Writers Unbound

Publisher’s Weekly reported that Harper Lee will be receiving the Presidential Medal of Honor on Monday for her literary contribution To Kill a Mockingbird.

NaNoWriMo is definitely well under way. Their website is backed up like crazy The forums are also hopping.

Hollywood Writers Strike latest is available at WritersWrite.

NPR interviews a writer who writes about a ghostwriter who writes about a man who may or may not be Tony Blair. Huh?

JK Rowling sues a small Michigan publisher over intellectual property rights. She also finished her first book after the Harry series. What a busy week!

You can now read Gone With the Wind from Rhett’s perspective.

MySpace gets into the book business.

Slate Magazine is having a special fiction week for our reading pleasure.

After finishing the book ‘Reading Lolita in Tehran,’ I remarked to a friend who’s an English professor that writers working in English as a second language are often more eloquent than those of us who speak it as a primary language. Azar Nafisi managed to write long sentences uncharacteristic of American writers, with layers and layers of meaning. It’s a beautiful book.

I felt the same way after reading Ishmael Beah’s ‘A Long Way Gone.’ Beah brings the oral history of his native Sierra Leone to the forefront. Starbucks Coffee Company helped bring this book to the marketplace. I have to say Starbucks really supports authors and literacy here in my hometown as well. I’ve done quite a few author events at different locations here. And even if you’re not a best-selling author, staffers treat you exceedingly well. The company donated $2 from sales of each copy of Beah’s book to support UNICEF programs for children affected by armed conflict.

Beah’s story for me is a page turner. It’s hard to imagine a young boy being converted into a child soldier, being fed drugs to keep him awake and aggressive, and losing his whole immediate family in a bloody war.

There’s a passage towards the end of the book—I’ve read and re-read it. I think it’s a well-nigh perfect piece of nonfiction writing. I learned a lot simply by reading and studying it. Beah is addressing the UN Economic and Social Council chamber about his experiences in a war-torn country:

“I am from Sierra Leone, and the problem that is affecting us children is the war that forces us to run away from our homes, lose our families, and aimlessly roam the forests. As a result, we get involved in the conflict as soldiers, carriers of loads, and in many other difficult tasks. All this is because of starvation, the loss of our families, and the need to feel safe and be part of something when all else has broken down. I joined the army really because of the loss of my family and starvation. I wanted to avenge the deaths of my family. I also had to get some food to survive, and the only way to do that was to be part of the army. It was not easy being a soldier, but we just had to do it. I have been rehabilitated now, so don’t be afraid of me. I am not a soldier anymore; I am a child. We are all brothers and sisters. What I have learned from my experiences is that revenge is not good. I joined the army to avenge the deaths of my family and to survive, but I’ve come to learn that if I am going to take revenge, in that process I will kill another person whose family will want revenge; then revenge and revenge and revenge will never come to an end…”

Beah wrote his memoir as an adult, but the syntax and tone in this passage are those of a child. There is so much in this single passage, especially in the genuine feeling back-lighting his words, “…don’t be afraid of me.”

English might not be Beah’s primary language, but he’s certainly mastered it well enough to move a reader, to shape his words as a revelation of universal truths.

Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Child Soldier, Beah, book, memoir, armed conflict, Sierra Leone, Starbucks, UNICEF, Civil War

It happens to the best of us. We have an idea for a book, a burning idea. So there in our cozy writing nook, we eye our laptop, frown at the phone, and stretch back in our ergonomically correct chair. We make a plan and start writing. We might even be lucky enough to meet with an agent, and even luckier still if the agent gives you his business card and says, “E-me with the first three chapters.”

We might then be unlucky enough to simply become stuck. And that is exactly where I am today with a nonfiction book that has been on my desk for 15 months. Half of it is done. The other half begs to be finished. And all of me hesitates every single day when I get a free moment, knowing I should be pounding away at that book. But for some reason, at the moment, I am unable to proceed.

I’ve asked myself if I really believe in the book. My first two books were hard to write, but I stuck to the course and got them down on paper. A publisher gave me contracts, two in a row, with an advance for each. They weren’t bestsellers, but they’re still on his list. One was published in 2004; the other in 2005.

I keep telling myself in order to finish the book, I have to cut back on freelancing. But the freelance work is a sure thing. Book royalties are iffy at best, impossible to calculate, because the bookstore can return the 20 copies that didn’t sell after you left your successful 50-book signing in a blaze of glory.

Somehow, I finished a new poetry collection. I’m editing the poems now. I have several options for publishing. So if I could finish a book that certainly won’t hit the bestseller list, why haven’t I finished one that might have an inkling of a chance?

So I find myself questioning this nonfiction manuscript. Because every thing I ever wanted to write, I simply wrote. I asked myself this morning as I rushed out to do an interview for a story for one of my newspaper clients if maybe I have writer’s block where this book is concerned.

I’ve never had it before. So maybe I’m learning to recognize it.

And maybe this isn’t the book I should be writing.

Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Book, Writer’s block, Manuscript, Home office, Freelance, Author

Having trouble deciding on a fee for a project? Want to find information about federal government spending? Need advice on blending your photography skills with your writing prowess? Bookmark WriterBiz.

Erik Sherman doesn’t really need to find more places to publish his work. His credits include Newsweek, New York Times Magazine, Fortune, Inc., Advertising Age and many other national and international outlets. Sherman has two recent books out. He has authored six books total and co-authored one. He’s working on a new book and he also teaches classes online. He’s a veteran full-time freelancer and photographer. So why would this guy take time to blog about the writing business?

Sherman had been editor of Contracts Watch at the American Society of Journalists and Authors for more than five years. He had done much of the contract reviewing for the ASJA Contracts Committee. “I knew I was stepping down from the committee at the end of June, 2007,” he says. “But I still consider it important to try and be of active help to others.”

Sherman also perceived a broader word canvas. “I saw the blog as a way of addressing some issues at greater length than I could post at a writer’s forum.” In addition he’d taught business planning and marketing online. His latest book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Canon EOS Digital Cameras, is a concise, easy-to-understand guide. With such a diverse perspective, Sherman thought blogging would offer a means to address a wider range of issues.

WriterBiz covers tools, practices and resources for the writing business. One useful post, “Great tools to track politics and money,” features a collection of timesaving links to sites like those with information about where federal money goes, the status of bills and committee action, and campaign donations. Another post gives tips on analyzing a client before you commit to provide writing.

Sherman says there are benefits from blogging he didn’t anticipate. “When you spend time trying to explain ideas to others, they become clearer to you,” he notes. He says he also enjoys addressing topics, issues and stories that he might not cover for a magazine or book in the manner he’d like to cover them. With a blog, the buck stops with the writer. “I become my own editor and publisher,” he says.

Sherman has also found that blogs can lead to assignments. For example, he recommended a blog entry to an editor he’d met, telling her he thought she’d find the topic interesting. “She did,” he says, “and immediately asked me to write a 900-word assignment.”

Sherman sees the future for freelance writers as “micropublishing.” He says this will allow writers to “create your own publishing outlets on specific topics that will draw audiences that might be too small to catch the attention of an editor, but that might offer the basis of a business model.”

And for advice along the freelancer’s way, WriterBiz is a great place to visit.

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Ed. Notes:
Erik Sherman does several other blogs besides WriterBiz. Visit his Web site for links to his blogs, publication clips and other information.

Sherman’s books Canon EOS Digital Cameras and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Pizza and Panini are available at amazon.com.

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Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Freelance writing, writing business, content provider, Web site, blog, expert

Sometimes, self-publication actually works

I wish there were more stories like this one. Editor & Publisher did a story about columnists who also write books. Dave Lieber, who writes for the Fort Worth (Texas)Star-Telegram, published his book The Dog of My Nightmares. Lieber, speaking to the National Society of Newspaper Columnists conference in Philadelphia, said his big mistake was including only one chapter on the dog. Lieber has sold 10,000 copies of his book. Editor & Publisher says the book costs only $1.50 to print and sells for $10 a copy.

Most of the stories I hear from self-pubbed authors are not this encouraging. One asset for Lieber is his column. You establish a reader platform when you write two columns a week for a major daily newspaper. And the fact he’s speaking to groups like NSNC means he’s getting great speaking gigs where he can sell books to an audience assembling for a variety of purposes—as opposed to standing in bookstores, trying to lure customers one by one. Lieber also believes in authors having a Web site as a tool in marketing.

Ginosko Literary Journal call for submissions

In my email, a call for submissions from Ginosko Literary Journal arrived. The journal is accepting short fiction and poetry for the fifth issue. Editorial lead time is 1-3 months. Simultaneous and reprint submissions are acceptable. My message says the journal is “moving towards a printed version,” and the editors are selecting material for an anthology. Also welcome: artwork, photography, CDs for posting on Web site; links to exchange. Authors like Grace Cavalieri and Michael Hettich are listed as contributors, so you’d be in fine company if your work is accepted. For full guidelines, visit the Ginosko Web site.

Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Self-Publish, Authors, Speakers, Books, Newspaper Columnists, Submissions Wanted, Journal, Publish

The St. John’s River has inspired my pen many times–resulting in poems, articles and essays.

Thomas Wolfe, William Faulkner and Edith Wharton are three of my favorite classic authors who have become well-known standard bearers when it comes to writing place. Wharton with her renderings of society and the class system of her day, recreates a place that grows far beyond geography.

Today authors like Khaled Hosseini, Rick Bragg and Tim Dorsey grow characters and plot from the places where they have lived and the cultures that arise in those places.

Novelist Carol Goodman does this with her intriguing mysteries. She may not have lived everywhere she’s written about, but she weaves the mythology of places into her plots.

Florida is a great opportunity for writerly exploitation—the state where I live is politically conflicted, green year-round and quirky. Where else do cops dress up like Uncle Sam and pull speeding motorists?

The poetry collection I’m finishing now—“Notes from a Florida Village”—delves my own experience with Florida. Poems about the St. John’s River, a favorite restaurant nestled beneath great oaks and the small green lizards that line up like soldiers on my front walk all grew from observing and experiencing place.

If there isn’t a place you want to tackle directly in writing, you can always do what J. K. Rowling does—make one up while you’re sitting in a café.

The world has never been so accessible—even if you can’t go somewhere in person, the Internet offers so many options for learning about a culture or locale.

But in my opinion, starting at home is one of the best options for a writer to explore his or her craft. My backyard has probably inspired more poems than any exotic place I’ve traveled. All around us are common objects and familiar faces. I think reshaping the familiar into something uncommon is a great challenge, but it’s also a comfort.

I don’t necessarily think you always have to write what you know. After all, a different journey begins when you set pen to paper, one you perhaps didn’t envision when the crystallization for a piece of writing formed in your brain.

But in writing about the familiar, you may discover things you never knew about—true epiphanies—sitting right under your nose.

Word Press, Technorati, Tags, novel, place, history, mythology, writing, style, technique, Wolfe, Faulkner, Wharton, contemporary novelists

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This is my first column for a new topic at 451press.com. I hope you’ll join me each week day for news, interviews and general information about writing.

I’ve worked as an independent journalist for years, and naturally, I have seen many changes in my profession. But these last few years have brought about trends and developments I never envisioned.

Now working writers often use the term “content provider.” The impact of the Internet cannot be understated. Years ago, I never envisioned having 24/7 access to most of what I write for different publications and sites. Now, if an essay or article comes out in Christian Science Monitor or The Florida Times-Union, I can pick up the link and archive that link permanently. This makes it handy for prospecting editors to see my work in a convenient way. Gone are the days of mailing bulky introductory letters and packages with clips. Email is one of the best blessings an independent writer has.

I also do a lot of poetry—my first book was a poetry collection that’s still on the publisher’s list. I’ve learned a lot about this quirky genre and will share some of those experiences in future columns. Who’d have ever thought poetry would be alive, courtesy of former U.S. Poet Laureate, Billy Collins, on youtube.com?

I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing Collins for The Writer, and I’ve also enjoyed hearing him in person at a reading. In my opinion, no other laureate has done as much for American poetry as Collins. I like the animation for Collins’s poem “The Dead.”

There are a number of resources I depend on, among them, membership in the American Society of Journalists and Authors. I also pay for a subscription to Freelance Success, a network that has truly earned its keep for me. I pay for a listing and subscription at Media Bistro as well. I’ll profile these and other organizations in upcoming columns.

I’ll also include writing prompts and handouts for use by educators or writers. I often speak to classrooms, and I’ve found teachers to be very receptive to new ideas to get those student pens (or keyboards) in motion.

Meanwhile, stop by each day to see what’s up in the writing business. If you have tips or suggestions for columns, please leave a comment here.

Above all, if you’re a writer, keep at it. Perseverance is one of the most valuable qualities a writer can have. (text by Kay B. Day)

Ed. Note: All columns by the previous editor are now archived in the category, “Wildcard,” for your convenience.

Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Writing, Freelance, Content Provider, Journalist, Educators, Teacher, Curriculum, poetry, Media