How To Be Your Own Publicist

By Barbara Claypole White

Press coverage is the frosting on your book launch and probably the only promotional activity you’ll engage in that’s free. Yes, FREE.

Author loops have endless chatter about hiring publicists, but really, you can do it yourself. Good press coverage depends on two things: research and crafting a story. And who better to do either than a writer?

As a former publicist, I created a marketing plan—okay, a glorified to-do list—with big dreams of national press coverage. But like most debut authors, I had limited time and resources. So, I focused on what I could handle—contacting the local press. And it paid off big time.

Local media is a huge resource for the following:
- news coverage of author events and book releases
- features /  interviews  with authors
- author event listings 
- book reviews 
- event photos—if it’s a slow news day

Step one: communicate with your publisher 
My publisher seemed happy for me to contact the local press, but I kept them in the loop. This was how I discovered that one of the lovely guys in the P.R. department could coach me through a radio interview. You’d think I’d know how to talk to the press, right? Wrong. I knew how to promote other people’s work, not my own. My debut novel, The Unfinished Garden, is a personal story on many levels. When I talk about it, I get sentimental and sidetracked. Not good.

Step two: do your homework
Research your local media the same way you researched agents. Decide who you want to approach and why. For example, I contacted the editor of Triangle Gardener, a free magazine with a long shelf life and a good circulation. She told me politely that the magazine didn’t cover fiction, but I had perfected my pitch. I mentioned how my novel had an interesting twist on the theme of the healing power of gardening. Because I’d done my homework, I also knew that a blurb about the book—with a picture of my pretty cover—would be a good fit on their “News for the Garden” page. As you can see above, it was.

Step three: figure out lead times
Common sense here, but obviously a local weekly with event listings has a shorter lead time that a glossy magazine that comes out once every two months.  Know thy lead times.

Step four: lists are important
Create lists of news journalists, feature writers, community calendar editors, book reviewers, photo editors, and local organizations with newsletters. You can contact all of them for slightly different things. For example, someone compiling a listing of local events will want only the most basic information: time, date, place, event. If you’re interested in news coverage or a feature, you will need to…

Step five: find your hooks
Figure out what makes your novel different or newsworthy. For example, I worked several different angles for The Unfinished Garden:

1. Local settings. My heroine owns a wholesale plant nursery in Orange County, North Carolina, where I live. For my inaugural signing, I chose to read from an important scene set at a local hot spot, the Maple View Farm Country Store. The county press loved this angle, as did a preserve-our-countryside group that publicized the event in their newsletter.
2. Local girl makes good. My heroine, who’s English, rushes back home to her childhood village after her widowed mother has a nasty accident involving a springer spaniel and a hedgehog. At one point, she visits the historic market town of Olney, near the village where I grew up. This was the angle I worked for the local press in England. In addition, I donated ten signed copies to the Olney Oxfam Bookshop, a charity store that’s mentioned in the novel—another angle that attracted the local press. (The shop also promoted TUG heavily on their Facebook page.)
3. Gardening as therapy. We have serious gardeners in my area. No brainer.
4. OCD is an unusual hook for fiction. OCD frames my world as a mother and as a writer of fiction and non-fiction. The hero of TUG is the first obsessive-compulsive romantic hero in mainstream fiction, and he's a believable obsessive-compulsive. Since myths, stigma, and stereotypes surround OCD, this makes him unusual. I used this angle to set up an event at the local library during OCD Awareness Week and to snag two radio interviews. Oh, and the success of Silver Linings Playbook has presented new opportunities. (The fun never ends with P.R.)

Step six: first contact
Press releases are useful, but I’m not a fan. Back in the day, when I had big dude clients, the best stories I placed were tailor-made for the media I approached. I know it’s time consuming, but I wrote individualized emails (consider step two). If you opt for a press release, research layout and keep content factual and concise. You have one goal: sell your story.

Step seven: follow up
Journalists are just as busy as we are. Don’t assume no answer means lack of interest. The most impressive coverage I received came from my local paper. I had emailed the editor several times, and she hadn’t answered. One day, on a whim, I phoned. She was so apologetic, said she’d meant to answer me but had been swamped. As we chatted, we discovered she lived down the road. After she stopped by one night on the way home from work, we spent several hours together. She did an in-depth interview, took photos of my garden, and left with a signed copy of TUG. Several weeks later, she posted a glowing review online, wrote a full-page article about me and the novel, and wrote a second article about OCD. I call that the motherload.

Step eight: preparing for interviews
Create five or six key points and aim to control the interview by inserting one key point into every answer you give. Here are my key points:

• The Unfinished Garden is a love story about grief, OCD, and dirt 
• It’s published by MIRA, the imprint of Harlequin that handles mainstream or literary commercial fiction 
• Readers can find me on Facebook 
• Readers can check out my website, barbaraclaypolewhite.com, for listings of my events
• TUG is available as a trade paperback and an e-book from Amazon, IndieBound, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, the Harlequin website, and iTunes, and signed copies can be ordered through Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill (my local indie)
• OCD is a highly individualized anxiety disorder that creates irrational fear in the absence of true threat. In its most severe form, it’s a crippling allergy to life. (Personal aside: Real OCD is a living, breathing nightmare. To fight back, as my beloved hero does, takes extraordinary courage. This is a point I wanted to make in every interview)

Step nine: send thank yous
Remember—you’re going to need these people for novel two!

Step ten: don’t stress
Any press coverage you orchestrate will help spread the world. If you only manage to contact one local media outlet, that’s still huge. Be proud, be very proud. And then return to what you do best: writing.

__________________________________

Barbara Claypole White is the author of The Unfinished Garden, a love story about grief, OCD, and dirt (Harlequin MIRA, 2012)

“White…conveys the condition of OCD, and how it creates havoc in one’s life and the lives of loved ones, with style and grace, never underplaying the seriousness of the disorder.” Romantic Times 4* review

“Barbara Claypole White gives us a moving story about the challenges of OCD and grief combined with the power of the human spirit to find love in the most unlikely of places.” Eye on Romance

“A fabulous debut novel, The Unfinished Garden easily earns Romance Junkies’ highest rating of five blue ribbons and a recommended status for its unpredictable originality! So good!” Romance Junkies

Get out! Get out!

by Sam Thomas

Most writers are pretty insecure about their craft. The insecurity is born of experience: we have seen our work rejected many more times than its been embraced, whether by agents or publishers. We are regularly tell ourselves (or are told by agents or editors) that our work is not good enough. We also tend to keep to ourselves – writing is self-expression for introverts. We did not start bands, take up stand-up comedy, or spend our evenings at poetry slams. We shut ourselves off from the world and wrote.

Fine and dandy, except that with the decline of marketing budgets and the virtual disappearance of literary taste-makers (except the one whose name starts with “O”), the whole J.D. Salinger approach to publicity is not going to fly. Want to get our books out there? It’s up to us. The problem, of course, is that we are insecure and introverted.

My goal here is to encourage new writers to get out there and meet people. Offer to present at local libraries, visit with book clubs, talk to whomever will listen!

If you do, you’ll discover some pretty awesome things. First, it’s a ton of fun. You are already passionate about your work, or else you wouldn’t have taken the trouble to write a book. That passion will come through. And remember that (unless you’ve set up a kiosk on a street corner), the people who come to see you are already interested in your work, or else they’d be somewhere else. You don’t have to convince them of anything. If you are polite and honest, people will walk away happy.

The other thing to keep in mind is that while you may not think it’s a big deal getting published, and you recognize that it’s a real grind, but others are much more excited. And while it’s pretty clear to you that you’ve been very lucky (at least that’s the case for me), that doesn’t mean you don’t have a good story to tell. People like to hear about the writing and publishing process first hand. The process might grind you down, but talking with readers and prospective readers will build you up!

So get out there!

How To Party Like An Author Rock Star

Twelve months ago I was an unpublished writer. My name hadn’t been in print since George W. Bush’s first term.

And then, magically, I could walk in bookstores and there it was.
The Lost Saints of Tennessee was published by Atlantic Monthly Press, a division of Grove/Atlantic, in hardcover in February 2012; the paperback is out this month. Despite the trend of letting debut books sink or swim on their own, my publisher consulted me on cover art, marketing strategy, and sent out a small truck’s worth of advance reading copies to reviewers and booksellers across the country. They had faith in my book. For a writer who spent eight years working on a novel with sparse amounts of encouragement along the way, it felt like an alternate reality.

And then things got really surreal a few months before the hardcover launch.

Grove’s director of publicity Deb Seager called me. “We’re thinking of hosting a media lunch for you and another author the next time you’re in New York.”

This was startling. First, no one and I mean NO ONE in publishing calls you—not your agent or your editor or your publicist—unless they view it as EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. Everything else is handled via email.

Second, it had never occurred to me, not even in my wildest self-aggrandizing fantasies, that anyone would throw me a “media lunch.” Sitting in deep conversation with Oprah? You bet. Talking with Terry Gross about how my little novel made its way to the #1 spot on the New York Times best sellers list? Of course. But lunching in a fashionable Manhattan restaurant with magazine and newspaper editors talking about my book? Uh, no.

I said yes. Yes, yes, yes.

And then I learned the identity of the other proposed lunch author. Grove/Atlantic is the American publisher for internationally renowned English author Jeanette Winterson—whose literary and film accolades include the Whitbread Prize and the Prix d'argent at the Cannes Film Festival, that Jeanette Winterson. Her memoir Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal? was being published by Grove the month after Lost Saints. I had been a fan of Winterson’s work since my college days when I read Oranges Aren’t The Only Fruit, her semi-autobiographical first novel written when she was 23.

Panic mixed with a nerve-wracking blend of excitement and disbelief took hold.  What would I wear?  What would I say?  What if I froze up?  What if they hated me?  What if Jeanette Winterson was annoyed some no-name debut person was sharing her lunch?  But mainly, what would I wear?
From the dressing room of Macy’s, I texted pictures of myself in potential outfits to my elegant and always stylish author friend Christina Meldrum.  She gave the thumbs up to a green wrap dress and a fitted leather jacket.  I bought brown knee-high boots to match.  The lunch would be late September with a crisp hint of fall in the air.

As fate would have it, crisp did not show up but a gasp of late summer heat did. The morning of the lunch I climbed out of my hotel room bed and prayed the suspicious cold symptoms that had plagued me for weeks would go away; the following week I'd be diagnosed with walking pneumonia. I drank coffee with a Thera-Flu Daytime chaser. The temperature forced me to scrap the leather jacket.  I wanted to ditch the knee-high boots too but had no suitable alternatives. Make-up applied, particularly to the under- eye circles and reddish nose, hair coiffed, and I was off.

Before heading downtown, I teetered up to the Magnolia Bakery near Rockefeller Center to procure the lunch’s final course—two hummingbird cakes, each inscribed with the title of the books being featured.  Hummingbird cake is a Southern delicacy and my main character Ezekiel’s favorite cake.

I cabbed it to the Grove offices with my suitcase for the plane ride home and the massive Magnolia boxes in tow. Their offices are on Broadway, right next door to the Max Brenner Chocolate Restaurant and across the street from Strand Bookstore, in other words an ideal location for a publishing house.
By this point I didn’t yet know who was attending the lunch only that I’d have five minutes to talk before the meal.  I had practiced my spiel on the drive from Bucknell to NYC the day before. I lugged my belongings to Deb’s office. Her email pinged. Library Journal gave Lost Saints a starred review, our first official review. My anxiety downshifted.

Then I saw the guest list.

On deck: book editors from Vogue, Oprah, Good Housekeeping, Ladies Home Journal, People, Library Journal, a sprinkling of local newspaper editors, and a soupcon of Manhattan booksellers.
Anxiety upshift. Like, into overdrive.

I had no illusions the group was assembling for me. They were coming to see Ms. Winterson. And like Tom Cruise in Days of Thunder, I would happily draft behind her considerable star power.

The restaurant was four blocks from the office. I walked with Deb, Grove/Atlantic head Morgan Entrekin and my editor Elisabeth Schmitz. It was a LONG walk in humid seventy-five degree temperatures while wearing a dress of a non-natural fabric and boots. We were the first to arrive at Ciano.

I immediately disappeared in to the downstairs bathroom where I spent five minutes psyching myself up-- I will not vomit. I will be charming. I will not sweat. I will not spill food on myself. I will not drink wine. Okay, one glass. I’ve been waiting for this moment my whole writing life.

Our party was in the private room upstairs. I joined the Grove people and saw that no one else had arrived yet except for a petite woman with curly red hair standing by a table with a book in her hands. My book.

Before my brain could even begin to process who this person was, she walked over to me. “You must be Amy. I’ve started your book and I really, really like it. Would you mind signing it for me?” said Jeanette Winterson.

As if the heat and the extreme nervousness of facing NEW YORK LITERARY PEOPLE were not enough, this, this was too much. I looked at Ms. Winterson with my mouth hanging slack. A beat passed. Then another. She gave me an encouraging look.

I finally managed, “I’m not sure where to sign it.” At that point, I had never signed a single book. Not one. To anyone. She kindly pointed me towards the title page and then told an amusing anecdote about where one was supposed to sign and how some people were just going to go sell the thing on eBay.

Here is what I wrote: To Jeanette, From a great admirer of your work.  XO Amy Franklin-Willis. Yep.  I put x’s & o’s on my inscription to one of the great literary treasures of our time. Oy.

For the entrée course I sat next to the Vogue books editor. A reader of Vogue since my teenage days, I was a bit intimidated but I mustered up the following ice-breaker: “Your friends must never want to go places with you because they feel such fashion pressure."

There was nowhere to go but up. I somehow managed to stand in front of the assembled crowd and say something about my book without stuttering or spewing spittle. Ms. Winterson, of course, put everyone at ease and made them laugh in her remarks. Note to self:  always use “f” word and say it with an endearing British accent.

My shining moment arrived at dessert. I whipped out the Magnolia cake boxes and told the story of hummingbird cake and how my great Aunt Beth made one when I was a little girl and the scale of the layers astounded me. Most of the crowd had never had it before and a pleasant ripple of sophisticated anticipation manifested.

I finally relaxed. Baked goods I could talk about until the cows came home. I sat next to the People editor and we traded working mom stories. I made the editor fellow from Newsday laugh.

Then, poof, it was over.

The media mavens left.

Morgan and Elisabeth were thrilled to have learned that Vogue planned to excerpt Ms. Winteron’s book in the magazine. They flanked her and her agent on the walk back to the office. I trailed behind them, feeling exhausted and just the tiniest bit like the girl no one picks at a middle school dance. Deb kindly kept me company.

The office buzzed with the arrival of Ms. Winterson. I ran into Elisabeth. Well, more accurately we both happened to be in the ladies room at the same time. She said some parting words through the stall before rushing back to her office where discussions about the gorgeous new covers they’d commissioned for Ms. Winterson’s backlist ensued.

I boarded the Virgin America flight back to San Francisco feeling one part author rock star, one part hopeless beginner author, and one part extreme gratitude that my publisher cared enough to put me in the same room with a literary star.

I could only hope that The Lost Saints of Tennessee caught a sprinkle of that stardust.
_______________

Amy is better at casual lunch conversation now.  Her debut novel is out in paperback Feb. 12th, 2013. The Lost Saints of Tennessee is an Indie Next Selection and Vanity Fair Hot Type pick. Visit her at www.amyfranklin-willis.com

A Writer's Wish List

Welcome to December. Here is your official welcome package: a snowflake, a large pine tree, a candle, a snifter of brandy. Whatever tradition you're gearing up for, it's likely you've got gifts on the brain, and a shopping list as long as your arm. Here are some hints as to what the writers in your circle of friends and family might be longing for this holiday season. Some are DIY, some are even free! Only one is purely mythological.

No matter the genre or publisher, these are guaranteed to make any author click its little heels together with glee while smiling ear to ear. You might even see a little tooth sparkle, along with a charming *TING* of holiday magic. And if that isn't an image to go on a greeting card, I don't know what is. In related news, I'd like to know who's stuffing all those cats into Santa hats.

Quit it.

10. Sales.

Authors love sales. So I know that you, being a good and virtuous family member or friend, have already bought the book. But now, you can buy your friends the book. Buy your kids' teachers the book. I remember at my book launch, several dear and marvelous friends actually said, "I'm doing my holiday shopping right now!" as they toted away an armful of copies. I have now erected large, permanent, ostentatious statues in their honor in my driveway. Yes, it's hard to get the car out, but these people need recognition.

Many authors are happy to mail you a signed bookplate, for even more palpable specialness.

9. Reviews

It is free to review your author friend's book on Amazon, on Goodreads, on LibraryThing. A thoughtful few sentences, a handful of stars, a couple of tags checked, a "Like" button clicked: these might seem insignificant to you, but they are beautiful gifts to an author.

8. Stories

Interrupt the novel, and I will destroy you.

A truth: Authors often chuckle to each other about how people come up to us saying, "I've got a great book idea for you. You write it, and we'll split the profits!"

Another truth: Most authors are walking around with 87 book ideas in their heads, and their only lament is not being able to crawl into a cave, dig a tiger moat at the entrance, and crouch over a laptop for the next six years, writing them all down. Did I mention the cave has wifi? And that someone occasionally tosses a turkey dinner across the tiger moat? Is this just my fantasy?

KIDS, STOP TALKING TO ME.

This one is tricky because not every story makes a good gift. Long ones usually don't. Ones involving the death of grandmothers, or adoptees finding birth parents, or really special, amazing animals... usually don't. What constitutes a literary treasure? Odd little snippets. Nuggets maybe. Sometimes whole book ideas emerge from tiny little bits of overheard conversation, or sometimes those little nuggets can fit into our books in weird ways.

Example: My friend Tina was chatting with me and some other people and casually mentioned she had a cousin or uncle or something who had escaped from prison by riding a cow through a river. I swear, it was as if the ceiling ripped open, a beam of light shone down on her face, and time slowed. I pulled up a chair and begged her to keep talking about this beautiful, magical cousin from god. Turns out he killed himself playing Russian roulette. WHAT? Was there NOTHING this cousin could not do? Turns out this backstory went like a puzzle piece directly into the past life of one of the minor characters in my WIP. It went in so perfectly, there was almost an audible click. Share your stories. Then get ready to read all about it.

 7. Social Media Love

Easy to Tweet: Hey, I read this book and it's awesome. If you loved Eat Pray Love, you'll want to get this one. It's like Eat Pray Love but IN SPACE!

Easy to share on Facebook: Hey, this book totally changed my mind about panthers. Turns out they're really lovable pets! Check it out. 

Post the cover on Pinterest. Microblog it on Tumblr. Pass the link around. Boost the signal.

6. Blog Posts.

If you have a blog, post a review or an interview! Relate the book to something personal to you, to give awesome content to your own readers while spreading the word for your author friends. If you don't have a blog, consider submitting a guest post to a blog you love. Starting a blog just to pimp out your friend's book is probably a bad idea, although I can see it working as a publicity stunt, if you were able to sustain it on a daily basis for several years. You can do that, right?

So many to choose from!

5. Booze. 

Note: This should also be on the wish lists for architects, bottle washers, chefs, dog walkers, educators, firefighters, grooms, hospital clerical workers, infographic makers, jewelers, kick boxers, loom weavers, magicians, nickel stampers, obstetricians, physicists, query critiquers, rocketry specialists, specialists of all kinds, truck drivers, unitarians, vets, white house interns, x-ray technicians, yak worshippers, and zebra inseminators.

What, my spell check doesn't like the word "inseminators"?

4. Encouragement. 

You can do it! Your book is freakin' fantastic! Are you kidding? Of course you can write another one just as good. Better, even. You are killing this author thing. 

As much as you feel like you've already stroked this needy author's ego quite enough, consider the fact that probably right now the soundtrack in their head is something along the lines of this: "That last book was a fluke. Nothing you say makes sense. You couldn't write your way out of a tiger moat. The things that are important to you aren't important to anyone else. That character's not likable. That idea makes you certifiable. Coffee is starting to taste bad, WHY? You're going to get a hole in your favorite sweater. The hole is coming. The groaning abyss that is your absence of talent will suck you down through that hole and annihilate you."

So you know, some cheery words are never amiss.

3. Time

If there's any way you can facilitate your author friend or family member getting more peaceful and uninterrupted time to write, this is a treasured, hallowed, beautiful thing. Loan your summer house. Babysit. When you're thinking of asking your author friend/family to volunteer for some lengthy, time-consuming activity, or get them involved in some really great idea for a project, or join you in a new hobby, reconsider. Think of someone else. Don't recommend new TV shows. Don't say, "You know, we should really go hiking on the beach once a week, for our health!"

Note to my personal friends: This is not a call for help. I have everything under control. Just send tigers. 

So, I was trying to think of what I would include for #2, and I told my husband what I was considering, he said, "What? That has nothing to do with gifts. Don't you want a gun/flyswatter? Or a robot that sharpens your pens?" It's true that I do want those things, but I feel a responsibility to be honest and deliver a true list, of real desires, and the list would not be complete without this:

2. Magical Plot Solutions. 

There's probably nothing you can really do here, and there's nothing to buy. But this is what authors really most want: plot solutions. We want to experience that sudden strange, unexpected brain-twist that results in a smooth, blissful unraveling of a huge plot-knot.

I want one really bad, this month. I'm praying and dreaming and hoping. I know it will come to me while driving, or while in the shower, or while reading someone else's book and thinking about something completely different, or while knitting, or while telling my dog to stop scratching his junk so luxuriously on the carpet -- I know it will come.

Like most writers, I'm an optimist. Even though we crank about the world and write books where everyone inexorably dies in despair, we all believe in magic, much like the kind that gets talked about in December. Writer magic comes in the middle of writing books. It comes when you're 16 chapters in and it's dismal and clanging and nothing works. It's like a special weapon that only becomes available when you've committed yourself to a battle you can't win. You can't predict or explain it, or make it happen, or find it by looking, but if you didn't think it was coming, you'd never start chapter 2. When it comes, it's the best, best thing ever. When you're waiting for it, the night can be long and dark.

I know I said it wasn't for sale, but if anyone's seen the devil, can you give him my mobile #? Thanks.

Note: My husband's next suggestion was "Sexy muse." But we all know what the #1 gift idea should be, right? It's not a brilliant cover or getting on year-end lists (although Book Pregnant authors have been killing it on that front, yo!). 

1. Sales

See #10.

Lydia Netzer is the author of Shine Shine Shine, which the New York Times Book Review just selected as one of 100 Notable Books for 2012. It was also chosen by Amazon as one of their Editor's Picks for the Top 100 Books of 2012, by Library Journal as one of five Top Women's Fiction Titles of 2012, and by Nancy Pearl in Publisher's Weekly as one of her ten favorite books of 2012. Written over ten years, two attempts at Nanowrimo, and many despairing moments, it's a novel about robots, motherhood, space travel, true love, and the perils of fitting in. Find her on her blog, Facebook, and Twitter. 

A Debut Author Learns About Libraries

by Amy Sue Nathan

Learning to be an author in addition to being a writer is an interesting process. While in the midst of planning publicity, working on a new website, and sharing news both regularly and prudently (I think both are important), I’m very aware that yes, book sales are going to be an important factor if I don’t want to become a one-book wonder. (No intention of that, mind you, and WIP is coming along nicely, if I do say so myself. Which I do. Also have a tickling of a story for book 3!)

And then a few weeks ago I learned that THE GLASS WIVES will be published in hardcover for the library market. That means that libraries can purchase a copy (or ten, um, book clubs!) of my novel and it will be sturdier and last longer than the trade paperback edition.  Because libraries are book buyers, this is a good thing. Whether we all like it or not, not everyone can afford to buy every book. And some people can’t afford or choose not to buy any books.  And this doesn’t mean they’re not book lovers or voracious readers. It means that I want libraries to have copies of my book so that everyone who wants to read it has the opportunity to do so, no matter where they choose to obtain their [legal, I'm looking at you, book pirating sites] copy.

The point here is to garner the attention of readers any way possible. This is not lost on me.

So, after I was finished with a personal celebration, knowing that my editor and publisher have confidence that libraries will want to stock-up on THE GLASS WIVES, I printed out THE GLASS WIVES page from the St. Martin’s Griffin Spring catalog, the first three pages, and a copy of the cover. And I marched my debut author behind over to the library in my town.

Small town. Big new library.

I introduced myself to the adult services librarian, leading with “I live in Small Town and St. Martin’s Press is publishing my first novel in May.”  Yes, that is a way to get a librarian’s attention. She was lovely, and interested, and her smile stretched across her face. She asked if she could shake my hand (heartily, I might add) to congratulate me.  She asked questions about how long it took me to write it, the agent-process, and she made many correct assumptions about the excitement level in my brain and heart.  The librarian needed to pass along my information (complete with actual telephone number) to the person who purchases fiction for the library because of course she was at lunch when I showed up.

I’m fortunate to live in an educated, education-centric community. I’m in contact with the local book club that started in 1938 and boasts over 100 members. It’s also not lost on me that the fact that THE GLASS WIVES is set in a Chicago suburb and about a divorced mom, and that I LIVE in a Chicago suburb and am a divorced mom, may send 9200 locals scampering for the book in stores, online, in this very library, looking for something or someone familiar, looking for answers and insights to my real life, or—gasp—theirs. They won’t find it, but hey, I’m no dummy.

I just nod and say, “You’ll have to read the book.”

DIY Promotions

by Barbara Claypole White

On Friday, October 19, Book Pregnant is heading to Myrtle Beach for the South Carolina Writers’ Workshop. David Abrams, Anne Clinard Barnhill, Lydia Netzer, Brenda Remmes, and I will be giving an intensive workshop on how to create a village to help promote your debut novel.

I first went to SCWW four years ago as a terrified newbie. Desperate to take workshops on craft, mingle with agents and editors, and meet other writers, I also daydreamed about winning the fiction category of the Carrie McCray Memorial Literary Awards, sponsored by the conference. In 2009 I placed second with the manuscript that would become The Unfinished Garden. Next week, with a little help from Harlequin MIRA, I will birth this book. I think that makes SCWW my baby’s godmother.

Returning as a faculty member is my tiara moment. I am thrilled to be part of this Book Pregnant panel, with each of us talking about a different aspect of marketing. 

Me? I’m the bargain basement girl of promotions. Partly, this comes from my outlet shopper mentality, but it’s also the legacy of my former life as a London PR for young fashion designers. My clients were wildly creative and perennially broke.  

As a debut author, the task of promoting your novel can seem overwhelming. But creating a marketing plan, or the less scary marketing to-do list, is no different to excavating a plot. Come up with a few ideas and then unleash your mind. Follow every crazy tangent; trust your gut; think around corners. And here’s the best part: the price tag is zero.

Start by asking some basic questions about your settings and characters. What gives them reader appeal? How can you build on that? For example, the countryside plays an important role in The Unfinished Garden. My heroine owns a woodland plant nursery in rural North Carolina, and a pivotal scene unfolds at a famous dairy farm. This was the angle that persuaded a local protect-our-countryside group to plug the novel in its monthly newsletter.  And as for my beloved hero?  He’s obsessive-compulsive, and OCD is an unusual hook for mainstream fiction. When I asked the local library about hosting an author event, I decided to suggest something different—a reading during OCD Awareness Week. The librarian was delighted.

Of course, the best free coverage comes via the media. Contacting journalists is no different to querying agents: research, customize, and never ask a question that comes with a yes / no answer. (Do you want to write a lovely article on my novel? No.)  Two-thirds of The Unfinished Garden is set near my childhood village in England, and who doesn’t love a hometown success story? After a regional magazine ran a piece with my local-girl-sells-debut-novel angle, numerous people stopped my mother in the supermarket to congratulate her. Jackpot. I boosted motherly pride and pre-order sales at the same time.

Finally, when life throws a curveball at your promotional endeavors, adapt. I created a spiffy marketing plan (this used to be my thing, you know?) and then discovered my mother needed heart surgery. I lost a month to being a full-time caregiver and house elf in England, and my head was wedged down the pity pot.  But twice a day, I had to exercise Sally the pampered hound. So I began an online walking tour of the settings that inspired The Unfinished Garden and posted a photo a day to my Facebook page. The response was incredible. After I uploaded a picture of the old coaching inn where I used to work, a long-lost acquaintance popped up to say, “That’s my local pub! I have to read this book!” My life was circling the family drain, but I was back on the promotional bandwagon, selling my novel one copy at a time. Sometimes that’s enough.

Three Ways Non-Writer Job Skills Can Help as You Publish Your Novel

By MelanieThorne

I’ve had a lot of shitty jobs.

I haven’t been unemployed for more than a month since I was fifteen. Combine that with a low tolerance for moron supervisors, a tendency to get bored quickly, and, as I grew up, the knowledge that I wanted a career as a writer and the refusal to work any job that would interfere with that goal, and I have a long, long list of workplaces. I’ve been a Subway sandwich artist, a busser, a hostess; an accounts payable specialist, a payroll specialist, an HR director. I’ve managed educational programs, offices, a Blockbuster. I’ve been a test scorer, essay grader, copywriter. I’ve taught pretty much everything related to English or writing at pretty much every level.

Sure, I was good at most of those jobs, some I even really enjoyed, but in my head I always believed they were simply a means to an end—a way to feed, house, and clothe myself while I was chipping away at my manuscript, on my way to my dream career as a published author.

I considered my writing classes and programs much more important than those lowly day jobs because in my naïveté, I thought I’d use my craft training and skills to, you know, write. But as it turns out, that’s only the first step. Now that Hand Me Down has been out in the world for four months I know that being an author—which is definitely different from being a writer—means a hell of a lot more than simply writing. You play the roles of publicist, copywriter, website developer, travel planner, thank you card sender, Vista print designer, social media manager, and anything else necessary. You basically become your own executive assistant to your author self. But you only work on commission.

If you’re a writer, you probably have your own list of “day jobs” (unless you are independently wealthy, and then I might hate you) during which you probably spent many hours nurturing fantasies of selling your book. What nobody tells you is that the reality of publishing a book is dramatically different than those work-day dreams in which you sell for a huge advance and sit back with a drink as it becomes a bestseller and then a movie and your royalties come pouring in like gold coins in cartoons and you can make a living as a writer simply by writing.

But the skills you gained while you whiled away the hours in your non-book-writer jobs can still come in handy. Here are three ways they did for me.

Teaching=Poker Face 

You never know what kind of bizarre questions or off the wall comments are going to come out of students’ mouths. “Recycling is stupid.” “Wait, women can’t actually have, um, climaxes…can they?” Not to mention all the bozo things they say in relation to writing—“why does it matter if I use their or they’re? It’s the same word.” Grr.

As a teacher, you get used to camouflaging your face so your true reactions don’t flitter across your features and give away your shock or frustration. This comes in handy when your readers, who will feel like they know you, ask you strange and personal questions, or tell you random bits of information, like the woman who told me she worked with homeless teens and sometimes did meth with them. “Just so I can connect with them.” Um…what do you say to that?

Weird things will happen to you, too. I guarantee it. With a proper poker face, you can just nod and smile and say thank you and move on. I recommend practicing this whether you are a teacher or not, because readers are people, and people are unpredictable.

Administrative=Organization

You will be asked to do a book reading and a book club on the same day, maybe in different cities, and, not wanting to disappoint anyone (debut authors will do everything we can to help readers connect with our books, so I guess, we’re whores…or is it just me?) you will agree to both and have to figure out how to make the travel work. You’ll want to get postcards, bookmarks, business cards, posters, mugs, T-shirts, book bags, and maybe even a cake with your beautiful book cover on it. You’ll want to send thank you cards and postcards to bookstores, book sellers, book clubs, libraries, your aunt who told everyone she knows about your book. You’ll have interview questions and guest blog posts and website updates and reader emails to keep up with. It’s a lot.

I’m naturally a pretty organized and efficient person, but I was overwhelmed with all the administrative details pretty quickly. Luckily, I had done payroll for an Excel genius and learned some of his tricks for spreadsheets. I managed travel and a ridiculously busy calendar for the CEO/president of a fancy-pants mortgage brokerage firm in Palo Alto, which made me better equipped to handle my suddenly very busy schedule. I've had more than a half-dozen office jobs over the years and all the organizational tools I picked up, I used. Anything that can help you gain some control over the chaotic first few months after your pub date will go a long way in preventing mistakes or missed opportunities and maintaining your sanity. 

Professional Writing=Deadlines 

Even if you had deadlines before you sold your book, publishing deadlines are different. It’s not just your agent or your critique group you let down if you fail to deliver, not just your editor, but a whole team of people who get paid to make your book baby a product. Waiting. Talk about pressure.

If you’re writing articles for magazines or journals or any type of professional writing they don’t care if you’re feeling creatively blocked. These are businesses. You must produce the commodity they hired you to create by the date you agreed upon, and if you don’t, they won’t ask you to write for them again. Experience with this kind of high-stakes writing deadlines helped me cope with looming publishing deadlines, and made me a little better at writing under pressure. If you can think of your book deadlines as another piece of regular work, it might help curb your nerves.

Despite my frequent frustration by the jobs that were not part of my ultimate career goals, I’m thankful for each position I’ve worked as each of them taught me something valuable, even the jobs that mainly taught me I didn’t want to do that job anymore because that often fueled my writing drive. Nothing is wasted, as they say, and if you’re like me, you’ll need all the help you can get from any applicable skill as you launch your author career.

What have you learned in a “day job” that has helped (or could help) your publishing process?

Melanie Thorne is the author of Hand Me Down, a debut novel that is the story of a girl who has never been loved best of all. Find out more about why People gave it a "compelling" 3.5/4 stars on her website, follow her on Twitter, or say hello on Facebook.