If you are working towards publication and own an eReader, chances are there’s a copy of APE: Author Publisher Entrepreneur sitting on your Nook. It’s a manifesto on the art of self-promotion and marketing books aimed at the self-published author, but it’s making waves for wordsmiths of all publication inclination.

Its author, Guy Kawasaki, wrote most of this bestselling eBook from a 5-by-5 closet of a dorm in UC Santa Barabara, and he had a few choice words about any authors with finicky writing styles in an interview with Upstart Business Journal:

Writers should disavow themselves of the concept of an “ideal venue for writing a book” because it leads to “wimpification”: “I cannot write because the conditions are not ideal.” If you wait until conditions are perfect—the kids are asleep, making straight As, the house is clean, and global warming has been reversed, you’ll never write. A great writer can write under any conditions—not only ideal conditions.

But don’t be fooled by his humble writing venue – he’s a successful startup engineer, entrepreneur, former Apple Evangelist, and possibly the epitome of a new breed of author brand.

As Swenson Book Development wrote about close to two years ago, there are some hard truths about publication and self promotion authors need to understand, and most of it rests on getting out there and making yourself known.

It’s definitely not ‘ideal conditions’ to be an author if you don’t like playing the marketing game. once upon a time all marketing was done by a publishing houses’s sales team, but those times are past; until you’re flipping titles like JK Rowling, there’s an expectation for you to promote your material – and yourself.

Would Mr. Kawasaki think your strategy is ‘wimpified’? Take a deep breath and start the new year with a brave new plan.

Writing and Listening — an Interview with Brooke Randel

3 weeks ago

As a young girl Brooke Randel knew little about the Holocaust—just that it was a catastrophe in which millions were murdered, and that her grandma Golda Indig barely escaped that fate. But her Bubbie never spoke about what happened, and the two spent most of their time together making pleasant memories: baking crescent roll cookies, playing gin rummy, and watching Baywatch. Until an unexpected phone call when Golda said, out of the blue: “You should write about my life. What happened in the war.” What results is a fascinating memoir—about one woman’s harrowing survival, and another’s struggle to excavate theRead more…