How To Succeed in the Business of Writing if You DON’T live in the Kansas City Area

Okay, maybe my last post was a bit unfair. For writers who do not live in the KC area or otherwise could not come to The Business of Writing - Success, here are a few nuggets of wisdom the 80 or so attendees got to hear from a few of the dozen experts:

• YouTube as a social marketing platform and search engine.  Are you aware that YouTube is the second most popular search engine after Google? Neither was I. Younger generations, I was also surprised to learn, visit YouTube before Google. (This is valuable information for those of us who write for children and young adults.) Creating vlogs (video logs) is a great way to engage your audience. “People want friends and engagement,” said Leah Stella Stephens, a self-described YouTube junkie who posts videos as Stellabelle. “If you’re boring and dull, that’s fine. There’s a place for you on YouTube,” says Stephens, who is anything but boring and dull. (How can anyone who wears a green, feathered wig be either?) "Be yourself. No one is exactly like you. Take risks."

• Develop your brand and be consistent.  There’s a reason why Coca-Cola cans are red and white and why those colors resurface in every commercial Coke makes (including white polar bears), says Kelly Dobyns Ziegler, principal of ZiggyFranz Advertising. Your brand, which can include colors, symbols (Nike’s swoosh), or special fonts (Stephen King’s), identifies who you are to your customers. Your brand should have “one voice,” Ziegler said, and should be present on your author website, email signature, business cards, and so forth.

• What makes someone say, “I’ll have what she’s having”?  This question was posed by Cyndi Swall, who describes herself as an executive coach and bliss mentor. Her answer was authenticity. “There can’t be a disconnect between the work you have created and how you show up in the world,” she said. “Perception is reality. Who are you, and what do you want me to feel about your work?” According to Swall, the story you are telling is your own and what’s possible for you.

• Why aren’t booksellers just thrilled when you bring in your newly published book for them to sell?  Pat Worth, co-owner of River Reader in Lexington, MO, gave several possible answers. Are you coming in at a bad time and expecting the owner to drop everything to work with you? Did you do your research to find out if this bookstore caters to your audience? Are you selling your book at competing venues down the street? Any of these actions can turn off a prospective bookseller, said Worth. On the other hand, coming in prepared can make booksellers want to carry your book and help you promote it. “You must have a website,” she said. “What materials do you have to help us sell your books—posters, shelf talkers?  Would you be available for NPR interviews?”

• Worried about copyright issues?  Donald R. Simon, J.D./LL.M, president of Simon Business Consulting, Inc., gave practical advice for protecting yourself and others. When submitting to a publisher, said Simon, “make sure you don’t send out stuff unsolicited. Only send it to people who have requested it." Simon stressed that writers should establish relationships with publishers or agents before sending their work. He also discussed work-for-hire contracts and clarifying who’s going to own the property if you’re working with collaborators. “Get it in writing,” he said.

Developing relationships was one of the recurring themes of the day.  Authors need to build positive relationships with their audience, of course, but also with booksellers, publishers, literary agents, and each other. The Business of Writing - Success was all about developing relationships and being authentic.

So if you missed out, don’t fret. Seek out opportunities to learn from professionals in your area, and don’t be afraid of change. Cyndi Swall, the executive coach, could easily have been talking about writing when she said, “Coaching is always about forward motion.” She encouraged each writer to ask, “Is what I’m thinking and doing in support of my new story, or is it keeping me stuck in my old story?”

How are you moving forward?

How to Succeed in the Business of Writing: Free Kansas City Workshop

So, you’ve written your novel. What do you do now? Should you self-publish or seek out an agent or publisher?  How do you go about marketing the book? What about copyright protection? Social media? Headshots?

The modern publishing world is filled with terms that can make a writer’s head spin.

But, relax! There is a guide through the maze. If you live in the Kansas City area, you can come on Saturday, November 10, to The Business of Writing - Success, Getting the Word Out. This workshop will feature 12 "mini-sessions" in topics relevant to new as well as seasoned writers. The presenters will include professionals in fields such as selling yourself, social networking, legal issues, accounting, and even stress management.

This workshop is not about writing or editing your work. It’s about taking the next step: getting your work out there.

And best of all: the workshop is FREE!

You do not even have to register to attend, though, registering at the above site helps the event's planners know how much food to prepare.  (Yes, writers need to eat, too!)

Local authors (including me) will also be on hand to sell our books.

The Business of Writing - Success, Getting the Word Out,  a one-day event, will run 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday, November 10, at Community Christian Church, 4601 Main, Kansas City, MO.

Don't let your novel languish in despair of ever being published or dying on the vine once it is published. Come to the workshop and find out how to get your work out there.

Cloud Atlas: Eye Candy for the Brain

Cloud Atlas By David Mitchell (Photo credit: life serial)

In 1936, a young, gay composer named Robert Frobisher flees from his lover’s hotel room. Decades later, the haunting melody he composes finds its way into the world of a reporter investigating a nuclear power plant. Decades before, an ill young lawyer leaves behind a journal for Frobisher to find.

These are just a few of the connections between characters, times, and places that turn up in Cloud Atlas, a stunning visual feast which spans the distant past, the present, and the far future. It features stalwart actors such as Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Hugo Weaving and Hugh Grant in multiple roles, heavily made up in some cases and crossing ethnic and gender barriers.  The actors are ably supported by computer-generated locations so imaginative they make the heart skip a few beats.

Yet for all its technical wizardry and narrative cleverness, Cloud Atlas never quite rises to the heights it could have achieved.  

 After nearly three hours of jumping back and forth between multiple narratives, the story falls short of saying anything new or offering new ideas. 

The movie’s central theme—that people are all connected and that our lives are not our own—is repeated ad nauseum like a liturgy to the faithful. If you accept this philosophy as true, here it is again to reinforce your belief. If you do not accept it, Cloud Atlas offers no compelling argument.

What we are left with instead is the cinematic equivalent of Trivial Pursuit. Just as players of the venerable board game move forward by correctly answering questions of a, well, trivial nature, so does Cloud Atlas connect its narratives in trivial ways. So what if Frobisher reads the lawyer’s incomplete narrative? So what if Frobisher’s composition turns up in a record store decades after his death? 

Some of the narratives, granted, are fun to watch—particularly an unscrupulous book publisher’s harrowing attempts to escape from a nursing home—and others explore the choices people make between cowardice and bravery.  Religion, consumerism, and corruption turn up as recurring themes.

But, in the end, the story telling and connections reminded me of classic Marvel and DC comics.   

Characters from one series would pop up unexpectedly in another. A weapon abandoned by one villain would be discovered issues later by another. A storyline from one book would lead to a new plotline in another.

And while such connections can be fun to piece together, Cloud Atlas sadly leaves little to the imagination. Everything is spelled out for us, leaving nothing for the reader to do but marvel at the technical and narrative gymnastics. (Hint for writers:  If you’re trying to impress the audience with how clever you are, you’re going about it wrong.) I felt I was watching a story, not participating in it.

The difference between watching a story and participating in one can be summed up by audience reactions to Cloud Atlas and Marvel's The Avengers, released last summer. When Avengers ended, the audience applauded. When Cloud Atlas ended, people filed somberly out of the theater. A funeral would have been more engaging.

Film Review: The Amazing Spider-Man—Not So Amazing

Spider-Man ™  and © Marvel.  Poster art © Sony

 

I’m usually several months or even years behind in my film viewing, so I only recently got around to watching The Amazing Spider-Man, released last summer.

Was it worth the wait?

In a word: no.

Oh sure, Andrew Garfield serves the role of Peter Parker/Spider-Man well. He’s a worthy successor to Tobey Maguire as a science nerd and impetuous but well-meaning dork—an ordinary guy.

And the film updates Spidey’s costume and features rapid-fire action sequences, humor, and pathos—all necessary ingredients for a Spider-Man movie. It’s adorned with veteran actors (Martin Sheen, Sally Field, Denis Leary) in supporting roles, and it’s got a mean and nasty villain (The Lizard this time, instead of The Green Goblin) who earns both our sympathy and hatred.

But in spite of boasting everything a modern super-hero film should have, The Amazing Spider-Man plods along like an emotional flat tire.

All the classic elements of Spider-Man’s origin are still there. Peter bitten by a radioactive spider—check. Peter being picked on at school by Flash Thompson—check. “With great power comes great responsibility”—check (though clumsily reworded). Murder of Uncle Ben—check.

Years ago, I took a series of courses in Arthurian legends. Among other things, we discussed the key elements of the legend—what must a re-telling via film or novel absolutely include to be a genuine King Arthur story, not a phony wannabe?  (Some of the items we came up: Arthur himself, Guinevere, Lancelot, the sword in the stone, and Merlin.) 

The filmmakers of The Amazing Spider-Man must have composed a similar laundry list. They kept what they had to but changed or altered whatever they could in order to distance the new film from the Maguire franchise. The most obvious change is the substitution of Mary Jane Watson with Gwen Stacy. This change adheres somewhat closer to the original comics (Gwen was Peter’s girlfriend before Mary Jane), and, though there are obvious differences between Gwen and MJ (one's a blonde, the other's a redhead; one's a brilliant science student, the other an accomplished actress), it still felt as if one cookie-cutter high school sweetheart was substituted for another.

Police Captain George Stacy, Gwen's father, also figures prominently in the film, and fans of the comics should feel ashamed if they don't know exactly where this is going. Never mind. Denis Leary is fun to watch.

But most changes seem arbitrary, such as the manner in which Uncle Ben dies. Yes, there is still a shooting and a robber, and Peter still feels horribly responsible. But the filmmakers strained to make this pivotal event as “different” from past accounts as possible. The result is like eating stale cake with fresh frosting.

And therein lies the fatal flaw of The Amazing Spider-Man: It takes few risks except for superficial and ultimately meaningless ones.

The most successful super-hero films of the last decade or so (Spider-Man, X-Men, The Dark Knight) dug deep into the well of each character and drew out a gusher of new potential. They didn’t “update” their heroes so much as they highlighted their universal and timeless qualities. 

The Amazing Spider-Man tries too hard to be now. When a major character dies (which happens twice in this film), we’re supposed to feel something, but I did not. When Peter struggles to keep his promise to one character, we’re supposed to sense his inner nobility, but neither the struggle nor the nobility are present. Instead, it is the villain who comes off as more noble, more heroic in the end.

So this film is like the socially inept kid who wants to hang out with the “cool” kids but thinks the wrong things are cool. He’s all flash and no substance.

For your Spidey film fix, rent the first two Maguire films instead.

What do Writing Teachers Write?

This is a truncated post because I've been busy preparing something for JCCC Faculty Day of Writing, a special site set up "to celebrate writing in all its forms" as part of the National Day on Writing. Other professors from Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, KS, will be submitting their writing throughout the day.

My contribution is the first chapter of THE POWER CLUB™,  newly edited from the posting back in July.  Even if you've read it before, check it out the new version: It's only getting better!

So what do writing teachers write?  Check out JCCC Faculty Day of Writing to find out. 

 

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