Push Push in the…Oh never mind…By Jenny Gardiner

It seems the themes at the Girlfriends Book Club of late are keeping me honest…this time around? How do I finish the book I'm writing? That's a hell of a question!

 This easily segues from my post last month, in which I think I first spoke about The Book (make that manuscript). This would be the one I've picked up and put down countless times over the past several years. It has transformed and been revised myriad times (I should say chapters here and there have been revised, since not enough has been written to constitute it being an actual book revision (insert laughter here). My first chapter alone has had so many incarnations it might well be mistaken for a cat plowing through those nine lives.

 Believe me, I have had plenty of reasons to give up on this thing. I think what's kept me coming back to it is when I've eventually reviewed the chapters here and there that I've written, I am pleasantly surprised and -- dare I say it -- impressed with what I've written. It's what motivates me: it's been like passing a kidney stone the size of an elephant. I'd hate to go through all that pain without a positive outcome.

 I have had many days in which I struggle for each sentence. This is so abnormal for me. I used to be able to crank out books with no hesitation. I could not write for months on end, then sit down and binge-write, and crank out the book I'd intended. But this book, it's stymied me. During the course of writing this, I've vacillated, I've alternated, I've roamed hither and yon in the quest to figure out what it was I was writing. Used to be I'd write a book in a fairly linear manner. I knew my starting point and I knew my ending, and the rest sort of sprung up organically. With this one, I've changed my intent, changed my theme, changed my characters, changed their jobs, changed their relationship, changed other characters, changed the intended outcome. Right now I'm still undecided about the final outcome and as I'm nearing a deciding point, I still can't pick which one is the best plan of action. But the great thing is I'm finally nearing that point, a point at which I never thought this book would reach.

I put this book down so many times for a variety of reasons. Other jobs got in the way of it. Dealing with marketing and publicizing other books posed obstacles. Life events added more roadblocks. And then there were times I was so purely stuck, I just couldn't figure it out, and procrastination seemed an easier solution. But I need to finish it. I can't let this half-written tome languish in my laptop, never to find an audience. I need to finish it so that I can have the satisfaction of tackling the untackleable. And so I have struggled through this thing, sometimes one word at a time.

Frustratingly, when I've returned to it after putting it away yet again, I have to pore through the entire thing, mulling over the slightest changes, refining and attempting to make this thing the best it can be. It's become my Moby Dick (insert more laughter here). Yikes -- maybe it's like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction when you think she's dead but she pops up yet again with that butcher knife.

 Sometimes I allow myself to get sidelined by the what ifs. What if I can't find a publishing house for it? What if this book isn't "big" enough? Big, high concept books get the attention of your publishing house, whereas lesser ones flounder and die if you publish through mainstream houses. But now I am happy to know that if I can't weed through the finicky world of mainstream publishing anymore, I'll just publish it myself. And it'll be a terrific novel and people will enjoy it.

 When I first started this book, self-doubts brought on by this Goldilocksian publishing industry really undermined my confidence, and allowed me to allow myself to be distracted by the potential for failure. But now I'm motivated to a) make this book the best it can be, b) sell it well, whether that is through a New York house or on my own, and c) finish it now. No more dithering. With each word I've squeezed out of my brain, with each chapter I've concluded, with each page I've counted as complete, I build in confidence and in knowing that this work in particular I earned, through the blood, sweat and tears it took to get me there.

 So how to I motivate myself through? I just do it. I need to succeed with this, I can't let my self-doubts get the better of me. I can't let external forces drive my end results. I can only control what I can control, and that means the final words on the page. I remember years ago hearing John Grisham talk about having to put your butt in the chair and write, every single day, that you're not really a writer if you don't do that. Back then I didn't buy into that concept because I didn't write in that way; I wrote in blasts, then nothing, and that used to work. But now, I'm subscribing to the butt in chair school of writing, and you know what? He's right. You can't publish it if it's not written.

 So now, back to work…I'll keep you posted!


  Sleeping with Ward Cleaver

Slim to None

Anywhere But Here

Winging It: A Memoir of Caring for a Vengeful Parrot Who's Determined to Kill Me

Accidentally on Purpose (written as Erin Delany)

Compromising Positions (written as Erin Delany)

I'm Not the Biggest Bitch in this Relationship (I'm a contributor)

And these shorts:
Idol Worship: A Lost Week with the Weirdos and Wannabes at American Idol Auditions

The Gall of It All: And None of the Three F's Rhymes with Duck

Naked Man On Main Street

find me on Facebook: fan page
 find me on twitter here
 find me on my website

BOOK GIVEAWAY: To self-publish or not to self-publish, that is the question by Brenda Janowitz

THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED. CONGRATS TO NIRUKA FOR WINNING!!

There's been so much talk these days about self-publishing.  Haven't heard about it?  Well, you can check it out here or here.  And it's something I've been thinking about for a while.  Ever since my imprint closed (RIP, Red Dress Ink!!) and I got the rights back to my first two novels, I've been thinking: what do I do now?!

Last summer, I sold my third novel in a two-book deal to St. Martin's, so there wasn't much time to think about it.  My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, comes out July 2nd and in anticipation of the launch, I've decided to do something I never thought I'd do.

I'm going to release SCOT ON THE ROCKS and JACK WITH A TWIST myself.  Now, I know what you're thinking-- it's easy to do since the books were already acquired, edited, and then copyedited to within an inch of their life.  And you'd be right.  The books are ready to go.  I read over them and made a few tiny tweaks here and there, but the truth is, all I really had to do was to format them for e-readers, get new covers and then hit "publish."  Easy as that.

So, I reached out to the fabulous Malena Lott over at Athena Buzz (seriously, how gorgeous are her covers?!) and voila!, she created an amazing new cover for SCOT!!

And man, do I love this new cover!  I think it really conveys the sense of fun and romance that are the heart of the book.  I'll be publishing SCOT sometime this week (with JACK to follow closely on its heels) and I'm really excited about this new journey!

So, tell me about your thoughts on self-publishing.  Are you for it?  Against it?  Have you tried it yourself?  I want to hear everything!!

Leave a comment below and be entered to win a free Kindle copy of SCOT ON THE ROCKS!!  Winners will be announced next Thursday, May 9th.  Leave your email addy so I know where to reach you!

I’m the author of SCOT ON THE ROCKS and JACK WITH A TWIST, now in the process of being re-released by yours truly. My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, will be published by St. Martin's on July 2, 2013. My work’s also appeared in the New York Post and Publisher’s Weekly. You can find me at brendajanowitz.com or on Twitter at @BrendaJanowitz.

When You Don't Get What You Think You Want

By Marilyn Brant

You know that song by Garth Brooks,
"Unanswered Prayers"?
Or that famous one by the Rolling Stones, "You Can't Always Get What You Want"?

Yeah, me, too.

But I wonder how many times, when you heard one or the other of them on the radio, you thought about something in your life and said to yourself, "No, no! I really do want that particular thing ___(fill in the blank with your heart's deep desire). I don't wanna just get what I need -- I'm telling you* what I need, and it's the same thing that I want!"

[*"You," in this case, typically refers to one of the following: God, Mother Nature, the Unseen Forces of the Universe and/or your Magic 8 Ball.]

Publishing seems to inspire such moments more frequently than, say, almost any other less crazy-making occupation. And I'm not telling you that only because I've had some rather heated discussions with my Magic 8 Ball. But, if I'm being totally honest, I'll admit that in the nearly 13 years that I've been a fiction writer, my perspective on what's an actual blessing -- vs. what's a blessing in disguise -- has changed.

I remember finishing my first manuscript -- a women's fiction story that was (roughly) 625 handwritten pages long and (exactly) 509 typed pages in Times New Roman 12. I can now see countless flaws in it...but, back then, I thought it was a work of utter depth, brilliant pacing and staggeringly beautiful prose. Of course, at the time I wrote it, I hadn't yet actually read a single book on the craft of fiction or taken a class on the art of novel writing or, you know, even talked to a published author about...anything. So, my frame of reference for what constituted a "good" piece of fiction was rather limited and more than a little faulty.

This did not in any way stop me from desperately wanting a publishing contract with a NY house for that book. And Garth Brooks could croon on the radio all night long about how thankful he was for prayers that went unanswered, but I was convinced I was more perceptive than he was anyway and, seriously (!!), I knew what I wanted.

Turned out, I needed to dig a little deeper into that desire. Yes, I wanted to be a published author -- that part proved true -- but what I really wanted, more than almost anything at the time, was to have written a story that was a good solid piece of fiction. I kept wishing for a book contract for that first novel. But it was actually acquiring the novel-writing skills that would lead to a book contract that was my deep-down burning dream. (And I got the contract eventually, too, but only after I'd finished my fifth manuscript. No one, not even me, should ever have to suffer through that first one again... I remain ever grateful and relieved that it never got published.)

With the enormous changes going on in the publishing industry over these past few years, I've had conversations with dozens of writers about the books they've sold or haven't sold. About the dreams they'd once had for certain projects and how they thought it was the end of the line when those stories weren't picked up by a traditional house.
Many novelists put them away in a drawer or hid them on a flashdrive somewhere. They tried to forget about them, but there was always that lingering sense of disappointment.

And then digital publishing exploded onto the scene.

Authors who'd never found the right editor to embrace their work, suddenly had a platform to make thousands of sales, if they could reach their ideal audience. Books that didn't fit neatly into a publishing niche before, now had an honored place on the virtual bookshelves. I cannot begin to count the number of times I've heard in just the past twelve months, "Thank God my book didn't sell to ____ publisher!" Why? Because it gave the author the freedom to sell it to another house that did more for them marketing/distribution-wise or to publish it themselves and reap much greater royalties than they may have gotten under different circumstances.

In one instance, at least, that was true for me, too. I'd been very discouraged when Pride, Prejudice and the Perfect Match didn't sell to a traditional publisher several years ago. It had gotten so close! It made it as far as that final mystical roundtable of publishing people at a well-known house...and, at the last minute, they decided against buying it.

Honestly, though, that was the BEST thing that ever could have happened to that book! (And I'd hug Garth Brooks and Mick Jagger and sing their songs along with them both, if they were here, just to prove it.)

From a royalties standpoint, the story earned more in its first month after release than I would have made from that traditional publisher's small advance, plus, I got to keep all of my foreign/audio/etc. rights and I had complete control over selecting the cover design and choosing the release date. But, best of all, I got my deeper goal...which wasn't really to sell that novel to a NY house, but to connect that story with its right readership. I didn't have the online community network back then that I do now, and that's a large reason why I think I was able to help this book find its audience. Not selling this story too soon was, in fact, exactly what I needed...and, surprisingly, what I wanted as well. Even though I didn't know that until a few weeks ago. :)

What about you? Have you ever not gotten something that you thought you wanted, only to later discover that it was a blessing in disguise? As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts!
_______

Marilyn Brant is the award-winning women's fiction author of According to Jane, Friday Mornings at Nine and A Summer in Europe, as well as a #1 Kindle bestseller who also writes digital romantic comedies. She likes to sing everything from pop-country to rock-n-roll (but only when she's alone in the house), and she's very attached to her Magic 8 Ball.

Is Going Indie Right for You? by Jess Riley

Unless you’re a member of the Lykov family, you’ve probably noticed that publishing has undergone some dramatic changes in the last few years. Most notably, it’s become easier to self-publish your work and actually make a living writing.

But how do you know if “indie publishing” is right for you?

My first novel was published in 2008 by Ballantine Books; the book sold at auction and went back to press three times. Not too shabby for a scrappy little midlist title! But the publishing landscape has changed significantly since that book sold, and I’m convinced that the same manuscript wouldn't sell today.

In the four years since that book was released, I wandered through a bleak literary desert littered with false starts, missteps, second-guessing, rejection, and depression. My original editor tried to help, pitching story ideas that I inevitably botched because they didn’t come from my own little Eeyore heart. She moved on to different publishing houses and new projects, and I returned to the desert.

In 2011 I was hit with the idea for All the Lonely People. My agent loved it (which came as a huge relief), and we submitted to maybe a dozen publishers, getting heartbreakingly close rejections. A few months into our submission process I began to lose patience and heart. Maybe I should have given it more time, but this past fall I pulled the book from submission and after lots of agonizing, released it myself.

I was inspired in part by Karen McQuestion, another Wisconsin writer who told me self-publishing was the best thing she’d ever done for her career; she controlled her destiny, and her readers were judge and jury of her work. (And who could argue with sales topping 500,000?) My husband also eloquently pushed me into the indie camp with, “You don’t want to be like the Confederacy of Dunces guy, and people only read your stuff after you’re dead.”

Several of my other author friends also encouraged me, because they too had made the leap…and it wasn’t that scary.

So I swallowed my pride along with any misgivings I had and prepared for Plan B. It’s a personal decision for each writer, and knowing what you hope to get out of it before you take the plunge helps. I’m pretty new to it all (and I still have lots to learn), but here are a few early observations:

Know your audience, know your genre. If you write genre fiction—especially romance or thriller—self-publishing could be right for you. If you write literary fiction, legacy (traditional) publishing is still a better fit.

Learn from the best. Before I took the leap, I researched what other successful indie writers were doing. Many are incredibly generous and knowledgeable (J.A. Konrath and Dina Silver come to mind), and have blogged at length about their experiences. In some cases, I hired their cover artist, formatter, and editor.

Hybrid helps. If you go indie, having a background in traditional publishing helps.  You can still succeed without it, but it does make things a little more challenging (depending on your genre), at least initially.

Define what success means to you. Regardless of how your work is published, remember that a very small percentage of all writers can earn a living writing full-time. Have realistic expectations; self-publishing does give you a bit more breathing room (no push to sell big the first week, no pressure to earn out an advance), but it might take months or years for your career to build.

Book bloggers are an indie author’s best friends. I was fortunate to have the support of several awesome book bloggers. If you don’t have the time to devote hours and hours to researching and pitching bloggers in your genre, consider investing in a coordinated blog tour or netgalley listing. You won’t have traditional exposure, so reader and blogger reviews are more important than ever.

Most importantly, be a professional, and be 100% sure your book is the best it can be. You might get just one chance to convince a reader that your story is worth their time and money. Quality counts.

Have an eye-catching, professionally-designed cover, and be prepared to pay for it.  The same goes for conceptual and copy editing. Which brings me to:

Have an amazing, professionally-edited story that people will recommend to their friends. Both legacy and indie publishing depend so much on word-of-mouth. Write a freaking incredible book.   This goes without saying regardless of how the book is published, but self-publishing can make it too easy to put something out before it's ready for prime time. (Refer to Saralee Rosenberg's awesome blog post a few days ago for some tips on that front.)

And be flexible and kind to yourself. There is a learning curve involved. If something doesn’t work, try another approach. Tweak your sales copy, re-do your cover, experiment with pricing or author collaborations. Keep learning, keep evolving. Take full advantage of the control indie publishing affords you. Think of your marketing approach the same way you think about your crummy first draft: you can always revise it.

Or better yet, write the next book.

I’d love to hear your thoughts: if you’ve gone indie, and what are your takeaways from the experience? If you’re an aspiring author, which publishing model appeals to you more?

~~~~

Jess Riley just released her first novella, Closer Than They Appear:
a quirky mix of lad lit and chick lit with recipes and bingo cards, because why not?
 

Beautiful, Difficult Change

Photo courtesy Flickr's  Orangeya

When Maggie invited me to guest blog with the Girlfriends Book Club this month, she mentioned that the theme was transitions. One topic that’s been on my mind lately fit that theme: a transition in belief, from authors seeing traditional publishing as the most attractive option for writers, to believing self-publishing may be as attractive—if not more attractive—an option.

I strongly support options for writers, and self-publishing is definitely one of them. Several author friends have found success through self-publishing new works or re-releasing books on their backlists. And I think self-publishing is a smart option for writers who either aren’t interested in traditional publishing or who have tried the trad-publishing route only to be told their work—while quality—would be difficult to define and/or place on a shelf. Traditional publishing is notoriously blind to books that don’t fill a specific niche, and self-publishing may be an ideal option for square-peg books, which are some of the best reads, in my opinion.

I’m all for self-publishing, but do you sense a but? Here it comes.

Last month, I spent an afternoon browsing titles at a local indie bookstore, positively in my element, because I collect books like some collect recipes. I picked up a beautiful-looking book and thumbed through the first few pages. Then an error leaped out at me. This wasn’t a typo, but a wrongness of speech—one of those I-know-you-meant-the-opposite-of-what-you-just-said type of errors.

I might’ve been on page three.

Disappointment filled me, and I’m not proud to admit that my first thought was, “I wonder if this is a self-published book?” It was.

I know that errors can be found in even traditionally published books—books that have been poured over by an editor and copy-editor; books that have been written by multi-published, NYTs-best-selling-superstar authors. It happens all of the time. So what is my problem? Why did I put that beautiful-looking book down and walk away?

Because the author-reader trust broke in that moment, and my faith shattered.

When you plunk down your money and commit to buying and then reading a book, you are allowing a writer to take your hand and guide you through a story. A tale that’s riddled with the literary equivalent of potholes is going to make for a jarring journey. Maybe it isn’t fair to judge an entire book on one early—if glaringly obvious (to me)—flaw, but life is too short and the TBR pile too teetering for meh reads.

“It wasn’t ‘meh!’ It’s a masterful story!” that author might have argued. “You didn’t give it a fair chance!”

And here’s where I’m going to sound a little bitchy, maybe. I don’t *have* to give any book a chance. It isn’t my responsibility as a reader to give any author a three-strikes read or consume a novel with one blind eye just to be nice.

The responsibility for quality lies with the author.

I know there are many, many writers out there who have self-published books, or who are considering self-publishing, who are doing their utmost to ensure polished prose. To those authors I say, “Thank you,” because here’s some truth, fair or not. Self-published authors have it harder, in some ways, than traditionally published authors—and I don’t mean the fact that they’re in charge of their own publicity and marketing. I mean they are claiming to be a Pro in writing AND in editing; that’s the pact they make with readers when they put a cover on a book and say it’s for sale. It’s done. Perfectly baked. Ready for consumption. They have that much more to live up to when they make that claim—that they’re expert in both writing and editing, that they’ve managed to conquer not just one but two huge mountains all alone and are ready to take readers on a tour. Early or frequent story errors injure that tenuous reader-writer/editor contract, and may be enough to cause someone to close the cover; they reveal a writer who didn’t do his/her due diligence, who didn’t take that contract seriously enough, who assumed maybe it would be just fine to be a decent writer but only a half-mast editor.

Here’s my truth. I don’t ever want to wonder if someone took a manuscript that didn’t work for craft reasons, that wasn’t ready for primetime, and decide to self-publish it to see if it might make money anyway. I don’t want to be slapped with the thought on page three that self-publishing was for that writer an excuse for settling on a lesser standard. I don’t ever want to think that self-publishing became for that writer the equivalent of stuffing an unready manuscript under the bed or in a drawer.

That may seem harsh, but the reality is that a self-published writer represents him/herself in all ways—and his or her story can fail in all of those ways.

Unless they don’t fail, of course. Unless they do their due diligence, and put in the hours, and revise and edit (and hire someone to help if necessary) until all of the splintery bits of their manuscript are memories. Unless they do everything in their power to make the difference between the level of craft in a traditionally published book and their novel insignificant.

Change can be beautiful, but it’s rarely easy, and this era of publishing is anything but easy.

What I’d like to see during this time of transition is for writers who decide to self-publish to become ambassadors for all self-publishing authors. I’d like to see a host of shining examples of how to do it right, with due attention to craft and a high level of respect for readers. That book? I won’t put down. I buy. I read. I love. I add to my keeper shelf.

Write that book.

What are your feelings about self-publishing, both as a reader and a writer, for worse and for better? 

Therese Walsh is the co-founder of Writer Unboxed and the author of The Last Will of Moira Leahy. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

"Falling Uphill:" Turning a Trunk Book into an E-Book by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga

In 2004 I was in a funk over my writing life. At last I’d landed an agent, but he wasn’t able to sell either of my manuscripts. And then he ended up firing me. (Much later I realized that he didn’t know what the heck he was doing, and I should have actually fired him, but that’s another story). One of these novels, after much revision, ended up as my thesis for my MFA program in 2008. But the other ms, called Falling Uphill—what could be described as a “chick-lit mystery with a little bit of old Hollywood thrown in”—went into my “trunk,” only to gather dust on my hard drive.

Flash forward to 2011. By now I’ve had two novels traditionally published and self-pubbed e-books are all the rage. And, I thoutht, why not take another look at Falling Uphill—maybe I could use it to jump on this indie-pub bandwagon. I hadn’t touched the ms for some seven years and as I read, I got caught up, just like a new reader. Did I write this? What’s going to happen next? I couldn’t remember how it all turned out. And, best of all, I liked it!

So I got to work. I put Falling Uphill out as part of Amazon’s Select Program under its Kindle Direct Publishing platform. This meant agreeing to sell the book exclusively on Amazon for a three-month period. Under the Select Program you get paid not only for the copies of books you sell, but also for books borrowed from Amazon’s lending library for users who have a Prime membership. But the best thing about the Select Program for me was being able to offer Falling Uphill for free for five days. When I did this (along with some self-promotion regarding the free giveaway), I garnered 35,000 downloads. This led to the book charting quite well on various Kindle free and paid bestseller charts, which gave it a visibility it wouldn’t have otherwise attained. Sales have remained steady and my Amazon reviews more than tripled. And through this people have also found out about my other books. Gaining new readers—that’s what it’s all about for me.

I couldn’t be happier with the experience. Pretty good for a trunk novel that probably never would have seen the light of day without the digital publishing revolution.

Excerpt from Chapter One of FallingUphill by Wendy Nelson Tokunaga

Ruth Fenton is dead, but I don’t know what this has to do with me.

I press the button on the answering machine once more.

            This is a message for Candace Grey. Ms. Grey, this is Sally Claiborne at the West Portal Home for the Aged in San Francisco. We’re sorry to inform you that Ruth Fenton passed away on Monday. A memorial service will be held here next Wednesday.

            Sally has left her phone number and says to call if I have any questions. Yes, I do: Who is Ruth Fenton?

            After spending four brain-numbing hours at my office correcting finals, it’s already way past ten. And I’ll still be late getting my grades in, which seems to happen every semester. As usual I’ll have to get up extra early tomorrow and finish inputting them into the computer.

Jeff’s still not home. When I saw the blinking light on the answering machine I assumed it was a message from him—not a mysterious call from San Francisco. It’s Thursday and already this is the fourth time Jeff’s arrived home later than me this week. This means every day so far. Is he going to tell me that yet another meeting with his department head required his attendance? I don’t know if I can keep buying that.

            “You sure he’s not cheating?” My friend Laney Svensson didn’t mince words over lunch today.

            “Cheating?” I put on my best that’s-out-of-the-question face, but I have to admit the thought has crossed my mind. After celebrating our fifth-year anniversary of living together just the previous month (a celebration that was all my idea—a weekend at the Rose Petal Inn bed-and-breakfast in Stevensville, with a view of Lake Michigan), there’s still no urgency on his part to set a wedding date.

“Is it really necessary to secure a piece of paper to prove our love?” is one of his favorite lines. And I get no straight answer as to why, when he’s told yes, said piece of paper is required, other than, “I’m just not ready yet and you’re so nice to be so patient with me. Give me time.” Toss in these recent bouts of lateness and it’s enough to make a girl wonder if indeed something fishy is going on.

            Ruth Fenton. Ruth Fenton. 

            I file through my brain, hoping to jog my memory into arriving at a clue as to who she could be. I forgot all about eating so I toss an individual frozen salami and sausage pizza into the microwave. I’m not about to make dinner for two for the late Mr. Jeff Sands. As the pizza pops and sizzles I hear the front door, then see Jeff in the doorway of the kitchen.

            He looks tired and a little drunk. “Sorry I’m late,” he says. “But some of the students took me out for a beer to celebrate the end of the semester.”

            “Did you eat something?”

            “Yeah.” He opens the refrigerator and takes out a hunk of Monterey Jack cheese and a Cadbury Strawberry Crème bar. “But I’m still hungry.”

            I stare at his food choices, and conclude that it really isn’t just my imagination that his eating habits have lately become increasingly bizarre.

“How come you didn’t call?” The microwave beeps and I remove my pizza, throwing it on a plate.

            “I knew you’d be sweating it out grading finals,” he says. “Did you get your grades in?”

            “No.”

            He yawns. “Well, that’s no surprise.”

            I frown. Procrastination is not in Jeff’s vocabulary—he turned in his grades a week before the deadline, as usual.

“So what students did you go out with?”

            “Just a group from my English Lit class. No one you’d know.”

            I wonder if maybe it was more like one particular student he was with. Perhaps Stephanie Filcher? I spotted him talking to her last week on campus behind the library, sitting together on a bench in the oak grove, a well-known make-out spot for students.

Stephanie has just finished my Anthropology 200 Gender, Mass Media and Society class, and is as auburn-haired, hazel-eyed, rosebud-lipped, and milk-skinned as an American Girl doll. She probably weighs more than I do, but her slight chubbiness is displayed in firm, rounded curves that are flattering on a college sophomore, but would appear downright pudgy on anyone over twenty-five.

When the semester started she made a point of telling me she had “that hottie” (her words) Professor Sands for English Lit, as if to see my reaction. It was obvious she knew he was my boyfriend, though it wasn’t something we broadcasted all over school. Very tacky for someone out of high school a good two years and enrolled in a halfway decent private college like Jonesbury (no University of Michigan, but respectable) to use words like “hottie” in front of her teacher.

            But it also might look tacky to ask Jeff exactly what he was doing with Stephanie Filcher at the oak grove, even though I’m picturing him on his outing tonight sucking down a Corona with her—in bed.

            “I have to tell you something,” he says.

            The professorial gravity in his voice nearly makes my heart stop. I’m transported back to high school, to Mr. Flack’s advanced geometry class, my knees trembling as he’s about to announce final grades. Here it comes. I brace myself for the inevitable I’m-in-love-with-Stephanie-Filcher-however-I-wish-you-the-best-of-luck-in-all-your-future-endeavors confession. I wish I were dead like Ruth Fenton. I hold my breath. “What?”

            “I just found out I’m teaching summer school so I can’t go with you to LA.”

            I consider this to be bad news, but it sounds a lot better than I’m breaking up with you. “I thought you said you couldn’t get a summer placement.”

            “Tim Gifford decided not to take the spot at the last minute. Dean Cooper asked me if I wanted it and I said yes. I figure I could use the money.”

            Notice he doesn’t say we could use the money. He insists that we keep our finances separate like roommates. I still owe him $8.75 for half of the Haagen-Dazs White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle ice cream, Milano Double Orange cookies, and Tofu Helper he bought on Monday.

            “So you can’t go with me?”

            “Sorry.” He leans over and brushes his lips against mine. Even after six years together his kisses still thrill me, though I’m not sure he feels the same. Maybe he wasn’t with Stephanie Filcher tonight. Maybe he still wants to be with me. Except not when I go to LA.

            I sigh. “Well, that kind of changes everything.”

            “This doesn’t stop you from going on your own, Candace. It’s not like I would be a big help or anything.”

            “But I thought it could be a kind of vacation for us. No school. No pressure.”

            “Well, we just went to Lake Michigan and that set us back some serious change.”

            Our LA summer together was to be half fun and half work, while I did research for my master’s thesis. No, Jeff might not be a big help with my research, but I don’t know what I would have done without him in my early days of teaching. I may still be time management impaired, but it was Jeff who saved my butt by showing me how to write a clear syllabus, deal with students who said I didn’t know what I was talking about, and helped me track down a way too familiar-sounding term paper to a website called “E-Z A” where a ready-to-turn-in paper on any subject can be downloaded for ten bucks a page. 

 “I was really looking forward to being with you.”

            He gives me a smile worthy of a hottie. He’s been wearing his brownish-blond hair shorter, which I like. It frames his face in a way that brings out the blue in his eyes, despite his gold wire-rim glasses. “I’ll miss you,” he says.

            “I guess things just aren’t going my way. You won’t be coming to LA and Ruth Fenton is dead.”

            “Ruth Fenton?” he says. “Who’s that?”

            “I haven’t the faintest idea.”

~~~

Find out more about Falling Uphill HERE.

Wendy Nelson Tokunaga is the author of the novels, “Midori by Moonlight” and “Love in Translation” (both published by St. Martin’s Press), and the original e-book novels “Falling Uphill” and “His Wife and Daughters.” She’s also written a nonfiction e-book, “Marriage in Translation: Foreign Wife, Japanese Husband.” Her short story “Love Right on the Yesterday” is featured in “Tomo: Friendship Through Fiction: An Anthology of Teen Stories” published by Stone Bridge Press, and her essay, “Burning Up” appears in “Madonna & Me: Women Writers on the Queen of Pop” published by Soft Skull Press. Wendy holds an MFA in Writing from University of San Francisco (2008) and teaches novel writing for Stanford University’s Online Writer’s Studio and has taught for USF’s MFA program. She also does private manuscript consulting for novels and memoirs. She is currently working on her fifth novel. Visit her at: www.WendyTokunaga.com and follow her on Twitter: @Wendy_Tokunaga

Once Was Blind, But Now I See, by Melissa Clark

The term 'self-publishing' used to make me cringe. Now I cringe at the fact that I used to cringe at it. I was blind to the entrepreneurial side of it.

My first novel was published by Random House. Naturally, I assumed my second would be, too. But my editor got married and pregnant and - gasp - quit her job, leaving me at square one. I had faith. I had hope. The new book went out wide. I waited. And waited. And waited. My agent suggested this was one of the longest waiting periods she'd ever experienced - through Christmas and even Easter. It was nothing short of a nightmare. 

Finally, responses started trickling in. Editors loved it, were fighting for it at meetings, thought it was a 'page-turner', 'quirky', 'unlike anything they'd ever read' - BUT - BUT - BUT they couldn't get consensus within their company. A book about a person who purrs like a cat? Not everyone was on board. The first positive pass was painful. The second, even worse. Eventually, I stopped counting, but at one point I was praying for a flat-out rejection. Those came, too. We heard from all the A-list companies and then reorganized and sent to our plan B. It wasn't catching there, either. We were scheming ways to send out to our C-list when I suggested we stop the madness.

Around the same time, my friend Leena and I had lunch. Leena is an indie filmmaker and was excitedly talking about putting her movie online (Her film had a wide and successful run at many film festivals). Another friend, fellow girlfriend Maggie Marr, was talking about putting her latest novel online. I trusted both these women. I didn't find anything cringe-worthy about their decisions to 'self-publish'. My final decision came after reading the Steve Jobs biography. I loved reading about the passion he had for figuring out ways to sell the Mac computer - it just seemed so creative and fun. I finished the book and decided I was going to go that direction, too.

I edited my manuscript for the 435th time, reached out to friends and strangers for blurbs, hired a cover designer, a formatter, made postcards, filled out some paperwork and voila! On March 20, "Imperfect" launched as an e-book. 

I have never felt more in control in my life.

I think that this adventure is even more exciting than the first book's publication. AND it's selling. There's still lots of work to do in the marketing and promotions department, but that's what entrepreneurs do.

The publishing climate is changing, and I think the change is favoring authors. And that's certainly something to celebrate.

"Imperfect" is available on Kindle, Nook, and everything else. Melissa will be giving away one copy of her new book to someone who leaves a message here AND follows her on her blog, Connections Clark by Friday, April 6. Winner will be chosen by random.org and announced on my blog.

The Girl with the K-Mart Tattoo

By Laura Spinella

I often pass on the suggested topics at The Club. Not because the query isn’t thought-provoking, but I am the girl with a racquet from K-Mart while most have been taking lessons from the pro for years. This time, for a few reasons, I felt like I had something to say, partly because of my new gig and mostly because I just turned in a manuscript. The latter has provided a good chuck of time to mull things over, including the effect of the changing climate in publishing.

Since last fall, when I’m not writing books or newspaper stories, I’ve been working as the editorial/content manager for AuthorBytes. They specialize in author websites, design and construction from the ground up. The owner thought an in-house author would make for a unique piece to the AuthorBytes puzzle. He was right. Well, at least from my point of view. Initially, the computer end was like being told I was working pyrotechnics for Metallica, but I’ve found I don’t have the aversion to flames that I thought I might. On occasion, I get to chat with A-list authors, which is a tough perk to find at most part time jobs. But the thing that’s been really surprising is the amount of time we spend integrating social media into websites. Even more surprising is how things like Facebook and Twitter have become part of a complete web presence. It makes the climate tropical in that social media is as much a part of publishing as the midnight buffet on a cruise ship. You just don’t want to miss out.



I recall a discussion about social media at GBC about a year ago. We all agreed it was an important tool, but the consensus was that social media wasn’t the main marketing artery leading to publishing success. But I don’t think publishing is the same as it was even a year ago, an industry that grows a new tentacle with every change of the tide. The steady trend of authors taking complete ownership their work is real, and I don’t see how wisely executed social media isn’t a path that leads to some level of accomplishment.




Not post related, just Happy Friday!

That path also takes me back around to my newly submitted manuscript. A year ago, I’d be all pins and needles, waiting for agents and editors to render an opinion. I’d be certain that life was doomed, culminating with a very off with her head moment if my book wasn’t well received. While I admit there are needles jabbing, and a positive response would be my first choice, it’s no longer my only choice. This, more than anything, is what I’ve seen evolve during the past year in publishing. The stigma that was once so thoroughly attached to self-publishing seems to have faded, particularly if you already own the credentials of published author. I believe it’s truer for non-fiction than fiction, though check back next week and that notion also may have changed. Along with several members of this blog, I’ve had the opportunity to observe other authors who, for whatever reasons, have chosen an alternate route to publication. Surely, you’ve seen the same, and I’d be curious to know if your ideas about self-publishing have changed or even come full circle. If you’ve done it, tell me what’s better about it. I have no idea if the concept would work for me, or if I’d be any good at all the parts required to be the autonomous ruler of my own book. On the other hand, in a business where more doors tend to close than open, it’s a window with an incredibly intriguing view.

Laura Spinella is the author of BEAUTIFUL DISASTER, Best First Book, NJRWA, 2011; SheKnows.com, Favorite Book of 2011. Visit her at lauraspinella.net or on Facebook.