Right Writing News, September 16, 2008, Issue #35

In my blog on The Writing Life, I've been writing about the children's book market. While this portion of the marketplace continues to be highly competitive, there is opportunity for writers. Let me draw several principles to help you in your efforts.

1. Get acquainted with the various nuances of the children's market. The books are targeted for specific age categories and you should become familiar with these ranges. You need to have a specific target market for your book manuscript. The vocabulary and topics will be different for each age group and your manuscript will have a better reception if you understand these rules.

2. Be flexible in your goals and dreams. Show your writing talent by writing for the children's magazine market. If you don't have opportunity with books, then try in a different area such as magazines. Also be flexible and be willing to take any opportunity. For example, many writers are only looking for a royalty book deal arrangement or where they earn a percentage of the sales from each book. Many children's publishers only offer the writer a work made for hire agreement or a flat fee for the writing. Are you willing to write under these conditions? I have written a number of books with a work made for hire agreement.

3. Join children's organizations. One of the best for children's writers is the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. You don't have to be published to become a member and they have an extensive array of resources and helps to teach you more about the children's marketplace.

4. Take training such as courses from the Institute of Children's Literature. The ICL has been training writers for many years. I love their course materials and their style of instruction. For over two years, I taught at the ICL and had many students which I mentored through the process of writing children's books. As an instructor, I critiqued their lessons and returned them to the students encouraging them to move ahead with their dreams and plans for children's writing.

5. Continue to build your relationships with editors and explore their needs. Can you write to one of their needs? Many writers are only focused on writing what they want to write. In general these writers ignore the marketplace and the needs of an editor. In the process, they are missing many opportunities for their children's writing to be published and to hone their craft.

6. Be persistent and keep working at it. You never know where you will find the open door for your next opportunity to write a children's book.

Are you open to new possibilities?

A Unique Book Promotion

I am always on the look out for some unique book promotion techniques. Why? Because they stimulate ideas which I can possibly apply to my own books or the books of others where I have some involvement.

One of those promotions is starting today for a book called Click Here To Order by Joel Comm. It's just the type of book which I would read without the extra promotion because it profiles or tells the stories of successful Internet Marketers.

In fact, Joel Comm really ticks me off. “We’re living in the good old days,” he says. What the heck does that mean?

I thought the “good old days” are what people try to get back to… but can never quite get there.

How “good” is it, really, when:

- Half the country is in debt up to their eyeballs and just one missed paycheck away –or one mortgage rate reset away-- from being kicked out into the street.

- Gas is priced at over 4 bucks a gallon, forcing the average Joe to cut back on driving or use grocery money to fill the gas tank.

- And speaking of groceries, they cost more every time we go shopping; then there’s out of control health insurance costs, and all the rest.

When you think about it, there are always those who seem to do well despite the conditions in the overall economy.

No doubt about it, thousands or even millions of people are at the mercy of their employers or the government to keep them out of the poorhouse.

On the other hand, there are those who are seemingly able to rake in the cash despite the gloom and doom on the ten o-clock news.

Hmmm…maybe it is possible to stand apart from the crowd and imitate the “gurus” who have cracked the code and dialed in the system for generating serious money.

Consider…

John Carlton – who learned copywriting after practically being *dared* to do it by a hostile co-worker. His copywriting education began by stealing the co-worker’s copy of John Caples’ Tested Advertising Methods. By the time she stole back the book, John had embarked on a self-education program that has resulted in him being one of the most sought after copywriters in the world.

Another John – John Reese – though smart as they come, college couldn’t hold his interest. After flunking out, he labored in a video rental store while building his business. He owed over $100,000 in credit card debt at his lowest point, and his friends and relatives may have thought he would fall through the cracks like so many other dreamers. Once he put all the pieces together… he became the cash generating machine that we know today.

Keith Wellman’s story is oh-so-familiar. Deep in debt and a family to support with his dead-end job, Keith was desperate. He even blasted Mike Filsaime publicly on Filsaime’s blog for taking advantage of his own desperation and hope. It wasn’t long before Wellman had to eat his words in a big way, as he is now a very successful entrepreneur with a lifestyle that others only dream about.

Hey, if you can’t beat ‘em, why not join ‘em?

In his disarmingly illuminating style, Joel Comm profiles these individuals plus more than 30 others in his book Click Here to Order: Stories of the World’s Most Successful Internet Marketing Entrepreneurs.

With the same intensity that produced his New York Times Best Selling book The Adsense Code, Joel dissects the paths that dozens took to jump on the internet marketer’s bandwagon.

While Joel is no John Grisham (yet), his book reads like one of Grisham’s novels; Joel’s subject matter is just so darn fascinating.

If you’re one of the guys or ladies mentioned in the book, you may wish the Joel had kept his mouth shut.

You don’t want to miss getting your copy. Joel Comm’s new book is the first to put over forty internet marketing entrepreneurs under the microscope. All the cool kids will be getting their own copy.

After you order the book, Joel offers a series of bonus gifts for $1--including an extra chapter which is not in the book and a series of MP3 interviews with people who are profiled in the book.

The overall promotion strategy is well orchestrated--yet with a bit of energy and planning, it could be imitated.

The Forgotten Path

By W. Terry Whalin

The blonde-haired writer sat across from me at a small table during a writers' conference, leaned into the table and poured out her frustration. She had a journalism degree, spent her season working for newspapers and now had published a series of magazine articles. At first the publications had modest pay but now this writer was beginning to write for higher paying and more well-known publications.

Yet her book ideas were rejected and she understood the reasons. In the nonfiction areas, she had no "platform" or market visibility. While her standing was rising among magazine editors, she recognized that few readers knew her and her work.

This writer had dreams of writing a novel but had realistically looked at the market and understood the huge hurdles that she faced to get a novel published. While she could spin an excellent tale, she wondered how she could devote the time and energy to writing a 80,000 to 100,000 word novel with the speculation that some publisher "might" bring it into print. She had no interest in self-publishing and producing a garage filled with books which never reached readers.

Now during our brief session, this writer was searching for answers about how to break into book publishing. She wanted to write longer works than magazine articles and was unsure where to turn.

If the story sounds familiar to you, then keep reading because I'm going to show you a forgotten path for book publishing. This path has endless possibilities and can provide financial security and a lifetime of publishing.

If you don't have a platform, one of the quickest ways to gain a platform is to use the platform of someone else. Some of you are wondering how you get attached to another person's platform. It's called co-authoring or ghostwriting. If you don't personally lead a large organization, can you write for someone who already leads a large organization? I call it the forgotten path because many of these busy people have aspirations of writing a book but will never get it done because of their own schedule. Yet they could make time to meet with a writer on a regular basis, tell you the stories then you could write the book for them. The writer doesn't have to have the platform but the writer brings the skill of crafting words and storytelling to the project.

Many years ago I discovered that I have a finite number of books that I want to write during my lifetime yet there are an infinite number of books that I can co-author or ghostwrite for someone else.

If you have never tried co-authoring or ghostwriting, I suggest you try a shorter magazine article for your first experience. It is better to experiment with a shorter assignment than a longer book project. Can you capture another person's stories and voice? Are you willing to be a co-author or a ghostwriter as a long as you are fairly compensated for your work?

Often you can find these longer book projects when you write a shorter magazine article. I've started my relationship with someone through a magazine article then it has developed into a longer book project. Also I've seen many other writers have this experience where they get with someone who is high profile to write a magazine article and start their relationship. Then that relationship takes a leap to a new level and they are co-authors for a longer book project.

From my experience, it is rare for an agent or an editor to put a writer with an inexperienced co-author or ghostwriter. You can gain the necessary experience collaborating on some shorter magazine articles.

Through my collaboration and co-author experiences, I've been able to write about some remarkable people who are now my friends. It has enriched my life and provided work. I hope you will consider this forgotten path.

The Fine Art of Plotting

By Laura Backes

In an interview with of The Writer magazine, Madeleine L'Engle talks about her book The Arm of the Starfish and says, "I had the book pretty intricately plotted. This is essential, because if you do not have a plot there is nothing to change."

That comment stopped me in my tracks. I'd never thought about why you plot out a book that way before, but it made perfect sense. I always knew a story outline was a framework, a way to keep the action on course, but this turned that belief on its head. If you don't know where you want to go, how will you recognize a better destination when it comes along? How can you revise, polish, improve a story if you don't have a starting point?

The knowledge that the first idea is often not the best idea is something experienced writers have learned the hard way. But they accept this because they love the creative process. L'Engle went on to explain that her protagonist, Adam Eddington, went to sleep one night, and when he woke up a young man named Joshua was sitting in his room. "Now Adam was surprised to see Joshua. I was surprised to see Joshua. There had been no Joshua in my plot." She had a choice: either rewrite 150 pages to incorporate Joshua into the story, or kick him out of the book. He stayed.

It's important to understand how to plot out a story or organize an article. A certain structure--the way characters move from point A to point B, at what point a chapter should end, how to present information to make a compelling argument--is necessary if you want to engage the reader. But if you don't keep your mind open to the unexpected, you'll miss out on the fun of writing. If you insist upon controlling every detail of the first draft, or if you're afraid to start over, you'll shut the door to your imagination.

This also applies to writers who agonize over selling their books before they're even written. They worry so much about the potential market for a piece (Is the subject too controversial? Is the age of the main character correct for the readership? Will my favorite publisher like this book?) that they back their creativity into a corner. When writing the first draft of a manuscript, I think it's a bad idea to imagine anyone ever reading it. This is a journey you're traveling alone, and when an unexpected guest knocks at the door, only you will know if you're brave enough to let him in.

Of course, some writing requires a bit of advanced planning. There's a man in my town who creates a unique type of artwork, and I'd like to profile him for a children's magazine. Before I ask him for an interview, I'm spending a day deciding on possible markets for the article. This will help me determine the age group of the piece, the slant I'll take, and what photographs I'll need. I'll come up with three or four possible approaches to the profile, and pitch these angles to him when I call. This will not only prepare him for the interview, but also show him I'm serious about writing the article. However, since I've never met this man, if he turns out to be an eccentric crackpot I'm prepared to go with the flow.

All writing is a balancing act between fancy and framework, between taking an idea that exists only for you and making it real for thousands of readers. If you don't put restrictions on your inspiration, you'll have the luxury of being able to sort out the good from the bad, of choosing what remains in your book, and what goes. If, at the beginning of the process, your expectations are few, you'll have plenty to change. Whether or not my article ever gets published, it will still be fun to spend the day with someone whose art fascinates me and to try to bring this work alive for young readers. I'll challenge myself to give my writing what Madeleine L'Engle calls "free will," and, if I'm lucky, I'll be surprised by the result.

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About the Author: Laura Backes is the publisher of Children's Book Insider, the Newsletter for Children's Writers. For more information about writing children's books, including free articles, market tips, insider secrets and much more, visit Children's Book Insider's home on the web at http://write4kids.com

Copyright 2008, Children's Book Insider, LLC.
Reprinted with permission.

Table of Contents

The Connection Between Platform & Proposal

By W. Terry Whalin

Branding Or Waste of Time

By W. Terry Whalin

10 Blog Traffic Tips

By Yaro Starak

Top 10 Tips

Principles To Help Any Writer

By W. Terry Whalin

A Unique Book Promotion

The Forgotten Path

By W. Terry Whalin

The Fine Art of Plotting

By Laura Backes