books already, and teach it myself. Perhaps another TMAC member could write a blog post for others who are interested.

The final session was a panel of two industry members and two media members—Media and Industry Pitfalls and Solutions—that I found excellent as a relative newcomer to the travel writing world. I learned the expectations that industry has of a writer, what not to do on press trips, how to fix difficulties if they arise, and much more. I will blog about this separately when I return from a solo press trip this week. 

I urge other TMACers who attended other sessions to use the comment section to fill in the rest for us.

IMAGES: © Photos by Pharos 2013. All rights reserved.

Related articles:

• I'm No Gambler, But ....

BUILD YOUR SCAFFOLDING, THEN TAKE IT DOWN

I'm proud to again welcome my professional editor, Joyce Gram, to The Beacon Blog. This time she shows us how to improve our storytelling by removing the scaffolding:

As an editor, I spend a lot of time showing writers how to get to the meat of their story, how to clear away the stuff that is bogging down their narrative, whether fiction or nonfiction, and threatens to send their readers looking for something else to do. Often the problem is weak writing—loose phrasing, misplaced emphasis, and especially repetition. Recently, I showed a writer how she had said the same thing five times in one short paragraph. Granted, the repetition was subtle, but it really slowed the pace. It was the kind of writing that makes a reader think, Can we just get on with things? 

Scaffolding obscures a reader's focus
(Photo: vpickering)

There is another level of the writing process that can bog a story down even more. It’s called “scaffolding,” a concept I had never heard of until I read Betsy Warland’s indispensable little book, Breathing the Page: Reading the Act of Writing. We have all read pieces that give us lots of background, lots of explanation, lots of setting up. Sprinkled in amongst all this may be bits of story, and often that’s what keeps us reading, but at the end of a few paragraphs—or pages—we haven’t moved along very far, and we’re getting impatient.

Most of this background, explanation and setting up is scaffolding: the essential platform from which the writer has built her story. Warland describes three motivating factors that propel writers to use scaffolding: notations, encodement and laziness. Notations are the shorthand that we writers use to remind ourselves that something is missing and needs to be fleshed out; in the meantime, we soldier on with the writing. Encodement is trickier. It is the blank spots where we think everything is perfectly clear, but it isn’t. It’s encoded, as if we were talking to an intimate who can finish our sentences, and the reader becomes confused. Only we can fill in the blanks.

And then there is laziness. The word may be a bit harsh—and pessimistic. I prefer to say that the writer isn’t quite there yet; she needs to write a half dozen more drafts and pay a little more attention to her craft. But like the other types of scaffolding, if this one isn’t removed, the narrative will never have energy, will never sing, and the reader will never sigh with joy.

Warland includes a helpful example of how to remove scaffolding. The original draft in her example is full of description, explanation and scene setting, with nothing happening until the final phrase. In the revision, with this scaffolding removed, the story unfolds. The scene opens with the piece of action that ended the original, and the reader is drawn into a vivid narrative.

Betsy Warland, Breathing the Page: Reading the Act of Writing. Toronto: Cormorant Books, 2010. 

© 2013 Joyce Gram

Gram Editing Services

www.gramediting.com

email@joycegram.com 

TRAVEL WRITING IS NOT ALL YOU DO!!

... Travel writers sell dreams....

Wild African Penguins, South Africa

Join Julie H. Ferguson as she presents
Travel Writing is NOT All We Do!

A lively, guided Q&A session with an addicted freelance travel writer/ photographer and nonfiction author. Text is not enough today, so join Julie to discover what is in her "Go Bag" when she travels on assignment and how she adds value to any kind of article that editors and readers cannot resist.

St-Malo, Brittany, low tide

Brought to you by the Golden Ears Writers

March 19, 2013

7-9pm

The Arts Centre Theatre Lobby

Maple Ridge, BC

Free!
No reg required

Deets and map here 

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IMAGES: © Photos by Pharos 2011. All rights reserved