Publishing Archives - MUSE • Leslie Keenan

Surprising Facts About Publishing Today

I eavesdropped on Digital Book World’s 2016 conference on publishing today (by following the hashtag #DBW16 on Twitter) and found much fascinating and useful information for writers. The first overarching point, reinforced by @dataguy (the numbers guy behind the site called Author Earnings), is implicit in the conference itself. Started seven years ago, by Michael Cader of Publishers Marketplace and Mike Shatzkin of The Idea Logical Company, it emphasizes the data that the Big Five publishers tend to ignore. (Think of it as the Moneyball of publishing— stats and numbers are…read more

How to Prepare for a Writing Conference

So you’ve finally decided: it’s time to go to a writing workshop. You’ve committed the big bucks and are ready to take the plunge. What do you do now? TWO QUESTIONS YOU NEED TO ANSWER FIRST If the answer is no to either question, you should definitely not attend (**with one exception below). Are you ready? That is, do you have a draft of the manuscript that is ready to go? When you attend a conference it is highly likely that someone will ask to see it, so you need…read more

4 Questions To Answer “Yes” to Before Attending a Writers’ Conference

It’s easy to get caught up when reading an attractive conference website and realizing all the great people who will be there and how much you can learn (there’s always more to learn). But is it the right thing for you at this moment? I tell my students there’s really only one reason to go: you want to make connections to people who can help you publish. That’s because I think workshops can be risky if you are not fully prepared and in marketing mode. If you are still nurturing…read more

How to Work With a Writing Coach

When is the best time to work with a writing coach, and what can you expect? You’re working on a writing project – whether it’s fiction or non-fiction, one book, a series of books, an article, etc. – and you wonder, would working with a writing coach be of value to me? You may not have considered this, or, you may have, and felt scared, intimidated, not sure if your writing is good enough yet, or if you will really get value for your money. Here are a few times…read more

Your Ideas for Writing a Book Deserve Your Respect

Do ideas for your writing project come to you at odd or unexpected times? Like in the shower, or while driving? On a hike, or just before you fall asleep? Do you intend to write them down when you can, but then find you forgot to, and now don’t remember what the great idea was? Successful writers treat these ideas with respect. They recognize them for what they are: creative gold. When they just come to you, your writing can become effortless—if you create a place to put them. This…read more

How To Start Writing A Book

“Just get it down on paper, and then we’ll see what to do with it.” – Maxwell Perkins “Getting it down on paper” is the tricky part to beginning a book. Especially if the idea for a book has been floating around in your head for a while, it’s hard to know how to start. Many writers also worry about what the first line of their book will sound like. They put a lot of pressure on themselves to come up with just the right words to form a…read more

Writing Your Book: Just Begin

Has everyone always said to you, “You should write that down,” or “That could be a book”? You know you have specific expertise, and perhaps extraordinary experience, in your field…well, why don’t you write it down? There’s no time like the present. Many successful books started just this way (think, Tuesdays with Morrie). Don’t worry if you’re not a writer. You don’t have to be. You just have to have a good story to tell or a special insight to share. All the rest–structure, grammar, punctuation, decisions about publication–you can…read more

What’s Going On With Amazon?

A lot of my clients and friends are wondering what my opinion is, of Amazon in its “war” with the publisher Hachette. The bare facts are these: We officially know nothing about the negotiations between the two, but most industry insiders are guessing that the issue is over terms for ebooks, and that Amazon wants to keep more of the money than Hachette wants. (For further details, here’s the link to the New York Times piece on it.) On its face I have no problem with this. Amazon is a…read more

Why you might subconsciously sabotage your writing – and what to do about it.

I have found in working with writers over many, many years, that underneath perfectionism and procrastination over why their manuscripts were never finished, is a deep subconscious fear. It is the fear of being rejected by other writers, or a circle of friends, who aren’t succeeding. This might sound laughable at first, but there’s a deep reason for it. It turns out that in order to survive as a species, humans have had to rely on the larger group. We literally have it bred into our bones to fit in…read more

How do you know when you are done?

After the excitement of finishing your first draft, and the tedium of making all the fixes and changes you knew you had to do, how do you know when you are really done and the manuscript is ready to send out, or that you need to polish it some more? The answer to this is tricky. On the one hand, you definitely don’t want to send your baby off to be read by agents before it’s done. You want to give it every opportunity to succeed. On the other hand,…read more