Authors: How to get published, another approach.

Any author who has tried to get published knows just how hard it can be. After all, reaching out to dozens of publishers and just ending up with a pile of “rejection letters” can be disheartening month after month. It sometimes may almost seem harder to get published then to write actually write a book. What is one to do? One certainly does not wish to extinguish the book burning inside oneself. Well, one idea is to think “outside the box.”

Fortunately, for the writer, the world of publishing today, is in the process of rapid transition. Emerging new options, offer tantalizing possibilities for the enterprising author. One creative solution to the problem is to consider “self publishing.” As the saying goes “if you cannot beat them, join them.” Why not become a publisher? Turn the problem on its head, make it the basis for a solution. It is not as daunting as it may sound. Dramatic changes in technology offer new ideas and solutions.

Today, many options exist to help authors publish their books independently. A large part of the process may be figuring out what will work for you and what has worked successfully for others. While the traditional world of publishing is opening up, new worlds in publishing are also emerging. In addition to traditional paperback books, publishing today is increasingly expanding on to the internet. One can certainly explore setting up websites, and publishing ebooks, for example.

Here too, there are numerous opportunities for an enterprising writer. Of course the writer, may need to learn new tools and/or form new alliances with emerging skill-sets. However, authors today, unlike past generations of writers, are very technically savvy. Gone are the days of ribbons and typewriters. Today, most writers create their works on word processors on a computer. Many authors, due to the rapid integration of technology into our lives, feel comfortable enough to experiment with the new internet writing and publishing skill-sets. Some may even argue, that html editors (the editors used to “write web pages”) are in many ways similar to the word processors writers use on a daily basis.

In fact, your current word processor probably has an option to create web pages. (You can try it by saving a file using a “save as” type command, in a “dialog box” that pops up look for the “save as type drop down box” and select htm, html or a similar variant. Click save, and viola you have a web page!) Of course, I do not mean to suggest that technology is always so easy or simple. In fact, often it may not be, as we all know. For many, either to due to constraints of time, skill or desire, their desire to explore new technologies will be limited. But one can always consider hiring or outsourcing tasks one is not interested in.

However, one approaches the problem, there are many options available today to become a paperback publisher or internet website-based ebook publisher. So the next time a publisher brushes you off, don’t take it personally, simply consider the new universe of options that beckons to you. After all, what is stopping you?

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Start your press release with a great headline that will convince the media to read further. “The headline of a press release has one job and one job only,” according to press release guru Paul Hartunian. “The only job of a press release headline is to force the reporter to keep reading. The headline has no other job. Don’t force your press release headline to do anything more than force the reporter to keep reading. That’s a big enough job!”

In press releases, headlines are critical. They’re the first, and often the only, thing the media reads. If your headline doesn’t immediately grab the reader’s attention, your release usually won’t be read.

To seize the media’s attention, link your headlines to:

1) Money,

2) Sex,

3) Health,

4) Controversy.

Remember to grab the media by looking at and reacting to what is in the news! The media does not care about you or your book.They care about how good an interview you are, how you react to something that is going on now- and they want you to help their audience and or readers-

Do your homework! Read magazines, newspapers every day- and watch several TV shows every day- including Today, GMA and CBS Early Show. Couldn’t hurt to watch Oprah too!

Make sure that you know everything you can about the reporter before you speak to him or her. Read all that they have written- do a google search- know where there went to school… Be prepared!

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When you are indexing a document, that is, creating an Index for a document, make sure you observe the following three golden rules for maximum user satisfaction:

1) Limit your Index to a maximum of THREE indented levels. Human mind starts losing track of the nestled groupings once you cross over into the fourth level and beyond. It helps a great deal if every level has its own styling. For example, the first level could be in BOLD letters, the second level in normal PLAIN fonts, and the third in plain ITALIC fonts. I’d recommend to use the same font family and not switch to different fonts in between indentation levels.

2) Always start your indexed words with LOWER CASE letters, unless it is an acronym. Lower case letters is easier for the human eye to read. But all acronyms should be in all caps. It is great practice to repeat every acronym also in its open form, starting each word with UPPER CASE letter. For example, repeat “ACS 115″ also as “American Cancer Society 115″, but not as “american cancer society 115″, etc.

3) Make sure all important phrases are CROSS INDEXED, cross referenced, under their respective letters. For example, repeat “space shuttle” also as “shuttle, space.” In this case both are under the letter S. Repeat “welfare state” as “state, welfare” under the letters W and S, respectively. Do the extra work if you want your users find what they are looking for easily. Cross-referenced index entries will prevent the users from thinking. And a user that can go through a document, book or manual without thinking is a happy user.

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Stories aren’t about plots, they’re about the people

Cedar Grove is a tiny town about a mile and a hair past nowhere. They’ve got two stoplights total and an old brick schoolhouse that also serves as the town hall and bingo headquarters on Thursdays. They’re very proud of their one-half of a fast-food restaurant. The other half is technically in Butner - not the same Butner to which you may be familiar with. Time rolls at a slow pace in Cedar Grove where the most exciting thing that ever happened was the time Cleetus Harley’s pig made front page of the paper for having borned her a piglet with three tails. These stories, they aren’t fancy. They’re just about the people. Kelly Swanson

This is how I open many of my storytelling performances and I have spent years “apologizing” for the fact that my stories don’t have strong plots, just strong characters. I always hoped that my audiences would form a connection with my characters - a connection that would somehow make their lives better having known the characters in my small southern town.

So imagine my surprise when over the course of my studies (I am always studying comedy, writing, storytelling, speaking, etc.) I ran across a book written by one of my favorite comedy writers (Janet Evanovich) where she states that stories aren’t about plots, they’re about the characters. This is not to say that a story doesn’t need a plot, or that plots aren’t important. It is to say that with weak characters, your plot is useless. So if you remember anything today, remember that the story is in the people. Let me say it louder: THE STORY IS IN THE PEOPLE.

She’s not the first one to say it, and most certainly not the last, but for the first time I stopped and listened and let it soak into my brain as another writing truth ingrained in my heart. (Here’s where my husband would tell me to quit being so dramatic.) And so the topic I have chosen to ramble on about for this month is developing characters. I have seen time and time again that when you take the time to fully develop a character, the story will write itself. Did you hear that? Spend time on the character and the story will write itself. I’ve seen it happen over and over. So trust me on this.

I’m a big believer in showing rather than telling, so instead of giving you a list of ways to develop a character, I’m going to show you how I developed a character just last week, and how opening up your mind to these characters will unlock story trails beyond imagination. Okay, so maybe I’m being dramatic again. Let’s just get to work and see if I can show you what I mean.

I’m huffing and puffing away on my treadmill (where I get my best creative work done) and I’m reading what Janet Evanovich (in her book “How I Write”) has to say about the characters in her books. And I was so intrigued and inspired by her insights that I immediately got out my life journal (yes, I actually meant it when I said I had a life journal) and decided to create a character right there on the spot. No story, no plot, no deep hidden meanings - just a character. And as every good writer knows, perfect characters are boring. We want characters who have flaws, who make mistakes - characters who are real.

So I trusted the first person to pop into my head and decided on a girl (because I am one, and know nothing about being a boy and don’t want to do the research to figure it out.) How about a girl who teaches dance in small town. Is it the best character in the world? Who knows, this is just practice so I’ll go with it. Okay, now what?

Writers should write what they know. So if you haven’t been in the military, you probably shouldn’t have your main character be a soldier unless you are willing to do the necessary homework to understand it from a soldier’s perspective. I’m too lazy. So I know my character will be somebody I can relate to on some level. Except that I know nothing about dancing? So why did I choose a dance teacher? Beats me. Problem is, I never danced or had family who danced so I don’t know anything about that. That’s not good.

How about this: She’s never had a dance lesson in her life. She has no idea what she’s doing. Now that I can relate to. And other people can relate as well to the concept of being somewhere where we’re in a little bit over our head. She and I are sounding more alike already. And what a great situation to place a character, for nothing opens the door for comedy better than placing a characters in situations where they don’t naturally belong. I’m not sure that made sense. Remember the show Bosom Buddies from years ago? The one about the two men who had to dress as women to live in their building? That’s what I mean.

Wow, now that opens the door for humor and conflict. But how can she be a dance teacher having never taught dance? It’s got to make sense. Easy….she filled in one day for the regular dance teacher who never came back. It’s a small town. Nobody else wanted the job, the kids kept showing up, and one thing led to another…and here she is. Stuck. She doesn’t want to quit and let the kids down. She’s staying out of obligation. But secretly liking it.

Already I can see the potential for stories here - the experiences with the kids. But I’m jumping ahead. See? The story is already wanting to write itself. But back to the character.

Every character wants something - sometimes more than one thing. They may want physical things or emotional things or both. So I need to make this character want something. How about this: She wants to be bigger than the small town where she lives. She’s got something missing in her life. Problem is, she doesn’t have any idea what, and she keeps chasing after different things each week (each story.) She’s indecisive. At this point my main character has some qualities like me, and some not. That’s okay.

Not only does every story’s main character want something, there has to be something standing in their way of getting it. This is often referred to as the conflict. Notice that we aren’t really worried about what our story is going to be about. We aren’t getting into the story’s plot where you travel down the road of conflict and resolution. We are talking about the main character’s conflict. What makes her tick. The parts about her that may never show up on paper - but that we need to know before we ever begin our story. Does that make sense? It’s almost as if you are doing a report on your character before you even think about writing your story. When you get to writing a story about her, you will find ways to SHOW us what she is like through her actions, rather than a paragraph that opens up and tells us all about her. That’s boring. Yuck. Anyway, back to the main character.

What are some other things about her? At this point I’m just going to list some stuff as it pops into my head. I may not use all of it. I don’t want to give all my quirks (the things that make that character interesting) to the same character. I may want to give her a friend with some of those quirks. But we’ll get to secondary characters in a minute.

Let me take a minute to explain to you something about characters. You want them to be realistic and make a connection to your audience. You want your audience to have a stake in your character - to be rooting for them. You also want your audience to have a stake in your other characters. You want your characters to grow, but also stay true to who they are. This may sound like a lot of work, and sometimes it is. But it’s worth it if you want to have a good story. And sometimes just coming up with a brief description of your character is better than nothing.

These are some possible traits for this main character, including things I need to think about in more depth:

 She tries new fashions and never quite pulls them off

 Everything relates to food

 She’s very uncoordinated

 Low self-esteem

 Bleeding heart

 Wants to save the world

 Thinks something is missing in her life

 Drives a van with Miss Pinky Lee’s School of Dance on the side

 Curses when she’s mad

 Eats when she’s upset

 Is a magnet for guys she shouldn’t be with

 Wants something more than this town has to offer

 What was her childhood like? Overweight, funny, failed at most things she did which she happily acknowledged and kept going anyway

 What has made her wish so desperately for something out there?

 She grew up in a conservative church and is conflicted now

Okay, that’s just a start. Who knows how big the list will grow or what will change and remain the same. Think how much can happen to this character when you start unlocking her personality. I already have so many ideas for stories about her dating life, her relationship with these kids, her uncoordinated attempts to teach, the recitals she has not knowing anything about dance. I even made of list of the messages that could be taught through the stories, like beauty is on the inside, etc. But that’s jumping ahead. We’re only talking about characters today.

What other characters will flavor these stories?

And that brings us to the antagonists or secondary characters as I like to call them. Remember that knowing these characters is as important as knowing your main character.

So I started thinking about what other characters would show up in these stories in addition to the main character? (Notice that I’m already seeing this as a group of stories - all from the creation of one character!)

I’m figuring this to be somewhat of a small town - and southern. Because that’s what I know. This could be anywhere though and still be a good trail for stories. I decided to have my dance studio be an old fast-food chicken place with a faint outline of a chicken still on the wall, and on rainy days you can still smell grease.

The first characters that come to mind are the kids who come to the class (lots of ways to go with that) and the mothers who bring them. Oh my, can you imagine all the types of mothers you can have? And don’t forget all the conflicts that each kid/mother brings with them. When I write these stories I will not work super hard to come up with descriptions on every character - at least not as much as I developed the main character unless it’s a story where the secondary character has a big role.

Then I started thinking about other characters who could come in contact with the dance class. Wouldn’t old people be fun? What flavor they would add. But how would they end up in the stories? How about if the dance studio is next door to the old folks home. Perfect. You’d get a lot of old people shuffling by wanting to see what’s going on. And I think old people make wonderful characters. Think of the many traits you could give your character. If you’re familiar with the current sitcom, King of Queens, think of the father played by Jerry Stiller. Is he not perfect? I think he is one of the greatest characters ever invented on TV. But that’s just my opinion.

And what about my character, Booker Diggs, who in an earlier story of mine was a beer drinking fishing junkie who lost a bet and had to take dance lessons. Turns out he loves it. What a great character to have in the dance studio on a regular basis! I just got chills.

I could go on and on, but enough already. You get the point. You probably don’t find this as exciting as I do, but isn’t it neat to see what has blossomed after just creating an imaginary character? You can do this too! Just please don’t take mine.

Even if you are a storyteller who doesn’t write his own stories, you can still take the time to develop the character in the story you are retelling. Even the good old Jack tale could benefit from a little character development. Just take some time to sit down and think about that character. This is what will make your story relevant to your audience. Then let those qualities shine through in what he says and does. I promise your story will be better for it and your audience will appreciate that you have a character that they can believe in.

I wish you all the best and hope that something in this rambling of mine made sense. Remember that stories aren’t about the plot, they’re about the people. And if you’re having trouble making up some people, good grief, go sit in the airport for an hour and take your journal.

Happy creating!

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Somewhere along the way, I have realized that people are more interested in buying a show, than in buying Kelly Swanson the storyteller. Especially if you give your show a cute and catchy title like “It’s all fun and games ’til the hair gets messed up.” Please don’t use that title for your show. I’m already using it.

With the holiday season quickly approaching, it makes sense to talk about how to put stories together to form a holiday show. Christmas is usually my biggest season with the number of holiday parties (churches, businesses, private parties, etc) that are looking for entertainment. So I’m going to show you how I put together a Christmas show. You will find that this process can be easily applied no matter where you take your storytelling.

I’ve made a list of the process that I go through to put a show together. I am using Christmas as an example, but you can see how it would work no matter what your theme.

1. Start by thinking where you plan on taking your show, and what kind of audience you want to target. For the sake of example, let’s say that you want to do a show for kids. You will probably have to be more specific than that because performing for toddlers requires something different than performing for fifth graders. Let’s say that you want to reach a wide span of ages. So we’ll focus on first through fifth grades.

2. Then think about what kind of message or theme you would like to have. In this case we have already decided that it’s Christmas. I can tell you right now, that you may have trouble selling that to the schools so you might want to call it a holiday program. Or call it a Christmas program and sell it to churches. It’s up to you.

3. Decide on a message or a common theme that you want to have in your show. I’m going to choose “Christmas around the world” as a theme for this example. If you want to use that theme, go ahead. If everybody did a show on that theme they would still be different because we would choose different ways to do that. So our theme is Christmas is around the world, and we want to show how children in other cultures celebrate Christmas. Not all cultures celebrate Christmas. So you may decide to change your theme and do something about holiday traditions in other cultures. Or do something different - like Christmas through the ages in America - the traditions back through time. Your options are endless.

4. Now decide the length of your show. I would suggest 45 minutes - no matter what you do or where. And I would recommend that you do not do one story that is 45 minutes long. I suggest that you do short pieces (all five minutes or less) and piece them together. You might want to have some extra stories ready in case someone asks you to perform longer. And because you are putting short pieces together, you have the flexibility to take away pieces if there are any last minute scheduling changes, or if you are asked to do a thirty-minute show. There have been cases where I was about to walk on stage and was told that I needed to cut ten minutes because we were behind schedule. Be prepared to be flexible.

5. Now choose stories that represent your theme. Find stories about how children celebrate Christmas all over the world. Look in libraries or on the internet. If you have relatives from other countries, ask them, and you will have some personal stories in there too. You could talk about food, costumes, songs, toys, parades, Christmas hymns and where they originated, etc.

6. Find things to put in between your stories that will break them up yet tie them together as well. You may want to read a poem, sing a song, do a dance, etc.

7. Find other things that will make your show interesting and/or educational. If you are good with Power Point, bring pictures. Dress in costume. Bring props that represent the different areas of the world. Have music playing in the background. Do an audience participation game. Ask them questions. Bring a doll from each area you talk about. These are just ideas. I’m sure you can come up with others.

8. Put your stories together so that there is a good balance. Alternate the funny with the serious. Don’t do two long stories and then three short ones. Do a short, a long, and then a short.

9. Now learn your stories and practice your show.

10. Give it a catchy title that will make people want to come. I kind of like “Christmas Around the World” as the title. But you can choose whatever works for you.

11. You might want to design some sort of picture to accompany the title. Clip art is fine. Or try drawing something yourself. Be careful with clipart and make sure that it is not copyright protected.

12. Write a one-paragraph description of the show that will make people want to come.

13. Do a flyer or a brochure or a postcard about the show and send it out to groups who may be interested. People starting booking for Christmas shows in early October all the way through November.

14. Decide how much you want to charge for your show and how much you are willing to negotiate

15. If you have the means, tape the show on your laptop, burn it on CD, and make copies. Put on a cute label with your contact information. Sell the CD at the event.

16. Ask clients if they have the means to videotape it. Wouldn’t it be great to get it on tape? Then you can sell it at all of your future events, year after year.

17. Once you have performed your show ask your client to write a testimonial letter about that show (referencing the show in their letter) and then you can send it with your flayer the next time you try to sell that show.

Now wasn’t that easy? Good luck putting together your own show.

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