Does an author really need to blog? Not necessarily. If you are writing fiction or a children’s storybook, probably not. If you’re writing nonfiction or memoir, probably so. To answer the question, you must ask yourself whether you can reach the audience who will buy your book with a blog. Children rarely make consumer choices about books, but their parents do. Tina L. Peterson wrote a middle-grade novel, Oscar and the Amazing Gravity Repellent. She has a Ph.D. in mass media and communications and is an activist for media literacy. In Media Parentis is where she blogs about smartphones and sleep deprivation, Superbowl Advertising Bingo, and why we need diverse children’s literature. If you have a way to speak to those who buy books like yours, then a blog may be a tool to pull customers to your writing. If you are writing for wildlife naturalists who spend the majority of their time in the field in remote locations like Linda J. Spielman, then you likely don’t need to blog because your customers aren’t likely to be searching online for A Field Guide to Tracking Mammals in the Northeast. But if your book is about a nonfiction subject on which people use search engines to seek out new information, then blogging can be an important instrument in your author’s bag toolkit. Blogging serves two purposes. One, it helps search engines keep your site at the top of the list of hits when someone types in your keywords. Every time you post…
When your writing is published, expect to go public. Positive engagement with your audience is critical to the success of your book. Readers want to connect with authors. And writers like to hear feedback from their readers. During the last decade publishers have come to expect authors to create and manage their online personas on various social media platforms to promote and market their books…. [Read More]
Filed Under: Amazon reviews, anti-Semitism, catfishing, Cathryn Prince, Deborah Lipstadt, Denial, internet trolls, Laura Silverman, Megan Kelly, Twitter
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Whether you’re new to Ithaca, have memories in Ithaca, or are a lifelong resident, you’ll learn why Ithacans love where they live in this beautiful new guidebook to all things local. 365 Things to Do in Ithaca by Laurel Guy will be released in December by Schiffer Publishing. Gorges. Enlightened. Quirky. Ithacans do things differently. On Cayuga Lake in the heart of New York’s Finger… [Read More]
Debra Silva Rivera is our guest blogger today. In 2015 she was selected by the Voices of Our Nation Arts Foundation/Voices Writing Workshop in Miami to work with novelist, poet, essayist, screenwriter, and playwright Chris Abani. Rivera lives in Ithaca and is working on a middle-grade novel. Cornell University’s Creative Writing Program invited Chris Abani to speak on campus November 3 as part of the… [Read More]
A common problem for writers of narrative is overwriting. They work on a piece, edit, add more, read it again, out loud, and add a few more things. Overkill. The writing becomes so writerly it draws attention to itself and gets in the way of the story. The raw authenticity evaporates in the translation to prose. There is enormous pressure on the unpublished writer to… [Read More]
Filed Under: boring, flashbacks, foreshadowing, overwritten, pacing, purple prose, redundant, spoilers, verbose
The work of being a writer is never ending. When you’re not writing, you’re reading. When you’re not reading, you can listen! Podcasts are a wonderful way to learn about new books, hear authors talk about their writing practice, learn new skills, improve your writing craft, and gain fresh perspectives on the business of publishing. Here’s a short list of some of my favorite podcasts… [Read More]
Filed Under: Fresh Air, Grammar Girl, Guardian Books Podcast, Longform Podcast, Longorm, Memory Palace, Nerdette Podcast, Nerdist's Writers Panel, New Yorker Fiction Podcast, Odyssey SF/F Writing Workshop Podcasts, Poem of the Day, Radiolab, Reading and Writing Podcast, SCBWI, Writer's Almanac, Writing Excuses