Stalking Emma Dryden

from Craig Lew

Rancho Santa Margarita, California:

It all began in a Borders Book Store thick with the smell of espresso and the sound of soccer moms gossiping.  

Yeah, that long ago...

I thought I’d do some research in the kid lit arena, possibly write a few kids books between film projects.  Should be easy.
Yeah, that naive...

I picked up a book off the Best Seller shelf with a one word title.

“WTF?  Who in their right mind would take a chance on an edgy YA novel written completely in verse?”

A rapid Google revealed the agent.

Ventana Sierra Advanced Writer's Workshop - Defining Giving Back

Greetings Turbo Monkeys

I write this from Carson City, Nevada, where I am experiencing the first ever Ventana Sierra Advanced Writers Workshop.

I’ve learned to include sales figures, articles and social media stats in my Pitch Kit by Laurie McLean.  http://forewordliterary.com

How to “turn” a pitch by Michael Bourret (and what the market is seeking at this moment)  http://www.dystel.com/staff/mike.html

To ask the right questions by Judith Curr

http://imprints.simonandschuster.biz/atria

Why this book?

Who will read it?

How will you tell your readers about it?

... Most important “What kind of cake is it?”

Lorin Oberweger taught me that slow things should be told quickly and that fast things should be experienced slowly and with great detail.  http://www.free-expressions.com

This world builder learned from Emma Dryden that not only should I describe the physical landmarks but I should also create the tenets, values and emotions of the worlds I design.  And that the world within my characters should also be as deeply detailed.  

http://www.drydenbks.com/about.html

This is an amazing workshop and I highly recommend you be here next year.

But seriously, the biggest lesson I learned at Ventana Sierra was the definition of giving.

The faculty gave back their honorariums, others gave scholarships, Ellen Hopkins is giving back to writers...but the Ventana Sierra Organization is giving so so so much more.

Ventana Sierra was formed specifically to help highly motivated young people, who desired college or career training, but were financially unable to accomplish their goals to build solid career paths toward a more positive future. The application process is stringent, the expectations high. Those who enter the program must commit to a minimum of two years substance-free, and maintain a 3.0 GPA if they choose a college track. Those entering career apprenticeship programs must receive regular above average reviews by their mentors.

In exchange, participants will receive housing, tuition and books, transportation, medical care and life skills classes.

"We're new, so we're trying to jumpstart the program now. We have purchased our first house, which will serve up to six young people, and hope to purchase another house by the end of the year so we'll have living quarters for twelve, six boys and six girls. So it will provide housing, life skills classes, food, medical care if they need it—whatever assistance they need to be able to concentrate on learning or reaching career goals without having to, you know, struggle by living on the street, or by, or whatever. I just want to make it easy for them to be able to get that." 

 --  Ellen Hopkins

Take a moment from learning your craft, from designing your world and from your writer’s life and visit http://ventanasierra.org

Is there something you can give? 

Likes? Shares? Time? 

Have a wondrous day!

Hybrid Publishing: What it is...and what it might become.

by Amy

From our tree house here, high above the publishing jungle, we hear things. (I hear things in coffee shops, too, and sometimes they end up in my books.) Lately, the term “hybrid publishing” has been tickling our ears. Monkeys love tickles and I was intrigued, so I snuffled around to see what all the hub-bub was about.

Hybrid publishing was originally minted to refer to those lucky self-published books that were later picked up by a traditional publisher. There are many examples of these 'cross-over' books, but I’ll point out PJ Hoover and her book Solstice, because she’s my Facebook friend and I like her.



(My tiara. I wear it on Wednesdays.)

Ironically, the term also applies to the opposite situation.  Books that were originally published by a traditional publisher and have gone out of print or are stuck on a backlist are being reclaimed by the authors, repackaged and re-released, either as ebooks or POD. I personally know of three well-published authors in the midst of this now. The process isn’t always easy – publishers are sometimes reluctant to let go of the rights. But those authors who can swing it get 100% royalties, lots of freedom and massive power. And a tiara. And a cape. (Part of that might be a lie.) Hybrid publishing is also used to describe traditionally published authors who decide to go the self-published route with their later books. But to me, that’s just self-publishing by a famous person.

Teams are fun!

The last example of hybrid publishing is one that I’m really excited about and one I expect we’ll see happening more and more. It’s a team approach—where an author and/or illustrator join forces with others to bring a project to life. Editors, digital content people, publicists, PR people…any number of folks can be added to the team, depending on what the writer and/or illustrator need, creating a process somewhere between traditional and self-publishing. I foresee a not-so-distant future where hybrid published titles like this are marketed on the street cred of the team members. Some free-lance editors (like our Fairy-Godmonkeys Emma Dryden & Harold Underdown) already have great name recognition and since they don’t work with everyone who knocks on their door, their vetting process offers a level of confidence to a potential buyer/reader.

A company called NetMinds is focusing on this ‘team approach’ with their Disruptive Team Publishing Platform, touted as “an alternative to traditional and self-publishing.” From their press release:  

Net Minds has built a software platform that allows authors to find any member of the publishing value chain, such as editors, designers, publicists, etc., selecting potential collaborators through a discovery system that includes ratings and commentary on a professional’s work. These teammates are invited into, or can request to join a project, offered traditional transactional and non-traditional compensation options, like percentages of the book’s financial performance, and the community then produces the book.”

In a similar-but-slightly-different vein, there is Diversion Books, headed by Scott Waxman, of Waxman Leavall Literary Agency (no stranger to traditional publishing.) Diversion offers “…a full service approach to production, marketing, and publicity, and engages the latest tools and technologies in order to produce and promote its titles in the best possible way.” To over-simplify their services...they help you self-publish your book, BUT there is a submission process and they don’t accept every project. They also take more in royalties than self-publishers but the author’s cut is still significantly higher than with traditional publishing—50% or more. Sadly, Diversion does not accept children’s, MG or YA titles at this time.

So, all of this is VERY cool stuff, but what do you guys think? Is this the way of the future? What are the drawbacks? Would you hybrid publish?

New Developments in Self-Publishing

by Amy

As a self-published monkey, I’ve been following the recent tossings and turnings of the industry with great interest. Back when I launched my book in 2010 (which is something like the Neolithic period with regard to self-publishing) things were pretty cut and dried. If you had a good manuscript, a publisher bought it and turned it into a book. Publishing something yourself seemed to indicate that your book wasn’t ‘good enough’ and that you were taking the easy way out.

Things have changed. Publishers, scrambling to make sense of a new landscape, seem hesitant to take risks on new books. Self-publishing has lost its stigma, thanks to some great authors putting out some more-than-good-enough books. (Self-published titles accounted for more of the year's best-selling eBooks than either Hyperion's or Harper Collins, and for the first time ever, a New York Times book critic put a self-published title on her best-of-2012 list.) And while the do-it-yourself route still has significant road blocks, there are technologies and services rushing to knock them down. Consider some of these new products and developments, and how they may affect self-publishing (click to Tweet!)…and by extent, the entire publishing industry.

Software:  One of biggest hurdles to successful self-publishing has been marketing – how do you get your book in front of buyers. Booklamp, which calls itself the Pandora of books, and Booksai, a program that uses Artificial Intelligence to recommend books similar to ones a reader likes, could open up that playing field. Booklamp’s engine isn't influenced by advertising budgets or popularity biases. Likewise, Booksai analyzes only a book's content, ignoring sales rank and purchase history. These recommendation engines provide great opportunities for self-published projects, which often don’t have the sales numbers to get recommended on Amazon or other large bookseller websites.

Self-Publishing Forums: Now that self-publishing has been around a few years, the trials and errors made by early authors can be avoided…provided you know about them. That’s the beauty of self-publishing forums. You’ll find everything from pros and cons on the various self-publishing platforms to information on how to format your manuscript to recommendations for professional editors. Self-publishing is a lonely road and these forums can help independent author/publishers feel less alone. For a list of recommended forums, see this great post at The Book Designer.

Big Six (er, Five) Self-Publishing Arms: Even the traditional publishers are starting to get in on the action. Simon & Shuster’s Archway and Author Solutions (owned by Penguin…House) offer varying levels of publishing packages to suit each individual author’s needs. I haven’t studied these in too much depth, but from my narrow perspective, they seem to take the “self” out of self-publishing and replace it with authors paying big bucks to a company to publish their work. Um...I think there used to be a term for that....varity press? vanishy? vanipy?

Mergers: With the Random House/Penguin merger a done deal and rumors of a Harper Collins/S&S mashup flying around, the traditional publishing jungle is starting to look a lot different…and a lot smaller. How self-publishing fits into that jungle remains to be seen, but it certainly does seem like there’s a lot more room on the battlefield.

So this is all great news for self-publishers.

However…

…before you go bananas and publish every last word you’ve ever written, keep in mind that publishing your own book is a tremendous responsibility and, even with these new developments, a LOT of work! I tapped two of our fairy God-Mentors, EmmaDryden and Harold Underdown, to give us their thoughts on self-publishing and what it takes to do it well. Read these brilliant words of wisdom with care before heading down that do-it-yourself path.

 

EMMA DRYDEN:

One issue I see happening is that because the technical aspects of self publishing are SO easy— in other words, it's easier than ever to get something up on the web for all to see—too many authors are doing so without thought and without following what to my mind are necessary best practices in the way of editing, design, and marketing, at the very least. To self publish well, one must think and act like a publisher, but most authors don't have any idea what that means, and it takes time and practice to find out. My concern is that someone's name is on a book- and that should mean the same thing as someone's reputation being attached to that book, so if a book is sloppy, unprofessional, and poorly executed, this will reflect on that author. So I feel it's essential for someone who is self-publishing to take care with the process, not rush, and be clear as to what the goals are by self-publishing. To self-publish something meant to be shared by friends and family is one thing; to self-publish with the expectation of being reviewed and to sell books, that's something entirely different. An author needs to think this through clearly and professionally, in my opinion.

HAROLD UNDERDOWN: 

A pitfall: I see a lot of writers (not folks who just want to get a book out—writers who see themselves as building a career as writers) who choose self-publishing as a shortcut. They see how much work it is to find an agent, then find a publisher, and they see that there are no guarantees that they will get published that way. Even if they find a publisher, they may then work with the publisher for years. So self-publishing looks like less work. You can get published faster and more dependably. The problem is that to self-publish successfully, as Emma notes, you have to do the things that publishers do. And those things are a lot of work. The experience of Amanda Hocking is a case in point—she self-published very successfully but, as she said at the time, this required so much work that she signed with St. Martin's so she could concentrate on writing. And there are no guarantees, even with all that work, that someone will succeed in self-publishing. A brief summary of what's involved in publishing is in this article: http://www.underdown.org/publisher-expertise.htm

Emma and Harold raise very important issues. The website Harold lists gives a rundown of all the jobs you'll be taking on as a self-publisher. It's clear that, to do a good job publishing your own book, you need either lots of skills and/or a lot of money to pay people to do the jobs you can't. And keep in mind Emma's point about your book being 'out there.' It won't go away if, three years down the road, you realize it's not that good. Trust me--that happens.

The bottom line...self-publishing may be easier than ever, but doing it right will never be easy.

Here's a big bunch of bananas for our guests, the amazing Emma and most excellent Harold! You guys are welcome in the Turbo Monkey Tree anytime!

 
Emma D Dryden is the founder of the children’s book editorial and publishing consulting firm, drydenbks, through which she provides editorial and consultancy support to authors, illustrators, agents, foreign and domestic publishers, and eBook and app publishers. An editor and publishing for over twenty-five years, Emma has edited hundreds of books for children and young readers, and has worked at Viking, Random House, and as VP, Publisher of Atheneum and Margaret K. McElderry Books, imprints of Simon& Schuster. She is on the SCBWI Board of Advisors and she totally rocked as a mentor for the Nevada SCBWI Mentorship program, where she inspired Turbo Monkeys Kristen and Marilyn.

Harold Underdown is best known for his wonderful children’s writing, illustrating and publishing website, The PurpleCrayon, and for his indispensible book, The Complete Idiot's Guide toPublishing Children's Books, now in its third edition. He provides editorial and publishing consulting services through PC Editorial Services and does workshops and retreats via Kids Book Revisions. Previously, he served as Vice President and Editorial Director at ipicturebooks and prior to that, was editorial director of the Charlesbridge trade program. He has also worked at Orchard Books and Macmillan. Turbo Monkey Sarah was the lucky monkey who benefitted from Harold’s awesome advice and mad editing skills during the 2010-2011 Nevada Mentorship Program.