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12 Parts of a Perfect Pitch for a Nonfiction Book: Exciting Agents and Editors About Your Proposal

February 27, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Pitching your nonfiction book to an agent or editor takes less than thirty seconds. The goal: generate maximum excitement in as few words as possible. Without being self-serving, you must capture the essence of your book, why it will appeal to book buyers, and what’s most impressive about your platform, promotion plan, and credentials.

Books are either prose-driven or promotion-driven. Promotion  and platform–your continuing visibility, online and off. on the subject of your book with potential book buyers–aren’t as important for certain kinds of books such as reference books. They’re also not as important for academic presses, or for small, niche, or midsize houses outside of New York. So you have to be clear about your publishing goals for your book and what it takes to achieve them.

Half of the twelve parts of a pitch are optional; you may not need them. Here’s how to excite agents and of editors at Big Apple houses:

  1. A sentence with the title (and subtitle, if needed) and up to fifteen words that prove your book is unique and salable.
  2. The model(s) for your book: one or two books, movies, or authors–“It’s The Tipping Point meets The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.”
  3. (Optional) A narrative nonfiction book, such as a memoir, requires two or three sentences about the time, setting, and the story.
  4. The most important thing about your platform: what you are doing to give yourself continuing visibility on the subject, online or off, with potential book buyers, and if the number is impressive, how many of them, and where. Wrong: “I give talks.” Right: “I give X talks a year to Y people in major markets.”
  5. The most effective one-to-three things you will do to promote your book, online or off, and if the number is impressive and appropriate, how many of them. Your promotion plan must be a believable extension of your platform.
  6. The length of your proposal.
  7. (Optional) The length of your manuscript, if it’s ready to submit.
  8.  (Optional) The names of people who will provide a foreword and cover quotes, if            they’re impressive.
  9. (Optional) Mention if you’re proposing a series.
  10. (Optional) Information about a self-published edition that will help sell it.
  11. Your most impressive credentials: your track record; experience in your field; years of research; prizes; contests; awards.
  12. (Optional) Anything else that will impress agents or editors.

            Like the parts of your proposal, these elements are the building blocks of your pitch. Arrange them in whatever order will give them the most impact. How to Write a Book Proposal discusses platform and promotion.

 

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference

Changing the World One Book at a Time

October 12, 2014 / www.sfwritingforchange.org/ sfwriterscon@aol.com

The 11th San Francisco Writers Conference

A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community 

February 13-16, 2014 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com / Mike’s blog: http://sfwriters.info/blog @SFWC / www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn / Laurie McLean, Dean / free classes / www.sfwritersu.com / sfwritersu@gmail.com / @SFWritersU  

Larsen-Pomada Literary Agents

Helping Writers Launch Careers Since 1972

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1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

 

 

 

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Filed Under: Getting a Book Published, Literary Agents, San Francisco Writers Conference, San Francisco Writing for Change Conference, Writing Fiction, Writing for Change, Writing Nonfiction Tagged With: , , , ,

The Holy Trinity of Creating Communities for Writers: Content, Service, Visibility

January 15, 2013 By Leave a Comment

For your work to be read, you need to build communities of fans. The holy trinity of community—the three elements you need to build community are content, service, and visibility:

  • Because content is king, you need to keep producing work of different lengths and in different media. You have more ways to serve your readers than ever: more media and devices for reaching them faster, less expensively, more easily, and in more places than ever.
  • Making a book succeed requires a holy trinity of acts by your readers:

–They have to buy your book.

–They have to finish it; 57% of books aren’t finished.

–They must like it enough to use word of mouth and word of mouse to tell their communities they must read it.

  • Readers have to find your work. Timing, the President descending from his helicopter with your book, and other forms of luck can make a book take off, but there are two basic ways books succeed:

–Magic: the simpler, faster way is word of mouth and mouse. Fans online and off enable a book to go viral, a rare phenomenon.

–Communication: consumers have to hear about a new product seven to ten times to convince them to buy it. Communication is queen. The faster you want to build your readership, the more effectively and frequently you have to use all of the ways you can to serve your readers so they remain engaged members of your community of fans.

Becoming a successful author usually takes more than one book. Agent Don Maass, author of Writing the Breakout Novel, believes it takes five books for authors to build an audience. Make creating fans for life your mission. They’re waiting for you, and they want to help you succeed. Why not let them? The aces are the writers who create content and communicate about it best. Finding them is easy: look at any bestseller list. Starting dealing yourself a winning hand now.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and suggestions for changes. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better.   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

Keynoters: Bella Andre, Anne Perry, and R. L. Stine

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference / Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 2013 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Geary and Franklin

www.sfwritingforchange.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com

 

 

 

 

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Filed Under: Book Promotion, Getting a Book Published, San Francisco Writers Conference, Writing Fiction, Writing for Change, Writing Nonfiction Tagged With: ,

Words and Birds: Catching the Write Flight

January 6, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Birds in flight … are not between places, they carry their places with them-claims the architect Vincenzo Volentieri. We never wonder where they are: they are at home in the sky, in flight. Flight is their way of being in the world.

–Goeff Dyer, quoted in The Global Soul by Pico Iyer

More people in more places have access to more books faster, more easily, and more inexpensively than ever. If you don’t want to splurge 99 cents to download all of Charles Dickens’ books on your e-reader, you can still have more than 80% of the best books ever written for free.

Public-domain books are available in print and for your e-reader from your library. If, as I do, you prefer print, they’re also available in low-priced editions at bookstores. Want to discover new authors for free or at low cost? Online booksellers and social reading sites like Goodreads will help you discover your next favorite writer.

What a glorious time to be a writer or reader! It’s far from heaven, but it’s about as close as you can get in this mortal coil. And sharing your passion for books online and in book clubs will make friends of strangers.

For birds, the sky’s the limit. But you can soar on the wings of words as far and high as your ability, freedom, resources, creativity, and imagination can take you. If reading and writing are your way of being in the world, now is the best time for you to take flight. You were born to fly. I hope you find home in the sky. May your words be wings that transport you wherever you want to go. Bon voyage!

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and suggestions for changes. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

Keynoters: Bella Andre, Anne Perry, and R. L. Stine

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference / Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 2013 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Geary and Franklin

www.sfwritingforchange.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com

 

 

 

 

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New Year New You: A Golden Age for Writers

January 1, 2013 By 5 Comments

You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.
–Author and speaker Zig Ziglar

In publishing, the beginning of the year is “New Year New You” time.  People use gift cards, exchange gifts, atone for holiday excesses, or start fulfilling their New Year’s resolutions by buying self-improvement books. E-books can add other media to them and make them social and interactive.

The new year is a time for taking stock of where you are and for deciding if you can get where you want to go faster. My wish for you is that 2013 be better than 2012, that you write better and get more of the help and visibility you need to succeed.

Technology has made this a golden age for all writers. The relative ease of writing, sharing, and profiting from your work on a worldwide Web of eager readers should be all of the inspiration you need to serve your readers as well as you can. You control your career. Your future is at your fingertips, on your tongue, and in your ability to speak, and build your visibility and communities to help you.

The essence of the challenge you face, whether you publish your books or Random House does, is that you have to balance being a writer and publisher, artist and merchant, creator and communicator, student and teacher, and being online and off.

You have to keep creating content that satisfies your readers’ need for information, entertainment, guidance, or wisdom so well they become lifetime fans of whatever you create and tell their communities to read your work. Content is king, but communication is queen. I call this passion for writing and service contentpreneuring: enterpreneuring for writers.

My brother’s unexpected death on December 28th brought home once again that my only salvation is service. As Lao Tzu said: “He who obtains has little. He who scatters has much.” So my resolution for 2013 is to serve you as well as I can. This is both an opportunity I relish and one of the greatest challenges I’ve ever faced, one reason I’ve neglected you.

Writing as well as I’d like is as hard for me as turning out your best work is for you. Finding something to say that will have lasting value for you is even harder. I live with the frustration nothing I write will ever be as inspiring, insightful, humorous, life-changing, or even just as well written as I want it to be. Knowing this doesn’t make me leap to the keyboard. Knowing that you need all the help you can get prevents me from stopping.

You need and deserve the best ideas, insights, and information I can give you. I will use posts from others and encourage you to send posts, yours and those of other writers that you think worth sharing. I’d also like to learn your writing resolutions and hope you’ll share them.

Two reasons this is a golden age for writers:

More readers than ever, everywhere on this aching planet, want to read your words.

It’s easier than ever to get your share of the gold.

I hope you will have a productive and prosperous 2013.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and suggestions for changes. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

Keynoters: Bella Andre, Anne Perry, and R. L. Stine

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference / Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 2013 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Geary and Franklin

www.sfwritingforchange.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com

 

 

 

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Creating a Literary Ecosystem: The 10 Essential Elements of a Successful Writing Career

December 18, 2012 By Leave a Comment

You can create a literary ecosystem: a balanced, organic, evolving, sustainable, inter-dependent, international, environmentally sensitive community. Your system will be unified by two holy trinities and by passion, interest, service, connection, and commerce. The ten circular, integrated elements of your literary ecosystem will be

  • Passion—your love for creating and communicating your work
  • Purpose—literary, publishing, and community goals that inspire you to achieve them
  • Professionalism

–knowledge about writing, publishing, and your field

--the holy trinity of craft: reading, writing, and sharing

–the holy trinity of commerce: communities, a platform, and test-marketing

–using the technology you need to succeed

  • Perspective—understanding that developing your craft and career is a long-term process
  • Products and services—being a contentpreneur by producing a steady stream of work in your field in different forms and lengths that you re-purpose in other media
  • People—win-win relationships with engaged, committed, growing communities of people you serve who want to help you, because they know, like, and trust you
  • Platform–your continuing visibility, online and off, on your subject or the kind of book you write with your communities and potential buyers   
  • Pre-promotion–test-marketing your work in as many ways as you can
  • Promotion— serving your communities by using your passion and platform to share the value of your work  
  • Profit—what you need to achieve your personal and professional goals and maintain the system

The importance of each element will vary, depending on what you write. Promotion and test-marketing will be more important for a book than a blog post. 

Your ecosystem has to keep learning from and contributing to your communities, the hyper-connected human family, and the planet. Your system will continue to build synergy as long as you sustain it by enriching its soil with content and communication. Make cultivating your ecosystem a lifelong quest. You will accomplish more than you can imagine.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and suggestions for changes. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

Keynoters: Bella Andre, Anne Perry, and R. L. Stine

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference / Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 2013 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Geary and Franklin

www.sfwritingforchange.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Filed Under: Book Promotion, Book Publishing, Getting a Book Published, San Francisco Writers Conference, Writing Fiction, Writing for Change, Writing Nonfiction Tagged With: , , , ,

Books and Babies: Labors of Love

November 29, 2012 By 4 Comments

Work is love made visible.     –Kahlil Gibran

The right to bear children, like the right to write, creates the responsibility to do justice to one’s creation. Without parents as models, children will become burdens to themselves, the people in their lives, and society. The love, patience, compassion, knowledge, generosity, conscientiousness, selflessness, skills,  sacrifice, pride, forbearance, discipline, determination, resourcefulness, creativity, courage, understanding, sense of humor, and spiritual beliefs needed to be a parent make it life’s hardest personal challenge.

Unless their books are irresistible to everyone who reads them, authors have to take the responsibility for the success of their books, or their babies will probably be among the 80% of published books that fail.

From the moment of conception, parenting, like writing, has to be a labor of love. Parenting requires spending two decades transforming children from being totally dependent into adults, capable of living and thinking independently. It’s a perpetual push-and-pull effect. You push them to be independent while pulling them back from challenges they’re not ready for.

The result of parent’s efforts should be adults who

  • Live by the values with which they were raised
  • Have a mature, ethical, emotional, and intellectual response to any situation
  • Attract a mate with the same strengths, vision of life, and desire to be a parent
  • Accept ambiguity and uncertainty, but are life-long learners with the potential to be a life-long earners in a rapidly changing culture
  • Balance service and self-interest, personal and professional obligations, and the masculine and feminine aspects of their identity
  • Fulfill the role of citizen and member of the community

Parents who bring up children like this create a legacy essential for sustaining the country. Nothing is more important for our future than parents’ labors of love.

Your book will be born twice: It may take you nine months to write it and your publisher nine months to publish it. You will do it faster and perhaps better, if you publish it yourself. You have to decide the best way to bring it into the world and achieve your goals for it. Doing  whatever it takes to get your books written, published, and promoted as passionately and professionally as you is what it takes to become a successful author.

Someone once said of a writer that “After receiving numerous rejections, he decided to write for posterity.” Once you decide why you’re writing, you’ll be on your way to achieving your goals. Children embody the love with which their parents raise them. The most likely way for your book to become a source of pride and profit is if writing and promoting it are labors of love. If they are, your book will succeed.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and suggestions for changes. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

Keynoters: Bella Andre, Anne Perry, and R. L. Stine

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

The 5th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference / Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 2013 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Geary and Franklin

www.sfwritingforchange.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com

 

 

 

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The Blessings of Thanksgiving for Writers

November 21, 2012 By 2 Comments

Thanksgiving is a time to take (turkey?) stock of the blessings that writers have:

  • Loving to learn, read, write, serve your readers, and share your passions
  • Stringing words together like lights that enlighten your readers
  • Knowing that you’re doing what you were born to do
  • Having literary and publishing goals that motivate you to achieve them
  • Having ideas to write about
  • Writing what people want to read
  • Producing work that has social value
  • Writing work you can resell in other forms, media, and countries
  • Having technology to  help you create, share, promote, and profit from your work
  • Experimenting with new ways to express your ideas
  • Being supported by your friends and family
  • Having a community of early readers
  • Having fans who love what you write
  • Being liked and respected by authors you admire
  • Having an agent, editor, publisher, and fans who champion your work
  • Finding new ways to Monetize your work
  • Having a community of collaborators to help you
  • Maintaining a balance between work, home, and leisure
  • Earning enough income to support your writing habit
  • Not having everything you want
  • Having challenges that bring out the best in you
  • Being so energized by your work and your readers that you wake up every day eager to write
  • Living in a home and community that cherish creativity
  • Being part of  a business which is a labor of love

Then of course, on Friday, there are turkey sandwiches on dill rye with mayo and pepper…

 I hope you’ll share these blessings and let me know which ones I left out.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and answers. I hope you find it worth sharing.

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

 

 

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August 24, 2012 By 4 Comments

Creating Your Literary Ecosystem: The 6 Elements of a Fulfilling Writing Career

After forty years as an agent, here is the essence of what I believe you have to have for a fulfilling life as a writer:

Gaia, the Earth, is an ecosystem—a unique, miraculous, self-sustaining combination of elements that evolved out of each other. You can create a literary ecosystem: a balanced, organic, evolving, sustainable, inter-dependent, international, environmentally sensitive community. Your system will be unified by passion, interest, service, connection, and commerce. The six circular elements of your literary ecosystem will be

  • Products and services—as much scalable, first-rate work in your niche as you can generate in different forms and lengths that you re-purpose in other media
  • Pre-promotion–test-marketing your work in as many ways as you can
  • People—win-win relationships with engaged, committed, growing communities you serve who want to help you, because they know, like, and trust you
  • Platform–your continuing visibility, online and off, with your communities and potential buyers about your work   
  • Promotion—using your platform to share your passion for your work with your communities
  • Profit—what you need to achieve your personal and professional goals and maintain the system

Your ecosystem has to stay open to what it needs to learn from–and can contribute to–your communities, the human family, and the planet. Your system will continue to build synergy as long as you keep enriching the soil by producing content that sustains it. The importance of the six elements will vary, depending on what you write. If your mission is using words to create change, make cultivating your ecosystem a lifelong quest. You will accomplish more than you can imagine.

 

The blog aspires to help us both understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as helpful as it can be, please respond with your questions and answers. I hope you find it worth sharing.

 

Do one thing every day to make the world better .   –John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

The 4th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference: Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 15, 2012 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Franklin & O’Farrell, San Francisco

Keynoters: Paul Hawken, Natural Capitalism, and Dan Millman, Way of the Peaceful Warrior

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn

Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

 

 

 

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Filed Under: Getting a Book Published, San Francisco Writers Conference, Writing Fiction, Writing for Change, Writing Nonfiction Tagged With: , ,

Marrying Commerce to Community: The Next Bookselling Revolution

August 4, 2012 By 5 Comments

People, companies, and countries that don’t reinvent themselves every three-to-five years will get left behind.

–John Chambers, Chairman and CEO, Cisco Systems

At the end of the nineteenth century, there was concern about the future of reading because people were spending so much time riding bicycles. New technology makes people think either/or instead of both/and. Publishing will continue to be a hybrid business, and it will flourish, online and off, as never before, if the publishing community collaborates on thinking outside the big box, and is creative and resourceful in taking advantage of the huge opportunities technology offers.

Overlooked in discussions about bookselling is that print books are a unique medium. They can be converted into other forms and media, but they are irreplaceably valuable. Imagine the world without movies and CDs as it was at the beginning of the twentieth century. Then imagine it now without print books. A catastrophe for our personal, professional, and political future. Can you imagine taking an oath on an e-reader?

Mosaic: An Online Bookselling Community

One way to assure the future of print books is to regard them as artifacts of culture, not just commerce. The solution to online bookselling is for the publishing community to create its own Amazon as a non-profit cooperative, formed and administered by American Association of Publishers and the American Booksellers Association with the advice and support of The Author’s Guild, the Association of Authors’ Representatives, and other writing and publishing organizations.
Publishers would upload books into the system, post metadata, change whatever they wish whenever they wish, and fulfill orders. The cloud and the low cost of starting tech companies make this project easier and cheaper to accomplish than ever. Present and former Amazonians would be delighted to help. It could start just by selling books, then add features members want.

A possible name for the organization: Mosaic, because it would be a unified image yet each imprint would be distinct and enrich the whole. The slogan to improve on: “We care about books.” With the support of stakeholders in the industry, Mosaic will be fail-proof and a service to readers everywhere. Making the software available to other countries will make the idea universal.

Indies Unbound: An Offline Bookselling Community

It’s been predicted that Barnes & Noble will not recover from its problems and will suffer the same fate as Borders and the independents the chains destroyed. The creative destruction of four-story bookstores will be the greatest opportunity ever for independent bookselling, if they become community-based nonprofits or co-ops. The ideal size for a bookstore is 3,000-4,000 feet. A growing network of independent booksellers can thrive if they do these four things:

1. Become member-and-community-supported nonprofits like other cultural resources, such as PBS, libraries, museums, symphony orchestras, and dance and opera companies. A customer in Four-Eyed Frog Books in Gualala, California handed owner Joel Crockett a $100 bill as a deposit on future purchases, which inspired him to start a Community Supported Bookstore program. Members buy enough books in advance, perhaps at a discount, to help assure the store’s survival.

If the ABA decides to receive petitions from towns with, for example, a thousand names of people who commit to buying $100 worth of books a year, the ABA can help find someone to run it, help the person to start the store, and have someone available to answer questions. Regional associations and other indies will help.

The publishing community can support the ABA in making the case to the government that booksellers who wish should be nonprofits. The AAP and the ABA can help support new booksellers who want to adopt this model. Towns, local realtors, and independent stores could help provide needed products, services, and space.

This could happen with libraries that want to start a store. The ABA can post the demographics required to sustain a store, and send them to librarians, Chambers of Commerce, and regional bookselling organizations asking for potential locations. This idea will lead to the revival of stores forced out of business.

2. Have Espresso Book Machines that enable stores to stock as many books as Amazon as well as printing books for schools and independent publishers. Wouldn’t it be better for stores to stock one copy of twenty titles than twenty copies of one title? I watched Jason Epstein’s excellent Book  Business being printed at McNally & Jackson in New York, before being handed the book warm off the press. It took five minutes. Since technology years are like dog years, in five years, it will take one minute. AAP and ABA should collaborate with Xerox on helping to get EBMs into bookstores now and encouraging publishers to make their lists available on EBMs. Color printing and printing in other formats should be integrated into EBMs as soon as the technology makes it possible.

3. Make Bookstores an ever more needed respite for screenagers by being community centers that

  • respond to their community’s needs and tastes
  • provide events and classes
  • serve as a meeting place for reading and writing groups
  • contribute to community events and causes

4. Continue to collaborate with other businesses to make customers aware that communities lose a quarter of every dollar spent in chains while indies spend that income in the community. There is a growing interest in locally produced food and independently produced goods. Indies can use signing and all the other ways they communicate with customers to convince locavores to become loca-shoppers.

The America we love will not outlive print books. Technology is transforming the world from a collection of me cultures into a hyper-connected we culture, a global village with a human family united by the same needs and desires. We need books more than ever to help solve the problems our institutions can’t.

Technology is giving us these two gifts for the book community to enlarge the community of the book. If, for the first time, the book community collaborates on marshaling the passion of readers, writers, and professionals, print books will receive the support they need and deserve. Like writing and publishing, bookselling is a labor of love. Wedding community and commerce will create an enduring union that will produce happy readers, publishers, and booksellers.

The blog aspires to help you and me understand writing and publishing. To make the blog as good as I would like it to be, I need your comments, questions, and answers. I hope that you will find it worth sharing with your community of writers.
The 4th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference: Changing the World One Book at a Time
September 15, 2012 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Franklin & O’Farrell, San Francisco
The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /
http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference
San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn
Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU
415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

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Filed Under: Book Publishing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

You and We the People: Writing for Change

July 4, 2012 By 12 Comments

One lazy man is called a disgrace, two lazy men are called a law firm, and three or more a congress.

John Adams in the musical 1776

Although America’s follies and problems approach in size and gravity its potential and stature, the United States is the best and greatest country the world has ever had. The signing of the Declaration of Independence is worthy of celebration, if only to remind us of how unlikely an enterprise America was at its birth, how remarkable its vision of America, and our role in keeping its ideals alive.

On the morning of America’s birthday, I want to recommend a speech and a musical comedy for you to watch. One may change your mind, the other your life. The first is a talk by John Perkins, author of Hit Man: An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded–an What We Need to Do to Remake Them. You can watch it at www.c-spanvideo.org. Perkins says that despite corporate bribes and paralyzing partisanship, we, as citizens, can determine America’s future.

America is a centrist country, but politicians and the public usually hear more from zealots at the ends of the political spectrum, rather than the middle. Parkins asked his audience to do one thing every day to make the world better, an idea as powerful as it is simple. More than ever before, writers have the opportunity, not just to make a living, but to make a difference. It’s easier than ever for the right idea and the right book to change the world, and the Internet enables you reach the world with your fingertips.

Perkins said that when Rachel Carson sat down at her small desk in her Pennsylvania home to write about how DDT was harming the planet, she had no idea that she would write The Silent Spring, a bestseller that became a classic that liberated the world from DDT and started the international environmental movement.

Whether you write fiction, nonfiction, or poetry, your passion and your gift for portraying the challenges we face, and proposing solutions, can make a difference. Knowing how big a difference you can make is impossible, but it’s much greater than you think.

How about writing and signing you own declaration of independence from whatever is keeping you from becoming the best, most creative and productive person you were born to be and that only you can be? Free yourself from beliefs, people, and activities that waste your resources, but don’t help you achieve your goals. That will be something for you to celebrate every day.

A revolution won is a revolution lost. When people believe there’s nothing more to fight for and just enjoy the fruits of victory, they begin to lose what was so costly to win. The only way to win a revolution is to keep striving to keep its ideals alive, especially at a time of political impasse, accelerating change, and the growing urgency of the problems we face. Our hyper-connected planet has only one economy and only one family: the human family. As Benjamin Franklin warned, we have to hang together, or we will hang separately.

For America to work, we have to do what we must to keep the vision of the Declaration of Independence alive and perpetually strive to fulfill its dream of a free, independent, thriving country, united by the compromises needed to balance contrary beliefs.

Every 4th of July, Elizabeth and I watch 1776, a Tony-winning  musical about the signing of the Declaration of Independence that has important lessons we ignore at our peril. The show brings to life the remarkable but all-too-human men who made it possible.  The show captures how divided and ineffective Congress was at its birth, how one vote made the difference, and the disastrous compromise on slavery required to make America possible despite overwhelming odds.

No matter where you are in your life or your writing career, remember Anne Frank’s words: “It’s never too late to start doing the right thing.” America’s only hope is to remain a revolution in progress that we keep alive with our efforts. Have a happy 5th. 

 

The 4th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference: Changing the World One Book at a Time will take place September 15th at the Unitarian Universalist Center, Geary & Franklin Streets, www.sfwritingforchange.org.

The goal of the blog is to help you and me understand writing and publishing. Rants, comments, questions, and answers needed to make the blog more helpful.

The 4th San Francisco Writing for Change Conference:

Changing the World One Book at a Time

September 15, 2012 / Unitarian Universalist Center / Franklin & O’Farrell, San Francisco

The 10th San Francisco Writers Conference / A Celebration of Craft, Commerce & Community / February 14-17, 2013 / www.sfwriters.org / sfwriterscon@aol.com /

http://sfwriters.info/blog /@SFWC/ www.facebook.com/SanFranciscoWritersConference

San Francisco Writers University / Where Writers Meet and You Learn / Laurie McLean, Dean/free classes/www.sfwritersu.com/sfwritersu@gmail.com/@SFWritersU

415-673-0939 / 1029 Jones Street / San Francisco, 94109

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Filed Under: San Francisco Writers Conference, San Francisco Writing for Change Conference, Writing Fiction, Writing for Change, Writing Nonfiction Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,
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