Writer On The Road

The Aussie Indie Podcast Launch Episode

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 09 Mar 2020 09:00:00 -0500

Introducing a new direction for Writer on the Road Productions, including our Publishing and Podcast activities. Although we've always been about bringing to our listeners the latest and best Indie publishing advice - as exemplified by our Business of Writing Podcast Series, Author Success Stories Series and magazine, plus our courses and workshops - we're now doubling down on the talent in our own part of the world. Australasia has a plethora of talent in the Indie publishing space and it's our aim to form community where we encourage each other, share our knowledges and work towards supporting ourselves financially through our writing. And, one day, we even hope to have our own conference. But, first steps are small steps. You can join us in our new adventure by signing up to our newsletter here:

http://writerontheroad.com/writer-on-the-road/

#161 Mel & Sam in Orlando: Audio Matters & What You Need to Know For Your Writing

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 16 Aug 2019 19:30:22 -0500

Podcasts are the new blogs.

And, as an author, the best way to reach your audience to promote your novels and stories is through audio.

If you’re not guesting on podcasts, it’s time to start.

Audio is king, is the key message we bring away from our Podcast Movement Conference in Orlando, Florida, as we wind up our America trip and get ready to head back to Oz.

And audio is only going to get bigger.

Think Google podcasts, Google searches, and anything else Google you want to throw in this sentence.

And Smart Speakers. One in five Americans already use one.

And a fun fact to finish, for the first time in history, nearly 40 percent of podcasters are women. Yay to us.

You can support us on Patreon here.

Read Full Transcript

[00:00:48] Hello and welcome to the final episode of our very special mini series about our trip through the United States of America. We're finishing off the mini series with an episode about Podcast Movement, the podcasting Conference where we are currently visiting in Orlando Florida. You can support our efforts over at Patreon.com/writerontheroad. [00:00:48][0.0]
[00:00:51] Sam: It's been really interesting everyone. We've got lots of statistics that I can write up for you when we get home. But one of the things that has really struck us is how very popular podcasting is and how that's going to increase definitely. [00:01:09][17.9]
[00:01:09] Mel: That's been the key message here and we've been talking about how even though we've got a sizeable chunk of listening people listening to podcasts there are still it's still an untapped space. There are only eight hundred thousand active podcasts globally so it's still a space even though it's really popular with listeners. It's not so popular created yet so lots of room to get in on the action. [00:01:28][18.3]
[00:01:28] Sam: Writer on the Road is still in the top 10 percent of podcasts which is exciting times in terms of our downloads. But there was a real divide between I think professional broadcasters and individual podcasters which was interesting. And then again another divide between non-fiction podcasters and the very exciting growth area of audio fiction which we'll talk about later in the show. It's one of my key interests, definitely. [00:01:56][27.5]
[00:02:10] Mel: I'm going to start with a session we had our own James Cridland from downtown Brisbane. I listened to a talk with James today on Google Podcasts and how that is really going to take off. [00:02:23][12.9]
[00:02:27] Mel: We went to a session the other day that shows that even though Apple Podcasts have a slow percentage growth rate they had so many to begin with that their raw growth numbers are still more than anyone else combined. But as we saw with James today Google podcasts is trying to creep into that space. [00:02:41][14.4]
[00:02:42] Sam: The exciting thing is that, as James explained it to us, is that Google is a service or Google podcast is a service that gets podcasts on to smart speakers, Google assistant in Australia. Google Smart Speakers have a sixty eight percent mark to market share in America one in five Americans have a smart speaker . [00:03:06][24.0]
[00:03:11] Mel: What's really exciting for us is Google Search. Google searches are going to bring our podcasts up so much more easily. Google is actively doing all the work for us. So the examples I gave I was talking to Sam about how this is really good for audio is it. I've Natasha Lister so anyone who is looking for an anything about Natasha Lester our podcast is going to come up right at the top of the pile. [00:03:41][29.7]
[00:03:41] Mel: So the thing that I wanted to talk about today everyone is get yourself on to podcasts to make sure your name is out there. I guess in the audio waves because Google is going to be prioritizing that as as podcasts become more popular and audio becomes more popular. [00:04:03][21.1]
[00:04:05] Mel: I definitely think we were we were going to a talk with Rob Walsh from Lypsen yesterday and he emphasized the fact that people still think that blogging is like an effective promotional strategy but the numbers he gave us were 42 percent of people read blogs monthly and 32 percent of people download podcasts there's not much of a audience difference. However there were like a thousand times more blogs and there are podcasts so it's a lot easier to get lost in the crowd with blogging whereas podcasting as we were talking about. Well it has a really large audience there aren't as many individual podcasts so it's hard if you do get lost in that crowd. And so as operational strategy going into a smaller space where there are fewer shows dominating people's attention is a more effective way for you to get your name out there especially since Google is just integrating your podcast players you can play them straight through google search they're implementing ways if you type like podcast with Natasha Lester. It'll come up in the like you can play it straight from Google and they're putting their little play on every Android phone that people get. [00:05:12][66.9]
[00:05:13] Sam: So it's really it's getting a lot easier for people to access podcasts on different devices. Apple podcasts obviously it's already pre installed in every iPhone with me gives it a lot of visibility and so it's a medium. So it's growing as people become more aware of it and numbers go up and listenership. [00:05:28][15.5]
[00:05:29] Sam: 70 per cent of phones are Android. Seventy eight percent. [00:05:34][5.0]
[00:05:40] Mel: And those Android phones these podcasts are going to be in there just through google searching. You don't even need an app anymore. So even though Apple podcasts are still providing the main downloads that is going to change and I reckon even by the time we're here next year. And the interesting thing is once you've got professional broadcasters and we've got we've seen a lot of really important people in suits wandering around here these guys are throwing lots and lots of dollars at. At the podcast medium which which is exciting. [00:06:11][31.6]
[00:06:12] Mel: We were talking people yesterday who've been hired to create branded podcasts for a lot of big brands. And so I think yeah that's right. Companies are starting to get in on the action and everyone saying no don't do it and you're just doing it because you feel like you have to. But people are starting to do it and it's starting to go hopefully with big brands and with big companies. What is interesting as well the way that it's interacting with an indie space but yeah it's definitely becoming more in the public eye. [00:06:36][24.1]
[00:06:37] Sam: And then moving on from that as well. Google podcasts. I think it's because it's on our mind today but it gives us worldwide access. [00:06:46][9.3]
[00:06:47] Mel: So sometimes in America only you can only get your word out in America or maybe England as well. Whereas I think the exciting thing is now giving worldwide access to our voices is huge plus there's going to be a native transcription service which which again gives us the written word to be able to repurpose and and use which which we do to a certain extent as well. But Google's going to be doing it all for us. We've got speech to text and I know Joanna Penn knows a lot about that. And I think Joan has been here for the last three or four days and she has I think follow up been following the whole industry thing. So she'll be really on top of all that. I was more interested in Okay what can we do for you guys in Oz how can we get your your books out our books out how can we in our neck of the woods start to spread the word internationally. And I think this whole Google podcast thing is right up there. [00:07:47][59.7]
[00:07:47] Mel: I'm lucky that I'm with podcasts websites. And the guys there I've kept my website really up to date despite me not because if I looked on my website and I've got apple podcasts and I've got Google Play so they're really looking after us. And getting word out I think. [00:08:02][15.0]
[00:08:03] Mel: And I feel like we're definitely we're so excited about all these new stats and things we're learning that we're firing them at you. So now how are we going to implement this into the future of Writer on the Road. [00:08:12][9.5]
[00:08:13] Sam: Let's talk about that when we get home Writer or on the Road will continue as normal. We'll still have our long form interviews. I want to get word out about as many of you as I can. Got a bit of a backlog of interviews to get through because I sort of knocked off before we came away. [00:08:26][13.7]
[00:08:27] Mel: And I think that long form long form interview is what people want to hear as soon as I mentioned that I was running a writing podcast and it was about books I had people giving me invitations to go on their podcast to talk about books to talk about my writers to do all this kind of thing. [00:08:44][16.7]
[00:08:45] Mel: And I thought this is where we've got a real interest point. We. I think a lot of our authors are starting to be a little bit better known in America. Yes. Which is really exciting. But the other thing that I want to do is audio fiction. [00:09:00][15.3]
[00:09:00] Mel: Yes, branching out a little bit. So we're still keeping that long form interview format branching out into developing some of our own work as well. [00:09:07][6.2]
[00:09:07] Sam: Well one of the things that's really struck me everyone and I think we should talk further about this as writers we are front and centre as content providers. [00:09:15][8.1]
[00:09:23] Sam: Well one of the one of the themes that ran through the whole four days here is how to tell a good story with a good character. And I thought hang on this is second nature to us it's what we've always done it's second nature to you guys. How about we come up with some idea where we start to get some of your fiction and we start to to read some of your stories or perform some of your stories perform our stories getting getting your name out there getting our name out there because we're writers it's what we do best. Which brings me to a little hobby or little my my latest hobby horse and it's a little production called Mama's Little Helper - big announcement. [00:10:02][39.1]
[00:10:03] Mel: You heard it here first at Writer on the Road. Well I was a little helper. [00:10:06][2.6]
[00:10:07] Sam: I need six romance authors and I need six romance older romance authors two to act doors to co write an audio drama with me and it's about half a dozen women being hooked on Valium in the 1960s and how their husbands locked them up in a mental institution. [00:10:25][18.1]
[00:10:26] Mel: It will feature murder mayhem and true crime podcast. So make sure you stay tuned. [00:10:31][5.1]
[00:10:33] Sam: And of course they all escaped from the mental institution and they all killed their husbands when the murder happened as they should. But the actual podcast takes place while the actual story drama takes place when these women are in their 90s and they've all created these ideal lives for themselves. And lo and behold it starts to unravel. [00:10:52][19.7]
[00:10:54] Mel: And these six women will do anything to protect their reputation. Definitely. And that's when the fun starts. So if you know of anyone who wants to participate in that it's it's again getting our names out there yelling getting our writing out there showcasing what what we do best as writers and that is tell a good story. [00:11:16][22.0]
[00:11:17] Sam: Yeah definitely one of the takeaways from this conference is that you can use podcasts we can use podcasts promote our work through interviews and through promotional activity we can also use it to get our own work out there because audio fiction is gaining traction and it's gaining popularity as a way to tell stories. So it's good practice for like writing your novels and that's also a good way to go get smaller more independent stories out there that you might not be able to get through the publishing world really. So yeah yeah. [00:11:44][27.5]
[00:11:45] Mel: And I think I think that's enough for now. I think there's lots of stats I'll write them up as I said Joanna's really good and doing this and I hate to pass the buck but I'm reading my notes here and it's really really interesting because we talk about downloads and we talk about the top 10 percent of of downloads per episode is only three thousand a month. Okay so. Those top 10 per cent of podcasts aren't getting the downloads by the hundreds of thousands that we keep hearing about. [00:12:18][33.4]
[00:12:19] Mel: This is median. By the way not me. No it's not just the fun little sticks texting the media and top 10 percent. Yeah. [00:12:24][5.5]
[00:12:25] Sam: Yeah. It's very easy to become I guess disillusioned when you hear broadcasters mentioning True Life podcasts and and the downloads. Yeah. As an aside I walked out of a few toy. I walked out of a true crime thing this morning because it's almost it's almost become cowboy country where a lot of these journalists are taking on the role of investigator but they're also taking on the role of I think trial judge. It was it was a little bit ugly. Oh yes we've solved this crime and yes we've got the perpetrator cornered and yes we're supporting the victim but these guys aren't trained and so it really scared me from a from a legal perspective is it going to be exploring and mother's little hope. [00:13:10][45.7]
[00:13:11] Mel: I believe we're going to have some true crime podcast is tracking down these elderly women who have escaped from a mental asylum. [00:13:16][5.7]
[00:13:17] Sam: So are so today's they go everyone it wasn't a total waste going to this true crime podcast because we will use it in our own fiction I love us all right. [00:13:26][9.1]
[00:13:27] Mel: That's the end of us for today that's the end of us for our adventures in America. We are writing a book as you know. The book will come out in paperback and e-book and then we're hitting the road this summer not only to promote the book but to talk to you guys live. Podcasting is something that we're going to get into and our first trip is down to Melbourne to see our beautiful Janine Kimberley across the sea dairy Fraser and Clare Connolly over in South Australia and then back up I think will come back up through Broken Hill. I think back up to Brisbane you rotter on the road is something that is just going to be a laugh a minute I'm sure. [00:14:03][36.1]
[00:14:03] Mel: Excellent. Yeah before we go Mel do you have one fun fact Fun anecdote or fun adventure to sum up our America trip for our listeners. [00:14:11][7.7]
[00:14:12] Sam: Yes the one fun fact that I would like to sum up is that we went go cutting last night and someone put a helmet on my head and I drive my go kart like I turn my caravan she came 40 seconds behind anyone except me. [00:14:24][12.4]
[00:14:25] Mel: Yes I came last same came second last. And Felicity came third last. So the Hammo's are on the road again... [00:14:25][0.0]
[752.1]

#160 10 Minutes with Sam & Mel: Tall Ships, Hamilton & a Research Sabbatical

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 08 Aug 2019 01:37:46 -0500

It’s time to write. And research. Join us as we enter the research and writing phase of our NYC journey. Let’s call it a writing retreat where we meet people who give generously of their time and knowledge with no expectation of return.

If you love history and the gilded age, then this one’s for you. Think tall ships, maritime history, old mansions and sticky buns.

Meet Pamela Grimm, author of Destiny’s Gold and Destiny’s Freedom. Pamela is an amazing historian and a person I had the privilege to meet whilst in NYC. Enjoy ten minutes with Pamela this episode with a full interview to come when we return to Oz.

Making friends is all part of life’s journey and how lucky are we to stumble across experts in all facets of maritime history; from bookshop owners to local historians to people who just want to help us on our journey, including our amazing Airbnb hosts in Rondout, in Down-town Kingston, New York. Listen out for our interview with Joe and MaryAnn next episode.

In the meantime, enjoy ten minutes with us as we reflect on our month in NYC and what it means to travel with purpose.

You can support us through Patreon here.

You can find out more about the amazing Pamela Grimm and her novels here.

You can listen to our interviews on Travel Writers Radio here.

As always, thank you for your support and interest.

Mel, Sam & Liss

10 Minutes with Mel & Sam in NYC: Living Like Locals and Dastardly Budget Discussions

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 31 Jul 2019 20:49:54 -0500

International travel, book buying, theatre attendance and writerly adventures all need budgetary considerations if one wants to survive for an extended period in the greatest city in the world.

Having comfortable shoes is also a good idea.

In this episode we chat about the importance of keeping an eye on the budget on a daily basis, discussing plans ahead of time and knowing when it’s time to slow down and enjoy the free stuff.

We also chat with our Airbnb Superhost, Michelle, who gives us some tips on how to choose the perfect holiday accommodation to meet your needs, and be legal.

You can find out more about our journey and the behind the scenes writing of our book, Living Like Locals in NYC, here.

#158 10 Minutes with Sam & Mel in NYC: A Night at the Theatre

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 02:10:21 -0500

The writing life can be tough sometimes and this week was no exception as we busied ourselves attending two theatre pieces; Antigone in Ferguson and Mojada.

You don’t need to know your Greek myths but it helps if you want to fully appreciate the political statement each piece makes.

The intention of original Greek theatre is to allow an audience to purge their emotions, and in both cases, Sam & I blamed the emotion of the theatre experience as we cried.

After such intense emotional connection it’s always good to have somewhere to go to debrief. In our case, we think we’ve found the perfect oasis in the Library Hotel on Madison Avenue – there are four hotels in the NYC Library Hotel collection, but for book lovers, it’s got to be Madison Avenue.

Listen to my conversation with Rob Rawlins, General Manager of the Library Hotel, at the end of this episode to find out why.

You can link to our Patreon account here for tidbits and essays about our adventures, and maybe even receive your free digital copy of Mel & Sam in NYC, available 1st October, 2019

You can find out more about The Library Hotel Collection here.

#157 10 Minutes With Mel & Sam in NYC: Writin’ Along On Our Pushbikes, Honey…

Melinda Hammond — Sat, 20 Jul 2019 02:01:26 -0500

Writing the road less travelled is turning out to be the path of our NYC ’10 Minutes With Mel & Sam’ journey. Exploring the greatest city in the world on foot, by bike, train and ferry is opening up adventures we never deemed possible all that time ago when we were planning our adventure.

But, as luck halos our heads, we’re following in the tradition of great writers we can only dream of emulating, as we cross literary paths with the greats: Walt Whitman, Jack Kerouak, F. Scott Fitzgerald and who knows who else.

Fun facts:

NYC is not as flat as you think
Biking around Central Park is easy, sometimes
The Hudson river is where the trendsetters hang out
Squirrels in Central Park are sad on Mondays
You don’t need a helmet to ride a pushbike in NYC

We talk about none of these things in this episode, but we meant to…

#156 10 Minutes with Mel & Sam in NYC: Bookshops Aren’t Meant to be Like That

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 16 Jul 2019 00:30:32 -0500

Join us in NYC to celebrate the creative freedom of being able to work from anywhere, starting with the greatest city in the world.

We explore the opportunities in the world of theatre, books and writing, combined with travel, good food and the occasional drop of Long Island wine.

In this episode we set the scene for what’s to come, discuss what makes a good bookshop, and chat with the writers of the off-Broadway musical, Assistants, about how to succeed at the hardest of creative endeavours, producing theatre.

#155 Never Give Up On Your Publishing Dreams, with Cassie Hamer

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 05 Jun 2019 06:08:13 -0500

If at first you don’t succeed at this thing called writing…keep writing, and learning, and writing some more.

Cassie Hamer, author of After the Party, has put in the hard yards, earning her Masters in Creative Writing, and then unlearning most of what she’d been studying for years as she searched to find voice.

And lucky for us, she found it with her debut novel.

Cassie opens up about the fears, doubts and joys of success as a published author. We even get a sneak preview of the joys of lunching with her editor.

In this episode, we cover a range of topics which can be summed – sort of – as follows:

Publishers want to publish your book
literary versus popular fiction
the value of Higher degree Creative Writing courses
what it’s like to meet your editor for lunch
a writing place of your own
finding and trusting your writing voice
rejection is part of the writing life
celebrate your wins
what is your next book?
writing is a personal journey

You can find out more about Cassie and her writing here.

You can find out more about Author Success Stories Magazine and TIPS For Writers here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel Today have with me the beautiful Cassie Hamer. Hi Casey.

Cassie Hi Mel. I love your podcast. You have such great warmth and enthusiasm and it really is lovely to be speaking with you.

Mel I'm really excited everyone to introduce a new writer and the book, 'After The Party. Now I had no idea what to expect but when I read it, it was thirty two young children at a birthday party.

Cassie I have three young children myself and they're 6, 8 and 10 and I have hosted quite a few parties here at my home on their behalf. I always find that kids parties are constantly teetering on the edge of total disaster because you have so many children they're so hyped up there are games of competition. There's far too much sugar causing total chaos. So I thought what what it a scenario into which to put an inciting incident. So as you say the party is a complete disaster the laser WAKES UP LIKE NOTHING'S READY TO GO. SHE'S ABOUT TO HAVE 33 children land on her doorstep which they do. And it continues to be disastrous. And she makes it through though she struggles through until the end and reads It's a relief that there will be kids and picked up and taken home. Well, all except one little girl who she discovers hiding in a dog kennel. And at first Lisa thinks well the mom's just running late. No problem. This is true and she gets a note and the note is from Ellie's mother and the note explains that in fact she's not coming back to pick up the child at all and that she's asking Lisa to take care of this child and then laces put into these massive conundrum what do I do. And the story takes off from there.

Mel It's really interesting because when I set out to to research for this interview Cassie I wasn't quite sure where this novel was going to fit. And one of the reviews that I read is this reviewer thought it was going to be a romance and I thought oh we must have another book here but it's not it's far. I think it's far deeper than that. It's got a lot of elements in it. We can all relate to it. We all cringe away from from some of the things that happen in it. But basically this book has a lot more depth and resonance than then just a quick story doesn't it?

Cassie I think I think it did. Well thank you very much for saying that but. I love books that have lice and chives and I think. Women in particular we are complex creatures. We are interested in a range of different things. One minute we can be talking about the dash in the next minute we're talking about the state of the planet and politics and we are not we cannot be pigeonholed. And my reading interests are pretty eclectic. They like to read across a range of genres. But I have to say my absolute literary. Goddess is Leon Moriarty. And reading her books was just a complete light bulb moment for me. And I don't claim in any way to have her ability because I think she is quite remarkable. But I did read from her books the concept that you can be quite serious subjects. I do it with a lightness of touch and that's absolutely what I set out to do with the party. I had written two scripts previous which were very serious and very sad. And I think that was a hangover from the fact that I had study a master's in creative writing at university and I think I was writing what I thought I should write you know art and writing degrees at universities have a very low tree end. And that's really just not me. I'm just not that really stupid serious substantial person. I like to love. I like to have fun. I also like to joke about politics and serious issues. And I think that's what I was trying to achieve with the body.

Mel This book does have some big questions in it. Who is in charge of the upbringing of a child.

Cassie Yeah. And when we talk collective responsibility to children I guess.

Mel As a teacher we I come across this issue all the time. How far do we go and where are the boundaries.

Cassie Yes. With Lisa and her sister Jamie. What inspired me to do that is that when I became a mom it was probably a surprise to me as to how maternal I felt not only to my own children but to everyone else's children. Now I'm not a particularly wonderful mother by any stretch of the imagination besides my three daughters. But I do have a great affinity for children. And if I see a baby in a shopping center on that person you will run up and try to wangle my way into holding the baby within five seconds of the mother do have a great sense that all children deserve love and deserve a safe environment that as we know that is just not the reality. And. I'm very interested in the foster care system and the out-of-home care system. I think there are many wonderful people in it. But I also think there are some children that fall through the cracks. And I just can't think of a worse do to a child take them out of their own home in a vulnerable situation and then to put them in an even more vulnerable situation does seems unconscionable to me. And that's something I wanted to injecting.

Mel You've done your Masters in Creative Writing and the idea that literature has to be serious. And I wouldn't mind unpacking that a little bit because once you've done I guess are higher studies course like that. And once you've started to do your own writing and we're going to talk a little bit about some of the literary competitions and things that you've entered with your short stories. What does it take to to find your own voice through all that?

Cassie It takes a lot of writing basically and it takes the personal journey of arriving at the point where you actually don't care about what other people think of your rating choices or your writing choices. Nothing makes me more cross now than genre snobbery and I see it everywhere you look at the literary pages about major newspapers. They're full of wonderful books of course they're wonderful books. They're of a very particular genre. And that's usually literary fiction or it's crime fiction. Now why is crime fiction which is very commercially popular considered more worthy of being in literary pages and women's commercial fiction which you almost never see in these review pages. It makes me very cross. I have to say and I think it's a throwback to patriarchy and sexism in that crime and literary novels have traditionally been mainly reached by and for men. But I think this is huge appetite for women's stories written by women and believing in to domestic experiences. And I think when really well written the mystic experience is a fascinating area to explore because as you said before you took this thing relatable and I think we often read because we want to learn more about ourselves. And I think fiction does allow us away to explore that and develop our feelings of empathy I suppose.

Mel I hear what you're saying because popular fiction has been debated for a very long time.

Cassie I think we all know that it does feel right.

Mel Sam just bought the Norton's Anthology of Literary Theory. I studied that when I was at Uni. Theory has just exploded in the last 20 years as we as we break off into all these different factions of literary theory and what makes a good story and what doesn't. And it's really interesting that the debate is still happening in our media because we've been very spoiled here right around the road. We had people like Rachel Jones and Natasha Alistair and always guys Alexander they're all fighting very hard for everyone's rights to write not only good stories but deep and meaningful stories as well.

Cassie Yeah I think so. You mentioned before was that before writing this book I had done a lot of short story writing and short stories saying in Australia has a very literary focus. There aren't many kind of commercial short stories compilations so I think through that I did try to hone my ability to write in that way. And that experience now informs the way in which I write the longer form fiction. I must say that. It's lovely to be free of kind of the shackles of literary fiction and I think. I've finally found my voice and my natural voice and I know that because it's not such a struggle to sit down and write. Writing in a literary or literary style does not come naturally to me. Whereas writing a book like after the party was just the title. It was so enjoyable to sit down at the computer every day and and ash it out. And that was quite a different experience to the short stories which require so much plumbing of your emotional bits and stripping back and considering every word. And I do love a really well-written short story but I also like the freedom of the longer form allows you as a writer.

Mel And it's that whole thing of finding your voice I think and it's interesting because what we used to joke about in literary fiction and I'm pretty sure that the joke is still around is that you write the story and then you go back and you stick in the metaphors and similes as a customer later I don't know.

Cassie But I mean certainly with short stories The brilliance comes out in the editing. There's no doubt. I mean that's probably true of all fiction. I would have to say I had an interesting analogy the other day where a writer said that that the story itself is perfect so the story itself exists in your subconscious and it's already perfect and your job as a writer is dust to uncover it. And so your first draft is kind of word vomit where you just get it all out. It is your second job is chiseling away and actually sculpting and uncovering a beautiful piece of artwork that lies underneath. I just really like that analogy.

Mel Yes it's true isn't it it's finding the story. I hate editing every one of these oh that's why I love Dragon Dictation. I can just tell my stories and then move on to the next one. I think we should all get someone else to edit our stories for us.

Cassie Oh I agree. It is no doubt that After the Party would not ever have seen the light of day unless I got the manuscript assessment on it. After I'd done the first draft and if I could make any recommendation to an emerging writer it would be to get someone. Who is not a friend or family member to read your work and. You have to get totally unbiased and critical feedback and you really need to consider that feedback carefully. Whether you accept that or redacted is your decision in the end. You need to have valid reasons as to why you did it. The feedback of a qualified professional.

Mel And manuscript assessment they look you do have to get a qualified professional to to take that on board and we're talking about structural made it's right at the very beginning of editing process because sometimes you too close to your story and you don't see it. Now you said you've written three novels. And did you go. Did you get the first to assist as well.

Cassie Yeah I did. One of the reasons was that I at the time that I write them particularly have many contacts in the writing world and there really was no one who I could just ask to do it. So I did my research and found some amazing professional editors who both of them books wanted to give me a report. Which was extremely useful just detailing major issues with the book with after the party. I took it to an editor called Kim Swagel and she came back to me not only with an overall report but she'd actually annotated the entire manuscript which if you know anyone who knows anything about editing will understand that there is a huge amount of work. And it was an unexpected if a surprise but she was really direct as well and to write things in the margin like what is this story. Where is this story going. It doesn't belong in this story. So she was very clear about where the problems were. And after I gave myself a few minutes to just. Inhale and exhale and you know have a little mental breakdown of that. She's absolutely spot on and I would be a fool if I don't follow her recommendations. So yeah I'm so grateful to her doing that. I just think it was priceless really. I know these assessments are expensive and it is involved to be able to pay for one day if you can muster the funds to do it. Give it to yourself as a birthday present or a Christmas present. It's absolutely worthwhile.

Cassie We were over it. I put it out to be published but I hired a professional group to do that.

Cassie It's quite frightening how many pairs of eyes can look at a manuscript and you will still never see the same things. And yes it is pricey but editing is one of the areas. On which I just might think you can scheme. I think it's essential. I've not yet heard of a writer who can produce an immaculate first draft and just don't think that person exists unless it's Tim Winton or someone like that. But. I just think it's almost impossible to do.

Mel I would say do we want to meet them anyway. Do we want to hear about those perfect people aren't they. I'm going to suggest not. So you've actually done it a little bit backwards. Employing people. Now you've done it a little bit back to front. You've actually written your manuscript you've got the assessment. Then you started pitching it is that correct.

Cassie Yeah that's correct. So what happened was that I wrote the manuscript in 2016. I gave my self six months to do it because at the site at the time I was studying a teaching qualification and I had six months left on that degree but I was only going one subject so I did have quite a bit of time on my hands so I bashed out this in six months for him to give me the report rewrite quite a substantial portion of it and then started to query agents which was a completely soul destroying. Eight months of my life I would say I'll send it out plentiful agents and I was just looking at the numbers that I a third of them never responded to of them expressed some interest but ultimately didn't pick it up and the risk said nigh night basically no. So that was a really. Difficult period. But I mean I guess by that point I'd actually been through a fair bit of rejection and it is part of the writing life and I think you probably get better at dealing with it the more it happens to you. And so after all the agents had passed on. I wasn't particularly shocked or surprised by that but I still really liked manuscript and when I reread it I wouldn't completely cringe and look for runaway and solve in the bathroom.

Cassie So far it's actually not that bad. I'm still going to persist with this thing. So. I decided to leap on in the process of meeting the publishers and put it out into the beautifully named slush piles of Australia. And it was going towards the end of that process again which had been pretty much an epic failure. When I realized that Rachel Jones whose books I love and I'd read. The art of keeping secrets which I would classify as a women's general fiction novel and it was published by Harlequin and I traditionally knew Harlequin as a romance imprint and had assumed that I wouldn't be interested in my book because it's not a romance book. This is a love story but it's very much a subplot. I don't realize that Rachel was published by Harlequin. You know what. Maybe maybe they might be interested. So I set it all with very low expectations and heights and then a few weeks later I actually got an email from them and I just assumed it was going to be another rejection. So with a very heavy heart I opened it and it said oh your manuscript has been put in the queue to be read by an editor.

Cassie And I think my hopes went up from zero to one and then a few weeks on from that I got another email asking me to come in for a meeting with the senior publisher and the publishing assistant. And at that point I forwarded it to my husband and I said a few swear words and said this might actually be a real thing. And it all went from there. The meeting went really well I was quite shocked by how much they seemed like the manuscript to the point where I was thinking I would actually tell you about the same book because I just had so many bad things about it that I really believe that someone. Was finally going to champion it. But I think as I said in the acknowledgements finding a public shot is a lot like blind dating. You do have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince or in my case my princesses. But you know when you get rejected it's not or it's not often because of the quality of the work. It's just because it's not what they're looking for at that moment. So they've already got too much.

Cassie And while it's very hard not to take it personally. Rejection isn't always a reflection of the manuscript that you've submitted. Yeah and it's interesting isn't it because at any stage any time alone that compendium you could've given up. Oh easily. But the only person who would have lost down would be myself. I mean the rest of the world doesn't care about my writing and my manuscript. And I think the thing that kept me going was the thought of being. A really old woman. And thinking to myself. Why didn't I just keep trying. Why didn't I just have another guy. And I just didn't want to regret not having given it everything. And the other thing is that I just really like writing and I think even if after the party hadn't been published I still would have been writing anyway. Just because it is something that gives me great pleasure and satisfaction and I think. You have to start doing it for that reason because there's not a lot of money in it. So you have to genuinely love it because it takes up a lot of time.

Mel It takes up a lot of your your mental space as well as you as you worry this thing through. I'm going to ask everyone because I'm a complete sticky book. Talk us through the meeting with the publisher. I don't think I've ever asked anyone that question before.

Mel What's it like walking into a meeting. I know I know you're in Sydney shaking your boots getting off the bus at George Street and the publisher. I know Harlequin are really champion Australian waters. I have a lot of Hollywood movies on the podcast when you walk in and you meet someone you we...

#154 Grand Narratives & Epic Adventures: The Real Meaning of Romance, with Elizabeth Ellen Carter

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 26 May 2019 06:10:10 -0500

Welcome to the world of pirates, love, blackmail, ill-gotten gains, treason and trickery. And that’s on a good day.

Elizabeth Ellen Carter is an award-winning historical romance author who pens richly detailed historical romantic adventures.

Carter is known for her meticulous research.

My husband jokes that it’s five minutes of writing and twenty five minutes worth of research per half hour…it could be half an hour on looking at what the liquor licensing laws were in t66he early eighteen hundreds or or checking the etymology of vagrancy to make sure that it’s accurate.

In this episode we learn about the difference between a privateer and a buccaneer.

The answer? A privateer has a letter of remit from the government. They behave exactly in the same ways as a pirate in the way they were used to supplement the Royal Navy.

More importantly, we learn what it takes to write a historical romance that has readers begging for more.

You can find out more about Elizabeth and her novels here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel Today I've got with me the beautiful Elizabeth Ellen Carter. Good morning Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Good morning Mel. Thank you very much for having me on the show.

Mel It's an absolute delight everybody I'm really excited. Elizabeth is an award winning an award winning historical romance author and I called her novels with permission of Elizabeth. What is it Alina. This is the kind of novel that I grew up on Elizabeth I'm so excited to be talking to you about it today.

Elizabeth Thank you very much. How you got into that because I got a novel when I was 17 from a girlfriend of mine in high school and it was the classic 1980s bodice rippers but the that the history in it it was set during the war of the Roses. I can remember the name it was Rose of rapture by. Brandywine Rebecca Brandywine and. It was a complete revelation. And I thought one day I'm gonna write a novel and if if it makes people feel it good. Go as as I felt reading this. So being swept away by the by the passion by it by the history by. By the really excellent universe creation then. Then I'd be very satisfied indeed.

Mel I have to read this out because I just went yes these are my kind of novels love blackmail ill gotten gains treason and trickery.

Elizabeth Oh yes yes. And that's on a good day.

Mel I'm going to go through all this at the moment because it's just so cool. Your newest book and I don't know whether it's part of your heart of the course's Sea resort stands on its own. It's called The Wolf of Wolf Street the pirates of Britannica. I just love it.

Elizabeth Thank you. I have been with them with the encouragement of my publisher Katharine Levesque. She has invited me to participate in this fabulous universe. So I have invented and ancestor from from the heartache of family. Gabriel hada. And he and his brothers are from other heroes of this particular adventure.

Mel That's so you everybody.

Elizabeth The heart of the course series the hero I guess is a privateer Captain Kit Hardaker and they're set from 1810 to 1816 on the Barbary Coast.

Mel Now I'm particularly interested in that a year on I'm having a pirate obsession myself at the moment. If they turned out to be really really popular for you they they have.

Elizabeth And again the encouragement from Luke from Catherine to pursue that. I was absolutely delighted with one review where I wrote the reviewer said this has to be turned into a series. And and and again it goes back to what we were talking about Earl. On the edge. So they they feel that they're at the center of the action then. Then that's just brilliant. So plug. So that has also been a great discipline. As an author as well because prior to. We're working on a series of standalone. So to commit to a series. And what's also interesting about the half the course says is the third book is a prequel to the first two. So at the end of Book 3 shadow of the core says is the beginning of.

Elizabeth The first book captive of the Course says the told from the different characters point of view.

Mel You are known for your research.

Elizabeth Yes. My husband jokes that it's five minutes of writing and twenty five minutes worth of research per half hour. That's right. I've I've got to. And it's interesting because I would become aware of that and it's how I approach lots of different things in life. I've got to. Almost like pull all the toys out of the toy box first and examine what I have. In order to create effectively create a universe. So yes it could be half an hour on looking at what the liquor licensing laws were in the early eighteen hundreds or or checking the etymology of. Vagrant and vagrancy to make sure that is accurate. So it's it's little things like that if I can't believe it. As as a reader I can't expect.

Elizabeth My readers to read to buy into that as well. So I love doing the research.

Mel And research is something we're going to explore more fully today everybody because this is a period of time that interests me. So if you're not interested in parts and Barclays you might as well go away now.

Mel It's not the stuff I want to talk about as well. But first of all what's the difference between a privateer or a buccaneer and a part right.

Elizabeth Semantics really. A privateer has a letter of remit from the government. So from that so they behave exactly in the same ways as a pirate in a way they were used as a de facto Navy they were used to supplement the the Royal Navy in. In.

Elizabeth Particular spheres.

Elizabeth So. So they were supposed to be doing it for the Crown and the Crown took a great amount of taxes from from their plunder but the privateers.

Elizabeth Plundered as well as any pirate.

Mel Yeah. Wasn't done Rhett Butler wasn't he approved here in Goma. Yes yes he was because he was also running a black market operation to to to help.

Mel Resource the south.

Mel Now the Barbary Coast is notorious notorious for pirates and all that kind of stuff. Now I've got another beautiful author Pamela grim who is also writing pirate stories and her sea captain is a female. So the Barbary Coast. Tell us about it and why we all know it.

Elizabeth The Barbary Coast. Well it's where we get the the word barbarian from. And that she refers to beards that the Barbary Coast is the coast of North Africa. It was. Controlled by the Ottoman Empire for quite a few hundred years and they use the North African coast Tunisia Libya Morocco as a base of operations to raid Europe. And that continued for many many centuries and not a lot of people realized that the American navy only came into existence because they I think it was Thomas Jefferson worked out that they were paying 10 percent of their GDP in tribute to the Barbary Coast pirates. So rather than them paying for that that money could go into the Navy and the the classicU.S. Marine songs from from the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli relate to that in particular and in the end it was around 1830 where the Pirates of the Barbary Coast were finally. Squelched. And and the French did that. And that's why we've got French speaking North Africa. And that was done too. But to finally end the slavery what is also interesting too is that people don't realize that the Barbary Coast pirates rated as far north as Iceland. They they used an island just in the Bristol Channel called Lundy as a base of operations and that they raided all across Cornwall and Dorset in Ireland. Absolutely incredible. And that's the setting. The early sic early 16 hundreds is the setting for the De Wolf of Wall Street.

Mel Now there is so much written about pirates there is so much research you can do you can go right down the I guess a tunnel of research and not come out again. Tell me about some of the color that you can bring into those stories because it's so rich isn't it.

Elizabeth It is. And that's one of the reasons why I really enjoyed it the heart of the Course says series. Technically it's a regency but because it's set in Sicily in North Africa there is a home of. An entire fresh perspective that you can bring to the genre. Sicilian culture is is is so so rich and so historic because it was a very important piece of land that was fought over by the Phoenicians the ancient Greeks the Romans the Byzantine empire the Ottoman Empire. All the way through. So it say here a different culture that you're bringing to the very traditional English Regency period as well.

Elizabeth So that's a lot of fun.

Mel I love Georgia to higher everyone we've had our beautiful Melinda Sara Mallory Hammond on here who writes Regency romances and we're going to have her on again and she's appeared on escape to the country which we can't get here in Australia but I'm going to keep trying.

Mel But as you say there is there's a whole genre around that Regency romance and you've made this part of it your own. But by taking the Barbary Coast approach haven't you.

Elizabeth And that's it. And Georgia Hey I was a little bit of an inspiration as well. Her very first novel was set during the Elizabethan period. And and.

Elizabeth To my embarrassment I can't remember the Beaujolais I think is the name of that particular one and that was a lot of fun. I had a lot of fun reading that. And yet Georgette Heyer best known for a regency also dabbled in in different time periods as well.

Mel And that's something that I want to talk to you about because you have dabbled in different time periods. I think I found one in 10.

Elizabeth Seventeen something like that it was definitely the 11th century yet I've gone as far back as 235A.D. the high point of the Roman Empire.

Mel Do you have a favorite. I guess a favorite period because once you start going across history no I only teach high school history so what I've heard of everything that you've mentioned but I don't know anything about any of it in depth. Do you think you specialize or do you think you'll keep jumping around and coming up with different things.

Elizabeth I'll keep jumping around. I've stuck in the Regency period because sort of again sort of quite right. I've got to be consistent in that time period. But I do plan to do a sequel to the Roman novel. I'd like to go back to medieval England because there's there's a a series that that I want to do set in the early 13th century which again is a blend of romance. And. And.

Elizabeth Crime and murder mystery. So I love the combination of the two.

Mel And this is real fodder for for the writer's brain and the ideas and as you said you've got your new series coming up. Do you find that your readers follow you.

Elizabeth They do. And I'm very blessed in that regard. Every new release there's an exploration of the back catalogue as well. So I'm. Thrilled that I've got a readership that enjoys time hopping as much as I do.

Mel I found a seer offenders a lady in the Demick books drop yesterday and I actually read the Alice network. Have you heard of that. No no. KATE.

Mel KATE someone I've forgotten her name as well. And I picked up this book and my point is she wrote about well will one then she read about what will do and then I went back and she had a whole series of different time periods as well. And I'm wondering whether that's a bit of a trend now that we're now following authors. Not like I want to read bodice ripper so I'll only read them across you know across all this.

Elizabeth You think we find out and we keep it. I hope. I hope that's the case because there's. I think if you start with you enjoy history and if you know.

Elizabeth If you get a consistent experience as a reader from one particular author I think I think they I think people will follow you across. John Rose. Philippa Gregory is another example of that. Of course she's best known for her Tudor period but she's also written in the late 17th hundreds as well. And also in the 20s and 30s if I recall as well. So I think if there's that consistent voice and that consistent experience all the way through. Yes I do think readers will follow you.

Mel Yeah. And I think once you build a world and trust your author with the research that you actually learn about a world so your readers have trusted you to do the research and does that come from your journalism background.

Elizabeth Yes it does. Because and and also from that very first bodice ripper run that I read. It presented a different view of Richard the Third. And of course sort of prior to that. Well no you know evil evil king Richard. This particular also presented him in a more sympathetic light and actually gave an all an alternative villain. To the murders of the princes. And from that it sort of. It was sort of. OK. OK. This is this is something that I can really see. So it's something that I've tried to bring into all of my books.

Mel Yeah. Now you talk about Dragon Blade prop publishing is that Kathryn Leveque or is that your own brand.

Elizabeth No that's Catherine Alibek.

Mel I was a bit confused there I just assumed you were an indie publisher but clearly not.

Elizabeth No I'm a hybrid. I got my back catalogue back from an earlier publisher. Every year there are a number of different. Collaborations. That are self published. My most recent self published one is a sweet little novella called The Promise of the bells. And that came from a know a concept of reimagining legendary characters in a regency setting so I chose the Dick Whittington and his cat.

Mel And that was a lot of fun. I could find out you can find out about these everyone on Elizabeth's website it's got a little heading there called blue stocking bills and I didn't even know what that was about that bunch of authors.

Elizabeth Australian New Zealand the United States all with a passion for history and different time periods. And we do at least one this year it'll be two anthologies. The most recent one they've done was one set of set for Valentine to a Valentine's in Bath and there's another one we've got planned for October.

Yeah.

Mel Now something that frustrates me like anything now I'm talking to you you’re clearly so good at your research is you build worlds you do everything yet romance novels and especially historical romance novels bodies readers get written off as rubbish and yet if a man writes that he becomes a hero and he's a marine he writes of maritime history and he's fantastic. Are you finding that your readership like I think people like us automatically respect our romance authors because we know the work behind it.

Mel But you're finding as a wider research is still being written as a bodice ripper not that anyone says to my face but I think it comes from a misunderstanding of what romance is.

Elizabeth And once I explain to people that that romance has a very very long history the word actually comes from Romans and it refers to the narrative structure that narrative structure we see in great epic adventures like Beowulf like Ivanhoe and where there's there's a hero's journey. And there's a a strong narrative arc that evolved in too much of Alaric romances again Ivanhoe is a perfect example of that then in more recent times perhaps the late eighteen hundreds to the early 20th century romance simply became a word to describe a love story. But once I explain that no the romance has a young as a wide and noble history. It's like the light goes on for a lot of people.

Mel I fought very long and hard for this everybody I work and all boys schools and I constantly say Oh that is so romantic and like I go away.

Mel Got nothing to do with romance and I give them that speed and I say romance has a grand tradition and I and I make them go and look it up and then we start to build out what romance is and they get a real surprise because in today's language it's about boys kissing girls isn't that what that's it.

Mel But just about every John Wayne movie he ever made has a romance in it.

Elizabeth Big and and you can call those romances because it follows a hero's journey. And there is there is a romantic romance arc in it because for rum looking at it from purely the hero's point of view he's got to have something to fight for. And and it's it's fighting for a principle and it's also fighting for the for the woman he loves. And. Gosh if if we if we appreciated that. The difference that men and women bring to two relationships. And within that that. That pure romance way I think would be a whole lot better off.

Mel I agree with you. And this is going to bring I want to bring in now your you've been likened to Daphne de Murray and now she is not known. I think she's only written one or two romances.

Elizabeth The other thing she wrote everything she wrote were grand sweeping sagas.

Elizabeth What they they were. I'm sort of very honored to be compared tribute to Mario. I like.

Elizabeth To broaden the romance. I think the the love story arc is is beautiful and necessary because it would be a romance without it. But to me the acknowledgement of feelings only goes part of the way to the promise that romance brings and that is the happily ever after. So I do like to. Bring the hero and heroine through some kind of trial that they have to work in partnership together as as a couple to be forged by fire to give that happily ever after. True authenticity. You know feeling feelings are amorphous. They they come and they go. But if you've got stakes together and work work in partnership together and that is proven through the story then to me that justifies the happily ever after.

Mel I think it is it Diana Gilbaldron and I'm not quite sure how you pronounce her name. She writes the most amazing heroines and heroes and I just love her novels. Tell us about the heroine that you put with kid Hardaker.

Elizabeth Oh she is she's great. She's great she's she's a bit of a blue stocking but she's a she's a realist there as well. And it was something that a reader actually mentioned that you know Kit was a man with no no past Sophia Green was a woman with no future and it was sort of this this balance between the two that I'd instinctively written but had articulated in that way and that's always a pleasant surprise. Sophia is an archeologist she works with her with her uncle.

Elizabeth And it's there that she and Kip begin to butt heads. They also butt heads because Sophia is is very protective of her young cousin.

Elizabeth Kit thinks the cousin is a bit of a flake and yeah she is. But but together there's an appreciation of recognition of their relative vulnerabilities and each of them have to take a risk in pursuing that romantic relationship.

Mel And they wouldn't be true romances if we didn't have settings of a grand scale. And I think that's what historical novels do best we have we have these amazing settings we have these amazing stories and we have lots of beautiful ships.

Elizabeth Oh yes yes yes. Kip has a schooner which is one of the smaller ships because that's it gets in and out of places. I've had great fun learning about seafaring learning about how to short sale much larger ships about fire ships. So to be...

#153 How To Narrate Your Novel, with Renee Conoulty

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 08 Apr 2019 23:55:02 -0500

You’ve written your novel and now it’s time to narrate it.

Renee Conoulty is the author of novels and flash fiction that contain elements of dance, romance, and/or military life in a variety of genre – chick lit, women’s fiction, romantic comedy, contemporary romance, children’s books.

She also has a book on how to narrate your own novels and stories, Narrated by the Author. In this episode, not only do we have the pleasure of listening to Renee read her work, we chat the following:

⬩ The pros and cons of self-narrating
⬩ Affordable equipment options
⬩ Narration tips
⬩ How to edit and master with free software
⬩ Audiobook distribution options
⬩ All the dumb things she did so you can learn from her mistakes
⬩ And much, much more!

Did I mention there’s a workbook? It’s called Character Voices: a Workbook For Audio Narration. And a course that takes you through the whole process, step by step? Check it out here.

You can find out more about Renee, her stories and how to narrate your own stories here.

Last, if you want to lift your mood, how can you resist taking a peek at Swinging Through Life and Renee’s other stories, or better still, listen to her narrate them.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: And today I'd like to welcome Renee Conoulty. Rene is a swing dancer and writes stories of dance romance and the military life. And I used to love the old musicals where Fred Astaire danced around the light pole so I'm hoping you've got something like that in store for us today, Renee.

Renee: I've got lots of things in store.

Mel: I want to talk about your book on how we as authors can narrate our own audio books. You have a workbook and a course as well over at http://heysaidrenee.blogspot.com/ and we're going to talk through the process of narrating our own work which I know a lot of us are interested in but before we do that I’d like you to read some of your flash fiction. Renee, thank you very much for reading to us today and then talking this through the process of narrating it.

Renee: No worries. The story I was going to read today is from my latest book which is called Swinging Through Life which is a collection of twelve flash fiction stories. So flash fiction is around the 500 word mark. All these stories are pretty much bang on 500 words but I've got another flash fiction collection that sort of varies a bit up to a thousand. The story I'm going to read today is called Sing Sing Sing. I like titling my books and stories after swing dance songs. So that's the song some people might have heard. And the main character in this story is codename Jane. And she also features in my first novel don't mean a thing. But she's not. She's not the main character in that one. Okay. Sing sing sing. Music pulled through cost. Okay. And that's when you pause it when you're actually narrating And then you go back and you start again. Music poured through the car stereo big band swing and jump blues. 19 favorite playlist. Her brother teased her about her taste in music but she didn't care. She preferred music from before she was born. Music from before her parents was born were even better. And that's where I would also oppose it and go back and fix all my typos and spelling mistakes and things but I'll just keep going. Music from before her parents were born. Is even better. She belted out the lyrics tapping the jazz rhythm rhythm on the steering wheel. The only thing that put her in a better mood than singing was dancing. But that was a little difficult in the car. She just needed to keep it together until she got there. Then she'd be fine. She'd never lose control in front of a crowd. That trek ended and the next song began. The words caught in her throat. It had been met in 19 song. The song that first dance to the song that first made love to. The song. She needed the last song she needed to hear of this of all days. The day match was marrying that girl. She skipped to the next track in the shuffle playlist and dabbed at the corner of her eye prying him a scar hadn't smeared. Night and shouldn't be said she'd moved on months ago. Derek was wonderful and she was happy. She glanced at the empty at the empty seat beside her. She'd be happier if he'd been by his side. Now I've lost where I'm up to. OK here we go. Turn the page it went funny. She'd call the hospital again before she left home but she she'd call the hospital again before she left home. But he still hadn't been cleared for discharge. Surely overnight observation would have been done by now. It was after 6:00p.m. Night and stomach knotted. He'd hit his head quite hard when he'd come off his pushbike. Why wouldn't he wear a bloody helmet just because it's not the law in Darwin doesn't mean it's not a good idea. Footpath step has its two. She almost swung her car around and drove to the hospital instead. But even if she did there was nothing she could do to help. And people would notice if she wasn't at the wedding. Nineteen pulled into the familiar car park at Nightcliff JT should be back here again tomorrow for the Sunday afternoon dance class. Everyone said it was so sweet that they were getting married at the same place I'd met. She pulled the invitation from her handbag and double check the details. The ceremony wasn't due to stop for 20 minutes. Nate ain't tricked her makeup in the visor mirror then stepped out of the car and locked it. She wandered over to the concrete dance floor with a swing dance classes were held and stared across the water to the jetty. Big white boats surrounded the posts all the way along. They should be having the ceremony here on the cracked concrete slab. This was where I'd really met. Where she'd met Matt to. A warm home a warm hand grasped hers. Am I too late. Nineteen smiled at Derek. You made it. I snuck out didn't want you to have to arrive alone. This was where she finally understood real love. That's the end of that.

Mel: That is absolutely beautiful and brought back a few memories to a friend I used to live in Darwin. I know Nightcliff, it's really cool.

Renee: Well both they're doing swing dancing. Still every Sunday afternoon neither quick Jedi on that cracked slab of concrete. They're all real places.

Mel: Flash fiction is an interesting genre on its own and it's something that we do in school a lot. It really forces you to make every word count and in the circumstances that you were writing them I think you said it was the Australian Writers Centre monthly furious fiction competition. It's really what you want to roll with your writing of these scenes, hasn't it?

Renee: I had a little play around with flash fiction before and so when I saw the Australian Writers Centre was doing a furious fiction competition I thought this would be good fun. It's good writing practice. You get to write a story and actually finish a story. And that's like when you're writing a novel that can take quite a while so to be able to get that done in one or two sessions was really fulfilling. I decided well I don't want to just have a bunch of flash fiction sitting on my computer. So what could I do to make something. That would work with my brand. I decided from the very first furious fiction competition that I would incorporate swing dancing somewhere in those first year worth of stories and then by the end of the year I'd have something I could publish. So that's what I did which was quite a challenge.

Mel: Some months some of the friends they came up with but I managed to twist everything around in some way to get a swing dancing reference in yeah.

Mel: And it's a writing habit isn't it. When everything else is happening in your life and like in the Air Force you move around a lot as we spoke about before to the past being out to develop a routine something like this actually makes you commit these stories doesn't it.

Renee: It was just that that once a month. Even when I was having a rough time if. I would just make that time it's like Okay Friday night the email came in and I'll read through the writing prompts and have a think about it and brainstorm some ideas and sometime Saturday I'd sit down and I'd write out the first draft and then Sunday I would take some time to go through and edit that and fine tune and make every word count as you need to when you've got a 500 word limit. You don't have words just to play with you've got to make everything fit the story.

Renee: And sometimes as a reader too we only want to read in snippets so that little story that you told it immediately created a picture for me. It took me to Darwin. I liked the idea of swing dancing because it's just pure romance. Yeah. And and people can flick through the stories and choose the ones that they want to in to comfort.

Renee: I also went on marketing that one I've mentioned if you want to retest if you want a story you can finish before your cup of coffee goes cold. Grab this one like you can. There's heaps of stories in there. You could sit there and you can read an entire story from start to finish. While you have the coffee you don't have to remember what happened for the next day. And carry on you can just slotted in when you've got a moment and it's great for people who don't do a lot of reading. To start with something short and sweet.

Mel: Don't make a mistake anybody you think these things are easy to write because they're not are they?

Renee: Like a lot of people when they start with flash fiction they just it's more like a vignette they just write. This is a little snippet of something but nothing actually happens. You've still got to sit down you've still got to work out character motivations you've got to have a goal for them you've got to have something happen they've got to want something in the story and they've either got to get the thing or not get the thing but you've got to actually. Still have a plot. And to work all that into 500 words you've got a limit you've got to introduce your character in 100 words or less and set the scene and then you've got to have obstacles or have things happen. Some some of my stories are stronger than others but yeah. Trying to fit them all in it's it's a challenge but you've got two collections.

Mel: Now look I know when I teach my writing workshops and I set the word limit because we're on it on time restraints. People can't do it. People get starting to write and they think the longer they write the better they are and I say well now you actually have to pull it back I want you beginning the land and I want you conflict I want all those conflict and then they start to get a bit cross because they want to just walk alone and keep writing was I will know we've got to have parameters here and this is with skill starts to come in doesn't it.

Renee: Definitely challenging. I'm lucky though that I tend to underwrite more than overwrite with my novels so it's a little bit easier for me to keep it concise I don't waffle when I'm talking but I don't feel quite as much good at writing.

Mel: You have novel out as well there are two collections. One's called Wife Mother Woman as well we've got a Swinging Through Life but we don't want it to move on to today. This is of interest to a lot of this is you know write your own audio don't you.

Renee: Yeah. So I've done that so far from my self-published titles. So the two flash fiction collections you mentioned there. I've also got a perma-free short story that I wrote for originally for the Romance Writers of Australia. One of the little gems competitions and it just missed out on getting into the anthology so I thought beauty I'll just publish that and I've done an audio version of that too. And I've also done audio version of my How to Make an Audiobook book because I figured well I might as well have an audio of that too.

Mel: I've had some fun researching here in preparation for my chat with you Rene and I found the book on how to write.

Mel: Then I found the workbook which is really interesting because it was how you mark up the manuscript and we're going to talk about that further and a few different things that you don't think of. You know documenting your technical record you know all these things that you think oh you just sit down and you talk but of course it's not that easy. And then you've put out this whole course now going to mention everybody this course is forty-nine dollars it would have to be the best value simply because you're talking about your own experiences and you're talking about the problems you had and then there was a riot.

Renee: There was a lovely expression there that made me laugh because it was all your stuff ups as well or something like that which you heard some of just then and as you can tell that's what happens when you sit down to record it doesn't come out perfectly. There's lots of editing and lots of other behind the scenes stuff that goes into a finished product.

Mel: When Sam does my podcast she spends an awful lot of time taking out ums and she says Mummy or your words run into each other. And it's hard to get rid of them. You know it's when you are reading your short story you'd stumble you'd stop and then you just repeat and keep going because you can edit all that out.

Renee: I would often do it often either leave a larger gap or I'd make a silly noise which helps with the frustration when you've made the same mistake four times in a row.

Mel: You go you make a silly noise I blow a raspberry and they show up really well on the audio files when you need to cut things out.

Renee: Yeah. And just for people who don't know anything about the equipment we'll talk about that in a minute. When you look at the audio it gives little vertical lines up and down and when you speak normally the vertical lines on up and down very much but when these forces it breaks and when there's loud noises it jumps really high and Semmelweis gets me to give a clap so that when she goes in she can go in and fix it two o'clock and snap your fingers or something it's like that like a if you haven't seen it if you can imagine a heart rate monitor with the bits that go up and down when your heart beats it's that kind of thing you know that you say on your screen we're recording an audio podcast here everyone and we're both during your fingers up and down kind of crazy women are we.

Mel: Let's start at the beginning. Equipment, okay people weren't in the right or people weren't podcast or people won't do any kind of audio because they're worried about equipment but it's not that hard is it.

Renee: No. I was a little bit worried about upfront costs and that sort of thing. So a budget was a consideration when I looked into it. I spent quite a lot of time researching before I got started. So all up so far I've spent about one hundred and sixty dollars and that was on the microphone and that's all I've had to pay for. I decided that I needed a decent microphone. But if you're just getting started you can do a practice run and try it out just with the headphones that come with your phone they've got a little mark built in and you can try it and see if you like doing it if you can handle doing the process if it's something you want to do have a listen back and if you do like it then go out and invest in a decent microphone. I wouldn't recommend using your phone headphones to do the final but it's a good way just to try out the process before you commit to lots of hours and a microphone that you probably won't use for anything else unless you do podcasting and microphones were a very interesting topic of conversation you can google them and you will get all kinds of advice.

Mel: I took my roadie Mike off my camera and I've been using that now for nearly three years then it now got specialist podcasting microphones which I didn't have then but very similar to my shotgun camera mike. Yeah.

Renee: Yep I've got a road. NTSB Mark. That's the one I picked up I picked it up atJ.B. Hi-Fi. They had a few different microphones that would do the job but this is one that I had heard of before and I hadn't actually planned to buy a microphone when I went in I'd gone in because my laptop died and I needed a new laptop but I did a little bit of a wander around the store and ended up coming out with a laptop and a computer like computer laptop and a microphone as well.

Mel: Yeah there's so many cool things out there and if you listen to me talk to Scott about what is it about Dragon Dictation.

Renee: You know you need a good microphone for everything else as well. And this is some of the things you can use it for. All right. Physical pros and cons of self-narrating now in I think was issue 3 of all the success stories make it seem we had a beautiful lady called Tina Dietz and she talks about how important it is to get in a professional Narrator And I know when Sarah Williamson's win Sarah Weems is just dumb got Nick from McLeod's Daughters who love with to narrate her Brigadier book which is really exciting.

Mel: I had a little listen to the audition too and I'm like oh I could listen to him all day.

Renee: We're romance writers really have fun. There is a time and a place for us to narrate our own stories isn't it.

Renee: Joanna Penn just mentioned that recently on her podcast as well. She's gone into the writing her own book she's just released her own self-narrated flash fiction. Oh short stories as well. And she had a podcast recently with seven reasons why we should narrate our own books. So it is definitely a topic of interest at the moment and a lot of her reasons were around branding and how a voice like even with you male I feel like I've known you for ages because I've been listening to your podcast. I hear your voice I feel like I know you I have I have a connection before we've even met which is a lot stronger than just writing somebodies books. Well when you hear their voice you do connect with the more.

Renee: I think that's really important. That's the number one reason everybody. Personal branding I think a reference in a pen at the bottom of the hour podcast chat today and also that Australian Writers Centre said that you can go in and have a go at writing and writing yourself everyone. But the reason I've gotten Rene on today because I know that you've done it and we can pick your brain because people know like and trust don't they. Once they know like and trust you they're going to go in and get your stuff. You're talking is like writing your own books does help to build that.

Mel: I had a go with Fiona McArthur everyone. She's got a book out on midwifery and she asked me to write that for her. But the trouble is I don't have a nurturing voice. I said you you're the voice that is that nurturing.

Renee: Come on let's get this baby out. VOICE I haven't got that I'm saying can step it up. It didn't quite work for I didn't think it was the right person for that. So it's really interesting you've got to find the right person. And yes everybody we can all have mic.

Mel: When you were...

#152 How To Boost Your Writing Work-Flow using Dragon Dictation, with Scott Baker

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 27 Mar 2019 21:07:45 -0500

Are you ready to ditch your keyboard?

Scott Baker is an expert in all things Dragon Dictation. If you want to learn to train your Dragon, Scott’s your man.

Scott’s official bio: Scott Baker has written dozens of books under various pen names and spent most of the last decade working as a freelance writer for numerous publications in the UK. He first began dabbling with Dragon voice recognition software in the late 1990s when it was, quite frankly, terrible. Things have improved dramatically since then and Scott now uses dictation on a daily basis, taking advantage of the tricks and techniques used by professionals within the speech recognition industry to write thousands of words per hour.

More importantly, he’s developed books and courses to help you master Dragon Dictation and incorporate it into your writing lifestyle.

What you need to know: Learning Dragon Dictation will cost you money, time and practice.

In this episode, we chat about the following:

boosting your workflow
2-10k words
transcription
what equipment you will need to invest in
workflow
training your dragon
Alexa, Google Home & Siri
accuracy
ditching your keyboard
and much more

You can find out more about Scott, and Training Your Dragon books and courses here.

You can listen to my first podcast chat with Scott here.

You can download Issue 3 of Author Success Magazine here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel Scott Baker is an expert in all things Dragon Dictation. If you want to learn to train your Dragon, he’s your man. In this interview, we’re getting into the nitty gritty of how we can use the dictation tool to improve our writing. Scott, tell us about the course you’re running.

Scott It basically takes you through everything you need to get started with Dragon and make the software part of your writing workflow. It’s available for both Mac and PC, and explores not just Dragon specifically but dictation itself – the act of using dictation, as opposed to just perfecting your use of the software. I made the course because, although I’ve written a book on this subject (‘How to Train Your Dragon’), there’s only so much you can put in a book. The amount of questions I get every single day… Most of my day is just answering emails, and I eventually thought it’d be easier if I could just show everyone – if I could just put it in a course. So that’s what I did.

It’s hours and hours and hours long, but that’s okay because literally every single step is covered, from setting up to making it as accurate as it can be over time. It’s a course about using dictation as part of a business; about integrating it and viewing it as a long-term thing. The goal is to use dictation instead of a keyboard, really. Forget the keyboard – that’s for editing, later. The course is about getting your first draft done with Dragon.

Mel Let’s start at the beginning. What’s the first thing we need to know?

Scott I get a lot of people asking me that same question – how do I start? Unfortunately you’re going to have to accept that this is going to cost money. Whichever way you look at it, the software is expensive. But it’s an investment – an investment in your writing career. Dictation leads to an enormous boost to your workflow. Part of the reason I got started with it is I can’t type very fast. I’ve had back problems for most of my adult life, so I decided I needed something to level the playing field for me, especially when I was working as a freelancer and had deadlines that had to be met. Dragon was the answer. It was the key.

The first thing to do is to get used to dictation software. Use some form of dictation whenever you can – on your phone, or through Alexa or Google Home or whatever. Ask it things throughout the day and just get used to talking to a machine.

I think these are the keys: first, to accept that it’s going to be an investment in money; second, accept that it’s going to be an investment in time; and third, just do it. Do it as much as you can, dictate as much as you can. I barely ever type anything these days – I dictate all the time. One day you wake up and go, ‘I don’t even think about it anymore.’ I’ve been like that for a while, and I think most people will once they get used to it.

Mel Let’s talk about equipment for a minute. I’ve got a Mac and I’ve been in all sorts of trouble lately.

Scott Yes. Unfortunately the software has been discontinued for Mac in the past few months, which is a bit of a blow. So you’re probably going to be looking to use the PC software, either on a PC or through parallels on your Mac.

Mel I’ve been looking at parallel programs for my Mac and they cost about $150. Money well spent, isn’t it?

Scott It is, but I will say that it’s not just $150. You have to buy the PC version of Dragon as well to go with it. That’s another $300, although it’s frequently discounted. I’d keep an eye out – I’ve known people who’ve picked it up for $99, $150. It seems the pricing is all over the place. One thing I would say is don’t be tempted to go and buy a cheap copy of eBay or somewhere like that. You’re going to be buying a pirated version. If it looks too cheap, it is too cheap. Only official resellers are allowed to sell it, so you can get it on Amazon. You can also get it from Digital River, the online distribution arm of Nuance (the company that makes Dragon Dictation). But other than that, I wouldn’t go buying copies that look extremely cheap, because they’re usually dodgy. As far as I know, the official price is still around $300, but I barely know anyone who’s paid that. I did, because I’m foolish. But I’d keep an eye out for discounts.

To run the PC program on the Mac, you need something called parallel desktop. You basically install a version of Windows on top of the Mac, and then you install Dragon and you can run it on your Mac. There are some limitations, but on the whole it works fantastically well, and to be honest the PC version is a lot better than the Mac version anyway. If you’re someone who likes to go out and record on the beach or hiking up a trail or something, you need to use Dragon’s transcription software – speak into a recorder while you’re out and then put the file into Dragon later. Transcription has always been light years better in the PC version. It’s so much better. I can’t even describe it. It works okay in the Mac version, but nowhere near as good as the PC equivalent. It’s a moot point now, of course, because unless you installed the Mac version earlier it’s been discontinued.

Mel Let’s go back to pricing for a minute. I see people all the time saying, “Oh, I’ll just use my phone recorder”, or “Oh, I’ll just use something cheaper.”

Scott People obviously want to save money. They want a cheaper way of doing it. You don’t have to go crazy, but you will have to spend a bit of money. The problem with other solutions, like built-in recorders or Siri, is that none of them do single-speaker dictation. When you talk to Dragon, it’s listening just to you and your voice patterns. You can adapt it and train it to your writing style. If it doesn’t recognise specific words, you can train it on those words, to the point where your accuracy is sky-high and you don’t have to mess around and make tons of changes and corrections all the time. You can just get on with writing. Siri and built-in recorders and the Google Docs voice recorder are great for doing a quick text or knocking out an email, but they’re not single-speaker dictation solutions. They’re designed to listen to anyone’s voice, throw it at a server somewhere on the Internet that figures out what the person said, and throw it back at your screen.

It’s never going to work for anything long-term – especially fiction and dialogue and things like that. Imagine having huge passages of dialogue, with complicated character names and place names and stuff like that – a solution that’s free isn’t going to recognise any of those words, so you’ll have huge amounts of clean-up afterwards. It’s not worth it. You just need to invest time and money in it. Dragon is really the only solution. There’s no competitors, unfortunately. There’s no other options. It’s Dragon or nothing.

Mel Can you get a version of Dragon to go on, say, an iPad Pro?

Scott Yes and no. There’s a program called ‘Dragon Anywhere’, and that’s the IOS version of Dragon. It’s very expensive – it’s about $15/month, and it’s very limited compared to the desktop version. It’s limited compared to the Mac version, let alone the PC version. There’s no transcription option at all. I find it crazy, because the iPad Pro is pretty powerful – the horsepower is there for Dragon to work brilliantly on it, but there’s no solution for that at the moment. You’ve got to use either a PC or a Mac right now. Obviously you can bring it over to your iPad later and edit the written file, but right now this is an issue.

Mel What about microphones? What’s the best choice there?

Scott The challenge with some mics, like some RØDE mics for example, is they’re omnidirectional. They pick up everything around them, which can be a problem if you’re sitting on the beach and there are waves crashing and wind coming off the sea. Something like a lapel mic is great if you’re in a quiet room, but because they’re omnidirectional they pick up everything around them and that’s no good. Dragon just wants your voice, nothing else.

Mel I used a lapel mic originally, but I’ve got a HS2 headset now.

Scott That kind of headset is what’s called a super cardioid mic. It positions the mic by the corner of your mouth, and just picks up sound from that area. That’s what you want, because it gives you a very pure, high-quality audio file to work with. The other thing I would mention is what’s called a ‘dead cat’ – the little fluffy thing that looks like a dead cat. You can get different sizes to suit different mics. You put it on the end of a mic and it works brilliantly to filter out tons of wind and background noise. It almost eradicates it. Something like that will make something like a headset mic even better when you’re out and about. It’s a couple of dollars on Amazon or eBay and that’s the wind problem solved.

Mel That’s amazing. Okay, let’s talk through the actual use of this thing. Let’s say we’re dictating a chapter of a romance novel, on the beach with everyone looking at us strangely. How do we go about it?

Scott I think the first thing you have to do is accept that you’re going to look silly if you do it in public. Who cares? I gave up on caring what people thought a long time ago. The way I look at it is – people don’t really care. I’m not even sure they notice. And if they do, who cares? These are transient moments when someone might look at you and think, ‘What a weirdo,’ then they carry on with their life, just like you are carrying on with yours. The important thing is you’re out and about and you’re getting work done. You’re being productive; you’re being creative. I’m not sure I’d set it up in a coffee shop and sit back and dictate my magnum opus, but being out and about and talking into the mic isn’t really an issue. I do a lot of dictating on walks. I know people who do it on treadmills! I couldn’t do that, but good luck to them.

I’m not sure doing it out in public is as odd anymore as it was a while ago. There’s a generation now that just doesn’t care. They talk into their phones all day long. They don’t care – maybe we should be a bit more like that. You see people strolling around holding their headset or holding their phone next to their mouth, just talking, talking, talking. I think this idea of talking to a machine has to a machine has to be something we get over. You’ve just got to get over it and do it. Once you do that, you’re off and running.

Mel The best part is when someone comes past and says, “Oh, haven’t you got a cute dog?” and you say, “Yeah, he’s cute” – and then it comes out in the middle of your story.

Scott Yes. You can just pull it out and pause it, and I don’t think people would mind – but you forget to do it sometimes. Then you look at the transcription and you’re like, “What was that?”

But of course, you do need to make sure you’re comfortable in your environment, otherwise you’re going to clam up and produce terrible work. You need to be somewhere comfortable to be creative. If that means being alone, in the house or on top of a cliff or whatever, then do what works for you. Getting used to talking out loud is the first hurdle. Once you’re past that, it’s easy. It’s liberating.

Mel The commands are fairly simple, aren’t they? You really just need ‘open quote’, ‘close quote’, ‘full stop’, ‘comma’, and ‘new line’.

Scott Absolutely. People get hung up on that – “I don’t want to have to do the quotations, the punctuation…” You’ve just got to rip the Band-Aid off and do it. It’s an avoidance thing – people don’t want to have to worry about saying ‘full stop’, ‘comma’, ‘semicolon’. But at some point you’ve just got to do it. If you don’t, you’ve got tons of clean-up later, and that puts you off dictation. You spend all your time cleaning up the draft and it takes longer than typing. Then you haven’t solved anything. It’s not just about the time you save – it’s about RSI and being healthy and dictating on top of mountains, being out in the world. You’ve just got to accept it and make it part of your workflow, and eventually you get to the point where you don’t think about it anymore.

My son had some homework to do recently, about Elizabethan art. He asked, “What should I put for this bit?” I started saying, “Say this, full stop. Type this, comma,” and I was starting to drop the punctuation in as he was typing it on his screen. I thought, ‘I’m even dictating here now.’ You get used to it. It just becomes part of your vocabulary.

Mel One problem I haven’t been able to overcome is the indents or the paragraphing. I still have to do it manually.

Scott A lot of it’s dependent on the app or program that you’re dictating into – whether you’ve got paragraph style set up, for example. When I did freelance, they’d send me a very specific document layout that had to be adhered to, and so I never even attempted to dictate into that. I would just dictate into the most basic program possible – TextEdit on your Mac, Notepad on the PC. There’s no formatting – it literally just spits out plain text. I would then copy and paste it wherever I needed later. Dragon really is a first-draft tool. There are some people who use it for more than that, but for me it works best when you take the formatting out of it completely, and edit later in Word or Scrivener.

Mel I saw in your course you had some tips about dictating directly into Scrivener.

Scott I demonstrate it in the course, but I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it unless you absolutely have to. Dragon has to have something called full text control, which means when you dictate into another program it gives full control of the text to Dragon. Dragon can then track where the cursor is and that sort of thing, so you can make corrections and jump about.

Scrivener doesn’t allow that in Windows. If you absolutely have to, there’s a setting you can use that allows you to dictate directly into programs that don’t allow full text control. It will work as normal for dictation, but it won’t allow you to make corrections. If, for example, you get a word wrong, you can’t say ‘correct that word’. Instead of making the correction, it will type out ‘correct that word’ into the document. So it’s really a last resort, and I don’t recommend it. I’d always stick to a program that allows full text control, because otherwise Dragon will never learn – it assumes it gets everything right. Unless you tell it otherwise and make corrections, it doesn’t get better. In fact, over time it gets worse, because you’re not adjusting it to your writing style and voice. So I’d stick to the copy and paste method.

You also can’t correct transcription in the obsolete Mac version. It just spits out the file as a Word document or rich text file. But you can correct transcription in the PC version, and it will learn from it, just as it would from dictation. You can get your transcription up to 98%, 99% accuracy, by taking a look at what Dragon has transcribed and correcting it where it’s wrong. Interestingly, the latest version of Dragon for the PC – version 15 – uses the same profile for dictation and transcription. You don’t have to differentiate at all. It just takes everything you’ve ever dictated and applies that to whatever you feed into it – it’s a holistic approach to accuracy.

Mel Are there other differences between dictation and transcription?

Scott Transcription tends to be more freeform – you just tend to talk and talk. That can lead to overwriting sometimes. You might find that dictating to your computer changes that, because you see what you’re saying appearing on the screen. Your inner editor might kick in a little and say, ‘Hold on – do I need that? Maybe I should rework this.’ It’s worth trying both to see if it changes how you dictate.

Mel Let’s talk about the writing itself. I find that my voice is a lot more natural when I’m dictating. We were storytellers before we were story writers.

Scott Correct. A lot of things have come along to enable us to tell stories over the years – the quill; the pen; the electric typewriter – that’s how old I’m getting, I had an electric typewriter; the word processor; the PC; the Mac; the iPad. It’s staggering, really. All of these things have been evolutions of the way we tell stories, and Dragon, or voice, is just the next evolution. It’s the next input method after the keyboard.

People get hung up on this – “I can only think through my fingers.” That’s because you’re used to it. The keyboard was actually designed to slow us down. It was designed to stop the hammers hitting into each other. That’s why we have the QWERTY layout we’ve got. It doesn’t make sense in the modern age. There’s no reason anymore to have this layout. So we end up with people who can type 120 words a minute but end with things like RSI, because you shouldn’t be using such a torture device to type that quickly.

It’s easier to dictate quickly than to type quickly by hand, which means you spend less time working. If you spend eight or ten hours on your laptop getting your words out, it’s going to take a physical toll, even if it doesn’t feel like it. You’re sitting at a desk, crouched over, sedentary, banging away at a keyboard. There’s impact for your fingers, your posture… Dictation takes that away, to some extent. Especially if you’re doing it on your bike or walking around – you’re active, you’re getting out in the world. I don’t have an issue with any way that people work, but I just want people to be well. Dragon is just the next evolution of that. We should embrace it. I look at my kids and they’re growing up with touchscreens, using them for everything. That’s going to happen eventually with voice. We’re in a bit of a voice war at the...

#151 What Happens When a Software Developer & a Pair of Writers Get Together? with Lee Powell

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 21 Mar 2019 05:37:14 -0500

Lee Powell is a writer and expert in technology. He works with Angela Ackerman and her co-creator Becca Puglisi at One Stop for Writers. He also created the Windows version of renowned writing program Scrivener.

When the team collaborated, they came up with the Character Building Tool, which combines Powell’s software design skills with Ackerman and Puglisi’s thesaurus writing skills.

In this episode, we chat about the following:

the importance of collaboration
Scrivener for Windows
One Stop For Writers
the Character Building Tool
following your passion
what happens when creativity and coding meet
integrating technology into the writing process
lifelong learning
the importance of deep thinking

You can find out more about Powell, One Stop For Writers and the Character Building tool here and buy Passion Driven here.

You can download your FREE Issue 3 of Author Success Stories Magazine here for your chance to win one of two six-month subscriptions to One Stop For Writers. Entries close 31st March, 2019.

Read Full Transcript

Mel Lee Powell is an expert in technology, who works with featured author Angela Ackerman and her co-creator Becca Puglisi on their site One Stop for Writers. He also created the Windows version of renowned writing program Scrivener.

Lee I can’t take credit for the inception of Scrivener itself. Keith Blount created the program for the Mac – I actually had to buy a Mac to use it as I was studying in the UK. I wrote to him in 2008 and said, “This is an amazing tool. You have a total paradigm shift. It’s non-linear. It allows me to make a mess and write in any way I want. Have you thought about doing a Windows or Linux version?”

He hadn’t. He was busy enough trying to rewrite the base version of Scrivener – the first write of that code had been a disaster. He’s not a programmer by trade. He was a teacher and working towards a PhD in medieval history, or something like that. When there was so much interest in Scrivener, he had to go back and write it properly. He’s a really interesting guy. We formed a reasonably good friendship over the years, and eventually he acquiesced to my petitioning and we started collaborating in 2008 or 2009.

Mel What kind of process was involved in creating the program?

Lee It took me about three years to even get to version one of Scrivener for Windows and Linux. We were so far behind the Mac – he had a seven-year start on me. As a software engineer by trade, I thought it would be reasonably easy. I’d been building banking, finance, and trading systems during my career. Unfortunately I was totally depressed. I used to write a lot when I was a kid (terrible novels that thankfully never saw the light of day). I used to write poetry and songs as well. I’m a terrible musician, but I’m quite good with the lyrics side of things.

Scrivener saved me. I was in my late thirties and had all the things I thought I wanted in life – kids, family, my wife. We’ve been married for 28 years now. It’s had its ups and downs, and fundamentally we’re happy. But I was totally depressed. I thought, ‘I’ve got to get out of this corporate thing,’ but of course you get used to the money. It was a Catch-22. I just wanted to align myself with my core values.

I’ve always loved writing, and the whole creative aspect of coding. The Windows version of Scrivener is completely rewritten from the ground up. We had to start from scratch, which was a wonderful experience. We had many years of seven-day weeks, until there was a little bit of money coming in and we could step back.

It was a huge risk, stepping away from the corporate work. But it’s like anything in life, anything to do with writing. You have to start on the side. The reality is probably only 100 authors in the world make a ton of money. The millions of others can make a decent income. If it’s part of who you are, you have to pursue it. You have to follow your curiosity and go down that rabbit hole, balancing the other things in your life as best you can. It’s risky, but it’s cathartic. Therapeutic. That’s why people read and write. We’re looking for answers; we’re looking for comfort. We’re looking to make sense of the world and our lives, with our wounds and past hurts. I just love being in this space.

Mel How does Scrivener help us with our writing?

Lee You can write a book with pen and paper – get someone else to type it up and correct it. You don’t need any software at all. The reality is that writers just write. They get on with it and do it every day. It’s not about software. What I like about Scrivener is that it allows me to write in any way I want to. However, the majority of people are overwhelmed by the complexity of Scrivener, even though we’ve tried to make it as simple as possible. There are a lot of different types of writers. Some are more sophisticated, some are technical writers, some are script writers. You can try to simplify the Scrivener software as much as possible, but at the end of the day it’s up to the writer.

There is a generous trial process. It can last months and months, because it’s thirty days of use, not thirty consecutive days like most software. There’s also a tutorial, which probably takes three or four hours – it’s a huge ask. But if people took advantage of the trial and the tutorial, the proverbial light would just go off. The software isn’t like anything else. It doesn’t care how you write, it doesn’t care what order you write in. It’s totally non-linear. It allows you to make a complete mess. It allows you to write different versions of something, and then compile and consolidate it. You don’t have to worry about styling. It’s a powerful tool, and I love it.

Creating the tool has been a great procrastination strategy. I don’t have any excuse, especially when version three comes out (which will be soon – it’s been in beta for about a year). Both Keith Blount and I want to continue with Scrivener, but we also want to write. To write again as an adult, after reading so many books on writing…

Mel What kind of books?

Lee There are so many options. You can do the whole Joseph Campbell thing, but he’s quite technical. There are people building businesses around teaching people to write. I did a course for three years, and it was really good – but I was paralysed with the amount of information that I was getting. What I should and shouldn’t be doing, what my inner and outer motivations were, all these technical terms… After reading all the literature and doing this course, I was so insecure in my writing that I just stopped, for about five years. It stopped being fun. Analysis paralysis, information overload.

When I look back over a decade of reading and studying this space, there are only a few books I keep coming back to. Strunk & White, ‘The Elements of Style’. That’s a staple. Sol Stein, ‘How to Grow a Novel’. Stephen King, ‘On Writing’. I can’t read his fiction – it scares me. But ‘On Writing’ is one of the best books I’ve ever read. He does believe that you’re either born a writer or not, which is probably the only thing I disagree with in the book. Technology and information and the way we assimilate information and feedback has changed.

This is why I like One Stop for Writers. You need a tool to write – Scrivener works for me, because it’s flexible and accommodates my changing style. One Stop is all about how you come up with an evocative, integral story. It’s about making your characters as deep as you want to make them. Ultimately a reader wants to live vicariously through a character. Deep down, we’re looking for answers. A fundamentally flawed character, with great traits and negative traits and wounds and lies they believe about themselves is compelling. It triggers ideas for your plot. Before I started to engage with Becca and Angela, my work was more plot-driven. I knew the character was important, but I thought it would come together by itself.

One Stop is amazing for character. It distils the plethora of information out there into tutorials and tools and worksheets. It makes sense of the information. I’ve understood more about the components of creating a story from working with One Stop and developing tools with them than I have from anything else. I love working in that space with them. It’s the other piece of the puzzle.

Mel What’s your role with One Stop?

Lee I take care of the technology. We’ve just released the Character Builder tool at One Stop. We spent maybe nine months drawing up wireframes to get us all on the same page, and make sure I understood where they were coming from. Then we spent a year developing the tool. It’s all web-based – totally different from Scrivener, which is a desktop tool. I haven’t worked in the web space for years. There was so much to learn, and it took me a while to get up to speed.

It’s a different process from working with Scrivener. Keith is the real brain behind that. He’s very involved in the community, and understands fundamentally what the tool should be. It’s also got a great interface. With One Stop, it’s been far more evolutionary. Even today, we’re a bit frustrated with the look and feel of the site. It’s evolving.

The Character Builder tool came about because a while ago I created this dictionary called Clever Dictionary. It was like a visual thesaurus, where you could look up synonyms. It was a complete disaster, but it had integrated quotes, various dictionaries, all integrated. You could search and find the perfect word. I approached Becca and Angela and said, “I’ve been using your books and I love them. I’ve got this tool, and I was thinking we could use it to put your content in electronic form.” They said, “It’s funny, because we were thinking about contacting you!” It was a moment of serendipity. Eventually we formed One Stop. We started out with just the thesauruses in electronic form, then moved to tools and worksheets. With the Character Builder, we realised we could leverage all of the thesaurus content and integrate them together. I’ve tried all sorts of character tools, but none of them are like this.

It’s elucidated how we can integrate all the other tools – how we can pull the whole of One Stop into a kind of global roadmap, so the writer can feel like they’re in complete control. They can see any part of the story project at any moment in time. The creation of a deep, compelling story becomes a lot easier.

Mel I’ve been playing around with the Character Builder, and it’s amazing. You can pull in backstory, personality, motivation, physical details, daily life…and it’ll give you a PDF summary of everything at the end. It’s not just another tool, is it? It’s going to be as big as Scrivener.

Lee I just don’t know. None of us are really businesspeople. It’s a labour of love. I’m very lucky that it’s worked out. One Stop is still in early days, but Scrivener’s been out for a while. We don’t actually do any advertising at all for it.

They’re both very organic tools. The Character Builder is a game-changer, not from a business point of view, but because I’ve never seen anything like it. You can as deep or as light as you want, but as you say, there are lots of different tabs you can use. There’s also a gallery, where you can upload photos. The tabs are also quite detailed. With backstory, you can go into emotional wounds, which are pulled from the thesaurus. You can make one wound primary, or have as many as you want. There’s also a ‘fear’ section where you can talk about secrets and lies, a section for positive and negative traits… The tool will then generate a summary or a blueprint, which you can augment as much as you want. You then select a character arc to suit that summary.

When you look at the three or four paragraph summary, you go, “That’s my character. I’ve spent five or ten years reading books and I’ve never gotten anywhere, and then One Stop comes along and nails it.” We’re going to finesse things in the future, but we’ve spent a lot of time trying to get this right.

One of my contributions, because I’m so stupid when it comes to writing, was implementing contextual help throughout the tool. Anywhere you are, there a little tab that you can expand or collapse. So if you don’t know what character arc or change type means, you can just click a link that walks you through the process.

Mel Have you tried out the tool with your own writing?

Lee Yeah, I tried it with one of the characters from a novel I’ve been working on in the background. I put him through the tool, and I tried to go through every area to test it. It took me four hours. I learned so much about my character. For me, I realised, ‘This character is a real piece of work. He’s nasty – but he’s got this really good side as well.’ And it brought up so many knock-on effects that could happen in the plot. It spawned a lot of other stuff. If you do the deep dive, you’ll get huge benefits. You think you understand something technically, but once you put your own character in there… It’s revolutionary. It’s a game-changer for people who invest time in their characters, and our stories can only benefit. Our characters can be so much deeper, and the vicarious connection with your reader can be so much deeper too.

The integration aspect is what we want to focus on now – integrating the content from the thesauruses into tools. I encourage people to check it out. Corporates always carry on about synergy, but I think we really have it at One Stop now. Working with women is a really interesting dynamic – they always want to stay in contact. I’m all like, “Leave me alone, I’ve got stuff to do…” But they’re so caring and loving, and we’ve managed to produce something amazing as a group of three. I know people balk at the subscription price, but I just think the value-cost equation will become more and more evident for people.

It’s interesting getting back in touch with my own writing. I’ve been out of contact with writers in general, because I’ve been so focussed on the tools. I had a guy write to me the other day, bemoaning something about Scrivener. I had no idea who he was, but I walked into Dymocks and he had a whole shelf of books to himself. I didn’t even know his name!

Mel You’re about to take a break for a bit, though.

Lee Yes. I don’t do enough of it. My wife has said to me, “This time there’s no laptop going with you.” We walked the Camino de Santiago all the way across Spain, about a thousand kilometres, and I still took my laptop. I just love my work – I don’t believe in retirement at all. You just stop working for money. One Stop and Scrivener aren’t about money; I’m doing my passion. Ultimately I’d like to do some writing as well, learn another language, get better at guitar… Life is getting simpler.

I’ve got whiteboards all around my room now, which is the best investment I’ve ever made. I get a coffee at the beach in the morning, then come home, sit, and think about whatever comes to mind. Then I challenge my beliefs about that. It’s fostering or feeding an innovation mindset. I started with five minutes, but now I can get up to about an hour. It’s a big ask for a lot of people, having the time to be able to do that, but when we start thinking about what we want, what juices us up, how we find balance…it feeds our creative energy.

You go through a phase when your kids move out, and you’re left with your partner, who you’ve been living with for twenty-five years. You’ve been reacting to the kids and talking to the kids, and suddenly it’s just you two, and you’re like, “I don’t even know if I like her. I don’t even know if I like myself. Who am I? What have I been doing?” It was actually a real blessing. It makes you think about who you are intrinsically.

I have a photo of me as a kid. I’m like four years old and I’m standing with a friend of mine. We’re at some kind of a building site, putting pallets and boxes together into a little cubbyhouse. And I remember the emotion of that moment. I’ve never been as happy in my life than at that point. That child knew. He was lost in the moment. I’ve got photos of my nan and granddad when they were very young. I see them at their wedding, I see them celebrating their sixtieth anniversary, but then there are also the obituary photos. Life is just gone. If I beat myself up and try to take on too much, I’m going to fail and hate myself.

I just try to create a rhythm every day – it might be taking one step, or four or five on a good day, towards a goal. I’ve got to work, I’ve got to pay the bills, but I also want to do this novel on the side. If I can take a step forward, write something or plan something, it’s like saving. Pay yourself first. In two years’ time, you’ll look at that saving and you can do something worthwhile with it.

Life is fundamentally becoming simpler as I get older. Maybe I’m becoming Stoic, as I shed off the material stuff and think, ‘What do I really need to be happy?’ It’s One Stop, Scrivener, writing, music, reading… I love learning stuff. It makes me feel whole. Does it have value at the end of the day? I don’t know. But I’d just encourage people to have a go.

I’m never going to be a great writer. My grammar’s terrible, I’m never going to be an amazing writer, but that’s not going to stop me writing. Some of the people that I like reading the best are pretty rubbish writers. Even the proverbial ‘Fifty Shades’, which I had to read because I lost a bet with my wife – regardless of whether E.L. James is a terrible writer or not, she’s talented enough to capture emotion, things that everyone was feeling, things that everyone resonated with. She deserves credit. She captured that essence. It doesn’t matter how good or bad you are. What matters is whether it gives you a sense of pleasure

#150 Career Strategies For Indie Authors, with Adam Croft

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 11 Mar 2019 21:34:07 -0500

Adam Croft is an Indie author and a counterpoint to anyone who says you can’t make a living through Indie publishing. He’s sold more than 1.5 million books and once bumped J.K. Rowling off the USA Today bestseller list. His ‘Knight and Culverhouse’ thrillers have sold more than 250,000 copies worldwide, and his Kempston Hardwick mysteries have been adapted as audio dramas starring some of the biggest names in British TV.

He’s also published several books in his Indie Author Mindset series, a great tool for Indie authors.

In this episode we discuss the following:

Professionalism as an Indie
Business & Creative hats
Kindle v’s Wide
Bookbub, FB & Amazon Ads
Vellum & formatting
Pre-orders, discounting and other stategies
Thinking longterm
Never giving up
Levelling up & aiming higher
Launch Strategies
Branding & Marketing
Keywords, tags an keeping your website up to date
and more…

You can find out more about Croft and his books here.

And don’t forget, if you haven’t subscribed to Author Success Magazine, you can check it out here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel Adam Croft is an Indie author and a counterpoint to anyone who says you can’t make a living through Indie publishing. He’s sold more than 1.5 million books and once bumped J.K. Rowling off the USA Today bestseller list. His ‘Knight and Culverhouse’ thrillers have sold more than 250,000 copies worldwide, and his Kempston Hardwick mysteries have been adapted as audio dramas starring some of the biggest names in British TV. He’s also published several books in his Indie Author Mindset series, a great tool for Indie authors. Adam, tell us about your success.

Adam I think you covered it pretty succinctly there! I’ve been doing this for ten years now. It’s interesting that, as you say, people think you can’t make a living Indie publishing, when all the data points to the fact that, on the whole, Indie publishers sell more books and earn more money than traditionally published authors. Research last year showed that the average traditionally published author makes about A$16,000 a year. That’s remarkably low, and that’s for an author with a long sought-after publishing contract from one of the big houses! The misconception that Indie publishing is a fallback option is completely false. I turn down up to half a dozen publishing contracts a year – just by looking at them, I can see that they’re not going to earn me nearly as much as I can do myself. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be! I have had a traditional publishing contract, and tried to get out of it as quickly as I possibly could.

Mel I wanted to talk to you about taking control of your own career and owning the rights to your intellectual property.

Adam It’s vital, especially these days when things move so quickly. Handing over the rights to something for even a couple of years, let alone for life, is just barmy. There’s just no reason to do it, because things change so quickly and you need to be agile. That’s one of the problems with big publishers at the moment. They’re not agile. They’re still doing things the way they’ve been doing them for years.

That’s why I write a lot about mindset for Indie authors, because that’s what stays relevant. Mindset is the bones of the matter. It’s also something people skip over when they get too much into the detail of whether Facebook ads or BookBub ads are better, or whether it’s this new thing. There’s always new stuff coming out in this industry. Yes, you need to be able to be agile and respond to those things when they happen – but it’s not all about the details. Getting the basics in place first is crucial for anyone.

There’s a lot out there to confuse people. I don’t think I’d want to be starting out as an Indie author now – it’s much more difficult than it was when I first started. Back then there weren’t as many authors, the fields were much easier to plow through… There was really only Amazon and Apple out there as retailers, and some defunct providers like Sony, who no longer do eBooks. Facebook ads didn’t exist; Twitter was only a year or two old.

It was a completely different industry. But the basic prerequisites or success, and the way of thinking about things – those haven’t changed. Being an Indie author is not just being a writer. It’s being a businessperson, an administrator, a statistician. Those things all need focus in a modern world.

Mel In your latest book ‘The Indie Author Checklist’, you talk about the importance of finding your market.

Adam Yes. A lot of beginning writers try to work cross-genre, or write in markets that perhaps don’t strictly exist. There’s a reason why publishers so often turn those books down – because they can’t find an audience for them. The book does need to be good, and it does need to be targeted. It’s not the case that internet marketing will help you sell any old book. It doesn’t work like that.

I have struggled and still do struggle to sell a great number of my books. I’ve had three or four major successes, but I’ve written 20-odd books, and the others sell fairly modestly. It’s at the level now where it provides me a decent income, but those books alone, without the big successes, wouldn’t have propelled me to stardom or anything. I probably wouldn’t be sitting here doing this podcast.

Mel And we never know which book will be the one that takes off. For Adam it was ‘Her Last Tomorrow’, and it allowed him to pay off his mortgage. It’s really cool!

Adam It is, yeah. But that’s my ninth book, and a lot of people have this preconception that there was this overnight success. At that point I’d been publishing for five years, and I’d earned very little from it. So it’s not quite as impressive as some of the headlines like to make out. It was a book that came along at the right time. I didn’t know at the time, but it’s changed my life completely.

Mel And you still don’t know where the first seven thousand sales of that book came from, do you?

Adam Not a clue. They came out of nowhere. This was back in early 2011, and it was easier back then to have an accidental success, which is difficult to do nowadays.

Mel Going back to writing to market – it leaves a bit of a bad taste in people’s mouths. But if you’re writing romance or thrillers, you want to make sure your books are recognizable to readers, don’t you?

Adam Yes. It’s not really about writing to market – there’s a subtle difference. It’s writing while being aware of whether there is a market. You shouldn’t look at what people are reading and think, “I’m going to write one of those.” It’s about writing what you want to write and publishing what you want to publish, but being aware that if there isn’t a market for your book, you can’t blame the market. It’s being aware of market forces.

I’ve done it completely accidentally. When I wrote ‘Her Last Tomorrow’, I didn’t even know what ‘psychological thriller’ meant. All I knew is that I was writing a crime novel from the point of view of the victim, rather than the investigator – getting inside the mind of the person who was most affected by it. And it turned out that apparently that’s a psychological thriller, and psychological thrillers are really huge! So you can hit things at the right time accidentally. It’s a case of being aware of what the market is, not reverse-engineering your book to what you think is popular. It’s being aware of whether it’s going to be popular, and setting your expectations accordingly.

Mel Even the tagline of ‘Her Last Tomorrow’ is intriguing – ‘Could you murder your wife to save your daughter?’

Adam Yes. I’ve thought a lot about what made ‘Her Last Tomorrow’ so successful so that I can try and replicate it. The concept is a part of that. ‘Tell Me I’m Wrong’ has overtaken ‘Her Last Tomorrow’ as my bestselling book, and it goes down the same lines.

A concept like ‘Could you murder your wife to save your daughter?’ speaks to everybody. It speaks to human instinct; it speaks directly to people, asking them a question. It gives the reader an impossible choice, which compels readers to pick up the book. I’ve done it a couple of times since, with a couple of different blurbs.

It’s not necessarily going to work for every book and every genre. Constructing that kind of blurb may not appeal to, say, sci-fi readers in the same way. But psychological thrillers have a wider audience. People respond to my ads and say, ‘I haven’t read a book in years but I was compelled by your hook.’ As another example, the tagline for ‘Tell Me I’m Wrong’ is ‘What if your husband was a serial killer?’ Again, that speaks to people. It’s about a domestic situation – most people have got a partner or a husband or a wife, so you start thinking, ‘What would I do if I was in that scenario?’

Mel You publish four to six books a year, so ideas are vital, aren’t they?

Adam Yes. Getting books published, getting material out there, is key for Indie authors – though not at the expense of quality, of course. For example, my first book took me two and a half years, for a 23,00-word novella. I started off very slow, but I’m getting the hang of it now. But yes, having lots of material is important. I make preorders available for my books, so people have the book land on their devices at midnight on the day of release. I wake up at 7.00am, 8.00am, and I’ll already have a couple of emails from readers who waited up to read it when it came out at midnight, and who have already finished it by the time I’ve woken up. I’d have to have another one ready by lunchtime to write quickly enough for readers! It’s not about writing enough. There is no such thing as enough; it’s not humanly possible. So it’s about writing as much as you can, as quickly as you can, without compromising quality.

Mel There are tools a writer can use to capitalize on that enthusiasm – like mailing lists.

Adam Yes. Mailing lists are absolutely key, for a number of reasons. Firstly, this is one of the only businesses in the world where you don’t have access to your own customers. In any other business, you would have direct contact with your customers. They would be coming directly to you; you would know who they are. Gatekeepers still exist in this industry. If you’re selling through Amazon or another retailer, that retailer has access to customer data and you don’t. Mailing lists enable you to get over that by having direct access to people. You can email them when you have a new book out. You can keep in touch with them. And at some point, retailers are going to cease to exist. Amazon might decide tomorrow to stop selling eBooks, and you need to have contingency plans.

Amazon also won’t necessarily tell people when you have a new book out. You need to be able to do that yourself! Mailing lists are also superb for selling your backlist. You might email them once a week with a story you’ve seen in the news that’s similar to your book, or with a bit of backstory about what influenced the book. People who’ve read it get extra depth and extra flavour, and people who haven’t read it get a little nudge to go and buy it.

Mel When I signed up to Adam’s mailing list, I got sent two books straight away. That’s a great hook, isn’t it?

Adam Yes, and it’s nothing new. It’s a case of looking at what businesses do in other sectors and deciding whether it can apply to you. Sending free books is the equivalent of that guy who stands in the supermarket and says, “Would you like to try this new sausage we’ve got?” It’s giving people a little taste of what the books are about. There are a lot of books out there, and readers stick to what they know and love. So giving someone a couple of short stories or a couple of books makes them more likely to buy the rest.

Mel That’s what helpful about your ‘Indie Author Checklist’ – it’s a reminder of what we should be doing and the tools we can use.

Adam The feedback I got was that it was a kick up the backside – a shove into the next gear. There’s a lot to remember in this industry. I mention in the book that several times I’ve forgotten to do basic things at critical stages of book launches. It’s an easy go-to guide that gives you a new angle on things and new ways to success, rather than something to follow religiously so you’ll be successful.

Mel You started out with trial-and-error too. You just kept trying things, and it’s your energy that’s gotten you to where you are.

Adam I guess so. I love doing this job and I wouldn’t do anything else. I’ve always written in my spare time. My dream was always to earn enough money from writing that I didn’t need to do anything else and could spend my days writing. Of course it doesn’t work out like that – sometimes I don’t write for weeks on end because there’s so much other stuff that needs doing. But this is still my job, I still love it, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. So I’ve always been determined to make a success of it.

Maybe that’s the mindset you need. You need to want it.

Mel I’m going to stick my neck out and say that if you want it and take advice on Indie publishing, you will have some level of success, because the structures that are in place put us on a level playing field with traditional publishers.

Adam The facts are fairly simple. If you’ve got a book and you shop it around to agents and publishers, even with a decent book you’ve got a one percent chance of it being published. If you write and independently publish a book, you will sell copies. Guaranteed, someone will buy your book. Statistically speaking, someone will buy it.

Already you have a guarantee of some level of success – you will be a published author and you will sell copies. Whether you sell enough to make a full-time living of it is largely down to you. It’s not something that will just happen, and it’s not something you can make happen by spending an hour or two a week on it. It requires applied effort and a lot of time. The growth curve isn’t a straight line. You’ll be putting in 16-hour days for four or five years. You feel like you’re making no progress for a long time – and then at some point the reward kicks in and pays off.

Mel Let’s talk about book launches. One thing you stress in your Indie Author Mindset series is that we’re here for the long game.

Adam Yes. Book launches used to be an important thing, because if you put out a book with a big publisher you had to sell lots of copies in the first few weeks, otherwise the book came off the shelves to make room for the next big thing. But books don’t have a shelf life now. They’re available in perpetuity. I’ve got books that are ten years old that still sell copies every day. You can always do some marketing and spike the sales all over again.

It’s no longer the case that a book sells well at launch and then dies off, so launches aren’t as important anymore. I don’t do massive launch marketing at all. My marketing budget will go to new books that I think have marketable hooks and will be successful, or to the first books in my series so that I can funnel readers through. Readers buying every book in a ten-book series is where you really get your success.

Mel You sometimes throw £1000 a day at your marketing budget, don’t you?

Adam I have done, but only if I make back more than I’m spending. I never throw £1000 at something experimentally. I always start off with £10 or £20, and if that £10 or £20 brings me back £30 or £40, then I’ll increase the spending incrementally and see if it carries on paying back. If it does, I’ll obviously keep spending more – doubling £10 is lovely, and doubling £1000 is nicer. But there are times when I spend very little on advertising, because for whatever reason I’m not getting a return from it. Maybe the ad’s been running for a little while and needs refreshing. It depends.

That’s the beauty of this. You can be flexible, and chop and change depending on the results you see day to day. I can see what I’ve spent on ads today right on my computer, and I can see if there are sales coming in from those.

Mel You’ve also talked in the past about writing through Scrivener and publishing through Vellum. Vellum’s always been a formatting place of choice, hasn’t it?

Adam It’s a beautiful piece of software. You can just pull your books into it and it’ll create beautiful-looking eBooks and paperbacks, and large print editions now as well. The learning curve for the software is also very small. It’s literally the work of a couple of clicks of a button to get a book out there. But it’s very powerful, and has some fantastic hidden features under the bonnet. If anyone reading this has been using Vellum for a little while and feels comfortable with it, I’d very much recommend going to their website and looking at some of their more advanced features.

I’d definitely recommend it. On the face of it, it’s not a cheap piece of software. I think it’s $150 or $200, but you can do so much with it. And if you’re paying someone to format your book – which you should be doing, rather than just uploading the Word document – then you’ll be paying close to that for one or two books anyway. If you’re going to be writing long-term and producing at least a couple of books, then it’s a very sensible investment.

Mel I’m always surprised that people quibble about those small amounts of money.

Adam It’s the same as any other career. If you went into another business, you’d have to rent premises, get a professional sign for the front, produce leaflets and flyers, pay for insurance… You’d be spending tens of thousands of dollars before you even open the doors. It applies to other areas too – if you want to become a lawyer, you have to pay through the nose to go to law school. If we want a modicum of success, we have to invest beforehand. Writing is no different from anything else. But for some reason, people think that you can design your own cover, upload a Word document, and become a bestseller. It’s a very romantic idea, but it doesn’t work like that. You have to invest.

When I talk about spending money on publishing, I’m thinking of the services that are required – things like editing, proofreading, cover design, things to make it more professional. What you should never do is pay a company that says, “Give is some money and we’ll publish your book.” The actual publishing of the book is completely free everywhere.

Self-publishing or Indie publishing isn’t an alternative to traditional publishing in the way people think it...

#149 Asking Big Questions: Writing The Landscape Novel, with Karen Viggers

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 06 Mar 2019 21:07:11 -0500

Karen Viggers is the award winning, internationally bestselling author of four novels, including her new release, The Orchardist’s Daughter.

She writes contemporary realist fiction set in Australian landscapes, and her work explores connection with the bush, grief and loss, healing in nature, death, family, marriage and friendship.

During our conversation, we discuss the following:

the intersection of nature and humanity
our connection to nature
the big philosophical questions
the importance of solitude and thinking deeply
hope, intimacy, humour
setting, character & narrative
writing the landscape novel
the music and rhythm of words
what is literary fiction
and more

You can find out more about Viggers and her novels here.

Read Full Transcript

#148 From Traditionally Published To Indie: A Success Story, with Keri Arthur

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 25 Feb 2019 21:02:05 -0500

I’ve always trusted myself. I’ve always written what I want to write and gone in the direction I want to. I’ve never actually had much input from the publishers that way. So that really hasn’t changed. I’m still using the same beta writer that I always have. I’m still with my same crit. group so you know none of that has changed. The way I work really hasn’t changed from traditional to self publishing.

Keri is a best selling paranormal and fantasy author. She has won several Romantic Times reviewers Choice Awards and a career achievement award. Most recently, she won the Australian Romance Readers Association best Fantasy Novel for 2018.

During our chat we talk about the following:

the importance of your author brand
the advantages of going Indie
being in control of your career
marketing
writing the best book is still the best marketing tool
Demon’s Dance
the importance of writing series
overwhelm
covers
and more…

You can find out more about Keri and her books here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Today I have with me Keri Arthur. Keri is a best selling paranormal and fantasy author. She has won several Romantic Times reviewers Choice Awards and a career achievement award.

Keri: I had my first book published in 2000 with a small press in America. I've been writing for 18 years now, with twelve years as a full time writer which is pretty amazing.

Mel: And you've got to be up to close on 40 books.

Keri: I think I'm 43 now.

Keri: I did write for 10 years before that with no success.

Mel: And you're now full time Indie

Keri: I am. I had no choice in it but I am.

Mel: I think that's a bit of a story in itself because clearly now when I think I looked on your fan page or the fan page you were right up there with Sherrilyn Kenyon. You've got about 30000 fans on your fan page. Yet traditional publishers have decided that paranormal fantasy isn't selling anymore. And so you've had to go into that. That in itself is a great story isn't it.

Keri: It is and it was a combination of my publisher and the New American Library who did the dark fantasy and the urban fantasy for Penguin Random House. They merged with Random House and Random House decided to close it down. I was then shoved across to Berkeley to do mainly romance and who didn't really know how to handle fantasy or urban fantasy. So arcs didn't go out and know I wasn't the star at Berkeley that. I didn't have that support at Berkeley as much. It's just sales figures. So of course if you're not getting the sales then they don't want you. So they dropped my contracts two years ago. They finished the books I'd handed in late. They decided to release those but the series themselves were dropped and I was forced to go full time.

Mel: The thing that attracted me as usual were your covers. You've got the Lizzie Grace series that's happening for you at the moment and you've got Demons Dance which I absolutely love. These Books are really taking off for you.

Keri: They are. I guess I was actually surprised how how well, particularly the Lizzie Grey series is doing well. But that again is the genre most known for it. You know when vampires and werewolves in which it is a magic star. That is basically what I'm well known for the fantasy series isn't quite doing as well but it's doing OK.

Mel: I'm guessing that this is the start of something really amazing for you. Are you excited to be I guess treading the indie path. Now I know there's lots of marketing which we'll talk about in a minute and branding and all the rest of it but does this liberate you in any way.

Keri: I find it it's just so amazing having that control. I love the control of being indie. I can I can choose my own covers. I do my own blurbs. It's Just it's just amazing having that control. I can put out books when I want to, not when the publisher wants. I'm finding it very freeing.

Mel: You've gone from two books a year with gone with your publisher and I know you've got an agent we had an agent and we'll talk about that as well but you're now doing four books.

Keri: I've done four books this year. I don't know if I'll do for you next year. I may only do three because hoping working nonstop to get those four books out and I'm actually I'm too into next year already. So. Yeah I might just take a little bit easier and just see how things go.

Mel: These books and ninety thousand one hundred and twenty thousand words long. These are big novels are and an awful lot of work.

Keri: Most of my novels are crime novels sit around magic and witches and where works and everything.

Mel: Urban fantasy and urban fantasy is vampires werewolf mythical creature set in a modern day urban setting.

Keri: According to the publishers that doesn't sell anymore. But in indie it's huge.

Mel: Whereabouts do the young Lizzie Graysons sit?

Keri: They're paranormal cozy mysteries. Basically they're witches and a werewolf reservations solving supernatural crimes.

Mel: The Riley Jensen series were bestsellers. The Kingdom of Earth series with Unleashed.

Keri: Unlit was the first one curse is the second one, Curse, is out. It's it's one of those things you really don't know what it's gonna sell like or how it's received until really the second one comes out. Because in Indie it's just you know you've got to wait for the series thing and patience.

Mel: You're new to indie publishing you are totally going from a standing start to having a publisher and agent looking after you to hitting hitting the ground running.

Keri: Not exactly, about four or five years ago my agent started doing self publishing. So I gave her the manuscript and she she formatted it and edited it never been like that and then put it out for me because I just it's it all sounded like too much work for me. So I thought I'd just shove it after her and let her do it all. And and then when I lost contracts I thought now I've got to do it myself because I was getting a little frustrated about the delays. Like if there was a corrections needing to be made or anything like that I couldn't do it straight away and that was frustrating me. So I decided hey do it all myself. I've got lots of mates doing it. So I had a lot of help get it and get my head around it all because it's a big learning curve when you've come from a traditional background.

Mel: There is an awful lot of what I guess overwhelmed with the marketing side all indie indie publishing, isn't there?

Keri: Yes there is. Oh there's a lot of places marketing had a market doing courses and everything like that. I mean I've always been a big believer in the fact that your best marketing tool is your next book. You know and you've got to write that next book. And I've never spent a lot of time doing marketing. I mean I've got I've got Facebook Twitter. I've got my Web site. I send out newsletters. I do that. But I haven't done a lot of advertise ment or anything like that because I just I'm not convinced it makes. A lot of difference unless you throw a lot of money at it. And I didn't have that money sir.

Mel: Dean Wesley Smith in the indie sphere everyone that says you've got to have your pie. And the more slices of pie you have on the shelves the more customers you're likely to bring in. Does that mean getting the rights back to the 43 books that you've already written.

Keri: I will never get those rights back. The Riley Jensen series. I think I burned out on seven of those books now but they're still selling so well I will never get those rights back. And the other books are still selling just enough that. I may never earn out on them but I'll never get them back.

Mel: Will people still be able to buy them?

Keri: Yes, back and buying more because they're all still selling. So they're all still on the shelf.

Mel: Now you're a hybrid author it means that people can buy the stuff that's already out there. But now that you have total control you can actually use your writing will explode because you you can choose the direction and you've already got a few series.

Keri: I've got the two series happening and I've got two more in the background that I know the ideas in the head that I desperately want to write but I've got to do the ones that I'm writing at the moment. nd talk about the marketing and and you know it all. All in all it's stuff that's involved in writing and then just print all of it. And John recon was all genres. Sadly I don't think they're doing it anymore. It was a Brisbane conference. And I I think they stopped doing it but it was all genres and all discussions and it was just fabulous. And it's just it's good to get out there and make your tribe.

Mel: And that's one of the secrets isn't it. I notice one of the things that you said is write the best story you can and hope to heal the readers find you.

Keri: There's two different types of conferences, the writer conferences and then there's the place like Supernova. Do supernovas twice a year usually I have been doing it for years and then you know that the fantasy comics books TV conventions. And that's that's where you can find a lot of writers. They're great fun.

Mel: We talk with everyone about how marketing is difficult. But the marketing side you know can be overwhelming. But this is the good side of marketing. This is where we get to be downright fun.

Mel: It is the best Supernovas I do. They're just two days of meeting people talking people mad costumes and yeah they're just such great fun. And it's a good way of getting yourself known and your books Narn without doing too much.

Mel: It's a really great way to I guess make a community and its community that seems to be the single biggest way of building a following nowadays isn't it because even social media has become overwhelming. People find you like you and love you. You can quite often have a fan for life.

Keri: Yes. That's why I'm a big believer in Facebook private Readers groups because it's a good way of getting all your posts and information and giving sneak peeks and they've been like that. Whereas the the general Facebook pages fan page that I've got. Not everyone. I mean I've got 30000 close to 30000 people on that. But you know maybe a thousand or so people will see a post. Whereas with the private groups at least everyone sees your post which is it which is good.

Mel: I notice all all all the writers that I see now they've all they've all got a fan page. They've all got their own reading group. And that seems to be the latest on Facebook. But I'm guessing that will change as well because nothing ever stays the same.

Keri: Facebook is always changing the rules. They're a pain in the rear.

Mel: Now you heard something I was reading I was reading the Carol of a fan page and it's got this six sentence Sundays.

Keri: It's just a group of Australian writers who every Sunday put six takes teaser sentences and only six days a sentence out of either a current book or a book that's coming out. It's just a way of everyone getting together and sharing little snippets to try and interest rates.

Mel: I read a little bit of yours trying to trying to do my research. And one of your books and I thought it's very easy to lose yourself in a good read isn't it.

Keri: Yes it is. I love there's nothing better than reading yourself losing yourself to a good book. Not that I do a lot of it at the moment unfortunately because I'm writing so much but yeah once things calm down a bit I'm hoping to get back to the writing.

Mel: 've got a sentence here and it's when the church bell tolls thrice in the middle of the night. Evil this way comes and I when I'm hooked. I love evil and I love your research books and if you had to talk about bloodthirsty brutal and bastardry or what comes to mind yeah I've got lots of good creatures I can tell you about.

Keri: I love my research creatures and I think I think that's why John Russo still sells and it may not be this genre that sells in the mainstream of what women are going to read romance. There's nothing wrong with because I've got a lot of makes it right up there and I actually love it. It's a good easy to read but that's all you see in the bookstores.

Mel: Paranormal still sells in e-books, doesn't it?

Keri: Well not according to my publishers because that's one of the reasons they dropped me because my sales were you know 20 percent or something here but people won't by e-books republish because they charge too much. But as an Indie they'll pay you 99 cents at a drop of a hat. I try to explain that to the buyer it's their fault they're not selling not theirs because it's eleven ninety nine for an e-book you know.

Mel: Indie books have gone up from two ninety nine was the going price now now falling for ninety nine no one even quibbles about it.

Keri: And you think about it you're sitting there you were typing away you really working hard for a hundred and twenty thousand words for ninety nine is tricky. I've got shapers three ninety nine and that's for the first little easy series I just for all the work you put into a book I think you've got to have a decent price on it. Not for ninety nine is fair I think for all the work. That we put in know and the paying for the decent editing and proofing and copy editing and covers a lot of work goes into a book.

Mel: There's no difference now between tread and indie publishing as far as a reader is concerned. Indie publishers are justice professional they often use the same editors and cover designers I've got to tell you your cover designs really stand out to me so I'm assuming you have an excellent designer.

Keri: I've got three different designers. I do. I love the guy who did the curse cover. I absolutely love. I've actually blew the cover up into a big poster selectors and put it on my wall because I adore it. He just caught it and I'm going to tell you that Demon's Dance coming through as well.

Mel: I love I love big books I love sagas I love series that that develop characters over time and I think Lizzie Lizzie Grace is starting to become quite a character. How many will be in the series?

Keri: I tend to write until I feel there's nothing more to write. I did that was a rather Jensen series. I hit book nine and I thought now I've made this character suffer enough. I can't do any more believably to her if I if I kept going. It was just for the sake of the money basically. So I ended it. The publisher were horrified by the my decision and were trying to get me to write more but it was just it felt right to end that line. So. I never actually decide beforehand how many it was gonna be. It's just I will know you know whether it's seven eight nine whatever books I will know when it's win at the end when I've got nothing else to write about it.

Mel: And I think this is the one thing that really stands out with me with the indie publishing trusting instinct running with your story doing what you know is best for your characters and editors and publishers always always can improve things and they always do and it's great to take their advice and and follow them I'm not saying don't do that. But when it comes to a career as a writer you're the one who knows what direction you want to go and how you want to control that career.

Mel: If you had the choice to go back to trade now and please let publishers with me. Would you let you do choose to keep control of your career.

Keri: If I went back to tread. It would only be on a part time basis. I'm loving the control too much to ever give it up fully. But the traditional publishers will not let me control anything if I went back to them. I'd have to be handing control that book back over to them because I'm not. I'm not a big enough name you know. Ah yeah. Hybrid is what I'd be if I had to go back.

Mel: Now there's an awful lot of writers making an awfully good income everyone to do well in trade publishing you've got to be a top name author to get the good advances and to stay on the shelves for a long long time.

Keri: I got let it be said that I got good advances sa you know I survived for 10 years on my advances.

Mel: You paid off your house with your writing.

Keri: I did. I paid off two houses with my writing.

Mel: Not only have you paid off two houses with your writing you have traveled extensively - lucky you have attended the Romantic Times conventions over the years. And you've also been to Ireland.

Keri: I love Ireland. I've got Irish ancestors. Yeah it's just it's just beautiful. I love it. I went this year I did a two week tour around Ireland and then I went on onto a cruise and cruised around Norway for two weeks. Yeah that was this year's trip. And I would have to say that the Irish are the best at storytelling and if you do and I'm guessing you have to be with. Which is werewolves and tells me we actually beat the Celtic tradition actually feeds right into that stuff. I Do a lot of research on legends and stuff like that. So I haven't used a lot of Irish legends but I had great fun researching.

Mel: And and this is again the beauty of the writing life. You are constantly stimulated if you're bored with your writing then you've only got one person to blame.

Keri: In my case if I get bored I kill someone in the store.

Mel: But it is it's wonderful you can even make things up as much as you want and in you in the genre that you write. I'm guessing the bloody of the mirror.

Keri: Yes there is it like and generally dark urban fantasy which means my stories get very dark and violent but there's also like the Lizzie Grey series isn't as dark as some of my stories. There's a lot more humour in it. The descriptions aren't quite as violent so yeah. But they're a bit lighter.

Keri: When I was with traditional I did an easy two year and I was quite happy doing my easy to a year. Yeah I've been working non-stop. Aside from the month I took off to go on the curtain and to Ireland I've been working my battles basically to find that stimulating do you find that you have risen to the challenge. Well I've got to you know I've got a daughter in the House and bills have to be paid.

Mel: I'm assuming life will continue to get easier as you establish yourself as I guess an indie careerist. Now you can write a book. Now we're talking 120000 words he returned 90000 words. You could write that and have it out in three months.

Keri: I can write it in three months. Yes. And then it's got to go through that all the editing and everything like that. Yes. So I think things don't change when it comes to the work part of it are different you have to trust yourself more now.

Mel: Or you just rely on independent editors.

Keri: I've always trusted myself. I've always written what I want to write and gone in the direction I want to. I've never actually. Had much input from the publishers that way. So that really hasn't changed. I'm still using the same better writer that I have that I did. I'm still with my same crit group so you...

#147 How to Cut Through The Noise & Win Google Love Using SEO, with Kate Toon

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 21 Feb 2019 06:51:53 -0500

“With small businesses, their greatest assets are all the other people in their network, and leveraging that can lead to big gains.”

Kate Toon is an award-winning SEO copywriter and SEO consultant with over two decades of experience in all things advertising, digital and writing.

She is the founder of The Clever Copywriting School and The Recipe for SEO Success eCourse, the co-host on the Hot Copy Podcast and the host of The Recipe for SEO Success podcast. She recently published her popular business book, The Confessions of a Misfit Entrepreneur – which also has its own podcast.

Google optimisation is something we have to do as part of our business marketing, along with keyword searches and increasing traffic to our websites. But, often, none of these things are at the top of our To Do lists – well, not on the top of mine, anyway, until now.

Because something has changed, and it’s called Voice Optimisation, and I’m all for it. As of now, words like who, what, when, why and how are driving searches. Yep, talking to our devices and asking questions is all the rage.

As writers, we need people like Kate to cut through the constant noise of what we should be doing to maximise our visibility and find readers for our tomes.

In this episode we chat about the following:

on page optimisation
SEO essentials
the importance of links
title tags
optimising images
the changes to SEO in 2019
position zero
algorithm updates
networking
Google Search Console
and more…

You can find out more about Kate here. And don’t forget to download your checklist and check out her SEO Nibbles Course, 10-Day SEO Challenge, and all the freebies she has on offer.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome, Kate.

Kate: Hello. It's lovely to be here.

Mel: Kate is an award-winning copywriter ACA consultant with over 20 years of experience in this stuff. She's the founder of Clever Copywriting School, A Recipe for Success and there's lots little freebies on her website.

Kate: One of the reasons I started my own podcast - I've got three shows - is that I get to talk to some of the smartest people in the world and learn amazing stuff direct from the horse's mouth and to be able to ask my questions, not read other people's questions and answers but ask my questions direct to the expert.

Mel: You have a book out called called 'Confessions of a Misfit Entrepreneur'. Now we know everyone entrepreneur is a real crazy word at the moment but you're the first misfit that I'm that I've met. So can you tell us all about it.

Kate: I totally agree with you entrepreneurs become a bit of a cliché really it's kind of you see pictures of people lying on a porch counting their money and talking about how they only work for five minutes a week. And I didn't know really what to call myself anymore because I started off as a copywriter. I built up quite a successful copywriting business and then I moved into selling courses and then resources memberships.

Kate: And now I have a conference every year that I run which is a content marketing and copywriting conference. So what do I call myself? I'm a business owner. I'm an entrepreneur. But I never really felt I fit the mold so hence misfit entrepreneur.

Kate: And the book is really a permission book because the subtitle is How to Succeed in Business Despite Yourself. I've bumbled and stumbled and wandered through having my own business I've made a lot of mistakes and I've worried about a lot of things and having a lot of fears but I've overcome them. And so I wrote it's kind of help other people go look I may not look like your traditional entrepreneur and I may not do the things that a traditional entrepreneur does that doesn't make me any less of an entrepreneur.

Mel: Most of the entrepreneurs that I read about and get emails in my inbox about a thousand times a day they've all done two hours of exercise they've meditated they've climbed Mount cozy Moscow and they're all back again and it's all before breakfast.

Kate: Oh yeah and they've had a green smoothie. Don't forget the green smoothie. So you know I work in a little heart in my back garden My mornings are not spent doing yoga and having Greens fuses just running around like an idiot trying to get my son to school picking up dog poo going to calls and getting to my desk not in some kind of Zen on Libyan state but more in a kind of frazzled say and then knowing that I really only have five or so hours to get everything I need to get done before I have to go and pick my son up school again and do all those other things you know most people have responsibilities whether it's kids partners pet parents whatever. And we don't get clear a our days to kind of indulge in a Zen and make money. We just don't get it. So I wanted to really be transparent and show that he can make a decent amount of money have a nice lifestyle. Even if you don't have that beautiful set up that these yoga smoothie beasts have so yeah.

Mel: You work extremely hard but there's plenty of time in between times to to have a life.

Kate: Yeah, there is. I think it is sometimes difficult to set those boundaries because having your own business. It will eat anytime you give it. There is no amount of time that will ever satiate your business is always more you could be doing. You know this other social media channels there's opportunities as you know you should be writing a book. You should be doing this. So it's the should can can really get to you. And I'll be honest. You know I had a couple of years in the wilderness where I was working very hard. I wasn't looking after myself. I was very stressed. I really had to kind of grab myself by the shoulders and say this is not the point you didn't start your own business to become its slave. And I'm now dragging myself out of that kind of mire and really trying to work to live not live to work. That's it's a cliché but it's very easy to fall into that trap.

Mel: What's going to happen in 2019 in SEO-land because things change constantly don't they?

Kate: They do but I guess to a degree the more they change the more they stay the same and I think unfortunately SEO does have a bit of a bad name. The things that frightened people about SEO is that changes all the time be it super technical and say I just don't want to do it. I think that's pretty much it. And so really all the Google and the search engines and try to do with the changes are replicate the human experience. So pretty much anything as a human that you find confusing or you don't like when you go to a website. Google's trying to eradicate that like Google doesn't like pop ups and Google doesn't like sites on secure and Google doesn't like sites that take 25 minutes to load on your mobile phone. Common sense, yeah. So the changes that are happening are pretty much common sense and they'll be known that you go. That's weird. Why is Google doing that. Because they're doing it to make us happier as customers and in terms of the technical stuff. Yes of course you have to have a well built website. But most of the platforms out there like WordPress Shopify square space Wicks we believe Neto big commerce. They are eradicating those technical problems for us. It's in their best interest to fix the bugs that Google wants them to fix. So really that's less and less tech stuff that your average small business owner needs to know about or do because the platform does it already. So then you kind of move into what Cyrus is talking about which is the big things next year. Do what I tell you what they are.

Mel: Yes, please. It's really good to know what we should be aiming for, isn't it?

Kate: It really is. And I think one of the biggest things that probably come as no surprise is the rise of a voice search and conversational search for these there's fewer and fewer people are typing into a desktop computer to find results instead they're talking to their Google Home the Google assistant Siri whatever device I have you can search your fridge they're not sure it's going to answer you back but it's you know someone to talk to on those dark lonely nights and instead of sort of saying you know pizza restaurant where Sydney money What. Hey Google where's the best restaurant in Sydney we asked questions we talk to it so Google can understand those questions now and it can look at the content on your site go. Does this content solve that customer's problem? Does it answer that question? Have they used the same kind of words that the person ask you no formal copy with long sentences and big words.?

Kate: Most people don't talk like that, you know. So that kind of informality of language on your website and the real helpfulness of really giving away your knowledge and share in concert with people. That's what Google wants that's what humans want that what Google wants. So I think voice search is going to compel us as writers to write like humans and really really write for our audience not try to write for audience and not try to sell our stuff in a way our audience might like it but to just help our audience build trust build authority and then they buy. So it's not a hard sell. It's having a conversation like we are now.

Mel: Yeah. And this is and this is what the cool thing is everyone and I've got to admit that I went shopping in summer and we bought a fridge we bought a fridge that was six hundred dollars and doesn't do anything but open and shut.

Mel: But my girls had a lovely time playing with the fridges that had computers in them and they do they just have like four and five thousand dollars everyone so I'm assuming they'll come down but just crazy stuff. But my daughters are also the ones that have laughed at me because when I look for something on a bigger search I actually type what I'm thinking you know where do I find such and such and they say Oh Mummy you're such an old lady.

Kate: You can tell them that they are wrong and mom is right that they are wrong because these days the who what when why how questions are driving Google search and you will notice there's the search engine results have changed. So if you type in you know how old is Obama or where is the iPhone tower you'll get something new now which is called featured answers or featured snippets that didn't used to be there and what it is is Google's best guess. They've searched the whole internet and they put that what they think is the best answer and what we call Position ZERO. It's above the ads even so if you can get your content in position zero you're going to get all the eyeballs and all the traffic to your site which obviously then you can convert.

Kate: And you know you may type that into google. I talked to Google and I know that's what I just said when why what how things. That is what it's all about. So you can turn round your daughters and tell them that they're old school and you are hip.

Mel: I love it.

Kate: I did I 37 speaking events last year and as I said I also have three podcasts one of which is kind of in a fallow period at the moment. I just think people connect so well with voice. I think people connect with video and voice in different ways. So I do a lot of video as well. I think that's very powerful for building a face to face connection with recordings this video on Zoom I can see Linda and we can you can you get those body cues that you just don't get but that our whole experience of listening to a podcast I think it's not like anything else. And I think that often people listen to podcast when they're doing their happy thing they're in a happy place they're walking their dog they're cooking you know. And so you start to associate that podcast with something that you love and it becomes very precious to you. I have a couple of favorite podcasts and I love the presenters in a way that's probably not quite right you know because I've listened to hundreds of hours of them and I'd do anything for them. And in my world which my podcast a little bit businesses which is a shame I'd love to have a non-business one and I hope to one day people by the time they come to buy my first thing they've listened to 50 hours of me and either they're going to like me or not like me but after 50 hours they're probably gonna like me and therefore I don't need to hard sell I've never done a paid ad on Google or Facebook in my life because I don't need to. Podcasts bring me people and video and interaction. So, yes, so so so powerful.

Mel: Something on my list of notes to talk to you about was that difference between video.

Kate: I do think there's a peculiar type of thing that works well on podcasts. I think it's a great medium for storytelling for interviews. But clearly like if I want to instruct someone on how to fix something on their Web site I need those visual cues I need to give to them to be able to see me clicking here and clicking there even just now. I just watched a quick six minute video on how to color correct something in the video. There's no amount of audio that could help me that I needed to see what button she was clicking. So I think it's about what do you what problem you're trying to solve what is the best medium for that sometimes it's podcast sometimes it's video sometimes it's the written word like you know I've written a couple of blog posts I've done really really well because I'm not sure that I've done well as podcasts because sometimes reading something funny just gets you sometimes a simple meme can really communicate more so I think it's I don't think one will take over they say that most people watch something like 40 videos a day even if they don't mean to. Most people watch videos with the sound down as well interestingly. So it's all about having the subtitles. And I just think it's different mediums. I don't think I would ever sit and watch a 40 minute video but I will listen to a 40 minute podcast so short and sweet instructional how to video storytelling longer form content than I think podcast is the go.

Mel: You talk about tags or captions on on your videos. We have to get the basics right. You called it On Site.

Kate: On-site or on-page basically means that you know when someone comes to your website there are certain things you have to do. The most important one is that it loads quickly. So your website - you want to make sure it loads in five seconds or less. Ideally three seconds or less.

Kate: And Google has a tool called google site speed where you can pop your website and you can find out if it does or not. Fixing the problem not quite so easy. Usually most sites it's because they've got giant image files on them and you reduce the size physically in the case size of an image and you're going to sort a lot of problems out. And so speed is a big factor. Being able to crawl your site being able to go to all the pages no blocks and weird things going on. And again Google has tools that will help you with that if you haven't already signed up something called Google Search console. It's fit to get your head around but it's Google's free tool that tells you everything that's wrong with your Web site. And then you may need to get someone to help you fix it but at least you are empowered and your understanding a bit of knowledge goes a long way and then it's other things like we all know some sites are ugly and they take they they've got big flashing images and things popping up left right and center or they've got gray coffee or white background that I can't quite see because my eyes on what they were or or no images or too many images or the copy just bleeds all the way across the page. This is one for us writers why are books this wide. It's because I can't connect to the next line if they're that wide but on Web sites people have copy that runs right the way my screen is this big I'm doing big hands. People like when people how to catch a big fish your copy goes all the way across. I can't bring my eyes to the next lines of readability is a really big factor as well. And not just in terms of visual readability but the language you are using. They say that the literacy rate online is about yes 7. So if you're writing concept that can only be read by an 18 year old or a postgrad you're losing your audience and there's a great little tool called Hemingway dot app which is a free tool that you can pass all your copy through. It will give you a flash Kincaid readability score and it will highlight everything you need to fix all those long sentences and adverbs and fantastic. I use it pretty much every day is free. So.

Kate: As an English teacher my heart just got broken. But unfortunately what you're saying is absolutely true. The average reading age is different because people don't read anymore.

Kate: Our kids don't read much as they preps should as far as I'm concerned. But the reality is they'll run rings around us when it comes to finding something online which. Yeah. And they. I guess they're streets ahead of us so we can't bag them too much for not wanting to to read along. But the going to grow up and be our consumers or their content. So we have to really think about it. And as as writers we're interested in getting our books out there. We're interested in bringing people to us and creating our communities. And I think it was Sara Shepard that said you know what it is our biggest asset is the community that we network with. And that's also true with with writers and we share the words and our readers. And it grows and grows.

Mel: I think there's a checklist on your website and if you subscribe to her newsletter you get this checklist for free and all the tools that we're talking about. There are links to it so we can just link off and come back and check all this stuff out which is really exciting. But one of the things that you mention is having 150 words - at least a paragraph of writing - on every page. Now we're told that people are visual now and all the rest of it and not to have too much words and not enough words and all the rest of it. And then you came up with this lovely amount of goods 150 words and I went oh OK I can do that.

Kate: Yeah well I think look it's it's very subjective. And Google because I'm very lucky that I get to speak to the reps from Google a lot. They come on the podcast I get it from Google and their approaches like the content needs to be as long as the content needs to be. If you're doing a recipe for how to boil an egg can pretty much explain it in three bullet points. If you're reviewing war and peace you might need a few more words. And I think that's the best attitude to take. My attitude is always you don't want it to be like two little brothers scraped over too much bread. You know if you're writing and you feel like you've run out of...

#146 Boundless: From Indie Brand to Indie Movement, with Michael Evans

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 12 Feb 2019 20:35:09 -0500

This week’s podcast showcases up and coming Indie author, Michael Evans, and coincides with the launch of the Indie Issue of Author Success Stories Magazine. Find out more here.

Michael Evans is a young adult author and futurist. He’s an up and coming Indie author, following in the footsteps of the likes of Adam Croft, with a business savvy to match.

Evans has published three novels and four novellas, under his brand, Boundless Press, and at the age of 16 he’s learnt a lot from his journey.

He is a keynote speaker at the upcoming Young Eager Writers Conference and will be running a Masterclass on Finding Your Voice.

He shows us how to build an author career from the ground up.

In this episode, we discuss the following:

building an author brand
mistakes to avoid when publishing your novel
time management
how to use social media the right way
structuring your life around your passion
tips for new writers starting out (and for the rest of us)
the importance of chasing your dreams
how to overcome financial mistakes;
the writing process
being an Indie artist
how to run a cost-efficient business
building an author career from the ground up
finding your writing voice

You can find out more about Michael and his books here. I also recommend you follow him on Instagram, Twitter and Youtube.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome to Episode 146 of writer on the road. And what a special episode it is. I'm so very excited to bring you an up and coming Indie author, Michael Evans. Our chat today coincides with the launch of Author Success Stories Magazine and it's our special Indie issue. I'm really privileged to chat with a young man who is only just starting out on his indie author career. He shows us how to do it properly. Already at the age of 16 he's learnt a lot from his journey and he shares those mistakes with us. But more importantly he shows us how to build an author career from the ground up. But what also excites me is his his branding and its boundless. He talks about how we can all grow together and our energies are boundless. And after chatting with him this morning I've got to tell you that I'm really keen to get back into my own writing. I hope he has the same impact on you. So for all our Indi and hybrid authors out there go grab yourself a pen and paper. Michael's got some great advice for all of us including how to work social media to all our advantages. It's really great stuff. He's got some great tidbits for us and he's an amazing speaker. And if you haven't already, pop over to Writer on the Road and subscribe to our Author Success Stories Magazine. This month is a special Indie addition and it's got some more great advice for those of us who are trying to do it alone but discover that we need a whole world of help to go along with this.

Mel: Michael a young adult author and futurist. This young man has blown me away. I've been talking about him about the professionalism with which he is approaching his career. He's building an author brand from the ground up and doing an amazing job of it. I've been following him around social media following his marketing efforts. And for someone so young I'm sure we're going to hear a lot more about him. I liken him to a young Adam Croft which is pretty amazing stuff. Michael first of all I'd like you to start and tell us a little bit about the books that you write.

Michael: As of right now I have three books and four novellas out in the Control Freak series and the Control Freak series is a young adult post apocalyptic thriller series that follows Natalie and her two best friends on their journey to get their life and family back that was stolen from the government after the Great Crash. Trillions of dollars were lost. And then after protocols years years enacted a secret government program. Thousands of lives are ended and millions of people are taken away for their families. The book opens up the control freak series with this dystopic world with this despotic leader rising to power after the Great Crash and takes that power and uses it to an active secret program. And this is after Natalee's father the main character disappears who is a scientist. Do you want this kind of a little mystery behind the story and Natalie who's the main protagonist has to follow. She has to pretty much first of all survive and escape. The government is trying to kill her and in the end she needs to try and follow her dad's path to try and get answers to where her family is. And this eventually ends up into her. Being involved in the whole conflict of the country and then it gets into the second or third book and well I guess I left out the whole climax of the first book I won't spoil anything but the whole series I wrote to kind of highlight my view on the negative impacts of what technologies specifically Nanobots could be in the future. Nanobots are pretty much like little robots that can go in the brain or self replicate outside the body and can be used for lots of amazing things. But I thought it'd be cool to write about what happens if they're used for bad. So. Yeah that's that's pretty much overview. What I've written so far which is the Control Freak Series.

Mel: Now I'm sitting here one I knew straight away that I was going to be out of my depth in this one. Michael is a futurist and a science nerd.

Mel: I guess I think you called yourself a geek or a nerd and you're one of the things that you wrote in your query letter to me. You wrote that you want to send a message in your novels didn't you?

Michael: Yes. There's always a main message in all my novels. Hopefully we don't end up in the same world as the control freaks. But in my books I try and highlight the darker aspects of the future and totally promote and encourage people in today's world to bring up conversations about some negative aspects or future and hopefully move towards a brighter one a good one. So that's kind of the main drive of my novels but I also like to highlight different themes covering mental health. There's always something that I'm trying to get across to help people and I mean with any book I think. You want entertain people but also give them the ability and tools and a world to escape to that hopefully can show them how to love themselves more and love life more and be happier. So that's really the core of everything I write and also always having a future minded way about things and trying to hopefully make an impact. And have my stories be part of a larger narrative trying to drive the world to a better place.

Mel: You're still in high school and you're going to take a gap year year and write full time. You've already achieved a lot without writing full time. You do that around the edges of your life. You're going to be a keynote speaker at the Young Eager Writers Conference and you're directing a Writers Masterclass about finding your voice.

Michael: Yes. The one big thing that I'll be focusing on at the conference is what I consider the foundation of my own writing which is voice and voice, it's kind of like that's a vague term. So what I consider my voice is the personality that comes through my writing that when I describe an event. Makes it unique to me because there's not really. There's some really great ideas that come up in literature and new trends that are started but all in all most ideas aren't like crazy unique. They're just kind of like you can compare them to other novels. Like I compare my novels to the darkest minds or divergent and that's a good thing you don't know. It's hard to be groundbreaking new always but you want to be groundbreaking and you and your storytelling and we all have a different voice and way about it. So I try to have one. With finding my voice. And trying to have a strong foundation of who I am what my values are what my personality is. And being comfortable with it so I can communicate that through a story. I guess all storytellers are reflecting their novels so even if I'm writing a different character in it I do have to recognize that that's my portrayal of it, like Natalie's struggles with anxiety or Ethan's kind of a more snarky character. That's my version of what a snarky character is. And it's being able to recognize that and be able to be authentic. And that's the basis of finding your voice and why I chose it because I think voice is what makes a great novel. I am always trying to refine my own voice my own work.

Mel: At the same conference you are talking about being boundless and I think this is going to be the crux of what you become known for. Tell us a little bit more about boundlessness.

Michael: I publish my books under Boundless Press, my own imprint, but boundless in itself is the core mindset of what I try to live my life by and what I hope to promote and get out there and hopefully have other people live their lives by. I want to become the core of my brand as I move forward into my gap year and certainly being even more conscious on Instagram and with the newsletter list.

Michael: What boundless is to me is the idea that in life our goals, our desires, our dreams our happiness, our love of any experience. We should try to pursue boundlessly. So that means that when you tell yourself in your mind like this is for any any of this is definitely something like I can't do it, I can't write that next book, or I can't sell that next thousand copies. When you tell yourself that, when you set a limit for yourself, you're already telling yourself you can't do it. And that's not the mindset you want to have. I always tell myself that I can do anything I put my mind to and the biggest thing about being boundless is recognizing that I can't do that alone. I can't I can't sell a thousand copies just by myself. I can certainly write a book by myself but I can't write a good book by myself. I need a team of beta readers readers and editor. I need a team of people around me which is why boundless. The core of it is together we are boundless. That's kind of like the motto I live my life by. And. It means that we accept people from all different backgrounds, diversity, religions, ages. The more people working towards the common goal everyone must be happy everyone wants to feel loved and have a great life. And we can all do that together. And that's kind of what being boundless is, hoping that the future of our world the future of our lives the future of everything is limitless, boundless. But only together and I hope like at least in my country that I live in America's right now extremely extremely divided politically and that's definitely not unique across the world. Although debate is healthy it's more important to remember that really the common goal is our future and the common things we want in this moment are very very similar. And that's more important to stand together and that as writers as any authors but also as just citizens of this world. And that's what I try to promote. So it's a hopefully a very positive, refreshing mindset that I try to live my life by. I hope I can impact others positively too.

Mel: It dovetails very nicely into building your career from the ground up. You talk about becoming more consistent with your newsletters and your YouTube and you getting your message out there. We all dream of that. We all want to do that. I'm now 57 and fifty podcast episodes and I'm still saying I'm gonna do that one day. Yet somehow you convinced me that you will actually do that.

Michael: So that whole setting up your brand and getting it right from the beginning that's taken a lot of thought. Pretty much every thing I planned out from the beginning. The core philosophy of it, the whole author brand. I hope to expand. Books are my main thing but with Boundless it could become merchandise to some other indie authors, clothing lines, helping others release their books. I hope Boundless can kind of become something like that and more of a movement that is personified or exemplified in my literature and my stories.

Mel: You live by the quote "normal is boring" which I love and you call yourself a creative indie as opposed to an indie publisher. You already have that big picture stuff in place. How are you doing all that while you're still at school?

Michael: I definitely work hard and I could probably get a little bit more sleep but that's OK. I do get enough sleep but the big thing for me is prioritizing my time and trying to spend time with things I love. I think a lot of people can waste time and I'm not saying I'm always perfect about that but I try and limit my wasted time and be as productive as possible. After school I come home and I'll get my homework done but before that I try to get about an hour at an hour and a half each day of writing time that I'll do every day and then I'll get homework done and then I'll do marketing and research. I like reading. Sometimes I'll be reading a book or sometimes I'll get caught up reading about different ways to market books -what's going on in the indie world and the traditional world - and I try to just structure that in every night. There is a habit I think for people who go like 'Oh that sounds like not fun to be doing that every day.' That's where I would say to them that probably being an Indie Author or a novelist is something that probably isn't for you. Because for me I wake up passionate about doing that every day. And really excited for it and I think that for everyone I wish everyone finds their passion and for me that happens to be storytelling. Getting a message out there and hopefully making people happy that way. But for anyone there's so many awesome things to do that with whatever your passion is. In this community it's definitely writing. I encourage anyone to just be strict about that and set goals that you hold yourself accountable to. Whether that be a word count goal I usually do that or a goal in terms of like I'm going to market this much, get reviews by X date and hold yourself accountable to what works for your schedule. I quit sports in high school. I do less of some things but some clubs I'm not as involved in because writing is more important to me. You have to do what you feel is right and what makes you happy. I try and balance that out and that's just a day to day process, and for me it works well.

Mel: You've already worked at a process for you by eliminating the stuff that doesn't interest you.

Michael: My writing time is from when I get off of school, anywhere between three and three thirty and I'll write from three to three thirty until five in my library at school or some days I'll come home and write. It kind of just depends on the weather and traffic and how I'm feeling. But that's my time right when the school day ends is when I write. That's just an everyday thing. Some people have problems with that but I don't look at my phone or social media. In fact with social media I feel like that's the number one distractor for people. I only use it for business so I don't have any personal profiles so there's not like I'm checking in with friends or family members on their network. My social media is purely books and author related. And that's healthy for me because I feel like social media and a lot of aspects can be definitely not good for people and can kind of distract away from their writing time every day. And my marketing time. It varies with how much homework I have but usually is from 10 to 11 10 to 12 depending on the day. But sometimes I'm like trying to get a book out there and you know I'm trying to publish it. The date to get it out like a week from now I'll do it first before homework because I love writing and I'll get the homework done later. It really just depends. I prioritize per day what's most important to me.

Mel: I noticed on your Facebook page is heavily curated. There are some amazing images on there so you take that part of it very seriously and you're crafting your brand.

Yes, on Facebook I've gone away from using it. I use much more Instagram, and YouTube is going to be my main focus. With my target audience it's Instagram. I'm already using really a lot. I found out when I first got into social media I had to do Twitter Facebook and Instagram and I found out like I was unable to do them and build a following on them. There was a lot of work in that for me. Concentrating on Instagram is what's going to be best. Just because young adults typically are on Instagram. So for me that's from my target audience. But across all social media platforms I take pictures with books and sunsets or that I'm big with nature because I feel like getting outside I think that readers don't do enough and that non readers don't do enough and just enjoying nature and I think like when you put a book or someone reading in a beautiful backdrop it's hard not to go Wow, that's cool. I kind of want to do that and it's a nice way to relax and that's how I hope to get some non readers in the social media community. We tend to be writers and writers readers kind of close knit and we tend to be more introverted. And I think it's important to get outside and that's reading. You can maybe meet other people who are reading it as other people get out into the world and just getting Vitamin D from the sun it's great. So that's what I try and kind of get that all out there. A lot of people will read it and escape from life and that's a good thing. I think reading would probably be best escape besides for me writing is the best escape but. I feel that if you're outside to make it even better because of you having a rough day and you're just sits in your room at home or on the couch reading a book you kind of feel like like. There's some days that's really relaxing if it's snowy outside. But for me I find that when it's nice outside to look at a good sunset there's nothing better than that. And that's kind of personifies who I am and that's why my social media is around those kinds of posts. And I think for other people it's kind of just like what is kind of unique about you. How can you highlight that because most authors just post pictures of their books. It's like what element can you add that unique about you that can add valuable content to the community because beyond a writer we really are. More just trying to impact people positively. And that's what we want to do first hand and if we can do that with a simple caption on social media post and make someone's day. Or at least make it better. I think that's really awesome and really important and almost more important than selling books is to sell yourself first. I think that's what people miss is that people want to be connected to the writer and a storyteller that you can get someone to like you and then read all your books. It's better than getting someone to read your first book and then try to go oh I have this other series. Because there's so many interesting stories but there's not many interesting there's not many people who make themselves seem like interesting storytellers when we really all are awesome. But it's hard to kind of do that and we're all trying to get boxed into what society tells us and what the norms are of social media and that's why I say normal boring...

#145 How to Create Characters That Resonate With Your Readers, with Angela Ackerman

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 05 Feb 2019 19:31:54 -0500

Angela Ackerman is a writing coach, international speaker and co-author of six best-selling books with the latest one the updated Emotion Thesaurus: a Writer’s Guide to Character Expression.

Angela is an international speaker and bestselling author who loves to travel, teach, empower writers, and pay-it-forward. She also enjoys dreaming up new tools and resources for One Stop For Writers, a library built to help writers elevate their storytelling.

She’s also one half of the team over at Writers Helping Writers, alongside Becca Puglisi. You can find out more here.

In this episode we chat about the following:

getting inside our characters’ heads
creating strong experiences for our readers
the relationship between setting and character
the mistakes new writers make
internal and external balance
show and tell
how to include backstory
sensor detail – making details earn their keep
emotional wounds
authenticity and the human experience
emotional layers
and much more

In fact, our podcast this week is more of a free writing workshop delivered by one of the best in the writing business. Thanks, Angela.

You can find out more about Angela and The Emotion Thesaurus here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome to another episode of road around the road. It's not very often that we get to travel to Canada in the middle of winter so I'm pretty excited about that as we sweat through an Australian summer. I'd like to welcome Angela Akerman. Good morning Angela.

Angela: Good morning and thank you.

Mel: Angela a writing coach, international speaker and co-author of six best-selling books with the latest one the updated Emotion Thesaurus: a Writer's Guide to Character Expression.

Angela: That was our very first book that we wrote, The Emotion Thesaurus, and it's kind of spread like wildfire. I think because it really tackled a topic that a lot of writers struggle with and there's not a lot written about there's not a lot of help in the emotion space. And I think the way we approached our book making it a really practical brainstorming tool that you can use as your writing or as you're revising it just really appealed to a lot of writers but being our very first book you know we were kind of feeling our way around it was we published it in 2012 when self publishing was really getting going and we were kind of nervous. You know will people like this or not. And so we've always wanted to go back over the years and kind of update it simply because we've learned so much in that space in that time we've grown as writers and as writing coaches and there's so many more aspects of writing that writing an emotion that we wanted to cover and there's so many other motions that we could cover in the emotional thesaurus so seeing that all of our books are a lot bigger. We've kind of gotten more verbose as we go along. We have as many motions as we can or as many settings as we can or whatever our topic is. So we have room to develop this book and so we finally decided that we were going to do it and we were going to go back and add fifty five new emotions to it.

Mel: There were about 75 emotions to start with weren't they?

Angela: Yes. Seventy five to start with and now this one has one hundred and thirty.

Mel: It's an online resource as well as a beautiful physical book it's coming out?

Angela: I think emotion can be kind of a taboo topic if you've got male characters you know in the sense that. Some people some males are not comfortable thinking about the deeper emotions that we have as people. But the reality is is we all have these emotions whether or not we show them or not and what we're trying to do through our fiction is connect to readers connect with them in a very realistic way which means you know. Pulling on some of those deeper things that are within us even if we don't tend to show them if we are masculine or masculine in nature. I know a lot of women that you know kind of hold back and they don't emotions don't always feel safe to express. So it's not always a sex issue or not but it's really important for us to make sure that we're writing characters who come across as authentic even if you don't necessarily show a lot of cues of what something looks like you're still going to feel it inside you're still going to have thoughts that are going to run on an emotional vein depending on what your what what you're experiencing at any given time. So we need our characters to behave the same way we need that authenticity to come through. So emotion is definitely an important topic no matter what type of book you write and you know not every book really goes in deep to the emotional experience but we start to touch on it because it's such a big issue in real life. You know that's why we're here. That's why we connect so deeply to everything around us is emotion. So if we don't you know have that mirror of real life in our fiction then it's really going to read as hollow.

Mel: What are some of the biggest mistakes that you see that new writers make?

Angela: All of our books are about show don't tell and it's not so much show don't tell as knowing when to show and when to tell. Both are used in fiction but I would say that a lot of newer writers they tend to tell too much or they will show and then because they're not sure if they showed strongly enough they'll also tell as well. And so in emotion with emotions are really easy way to do that is when you name the emotion you know shivered in fear. Your description of the moment the mood that you're building in you're seeing the character's behaviors their thoughts all of those things should indicate fear and that should come through to the readers you should never actually have to say in fear because it's just should not be needed. And so that's something that I see quite frequently as is kind of that that tendency to tell. I would say another one that I see often is sometimes the characters can either get too much in their own head where there's a lot of thoughts that sort of slow everything down. A lot of back story that comes out early on or there's very little fox very little internal ization at all. And it's it's. Most of the showing especially emotion is shown through body language body cues which it'll show behavior is always a very important component to showing emotion but it's only one component you really need the internal and the external working together so that readers really understand what the character is going through and it kind of pulls them into their point of view better. So I would say yeah. Back story telling more than showing over relying on thoughts or underline on thoughts. Those are probably the biggest issues I see.

Mel: When it comes to the editing process I'm guessing this is where your book comes into its own because it makes us think more deeply about what our character motivations are.

Angela: I've heard from writers that use the emotion thesaurus more in editing when they're kind of drafting there in the moment they don't want to stop and think so they'll just sort of shove a cue and they're like you know that she smile or frowned or you know or even telling telling is OK in the first draft. You know if you're in the flow don't ruin the flow by trying to think of the perfect description you know go ahead and use that word fear or worried or whatever and just make a mental note to run a search for those things when you're done your draft so that you can come back to those places and think about how the character would express this emotion in a way that is true to them their backstory who they are their personality how they feel in the moment their comfort zone all those kind of things are going to come into play and that is going to dictate how they're going to behave in this moment by Yeah and the moment you don't necessarily when you're drafting you don't want to think too hard about emotion. But I have had other people do that. You know they get stumped they get blocked and they are unable to move on when they're drafting. And so when they need ideas just reading through the lists can really trigger something. You know we've purposely. Created a guide where every emotion that we tackle whether it's the body language that's tied to it or the thought process of the go along with it or the visceral sensations they're all somewhat generic on purpose because we want writers to adapt those to whatever they're whatever kind of character they have. And hopefully by reading through the list they'll spot something where they can imagine their character doing that exact thing and then they can put it on the page in a way that's really fresh. So that's kind of we see that too. But mostly I would say people use it as an editing tool.

Mel: It's one hundred and thirty different emotions that you just don't think of yourself do you? I can see why this would be a Bible..

Angela: As soon as you start attaching your characters names to those scenes your brain automatically starts to think about your character in those tunes don't they said.

Angela: Until we really think about emotion deeply we will stick to sort of the same classic emotions and we have to remember that part of our job is to be authentic to the character and part of our job is to create a really strong experience for the reader. And I think that those strong experiences really come through when we give them emotions that are a little bit off the beaten path or once that we don't know. Our brain doesn't immediately jump to there's a lot of gap in between different Cardinal emotions that we can explore that can be a lot of fun to see how the characters are going to respond in certain situations and they ring true. You know also the other thing that I find is that in real life we're often conflicted we feel a lot of different emotions at once or we'll feel emotions that are completely different opposite of each other and we can write about that on the page we can show how a character might be really excited that they bought a brand new car but then they're also worried you know am I gonna be able to make these payments and what if I park somewhere and somebody scratch my door and just all these thoughts that come in our heads. That's that's exactly the human experience and that's what we always want to communicate on the page. A range of emotions not just the same you know 10 emotions that we tend to. Sometimes we can get caught up in in describing so this kind of also prompts that range for us to really reach a little bit deeper and think about you know what kind of new emotions we can bring out that are that work naturally with the scene.

Angela: We're we're really all about the show don't tell. And we stretch out across every aspect of writing. Where we come from it as. Is that any description that you put in your story. It should work really hard to be there. It shouldn't just paint a picture for readers. It should characterize it should push the story forward it should set the mood. It should reveal emotion there should be something that it does. And so every topic that we tackle with description we try to do that. So we have. Two books on setting because it was such a massive topic we had to break it into two books and together they look at two hundred and fifty different fictional settings that you might find in your character's world. Anything in the natural environments around the home in urban environments and they look at all the things a character might see smell taste touch we're here and this encourages us to think a little bit more deeper with our sensory description as we tend to write what the character is seeing and we don't add enough of that sensory detail but it also looks at different things that can happen in those settings like the different type of conflict that could happen potentially in those settings and the different people who will be there in those settings that you can think about is this person going to block my character's process or how could this type of person you know create a situation where my character has to think on their feet and work through a problem. So it kind of inspires a lot of different ideas.

Angela: We have two books on personality one is the positive trait the source and the other is the negative trait the source and these look at the two halves of character personality. So they look at a lot of the different. Behaviors and actions and thoughts that a person would. Naturally feel and do based on different personality types. A character who is loyal is going to behave a lot differently than someone who's corrupt a character who is moody or. Controlling they're going to behave a certain way you can get a you can get an idea of how that behavior is going to look on the page and how they're going to interact with other people what the relationships are going to be like. So we really want to encourage people to think deeply about what traits they give their characters and not just assign something but think about why those traits appeared in their personality. You know who did the character in their past backstory. Who did they know who were their influencers in their life you know who taught them things encouraged them cause them to grow find out who they were but also who held them who tried to take their power what. Bad experiences were in their pasts created emotional wounds things like that. All of these things just like you and I.

Angela: We have a different personality based on our background how we were raised who we were raised around and the type of environment we were in characters of the same. And so if we can think on these deep levels about why our characters are the way they are and what appears in their personality we're going to build really well-rounded memorable characters that are just going to light up the page and then finally the last book that we have is the emotional word thesaurus. And that's the one that we wrote our last book before this one. And it was definitely the most difficult book Beck and I have ever written and it looks at. I think there's a hundred and sixteen different types of real world psychological trauma known as emotional wounds and these are events that have happened in a character's past that have changed them often in a very negative way something that is unresolved that in the scope of the story they're going to need to work through sort of dig up from deep where they've buried it. Look at it and learn how to move past it in a way that's more healthier than they've been doing up to now because this really ties into character arc.

Angela: Most stories are based on a change arc where a character starts the story one way and they end the story in a different place some something that are maybe at the start of the story you know there is something feels like it's missing from their life or they feel like they're being held back or they're unhappy and throughout the course the story is going to grow and they're gonna change and they're gonna evolve and become someone stronger who can meet the challenges ahead in the story to achieve whatever goal it is that they have and the things that they need to face are things within them things that are holding them back. Things that are keeping them from living their life in full. And those are often tied to emotional wounds these things that are within them that you know some something terrible happened and they never quite moved past it in a in a healthy way. So we really dig into what each emotional wound is the different types of behaviors that will typically present in someone who has that particular wound especially when it's unresolved. And look at different triggers that might trigger that you know as we all know like different experiences that we have. They remind us of our past sometimes in good ways sometimes in bad ways. So in storytelling we can think about what kind of triggers can we weave into the story that's going to help bring this emotion this emotional wound to the surface so that our character can process it and they can start going through it. So in some ways it sounds a little bit sadistic that we're actually causing them pain bringing up these bad memories that they have but it really is a necessary process if we want to see that internal growth and work through that internal conflict so that they become someone stronger and you know where to have hope and look to the future you know and see what's possible instead of what isn't possible. So yeah that's that's the emotional and thesaurus. So that was quite a roller coaster because like I said it's everything that we pull is deeply a lot of psychology in it and emotional wounds more so than anything. So it involved a lot of really going through real world pain. So. Hopefully writers will find it helpful and hopefully because we did some of that research then they will have to do a little less so.

Mel: This is a workshop in motion and we can all put our manuscripts I think through the test and make sure that we include some of these things.

Angela: Setting is actually one of the most powerful tools that we have in our writing tool kit and it's interesting because I think a lot of writers sort of overlook it. They think I do pretty good setting description you know I've got my sounds and my smells and they sort of that's as far as they go with it. But setting is it. There's this beautiful relationship between setting and character and when you put the two together you create emotion in real life. You know there's always places where we go all the time. We frequent them. We have our favorite coffee shops. We have our favorite places that we vacation. We have our favorite room in our house. And it's because all of these settings mean something to us. They make us feel good. And so we like to be in them and their settings that we avoid. There's places that we don't want to go there. They we associate them with danger or something bad happened there. And so we avoid those places. And in storytelling we can do the same thing to bring out some great conflict in the story. We can use setting in a way that you know it was going to the way we describe it is going to create a mood. It's going to make the character feel like Allen so it's gonna make them feel at ease. Whatever it is that we decide what to do. You can foreshadow with your setting and you can make your setting have a really strong emotional value. And that's where you specifically choose a setting in a scene that's going to have a deeper meaning to one of the characters. Usually the protagonist but sometimes other characters as well. And it's it's going to have a stronger meaning for them. Something good or something bad. It's up to you what you're kind of going for in the story.

Angela: I have an example of a character who. You know he's interviewing for a job and it all goes well over the phone and the CEO tells them you know like you seem like the exact person that we want instead of bringing you into the office. Why don't we meet for lunch and we'll just you know...

#144 Out of Africa: Telling the Story That Wants to Be Told, with TM Clark

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 21:04:41 -0500

Born in Zimbabwe, T.M. Clark completed her primary school years at boarding school in Bulawayo, but on weekends and holidays she explored their family ranch in Nyamandhlovu, normally on the back of her horse. Her teenage years were totally different to her idyllic childhood. After her father died, the family of five women moved to Kokstad, a rural town at the foot of the Drakensberg Mountains in South Africa, and the boarding school hostel became her home.

In the tradition of Tony Park and Wilbur Smith, Australian author, TM Clark, writes what she knows and tells the stories that need to be told.

The settings for her novels, The Nature of the Lion, Child of Africa, Tears of the Cheetah and Shooting Butterflies, are all sparked by her imagination but based on her childhood homeland.

In this episode, we chat about the following:

the nature of storytelling
research different cultures and wild places
getting the facts right; local words, customs, culture, politics
border wars & the bushmen of Africa
setting as character
the importance of plot to drive a story forward
procrastination, and how to overcome it
writers block
raw emotion

You can find out more about Clark and her books here.

#143 Do You Need An Agent? The Business of Being a Writer, with Haylee Nash

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 23 Jan 2019 22:51:05 -0500

Ever wondered whether you’re better to strike out on your own with your writing career, pitch directly to publishers or hire an agent? Haylee Nash, of The Nash Agency, outlines the pros and cons of each option, demystifying the publishing cycle in the process.

But be warned, after listening to Nash, you’ll be hard pressed to justify not running with an expert.

Think of an agent as an industry expert that has you as their primary focus in a publishing world that throws up more options every day. Besides, everyone needs a cheerleader and therapist, says Nash.

In this episode we cover the following, and so much more:

the benefits of editorial feedback
how to pitch to publishers
framing your work to sell
the importance of a good bio
the craft and business side of writing
marketing opportunities
what’s trending in 2019
managing your career

Most importantly, Nash has a Writers Retreat happening at Mt Tamborine in Southeast Queensland in February, with guest tutors, Rachael Johns and Josephine Moon.

You can find out more about Haylee and The Nash Agency here and the Writers Retreat here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Today, I have with me Haylee Nash. Welcome Hayley.

Now I heard all about hayday from the beautiful Amy Seton. So of course I had to track down and bring her on to the podcast. What I hadn't realized Hayley is that you used to work at Pan Macmillan and Harlequin. You represent some of our best Australian authors, Josephine Moon, Lily Malone, Annie Seaton and Lisa Ireland to name a few.

Haylee: Yes it is. I currently have 18 signed.

Mel: We have our very own agent here in front of us representing both indie authors and traditionally published authors with some depth of experience. How long have you been an agent?

Haylee: I'vee been an agent for two years. It's been an incredibly interesting journey but really fulfilling and very nice for my ego because it was terrifying.

Haylee: Starting out on my own particularly as I have a child and a husband and we know there's bills to pay. But it's been so rewarding absolutely rewarding.

Mel: I'm sitting here looking everyone at this amazingly healthy glowing woman who just got back from the gym. If there's any reason that you need an entrepreneurial life it's so that you can do what you want when you want and work until midnight every night.

Haylee: That's exactly right. It's like I can so I can surf if I wanted to in the morning and be up at 6 to play Barbies with my three year old daughter, the life of a working mother.

Mel: You talk about appraising manuscripts. You've got all these amazing authors on your books at the moment. Being represented by an agent has actually changed over the years hasn't it?

Haylee: Yes. I think there's a lot of people now who are represented who have been published. I don't have the exact percentages on me but because publishers have to be smarter than me I'm more connected than ever just because of the wide range of things that are selling and the way that trends and genres change. They're more connected to writers so agents.

Haylee: Some people find it on their own which is brilliant.

Haylee: I'm always careful to tell people what I do what their money or their percentage. And also to let them know if they really need me or not because a lot of authors have found a publisher. The Publishers direct to them because they have a huge amount of followers or whether they have a hugely successful blog or YouTube channel. And often if they're speaking. It's a very business savvy and they're speaking directly to their audience and that's what the show is. Sometimes they don't need an agent.

Haylee: However at the very very least it's useful to have one because you know the contracts and know where there's meeting room. What we get to be back off basically and we get to make sure that the author and publisher relationship is unscathed. When you get into those nitty gritty things when things are getting a bit uncomfortable it means the author can say it was my agent and meanwhile I have a lovely supportive relationship with the publisher.

Haylee: There's so much to know and so much to learn and it's very very difficult to keep on top of everything and even the fact that you said you can find a publisher or a publisher finding people on Instagram. I mean I guess I know what I know as was going through there at one stage as we search out on the Internet. But having an agent to help you navigate seemed like a pretty smart thing to do.

Haylee: At the same time it's it's such a multifaceted process. What stage are you at as a writer. If you have to show feedback so I'll do developmental and structural edits. Sometimes copy edits, what's necessary. It's pitched to publishers which is a huge part of what we do and finding a way to frame the book that is going to be palatable to a publisher which is often incredibly hard to do as a writer because you're so close to it.

Haylee: And I know a lot of authors who don't read in the area that they are writing because they're worried about plagiarism and so forth and so whereas we know the sales figures we know what's trending so we're able to make those comparisons. We have relationships with publishers and with both publishing houses and the publishers within those. So that we know what their particular tastes. So we know who to pitch to and we just get you know basically our emails read so much faster than a writer can through the slush pile.

Mel: I know slush piles have always been the bane of writers lives. I didn't even know that they used slush piles anymore but I believe that publishers have Fridays and all that kind of stuff. Not only can you get I I our writers what's in front of a publisher you actually get it in front of the right publisher.

Haylee: Yes exactly. And you know in an ideal situation you have you know maybe three publishers and a ring towards the end.

Haylee: And it's not just about what they're offering in terms in advance means world she's but you know publishing plans and how they their vision for the book. If they're going to have a marketing outline and publicity what tell you about so that it may actually be that you accept less than advance because you know that the right publisher is actually going to put more effort behind marketing. And sales and publicity and you're get the money anyway in your royalties.

Haylee: So it's about giving you that one get in front of publishers and then helping you choose the right one.

Mel: I'm guessing one of the reasons you're so popular is because my very first question is choosing the right agent and with your background and your experience in the publishing industry I should imagine that you have a few writers knocking at your door.

Haylee: I have a very large inbox of unread manuscripts I have my own slushed file which haunts me because I know how much amazing stuff is in there and it's just a time thing.

Haylee: A lot of our time is unpaid.

Haylee: Even once you sign on over there's so much work that you never get paid. If a deal doesn't come through. So coming out to lunch every night is hard. But yeah I've because I have been on the other side of things. I mentioned.

Haylee: My knowledge of where to market and opportunities that are available to us and what a content looks like what things publishers are going to give and what they're not and how the publishing cycle works.

Haylee: So you know if it isn't three months out from release and you've just finished your copy at us then I'm a bit concerned because I think that advanced through copies should be immediate. So general interest so they are the kinds of things somewhere else because I've been on the other side.

Mel: When you take on the editing process that's a huge field on its own. Do you charge separately for it?

Haylee: I have two separate sides of my business so I do pay the toll for my health as a sign of my sentence for structural and copy edits as well as many squidge appraisals and other science that the agency is not paid quite as much as the commission eventually from the deal.

Haylee: So while I don't I'm hesitant to take on work that require a lot of work from me just because it's very time consuming.

Haylee: If I think a person has a platform and a really great voice then I will do that work with them.

Mel: You have a great champion in Annie Seaton and I know after all the hard work that she put in all the years she's put in she really is an overnight success with the latest book.

Haylee: Yes. That's The thing. Overnight success is there's always there's all those years of planning and writing manuscripts and synopsises. And I know that that phrase whenever I read about musicians and about writers anyone in the arts really. It's such a chicken. Take the case. And then there's really great writers there's no way that overcomes excesses because they've found that across many years. And he is I mean I find her base of her success in hybrid publishing weeds with entangled and weeds and her own self publishing and I bought her when I was a of your own legal contract based on three chapters which is very very rare. Usually you will sign someone for fiction on a full manuscript and not committing to three books straight up as big as what. But she and you would a hardware store. She was a new had an audience. And I knew what was silly this time and she is just confirms absolute strength strength and saying in the background as an agent what she does and how when she gets the right support she can just fly.

Mel: Tell us how we should pitch to you.

Haylee: Okay so you're going to have the shit hot three just three chapters and have it be the first three. I mean I know some people say oh I want to give you the middle. But I'm much for the first three chapters and I need to be strong. No I'm not saying I love building or have you know an intense sex scene but I need to show that beginning of plot points. Strong character and so no hooks and little bit of foreshadowing in there that's going to cross the line. You need to have a good vibe that it's useful to have great information not just you know who you are Joe but it's a singular point of interest that may be used for a publicist further down the line to get your feature. So how does something in your life tie into what you're writing so and why your interest is what like how you handle the story how you know why you're inspired to write it.

Haylee: There's only so many times I remember reading hearing in pitch manuscript and then reading it and twice and forgotten too. And it was exhilarating it wasn't quite ready that was written about it to tell me the really strong family link. That's Chuck fighting with a well known strands figure. That is the hook and she got in pitch. And then she said it's men so that you know those kinds of times you need to be reminded of what this now while some people are hesitant to do because they've got their feet noting themselves. You know I had a manuscript recently that said it was a tie a cross between two bestselling authors and one one best selling author who was much fiction one who was military and you know even though it sounds so amazing. I read it a third way and she was on the money. So if you know you don't decide you are much fiction that go beyond my writing. But be aware of who your mother actually is and what's working because it as soon as you sell it to the agents the agents and scientists publish an apology selling it to the bookseller or to their sales saying that the bookseller and all of those books you have them right in front you make everyone's job easier.

Haylee: Particularly this year Australian crime has hit an all time high. Christian White, Chris Hamer and a few others so it's really cutting through and find for a long time as a dirty word polishing and just hacking form and now you're seeing those books selling overseas and having film rights sold. That's why you find waves with any trend is that one big wave will happen and then there's a bit of a clash effect will attract more people and they know it gets flooded sometimes it doesn't. With a modification for instance with 50 shades.

Haylee: You had a few big sales and then there was a whole lot of them for a while until you went away. Other times with things like domestic law while you're no longer saying the goal and train and book flights. That hitting the top 10 thinking now have established careers because of that John and you find it attracts more readers sometimes people who haven't heard before for read sparingly and they're reading more because if anything I don't think it's any big trend that comes up is really use. To the whole industry in that way.

Haylee: There's also an appetite for Australian women's fiction and particularly upmarket commercial where it's fiction which is basically incredibly like it's still got great complex characters but it's just that beautiful writing as well the kind of book club read overseed publishers are really hot that and that came out of Frankfurt is that you know people are still really hungry for that and wanted to that really well. So it's. I guess it's in a way that I think it sort of touches on those themes that domestic market and that personal everyday stuff that you go through that is actually incredibly interesting to write about and can be a huge flaw even though these things do happen over us and it's those the way we deal with them and our emotions around them and a complex scene that makes it a novel.

Mel: Yes we're expected to be author and businesswoman and promoted and all the rest of it. Having someone such as yourself with your depth of knowledge and seeing coming through here today is almost a gift kind.

Haylee: It takes having an agent where we can give you advice on how to do it. It just means that you can focus on writing and then if you publish the writing and the editing was. So taking away their concern about what else is out there who are usually writing to and basically you have a cheerleader who is constantly chanting for you to anyone who will listen. And you know we're therapists as well. Says you need a an editorial or you've had a failed relationship with the publisher working out with your agent a result of just how to how to find how to keep your career going.

Haylee: The trick is make sure you've got a good story to tell. And I think there are a lot of writers out there floundering around in this so writing courses run by people who can't write very well which is one of my little bugbears to be able to get together and talk about it.

#142 The Magic of Being a Writer, with Belinda Alexandra

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 27 Dec 2018 20:57:09 -0500

One of the joys of being a writer is sinking into the research abyss: events, characters, society, music, language and culture, reading books of the period, interior design, cookbooks, and the list goes on.

Belinda Alexandra writes historical and historical/contemporary fiction novels set in exotic locations with the latest being The Invitation, a gilded age Domestic Noir, full of passions, secrets, history and intrigue.

A born storyteller, Alexandra takes us through the Narnia wardrobe to a world of excess and opulence, where deceit, betrayal and moral corruption in New York at the turn of the twentieth century rule.

The trick, says Alexandra, is to show your research sparingly. Start with a visual depiction of your setting, and choose your details wisely.

Alexandra’s books have been published around the world including in the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Germany, Hungary, Turkey, Brazil, Poland and Norway, as well as Australia.

You can find out more about Alexandra and her books here.

#141 A Room Of Her Own, with Darry Fraser

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 12 Dec 2018 20:47:46 -0500

Darry Fraser is the bestselling author of Daughter of the Murray, Where the Murray River Runs, and The Widow of Ballarat. We first met Darry on the podcast, here, where we talked about the research and writing of The Daughter of the Murray, and here, last Christmas, as part of our Summer Reading Series.

This week we talk about the discipline of being a writer, about learning to be present while you’re writing and how finding your own style is critical to building a successful author career.

You can learn more about Darry and her books here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome to a very special Christmas episode of Writer on the Road. I have with me today one of my favorite writers who's been with me since the beginning. I'd like to welcome Darry Fraser.

Darry: Thanks for having me once again.

Mel: We first met with Darry's first novel, Daughter of the Murray. Then there's Where the Murray River Runs and now we're celebrating the Widow of Ballarat.

Darry: Thank you. It was a wonderful experience to be writing this particular book so I'm hoping that it will do.

Mel: Dhari has a reputation of one of being very shy and retiring but the fact is your book are doing not only really really well and are some of the best sellers here in Australia at the moment.

Darry: It's wonderful news. I actually don't have a sense of how they're doing out there. I'm very grateful that people are happy for me and reading my books and contacting me about them. And as long as I'm doing what I love to do and somebody else is loving to raise them I'm more than happy.

Mel: There's another lady we have on the podcast, the beautiful Tea Cooper. She's doing very well as well.

Darry: Yes, we have very very different styles of course and very different interests in our history in the sense that she seems to focus on a happiness at a time where we might have dual timelines. She a very easy style. It's quite interesting to look at another historical fiction set in this time.

Mel: I don't think I'm giving any secrets out here that you live on the beautiful Kangaroo Island but your books are set on the Murray River. You're in a great part of the world for Australian history aren't you.

Darry: That's correct. People have asked why I don't focus on my own area a little bit more. I'll leave that to other people. There are a lot of events to draw upon here but the things that interest me about that time are relationships between people and clearly the things that affected people are the same as now, relationships between people and how events affect them such as in the bigger pilot Ballarat and the director so have been them have been the sort of thing that drives my story so I guess that's not unlike other wars is that you tend to stick yourself in the moment.

Mel: Clare Wright wrote the women of the goldfields story and she's moved on to the suffragettes in Your Daughters of Freedom, But to have these stories come alive for the rest of us and give us very strong heroines are with real problems too are must be must.

Darry: I've been glad to be able to do what does but with fiction. I think we both have books out about that particular era, in Ballarat and women on the goldfields. I think we tend to let it all slip by us that women put up with all this stuff because they had to not because they wanted to. A lot of them didn't know any difference. And so it was just par for the course it has been the way it's been for centuries and centuries but suddenly in the 1950s especially at Ballarat Goldfields women realised they could do a lot more. And that was very interesting to me.

Mel: I just completed a talk at the town's storytelling tour here of Brisbane everyone where the beautiful Natalie Cowling role brings alive local history local Queensland history and she brought together 26 amazing women from our time these days. And when you listen to the talks we have scientists we have our first lawyer in Queensland we have the clergy or wives who are women strong women in their own right even though the governors and the men get all the name we all the glory I guess we have what we know as an is coming from late 19th century history everyone the Australian legend and they're all masculine.

Mel: So in a way with your research you'd come across some very strong women you are very strong women.

Darry: I think that the general assumption is that as you say the men did all the work but let's face facts there. There's no men doing all this wonderful stuff without the women behind them. So it's just assumed that we were there without our actually taking the spotlight if you like. They were amazing women on the gold fields and Chisum even in the gold fields. So. That male sorry excuse me I'm sorry about all this. I don't know how to turn the sound that. So Alan Chisholm actually visited the gold fields prior to the Eureka Stockade and wrote letters on behalf of both men and women after the stockade avenged. But she she did a lot of what I would call social work in the day and yet died a pauper in back in the UK virtually unknown for what she'd done out here and there were a lot of women in her situation because they didn't they didn't have men to push them to the floor after they'd done their work. So there was no platform for women to get up and do what they wanted to do. And I think there's a delightful saying. No shy retiring woman in history was ever taken any noticeable risk that effect so you don't see people like Marie Antoinette and other people sitting back and talking rubbish now saying I have to cut that bit.

Mel: Moving backwards to your first novel, writing a story and how long it takes and gaining that confidence to to put your work out there, that was a huge step for you, wasn't it? Putting that first manuscript out there when it was picked up. Daughter of the Murray was a journey for you, wasn't it?

Darry: It certainly was. I started and finished my first draft if you like of that book in 1982 and of course All the Rivers Run had just hit the telly and it took off and because my book was about a young woman taking to the river on a red paddle steamer working around business and whatever it was too close to the River's Run. So I put that aside for years and years and even if I kept writing in the closet if you like and then circumstances hit me and I thought I don't have much time anymore to do the thing I want to do. You know when you're in your 20s you have all the time ever when you've tracked down those little bit. So anyway I decided it's now or never. So I pulled this manuscript out. I've been fiddling over the years, refining it. I put my big girl pants on and decided to go take it to a publisher at a conference in 2015 and in 2016 it was published on that same first draft. I was very lucky.

Mel: And now you're launching very successfully your third strongly received novel, you're being recognised a lot more.

Darry: Yes, that seems to be the case. I know I'm well known here on the island because there's a lot of people who are well-known here on the island and that's just I'd advise people not even straight up in the ship making some support. So there's nothing unusual for me here when I go abroad. When I go onto the mainland you know I'm still in that regard totally unassuming so I'm quite delighted when somebody says oh I don't know if I from somewhere or other and I've got to go by boat so you sort of I mean I just think that is totally absolutely delighted. But I never I have never and I hope my dream never ever presume that I will be well received wherever I go or that my books will be well received and that that actually keeps me on my toes well and truly on my toes.

Mel: You've got the third book published. It's we're doing a soft launch at the moment when you see official launch official launch.

Darry: Wednesday the 28th of November in Adelaide at gimmicks Rundle Mall and at six o'clock and that's going to be very very lovely.

Mel: And as we know in the field of traditional publishing everyone your next book is now is with Harper Collins, is it?

Darry: I made my deadline by a couple of days and that's with the publishers at the moment and that if that's accepted which things first it will be it will be published next year. So that one will be what we think might be the last of the Murray books.

Mel: It's interesting as because traditional publishing takes so much longer than indie publishing but your reputation grows with every book that you put out you have got a good Christmas look out at the moment as part of an anthology.

Darry: Yes that's right. I was asked throughout the year whether or not I could write 30000 words on. A. Historical. Story for for Christmas show. I of course had to research center and I was so very quietly I'm a little bit of a Grinch around Christmas time but I do love the whole Shanter. Thing. Especially Australian Phantom. So I wanted to try and find something that would first of all my imagination. And when I found the two things I needed that a thousand words went quicker and I think I've ever written anything. And I so enjoyed that story. I'm a little bit in love with it myself and it almost feels like shit and his team that people in the story just sat alongside me at the campfire and took me away. So when you hear writers talk about the news and whatever sometimes it is just absolute magic that it comes to the right and centre centre. Was it as well known as we presume he might have been. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer wasn't even around then he came about in the 1920s which I'm very glad I didn't. I'm very glad I did do my research fellow said himself in the 1896 doing his research in that area.

Mel: So had lots of fun and fun. You get you get a CTV run of the deep love of history. Derry has and I'm sure we talked about that in some great detail in the last podcast so I won't reference that so we don't cover the same material. Now the book we're talking about is called Our Country Christmas and it's got some of our beautiful Walters's Scott Derry Fiona Jacqui and down here we've had on the podcast page you which she been meaning to catch up for some time and I've got and it's our country Christmas Day three stories called The driver comes home to Christmas and it's got this beautiful painting is beautiful outback scene isn't it.

Darry: Down among the gum trees I'm guessing with the campfire that painting is what triggered it isn't it. If there's a graphic artist in the 1960s here by the name of Jack War and I'm sure many many Australian people will remember the lovely Santa and the drover painting that was featured in the woman's slightly at the time and also on the back of the arm spicket teams and I don't remember as a kid sharing a painting and delighting in the absolute magic that leapt out.

Darry: If you ever get a look at it you can see in the background there the driver who horse looking at the reindeer and then there's a little black Kelpie's shaped.

Darry: It was just such an inspirational painting. So I decided that I would try to see whether or not Jack was family were still around. I found them. I contacted them and whilst I was too late to prepare acknowledgement in the book for them they are acknowledged on my website as being the family of objec or and and I'm quite sure his paintings have delighted other people of my vintage if you like. For a number of years but can't. Remember who they sent in my story didn't have his red suit on. He was very much fun to have in the story.

Darry: I'm very aware of copyright. I'll left to put that photo up on the podcast image or review. I have it out there in the public and the family are more than happy to have their place work out there.

Mel: And I think that's when the rewards of writing historical fiction and writing about early Australia which thank heavens everybody has come so much back into fashion with you guys doing these beautiful historical novels

Mel: You mentioned that you are writing more and more and you've got the little 30000 novella happening or it happened. Are you going to be doing more of those sort of side projects as well as your big novelty.

Darry: I'm hoping to. I think I've understood my own process. I hope that the publishers will ask me to do more. And in the mix with the the book HarperCollins book they will see thirty thousand words. I've also finished another historical that is being privately commissioned and then for the return of Ballarat I was asked to do a prequel and so that was 4000 words and then I was asked to another. 4000 word prequel so they keep me busy. I hope that's going to be the case this year but it's always a surprise to me what they come up with. So whilst I'm not waiting in the wings I do believe that there are other things out there working away.

Darry: I hit that road wafting in the wind maybe things will be working in the ME wafting on what I don't know what to say but when I've been waking back and not putting everybody on the run I'd like to know about prequels.

Darry: For the Ballarat. It was decided to try something different especially as I'd established with the first two novels and that I had been really well we saved the prequel and I did have to clarify what I needed. I found it a bit difficult to separate myself from the actual story so I was given an outline if you like of what they required and it it really quite stumped me so I chose a character from the book who wasn't the main character and I tried to give her. A three story. And a pretty story event that was sort of final readers towards the with or Ballarat so the widow herself. Her name is Nell and her friend is named Flora. So the sequel is from Flora's point of view. It does give the reader. A couple of signposts about what might be happening but I had to be so careful I didn't are giving away my book and also to keep it interesting but from Gloria's point of view it was more about the rumblings on the goldfields before the actual battle and there were many many months building up to the actual battle itself. So it pretty well. It was it was good to do but I also had to be very careful not to overshadow what was in the main book. I don't know if I got it right but it's out there it's called Hill of Gold.

Mel: These are stories to whet people's appetites.

Darry: It's a book only and they trace charge you know you could go to Amazon Dot Com you and Google my name and it will be there to download free of charge. And you couldn't decide to read that first or not. It doesn't sort of. Does it sort of changing as it added layer if you like. I believe there might be another one to come out later but they will somewhat choose not to publish at once and so if the projects have been ongoing. And hopefully it will it'll help us.

Darry: This is just one way of them maintaining a presence on the e-book market with their top authors and giving something away for free in order to get people to buy the my novels. I'm not sure that they've always done it but I think they are having a look at that and they do know that when you offer something for free you can get quite good hits on it and I don't tend to look at a lot of the stats on Amazon for instance although I did make up cake and when it first came out it was holding a sign in the top 10 Kindle for something or other. And so hopefully that's paid interest in certainly this book.

Mel: I want to talk about what you've learned about the writing process and your overnight success that has taken many years. What Would you say about this whole overnight success thing and what it's taken you to get where you were and what your journey ahead of you.

Darry: Ultimate success is really interesting and I haven't got there yet but I really don't think but when I do think back this last section of my little journey if you like I don't knock them every time in December. So I haven't even been out there for two years. As far as my books. Go so I I have a sense of things being buried we whirlwind but as far as the writing goes you you do learn a hell of a lot if you're actually. Going to sound really funny present while you're writing. Yes it comes straight from the head of the keyboard and away you go no rest of it but suddenly you write something and you need to be very present as to how that transcribes from you your thoughts to the keyboard. And I guess that's what your first draft is all about which is usually actually rubbish.

Darry: For instance in the book that I have for 2020 I'm about 33000 legitimately. Let's say just one third of the finished book and I've written the first paragraph at least 33 times so you virtually go. How. First of all about your own style. So you do have to be very present when you're. Actually listening to that or watching that. And I do have very strong reader who tells me that I've gone off my own voice. Which is interesting or that I need to. Bring back the diary writing which I guess is the same thing. So I'm very aware that I have a style and that I need to be present when it's when it's doing its thing. I can't describe it as a third party. It's about the best way I can describe it. I mean we're not when I'm chatting one down at a coffee shop or talking email or whatever I might be doing. I'm actually just me but when I'm writing I'm I'm actually I think there's a third party in there somewhere.

Mel: I think spending a lot of time on your own I guess immersing yourself in your fiction.

Darry: Whether your present and focused and writing I guess to the depths that you need to do to write a really good character is another thing isn't it is because you try to run the risk of my characters all sounding the same although I have a visual of them and I know perfectly well that they're not the same. But you right about spending their time on your own and then when I do go to my little place of work Gin House when am I actually say to them I've been time travelling just give me a minute I need to be talking 21st century English again and so on. So it is quite amazing how quickly you can become immersed and it's also a discipline if you're training. So if if there were one thing I would say to people who were sitting out on the journey in particular is don't underestimate how tough you have to be on yourself.

Mel: In a different sense here you have to be tough on yourself to enjoy it. Now anyone who follows Derry on her Facebook page there is an awful lot of a gin jokes and a bottle of gin.

Darry: There's a boutique gin distillery here on Kangaroo Island. One of us will probably be first dedicated Australian gin distillery in the country about 12 years ago. But I work out there and we're having our second little book launch out here this afternoon. And so I decided that because the Widow of Ballarat was in an era where alcohol or grog was just totally rife and Jean was around gin was imported. I thought that's going to be interesting. All she can do there so there's a little line in the book which refers to Mrs Lark's gin and so we will be launching a new label and a new gin this afternoon...

#140 Writing Life Out Loud: A Story Told in Real Time, with Lisa Messenger

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 06 Dec 2018 21:13:55 -0500

Lisa Messenger writes her books in real time – almost like a journal. Sometimes the results aren’t pretty, but they’re real.

Messenger is an Australian entrepreneur, author, and the founder and CEO of Collective Hub, an international multimedia business and lifestyle platform.

She is also an international speaker, best-selling author, and an authority on disruption.

She writes books in real time, her latest being Risk & Resilience, the story of the tough lessons she’s learned during the last eighteen months of her entrepreneurial journey. Her story isn’t pretty, but it’s heartfelt and we learn about the cost and responsibility of a successful career where people rely on you to lead the way.

It’s a story about how to survive, thrive and prosper through pivotal times, and how taking time out to re-charge is paramount.

Today, we chat about what it takes to write out loud, to share the details of the hard times as well as the good, and what we can all learn from Lisa’s journey.

And why, sometimes, bigger isn’t necessarily better.

You can find out more about Lisa, her books, courses and Collective Hub here and here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome to another episode of writer on the road. Today's guest doesn't need an introduction because we all know and love her. Welcome, Lisa messenger.

Lisa: That is a beautiful introduction.

Mel: Lisa is an international speaker, best-selling author and an authority on disruption in both the Corporate sector and the startup scene.

Lisa: I love that word disruption. It's funny to say I'm an authority on disruption. I think when I was at school they may have worded it slightly differently. How it was that disruptive notion back then that saw me sitting in the hallways outside the classroom for the majority of my school life.

Lisa: But I'm still that same little punk rebel. Asking how to buck the status quo and always try to find a different better way of doing things.

Lisa: It's just that. Strangely enough that's kind of celebrated now hopefully a slightly more for nest and I get a girl a little bit spiritually and emotionally since the school days. But anyway it's an interesting space.

Mel: I'm the English teacher teaching the drop out student and the student's famous and I'm still there in the classroom.

Mel: This is a bit of a personal story for me but I do have the woman who has influenced my journey over the last I guess well over five years. The current book you have out there is Risk & Resilience and we're going to talk at length about that one today. But the book that started mine was Money & Mindfulness. It's been out a few years hasn't it?

Lisa: Yes, beautiful it gives me shivers when I hear that because I think there's so many people in this world that we all of us don't connect with or you know just silently doing something that is helping other people and then suddenly you have this connection and you hear about the impacts and that's very beautiful and I look forward to hearing your story.

Mel: Let's talk about money and mindfulness. We think we know all about it until we haven't got any. I found myself in a situation where I didn't have any I had two young children we were travelling in our caravan and everybody through Coffs Harbour and I went into the news agency and I found this amazing little what I thought was a paperback book in a news agency. I didn't have any money and I splurged out I think it was 30 bucks of my last hundred and bought this thing because it had pictures of the ocean. Lisa, that was such a practical book but full of joy and life because of the images, because of the topography and you've carried that through to your current books. It's more than just a How-To book isn't it?

Lisa: That is a beautiful thing. It's a big thing in being unafraid and courageous enough to invest in ourselves even when things are you know I've been through that many times myself. I wrote that book because in March 2013 I started a print magazine and it was collective hub and it was 11 years into my entrepreneurial journey. So I kind of go well when something finally worked it was like an 11 year overnight success and that magazine within 18 months was in 37 countries like it was crazy but people kept saying to me but how are you doing this.

Lisa: You must have all this money and I said No I don't have no money.

Lisa: And so I really wanted to write my books in real time and win people to understand the journey that I'd been on the mind set and you know perceived or real barriers that I had to overcome and that there are no more currencies than cash. That was really important to me about how do we find like minded non-competing businesses and how do we kind of remove cash as the only currency and sort of thing. Well I love what you're doing and I love what you're doing what's the value exchange you know and how can we actually work together so leave it to the higher and the other premise of that book is that I think I used to feel that money was a dirty word for years and I kept myself kind of small and I felt guilty. You know the very thought of making money and I had to kind of shift my own mindset and go and worthy of this and so largely that was also about making money or making profit and doing good in the world don't have to be mutually exclusive and in fact what I've learnt is that we need to make money to have freedom and platform and choice.

Lisa: And so now I'm very comfortable with the notion of making money because unfortunately as much as we can trade other currencies and other things sometimes like print bills you know you have to pay with cold hard cash. So yeah the book was very practical and a lot of the mind set and the tools it kind of helps me on my journey to expand from literally you know zero dollars and three staff under the age of 25 entering into a highly saturated market that I knew nothing about that people said was dead or done things that I that's really a book about how I overcame all of that I guess and look it's a really cool story everybody and it's the one that I will remember for ever.

Mel: But then we move forward to the new book, Risk & Resilience and again it's this little 'live in the moment' experience true story that has reached out and touched the rest of us.

Lisa: The premise starting Collective Hub was to I was so sort of sick of the media at the time how you would read about these extraordinary people.

Lisa: But there was something lacking there. I was always asking what's the story behind the story. How did they start. Why did they start. How did they get funded. How did they find distribution. I was always perplexed and confused about this.

Lisa: So that's kind of the premise on which I started the magazine and then I thought whoa it's kind of my you see I felt to write books to actually tell my own story behind the story so people could you know relate in real time. So I've actually written six books in the last four and a half years. But yes the latest one risk and resilience is anything but pretty. And I started writing that in October 2016 when the collective hub started hitting the skids a little bit. So it was interesting going from three staff you know everyone on minimum wage suddenly had 32 staff and over three million dollars in fixed salaries. And it happened very very quickly and suddenly it as a creative and a visionary and a leader I found myself in this kind of horrible situation of systems and processes and I andH.R. and legal and finance and yark and I just was kind of drowning every day thinking well this isn't fun and I started questioning will is bigger better.

Collective Hub has given me the wildest journey of my life, like amazing in so many lessons but um but suddenly got quite ugly so I started writing this book October 2016 thinking it would have a very different ending and unfortunately as I got further into writing the book the business kind of went on this trajectory of you know it kind of got worse and worse before it got better.

Lisa: So I was like well I said I've tried it I put it out there and I think it's only through doing that and being authentic and raw and real and kind of going well. This is the reality of a high growth startup and an entrepreneurial journey which often isn't pretty. And I think it's given other people permission to kind of go Wow. You know your purpose and you can remain the same but if the delivery mechanism is actually drowning you as it was me then sometimes it's time to break a few things. So I did that and I've never felt so purposely fabulous.

Lisa: I built a business and found that it was actually to not what I wanted it took away. You mentioned that creative visionary in that creative journey and suddenly you're surrounded in paperwork and you're dying under it and you you have to pull back and that's what really intrigued me in your story.

Mel: You paid right back and got rid of it all. You knew before you could come out of the ashes phoenix like an end rebuild.

Lisa: Thank you. That was a very difficult time with some kind of brave and courageous just like passes and also you know surrounding myself with some people way smarter than me who I had to listen to and they literally like you know cut the guts out of the business the cost base is way too heavy. And so I just for the first time in my life just listened to these people were like on a daily basis and the guy that helped me Damien dig out of it he was meant to be with me for four days and he said I've never seen anyone just follow something to the T. So he stayed with me through the whole ugly journey of you know about 14 months or something he just stuck by my side and helps me wind out of it and the only way I can describe it is I just kept saying I just have to break everything like literally you know close the print magazine 52 issues in five years and you know make people redundant just cut the guts out of the cost base and get intimate with my data again and understand kind of where it had gone wrong and it did that really quickly and it was only a few months really after I broke everything and then I was like oh my gosh it's so obvious where you know these mistakes kind of happened and so now I'm building back up in a much more sustainable you know a much more sustainable way which will give longevity to my purpose so yeah I'm excited. I feel like I'm back in flow I have energy am again surrounded by fabulous people and you know I'm able to kind of breathe again as a creative.

Mel: It's exciting because I would actually call what you're doing now you're almost in Indie aren't you. You've moved out of the corporate you moved out of the traditional and now you're going Indie you're flying solo you're hiring freelancers and you're moving forward with purpose.

Lisa: My head of my advisory board is chatting to him a few days ago and I said you know it's so great to be out the other side of that big failure.

Lisa: And he said to me failure what do you make like that sort of failure. And I just thought oh yeah you know so many people.

Lisa: I mean I think it's great because you read about so many you know big global companies ABM Bay and pretty much everyone who's done anything big in the world has had you know some kind of big almost closure and then they've gone okay. Cut cut the guts out of it go back to basics now let's rebuild Phoenix like as you said and say hey it was like no this is the best thing you ever did. And and since then I have actually so many things have happened. I've had extraordinary other business women and men who have like Samantha wills. You know she's got the jury company she started in 2004. Jodie Fox she started her business. She's a prayer I think she got 30 million dollar investment or something last year. All these people have closed their businesses ready for the ultimate pivot and I think hopefully they have given permission to people to be unafraid to just go now. This is working you know I'm just going to close and work out what the next iteration is. And history will say that a lot of people now want to invest in whatever's next.

Mel: I guess you know how to not mess it up again.

Lisa: And I think that's really the best thing is messing it up. I think getting in this is an entrepreneur.

Mel: Lisa is an entrepreneur's entrepreneur. Are you getting in there doing it. Messing it up learning by your mistakes learning by your growth. I did see a few pictures of you with Richard Branson so I think I read a bit of fun in that.

Lisa: Do you know what the it was the first time.

Lisa: And still it's I mean gosh and yet Richard Branson I mean I spent time on his private island with him and then I ended up chairing the Virgin where conference with him so set on stage with him for three hours in 2016 at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. You know I was the only person in Australia to have Jamie Oliver on my cover last year when he was at Yes I've spent a lot of time with them like you know Anna Wintour the doyenne of Vogue and you know Devil Wears Prada September Issue. She asked me to go meet with her in New York and I did that because collective had you know come on to her read. Yet John Cleese you name it I've had a pretty good.

But when you step into something so big you know it.

Lisa: It's not for the faint hearted you know but the beautiful thing is that because as you mentioned I've chosen to be an entrepreneur for entrepreneurs living my life out loud showing that anything's possible. I believe that you know going to that that space of nearly kind of going under was actually perfect for me because it's only having been there that I can now warn other people do that you know bigger isn't better use specialists not generalists like a decentralized workforce of freelancers and consultants is amazing because as we all know you can dip in and do power and bring them in project by project and there's so many things I've learnt.

Lisa: I'm very grateful I don't want to repeat the journey that I'm very grateful for this indie publishing world everybody we've got a fellow called Tim grow and he wrote I think we should have thirty thousand copies and now he's gone on he's put out a story. Well this is the real journey and it's really ugly and I didn't do this easily and even running the book was a trauma. We all see the shiny bits do we. We all see the shiny magazine but we don't see the work and the tears and clearly they would have been a few tears behind risk and resilience because the decision hurt. .

Lisa: You know as a leader and a visionary it's very difficult and it sounds like you've been through some of this and all go through a certain degree but you know fronting up to that office every day through that period and kind of saying okay you know let's change the world.

Lisa: And then come home and just falling in a heap you know crying. I should go and get the money to pay for everything. Yeah I mean that's the ironic thing in a way was that the magazine was still growing which was extraordinary and our digital footprint and our events were also still growing I mean we worked through that period often running up to four events a week and so it has a business very much you know growing and the community was loving it. The problem was I had way too many people on the way to higher salaries you know and way too many big costs involved with the business I just was never going to work in that iteration.

Lisa: Personally I'm assuming there is a there's a personal cost to losing your freedom. There's a personal cost to the responsibility of of of having to keep all those people employed. I mean I think I read somewhere that you knowing that you were working these people to the capacity and the stress involved in all that.

We don't know because I haven't but the systems and processes in place it meant a lot of what we were doing was grossly inefficient and I would have you know six direct reports and four of them would be coming to me saying hey we need to do this and was like the other person doing that and you know it so that was very interesting going from a very small team of three where you know everyone kind did everything and we all knew exactly what was going on and we were also passionate to suddenly I think it was almost like you know I would have an idea and then it would be filtered down through 3 eight people before it actually got implemented. So I think there was a lot at way too many people involved you know. And so in future what I would say and I'm saying to any creative is get really intimate with your data and have a great to see alongside of me who is all about or you know whatever that is that can be a freelancer just some great financial person who is kind of slicing and dicing data. I'm always surprised by creatives and how much they can like to see what I'm doing but I really know from charging right into her and I put something up on my Instagram. Yes I think the most likes I've ever say it was about being creative and charging appropriately so that's really important I think. Otherwise it's fun for a while but then we do burn out and we get resentful because we like it myself and everyone else is making all this money and having a great time.

Mel: That's one of the things that we indie writers and creatives come up against all the time is coming to terms with the fact that we can have a creative person at one stage of the day but at the other stage of the day we have to get on top of that. We have to know what's going on behind the scenes and it's just such an unfamiliar hand that you can make mistakes can't you. Before you learn the ropes but you started somewhere and look you in now.

Lisa: I wrote my first book in 2004 and was called Happinesses and I self published back then. I Just started to kind of learn about it and then so I've actually written a lot of books but no one read any and all that. I read like 24 books.

Lisa: I don't think anyone read the first 800 although I don't know what number mine was but the money went was fantastic.

Lisa: But I think the latest one everyone and there's been a couple of really good ones I think finding your purpose was one of them but that Risk & Resilience is really a key word nowadays we throw it around like anything because things go wrong and good people have bad things happen to them and you come out the other side of it.

Mel: Now I know you might have been at Bangalow which is northern NSW.

Lisa: Last January I just decided to move physically away from the office because I find when you're in office you know you can be busy but not necessarily productive and also suddenly things coming out you all the time we just react react react.

Lisa: I was like I physically have to remove myself from space to like think clearly and go What is the next move you know. It wasn't a decision that I made lightly and it took some time.

Lisa: I think that you know whether it's just moving to a different suburb or doing something counterintuitive to the norm and just removing yourself see you've got that time and space to actually think about what is the best use

#139 Writing Fight Scenes For Women, with Aiki Flinthart

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 26 Nov 2018 20:48:23 -0500

Aiki Flinthart is the author of the YA 80AD Series (where the downloads went nuts), the Ruadhan Sidhe Series, Shadows Wake, Shadows Bane and Shadows Fate, and now, newly released, Iron, the first of the Kalima Chronicles. She has been shortlisted for the Aurealis Awards & Writers of the Future Contest, appeared on the Science Fiction/Fantasy Writers Assn of America YouTube channel – and she writes kick-ass women characters.

In a Zombie apocalypse, you need to be able to shoot without sticking your head out.

Read a Flinthart novel, and you’re immediately transported to a world of Terracotta Armies, Chinese inventions or Eastern Philosophy. You learn about pyramids, tombs and hieroglyphics.

Think Martial Arts, knife throwing, horse-bows and archery, add a few swords and daggers, mixed with a few myths and legends, and you start to get a faint understanding of what you’re in for.

Did I mention shape-shifters, vampires, aliens, elves and quests? Yes, I’m way out of my depth, but it doesn’t matter. Flinthart is an expert in all things fantasy.

In this episode Flinthart talks us through the psychological and physiological differences between men and women in fights, in between talking all things writing.

You can find out more about Flinthart and her novels here.

COMPETITION:

If you’d like to win a copy of Iron, send a pic of you wielding an iron (at your ironing board:)) to melinda@tropicalwriting.com.au

Read Full Transcript

Mel: Welcome to another episode of writer on the road today. We're staying here in my beautiful town of Brisbane. Welcome Aiki Flintheart.

Aiki: Hey, thanks, Mel. Appreciate it. Glad to be here.

Mel: We have the beautiful Deb Kelly to thank for this one. And we are going to Fantasyland. Aiki has nine or 10 books published, middle grade and adult fantasy novels.

Aiki: I have been training in martial arts for about 18 years or so. It's good for writing it gives you lots of good fight scenes.

Mel: I had a look at some of the covers on your books and there is this woman and she's holding a knife. I love her expression. She's a kickass female. I like her. And we're going to talk about that today about how to write fight scenes because that's what Aiki specializes in.

Aiki: I've actually been writing my whole life but early on they were really dreadful romances that will never see the light of day. And then my son is dyslexic and he was really struggling with the big fat books like the Harry Potter and things you wanted to read something actually but he just couldn't get through them. So I wrote a series of five books for middle graders portal fantasy as kids get sucked back into a computer game set in 1880 and my sneaky goal was to to hide some real history in there so the kids have to go through five levels in five different countries all said in 88. And while they learn things about India and China and Egypt along the way and it's the fight scenes. But you know after I publish those they were really quite successful. There's been about 400000 downloads but. I then realized I really didn't know what I was doing. I went away and learnt a lot of things and wrote some more books and now the ones that are coming out you know are stronger read better written but the older ones keep selling really well so there's something about them.

Mel: 400000 downloads of middle grade novels is amazing. We're talking digital. Aiki Is an indie publisher. And when I went on your website other than Amazon and your own website where else can we buy your books.

Aiki: They're on all the major retailers so I books and Kobo and Barnes and Noble and a couple of others here are all the major retailers and you can actually print on demand as well if you walk into a bookshop and say I want this book they'll order it for you here.

Mel: On your website there are bonus materials and background research and I was off to China myths and legends. You really have to know an awful lot to be able to write these fantasy novels to build two worlds.

Aiki: The research involved is incredible. The latest one that's coming out I own is actually a science fiction fantasy set on a future colony world but my background as a geologist so I decided to do an alternate world a different world. You've got a really science the heck out of those things you have and do your hard science research and for historical ones you have to do your historical research because someone out there will pick you up on every mistake I guarantee. And I was trying to teach kids something so I wanted it to be as accurate as it could be. So yeah it's fun.

Mel: We were talking about me before the episode or before the podcast today I interviewed Sherilyn Kenyon which is why I reached out everyone for fantasy and science fiction because our listeners want that.

Mel: But what happened when I read Sherilyn. I was really hooked on these stories. These stories are fast paced action. You learn something along the way about a whole new world. Crushing it to make up other languages and words that I'm not even going to pronounce here on the podcast you are right up there.

Aiki: The 80AD series it's actually kind of amazing I get fan mail every day from all over the world like the Caribbean and Poland and India and always it it's adults who say I downloaded these for my son but I absolutely love them I've read them three times but just had a lady in America who read them about five years ago and now has a little boy that she's named after the main character which is so cool.

Mel: You're 15 years martial arts trained and knife throwing and archery.

Aiki: Unless you'reJ.K. Rowling there's a huge disparity between the big selling authors and the rest of the world. So most of us have to unfortunately have full time or part time jobs and I run a full time business and luckily my son has grown up so in the evenings I have time to write and my husband is very supportive.

Mel: You're an indie publisher. You've had 400000 downloads so they download a few dollars each. And even with that amount of downloads you're still not making a full time living.

Aiki: No unfortunately because very early on I had them up for free for a little while and then put money on them after that. I do get money but it's clear it's not as much as anybody thinks because those royalties but Amazon takes a percentage and all the other retailers take a percentage and when you're only selling Abebooks for a very small amount there's not a lot leftover.

Mel: This is where the indie publishers or indie authors have the advantage.The Shadow trilogy three books. Yeah. So you've got them there. They finished and you're starting on your next series with the book coming out, Iron, and it's the first of the Palomar trilogy. The more books you have and every little bit adds up. This is where being Indie has come into their own.

Aiki: It is because the modern trend in Indie authorship is to put out a lot of books as fast as you can. To be honest I'm not sure that's going to work for fantasy because fantasy novels tend to be longer. The Shadows series are 80000 each. Iron is 140000 the two sequels that are already written and their 120 130000 so that's a lot of words and it's quite hard to put that volume out quickly. But that's kind of how the authorship works you just keep putting books out. To be honest I'd rather do a few fewer that are really good quality. And not as much because I'm not dependent on it for a living. I love writing. I don't care.

Mel: Your blog called Warrior Woman: so it's good to have a little slice of life as as she built up I think your writing confidence. And it's interesting because the very first thing that I read was and I've written it down here as a quote and it's something about the middle where you need to find the middle ground between paralyzing lack of self belief and ignorant overconfidence as as a writer.

Aiki: And I thought how very true that is it is it is because when you first start writing you think you know what you're doing and you just pour out the words and then you know if you get negative feedback or you get other writers who go. But what about you start realising what you don't know and you don't know what you don't know. And if you suddenly go oh my god I can't write anymore. I don't know enough and you could get trapped in this cycle of having to be perfect because so many writers tend to be introvert perfectionists. So you kind of have to find that ground where you're still writing and still learning and just be comfortable with the fact that it's never going to be perfect and let it go.

Mel: The advantage of indie publishing is you do make it the best you can and done is better than perfect and later on you can go back and fix it.

Aiki: [00:10:20] Oh yes definitely. And you have to treat that as a good thing because no matter how many times you get it edited because obviously a better book is better if you do get it edited. So I have to say look I highly recommend that you get books edited and any feedback that you get that's positive and useful as opposed to just nasty and negative because everybody gets those and you just have to ignore them. But feedback that actually tells you something like Oh you've made a spelling mistake that's worthwhile take it on board accept it. I actually start my books now where they have a warning to all my American fans because I get a lot of American. I start saying no this is written with Australian spellings. Get over it. Because I got tired of them telling me I was spelling things wrong.

Mel: [00:11:10] I was reading I read all your book blurbs because I was hooked. And one of them at the bottom said if you're expecting shape and shape shifters you're going to be disappointed.

Aiki: [00:11:20] Yes because paranormal at the moment in an especially romances paranormal romance is a big Aperol shapeshifters and vampires and you know there's still some zombies hanging around but I just yeah I didn't go that way. So I just thought I should warn people because no shapeshifters.

Mel: [00:11:40] I got the impression from what I've read yours are a pure fantasy or science fiction that will stand the test of time.

Aiki: [00:11:51] Well I'm hoping so. You know you have to try to do that. You have to kind of minimize the amount of current pop culture references which isn't easy when the shadows is an urban fantasy. There are some in there. But yeah I tried to make the heroine's tough. I've one of the things my husband loves about them is that the relationships in them are equal for women and men are equal. There's no there's no love triangles there's no you know one person being dominant over the other. He he really loves that as a male and this Meteora as a good example of how women can be strong and men can be strong and neither of them has to take away from the other. And that's one of the things I'm really passionate about is writing women as equal and strong without being wimpy walked over and this is cool because you you you have a young audience as well as adults.

Mel: [00:12:52] It's great that the kids are getting these messages I think and the adults amongst us as well. And let's let's kick in now to the workshops that you run because I've got to tell you I am absolutely fascinating. Where do we go if we don't do your workshops I know this story running Mitchell did she get to people.

Aiki: [00:13:11] I'd love to. I want to do one of those as a master class but the liability issues are horrendous. You know look at the moment the workshops do have some demonstrations I have a couple of demos of small techniques that I can use on people that won't hurt them.

Aiki: [00:13:28] And it teaches people things like gun disarms or reactions to techniques that people apply and it's it's hilarious to watch but a lot of it is to do with the physiology the psychology the body chemistry the mental reactions the whole lead up to a fight scene and the differences within how women and men react to violence and handle violence. And it's actually a really fascinating subject. I'm thinking I should do a masters on it or something.

Mel: [00:13:58] I actually think you should write a book on it for the rest of us writers. I was I was enamored I was hooked. Everybody. The workshop is the it's a well I call it a kickass writing scene writing fight scenes for women I want to have go but it's the physiological and psychological differences between men and women fights trained or untrained in martial arts.

Aiki: [00:14:22] Now I take for granted I guess what I know but if I was going to write a fight scene or even an argument scene or even a disagreement scene it is more deeply and give it more credibility and to make it more authentic.

Aiki: [00:14:41] I've had people in the workshops who write straight out romances and there's no action or fights at all but because the psychology and the physiology of leading up to a really full on argument is very similar to the physiology and psychology of leading up to an actual fight scene. It's all applicable.

Mel: [00:15:00] Yeah. Now this didn't come about by accident. Everybody remember we've got to hear clearly she doesn't sleep clearly she's 150 because of all the things that she's done and how she's lived. You had eight years of running workshops for corporates on characterisation.

Aiki: [00:15:17] I was working with businesses teaching them how to understand personality differences in the workplace so that they could hire people to create teams and I suddenly realized that you could apply equally to writing if you're writing an ensemble cast in a book. If you write balanced personalities so that you've got representation like say five different five to eight different personality types or four or eight depending on your team you're appealing to all of the readers then you've got everybody covered. Somebody is going to like one of your characters and it also leads to brilliant conflict about options because you know a leader who's really strong willed is always going to conflict with the really laid back easy going person is going Yeah I don't want to go there go and have your own quest. I go off so many opportunities for conflict and personality profiling it's fabulous.

Mel: [00:16:13] I'm sure I'm not the only one sitting here going where can we buy the book. Can we buy the cheat sheet. No. There's a lot of stuff on your website. Bonus Material for the actual books and the physical research of China and all those places and myths and pyramids and teams and hieroglyphics and we need to go on. But there's nothing on there as yet for writers to be able to go to your website and buy the book because I'm guaranteeing I'm not the only one.

Aiki: [00:16:48] I'm actually at the moment because I've given this Saint's workshop a few times and I've given the personality profiling workshop a few times I'm now at the point where it's refined enough that I know how it should go. So I've actually pitched it to Worldcon in New Zealand in 2020 as well and I'm really hoping that if they take it up I can have a book ready to go with it for 2019 2020 and then that will be available to you know obviously I can't give workshops all over the world as much as I'd love to. Feel free to invite me if anybody's listening. But you know fallling Yeah it means that other writers can hopefully benefit and take away the useful stuff but their fight scenes and their personalities as well.

Mel: [00:17:30] It's screaming out for online courses everybody is screaming you have for webinars if you follow the tradition traditional indie publishing route think Joanne opin think all those guys. If you were that way inclined over time you're going to have an amazing business and your books some of your books are set here in downtown Brissie or I'll be interviewing you in the future.

Aiki: [00:18:06] I've gotten very very very famous.

Mel: [00:18:09] Let's let's talk a little bit more about your expertise in writing because you haven't got this far this quickly without having that expertise as much as you say you started from scratch and you were just arrogant. And we went for it. You have an editing service and you offer some amazing. I guess I'm not an you but you take us through what needs to be done before books published. I'm talking structural with its line. It is just a simple menu script assessment. So what do you really look at your website and what do I need to have all that stuff done.

Aiki: [00:18:51] It's obviously everybody's choice but I don't think you can these days get away with out at least a structural analysis on your book. I know that when I when I first started writing I didn't actually know what story structure was and but because I had read so much as a child and a young adult when I went back and looked at what I'd written in the series I realised I'd actually nailed the structure unconsciously but I was really lucky because I don't think I could have rewritten them all. But when I read it when I looked at shadows wake the first one and applied a structural analysis to it I realised that I missed it and missed a key point that I had to completely rewrite and shift scenes around to make it work. And sometimes you need that external eye to go okay yes you feel like your story is not working here and this is why your scene is too long or you're seen as not paced correctly or you're one of the characters doesn't have a strong enough arc so you do need an external eye and if you can get a lot of it from good beta readers that's a great place to start. But sometimes beta readers love you too much and they don't want to tell you the things wrong because they don't want to hurt your feelings. But as a writer you've just kind of got to suck it up and go yeah I need some help with this. It's not perfect it's never going to be perfect but I'm sure it can be better. And that's where you need the help of somebody who maybe has a few more years of experience. That's really all it is just a few more years.

Mel: [00:20:23] You've got your own coming out as we speak it's going to be a series as well. Have you had the book professionally edited and given your own experience.

Aiki: [00:20:32] Definitely. Because you just can't seem to read it so many times you cannot see the mistakes and I learned a lot from when that one got edited. That was really useful. And the same year you can then take away what's been applied to one book and immediately take it to your next book and apply all those new skills the land to that next book and it's better again. So you require a bit less editing on that book because you now know a bit more about what you're doing. So hopefully the process of getting edited means your next series of books your next set of books you know is tighter and stronger right from the get go and that's it that's the experience of all authors whether they're in the or traditionally published. The more you write the more you get edited the less editing you gradually need because you kind of know what you're doing.

Aiki: [00:21:25] Remember this is a lady who started out not having a clue what she was doing and just wrote rows and...

#138 The Spiderweb Effect: How Writing A Book Will Grow Your Business, with Brian K. Wright

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 20 Nov 2018 20:39:40 -0500

Brian K Wright is the host of Success Profiles Radio and publisher of Success Profiles Magazine. Over the last 6 years, Brian has interviewed world-class achievers such as Darren Hardy, Jack Canfield, Loral Langemeier, Kevin Harrington, Sharon Lechter, and many more.

A lot of people, when they think about writing a book, they think of selling millions of copies and it’s a really nice idea but unless you’re really famous or well known that may or may not happen.

It’s what you can do with the book once it’s done that’s the goal, whether it’s speaking on stage, having a coaching program, staging a live event, or being invited to do shows. It will present opportunities to sell your book and make a lot of money at your bookstore signings.

There are a lot of opportunities to go beyond the book but the book is the springboard by which you can do everything. Brian’s radio show was the springboard that created a lot of opportunities and then the book spun from that and the magazine spun from that. Start somewhere, master or something I know I’m going and then figure out how to spend it.

A lot of people make the mistake of trying to start a bunch of things at once and end up not doing any of them very well.

A book is a credibility piece. If there are let’s just say hypothetically 10 people in your industry and somebody is trying to decide who to work with. If you’ve got a book on the other nine don’t guess who automatically has the the first opportunity the person with the book because you you must be the expert.

People will make that assumption and so they’ll check out your book. They like to do their research and figure out who people are. If they see your book it can be a nuclear business card.

You can find out more about Brian, his books and Success Profiles here.

Read Full Transcript

Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today we're travelling to Arizona which is a little bit far away from where we are here in Oz. I'd like to welcome Brian Wright. Brian is a guest that I have been recommended to by Brian Burkard. Hi Brian. This one's for you. I have been encouraging my friend Brian from the Marketers Mindset to write a book for a long time and I believe part of your expertise is in book writing.

Brian: It is. I've done three of my own books and I go through my books for other people and I also host a meetup group here in Arizona for offers and side started that a couple of months ago I had my third meeting earlier this week with my group and it's been a lot of fun it's been a great journey.

Melinda: I always go straight to the top when I need my experts. Brian, I've got to tell you that with my research that I've been carrying out tonight you are the expert of all experts. You have a wonderful book out and it's a new book released this month and it's called Success Profiles, Conversations With High Achievers. You can have a podcast success profiles radio.

You also publish the Success Profiles Magazine.

Brian: Yes. It's a spinoff of my radio brand. When I started my radio show back in 2012 I realized after a while I had so much content that I could repurpose.

I think this is really important. If you are creating content repurposing in as many ways as possible. Some people will listen to you do a radio show or podcast. Some people read but some people will read your magazine. Some people will meet you in person but they won't find you everywhere unless they're a super fan. But you have to reach people where they are. Some people prefer to read. Some people prefer to listen and so repurposed content to appeal to as many of the senses as possible so that people have a greater opportunity to find you.

Melinda: Brian is an expert at this everybody. I'll confess it's four o'clock in the morning here and I started researching Brian's work at midnight and I have kept going for hours and hours. I have the most fascinating man with me here today. Brian, your new book. Let's start with your books, then work backwards on how to write one. The focus this week is on nonfiction.

Melinda: For those of you who haven't explored the opportunities with nonfiction they are absolutely amazing to build your brand and share your expertise and Brian does this with his latest book.

Brian: I've talked to some of the most amazing people. I talked about repurposing content a while ago I had this idea to present a compilation book to a publisher and I found them on Facebook interestingly enough Mortgage Giants Publishing and I had this idea for the book where I would compile some of my most favorite interviews from some of my most well-known guests into a book and they loved the idea.

They've done compilation books before. Some of them aren't very good because they're not edited very well but they said that I did a really great job of editing my book. Now here's the thing. Done is better than perfect. It took me a while to put this together because there were days I just feel like working on it.

I just you know I have to feel properly inspired to keep going and I went for weeks without being properly inspired I didn't want to finish but then I realized it was sitting out there and I had to get it done.

I decided I had to get it done right after some really amazing people Darren Hardy who published Success Magazine for many years. Jack Canfield who co-wrote all the Chicken Soup for the Soul books. Those books collectively have sold over 600 million copies I believe with various titles. It's a huge series. The Success Principles, Maya The Millionaire Maker Tom Zeigler some of the legendary Matt Gallagher. I had 11 really amazing interviews in that book and you can find it on Amazon. You can find it in Barnes and Noble and find it everywhere. And it was really a joy to put this together.

If you are not sure what contact you can create you can co-create that contact with other people via a podcast or interviews. If you have expertise in one particular topic which a lot of us do and you know experts who are in your field might be able to lend an interesting perspective that maybe you don't have. That's a great way to create contacts through a compilation book or even doing it through a virtual seminar which I get to be doing a virtual seminar toward the end of November. My coach and I are putting this together. He is a website designer and that gives me a virtual iPad which will be free Twitter. And that's going lead to a live event in the spring. Also, the whole idea that you should make your book into a business and it should be part of what you're doing.

Melinda: A lot of people, when they think about writing a book, they think of selling millions of copies and it's a really nice idea unless you're really famous or well known that may or may not happen.

Brian: It's what you can do with the book once it's done that can be the goal by for you whether it's speaking on stages whether it's having a coaching program whether it's staging a live event, whether it's being invited to do shows like your fine show here. It will present opportunities which you can then spend to income and other revenue sources so you can sell your book and make a lot of money at your bookstore signings here in town. In fact, I've done four of them and I've had a really great time. I've learned a lot. I've got two more scheduled for the near future but look beyond just selling your book.

There are a lot of opportunities to go beyond the book but the book is the springboard and I tell this to my clients all the time. The book is the springboard by which you can do everything for me my radio show as the springboard back created a lot of opportunities and then the book spun from that and the magazine spun from that and so on and so forth. So I'll start somewhere master or something I know I'm going on and on here but master something and then figure out how to spend it. I think a lot of people make the mistake of trying to start a bunch of things at once and you're gonna end up doing any of them very well.

So master something and then spiderweb it up from there.

Melinda: You are fascinating in what you say and I've been making notes here and I'm not even sure where to begin unpacking what you're talking about.

The event virtual event is going to be Wednesday Thursday November 28th and 29th, which might be the next day in Australia.

Brian: Look for a print or a dark author or a live dotdot.com so look for that in the coming weeks and I'll be posting about Facebook and I know we’re connected on LinkedIn.

Melinda: I did a course here in Australia with Adam Hoolahan and it's LinkedIn influencers so there's a whole range of business people are starting to test the ground. A lot of trying to get a start. I know you work a lot with entrepreneurs and a book is key isn't it.

Brian: It's a credibility piece. I think a lot of people just use the book as a credibility piece. If there are let's just say hypothetically 10 people in your industry and somebody is trying to decide who to work with.

If you've got a book on the other nine don't guess who automatically has the the first opportunity the person with the book because you you must be the expert. You have to be some how people will make that assumption and so they'll check out your book and people you know they're savvy these days. They like to do their research and figure out who people are and is it going to be a fad is it aligned but if someone has a chance to see your book it can be really a nuclear business card and books don't have to be 200 pages. I think sometimes my clients get stuck on the idea that their books have to be long not really that old rich dad poured out rubber here psyche 20 years ago 114 pages. One of the most influential books in the last 20 plus years so he doesn't have to be very long my first two books were under a hundred pages.

My current book is 270 pages so right until you think you've said everything you want to say. And sometimes when I work with my ghostwriting clients they get so convoluted that they have so many great idea.

I had one client who I know wants to write multiple books. I told him one day I said I think you're trying to write off or gearbox at once and that made him stop. He says I think you're right. And so I said do this have four separate no pads. Every time you have an idea and put the title of all of her books on the top of each notepad page every time you've got a great idea.

Figure out what book that the idea actually belongs in so that you don't confuse yourself on your current project and by time you're done with the first one. If you've got a couple pages of ideas for your next book already outlined you're miles ahead. Now I'd like to start from zero anymore. So carpels can't compartmentalize your ideas and write them down but put them in a bucket and go from there.

So at least you don't forget what your idea was which is really important and secondly you know where the idea is that you don't have to think so hard about the next time. So if you've got all these ideas. Ask yourself Does this idea belong in my current book or is this another book some more later. Because that's a very real possibility.

Melinda: We did a series recently here on Writer on the Road with Paul Brody and he helped us all publish a book and he took us through the process and the very first thing he said is exactly what you've been saying.

They're very happy with 20000 words otherwise you'll see in two books number two three and four and a really good example of this everyone in our Indie world is Adam Croft. He is worldwide known as one of the biggest Indie fiction authors.

He wrote How to be an Indie Author. And it was really short it. I read it in an hour and thought it was meant to happen but an hour it people want it sure.

Brian: And here's the thing. People's attention spans are a lot shorter now than they used to be. And so couple that with the idea that a lot of people don't read a book after school after high school or whatever level school in that you finished because they had to do a lot of reading and so now it's not fun but if someone is reading a 64 page book and then get it done in an hour they feel like they accomplished something I wrote a book yay.

I tell people all the time it's like the bigger books aren't necessarily better books sometimes. Like I said before the most effective books are the shorter ones and you want to write something that people will read and people don't want to necessarily go on and on with their work just get in get out be done say what you need to say and be done.

Melinda: That's very much so in the business world because a lot of these people they're not expert writers they're expert in health and fitness so they're experts in whatever field where they want to get in and get out and get done as well don't they.

Brian: Absolutely. People are busy people are very busy and I mean even Why do Facebook lives I keep them to four to six minutes. I don't go on and on for half an hour about nothing. God bless everyone who does Facebook lives. A lot of them are great but if I'm really busy and I don't have any idea how long your life is I mean outstay for the whole thing I might if I really love yeah I'll stay but I want to respect my listener's time my readers time. I say my piece and dialogue and people know that I will provide whatever value I can in a shorter my time make it munch of all if you will actionable and then let's move on with our day and I'll come back again later and do this again.

Melinda: That brings us to the format of your book. It's absolutely beautiful. Everyone this is an idea I've had and again Brian says Done is better than perfect I'm always talking about it but I never quite get around to doing it.

Brian: I've got to mention I have 35 under my belt now and I've kept every transcript with the idea of turning them into books still not done. This thing of yours is a bunch of podcast transcripts turns in to something that is very readable even if you just want to choose one at a time.

I have an idea for you because my second book was a much shorter version of this book. I had three shows in a row where my my guests were expert in sales and it just jumped out at me.

Jeffrey Gettleman or Eric Laphams Scott Lopez and these three interviews might make a really short book a really good short book and I was 64 pages. So what I would say for you or anyone else after doing a podcast if you've got several shows on a common theme that might be a candidate for a really good short book my podcast and radio show is about success celebrating other people's successes so I get to explore different topics.

Brian: I interviewed Mark Robinson from the UK recently where he gave away a flat on television on Channel 4. I interviewed yesterday a copywriting expert but so those are completely different interview relationship experts fitness experts yeah like you said but if I've got people who have expertise in a very similar topic grouping those together in a short composition book maybe we can idea and people want it.

Melinda: People wanted everybody I know with the podcast people go to my website they're looking for something to buy and of course there's nothing there but there's going to be one day going on and it's really interesting people.

Brian: You're not pushing and selling your ideas. People actually want the content that people want to be successful and one of your I guess your mission though is it is to help people be the best they can be because you feel that they're living beneath their potential which I found was a very interesting expression.

I think a lot of people settle for what they think they can get in life and I've been there I've been there and I've done that and over the last maybe a couple of years especially the last 12 months especially I've reached that epiphany that I just have to say yes to myself and do what I meant to do in life. If you get good at something that you don't enjoy doing the world will keep asking you to do that thing and you'll be miserable.

Melinda: You were an educator. You began teaching composition. I haven't even heard that expression in many years. We call them essays now those English composition are now taken back expertise as an educator and you have moved into the corporate world and you're an expert in in leadership motivation and inspiration to 10 minutes would you have me inspired. Do you find that people are I guess with your with your magazine your success profiles. When did that come about? How do we find it and is it print or is it digital?

Brian: I do print out a few copies to give away at networking events or what I do with my Meetup groups I meet them.

I give every new person a printed copy so that they can see it. But success prop US magazinedot.com is where people can go in if they want to subscribe it is a paid subscription but it's absolutely worth it. I put out a magazine issue every single month and usually the person on the cover is someone I've already interviewed on my show and I just curated some of that interview and make that feature article I put them on the cover and they usually love it because what I can tell them no extra work is hard if you just give me your shirt via your best picture. They're happy to accommodate it.

So is that everybody that gets that gives you guests the ultimate exposure and it sets them up as an expert before they even write a book.

Because they are on the cover of a magazine. Yeah. Kevin Harrington from Shark Tank was my first magazine cover back in December last year. And when I approached him I said personal thank you for being on my show three months ago some new things are going on and putting together a magazine I want you to be my first feature and I just like I explained Norks to wear his Ricardo of you are just curate material that we've already done and I don't need to interview you again. If I can just take your best picture we can go and he's like you let's do it. He answered me in less than an hour or a half and said Yeah that sounds absolutely great and I did print some copies because I met him in person at an event that he was speaking at and he recognised me immediately. And I gave him the magazine and it was so cool because he said part of my presentation was about digital marketing.

Is it okay is this primarily digital and you just print a few free events like this. I said absolutely that's exactly what I'm doing he says. I hold this up and talk about your magazine during my presentation. Yes. Am I going to say no to the ads and the photographer the events. Had a really wise moment because a few weeks after the event I saw a picture of him approaching me and shaking my hand as he was moving as he right before he spoke and I shook my head and said Thank you Brian said You're welcome. Then started speaking somebody caught that moment on camera. And that's the cover photo on my Facebook profile now.

But the idea of where the magazine came from I had so much content to repurpose and I thought What a shame it is that I haven't repurposed this in any way so I bought the domain for success...

#137 Writing, Procrastination & Getting Things Done, with Geoff McDonald

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 13 Nov 2018 21:06:22 -0500

In the last 13 years, Geoff McDonald has read 550 books and written sixty plus Book Rapper ebooks, as well as over 1000 blog posts. And now he’s launching two books on the same day, Done and Project Done.

McDonald has always been prolific, great with ideas and creativity, but not so strong at execution. It wasn’t until he bought a new laptop computer that he realised the untapped potential of all that creativity, and the problems he had with not finishing his various projects. Whilst copying over files he found 25 unfinished books.

I was like, “Oh, my God, how much of my time?” You know what’s going on, that if I’d finished even half of them life would have been different. I’d had a whole bunch of products I’d know I’d be known for, a whole bunch of my ideas, and in that moment, I realized my life had been about building this body of work. And I haven’t actually finished half my body of work. Heaven forbid, had a lightning bolt come down and zapped me on the head in a moment I would have had nothing to show. I would have had a whole bunch of unfinished stuff to show for my life.

In this episode, we discuss the following:

why we’re where we are with our creative projects
how to improve our motivation
the importance of adjusting our goals
redesigning our environment for maximum productivity
how to triage our priorities
developing our inner drive
making change stick
and much more…

You can find out more about McDonald and getting things done here.

Read Full Transcript

Mel: We're going to spend the next half hour or so talking books and publishing. I'd like to welcome Geoff McDonald. Hi Jeff.

Geoff: Hi, Mel. Great to be on your show.

Mel: Geoff has written a book called Done: Why You Fail To Finish Your Projects and What To Do About It. Everyone who knows me knows exactly why I've got Geoff on. He's read 550 books in the last 30 years, written 60 plus books under the guise of book report which we'll talk about shortly. He's got 1000 posts and over100 podcast episodes. And that's just in his spare time because he’s also a Public Ppeaker. He's an ideas architect and the list goes on.

Mel: Let's start with your current project, Project Done. Help us out, Geoff. We’re writers and some of us are perhaps bits of procrastinators. It’s what attracted me to your book in the first place because I believe you had that problem yourself, even though your list doesn’t show it.

Geoff: I can point to that list of all these things well done but I'm probably closer to you than you think, and I think it's an interesting one that there's probably a little tipping point there. Basically, I did my strength profile a while back and I realised I had almost no strength around the execution stuff. And pretty much that summed up what I'd been doing. Not finishing.

A few years ago, I bought a new laptop computer. I previously had a desktop that had this really big hard drive on it. When I got the laptop, it had a really small hard drive on it, so I couldn't just press the button to copy all the files. I had to manually sort through them. I found an old book file. I had spent a lot of time on that one, but I never finished it, and this went on and on.

It turned out there were 25 unfinished books and they weren't just headline blind folder. There were l50 to 100, 150 pages on each of these books. I was like “oh, my God, how much of my time?” You know what's going on, that if I'd finished even half of them life would have been different. I'd had a whole bunch of products I'd know I'd be known for, a whole bunch of my ideas, and in that moment, I realized my life had been about building this body of work. And I haven't actually finished half my body of work. Heaven forbid, had a lightning bolt come down and zapped me on the head in a moment I would have had nothing to show. I would have had a whole bunch of unfinished stuff to show for my life.

I'd done a lot of writing and a lot of effort, but I actually didn't finish anything, so I realized I needed to fix this or at least address it. And that's where Done came from. There’s a lot of the stuff out there on productivity that really suits someone that's more sequential. If you follow undisputedly that's perfect for you. You just need to know that sort of approach - write your list and then tick them off. But I found I couldn't do that. I got bored really quickly and I think it’s the same for a lot of creative people. I think a lot of writers are like this. It's like, you say one thing and I'll go up on three different tangents and that makes it really hard to finish a book. I'm always generating the ideas but not able to bring them back so it's that divergent thinking, convergent thinking piece.

I had to research how I could get things done and that's what the book became. It was like, “How do I get projects done?” And that's what it's like for people who don't get traditional projects done.

Mel: It might keep you that way as well because now everybody Geoff and I are soul mates.

But the first half of that I'm not in my head going this is me. This is now I've spent 20 years living in mining towns writing novels writing essays writing articles and they're all sitting around here. I think I counted up everything that my daughter and I have made to this point is something like 130 products. What about you.

Geoff: I'm very excited to hear. I believe there are seven rules to getting through some of this stuff. I'm not the only one out there who does this stuff. and it's not to see what people say, “oh if you're not publishing, not doing this, it’s fear,” but it absolutely nothing to do with fear. It's because you've found another shiny object in your plan. Pretty much the simpler strategy that I've got that worked for me was to break things down into smaller chunks.

When I looked at the book so clearly I've written a few books but there was all these other things that I didn't finish and mission with all the books, I realised I basically have the attention span of about a week. So, if I have a project that's going to last a week, I don't actually have to create a project plan for it. I can stay on track mentally for it. But when it gets past a week that's when I'm likely to get distracted by a whole bunch of stuff and I need to put a plan into place.

Mel: Life has its ups and downs and things happen where you can't finish things, but I do think that a lot of us suffer from that same problem. Some projects get lost a little and doesn't take very much to put us off track does it?

Geoff: That's why I think we need to break it down. Some people can stick on a project forever. They’re like chugging diesel engines and chug away, whereas I'm a sprinter. I go for a short sprint and then I stop, and I take a break. But the problem with that approach is when I take a break and come back, I'm usually as you've suggested or maybe something else over there. Let's go over there and I just get distracted and I start something new, which is a strength around creativity and innovation not a strength around execution.

Mel: I tried to do that Strength Profile, but I think it costs a few dollars to do it.

Geoff: The one I get is the Gallop Strength Finder which is about $15, and you can buy one in I think in Marcus Buckingham's books. Have a look at them and you get the free test with the book.

Mel: It's interesting everybody and I'm sure we've all done one, working out what our strengths are and things like that. I come in very strongly as an ideas’ person but I never finish anything. I've always said that I need I need a manager. My business partner (Sam) has exactly the same brain as me so we have a lovely time with our ideas but nothing actually happens in our business.

Now I want to talk about your Book Rapper series because this is something that we as creatives can really take advantage of. Geoff, they’re all good books for us - we're talking business books here - and then we'll move into the writing books. You have written a series of guides that will take us a night to read.

Geoff: They can be read in about half an hour, maybe forty minutes tops. Where it started was one day I was sitting there doing some client work and I think it was probably a Wednesday or something and I was just like I have this pile of books that I want to read. And I thought, “Oh, I'm going to read this book.” And I went and sat there on the couch and I picked up the book and I thought well did you feel it was something I should be doing the client book.

And then I made a deal with myself. It's like if I can get paid to read the books then I can read a book during the week. Otherwise, I've got to read the books either in the evening or on the weekend. And that's where Book Rapper came from.

Book Rapper essentially is like a book summary service except I don't literally summarize the books. I rewrite them in a different way and organize the material. Sometimes it’s quite close to the book. Sometimes it’s a little bit different to the books but basically instead of taking four to six hours to read a business book it was like having you read this in about half an hour and that's what they were designed to do.

And what came out of that was not only I had to read the books in a systematic sort of way and I was already reading the book and I was already taking notes. When it first started, I produced better notes and that's when people said, you should sell this, and I thought okay, I'll have a crack at selling it. And it went from there.

The basic idea was I drew a lot of diagrams. My original career was as an architect. I'm always sketching and diagramming and modelling and doing diagrams of things and that's where book wrapper really was. A limited amount of words but also some pictures and diagrams about what are the key concepts in the book. And the idea was that they were all on horizontal force shapes that you should be able to hold up the sheet. And just by looking at it you should roughly be able to get the core idea is and then if you want to you can read. So if you picked up the issue it might be 10 or 12 or 14 pages long. You should be able to scan it just like I got it. Scanned got it scanned got it. So you can actually get the ideas very quickly. But then you can also read. Three words on it and get a deeper thing. And then if you wanted more you can obviously go to the book. So I was looking at that sort of layering around ideas.

#136 Allegory & the Australian Landscape, with DM Cameron

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 06 Nov 2018 20:33:45 -0500

Sometimes, it’s best to let a novel speak for itself. DM Cameron’s Beneath The Mother Tree is lyrical from the first page and deliciously unputdownable.

It could be Cameron’s Irish ancestry, or her background as an award-winning scriptwriter, or never-give-up attitude, but her debut novel hooks us from the first page and keeps us enthralled.

Or it could be that I love landscape novels and Cameron’s intertwining of Irish and Indigenous cultures as they meet on an island that’s at once familiar and sinister is riveting stuff. And the real treat is listening to her read her story aloud – did I mention that Cameron is also a voice artist?

This podcast is about a writer’s love of storytelling in all its forms. Enjoy.

A masterly evocation of place…Read it as an allegorical tale or just enjoy a rattling good yarn of young love, small community dynamics, obsession and mystery.’ The Weekend Australian.

You can find out more about Cameron and her work here.

#135 How to Build a Community of Loyal Readers, With Rachael Johns

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 21:27:07 -0500

ABIA award-winning and bestselling author, Rachael Johns, is one half of the duo who has been organising the upcoming Australia’s West Coast Fiction Festival, an event eighteen months in the making. The other half is Tess Woods.

It’s shaping up to be one of the biggest events of the year as sixty top Australian and New Zealand authors converge on Perth on the 3rd of November, 2018, for book signings, a cocktail party and live band.

Johns is currently Australia’s leading writer of contemporary relationship stories around womens issues and her newest release, Lost Without You, is hitting the shelves as we speak.

Our conversation is a free-wheeling chat around what it means to build a community around your books and our conversation includes:

why your readers matter
libraries, bookshops & festivals
writers retreats
the benefits of bookclubs (Johns’ club, with friend Anthea Hodgson, has over 1000 members)
authors promoting each other’s books
Di Morrissey and Judy Nunn (Nunn will be at the festival)
online communities, word of mouth meeting with your fans

You can meet your favourite authors, including Johns, Judy Nunn, Amy Andrews, Fiona McArthur, Pamela Cook, Helene Young and more at the West Coast Festival. You can find the full list of the sixty attending authors here.

You can find out more about Rachael and her books here.

#134 Women’s Fiction Takes to the High Seas, with Tricia Stringer

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 16 Oct 2018 20:10:52 -0500

There’s something about character driven novels that has you turning the pages, feeling you know the characters already but want to know more.

But what about writing them, with one eye on giving your reader a satisfactory ending whilst at the same time putting your characters through their paces and herding them all in the same direction towards that ending?

Juggling five characters’ points-of-view and delving deeply into what motivates each of them is the latest challenge for bestselling and award winning Aussie author, Tricia Stringer, as she tackles her tenth novel and first Women’s Fiction.

Stringer is already a bestselling and award winning author, with historicals set in Australia’s Flinders Ranges and rural romances. Now, she’s taking to the high seas with her first women’s fiction.

Writing bigger, more complex stories suits Stringer and Table for Eight is, hopefully, the first of many. I started reading her book for research but was hooked from the beginning.

Advice from Stringer for writers is write the story you love to read, do your research – in Stringer’s case she had the onerous task of going for cruises – using photos for inspirations, and writing regularly, preferably daily.

We also chat about doing the rounds of libraries and bookshops, as well as marketing online via blogs, reviews and bookclubs.

You can find out more about Stringer, her books and current marketing tour here.

Knowing When It’s Time to Step Up Your Writing Ambitions, with Ber Carroll

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 04 Oct 2018 23:45:45 -0500

Told in seven first-person voices, The Missing Pieces of Sophie McCarthy, is a new direction for Australian author, Ber Carroll, author of eight contemporary fiction novels. Tightly constructed and difficult to edit, it’s Carroll’s most ambitious novel yet, and if the early reviews are anything to go by, a highly successful novel at that.

Carroll is not a planner and goes where the novel takes her, and Missing Pieces has taken her in a whole new direction. It’s why this is her first novel published under B M Carroll instead of her usual Ber Carroll.

This novel came to Carroll cohesively and she used a coloured spreadsheet to keep track of all her characters. She writes real events with real people pushed to extremes, with strong female characters.

You can find out more about Carroll and her novels here.

#132 What A Career as an Author Looks Like: 10 Years, 15 Books & Gaining Momentum, with Jacquie Underdown

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 24 Sep 2018 06:37:45 -0500

Have you ever wondered what it takes to be a career author? Jacquie Underdown has put in the hours and she’s starting to reap the rewards after ten years of hard work. It’s not an uncommon story.

Underdown set about learning her craft through a A Masters in Writing, Editing & Publishing. Her first contract was an ebook with Harper Collins five years ago, when ebooks were an emerging market with Traditional Publishers (back then, texting was also new).

With over a million words published in novels, novellas and short stories, Underdown has learnt a few things, including the fact that writing is a longterm game, nothing comes easy, and getting a book out takes time, practice, determination and support.

In this episode we discuss the following:

learning the craft
blogging
flow
the longterm game
diverse heroines
the importance of good grammar
reading as a writer
post-novel blues
writing schedules
how life and writing intertwine

You can find out more about Underdown and her books, including her new Christmas novella, here.

#131 Kindle Unlimited or Wide, and Other Vexing Indie Publishing Questions, with Joanne Dannon

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 16 Sep 2018 20:42:34 -0500

There’s no such thing as an overnight success in the writing game – well, maybe occasionally – but there’s a fast establishing pathway to give yourself the best chance of a long and profitable writing career.

First, it takes time and writing more than a few good books, preferably in series, followed by perfecting your marketing and branding, building a loyal following who sign up to your email list, and coming to grips with the vagaries of the available sales platforms.

And that perennial question, should we go Kindle Unlimited or wide with our books?

Someone who has come to grips with all of the above, and more, is Joanne Dannon, bestselling Indie author, and expert in all things Indie Publishing. Fresh home from conferences in both New Zealand and Australia, Dannon is current on what it takes to succeed in the writing game in 2018 and beyond.

But it wasn’t always that way. Joanne, a oft-returning guest on Writer on the Road, has learned the hard way, by doing the work, making a few mistakes along the way, and continually working at her craft and business skills.

In this episode, Dannon shares her tips for aspiring authors (and for those of us who need to brush up on the business side of our writing):

Kindle Unlimited or wide
the importance of writing in series and boxed sets
consistency of book covers
Goal, Motivation & Conflict – the keys to writing a great novel
making mistakes
marketing – D2D and other options
it’s not a competition, silly
the liberation of going Indie
more, lots more

This is my best chat yet with Dannon, who has shared her journey with us from the beginning. She now has fourteen books published and is currently celebrating her most recent boxed set, Kiss Me.

You can find out more about Dannon and her books here.

Origin Stories, Myths & Dragons: How to Write SciFi/Fantasy, with Sherrilyn Kenyon

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 07 Sep 2018 00:33:02 -0500

With over 70 million books sold, Sherrilyn Kenyon is worth listening to when it comes to all things writing. She’s experienced all the trials that we’re familiar with and celebrated all the successes the rest of us dream about.

Stygian, a Dark Hunter Novel, has been named the Best SF and Fantasy novel for August, 2018 by Unbound Worlds. The Dark Hunter series, at twenty-nine and counting, is a #1 International Bestselling series, along with Kenyon’s Deadman’s Cross, Hellchasers and Nevermore Series, to name a few. You won’t run out of books to read anytime soon, and there’s more on the way.

Our conversation ranges across a lot of topics – Kenyon is a delightfully generous guest – as we learn about ancient languages, medieval myths and origin stories. Kenyon’s father was a biblical scholar, her grandfathers, one a Sharman and one an evangelist, and Kenyon herself a scholar of ancient languages, as well as part Celtic and part Cherokee.

Ever heard the expression ‘old as snot’? It’s accurate, as is everything Kenyon writes. In fact, she’s a stickler for accurate dialogue and it’s one of the things that make her books a delight to read (yep, I entered the realm of fantasy and found that I love it:))

And the best news? She’ll be visiting Oz early in 2019.

There’s series, spinoffs, manga and comics, with Kenyon’s books soon to hit the big screen. You can find out more about Kenyon and her books here.

How to Optimise Your LinkedIn Profile and Why You Should, with LinkedIn Expert, Adam Houlahan

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 30 Aug 2018 04:23:59 -0500

Are you a scaling entrepreneur who wants to gain influence by defining who you are and why you matter? Checking your LinkedIn profile is one of the first things a potential connection will do before they reach out to you, and you need make a good impression.

Social Media Strategist and LinkedIn expert, Adam Houlahan, has written a book about it. The LinkedIn Playbook will walk you through the process of optimising your LinkedIn profile and creating a highly professional presence online. Or, if you prefer, join his 12-week Influencer Program here. I did. There’s also a free 4-week course.

What can you do for your ideal client? An easy enough question, but damned hard to answer in a couple of catchy sentences. During our chat, Adam not only tells you how but also why. Then there’s your pitch, headline and summary.

So much to do…here’s a few things we touch on in this episode:

How to personalise your message
Making sure you follow-up
Using a professional profile pic
Why your personal life is irrelevant
Why LinkedIn is not like other social media
The importance of keywords & tags

Are you ready for when the next big opportunity knocks? You can find out more about Adam, and his books and courses here.

#128 Name Your Poison: Writers, Alcohol & The Creative Muse, with Cassandra Gaisford

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 22 Aug 2018 09:04:21 -0500

Are you a grey area drinker? If your writing routine is anything like mine you go about the business of writing all day and knock off in time to do a little editing whilst watching the sunset and enjoying a glass of wine or two…or three.

Imagine my chagrin reading psychologist and author, Cassandra Gaisford’s latest book, Mind Your Drink: The Surprising Joy of Sobriety; Control Alcohol, discovering freedom, find happiness and change your life. Alcohol is a neurotoxin, a flammable liquid and a poison.

So much for romance. In this episode we chat about the following (among other things):

alcohol and our writing productivity
happiness without alcohol
experiencing joy and physical wellbeing
our changing relationship with alcohol
drinking habits (and how they impact on our writing habits)
why giving up alcohol is hard
creative expression and joy
rethinking drinking
a good night’s sleep
stressing less/loving more

There’s also a sobriety journal and a Mind Your Drink workbook. You can find out more about Cassandra and her books, courses, and other writing here.

Disclaimer: as I write this I’m sitting on my verandah, watching the sunset and my drink of choice is lime and soda in a chilled glass with ice and a swizzle stick

#127 How To Self-Publish Your Book, with Alexandra Amor

Melinda Hammond — Sat, 18 Aug 2018 00:52:00 -0500

The world needs your book, says Self-Publishing coach, Alexandra Amor. In the ever-changing world of publishing it’s easy to become overwhelmed and that’s where Amor steps in as she guides your through the publishing maze.

Amor has been an independent author for over ten years. She’s written eleven novels and hosts a mystery podcast (you can find out more her novels and podcast here). She VA’s for Mark Dawson and Joanna Penn. If there are any better testimonials than these pillars of the Self-Publishing world I’m yet to find them.

She offers support and accountability throughout your publishing journey, and has been trained by Life Coach, Martha Beck. Investing in our businesses is the best thing we can do and it makes sense to save money by investing in a good coach. With Amor, you’re in safe hands.

In this episode Amor shares her knowledge on the following:

multiple streams of income
series writing
freedom and money
dictation
side hustles
change
the long game

She also has a great book, ‘The Red Hot Truth About Self-Publishing Your Book’, that’s available for free at the moment. You can find out more here.

#126 What Readers Want in a Novel, with Book Reviewer, Helen Sibbritt

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 21:08:32 -0500

Writers need readers and one way to find readers is through book reviews.

With over 800 romance book reviews under her belt Helen Sibbritt knows a thing or two about what makes a good book and it would be pertinent for the writers amongst us to listen to what she has to say.

She’s what’s known as an Influencer and she always has a review list she’s working her way through.

How do we get onto Sibbritt’s list? Blurbs matter, as do professional covers, and testimonials. Sibbritt often turns to Goodreads and recommendations to find her next good book to read.

She enjoys long lunches with fellow readers – Romance Reader Lunches – and they share recommendations. Word of mouth is king, or should I say queen?

The Australian Romance Readers Association has state chapters and the groups are influential amongst readers.

You can find Helen on Facebook or Twitter sharing her recommendations (I did), or enjoying a long lunch somewhere…you never know, it might be your book she’s recommending next.

#125 When Australian Romance Authors Take on the World, with Alli Sinclair

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 29 Jul 2018 22:19:29 -0500

Australian romance authors are taking on the world with their novels. Hot on the heels of Natasha Lester’s success with The Paris Seamstress, Alli Sinclair’s latest novel, Burning Fields, will be available worldwide in November. Burning Fields is an historical novel set in my part of the world, Far North Queensland, and is touted as an Australian historical with an Italian influence.

During our conversation we chat about the following:

women’s experiences during WW2 and beyond
the role of women in history
researching historical fiction in Australia
what a romance novel is and what it isn’t
exploring the Australian landscape and the potential for stories
the benefits of writing communities, festivals and friendships
women’s perspectives on life and writing
Alli’s next book
Writers Retreats, especially those at sea
the German book market and international translations

Sinclair’s fourth novel was released in Oz and New Zealand in June and the author is busy on the launch trail here in Queensland as I write this. Even more exciting is her Writers At Sea Retreat to New Caledonia with TM Clark, from 30 August to 7 September, 2018.

You can find out more about Alli Sinclair, her books and her retreat here.

#124 Strategically Planning a Writing Career, with Annie Seaton

Melinda Hammond — Sat, 21 Jul 2018 00:01:43 -0500

We talk a lot here at Writer on the Road about what it takes to be a successful author. Today, we’re celebrating the success of one of our favourite authors, Annie Seaton. Our conversation is short and it’s powerful as Seaton shares with us her journey over the last seven years.

Here’s what it takes, Annie Seaton style:

seven years
high energy
never giving up
always pushing forward
seeing results
celebrating the small wins

Congratulations, Annie Seaton, from everyone here at Writer on the Road. We look forward to the next seven years of watching you shine.

You can find out more about Seaton and her books here.

#123 On Being a Real Writer, with Christian White

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 23:18:38 -0500

It’s a question that bugs us all – when do we get to call ourselves a real writer? Christian White, Aussie author of thriller The Nowhere Child shares with us what it feels like to become an overnight success in the literary world.

The Nowhere Child is White’s fifth novel but the first to see light of day. He shares with us his journey from winner of the 2017 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript to signing on with Australian publisher, Affirm Press, to having his novel picked up by publishers around the world. He says his characters will be better travelled than him as they jet off to farflung countries with him hot on their heels.

We all want to be Christian White, and he makes it seem possible for us all to have what he’s got. His overnight success took fifteen years and a firm belief in himself as a writer. Well, maybe not so firm a belief at times, but he stuck to it, and look at him now.

During our conversation, Christian shares with us the following:

the importance of believing in yourself as a writer
the best day jobs (think driving golf carts and selling t-shirts)
the benefits of entering competitions
surrounding yourself with people who believe in you
there is such a thing as an overnight success
being a writer is fun
what it’s like to write book number two
the pure joy of watching yourself be a successful writer for a day

You can find out more about Christian, his journey, and his novel here.

#122 Writing For Your Life: An Indie Publishing Success Story with Bella Andre

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 22:04:14 -0500

Have you ever wondered how to become a bestselling Indie author? Well, here’s the secret: write and write a lot. This is from a woman who has just celebrated selling over 7 million books. Her other secret is to work really hard for a very long time.

Bella Andre is the New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of “The Sullivans”, “The Morrisons” and “The Maverick Billionaires” series.

In this episode we chat about the following:

what it was like starting out when Indie publishing was the ‘wild west’
the importance of good writing habits
writing fast
why ignoring the white noise of social media is important
a love of reading
prioritising your writing
the importance of writing buddies
Conferences and networking
building a community

There’s a lot more to this interview than mere details. It’s the generosity of spirit that Andre exudes. She makes it not only possible but probable that we can do what she’s done. And that’s exciting.

Better still, she’s heading our way, with her first stop in Sydney, then over the paddock to New Zealand and the Romance Writers of New Zealand Conference.

You can find out more about Bella and her books here.

#121 When Writers Collaborate, with Kelly Hunter, Victoria Purman, Cathryn Hein & Fiona McArthur

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 05 Jul 2018 23:16:07 -0500

What do you get when you combine the talents of four of Australia’s top romance authors – Kelly Hunter, Victoria Purman, Cathryn Hein and Fiona McArthur? A bestselling romance series, for a start. And an altogether fun podcast, notwithstanding the challenges of keeping track of the number of awards, novels, and accolades these ladies have notched up between them over the years.

In the crowded and competitive field of romance, these ladies stand out – as does their latest venture, a rural romance series smattered with runaway brides, historic homesteads, and quaint country towns full of characters we all recognise.

The secret behind the success of the multi-series, The Outback Brides: Maggie’s Run, Bella’s Secret, Elsa’s Stand and Holly’s Heart, is the chemistry between its authors.

Mark Dawson, author and podcaster, says ‘collaborating on a writing project can be both enjoyable and profitable if done properly…it can challenge you and make you a better writer.’ These four women were already at the top of the romance pack before they joined forces. Combining their strengths, story telling, technical expertise was always going to be a win-win for both the writers and their readers.

In this episode we get down to the nitty-gritty:

communication
project planning
time management
accountability

You can find out more about the authors here: Kelly Hunter here, Victoria Purman here, Cathryn Hein here, and Fiona McArthur here.

The Art of Travel-Inspired Novel Writing, with Janice Horton

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 27 Jun 2018 21:05:33 -0500

Travel fiction has a long tradition. Think Gulliver’s Travels, by Jonathon Swift, On the Road, by Jack Kerouac, and more recently, The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger and The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall-Smith. The list is endless.

Janice Horton’s, The Backpacking Housewife, is in fine company, and although Horton is experiencing something like an overnight success with her new novel, it’s actually her thirteenth. Like most overnight successes, there’s a lot of hard work and learning her craft that has led her to this point. And a lot of travel.

Being in the right spot at the right time has brought this travel adventurer a bit of luck – or so it seems at first glance – when she ran into a Harper Impulse executive who invited her to write a novel for Harper line, which Horton immediately set about doing in a three hundred year old French castle surrounded by vineyards for inspiration.

It’s only on hearing Horton’s whole story that we learn her success has nothing to do with luck and everything to do with honing her craft over twelve novels and four years of writing fiction.

Francine Prose writes about The Art of Travel Inspired Novel Writing in Travel & Leisure magazine, stating, “Creating great travel-inspired novels means channeling the voices, thoughts, and perspectives of an imaginary foreigner.” You can read the full article here.

You can find out more about Janice, her books and her inspiring lifestyle here.

And if you’re looking for a great travel fiction read to inspire your next trip, try scrolling through the 1,000 blog posts on TripFiction.com here – or you can just use the search tool but who knows what adventure you might miss

You can find a list of popular travel fiction on Goodreads here.

Accountability, Clarity & Mindset: Success Traits For Entrepreneurs

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 21 Jun 2018 20:45:31 -0500

Success comes in all shapes and sizes and it seems successful people share similar habits. A strong success mindset requires vision, strategy, focus, grit, consistency, and positive positive habits.

Kim Argentsinger is a creative entrepreneur, coach and writer. It’s her job to help us get out of our own way and create a plan to take us to the next level, to find our own version of success.

What are our core business values? What lights us up? Kim shares her tips on morning routines, positive intentions and keeping things real. Build relationships, not social media likes. Ask questions. Know what you want and double down to get it. Did I mention branding? Brand clarity is a must.

Last, there’s that pesky accountability question; what happens if we don’t follow through? The artist’s brain is full of insecurities and fears. Kim suggests we take show ourselves a little compassion, that we take a holistic view of what success means to us as individuals, businesswomen and creatives.

She helps us seek clarity about our dreams and how best to achieve them.

You can find out more about Kim and her coaching services here.

Bikers, Millionaires & Military Men: Writing The Romantic Hero, With Jackie Ashenden

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 10 Jun 2018 21:18:39 -0500

The Business of Entrepreneurship, with Classy Career Girl Founder, Anna Runyan

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 28 May 2018 03:01:27 -0500

Are you ready to invest in yourself to achieve your goals? Do you know what your ideal workday looks like? Do you need a step by step process to help you get where you want to go with your life? Anna Runyan, founder of Classy Career Girl, has a Corporate Rescue Plan just for you. In fact, she’s just launched Corporate Rescue Plan 2.0.

Stuck? Anna runs a bootcamp to get you unstuck. She also has a free list of 75 tools to help you launch your new career plan (I saw it on Instagram).

Her keys to success include growing your audience, picking your platform and being consistent. The word ‘focus’ pops up a lot. There’s a 90 day planner (the trick is to focus on the top three things on your list each week), batching time and to focus on revenue producing activities (yep, that word again). Validate your ideas, build a community and create excitement around what you’re doing.

The trick is to serve your market, work to your strengths and consistently produce valuable content.

Named as one of Forbes thirty-five most influential career sites, and read by millions of women every week, the Classy Career Girl website has earned its stripes.

Anna knows more than most about how to achieve your greatest dreams. A former career coach, Anna runs one of the top career podcasts for women, has been named Woman of the Year, and is a speaker at the Global Leadership forum. So when she speaks it’s not a bad idea to listen – and she shares her knowledges with us here at Writer on the Road for nearly an hour.

You can find out more about Anna, her Corporate Rescue Plan and more here.

Turning To Crime: Writing Colonial Mysteries, with Alison Stuart

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 17 May 2018 05:54:38 -0500

Curious about how an author goes about building a world to create a series? Alison Stuart, Australian author of historical fiction set around the time of the Civil War, is embarking on a new project, the Harriet Gordon Mysteries, the first of which, Singapore Sapphire, is set in 1910 Singapore and will be released early in 2019. You can find out more here.

Alison spent three years living in Singapore as an ex-pat wife and used the time to hone her writing skills. She is a lawyer and past president of the Romance Writers of Australia.

Our conversation ranges from how to write a crime novel to the intricacies of Scrivener as a word management system and the importance of writing groups. You can find out more about Alison and her writing here.

This week’s sponsor is Paul Brodie’s The Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program. You can find out more here.

#115 How To Market Your Book: The Five Stages Of The Reader’s Journey, with David Gaughran

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 10 May 2018 21:25:27 -0500

‘Self publishing hasn’t just arrived, it’s taken over,’ says a man who knows. David Gaughran, champion of Indie authors, and author of several versions of Let’s Get Digital and Let’s Get Visible, has released a new bible for us, Strangers To Superfans, A Marketers Guide To The Readers’ Journey.

Think discoverability, visibility, consideration, purchase and advocacy, and you’ve got most things covered. The trouble is, most of us don’t think enough about these things, or at least, we haven’t until now. David talks us through failure points, optimising each stage of the reader’s journey to increase conversions, boosting sales, and best of all, passionate readers.

‘Writers need less convincing to self publish and more tools to do it effectively,’ says David, and being the man he is, he set about giving the rest of us the very tools we need. And just in case you’re interested, my favourite fiction novel of David’s is Mercenary, about Lee Christmas, a hard-headed drifter who changes the fate of a nation. How can you resist?

You can find out more about superfans, getting visible and digital, and David’s fiction here. You might also like to check out his blog. It’s got everything you need to know about Indie publishing, along with a great free guide, Amazon Decoded. Be prepared to stay awhile once you visit.

This week’s sponsor is Paul Brodie’s The Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program. You can find out more here.

Advising Young Women in Business by Studying The Masters In Leadership, with Robyn Wilson

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 25 Apr 2018 08:30:56 -0500

Working with millennials is rewarding because young entrepreneurs think differently. New ways of thinking, getting rid of the past and working with new technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, is the way forward. Any of these things sound familiar?

Robyn Wilson, educator and lifestyle designer, is at the forefront of a revolution, or if you like, a changing of the guard, and she’s right in there making a difference where it counts. Think Ken Robinson. Think the Khan Academy. Even the way we learn nowadays is different. Deny the obvious at your peril. Pushing boundaries, removing fears and valuing creativity are what Building Intelligence Leadership is all about, B/L for short.

Fit For Purpose brings together fifteen high performing leaders to share their views on the future directions of business leadership. Robyn has her viewpoint and people are listening. With a background in education and coaching, Robyn has made sure she has stayed abreast of the changes in business leadership and she is passing on what she knows to the next generation. Can we afford not to listen to her message? I think not.

You can find out more about Robyn and her ideas on business leadership here.

This week’s sponsor is Paul Brodie’s The Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program. You can find out more here.

The Rhymes & Writings of Aussie Bush Poet, Tim Borthwick

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 17 Apr 2018 21:32:19 -0500

There’s nothing better than kicking back around the campfire in outback Australia and listening to a bush poetry slam. Humour, larrikanism and more than a little heartbreak often make up mood of most bush poetry, all of it heartfelt, and most of it inspired by the poet’s personal experiences. Enter Tim Borthwick, quiet and unassuming, but also your quintessential, outback Aussie bloke. Waltzing Australia is a collection of his poems, with the added bonus of a yarn accompanying each poem. The collection is recited by another Aussie icon, Jack Thompson, but today, Tim also recites one of his poems for us. You have to listen to the end for that one.

Tim Borthwick is a Bronze Swagman Award-winning writer of original bush poetry. From a young age he loved to read the poems of Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson, captivated by their ability to tell a story through rhyme and rhythm. Born on a sheep and cattle station in western Queensland, Tim has spent most of his life on the land, and has a great love for the people and stories of the Australian outback. Tim lives in Toowoomba, Queensland, and gets out to the bush whenever he can.

You can find out more about Tim and his poetry here.

#112 It’s The Journey That Matters: A Healthy Writing Life, With Joanna Penn

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 12 Apr 2018 05:11:05 -0500

The life of an Indie writer is a busy one – what with writing, taking care of business, family life, eating, exercising and down time – so is it any wonder we need a little help occasionally to re-align our priorities, and get our lives back into balance.

Today’s guest, Joanna Penn, teamed up with Dr Evan Lawson to write The Healthy Writer, and in it she shares her personal journey to achieving balanced, healthy writing lifestyle. Walking, yoga, sleep, community and a healthy workspace are a few of the things we touch on, but Joanna also shares the importance of comparing ourselves only to where we’ve come from and not to others, learning to stop and take a break, and framing our challenges in a positive way.

Joanna is an award-nominated New York Times & USA Today Bestselling Author of Thrillers and she also writes non-fiction. Starting her writing journey in 2010 here in Oz with The Year of the Novel, she’s gone on to publish nine non-fiction books and seventeen fiction stories. She talks about the importance of scheduling, of finishing what you start and building a body of work.

You can learn more about Joanna and her non-fiction books here and her thrillers, written as JF Penn, here.

This week’s sponsor is Paul Brodie’s The Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program. You can find out more here.

#111 Deep Writing, with Kevin Tumlinson

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 06 Apr 2018 00:41:28 -0500

Kevin Tumlinson has just returned from a road trip and he has a few secrets to share. You see, he learned a few things out there on the road about the writing process and his novels are all the better for the time he spent on the prairies. And Kevin, being Kevin, is ever generous in sharing what he’s learned.

The single most important thing Kevin has discovered over forty-three novels is that deep thinking leads to deep writing. It’s vital that we give our brains time off to ponder the deeper meaning behind our ideas. And reading good writing is the best way to learn how to write good words.

But it’s not just about putting words on the page. The ways to market our books are also changing. It’s getting more personal as authors reach out to their readers through direct marketing via email lists. Kevin talks us through his process of engaging loyal fans in the writing and marketing process for all his books. Being personal and relatable are key. He stopped advertising months ago and now relies on his street team, email list and interaction with his fans.

Then there’s the dynamic Indie Publishing environment that Kevin knows so much about in his role as Marketing Manager for Draft2Digital publishing. It’s still early days in the Indie Publishing and there’s so much more to come as the quality of author products continue to improve. Audio, direct sales and an increasing acceptance of Indie authors as writers of quality books. D2D continues to add to its list of services to complement its Universal Book Links, with Book Tabs, Author Pages and Print Solutions all available to D2D’s customers.

Kevin’s latest novel, The Girl In The Mayan Tomb, is out now and he’s already deep into the writing of his next book, The Antarctic Forgery (working title). You can find out more about Kevin and his novels here.

And don’t forget to check out this week’s sponsor, Paul Brodie’s The Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program, here.

Hard Work, Luck & Timing: How To Write A Bestseller, with Natasha Lester

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 26 Mar 2018 22:49:01 -0500

Sagas are back!! The Paris Seamstress is the right novel at the right time for Australian Author, Natasha Lester. How much will a young Parisian seamstress sacrifice to make her mark in the male-dominated world of 1940s New York fashion?

Labelled as a novel of ‘hope, heartache and a journey of discovery’ by Books & Publishing, Natasha’s much touted latest novel is finally available – yep, it’s launch day.

If you are enamoured by Tiffany’s and New York City’s garment district then you’re going to love this one. In fact, all of Natasha’s books are about to be published in the UK by Sphere.

Natasha is suddenly what we all know as an overnight success. But if you want to know the real truth behind what goes into writing a bestseller, then Natasha shares with us the highs and lows – and everything in between – of the writing process, from pre-drafts, the first discovery draft, and all the drafts after that, about six in total for Natasha.

From research trips to watching documentaries and listening to podcasts, Natasha shares with us the story behind the story of The Paris Seamstress. Then there’s meaty issue of dual narratives that kept Natasha awake for more than a few nights as she learnt the intricacies of tying the two narratives of her latest novel into one seamless whole.

Know anything about daily life in another era, about underwear and when doorbells were invented? And then there’s the next novel, tentatively titled The French Photographer, and here we chat about museums, chateaus and Christian Dior.

But the one big take-away from our chat – and there are lots of take-aways – is that ideas take time. They need to be ready, to incubate, and that other art-forms are a great source of inspiration.

You can find out more about Natasha, her books, and the writing process here.

This week’s podcast is sponsored by the Book Publishing For Authors Implementation Program, soon to be shortened to Get Published, and put together by eleven time bestselling author, Paul Brodie. You can find out more here.

#109 How To Succeed At Self-Publishing, with Joanne Dannon

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 22 Mar 2018 00:15:53 -0500

Learn how to self-publish before you choose to self-publish, is the sage advice of self-publishing expert, Joanne Dannon. It’s easy to upload your book, but it’s a lot harder to sell your book, develop your brand and make a living from your writing.

Step 1 is to write a good book, followed by professional editing rounds, formatting, cover design and uploading to the various sales platforms.

Then, there’s the business side of things; your website, blog, social media strategy, and mailing list. Did I mention being consistent with your brand from the start, which will save you the pain of having to re-jig everything down the track?

Still want to self-publish? Good.

Joanne has published thirteen books, and she’s made it her business to learn the business of self-publishing. The rewards are more than merely financial. You are in control of your business and making mistakes is all part of the learning process.

Luckily, there are great courses, blogs, conferences and people out there to smooth your journey. Being professional is a great place to start, and there’s no-one better to listen to than Joanne when it comes to being professional about self-publishing.

I’ve been teasing her about being the next Bella Andre – but secretly I think Joanne is already successful in her own right. You can find out more about Joanne and her books here.

This week’s podcast is sponsored by the beautiful Sherrie McCarthy over at Creative Mermaids. You can find out more here. And your can find out more about our our Writing Programs here.

#108 The Secret Life of Authors Revealed, with Rachael Johns, Lisa Ireland & Sally Hepworth

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 14 Mar 2018 23:19:12 -0500

How much fun can three Aussie Romance Authors have? Rachael Johns, Lisa Ireland and Sally Hepworth share their secrets of living their lives as professional writers, including making the time to write, pushing through the resistance, finding your tribe and more, much more.

The trio chat about word-counts, trusting in the process and accountability. Committing to the writing life is a choice, and it’s not for everyone, but if you’re an aspiring author, or an author on your own writing journey, then these ladies have something to share with you. A few gems; if it’s easy, forget it, don’t reject yourself, fracking around (not sure what this one’s about but I’m going to listen again to find out:), just put your work out there, and don’t lose faith in yourself. There’s also a wonderful thing called a Freedom App, which turns everything else off, and leaves you to write undistracted, something I’m checking out as I type this.

Rachael, Lisa and Sally have published over thirty books between them, with Sally having just released her novel, Lisa is next and Rachael later in the year. They not only know what they’re talking about, they’re generous in sharing their knowledges. You can find out more about Rachael here, Lisa here, and Sally, here. Don’t forget to subscribe to The Secret Life of Authors newsletter on any of their websites.

This week’s podcast is sponsored by Sherrie McCarthy over at Creative Mermaids. You can check out her ever growing band of creatives here.

#107 A Passion For Writing; Making a Living Doing What You Love, With The Cooking Ladies

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 06 Mar 2018 07:01:21 -0500

From working seven days a week as restauranteurs to a self-funded life on the road in an eleven metre motorhome, Phyllis Hinz and Lamont Mackay, have lived the life most of us dream about. More commonly known as The Cooking Ladies, the duo have cruised the United States and Canada, and gathered more than a little infamy along the way. Am I jealous? You bet. Phyllis and Lamont have dared to follow their passion and made a huge success out of doing it.

With sponsored travel/cookery books to freelance writing for magazines and more than a few of their own Indie-published books, these ladies have attacked their freelance lifestyle with both professionalism and zeal. That the rest of us can learn from them is a given. Their latest book, Let’s Get Grilling, is their first foray into traditional publishing, and is an object of beauty for both its images as well as its travel tales. And, lucky for us, the ladies have provided two copies of their book for me to give away.

Food, travel and writing have a way of going together. From the people you meet to the places you visit, there’s always a story to tell. For Phyllis and Lamont, it’s been a combination of hard work, business savvy and meticulous planning. Very little is left to chance with this pair, as you’ll hear. And their best piece of advice, always have a pitch ready that tells what you can do for others. Oh, and always say “Sure” when someone asks you to do something because you never know what opportunities lay ahead.

You can find out more about The Cooking Ladies, their travel tales, recipes and books here.

#106 Travel, Work & Play; The Life of a Digital Nomad, with Barbaralicious

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 22:28:54 -0500

Ever wondered about taking your work on the road and combining it with travel and pleasure? The freedom to do exactly that is common for more people than you think. Co-working spaces solve most problems in relation to internet connections, skill-sharing, meet-ups and events. There’s a growing community out there who can tell you where to go, what to see and how to get your work done. An added bonus is the friends you make along the way.

Barbaralicious is what’s known as an influencer in the digital nomad space, and her philosophy on life is the things that make us happy are not material possessions but what we give back. Today, she chats with us about the sixteen books she’s published – one a month – the fifty countries she visited and all the tricks and tips she’s learned along the way. She runs a travel blog for digital nomads and online workers, and she’s worked hard to establish her brand, publishing City Guides for Digital Nomads.

Barbara funds her travels through her books, articles, affiliate links and sponsorship. As she says, some days are better than others and often her traveling and accommodation style fluctuates with her fortunes. However, with the rise of housesitting as an option, being single and footloose can have its advantages.

Making a living – and a lucrative one – can be done. And that’s where social media comes in. With over 40,000 followers on and a large email list, Barbara doesn’t have much trouble reaching out to her followers. Whilst uploading this podcast it was easy to track Barbara down. She’s off home to Europe from a long stay in Asia but she’s already planning on coming back. Did I mention she speaks Italian, Spanish, German and French, after studying languages at university?

You can find out more about Barbara, her travel guides and her blog advice here.

This week’s podcast is sponsored by my 30 Days To Better Writing Habits. You can find out more here.

#105 Writing Through The Messy Middle with Creative Mermaid, Sherrie McCarthy

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 23 Feb 2018 03:02:44 -0500

We all have good days and bad days with our writing, but spare a thought for today’s guest where a good day is a very good day indeed and a bad day could sink her boat. Sherrie McCarthy, founder of Creative Mermaids, encourages us all to live our most creative and vibrant lives – and have fun along the way. You can find out more about Sherrie and her Creative Mermaids here.

Today’s podcast is sponsored by 30 Days To Better Writing Habits. Starting with a blank page can be scary. Getting into a writing habit takes time. Day 1 is only the beginning. By the end of your thirty days you should have an organised writing routine to help you write the book of your dreams. You can join us here.

#104 Squeezing Your Writing Into The Gaps of Your Life, With Clare Connelly

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 13 Feb 2018 23:13:55 -0500

Harlequin Mills & Boon sell a book every four seconds, and today I’m chatting with Australian Romance Author, Clare Connelly, to learn the secrets to writing a romance novel. You also get to tweet your pitch for a chance to win one of four copies of Clare’ M&B Dare romance, Off Limits.

Clare’s first tip is to write a lot and write often – it was going to be the title of this podcast but I couldn’t resist the idea of using a title that we can all relate to – and like Tracey Pedersen’s ‘write a million word in a year group, Clare is a member of the Romance Writers of Australia Wordcount Warriors, so she practices what she preaches (she also mentions that she can write 1000 words in 20-30 minutes which would help:)).

With three Presents, three Dares and an Indie novel coming out this year – and most of those word already written – Clare’s working on a bigger project, a commercial women’s fiction. As for time management, she says she does what she has to do to get the writing done.

Conferences are life-changing, and Clare shares the secrets to pitching to an agent at a Conference. With this year’s RWA Conference in Sydney coming up, it’s a good time to hone your pitches and send them to us at @clarewriteslove or @melinda_hammond.

There’s also the immediate opportunity to pitch to Mills & Boon’s Romance Blitz, where you’re guaranteed editorial feedback. The opportunities are endless.

You can find out more about Clare and her novels here.

This week’s episode is brought to you by my 30 Days to Better Writing Habits. You can find out more here.

Happy writing xx

#103 How to Write a Million Words a Year the Romantic Way, with Tracey Pedersen

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 07 Feb 2018 01:02:42 -0500

Grow you email list, network and promote your books, is the advice that prolific romance author, Tracey Pedersen, shares with us today and she makes it sound so easy. But listen a little closer and you’ll learn the real secret. Bum on chair and write.

Tracey is dedicated to her craft and she’s learnt everything she knows along the way. She calls it taking action through a constant stream of baby steps. Her romantic comedy, Married This Year, is the first in a new series and is proving to be her most popular book yet.

She has grown her email list from a few hundred to over 16,000 by following Nick Stephenson’s advice in Your First 10,000 Customers and she has carried out joint promotions with other authors from Stephenson’s Dream Team Network. I’ve bought the first, and joined the latter but Tracey’s done the hard slog, written sixteen books and counting, and has worked her way through Mark’s course with determination.

She attended 20 Books to $50K in Las Vegas last November, and is currently taking part in a Million Word in a Year challenge. As she says, it’s only 3000 words a day, which doesn’t sound nearly as daunting, does it? Tracey should know. She’s given up her day job and is living comfortably off her Indie income. Freedom, it seems, is just another word for bum on chair and doing the hard yards.

And in case you’re wondering, yes, I’ve joined Tracey and her million word challenge. Small steps, you said Trace?

You can find out more about Tracey and her success story here. And there’s a great article she wrote for Mark’s blog where she gives the rest of us a gentle nudge in the right direction. You can find the article here.

This week’s episode is sponsored by 30 Days to Better Writing Habits. You can join me daily at 9.00am over at my Facebook page here or sign up for my newsletter and receive a free copy of The Voices in Your Head Writing Guidelines.

#102 The Thing About Freelance Writing, with Lindy Alexander

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 30 Jan 2018 22:51:43 -0500

If you’ve ever thought of supplementing your income with a bit of travel writing, dabbling with magazine writing or becoming a serious full time freelancer, then sit back and listen as Lindy Alexanders shares what she’s learnt along the way to earning $100k a year as a freelance writer. Here are some of the things we discuss:

Being a fast, trusted and reliable writer
The shift towards digital pay rates lifting
Compelling personal stories
Developing relationships
Inflight magazines
Research
How to pitch
Finding ideas
Testimonials
Taking good pics
Managing workflow
Saying no
Biggest fails

If it all sounds romantic, then you’re right, it is. But it’s also hard work and you need to be professional in your approach if you want to be the go-to writer for editors. You can find out more about Lindy and her year of freelancing, and subscribe to her newsletter here.

This week’s podcast sponsor is Travel Writers Radio. You can listen here.

Girlpreneur: the Theory & Practice of Entrepreneur Education

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 24 Jan 2018 05:59:07 -0500

The world needs more daydreamers. It’s okay to fail. How do we enable our girls? These are just a few of the ideas up for discussion with Col Jones, entrepreneur educator at Queensland University. Then there’s Sam, Girlpreneur, out there doing her way. I call it when theory meets practice. And it makes for interesting listening for the rest of us watching from the sidelines.

As teachers, we know when we’re successful when our students are capable of creating their own opportunities for satisfaction. Sam’s done that but neither she nor I are sure how, or why, and that’s where Col comes in, naming more than a few of the qualities Sam and I take for granted in our small world, but ones we know are far harder to come by in educational institutions, that is, schools.

Col lists the six attributes students can develop through entrepreneur education; intellectually, close friendships, independence in value judgements, tolerance of ambiguity, an uncommon interest in the common place and a balanced sense of humour. Most of Col’s students are already passionate by the time they get to him and it’s his job to set up the environment for their future learning. He talks about entrepreneurial competencies and his students being able to create their own opportunities though their adaptive capacities. He also writes books on entrepreneurial education and is currently working on a manifesto on how to teach entrepreneurship. But the real secret, he says, is getting out of students’ ways, and creating a space where they can gain confidence in their abilities by walking in an entrepreneur’s shoes.

This is not the first podcast chat I’ve enjoyed with Col and it won’t be the last. He’s even set me some homework, reading A Primer for the Philosophy of Education, by Samuel Rocha. I’ll try to get hold of Col’s manifesto for teaching entrepreneurship, too. You can find out more about Col, his books and his teaching here.

As for Sam, she’s promised she’ll join me on the podcast again but only if I give her the questions first. Go figure, my daughter lost for words. And I have the evidence to prove it. Thanks, Sam. Love you. xx

#100 Creativity & Entrepreneurship: Skills For The 21st Century

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 24 Jan 2018 04:26:56 -0500

Creating something from nothing is the entrepreneur’s most important skill. Discipline and art is what makes it happen. Jarie Bolander, Editor in Chief of the Daily MBA and author of The Entrepreneur Ethos: How to Build a More Ethical, Inclusive and Resilient Entrepreneur Community,unpacks the internal workings of what it takes to be an entrepreneur. He talks about the traits entrepreneurs need, the internal challenges we face on a daily basis and the importance of leading from within. Jarie shares tips on how to build success into our daily lives, including how creativity on a deadline is the best kind of deadline, why telling stories matter, the importance of timing and how best to foster the leadership skills we need to succeed. What we do matters and Jarie talks us through the entrepreneur ethos in a way that not only gives us permission to follow our passion but to build a better world doing it. You can find out more about Jarie, his books and coaching here.

Sponsorship of this week’s episode is by BrodieEDU. You can set up a 15 minute call with Paul so he can answer any questions that you have about the publishing and marketing process with your book here.

#99 Summer Reading & Writing Series, with Darry Fraser

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 01:11:31 -0500

Happy summer reading, everyone. Meet Darry Fraser, author of historical and contemporary fiction. You can find out more about Darry and her novels, Daughter of the Murray and Where the Murray River Runs, here.

I asked my Summer Reading Series guests four questions in an attempt to peek behind the scenes of the life of a writer:

What books influenced you as a writer?
Where do you write?
What do your readers most often want to know about you?
What are you reading now?

We hope you enjoy our Summer Reading & Writing Series. Happy New Year everyone. xx

#98 Summer Reading & Writing Series: This Writing Life, with Tess Woods

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 28 Dec 2017 01:32:29 -0500

I asked my Summer Reading Series guests four questions in an attempt to peek behind the scenes of the life of a writer:

What books influenced you as a writer?
Where do you write?
What do your readers most often want to know about you?
What are you reading now?

We hope you enjoy our Summer Reading & Writing Series. Happy New Year everyone. See you in 2018 xx

Research Matters: Tools for Writing Historical Fiction, with Tea Cooper

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 18 Dec 2017 00:06:16 -0500

A conversation with Australian author, Tea Cooper, where we discuss all things research, from the wonders of Trove to the delights of local folk museums spawning treasures that bring added life to our stories. You can find out more about Tea and her novels here.

It’s 5 o’clock Somewhere; Writing on the Road & Making Money Doing It, With Joe Russo

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 05 Dec 2017 23:13:56 -0500

Freedom’s just another word for taking the leap, and getting out there and doing it. Word is, it’s not as scary as it seems. Joe Russo, of We’re The Russos, should know. He’s written a book about it, Take Risks; One Couple’s Journey to Quit Their Jobs & Hit The Open Road. Not only is it possible to live the dream and travel the world, it’s possible to make money doing it. Best of all, you don’t need to be a tech junkie or have all the you-beaut equipment. A computer, an iPhone and a reliable internet connection is all it takes. That, plus the ability to write and talk your way into an income. Best of all, once you’re out there, you’ll meet lots of like-minded souls on the same journey. Joe talks about Youtube, the importance of your website, social media, books, Patreon and more, but the message is the same for all of us making a living from our writing. Multiple streams of income matter. Being able to diversify offers flexibility. The rest is in the doing – think it’s always 5 o’clock somewhere. Joe & Kait are building up quite a following as they demystify the living on the road lifestyle. Their first book was about taking the leap. Their next book, in the writing, is about making a living on the road. You can find out more about Joe, Kait and their travels here.

This week’s sponsorship of the podcast is courtesy of Paul Brodie, President of BrodieEDU – you can find out more about Paul and watch his free webinar about the three secrets on how to market your own book to a #1 Bestseller in the next 90 days here.

The Voices In Your Head; Daily Intentions & A Healthy Writing Mindset, With Brian Burkard

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 29 Nov 2017 22:38:18 -0500

Are you ready for a few top mindset strategies to help you deal with fear, ego and money? Brian Burkard, of the Marketing Mindset Podcast, mixes it with the experts and today he shares his mindset toolkit with us.

Developing a growth mindset isn’t easy but there are a few tricks, like starting your day by setting your intentions rather than reacting to other people’s agendas. Living your dream, never giving up, reminding yourself that now is always the best time to start and sticking with whatever it is you’ve started for however long it takes.

Limiting beliefs, the shiny object syndrome and comparisonitis all work together, often in tandem, to derail our best intentions if we let them. It also pays to remind ourselves that there’s rarely a beast called overnight success. Instead, there are systems. Act fast. Be focused. Learn from failure.

And the one I like best, find yourself an accountability partner, a coach, or someone who will help you commit to your goals. And remember, inspiration comes from within, and your hero is yourself ten years from now. You can find out more about Brian and download your mindset toolkit here.

Our sponsorship this week is courtesy of Paul Brodie at BrodieEDU – you can find out more about Paul and download his free video series on becoming a bestselling author here.

Getting Started on Your Writing Journey, With Judy Lawn

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 19 Nov 2017 19:38:50 -0500

‘Where do I start?’ is the question Judy Lawn, author and Creative Writing Teacher, is most often asked in her writing classes. That, and where to find ideas. Her advice is always the same. Study good stories in depth and find out why they work. Look at the dialogue, setting and characters, the backstory and point of view. Never stop learning and don’t be put off by what others tell you. Take heart and write. Pluck up the courage and just start. Judy has been teaching writing classes for nearly twenty years and she has a few tricks to get our writing muscles working. Today we talk about ideas maps, sentences, key words and proverbs. We talk about using the five senses and polishing our writing till it sings. This is a podcast about writing and why good writing matters. Judy should know. She’s been published anywhere and everywhere, from Woman’s Weekly and Woman’s Day through to New Zealand’s Literary Journal, Takahe. She’s the author of Creative Writing and Take Heart & Write. You can find out more about Judy and her books here.

#93 Creating a Work/Life Balance, with Annie Seaton

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 13 Nov 2017 20:25:27 -0500

Have you ever thought about sitting down and planning exactly what you want your writing life to look like? Annie Seaton – author of Kakadu, Daintree and Diamond Sky, along with countless other novels over the last five years – takes a breath and shares with us, not only her writing journey to date, but how she’s fighting hard to gain some kind of balance to the crazy thing we call our writing lives. Annie’s the first to admit she’s driven to succeed and sometimes there’s more work than play in her life. But all that’s changing as she sets new goals and works out what the next stage of her journey will look like. More single titles, showcasing the depth and maturity in her writing, along with the romances she’s always loved to write. If she writes everything she wants to next year her word count will hit 440k, but it’s time to find a balance. Think a bit of gardening, walks on the beach with the dog and the occasional road trip, and things start to sound a little more sane. Annie calls it putting a few eggs in your personal basket. Our chat today ranges from dispelling a few of the myths about the writing life, to establishing your brand and positioning yourself on social media. She also mentioned something about being disciplined. Annie’s latest release, Come Back to Me, is out now. She also has a sixty-page book, Tips & Tricks for Aspiring Authors, which she updated especially for us. You can find out more about Annie, her books and her adventures here.

#92 The Six-Figure Travel Writer, with Gabi Logan

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 24 Oct 2017 20:29:41 -0500

Ever wanted to try your hand at travel writing? The first thing you need to do is identify what’s motivating you; being published, freedom to travel or free trips? Once you know your motivation the rest falls into place, especially if you listen to the advice of Travel Writing Coach and journalist, Gabi Logan, or read her book, The Six-Figure Travel Writing Roadmap. Or sign up for her webinar series. Or, best, tap into her Dream of Travel Writing database that lists all the gigs available each week. Make no mistake, it’s not easy, nor is blogging and hoping someone will notice you the way to go (tip: Gabi earns more guest posting for others and doesn’t have a blog of her own). Gabi’s advice is for those of us interested in the business side of travel writing, where the single best secret is showing up and doing the work. In this episode, Gabi chats with us about establishing credibility, where to look for the best gigs, pitching, attending conferences and how the best stories may just be around the corner. More importantly, she shares her tips on creative energy, managing your time, and gaining a work/life balance. You can find out more about Gabi and the business of travel writing here and here.

How to Write a Book & Get it Published, with Paul Brodie

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 16 Oct 2017 20:16:52 -0500

Do you crave the freedom to do what you’re passionate about? If that means getting your book out there and being an authority in your field then you’re in the right place. Ask yourself what are you willing to invest and what it’s costing you not to have your book out there, and you start to get the idea of the power of Brodie’s reasoning.

Committing to the decision to write and publish your book is yours and it’s Brodie’s job to help you create the frameworks and systems to make it happen. His secret? Three words: accountability, focus and implementation. He not only guides you through the process of writing and publishing your book, but also how to launch it and build your audience. There’s a lot more but you get the idea.

If you missed Episode 81, then it’s worth a listen, too. Actually, I could listen to this man all day but that’s not the idea. The idea is to be motivated to write with Brodie in your corner. Start with the freebies, three hours of up-to-date audio, Book Publishing for Authors, watch the free webinar, and buy his book. You’ll find it may just be only the beginning of your journey with this man. I know it’s mine.

You can find out more about Brodie and his coaching business here and access the free give-aways using the links below. Enjoy!

Get Published Webinar Link: http://www.onlinemeetingnow.com/register/?id=lrcmzxh7qg

Book Publishing for Authors Free Audiobook Link: http://www.brodieedu.com/bpfa

Creating a Writing Life, with Tamsin Janu

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 20:48:15 -0500

Interested in literary festivals, school visits and speaking gigs as part of your writing schedule? Award-winning Australian author, Tasmin Janu includes the Adelaide Writers Festival and the Premier’s Awards on her resume, Scholastic publishes her books and she makes her living from her writing life, with the occasional day job thrown in. And she’s young. From studying law and international and global studies, to being the remote community youth worker, to globe-trotter, Tamsin has packed a lot into her young life. Her first book, Figgy in the World, is set in Ghana, and it’s followed up with Figgy and the President, and Figgy Takes the City. And now there’s Blossom, a story about a young girl who finds a strange new friend on her doorstep. If you want to know the secret to Janu’s success it’s consistency – yeah, I asked – and knowing your market. Read a lot in your genre (the current stuff), be yourself and write what you want to write. Oh, and being able to write a couple of thousand words in a day is nifty, too. Make friends, network and don’t forget to join a Writers Association. Listening to Janu talk I feel like I’m learning from an expert, which I am. She knows her stuff, and lucky for us, she’s generous with her knowledge. You can find out more about Janu’s books and story here.

Rich Pickings: Where to Find Story Ideas, with Fiona McArthur

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 04 Oct 2017 01:30:47 -0500

Write every day, start that book and keep going forward. If you think it sounds like good advice then you’re in for a treat. Fiona McArthur knows what she’s talking about. With nearly forty romance and a couple of non-fiction books to her name, two million sales, translated into twelve languages, it’s not a bad effort for this quiet country author who just happens to set her books in exotic outback locations. Sit back and listen as we journey to remote outback Australia, and learn about the allure of the outback for so many Australian writers. Strong capable heroines who rely on their own strengths to save the day coupled with locations that make for drama that would test the strongest characters, male or female. Throw in babies who wait for no man or woman to make their entrance, and you have all the ingredients for great stories. The Baby Doctor, McArthur’s newest release, is already 28 on the iTunes and The Homestead Girls, released in 2015, is still featuring prominently on the charts. All this for a writer who took ten years to sell her first novel. It’s an episode worth savouring. You can find out more about McArthur and her books at www.fionamcarthurauthor.com

Making Stuff Up: From Non-Fiction to Fiction Author, with Julie Schooler

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 28 Sep 2017 21:25:48 -0500

How many assets do you own from your writing? Julie Schooler shares with us why it’s important to take care of your writing business even as you add more assets to your list. In Julie’s case, it’s meant a switch from non-fiction to trying her hand at fiction and she shares with us the struggles and joys of writing her first fully made-up story, along with her journey to getting it published. If you’ve ever thought of writing and publishing your own picture book, then Julie shares a practical way of going about it, from using a spreadsheet to choosing an illustrator, keeping control of costs and the sheer joy of producing a beautiful product. Her next project is a Bucket List Blueprint which I’m looking forward to reading.

The Art & Craft of Writing Romance, With Barbara Hannay

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 19 Sep 2017 23:22:01 -0500

With guest host, Sarah Williams: Barbara Hannay has been writing rural romance for twenty years and has seen many changes along the way. We talk about her early days writing for Mills and Boon before being head hunted by Penguin.
Over recent years her books have had multiple stories and time lines and it is an art the way she weaves these together. When she’s not writing, she teaches writing workshops, goes on retreats with other writer friends and enjoys living in the beautiful North Queensland Tablelands.
It was at the Townsville Writers Festival two years ago when I first met Barbara and I credit her with inspiring me to write my own rural romance novel – The Brothers of Brigadier Station. You can find out more about Barbara Hannay here.

Crazy Good Advice: Crowdfunding & Social Entrepreneurship, with Tony Loyd

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 13 Sep 2017 01:44:47 -0500

There’s no better introduction to what Social Entrepreneur and podcaster, Tony Loyd, does than the following quote:

‘Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The square pegs in the round holes. The ones who see differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify them or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones we see them as genius.’ Rob Siltanen

For the rest, you need to read Tony’s book, Crazy Good Advice. You can find out more about Tony, his book, podcast and radio show here.

Networking Matters, with Lisa Sweeney

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 30 Aug 2017 21:11:17 -0500

Making a difference, values driven and entrepreneurial just about sums up what most of us want in our professional lives. Lisa Sweeney took things one step further when she purchased Business in Heels with her friend Jo Plummer. The duo’s business now has over 100,000 member across forty locations, and they’re well on the way to achieving their goal of creating a global network of businesswomen and entrepreneurs. What does that mean for Indie authors? A built-in support network, for starters, and then there is all that expertise to tap into, along with opportunities to make new friends, forge new business relationship and..err..the chance to learn how to network. So why did I hate my experience at a Business in Heels networking event? Because I’m bad at it. If the key to personal and professional growth is discomfort then this is where I need to be. As Lisa says, it’s a mindset shift, moving from hiding in our attics to success through collaboration, marketing and trade. Her advice; think big, get a strategy in place and organise your marketing. Oh, and it’s not about me, it’s about the other person. Being a writer is easy, being an expert, or touting your wares, is a lot harder, and having a network of women to support, encourage and yep, sometimes push a little, can only be a good thing. Women entrepreneurs are growing in and out of the corporate world and more women are starting their own businesses. It makes sense to help each other along the way. So it’s time to get out of our attics and – my worst nightmare – network five to seven times a week. You can find out how here.

Write More Books, with Leeanna Morgan

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 23 Aug 2017 20:33:46 -0500

On any given day Indie author, Leeanna Morgan, gives away 1000 books and sells another three hundred. She has been publishing her books since 2014, writes 2000 words a day, and has published over twenty books to date. It takes her six weeks to write and another two weeks to edit, and she loves it the whole process. The secret to her success is – no surprise – write more books. Leeanna’s books are contemporary romances set in Bozeman, Montana but she has her eye on her home country, New Zealand for an upcoming series. Her series include The Montana Brides, The Bridesmaids Club, The Protectors and Emerald Lake Billionaires. Her best tips? Write more books, try new things, build a backlist, publish regularly, write series, go wide with distribution, be consistent with your branding, choose your genre well, and outsource what you’re not good at. The most interesting thing happening right now, says Leeanna, is around pricing. You can find out more about Leeanna and her books here.

How to Make a Living With Your Writing – Part 2, with Cassandra Gaisford

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 17 Aug 2017 09:53:15 -0500

Last week it was about developing a millionaire mindset, this week it’s about daily habits, attitudes and behaviours. Ours! What do we do every day to move ourselves, step-by-step, towards prosperity? Part 2 of my chat with Cassandra Gaisford completes the Prosperous Author jigsaw puzzle. ‘A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper,’ says E B White. Doing the work is Cassandra’s solution. Fifteen minute routines, doing what we can with what we have, where we can, writing faster, and making friends with technology are a few tips we can take away. Sleep, finding our tribes and foregoing the nightly tipple may also help. Cassandra recommends we develop resilience, focus on what we really want and fight for our dreams. My advice, finish what we start. You can find out more about Cassandra, her books and her coaching here. Oh, and don’t forget to listen to last week’s episode here if you already haven’t.

#82 How to Make a Living With Your Writing – with Motivational Coach, Cassandra Gaisford

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 09 Aug 2017 01:10:19 -0500

Adopt a millionaire mindset—dream big, be audacious, take inspired action, and fear less, says best selling author and motivational coach, Cassandra Gaisford. We need to live more and experience life to the full. The power to create a life of prosperous significance lies within us and Cassandra tells us how with her Prosperous Author Series, which kicks off with Developing a Millionaire Mindset. It sounds easy enough, except it’s not. That’s where Cassandra comes in. After an hour listening to Cassandra talk us through the process we are empowered to go it alone. Until next week, anyway, when she’s back to share a few tricks from Book 2 with us on productivity hacks, how to do less and make more. There’s never been a better time to harness the field of vast potential to make a living from our writing. But to grow our income we need to grow, too. Cassandra’s Series will show us how. You can find out more here:

http://www.cassandragaisford.com/

#81 Do You Need a Writing Coach to Help You Write, Publish & Market Your Book?

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 21:09:46 -0500

Have you ever tried the do-it-yourself approach to a task where it ends up costing you more time and expense than you expected, not to mention the frustration at finding out halfway through that your project is not as easy as it looks? Welcome to the world of Indie writing and publishing. You start out with good intentions, falter, flounder and finally fall while everyone around you finishes their masterpiece, gets rich, retires from their day job and launches courses on how-to-write aimed at people like you which, if you’re anything like me, you never finish or sometimes even start. Welcome, the professional writing coach. Yep, we pay for everything else and it’s about time we started paying the experts to help us write, publish and market our books. Paul Brodie, of Brodie Education, specialising in motivational, publishing and leadership seminars, is one such expert and he’s proved it by walking his talk with eight Amazon bestselling books to his name. His question, what are you willing to invest in order to change your life? Paul believes books should be inexpensive, straightforward, direct and not contain a bunch of fluff – and he’s also a straight talker with the ability to explain complex ideas and strategies in a simple and straightforward way. He’s also just launched his latest coaching course, Book Publishing for Authors in 90 Days or Less. You can find out more about Paul and his services here.

#80 A Passion for Indie Authors, With Kevin Tumlinson

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 25 Jul 2017 00:55:03 -0500

Kevin Tumlinson’s been around the publishing game for awhile and he’s learned more than a thing or two about Indie publishing on his way. With the third book in his Dan Kotler Thriller series, The Devil’s Interval, released around about now, Kevin practises what he preaches. Did I mention he’s also Director of Marketing for D2D, the most successful digital publishing aggregate, helping the rest of us follow in his footstep. And that’s when my conversation with Kevin gets really interesting. D2D have just announced a new service where those of us not in America can get our audio books produced, published and distributed (or any of the three). Findaway Voices is God’s answer to those of us in the antipodes who want turn our books into audiobooks but, to date, haven’t been able to without a whole lot of effort. Now, it’s just a click away on our D2D dashboards. Oh, and while I wasn’t looking, D2D have also snuck in a neat way to get our ebooks into print without all the fuss of us having to do everything ourselves. You can find out more about Kevin and his books here and about Draft2Digital here. You can also listen to our last chat about how to write and publish your books here.

#79 Five Publishing Myths Debunked, with Belinda Pollard

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 19 Jul 2017 00:12:34 -0500

‘You never finish writing a book, you just stop,’ is a truism for most writers. Then comes the hard question, should you self publish or go the traditional route? The trouble is, there are more than a few myths still to be dispelled around the subject of Indie versus traditional publishing, and it’s a coversation worth having if you have a book to send out into the world. Belinda Pollard – publisher, editor and author – knows what it takes to write and launch a book because it’s her job to make our books the best they can be. Belinda has a passion for self publishing and is meticulous about making books, hers or ours, perfect. As a developmental and structual editor, and CEO of Small Blue Dog Publishing, she knows what she’s talking about. She works with both beginning and established writers, and has advice for both. From how to publish, to beta readers and distribution, Belinda has helped more than a few authors through the maze that is publishing in the twenty-first century. You can find out more about Belinda, her books, and her business here.

Writing Crime Fiction, with LA Larkin

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 11 Jul 2017 21:14:08 -0500

Crime fiction is the biggest selling genre in Oz, says psychological thriller author, LA Larkin. Think biological warfare, espionage, cyber-stalking and hacking, and you start to understand how Larkin spends her days – researching it, not doing it, that is. Her latest novel, Devour, described as ‘ice-pick sharp, packed with intrigue, action and spine-chilling suspense’ is full of all of these and more. The Australian/British author is always learning and shares with us how to go about writing action adventure thrillers. In Larkin’s case, the environment plays a large part in her stories and to this end she’s spent time in Antarctica, researching the chilly stations of a scientific research station. During our chat I learn about white hat/black hat hackers and how the webcam on my computer may be watching me. I also learn about writing habits and routines, which I really need to do something about. You can find out more about Larkin and her novels here.

Telling Stories; using Dragon Dictation to improve your workflow, with Scott Baker

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 03 Jul 2017 23:56:26 -0500

Have you ever tried speech recognition software to dictate your book and supercharge your writing workflow? Scott Baker, author of How to Train Your Dragon, and soon to be provider of online courses of the same name, shares more than a few tricks and tips with us on how to get the most out of the dictation software whilst maintaining our sanity. But it’s his next book, unwritten but in the planning stages, that interests me, Train Your Brain to Write With Dragon, because it’s one thing to buy the software and associated gadgetry etc but it’s another altogether to learn to speak your punctuation at a fast rap. Scott can do it and he assures us it becomes second nature after awhile, but getting your head around all the quote, fullstop, comma and new line stuff that the fun begins. I’ve tried and I’m still deciphering the mess I made. But 7000 words an hour is worth the fight. Being able to ‘write’ anywhere and pin down the atmosphere of a place, character, or setting is irresistible. Scott is adamant it’s the way of the future and who am I to argue. Not only is it impressively fast and accurate if you do it right, it’s also a lot of fun. You can find out more about Scott, his online courses, book, tips and tricks here.

#76 Where Do Stories Come From? Writing Sagas, with Jean Grainger

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 27 Jun 2017 22:26:56 -0500

The Irish are born storytellers and Indie author, Jean Grainger, is no exception. Following in the tradition of Maeve Binchy, Jean’s sagas span centuries and wars, exploring friendships and family ties. If your heart is broken it hurts, Jean says, a theme embedded in all her stories. With three novels published and one on the way, Jean is a natural. By day she teaches poetry to teenage boys and for the rest of the time she writes, sometimes up to 20,000 words a week, discovering her passion for writing whilst in the midst of a Phd on Irish Women in WW2. She ditched dry academia and used her research to So Much Owed, the second of her published novels. Her first, The Tour, took its inspiration from her job as a tour guide in County Cork. Married to her historian husband and living in a cottage in the Irish countryside, Jean is currently immersed in preparing book number four, Under Heaven’s Shining Stars, for release. You can find out more about Jean and her writing life here.

Follow Your Dreams & Build a Career From Your Passion, with JB Glossinger

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 20 Jun 2017 20:43:05 -0500

Sometimes life gets a little crazy and it’s time to realign. The Sacred Six: The Simple Step-By-Step Process For Focusing Your Attention And Recovering Your Dreams is my go-to book when I’m in overwhelm. JB’s book (and six-module course) is about helping you get clear about understanding what’s really important in your life so that you’re going in the right direction. It’s about being in total alignment where total chaos reigns. It’s about aligning your values, your spirituality and getting yourself in balance. And it’s about finding your freedom. JB has an MBA and a PhD and rather huge libraries on spirituality and business, and he believes in education. He believes the reason you can be successful is your willingness to learn, to try new things and to fail if necessary. Nobody can take your education away from you. Look at who are the teachers, where the teachers learn, where did they get their information and how can you learn from them. You can find out more about JB and The Sacred Six here.

Online Marketing: How to Make the Most Out of the Content You Create, a Free Tutorial with Hani Mourra

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 13 Jun 2017 21:09:27 -0500

Softwarepreneur, Hani Mourra, works with entrepreneurs to grow their businesses through social media and today he shares more than a few secrets with us as he takes us through the basics of repurposing the content we create to grow our businesses. He reminds us of the three main tools we have at our disposal; written content, video content and podcasting. He shares with us the best way to build our customer base through capturing email addresses, automating emails to our lists and much more. Most importantly, he shares his latest toy with us – a repurposing tool – that allows us to repurpose our content. Did I mention Hani was a software engineer in another life and that he’s already built wordpress plugins such as Simple Social Press and Simple Video Press? You can find out more about Hani and his software tools here.

Fan Fiction: Why Every Writer Should Read It – and Write it – At Least Once, With Tari Jeffers

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 06 Jun 2017 19:41:47 -0500

Fan Fiction is more popular than you think. Think Harry Potter fanfic, or Jane Austen if that’s your preference, and you’ll find legions of writers creating stories based on their fave characters. There’s something out there for us all to read – or write – but make sure you know the lingo. Fanfiction terminology is rife and it’s easy to give yourself away as a rookie if you don’t get it right. Worse, you can accidentally stray into territory that can make you blush. How do I know? Well, I’d never heard of fanfic until my good friend, and fanfic author, Tari Jeffers, filled me in on what I was missing out on. At the ripe old age of 28, Tari’s considered an elder in the world of fanfiction writing and she’s clocked up more than a few hundred thousand words in her favourite genre – good writing practise, yes, but also a creative artform of its own. I can’t say I was hooked but I was definitely intrigued. And trying to convince Tari to put her writing skills to work outside the fanfic world fell on deaf ears. It seems once hooked on fanfic you’re hooked for life. Go figure:)

PS: There’s an article in Forbes Magazine today with the headline, ‘How Christina Lauren Went From Fanfiction Fame to 14 Bestsellers’ – okay, I’m hooked now!!

The Time to Write: Lessons From Writing a Novel, with Lia Weston

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 31 May 2017 01:26:31 -0500

If you think you don’t have the time to write, think again. Five minutes listening to Lia Weston talk about her writing life will have you racing to your keyboard, or notepad, or jotting down notes with one hand while you answer the phone with the other. Lesson one: there is always time write if you make it. Lesson two: immerse yourself in your writing every chance you get, even if it’s only half an hour, no excuses. Lia has a great article on writing a debut novel where she lists the real lessons she’s learned on her way to writing her latest novel – my favourite is that it must be written before it can be rewritten. You can read the article – along with Lia’s Writing Novels Blog Series – and find out about her new novel, Those Pleasant Girls, here. I also have a couple of her novels to give away, courtesy of Pan Macmillan (pop over to my FB page to find out how). Oh, in her real life Lia runs a bicycle shop with her handsome hero hubby in the wine country of the Adelaide Hills. Can it get any better?

Writing Non-Fiction: Author Bootcamp with Kylie Ansett

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 23 May 2017 20:35:00 -0500

The process of writing and publishing your book can be overwhelming. Kylie Ansett, best-selling author, has not only been on the journey from rookie to published author she now teaches others how to do the same. With her writing training programs, webinars and bootcamps Kylie shares the who, what and why of becoming a successful non-fiction author. Today, she takes us on a journey from mind-mapping our book, to finding the time to write, the importance of a good title, book descriptions through to marketing, categories and rankings. More importantly, she explains why it’s important to put ourselves in our stories and walks us through her rigorous self-editing process. People want 20,000 words, easy to consume non-fiction books with one angle. Kylie suggests that writing a non-fiction book, from idea to published book, is not only doable it’s easily doable with the right mindset. You might like to have a pen and paper handy for this one. You can find out more about Kylie and her training programs here.

Don’t forget to check out my affiliate link on Facebook advertising over at Take 10 Social here.

Indie Author by Design, with Sarah Williams

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 15 May 2017 20:42:34 -0500

Listening to Sarah Williams talk is like listening to a How to Be an Author The Right Way talk. History buff, world traveller and published author, Sarah heeds her own advice when she tells her students to live a life worth writing about. Running courses on how to write synopsises and blurbs, co-ordinating the Townsville Writers & Publishers Centre and organising the Townsville Writers Festival are a few things that keep Sarah busy, not to mention her four kids and regular writing habit. She also manages to find time to learn; think Michael Hyatt and how to pitch, the annual RWA Conference, Alliance of Independent Authors, and her own publishing company, Serenade Press (I met Sarah at a Joanna Penn Conference in Brisbane). Tired yet? Wait, I haven’t mentioned her writing. Sarah is celebrating the launch of The Brothers of Brigadeen Station, Book 1 of her Brothers trilogy set in outback Queensland – this one out Julia Creek way, with books two and three not far away. Sarah’s secret? Deadlines, albeit self-imposed. You can find out more about Sarah on her Facebook page, Sarah Williams Writer.

Deep Writing: From Million Download Indie to Hybrid Author, with Clare Connelly

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 09 May 2017 20:39:44 -0500

For an author who published her first book in 2014 Clare Connelly sure is prolific. The secret to Clare’s success is deep work – plus confidence, speed and starting in the right spot. Clare doesn’t always write 14,000 words in a day but she has and she can (take heart, she started at 800 words a day). She also says she’s obsessive and once she starts she writes quickly. She’s not joking – she now has forty three novels and six boxed sets to her name. The other thing that happened quickly was her journey to hybrid publishing with Harlequin. Writing for Harlequin has been a long held dream for Clare and when she saw her opportunity she took it. At last year’s RWA Conference she pitched to Joanne Grant, Harlequin’s acquisition editor, and as she says, things are now happening quickly – just like with her Indie books really:) The secret to her writing? She firmly believes the conflict in her novels has to be something that a conversation can’t resolve, that it has to be bigger than that. For more of Clare’s secrets you’ll have to listen to the podcast. You can find out more about Clare and her myriad books here.

Don’t forget to check out Take 10 Social’s Facebook Ads for authors here.

Social Media for Business: Why Your LinkedIn Profile Matters, With Adam Houlahan

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 02 May 2017 19:56:29 -0500

Have you given any thought to your LinkedIn profile lately? Adam Houlahan, author of The LinkedIn Playbook: Contact to Customers. Engage. Connect. Convert., provides a rundown on how to bypass the gatekeepers and reaching out to your ideal clients. He is also an international social media speaker with over 500,000 social media followers across multiple platforms. His advice? Sharing the right content, providing value for your clients and positioning yourself as an expert are three things to consider when posting on LinkedIn. Setting up your profile with a professional image, summarising what you do and why you do it, adding a call to action – you want people to be able to find you, right? – and explaining your why will give you an 80% success rate in attracting the right clients. If you’re anything like me, you have a profile but you haven’t optimised it, and taking the time to learn LinkedIn properly is on your To Do list but never quite makes it to the top. Well, it’s not as hard as you think and Adam has a course of two to help you along the way. You can find out more about Adam and his social media strategies here.

Don’t forget to check out Take 10 Social Facebook Ads Masterclass here.

The Science of Storytelling – A Strategic Business Tool – with Gideon For-mukwai

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 25 Apr 2017 20:04:29 -0500

Thinking of storytelling as a strategic business tool is what Gideon For-mukwai does best and he wrote a book about it because there were plenty of books about the art of storytelling but nothing about combining that art with the science of storytelling. Gideon is a raconteur as well as an author, educator and speaker. He based his doctoral studies on researching the power of narrative, and in particular, how we need to use stories to educate others. He talks about Lincoln, Churchill and Martin Luther as examples of great storytellers and how people will remember a story long after they forget the data attached to the story. ‘How to win the hearts and minds of your prospects’ is the tagline of Gideon’s latest book which goes through the five ‘G’s of a captivating story; give a good guy a worthwhile goal, put a massive obstacle in his way, get into a duel, find a guru and end with a gift or a payoff. It’s having a story to tell that matters and by telling a story we can all touch and empower others. You can find out more about Gideon and the science of storytelling here.

And don’t forget to check out Take 10 Social’s Facebook Advertising Masterclass here.

Self-Publishing: Why Now is the Best Time to Write and Self-Publish Your Book

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 20:19:21 -0500

There’s no doubt that self-publishing is a growing business model for authors. You only need to read Hugh Howey’s quarterly Author Earnings Report, or read about the success stories of authors like Joanna Penn or Mark Dawson, but can the rest of us build a profitable self-publishing business for ourselves? Today’s guest, Joanne Dannon, is doing just that and with her 8th book about to be released and 10,000 people on her mailing list she knows what she’s talking about. She’ll be the first one to tell you about the work behind her success – self-publishing is not an easy road but it’s a rewarding one – and she’s generous in sharing what she’s learning along the way. We talking about the balance between writing and business, being visible in a crowded market, keywords, FB ads and more. You can find out Joanne’s books here.

Don’t forget to check out Take 10 Social’s Facebook Ads Masterclass here.

Write What You Know, with Lisa Ireland

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 11 Apr 2017 00:26:27 -0500

Teachers know best, right? Teachers turned successful writers are an intriguing bunch. Dedicated, passionate and knowing how to engage an audience with a great story are all tricks of the trade so it can almost be argued that it’s no great surprise that Lisa Ireland’s novel, Feels Like Home, was not only a bestseller but established Lisa as one of the Top Ten Debut Fiction Authors in Australia in 2015. Her latest novel, The Shape of Us, is already causing talk and with good reason. It’s good. But what I love most about my chat with Lisa today is the discussion about how much her mother influenced her writing. Lisa has a letter devoted to her Mum on her website and, in finishing, she says, ‘Most of all, Mum, thank you for always, always, taking my writing seriously, for believing in me and for being proud of me’. It’s what mothers do best, and teachers, and writers mentoring those coming along behind. And it’s what Lisa does best, too. You can find out more about Lisa and her books here.

And don’t forget my sponsor, Kate over at Take 10 Social. You can find out more about her Facebook Advertising Masterclass here.

Writing YA Fiction with Steph Bowe

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 03 Apr 2017 22:14:24 -0500

Making our living from writing is a dream for many of us but not for today’s guest. For Steph Bowe the dream is a reality. In fact, she has never known any different. Steph has always written and, at 23, is about to launch her third novel for young adults, Night Swimming, which she describes as ‘a funny, diverse story of family, love, musicals, crop-circles and goats’. And she keeps good company, alongside Merlina Marchetta and Lili Wilkinson, to name a couple of other successful Australian YA authors. So it can be done. Steph is a Stella ambassador for schools and she’s a firm believer in the need for a diversity of books. Today we talk about the importance of characters and relationships in YA fiction, as well as why self-promotion as an author matters and how to go about it. You can find out more about Steph and her books here.

Don’t forget to check out Take 10 Social’s FB ads Masterclass here.

This podcast is sponsored by lifestyle and fitness coach, Jennifer Gale, at Fit ‘n Fifty Plus, and it’s not her fault I’ve caught the flu. You can visit Jennifer here.

Defining Your Own Success: Indie Versus Traditional Publishing

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 27 Mar 2017 20:02:09 -0500

Have you ever thought about having a crack at writing a novel? Cassandra O’Leary did and the result was Girl on a Plane, the cover of which found its way onto a billboard at the Frankfurt Book Fair. This is a fairytale story of a book release, from a co-ordinated book cover reveal to blog tour to winning awards. And it’s about defining your own success. Released globally as an ebook through AvonMaze/HarperCollins in 2016, O’Leary’s romantic comedy has grown wings and has a life of its own, winning the We Heart New Talent contest in the UK. O’Leary lives in Melbourne, Australia, and is working on romantic comedy number three. You can find out more here.

Check out my first official affiliate, Take 10 Social’s Facebook Masterclass, here.

And Fit ‘n Fifty Plus here.

Time to Write: a Day in the Life of an Australian Author, with Fiona Palmer

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 21 Mar 2017 20:03:01 -0500

If you think a rural lifestyle, an inspiring landscape and salt-of-the-earth people are the things of romance novels then you’ll learn a lot from today’s guest, Fiona Palmer. Fiona not only lives the romantic dream but she turns it on its head in fine style. Let’s try again. Picture stock car races, fishing at places you only get to see in hardcore 4×4 magazines and wheat harvesters with wheels taller than most of us, and you start to get a mere glimpse of this woman’s life. Watch the The Day in the Life of an Australian Author Youtube clip here and you start to see that eight books didn’t happen because of the romantic dream but more by damned hard work and fitting writing in with a life that can only be described as a tad busy and fulfilling. If there’s one person that can share a few tips on knuckling down and getting the writing done it’s Fiona. But be warned, after listening to this you’ll never be able to use the excuse, ‘I haven’t got time’, again. You can find out more about Fiona, her romantic lifestyle and view her beautiful pics here.

#61 Harnessing Your Inner Storyteller with Sean d’Souza

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 13 Mar 2017 20:11:27 -0500

Passions and priorities are the secrets to the success of my guest today. You need time and space to create and Sean D’Souza of Psychotactics has created a lot of both in his life. He has made the decision to keep his business to the size it is and, instead, chooses to work nine months of the year instead of twelve. In his spare time he travels, creates amazing cartoons and experiments with food. Knowing yourself is key and Sean spends every morning intently focused on his inner self. Some of us call going for a morning walk a simple pleasure but it’s vital part of this man’s daily routine and it’s his daily routine that makes this man the success he is, both as a family man and a business man running a company earning figures the rest of us won’t get near working fifteen months a year. Sean is an author, cartoonist and speaker, and a strong believer in giving forward. It’s his values that enamour me and shine through in today’s interview. You can find out more about Sean and his business here.

Today’s episode is sponsored by the beautiful Jennifer Gale of Fit ‘n Fifty Plus who is doing her best to get me fit to write. You can find out more about Jennifer’s fitness and coaching business here.

How Utilising Social Media Can Help Grow Your Writing Business with Kate VanderVoort

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 06 Mar 2017 20:16:01 -0500

When was the last time you conducted a social media audit, reviewing your strategies and reader reach? Kate VanderVoort, founder of Social Mediology, shares more than a few tips on how to build your brand, your online community and increase sales. As we chat about strategies for Facebook, Instagram and other online platforms to engage with our readers I find myself forgetting that I’m the interviewer and, instead, start taking notes. If you’ve ever wondered if spending an inordinate amount of time on social media networking is the best use of you time, then the answer is both yes and no. A social media presence is a must but it’s important to be intentional. Providing excellent content on a regular basis in an strategic manner is key. You can find out more about Kate, her online social media training and workshops here.

Fit’n Fifty Plus is this month’s sponsor of Writer on the Road. Check out Jennifer Gale’s coaching and fitness services here.

#59 Goal Setting, Focus and Living Your Passion – with Keith Abraham

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 28 Feb 2017 11:05:25 -0500

Discovering your passion, setting goals, beating procrastination and focusing on achieving your writing dreams is possible if you know how and Keith Abraham not only knows how but has helped hundreds of thousands of people do just that. And now he’s with us to share a few tips, tricks and sure-fired success methods to not only set us on our writing journey but to keep us moving forward. But first we have to know our why, and once our why becomes clear the how becomes easy. Think purpose, motivation and desire, followed by planning, methods, strategy and action. Have I mentioned rituals, creating momentum and being the best we can be? It starts with finding our passion and from there it’s about designing our lives. But don’t worry, Keith has more than a few suggestions to help us on our way. You can find out more about Keith and his Passionate Performance coaching here.

This podcast is sponsored by Jennifer Gale, Fitness and Lifestyle Coach, at Fit ‘n Fifty Plus. You can visit Jennifer here.

The Creative Benefits of Writing Short with Jessica Aspen

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 19 Feb 2017 20:16:10 -0500

Taking control of every aspect of your writing career, from writing to marketing to standing proud behind the results of your efforts, is something that Jessica Aspen is passionate about. Jessica has a list of books, FB group, newsletter, mailing list and is currently in the running for a Kindle Scout publishing deal. We chat about the benefits of contests to build your email list and readership, the difference between warm and cold leads, and the benefits of belonging to a writing group. Oh, and pen names and winning awards, the importance of measuring your success and keeping up with trends in your genre. Jessica writes twisted fairytales in the paranormal genre and new adult novellas found their way into our conversation. As did Jessica starting her own Wiki. You can find out more about Jessica – and vote for her in Kindle Scout – here.

My sponsor for this episode is fitness coach, Jennifer Gale, at Fit ‘n Fifty Plus. You can visit Jennifer here.

Read Full Transcript

Duration [00:41:31]

Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today we're crossing to the other side of the world and I am really naughty, I forgot to ask where. So I have the beautiful Jessica Aspen with me this morning and she lives in a world of spicy, twisted fairy tale romances. Now what a great way, it's five am here in Australia, what a great way to start the day, spicy, twisted fairy tale romances. Good morning Jessica.
Jessica Aspen: Good morning.
Melinda: Good morning, where are you?
Jessica Aspen: I am at the foothills of the Colorado Rockies near Boulder, Colorado.
Melinda: Welcome to Australia, welcome to Writer on the Road. Tell us what you do, it sounds intriguing.
Jessica Aspen: Well I do exactly what you said, I write twisted fairy tales, I have two different series out currently, one is more of Tolkien, modern Tolkien twists on fairy tales set in a Faye world of Underhill that intersects with our and the other one are short, and a little bit spicier novellas set in the modern Colorado Rockies, so right in my backyard pretty much.
Melinda: The thing I want to unpack with Jessica today everybody is that short writing and I guess novella length leads to a lot of creativity, I'm pretty excited about this form of writing as everybody knows because I keep raving about it now. You said you have quite a few in your novella series?
Jessica Aspen: I have six, I have six in the novella series. One's a little long to be a novella, I struggled with that one but it's a little long. But the rest are all between about 32 and 36,000 words, they're long novellas, they're not the super short.
Melinda: They sell very well. I notice that there is some awards on your webpage here, you've won the OK RWA International Digital Award 2014 Finalist.
Jessica Aspen: Yeah I finaled a lot. So always a finalist never a bride.
Melinda: Hey I think being able to put those things on your website is pretty impressive and here in Australia there is a lot of women who or some of my writing friends they're always putting up these little red signs saying I'm a finalist in this and I'm a finalist in that, readers I think appreciate those kinds of things.
Jessica Aspen: I hope so, I enjoy entering them. I particularly enjoy entering contests that are judged by readers and librarians rather than authors, I think there's a different view on books that readers give.
Melinda: We have a very strong reader network here in Australia, especially with the romance guys. They're very well respected among our writers because they're very supportive. Now you've, you follow up that quite a bit where you are don't you, you interact with your readers fairly well?
Jessica Aspen: I try to. I have a newsletter group, I have a Facebook group. I really enjoy doing the newsletter because I find that they email me personally and I, I thought it would be a lot of work answering emails personally but it turns out to be a joy, I get these wonderful emails from people sharing personal details of their lives with me and it's like having a whole new set of friends and I really enjoy that.
Melinda: You've built your email list up.
Jessica Aspen: Yes, really this year. I started off the year with about 300 and I now have nearly 4,000.
Melinda: That's amazing because we all hear that building our email list is something that's really, really important and it's integral to selling our future work. So would you like to talk to us about how you built that email list so very quickly because I think going to 4,000 in such a short period of time is pretty exciting?
Jessica Aspen: Well I've had it in the back of my books, so I've had that organic growth you have. I also have it on my Amazon page, I have it on my website, I have it everywhere you see it. So I get a little bit of organic growth that way. But what I did this year was I decided to focus on it and I took Mark Dawson's class on Facebook advertising and floundered. I just struggled with the technical things on it. I can do technical things but it was very stats oriented, there were all these things you had to do.
So a friend of mine was using a service by a man named Johnny Andrews and it was called I Love Vampire Novels and he has now broken out where he does other types of books, he does all different types of books now, but what he was doing was doing the Facebook advertising for you and for a very reasonable price and I told her try it and then she did well with it, so then I decided to do it.
So for a, I think a fairly minimal monthly price he will handle the advertising for you and the way he does that is with contests. So every three months your contest rolls over. So you give prizes, everybody wins a free book from you, so everybody gets a sample of your writing, everybody gets put onto your newsletter list and then you have people who win prizes. So it's what I would call warm leads.
So the people who sign up through the back up my book I'd say that's a hot reader, they know me, they like me, they signed it through the back of my book. The ones I get through Johnny Andrews and I Love Vampire Novels I would say are more warm leads. I know they like paranormal romance because they're clicking on it, I know that they are open to all of this because what they do get to win are books, so I know they're readers, I know they're paranormal romance readers but they are also there for the prize, maybe they're not so interested in me, maybe they don't know me. So I get a little bit of a drop off from that. They're not quite as enthusiastic as the hot leads, but they're still interested and most of them have stuck around.
So I've been very happy with it. It's been a very easy way to build my mailing list because all I had to do was pay a little money for it and I don't have a ton of money to put towards things like that but that seemed worth it to me.
Melinda: Yeah I paid for the Mark Dawson course as well, I don't know many of us who don't because we all live with high hopes and I paid for that, oh ages and ages and ages ago and unlike Nick Stephenson's, what is it, First 10,000 Customers, I actually looked at some of the modules on that, Mark Dawson's I never even opened. I thought oh it just makes my eyes glaze over and I thought I paid all that money and I'm just going oh give me a break.
I found a lady here in Australia, I went to this absolutely Business in Heels networking event, didn't I everybody, I tell everyone on my podcast how bad I was at networking and how I sort of hid in the corner and didn't want to talk to anybody, couldn't climb out the window fast enough, but I met a beautiful lady by the name of Amber and I've just handed all my Facebook advertising for my course over to her.
Look, it was a reasonable price for the time and effort it would have taken me to ramp up, I guess it was well worth the money to have someone else do it for me. So I'm going to, everybody, I'm going to actually get Amber to start a little contest and I'm just trying to think of something that I could give away, I've got some middle grade fiction books so I might give those away and get people interested in the course in that way. So thank you Jessica, that's it from Writer on the Road, I've got what I wanted out of this today, I'll see you all later. No.
Yeah, now when we started this conversation with Jessica today she very kindly said that she doesn't think she's an expert but already ten minutes in you're giving us great tips. Do you think as authors we under sell ourselves? We have skills that we don't, that we take a little bit for granted but there's always someone better than us and doing things differently and more effectively so we, I guess we undervalue our own skills.
Jessica Aspen: I definitely think that's true and it might be particularly true for women. I know in my own case I felt like, I got my degree and then I didn't do a whole lot with it, I stayed home and I did small jobs for lots of different reasons. So I didn't end up having a big career and a lot of people I know in the business, one of the successful authors I know is a lawyer, actually I know several lawyers and engineers and people who were in marketing and now they're writing romance and they're taking all those skills they learned in the business world and applying them, Joanna Penn's a good example. She had a huge job advising businesses on how to do almost exactly what we're doing, I mean a she had a big, big job. So they start off right out the gate, 20 years ahead of where I am and so I feel like I'm always a little struggling, especially at the beginning I have felt like that and maybe I tend to carry that along with me, I don't tend to realize what I have learned and accumulated until I start talking to someone and they're like oh you know that.
Melinda: Yeah and everybody I was attracted to Jessica in our Joanna Penn Creative Freedom, what do we call ourselves, I guess we call ourselves support group, Facebook group, whatever we are but there are a group of amazing women and I'm wondering whether like indie authors and self-publishing is becoming so mainstream now and so professional because of the caliber of, I guess, writer/ businessperson that it's attracting.
Jessica Aspen: Well I think, I think that's always been true in romance, I think it's been a big secret that the romance writers have been business oriented. I didn't realize it until I started talking to people in other genres, they were five years behind where the romance writers I knew where and you'll hear it over and over again in the podcasts, they start interviewing the romance writers and they're way ahead on the business side of things a lot of times so and a lot of them had huge careers and then were writing romance on the side for fun and then applied all that in there.
I think romance is a dirty little secret sometimes even it doesn't matter what kind you write, it can be sweat romance, it can be spicy romance obviously. But even sweat romance I know people who don't want to tell anybody, it's they've got this secret. So they're keeping regular jobs and they still have all of this. So I don't know, I think I've always run into very smart women in the industry through Romance Writers of America.
Melinda: Yeah and it's interesting isn't it that I'm surprised that you're saying that writing romance is still a secret because like it seems everybody either is writing romance, knows a romance writer or reads romance but that could be just in the field that we move in but I also know that Joanna Penn who is our, I guess, our head honcho/our matriarch, she writes thriller-adventure novels but she's also paired up with someone to write romance as well.
Again, this is what I love that pushing boundaries, that trying new things. As indie authors we have this wonderful opportunity to try all these different things and writing short which brings me back to where we are with your spicy romances, is particularly good for being able to twist things around and try new things. Now I notice you do write these twisted fairy tales, these spicy, twisted fairy tales can you tell us a little bit more about those because I'm intrigued.
Jessica Aspen: Well I started off writing the long twisted fairy tales, 90,000 words, and I stumbled across a contest for red, hot fairy tale novellas and I thought oh I can't write that oh no way, so I spent three weeks and churned out thirty thousand words and sent it and it was through a publisher and they kept my manuscript for six months, they almost published it, they finally decided not to, it didn't win the contest and one of the reasons was that the person who put it out there had decided they wanted traditional fairy tale twists and mine, it didn't say that in the ad and mine was a contemporary, it was a contemporary story but they still kept it and almost published it, it took them a long time to decide not to publish it. So that's how I ended up writing the shorter ones it was almost just completely out of the blue.
Melinda: Yeah.
Jessica Aspen: And the hots ones because I never thought, I thought maybe I'd publish under a different name because I wasn't sure anybody should be reading that I knew.
Melinda: Do you publish under other names or is it all under your own name?
Jessica Aspen: Right under it's under one name, this is a pen name, Jessica Aspen's a pen name and I actually started that so I could keep it a secret. I did, I decided that I didn't want people to know, my husband's family I thought would be too conservative, but it turned out my husband outed me right away, I was like no! So he did it first and all the way up to its 80 something year old aunt started reading my spicy books I was like okay, what was the purpose of the pen name.
Melinda: So I'm not talking to the real you, this whole pen name thing has got me intrigued. I just, yeah go.
Jessica Aspen: I go completely by Jessica Aspen now, I do everything, register for things under Jessica Aspen, I do everything under it. I don't do taxes or actually business work under it but everything else I do because it's too confusing to have two names.
Melinda: Yeah okay well everybody I have to ask, I'm sorry close your ears, I want to know and I had a friend in north Queensland and she lives entirely off her income writing gay erotica, now I don't think yours tips into the erotica at all but it's certainly spicy and one of the things that intrigued me is that you have great men who are really, really strong and I've written down all these quotes here but your women are equally as strong. So you must have these really dynamic things happening on the page.
Jessica Aspen: I hope it's dynamic! I like, it can be difficult because I really like books that move. I came from a background of reading everything, so I grew up reading science fiction and fantasy and action/adventure as well as romance. So I like books that move, I don't like slow books. Even though it's funny, I also like books from the 1800s because I'm still an English lit major, so I still love Sense and Sensibility and all that. But when I'm writing I want those books to just go boom, boom, boom, boom. So I want tension in the storyline, I want it in the action, I want my evil person to be complex and tense and then my hero and heroine I want them to be tense.
It's funny because my very first book The Dark Huntsman the one criticism that I do get on it is that the girl is not as strong and part of that's because it is a fairy tale twist and it's a Snow White twist and if you know, if you're familiar with the Snow White story, Snow White's a wimp. She just gets pushed around by everybody and she's stupid. She eats the poisoned apple and then she takes the poisoned comb and she ends up marrying the guy who kisses her when she's dead, it's a really horrible thing.
So I thought I was making my Snow White fairly strong and she marries, she doesn't marry the prince who has the necrophilia tendencies, I feel as though that was a little weird. So, but that's the one thing I got with that. But I learned after that that if you're going to write fantasy novels and paranormal novels readers want very strong heroines. So if your heroine is not strong at the beginning, she needs to be strong by the end.
Melinda: Wow I'm still recovering from Snow White being a wimp, I love it.
Jessica Aspen: Snow White is a wimp, let's face it.
Melinda: We're going to stop talking writing now and we're going to trash all our Disney heroines everybody. Talk to me about paranormal, I don't know a whole lot about paranormal and I know it's a huge genre and especially along my teenage students they can't get enough of it.
Jessica Aspen: Yeah actually, well paranormal is huge and it covers a wide variety of smaller genres. When I first started writing twisted fairy tales and my longer ones are called fantasy romance because they're like, they have like Tolkien-type elves and high fantasy elements in them, there was no fantasy category, there was no fantasy romance category, it was myself and probably six other people out there and there was no way, there were no key words for it, you couldn't get listed for it. So I put it under paranormal and paranormal just, it really is all the supernatural elements of romance. So I actually belong to Romance Writers of America has a group called the Science Fiction, Fantasy, Paranormal, Time Travel, it's got all these initials. But all of those kind of get lumped under paranormal sometimes. But we're starting to get more individualized.
Melinda: Yeah and these are so, I guess these kinds of conversations are so important. You talked about key words and all that kind of stuff getting listed on Amazon. I notice even when I try to put up my little things, trying to find the right category is just such a nightmare because they're just so broad and they're so general.
Jessica Aspen: Well I think Nick Stephenson's class has helped tremendously, even his free videos. I think he has three free videos that you can get so even starting with the first three videos was amazingly helpful for me. I haven't worked my way all the way through his class yet but the little tweaks that I have done that he has suggested have been very, very helpful. I think with keywords one of the things is that every once in a while you kind of need to go back to them and see what's working and what isn't working and tweak them and sometimes I'll do different keywords.
So my shifter books are fairy tales, they're shifters, they're contemporary, they're paranormal. They've got so many different things, they're also really new adult because they're stories about early twenties. My first one Red is about a shifting, a wolf shifter who wants to go to college but her mother thinks she shouldn't go, she wants to keep her home. So it's a very new adult thing where the mom doesn't think she's capable of going to college and she really badly wants to go. So that's a new adult theme. So trying to find the right place for books like that that have so many complex themes is very difficult. It's one of the blessings of being an indie writer that we can...

Packing an Emotional Punch: How to Write a Romance Novel with Amy Andrews

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 13 Feb 2017 20:08:52 -0500

Packing an emotional punch is at the heart of all romance writing. Keeping readers in suspense, creating characters that engage their hearts and making them care even though a happily ever after ending is inevitable are the secrets to writing a good romance novel, says Amy Andrews, Australian Romance Author. It’s not as easy as it sounds. Amy has written over fifty novels and sold millions of romances, so it was only natural for me to seek her out and garner a few tricks of the romance writing trade. The problems that Amy sees when she edits a writer’s manuscript include stories that start in the wrong place, too much backstory and introspection and overwriting. The good news is all stories are fixable with a bit of help. You can find out more about Amy’s manuscript assessment service, Word Witchery; Story Solutions for Genre Writers, here.

#56 Living a Creative Writing Life: Finding a Work/Life Balance with Posie Graeme-Evans

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 07 Feb 2017 20:21:04 -0500

Meet novelist, producer, editor and director, Posie Graeme-Evans, an amazing woman who my research tells me is ‘one of the most diverse and dynamic forces in Australian television and Film’. I’m chatting with Posie today because of Pickets Hut, renovated by Posie and husband Andrew and now known as the Writer’s House. As far as living the creative dream goes, Posie has made it happen; the duo live on 80 hectares on the edge of some of Australia’s most spectacular wilderness in southern Tasmania, and she loves nothing more than solitude and ‘being attuned to quiet and unpeopled landscapes’. And according to Posie, the cold winters that Tasmania is renowned for are perfect for a writer. The author is up to book number seven, which has stalled for the moment while Posie and her husband concentrate on their accommodation business, including the Writer’s House and Helmsman’s House, at Frenchman’s River. If you want to learn more about living a creative life filled with the simple pleasures of sunrises, sunsets and chooks, you can visit Posie’s website here and Frenchman’s River to find out more about the Writer’s House here. Be prepared for some spectacular photographs.

As always, this episode is sponsored by Fit ‘n Fifty Plus. Check out Jennifer’s fitness and coaching business here. Don’t forget to tell her I sent you.

#55 The Business of a Writing: Let Your Story Empower You, with Cierra Seay

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 01 Feb 2017 19:52:56 -0500

Defining your own success, choosing where you want to be and taking responsibility for your life are all things that Cierra Seay, entrepreneur and host of The College Dropout Podcast, knows something about. Throw in the surety of who you’re truly meant to be, riding your own wave and strong opinions on the difference between learning and schooling, and you get more than a little inspiration from this successful young woman. Cierra’s success comes from, I think, strong core values, great mentors, building relationships and working fourteen hours a day. You can find out more about Cierra and The College Dropout here.

This podcast is sponsored by Fit’n Fifty Plus. Visit Jennifer and her team here and don’t forget to say I sent you.

#54 The Writing Life: Just Doing It, with Authorpreneur and Educator, Paul Brodie

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 26 Jan 2017 00:19:24 -0500

Our greatest opponent to our success is ourselves is akin to advice my mother once gave me; feel the fear and do it anyway, what people think be damned. Yeah, she made up the last bit – and I’m guessing she didn’t really mean for me to run away on a yacht for ten years – but it’s advice that is touted more often than followed nowadays.

Paul Brodie, in his latest book, Just Do It; Ten Ways to Increase Making Your Dreams and Goals a Reality, reminds me of my mother’s advice and his ‘Just Do It’ is all the encouragement I need to once more follow my dreams. Only this time I won’t run away on a yacht, Paul…promise! Paul is the President of BrodieEDU.com where he advises clients on branding, marketing, self-improvement and personal development. He runs motivational seminars and is a firm believer in affirmations and a positive mental attitude. He encourages us to be our own champions, takes us out of our comfort zones and reminds us to think about what’s important in life. Oh, okay, I’ll run away in my caravan instead. You can find out more about Paul and his books, coaching and motivational speaking here.

This podcast is sponsored by Fit’n Fifty Plus. You can visit Jennifer Gale to learn more about her health and fitness programs here.

The Writing Life: Writing Stories on the Road with Victoria Black

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 24 Jan 2017 19:40:08 -0500

Writing stories while travelling Oz has gotta be at the top of my ‘to do’ list. Victoria Black was the first guest on my podcast fifty three episodes ago and back then she was setting out on a caravanning holiday with her husband. You can listen to the episode here. Now she’s back to launch her collection of short romance stories from her travels, Campfire Tales. During our chat Victoria shares the joys of travelling and making up stories along the way, and how the sensory details of the places she visited make her stories all the richer for the added detail. She also experiments a bit with style and form, which is my favourite reason for writing short. Interesting things happen on the edges and interesting things happen in the outback. You can find out more about Victoria’s writing and Campfire Tales here.

This podcast is sponsored by Fit’n Fifty Plus. You can find out more about Jennifer Gale and her health and fitness coaching here.

The Business of Writing and Why Libraries are our Best Friends with Janine Kimberley

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 18 Jan 2017 19:51:41 -0500

Every writer wants to get their books into libraries to reach the widest audience possible and Janine Kimberley is with us today to advise us on how to give it our best shot. Libraries are where readers go to discover a new author or borrow anything and everything of an author they already love – libraries are fantastic supporters of writers. If you’re interested in connecting with your readers through meet-ups, author talks or merely having your book/s on display at your local library then Janine will tell you how to go about it. But most importantly in this crazy, overly-busy world, libraries are places readers to go to browse and ponder the world of books and reading. An ideal place, really, for a writer to hang out. Through their networks librarians stay abreast of the ever-changing opportunities to bring together writers and their readers. Janine is off to the Australian Readers Convention in February to stay abreast of what readers are looking for when they go to the library. Information, as they say, is king. And with so many books out there it great to have friends out their recommending our books and influencing our readers. Thanks, Janine.

Don’t forget to visit Jennifer Gale at Fit’n Fifty Plus if you’re interested in making 2017 your year of living healthily. You can visit her here and don’t forget to say I sent you.

Business of Writing Mini-Series Day 3: Reading the Numbers, with Nadine Travers

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 21:00:38 -0500

It’s time to put on our CEO hats and get serious about the business of writing. Nadine Travers chats with us today about how important it is to read the numbers of our businesses; knowing our costs, managing our time, collecting our invoices in one place, having a separate bank account for our business and making sound business decisions such as hiring the services of others based on the data. Alas, I didn’t kick too many goals during this this conversation but it’s never too late to start. As Nadine reminds me, information means power and it’s important that as business people we know where we need to focus our time. And if you’re like me and words like fixed costs, break even points and spread sheets send you running to the corner sucking your thumb then be assured Nadine makes it all sound easy. You can find out more about Nadine, her novels and French translations, and how to organise your finances here.

Writer on the Road is sponsored by Fit N Fifty Plus and you can visit Jennifer and her team here. Don’t forget to mention I sent you:)

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Duration [00:41:04]

Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today we're going to Montreal in Quebec and I've got the beautiful Nadine Travers with me who writes paranormal and time travel stories. Welcome Nadine.

Nadine Travers: Hi, thanks, welcome and happy to be there.

Melinda: Happy to be there. Nadine has a beautiful accent and I believe she's bilingual, I believe you speak French and English Nadine.
Nadine Travers: Yes, true. My native language is French and my second language is English.

Melinda: My daughter and I love we love everything about France, my sister's over in France at the moment, I've got her to buy me some French Mills and Boons so I can come home and read them in French and now I've got my very own French speaker here. But the reason I'm bringing that up so very early in the podcast is because we're going to speak finances but me being me I actually want to talk about the French translation first, far more romantic than talking about behaving myself financially. Tell us about your French translations.

Nadine Travers: I am going to release in 2017 my time travel series in French. So I'm going to test the French market too, that would be pretty exciting to be there. The first book is already translated and I need to do some correction about it but I'm going to translate with, I use a Dragon to do my translation too so it's a fun process to do that. Second book is going to be all fully translated before Christmas. So after that's going to be only revision and I'm going to put that online for the French market and for people all around the world that speak only French. It's going to be good.

Melinda: Okay now to even begin to unpack what Nadine has just said would take a while. Foreign translations for a start, now you have quite a few stories up there for sale, we've got Supernatural Intelligence Agency, we've got Scotland Lovers, Nadine's book have the most beautiful covers which is I guess what attracted me to them in the first place. Nadine how do you go about that or organizing a translation process from where to go. I notice you've got a blog post about it.
Nadine Travers: I was in the search during summer time for my break for my vacation time, if I was able to find expect for Amazon or Kobo have, I can have the French book about it, but more like a system like Draft2Digital but for the French market. I found one, which is the Immortal was it called, so they do the same process as Draft2Digital but for French book with other small market for the French one too.

Melinda: You translated it into French yourself?

Nadine Travers: Yes.

Melinda: Okay.

Nadine Travers: I used Dragon for that because it's easier.

Melinda: I know you keep saying you used Dragon and I know you've said that a few times now already in five minutes, I've got no idea what you're talking about.

Nadine Travers: It's what we call self-dictated. So you dictate what you need and your computer's going to type it for you.

Melinda: I understand, so it's just a dictation, that one that we talk about. Okay now I know the dictation that I get here in Australia it's not the professional model, we can't get it here in Australia and so anything that I, I tried talking into it when Joanna Penn talked about it, I thought I'm going to do that as well, that's a great idea. So I was in the bubble bath and I started dictating into this thing and the gobbledygook that came out the other side just cracked us up so we thought we'll never do that again. So you've obviously got a professional package.

Nadine Travers: Yes and I'm using the French one, so that's why, I'm reading my book, I'm reading my book and translating in French each time that I read it so that give me more, it's faster that way then just to type it.

Melinda: We're here today to talk to Nadine about finances, we're in the middle of our five day mini-series, we've exercised ourselves to death, we've been talking about mentoring and coaching and all sorts of things. Today we're going to get our finances straight. Nadine can you tell us a little about your background in finances and how that brought you to the writing world.

Nadine Travers: I've been in accounting for the last 25 years, still in accounting right now as my day job. I did different kind of general company to the services to the real estates, commercial real estates which I'm working right now since 15 years now and I write since I'm little, I was seven years old when I, me and my friend we have to move apart because I was moving another town and we loved Star Wars so we decided to create stories, romance stories with Star Wars character with ourselves. So that's how I started. I get back I was 16 years old, after that I have a story that's historical that I write at that time about it.
Melinda: Yeah and as we're talking if you had to talk us through why organizing our finances is so important as a writer, what kinds of things would you advise it?
Nadine Travers: A few things. You need to, the way I see it, the way I understand because I talk a few writers all the time is that we don't be account for the time with we doing so the planning for the next year and the book release and stuff like that, it's part of the process of the manager to do it, how many times is going to do to write that book, it's going to be three months, four months, so you're able to plan it in advance and so okay next year I'm going to plan for two books, three books, that's part of the manager.
But also you have all the side with somebody call expense, I prefer to call it investment because you invest it in your book by doing, hiring freelancer making book cover, editor, formatting or marketing as some, a lot of thing like this for your book. So those investment is more like to help to produce your book, so you produce a product which is your book and you have different kind of product because it can have an eBook, you can have a paper trade book, you can have the hardcover or you can have the [00:06:45] (unclear) book which is three or four kind different product but the way you write it is going to be write it for the four of them, you're not going to write only one but your cost is going to be reducing, your time is going to be reduced.
But you also, the biggest point is to put it to be, what we call break even meaning if you pay somebody to do your edit, your cover design, is going to have some investment for your book so to be able to break even that mean that your, all your investment be covered by your sales and now you're starting to do money about it. So some people see the money entering but they forgot all the investment that he did at the beginning about it. But he need to be able to break even to say now I'm starting to make money with my book so I can invest on the second one or the third one or the fourth one.
Melinda: Yeah. I think a lot of us forget, we see our little monthly royalty checks come in and I was just talking this morning saying my royalty for the Miner's Wife this month was something like $98 and I went wow, I'm not going to survive without a day job on $98 a month. So I guess what you're suggesting is that we have a reality check right at the beginning.
Nadine Travers: Yes, you need to, for my part if I do my experience I decide to formatting myself so I don't pay anybody to do that. So I think you need to sit down and to see who's I'm going to hire for freelancer, what I can do by myself or some people I say that they are trading some services between them. That could happen too but for that you need to know how many hours you're going to put that to be equal with the other person of it so that's why you need to know how much time you're willing to take so that services are to be resourceful. In that time you're not going to produce another book in the same time but you're going to invest in the book that you have right now.
So that depend on what you prepare to hire doing yourself or do some trading. I think that's the key. You need to know first what you want. I decide to do my formatting for, I'm going to release my ACI first book in [00:09:11] (unclear) next month, I'm working on that but I'm doing myself. Some peoples going to hire people because they don't know about, I have another friend, she's doing a cover design because she's using 3D graphics which is pretty gorgeous about it, so that depend how you be comfortable and what you able to pay for it or able to do for yourself.
Melinda: Yeah and I know everyone I listen to and everything that I read it says if we're going to be business people as indie authors then we have to keep good records. Now even with my podcast I'm all over the place, forget my writing, my looking at my desk and I'm going wow I don't even know where anything is, how I would I possibly know what's going in and going out. What tools do you suggest Nadine?
Nadine Travers: I will suggest, some people's going to put shoes box, going to put all the thing that you need. First all you need all to keep your records, invoicing, invoiced by internet if you use a PayPal, PayPal [00:10:17] (unclear) all the transaction, even though your bank account which, one of the first important when you do a business like this you need a separate bank account versus your personal one for government purposes to show them that you want, event though you're not incorporated or you're not a company legally you're a sole partnership in some way so you need a separate bank account to separate your personal finances versus your career finance.
That's the first step to be doing in the business type. So that way you're going to track all the transaction, put the invoices all together and now some government, I know that some people, I know in Canada is going to be three, it could go back for five years back. So I suggest to scan it and to put it somewhere like Dropbox, something like that to keep it, keep your record when you have it all done, finished, you scan it and you keep it pretty precious about it.
Melinda: I failed at number one everybody. I didn't even get off point number one Nadine. I've got my Tropical Writing Services business and I've got my ABN and I know you call it something different over there but it's my tax number. But my bank account is where all my money goes which is not a lot of it, you've made me sad.
Nadine Travers: It is, it's the first rule because you need to separate what is business and what is personal because if your government could go and check your book and they're going to see, usually they give you a year when you started to manage everything and to put everything together. After the second year they say that okay your second year great in your business it should be more serious so you should be having a bank account. It could be a check account, it's not something pretty exhaustive to do about it, I have a check account separate from my thing for my business as a writer and I have my personal account with my husband and my family's.
So that way that keep track, so I can list to grab my look I have this, this start to actually pass through, I have the invoices about it, it's easier to track because the way I see it for them, especially, not if you buying a course for writing, I'm pretty sure the government knows because it's your writing business, but if you buy some papers, ink, if you want to buy a laptop for your company and you put their personal, the government say this is a personal purchase because how they may know that is for business reading it. So if you put in your business related account now they're going to know okay this is for her business, that why she passed it through to her bank account for her business.
Melinda: Okay, so that's number one is a cross, what's number two? See if I can get it this time.
Nadine Travers: Sorry, number two is keep your things, the more closer that you get for your invoices. I know that Amazon provides some excel spreadsheets when you have your sales and your exchange because you're in Australia, I'm in Canada and the money is different so we have some exchange versus the U.S. and everything like this, so that became, you have to do it both ways because I do some freelancer for editors in U.S. so I pay much for that because I have my U.S. exchange regarding this depending on the money how the thing it is. That will be the same thing when have sales on Amazon U.S. I'm going to have the price in U.S. and they're going to convert it in my money to transfer it into my bank account. So that too could be tricky because both of them you need to account for because it's money more that you have, it's money more that you expense or you invest in your company.
So the thing is take out the spreadsheets over at Amazon. If you one in Kobo too, Kobo will send you an email each month for your royalties, Draft2Digital will also, I don't know for Smash Word because I don't use it but those kind of company going to give you spreadsheet for your month for the royalties and the rest keep all track of all your invoices, your investment, editor, book cover if you buy some paper because you need to print your book to put, to do your review or your correction manually, this become part of your business too. So that need tricky. That's all the cost, that's why it called investment.
But you have other cost too with fix costs. Fix cost which mean it's not related to your book but is related to your brand, meaning web design, web hosting, if you have a virtual assistant, if you have a PA, some bigger one, I don't have it but some do. If you using other services that's not related to produce a book or like your case in the podcast you have some cost that of investment for your podcast, it's they are for your podcast. But web design or web hosting is more like your brand, it's more like your name so that's something that usually is fixed or I think you can buy a package for one year, two years or three years. Some people going to pay each month, but that depends on how your thing it is, how you set it up your stuff.
I have a VA for my part, which I pay him two, each two months, so it's regularly a cost, that's why we call it fixed because we know every two months I'm going to have an invoice from him regarding this. That's how the thing is work. But it's for my promotion, it's for my brand, it's for my, it is related to my book but it's not really marketing for my book. Facebook ad for a book is for the book production cost. So that's two different things, we need to separate those two.
Usually fixed cost you're paying your mortgage, you have your apartment, you're renting part of it, part of it you're able to tuck in your business because you're doing your business inside of your house too. So some stuff there are fixed but already paid those thing because everybody's going to have to live somewhere, you paying your internet, you have your telephone, your cellphone whatever you're using. You have those already so that mean you can deduct it, but not all of it because you have to take personal part of it. But portion's going to be professional wise, yes you can do that. That is a fixed because it came back each month at the regular pace.
Melinda: Okay well I'm, my accountant has suggested some of that stuff and that's two crosses everybody. I really am going to get this stuff sorted out I promise and that's why I've got Nadine on here to help me. Number three?
Nadine Travers: Yeah. Number three I think that if you want to push a little bit further the breakeven point is the fun part because you know that you're going to cover all your investment that you did for the book. Now you're starting to make your real money, accounting wise. You already make money because you have royalties but you did investment about it. It's like you're putting money in the bank until you have in the interest to cover what you already put in the bank you're not really making money around it, so that's the same process.
So by doing that, when it's time to make money about it you can take that money and invest in a second book, you can take that money and pay your [00:18:27] (unclear) for the year, you can take money and help you buying material that you will need for you example your podcast and stuff like that and your microphone or your new computers or stuff like this. So that's all depend on what you want to do with your, what we call the break even. So the thing is to grow the fastest that we can to that breakeven point. I think that's one of the key about it.
Melinda: I know, look we all try very hard don't we everybody to I guess cover our expenses and in this day and age with all the things that you talked about earlier, we've got our eBooks, we've got our hardcover, oh sorry, our softcover print books and we've got our audiobooks and now we're talking foreign translations. I guess if we don't write them down things could get very confusing very quickly.
Nadine Travers: That is true because you got to have some investment for the audio book an example, you're going to have the narrator probably if you don't do it yourself to pay. But that is for, only for the audio book. But all the other costs, probably some modification for your cover but your basic of the cover is already done, it's already just an extra you're going to pay, it's not so much money about it.
So you know for the audio book your breakeven point is going to be closer to get that an eBook if is the first book you release because you're going to have the edit, you're going to have the cover to be done, you're going to have the formatting to be done, which you don't have to do in the ECX or audiobook about it. So some product break even's going to be the fastest, better, faster than an epub in some way because your investment's going to be less than the previous one you're going to do because usually people, the way I see it, they're going to release the eBook first, after that is going to be print on demand with Create Space or Light Source and after that they're going to jump in the audio book. In some...

Business of Writing Mini-Series Day 2: Positivity and Opportunity with Life Coach, Lisa Cherry Beaumont

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 00:02:34 -0500

Yesterday it was health and fitness and today it’s my whole life. Lisa Cherry Beaumont is a Life Coach and today we chat about lifestyle, fulfilment and life purpose alchemy. Lisa outlines a four step process for change, mentions gratitude practise, meditation, goal setting and brain training (among other things), and offers us action steps to fight off overwhelm and disillusion. She reminds us that everyone’s definition of success is different and it’s important to ‘have somebody there to guide you, push you over it, to talk you through it as you just keep going, keep making sure that you’re moving forward’. You can find out more about Lisa and becoming unstuck here.

Writer on the Road is sponsored by Fit N Fifty Plus. Please visit Jennifer here and don’t forget to mention I sent you:)

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Duration: [00:32:14]

Melinda: It's welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road, yesterday I was getting my exercise coaching and today I'm getting my life coaching. Welcome Lisa!

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Hello Melinda, nice to speak to you!

Melinda: I'm speaking to Lisa Cherry Beaumont, life coach from sunny Florida but at the moment she's in San Diego, just come down from the rooftop swimming in her pool, or swimming in a pool, eating a nice vegan lunch to share with us how to get our lives on track and live with purpose. Lisa how did I go with that introduction?

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: That was a good introduction. The only thing that wasn't accurate is that I've been in Florida but it's not from originally, I'm actually from the U.K. but I do love Florida and I have spent a little bit of time there. But it was a great intro otherwise, thank you. Very accurate.

Melinda: How are you going to help me as I make my transition from school teaching which ends in three weeks, moving on to a full time writer's life or a full time creative life and without all the pain and fear that goes with losing a full time income and living a fulfilling passionate life doing something I love?

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Sure well the first thing that I do with people is take them through something that hasn't really got anything to do with their work but really to do with what lifestyle they want to achieve for themselves. So are they the kind of person that wants to stay in one particular place and raise children and whatever, are they somebody who wants to travel around the world, what really do they see as their ideal lifestyle, so that's where I'll start with you. I would ask you what sort of lifestyle and get really specific on what it is you want your life to look because ultimately that's what you're trying to achieve, a lifestyle and then your work and your purpose fits into that.

Melinda: Being specific and goals. Now that is something that we do as writers and we're encouraged to do as writers aren't we everyone, know what we're going to do, what we've got planned out for the next couple of years. We're a little bit, or I'm certainly a little bit more lackadaisical when it comes to my life because everybody else has a part of it. Focusing back on me and what I want to do, how do you encourage, I suppose we're talking today about women, encouraging women especially to focus on where they want to go when there's so many other people taking parts of them?Lisa

Cherry Beaumont: If you've got a partner, if you've got children, if you've got other work and so on then that has to, you have to take all that into consideration. But ultimately we've all heard the phrase you've got to put your own gas mask on first kind of thing. You've got to make sure that your needs are taken care of first before you can give to other people.
What I notice is really common with a lot of women is that we have a tendency to feel a little bit guilty if we put ourselves first like we shouldn't be doing that, but it's necessary because we're a happy wife, a happy partner, or a happy mother or whoever it is that's relying on you, that's the foundation, that's the foundation for you being able to give to others is making sure that you're happy first.

Melinda: I agree with you, I think it's on the airplanes where you've got to put your own mask on first and I always look at that and I think oh please don't let that happen. We talk about putting ourselves first, I was talking to an exercise coach yesterday and she was saying you just have to make the time, you have to meditate, you have to take ten minutes for yourself and everyone else around you will benefit. So I'm assuming with life coaching as well if we get our own heads on right and know where we want to go then everyone else around us will benefit.

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Absolutely. There is a tendency as well for us to believe that if we have what we want that other people are going to be upset, other people are not going to like it, other people they won't get used to it. But the fact is if you don't follow your own dreams, if you don't decide what it is that you want then someone else is going to decide it for you and you're going to be the one that feels miserable, you're going to be the one that feels unhappy, you're going to be the one that has nothing to give and so ultimately all those around you that you think you're going to be upsetting you're actually going to be upsetting them more by not being happy within yourself.

Melinda: I was reading on your website this morning Lisa that there were signs that you're not happy. Can you take us through some of those steps because that was one of the very early things, I read those, there were four things there and I read them and I went yeah okay it is time for change.

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: That's a blog post that I put up yesterday in response to hearing about somebody who is basically bashing their head against the wall with the same thing over and over again. The first point in that blog post is to get you to identify that there's something that you need to change. So one of those things is that you keep coming up against the same problem over and over and over and over again.
Another identifier is that people keep giving you the same advice and your friends or your family or whoever, or your colleagues are starting to get frustrated with giving you the same advice over and over again and you're just not listening.
One of the other indicators is any kind of what I call overuse or self-medication which can be anything whatsoever, it can be drink, it can be overeating, it could be shopping for things that you don't need, it could be staying up half the night online on Facebook or playing videogames or whatever. So this is when you know that something's not right, these are really good indicators that something needs to change.

Melinda: As writers I know we often have to have full time jobs and part time jobs, anything to supplement that income. When we take that leap into full time writing it can be really scary not only financially but to have the confidence to know that you can work and work to a plan from home. I guess there's a lot of fears around it or surrounding the issue of taking that leap.

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: It's absolutely terrifying for most people. You're right outside of your comfort zone because you've been, unless you've been brought up with, in an entrepreneurial environment where perhaps your parents were entrepreneurs or whatever, if that's not the environment that you've been brought up, if the school that you went to and most schools do teach, you go to university and then you get a job and you have a steady income and that's what success means in society generally.
So something outside of that, it's almost like well there's no, there are no rules and regulations to this, there's no security in this good grief what's going to happen and it does take a leap of faith, it really does. If you don't feel that then you're quite unusual. If you don't feel that it's a bit scary then you're pretty unusual.

Melinda: I wake up in the middle of the night and I go oh what's going to happen that very question that you ask, I have enough income to get me through the next couple of months and then after that all bets are off and I thought why am I doing this and I thought because I can but in two months’ time I might be talking to you again going yeah shouldn't have done that. What are some of the strategies I guess to help you through that period of absolute fear? What am I going to say to myself when I wake up and go uh-oh I'm in trouble?

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: That's a really great question. As a business owner you will come across it over and over again. So some of the strategies that I use with people are a lot of people try and run and hide from meditation but I'm afraid it really does work, it really does help. Bringing yourself back into the present moment is a really good strategy for removing the fear because the thing is Melinda when you're in a state of fear, when you're sort of feeling oh my goodness how am I going to manage, what's going to happen in two months' time, oh my goodness, what you're doing is energetically pushing away the good things that could be coming to you.
So what you have to do in order to attract the good things, I know this is, it's very metaphysical and it all sounds a bit airy-fairy if this is not the way that your mind generally works but this is how it works. When you are in a better frame of mind, in a more positive frame of mind and I don't mean delusional, I mean just feeling positive, putting positivity out there, then it's attracted to you and you will find the opportunities do present themselves.
But just going back to what we said right at the beginning of the call is about setting goals for yourself, what is it that you actually want because if you are floating and floating and floating, floating you are not necessarily going to get what you want because you don't know what it is you want and therefore you're not going to recognize it when it comes and sits right in front of you for you to take hold of.
Here's, let me just give you a little story. I'm moving around at the moment and I'm using, I'm staying in different properties because I don't live here, I'm traveling at the moment and I need to find somewhere to stay in the next few days and so I've been looking online for places to stay and I just couldn't find, it was like I can't find what I want, I don't understand it. Then it was like hang on a minute do you know what you want, have you decided exactly what you want? So what I did was I made a little short list of six or seven prerequisites for the place that I want to find. I found three within five minutes because I then had decided exactly what I wanted and I found them. That's what it's about.

Melinda: I think that's the crux of it Lisa when it comes to knowing what you want and then chasing it. I've written down here positivity versus delusional. Now many times I've been at this point where I'm going to jump off and take this leap. I have a very loving, kind sister who I absolutely adore who's in Paris at the moment and she constantly tells me I'm delusional and that I have to keep a real job. In the back of mind I've kept that and I'm thinking yeah you're right, I actually do.
So I'm wondering whether all these years we're I've stopped, I haven't made that leap because in my own mind I've trained myself, it's not my sister's fault, I've trained myself to think I can't go for this, that I'm going to fail. It's only at the ripe old age of 55 that I'm going I'm actually going to try the other approach this time, I'm going to try this positivity and meditate and pray that in two months’ time that I am open to the opportunities that do come my way because as you said if you put yourself in the position things actually do happen.

Lisa Cherry Beaumont: We are trained to believe that we're delusional if we want something that's outside of the box, we're pushed into a box, society pushes us into that 9 to 5 job box and we are kind of lead to believe that if we want something different from that it's like well it's not possible but of course it's possible because a lot of people are doing it, I mean I'm doing it. There's a lot of people doing it, working for themselves, maybe they travel, whatever, being writers. It's entirely possible. I think what is the, I think your question there is what the difference between being positive and being delusional. Well goodness, it's a fuzzy line is that one isn't it? It's a fuzzy line, what is the difference between positive and delusional?
Melinda: It's my quote, it's my mantra. I look at it as Alice down the rabbit hole. I use Alice in Wonderland to run my life and we've come across this wonderful quote about the Cheshire cat and it's the grin without the cat and I just, I love that. So if you put your grin out there the cat will catch up and I thought we're just going to have to run with it and see what happens.
Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Oh I like that.
Melinda: You've got brain training exercises. Training my brain Lisa?
Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Train your brain, do you know what there's the simplest exercise that I do and I didn't design it myself, it's been going for years is a really strong gratitude practice and that is where you look for, beginners to this, so if you're listening and you're thinking what on earth is a gratitude practice, if you're a complete beginner to this, then what I want you to do is to get a piece and I mean piece of paper and a pen, I don't mean on your computer or on your phone, I mean actual pen and paper and write down every day three things to be grateful for and there is a ton of scientific evidence that this actually makes you feel better, it makes you feel more positive, it attracts greater things into your life, you become more successful in whatever it is success means to you. It's really, really effective.
When I say three things to be grateful for every day I don't mean that it has be a marriage proposal or winning a free trip to Paris or whatever, it can be just little things like I got up today and I'm having a really good hair day, I don't even need to do much with my hair, that's something to be grateful for. I got to the coffee and they were giving away free coffee or I got a smile from a stranger in the street or just little things. If you can find three things, if you can't find three things to be grateful for then you're not trying because everyone's got three things to be grateful for, just waking up with a roof over your head you can have, a cold refreshing drink of water.
What it does is it trains you to look for the positives instead of focusing on the negatives and the worry and whatever it is you feel is bringing you down and it gets you into that positive state where you are attracting more good things to and you're recognizing them and pulling them towards you as well. That would be, for a beginner, for somebody who already does that then ramping up to ten a day. If you're already doing ten a day and you want to ramp it up even further some people do a 100 a day that is a challenge I can tell you. Melinda I've done the 100 a day thing and you are like I am grateful for my eyelashes.
Melinda: Well I can tell you that as writers we'd rather channel those, I think those 100 gratitude things into a chapter of a novel. I think having that privilege of being able to write out our thoughts and write out our stories is something that we have as writers that can be very beneficial when it comes to I guess this life coaching idea. You have a book called The Life Purpose Alchemy that turned into a bestseller.
Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Yeah, that's right, Life Purpose Alchemy: Discover what fulfills you and do what you love for a living. It's actually not a storybook, it's not a novel, it's not even an instructional book. What it is is a workbook and yes I've got a lot what some people call woo-woo going on with me, but I'm actually incredibly practical as well.
What this book does is takes you through six steps in order to figure out what it is you want your life to look like and what work you want to do and then how to get started. But it does also tackle that thing that you talked about, the fear. So what I did was I took the top ten fears of my clients, the ones that just keep coming up for them over and over again and I did some mindset work on, some exercises on being able to shift their mindset around these top ten fears so that when they do come across this, which inevitably they'll come across some of them if not all of them, then their mindset is in the right place already so they don't hit a brick wall and go running backwards.
Melinda: Yeah and that can happen as well. I think we'd all love to be living in our attics and writing our novels and living this very romantic life but reality needs I guess, we need to balance that with our realities don't we. One of the things I wanted to very quickly talk about with you is this idea of a life coach and why they're becoming more and more popular. Now I listen to a lot of podcasts out of America and life coaching and mentoring, those kinds of things, are almost dare I say a dime a dozen now. If you're looking for a good life coach, what are you looking for?
Lisa Cherry Beaumont: Well do you know I'm going to answer your first question why are there more of them. Why are there more them? I believe that there's probably a lot of answers to this question but I think one of the answers is that we are becoming less and less of who we really want to be, of who we really are. What a life coach does, what a good life coach does is gets you back to being who you are, who you want to be, what makes you happy.
What makes a good life coach? Well there's all sorts of different life coaches, there's all sorts of different coaches that deal with all kinds of different things and people help you with anxiety and depression, some people will help with your business, some people will help you around your money mindset for example, you've got writing coaches, you've got all sorts of different coaches.
Specifically what I do, I trained as a general life coach, personal performance coach which is, yeah that's what I trained to do. But as I did more and more of it I realized what it is that I am particularly good at and what I particularly enjoy doing. So what really authentic for me and that's life purpose coaching. So helping people to find their purpose and then get started doing it.
So what you’re looking for in a life coach is someone who is able to deliver the results of whatever it is that you're trying to achieve. So if you're wanting just generally to be happier then you might want to look for someone like a happiness coach. If you're looking for someone, if what you're trying to get in your life is just to be more effective, to actually get more done then you want a productivity coach.
There are some general life coaches and I would say all coaches can help you with most things but if there's something specific that you really want to deal with then I would say go for somebody who specializes in that, like you would with anything....

Business of Writing Mini-Series: Health, Fitness and the Writing Life with Jennifer Gale

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 08 Jan 2017 22:05:16 -0500

It’s that time of year and for some of us, that time of life, where living the creative life – and especially the writing life – may require some adjustment to our routines to include that most wonderful of words, exercise! Today’s guest, Jennifer Gale, is a certified Wellness Coach. She has a Masters in Science, is an international speaker and researcher, and will soon release her book, How to Get Fit and Stay That Way. I’m the first to admit that Jennifer has her job cut out bringing me back to the slim, svelte shape of my youth but with all credit to her, she’s going to try. There are things every fit and healthy person needs to do as part of their daily lives and today, Jennifer shares with all of us the tips, tricks and tools to help us along the way to that magical place that is alas, part of that fantasyland known to me as my misspent youth. But don’t worry, Jennifer has personal experience to support her ideas. At fifty, she participated in her first triathlon but she had to learn to ride and swim first. So, if you – like me – need a little reminding that the good life comes with a price, pour yourself a glass of wine and listen in as Jennifer promises to get us all back on the path to good health and fitness in 2017. Happy writing, everyone.

Writer on the Road is Sponsored by Fit N Fifty Plus. Please visit Jennifer here and don’t forget to mention I sent you:)

Read Full Transcript

Duration; [00:36:17]
Melinda: It's welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I've got with me today someone who I think I need very, very much and I'm hoping that some of you may gain something out of this conversation as well. But if you don't you can live in eternal hope that your podcast extraordinaire will be in good hands and good health leading into 2017 and my year of living creatively. I'd like to welcome today Jennifer Gale, hello Jennifer.
Jennifer Gale: Hi Melinda it's lovely to be here and lovely to be interviewed for a change.
Melinda: Now Jennifer would you like to tell us what you do?
Jennifer Gale: Okay so I have a company called Fit n Fifty Plus which sometimes gets some people scrambled because and was taken on the blue [00:00:45] (unclear) so it's an "n" and I provide health and fitness coaching for women over fifty really looking at the whole woman though not just I want you to run up the street and I want you to do twenty squats. I like to look at whole woman because as you get older things actually change quite a bit and there aren't too many people out there training that actually understand that. So I also have a whole lot of other things and my mantra is to provide information and inspiration for women over fifty to look better, move better and feel amazing.
Melinda: Now I'm all in for feeling amazing because I'm feeling a bit haggard at the moment, I've just come off school, I'm tired, I'm grumpy. But the good news is it's my birthday and so--
Jennifer Gale: Oh happy birthday!
Melinda: Yeah, so I'm 55 and I'm about to start my year of living creatively.
Jennifer Gale: Perfect age.
Melinda: Jennifer is going to get me fit and fantastic and get me on, there's a bike ride here in, I don't know it's next year 2017 and it's called the Cycle of Giving and you can ride 100 kilometers and you pay for the privilege of doing it. So I'm going to line Jennifer up, I'm going to keep you updated on my health and fitness, Jennifer, Penn on the Creative Penn podcast she walked 100 kilometers, I'm going to cheat and ride my bike.
Jennifer Gale: What fun.
Melinda: Yeah so Jennifer you've got a big job ahead of you and I wish you all the best. But let's go back to the beginning. Jennifer your qualifications are pretty impressive. Would you like to tell us about them?
Jennifer Gale: Well like most women I feel like an imposter most of the time but yes I have a masters of science but more importantly I have a background in cardiology and intensive care so I actually established three phase cardiac rehab program in New South Wales. So my background is really caring for people that are not well. So I know a lot about physiology and the physiology of exercise and what exercises do what to you and so I've worked with the hardest cases Melinda and managed to get them fit.
So I've had some in my past, I've worked with thousands of people particularly women but like real claims to fame where getting some of my heart transplant people to do marathons and things like that. So I believe that everybody can do whatever they want to do if [00:03:15] (unclear) to take it slowly and you know what you're doing.
So my background really is in health and in really the science of being healthy and well. So you'll notice on many of the things that I give you or any of the things on my website or anything like that I always try and research the very depths of it because there's a lot of misinformation out there particularly about how to exercise, how to care for yourself, what to eat and a lot of it's not based on science. And of course because I've got a science background I'm a bit thingy about that.
So that's my background and if you read a little bit more, I've always been a healthy person but I was a very busy person, I was an executive and ran hospitals and all kinds of crazy things like that. But my husband got really sick when I was fifty and he nearly died and I'd always wanted to do triathlon and I thought to myself what on earth are you waiting for. So I had to teach myself how to swim and how to ride, I already knew how to run and so off I went. During that process I learned an enormous amount about what wasn't available for women over fifty.
So all the little bits of information about how to buy a bra, how to buy shoes, what kind of socks should you wear, what should you eat, how fast should you run because it's so different when you're fifty than when you're twenty because when you're twenty your body will actually respond and recover so much faster and it will forgive you a lot more than it does when you're fifty. So yeah, so that's a little bit about me. I'm really passionate about helping women understand how easy it is to be well and getting, supporting them to do that.
Melinda: Jennifer's being a little bit shy here, she missed her masters degree in science, she missed that she's an international speaker, research, certified wellness coach and an author of a book that we're hoping we may be able to give a couple of copies away once it's released sometime between now, before Christmas and after Christmas.
But it has the most amazing cover, the podcast has the most amazing cover. It makes me feel good because it's pink and bright green and I'm thinking I like the colors their mantra is participating fully in our lives and I think as writers I'm just wondering how difficult it is to get the balance sometimes with so much going on, families, writing, the business of writing for us indie publishers and sometimes having to do work at an outside job as well. Life gets a little bit topsy turvy at times Jennifer.
Jennifer Gale: It does, it does and there is one key thing to all of that and that's actually planning. The most, if you do nothing else in your life you need to sit down for about fifteen minutes on a Sunday probably and think what on earth am I doing in my week and where am I going to fit me in because you have to actually take care of you because you're the powerhouse for all of those things and if you don't all of those things will fall over. If, that is the one thing that all successful healthy women do, they plan their weeks which means they plan when they go to exercise and they plan what they're going to eat and they plan their ten minutes just on their own, just emptying their brain or doing a bit of meditation or whatever. It's the absolute key when you're busy. And having written a book I understand how hard it is to keep healthy when you're writing because you get in a vane and you can't stop and really you've got to know enough about yourself to understand where you're going to fit that 30 minutes in for you every day.
Melinda: Okay look it's been great having you on the podcast Jennifer, everybody you heard it here on Writer on the Road. I don't want to hear anymore because I'm all sad now I'm thinking I can't find 30 minutes a day it's all too hard. Set me an easier goal!
Jennifer Gale: We start off with that. I've started off people just doing five minutes.
Melinda: Yeah and it is amazing everybody that we do get wrapped, oh so very wrapped up in our businesses and our writing and I know full time writers I have some amazing women on the podcast Jennifer and they will write up to 5,000 more words a day and trouble is most of them are full time writers and independently wealthy from their writing and they can go for long walks on the beach in between times.
Jennifer Gale: Oh that sounds good.
Melinda: Annie Seaton I'm talking about you now. It's crazy and it's a whirl, I guess it's for the rest of us who have families, who have full time jobs, who are writing, who are business people. Now what inspired me a little bit with you is you ran a triathlon at the age of fifty but you couldn't ride a bike or swim, how amazing is that?
Jennifer Gale: Well I tell you it was a big journey, particularly the riding part. My husband used to be a really good cyclist and so one of the things in his treatment was really effecting his ability, he took really high dose cortisone which sends you a little bit psychotic for a bit and I thought if I had something that he could help me that would really help take his mind off it. So I had to buy a bike, I bought a $250 bike, RS bike and down we went to the village road and learned how to ride and I tell you the first time I crashed into the fence. It was hilarious, it was hilarious but it's amazing, it's just amazing what you can do when you start.
You just have to start. Then I think nothing of going for a 50 k ride, like it's nothing, it's really nothing. But just getting the around the village, the worst thing for me was turning around. I used to stop the bike and turn the bike. The first time I turned around properly was at my actual triathlon and I was so proud of myself because I didn't stop the bike to turn the bike around.
Melinda: Well turning a bike around. I am a toddler, I love tooling around dirt tracks out in the bush where there's nobody and I avoid hills if I can, although I did live on the west coast of Tasmania and I rode from Rosebery to Zeehan to have a go [00:09:47] (unclear).
Jennifer Gale: That's a good ride.
Melinda: It was an amazing ride and it was really good right. But I was as you said a hell of lot younger then. In village though, isn't a circle?
Jennifer Gale: Yes it is, so Salam [00:09:58] (unclear) was quite easy when I was learning but my awful son and my awful husband said okay now you've got to turn around and go the other way. So it was quite hilarious. I can do it now, I can turn around no problems, I wouldn't say I was an incredibly confident rider and I think that's just because I started a bit older. But the more and the more you ride the more confident you are. So at the moment I haven't been riding a lot, I've been running if any of you follow me know that I'm on a mission to do a half marathon next year. So I've been running a lot. So I haven't really ridden that much in the last year but I have a beautiful bike now, so I have a special women's triathlon bike. Yeah, so that was good.
The thing about swimming that was really nice was I discovered a new way of learning to swim and the name will come to me shortly. But it's about being more fish like in the water. So this is an adult way of swimming and they do it all over the world, I'll look it up in my email in a minute and they teach you to lie in the water rather than teach you stroke so you learn how to feel your body in the water before you do any swimming and it was just the best thing.
I ended up doing an open water swimming course and swimming in storms out to sea, I'm not at all scared at all of the water anymore and that was, learning to swim was really beautiful. It's the most beautiful thing you can do, you glide through the water, it's quite, you can't take your phone, no one can talk to you, you're on your own with the water supporting your body, it's just beautiful.
The first time I did, when I did my first triathlon I only had to swim, I think it was 200 meters, it was a baby one and I was out of the water second or third last and I was so mad at myself because I couldn't swim the whole way like I turned over and backstroked and everyone was faster but I learned an enormous amount doing that.
The funny thing was you spend so long trying to remember all these rules in triathlon like how to find your bike when you come out and there's 700 bikes there and I'd made great pains to know where my bike was. Of course when I came out there's only two left so it was quite easy to find my bike. But yeah it was an interesting as an adult to learn those things. It was good, it was great for me, met some amazing people. There's nothing quite like mixing with really super fit people to make you super fit. One thing they never do is smoke.
Melinda: Or have a glass of wine after work.
Jennifer Gale: Yeah you don't, I didn't drink when I was training, so when I'm training for a triathlon I don't drink during training season. It just, it effects your training too much. I might once a week have a glass of wine but I was a CEO then, so CEOs generally drink a lot, I can tell you it's part of the position description. So that was an interesting thing for me to, yeah having a job like that and then not to drink it was really good, really fun.
Melinda: Yeah and I think it's part of the job description for writers. I think the writers work all day but you get to that stage at the end of the day and you think I've worked really hard and I'll have a glass of wine. I stayed home, I waved the last two days of school because I threw my shoulder out that went down to my elbow and up to the back of my neck and I had to stay home. Basically I worked all day on my business and I got to about half past five, six o'clock and I think oh I've worked really hard I'll go outside and have a glass of wine and I thought it doesn't matter, even when I've through a fit look and I'm injured I just think oh end of the day I'll have a glass of wine and it's just habitual. It started when my eldest daughter was born.
Jennifer Gale: Funny that. We used to call it the suicide hour where my friend next door used to ring me and say please come before I throw the wine cask at her.
Melinda: Oh yeah mine started in, oh that's Jennifer, my started, I never drank until I was 25 and my first husband I we went on a yacht and we lived on a yacht for many years and happy hour was a tradition among yachties. I notice on your gravitas that you have a picture of a yacht.
Jennifer Gale: Ah yes, well actually you know that is, that's a tall ship and I love being out on the water and we went for our thirtieth wedding anniversary went to New Zealand, to the Bay of Islands and we went out on the tall ship, the Tucker Thompson I think it's called and they let me go out right out on the bow like Titanic style, so that's what that picture is. My husband took that picture which is why it's not that great. But I loved it, it was so much fun just being out on the bow.
Melinda: Yeah and I think it comes back to being able to do those things and as we get older, Jennifer has written a book and we're going to talk about that everybody in a minute so just be patient with me, I am getting there. But as we get older in order to do all the things that we want to do we, and Jennifer's talking about bike riding and triathlons, I'm not going to go to that extreme but I do want to be able to get back on my bike, I do want to be able to play my 18 holes of golf because now that I'm living creatively I have to play golf, it's called networking. I went to a business in heels function.
Jennifer Gale: Oh yes I heard about that.
Melinda: Absolute disaster I though I'm going back to the golf course.
Jennifer Gale: Take one for the team.
Melinda: Yeah much safer. But you've got here nine things every fit and healthy woman needs to do. Okay nine things, we can do nine things everybody can't we?
Jennifer Gale: Yeah we call all do nine things because they're simple. The key is to actually inchoate it into your daily living. So the key is not to do it on top of, it's, the key is to do as a part of and most of those things are things that you can do as part of your day, really. I mean being mindful about what you eat, that's not hard. Just think about it, think about what you're eating, instead of eating really, really fast make sure that you stop, enjoy it, think about it because as soon as you start to think about it you actually slow up, you don't eat as much, it's been proven you don't eat as much and you eat better because you actually taste it. There's this thing called the crunch factor that your brain turns on when you crunch. So most of the crunchy things in life like nuts and celery and things like that, the crunch actually tells your brain that you've eaten and helps you to feel full. So yeah they're all things that you can incorporate. We'll talk about them in length as we go along.
Melinda: I'm in trouble team, help me. Now there is a page dedicated to chocolate on Jennifer's website. Tell us about chocolate because we can still have it and I know from my old organic eating days and my earth mother days that it is okay to eat chocolate but usually dark chocolate.
Jennifer Gale: Yeah so I put the chocolate on because lots and lots of women love to eat chocolate and I thought I need to really understand the science of this and there is a science behind chocolate, it's like red wine. They both have something in it that helps the cholesterol level inside your arteries. So it's like a scavenger if you like getting rid of the bad things but the key to eating chocolate is to not eat too much of it and to only eat really good quality chocolate. As soon as you start to put those things on you can actually can't afford to eat a kilo of chocolate. So buying a kilo of chocolate's not a good thing to do. But having six or eight squares of dark chocolate is a really good thing to do for your body and it tastes so nice.
So my husband and I have got this thing about fair trade and slaves and children and all that kind of stuff, so we've stopped eating [00:18:07] (unclear) chocolate as it is and unless they can tell us that the cocoa beans are harvested by children who are being paid nothing and that the farmers aren't being ripped off we don't buy it but that does mean that our chocolate is $8 a block.
Melinda: Now everybody I knew I would bring this back to books. There's a bookshop in Townsville called the Laurie Hugh Bookshop and it has all the fair trade chocolates that Jennifer's talking about and they are 8 or 9 dollars and my daughters and I made a weekly junket to this bookshop and we'd buy ourselves...

Focus on Writing: Creating a Writing Life with Vanessa Carnevale

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 03 Jan 2017 21:46:02 -0500

With every new year comes good intentions and as writers we’re especially good at creating dream lives for ourselves – then reality kicks in and all our lofty goals go to putty. Vanessa Carnevale, author of The Florentine Bridge, has some timely advice for us as the euphoria of the new year fades and the hard work of keeping our dreams alive kicks in. Here’s a precis of what she has to say:

You don’t find the time to write, you make the time
Writing is a job
Move forward with your goals
Keep your house in order
Take a notebook wherever you go
Set writing days and fiercely guard them
Trust yourself

And most of all, remember you’re the one that matters. You can find out more about Vanessa and her writing life here.

The Creative Writing Process and Writing Shitty First Drafts, with Pamela Cook

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 20 Dec 2016 02:03:17 -0500

Talking about the creative writing process is aways interesting and today Pamela Cook – teacher, author and creative writing coach – shares her thoughts on the creative process. Pam has a Masters Degree in Creative Writing and published Blackwattle Lake in 2012 after participating in the Queensland Writers Centre/Hachette Manuscript Development Program (she wrote the first draft of 50,000 words during NaNoWriMo in 2009). Pam talks about how each story has its own process and how she writes her first drafts quickly. She uses word sprints, reads widely and values her network of writing friends. And somewhere amongst it all we talk about plot, Pam’s other books and why she refers to her books as rural fiction with romance elements. The Crossroads is her newest novel, released at the end of 2016, and makes for perfect summer reading here in Oz. You can find out more about Pam and her books here.

The Research and Writing Journey of Daughter of the Murray, with Darry Fraser

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 13 Dec 2016 02:15:15 -0500

Anyone with a keen sense of history, who loves romantic sagas, and has more than a passing interest in strong women of yesteryear will enjoy listening to author, Darry Fraser, as she talks about suffragettes, post-colonialism and the great Aussie motif that is the Murray River. Daughter of the Murray is an adventure romance set in the 1890s on the Murray River around Swan Hill. It’s known as an Oztorical. I made the mistake of mentioning Nancy Cato’s All The Rivers Run (which shows my age) but Darry assures me her story is her own. And it doesn’t take long to learn the depth of this author’s passion for her subject. She’s also a damned fine actress, and we learn a little about her roles in her local theatre group’s stage performances. Our conversation is as much a love affair with landscape as it is about writing, and Darry’s Daughter of the Murray is testimony to that affair. You can find out more about Darry and her novel here. And thanks to Black Stump Media for the pic of the author.

Boxed Sets: advantages beyond the monetary

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 05 Dec 2016 02:46:28 -0500

Listen in as a group of writers discuss the advantages of banding together to give readers a smorgasboard of Christmas stories for ninety-nine cents. Am I convinced it’s a good idea? Sure am…it was the deadline I hated:) You can buy the set here: http://geni.us/iP435

Book launch: From overwhelm to step-by-step launch plan with Mimi Emmanuel

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 01 Dec 2016 22:05:43 -0500

We’ve all been there, right? Written the book then wondered what the hell we’re going to do with the thing…Mimi is here to save us from total overwhelm with her new book, The Holy Grail of Book Launching in Three Volumes: This is What I do, Essentials For Launch and Extra Awesome Sauce. Now, I don’t know about you but I went straight to Bk 3 – with a teaser like that, how could I resist? Today, I talk to Mimi about launch plan for The Holy Grail and pick up a few tips along the way. You can find out more about Mimi and her books here. Towards the end of our chat we get serious and Mimi shares the stories behind another of her books. If you had to choose only ten foods to live on for years on end what would your list look like? All good fun until you learn that Mimi wrote a book about it, My Story of Survival: Five Years on Ten Ingredients. A tough gig for anyone but I gave it a shot – alas, my top three were coke, chocolate and alcohol. You have to listen till the end to find the rest:)

Doing It Scared: the habit of writing and taking back control of our lives, with Scott Allan

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 30 Nov 2016 21:25:28 -0500

Negativity is such a killer of our dreams. Scott Allan empowers us to take back control of our lives and create habits that help us succeed. Of course, there’s a catch – there’s always a catch – and it’s that we’ve got to do the work. Scott’s latest book, Do It Scared, comes fast on the heels of his empowerment and rejection series, and he has plans for more. When Scott asks me what are me what are my biggest fears and my biggest failures I gulp. Can’t wait to see what your answers are:) You can find out more about Scott, his books and his answer here.

Lessons Learned Starting an Authority Site with Kindlepreneur, Dave Chesson

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 28 Nov 2016 20:45:12 -0500

Dave Chesson is commonly known as the Kindlepreneur and he is the owner of authority site, Book Marketing for Self-Published Authors. He averages approximately $7829 in book sales, has started eighteen websites and has five books published (if you notice a slight obsession with stats here you would be on track to Dave’s secret to success). There’s also something on his site about 1723 cups of coffee but I’ll leave that for him to explain. Dave may not be a bestselling author but he’s the best selling author – his line, not mine – and he has the all the stats under the sun to prove it. This guy’s monthly traffic stats read like my annual income – he gets 90,000 engagements per month, and he’s getting monthly pay increases of 20k. If you do nothing more than visit his site here. It’s a doozy, with authority content on author networking, international links, keyword strategies and rankings, international book markets, launch reviews, FB ads, courses, traffic to your website…need I go on? He also has the definitive list of the best podcasts on Writing & Publishing so I have to be nice to him. Be warned, this is a podcast where the romantic and the realist battle it out – and one where the realist wins and the romantic retires to her attic for a Bex and a good lie down. Enjoy:)

The Authorpreneur Life: Become More Confident at Selling With Sales Enthusiast and Confidence Coach, Barry Watson

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 27 Nov 2016 20:59:58 -0500

It’s time to redefine our view of selling – and our view of rejection. Why be average when we can be awesome? Barry Watson, author of Sell With Confidence: Crush Your Fear of Being Rejected, Avoid Being Pushy, and Have the Courage to Make Money, is an international sales trainer and high performance coach. The days of the starving artist are long gone and the secret is not only to write good books but to become more confident and successful at selling them – count me in! Having a simple, yet effective, game plan is essential if we want to be successful at selling. Defining our goals, attracting the attention of our customers, starting a conversation, gathering information, tailoring solutions to our customer’s problems, and developing a selling attitude are six of the seven steps. The final step is overcoming our customer’s objections to buying our books. Behind every objection under the sun, is a sale waiting to be won. You can find out more about Barry, his one-on-one sales coaching, speaking and books here.

Writing Platforms and Building Your Email List: The Secret to Success is Marketing, more Marketing and Damned Hard Work with Elicia Hyder

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 21 Nov 2016 19:48:38 -0500

If you think you have excuses for your lack success in this ever increasingly busy book publishing game, Indie or Traditional, then it’s time to get real about what it takes to succeed. Think fourteen hour days, self-education and a boots-and-all attitude that makes me wonder at my audacity to think that I could succeed with my lackadaisical attitude to my business. Elicia Hyde is a marketing expert and she brings everything she’s learnt in marketing in the last fifteen year to marketing and selling her books. Elicia’s first tip is to surround ourselves with people who have been there before us. In Elicia’s case, this was Joanna Penn, Mark Stephenson and Mark Dawson, all of whom share their expertise through blogs, podcasts and/or courses. Coming hot on the heels of that piece of advice is email list building and funnels – our direct FREE line of communication to our readers and Elicia’s Number 1 marketing tool. And after listening to Elicia’s story, I’d love anyone to have an excuse for not trying at least some of the marketing tactics Elicia suggests. Sorry, folks, there goes our ‘we haven’t got enough time’ excuse, right out the window with everything other excuse we’ve been feeding our neurotic selves. This woman’s story is amazing and if her books are half as intriguing then I’m off to buy them all. You can find out about Elicia, The Soul Summoner Paranormal Suspense Series and her other books here.

The Writing Life: Book Launches, Landscapes and the Aussie Bushman – chatting about the launch of Daintree with Annie Seaton

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 15 Nov 2016 20:57:46 -0500

Annie has me hooked at mango cocktails and tanned waiters, and I now can’t wait – along with thousands of other avid fans – for the imminent arrival of Annie’s new book, Daintree. Today we share the countdown with Annie, and as we go to air, it’s only thirteen sleeps to go. Forget evergreen content, this is one episode worth dropping everything for and listening to as this ever generous Australian author shares her over the top excitement as her baby gets ready to fly. Activist romance, eco-adventure romance, or whatever label you choose to describe Annie’s books, if Daintree is anyway near as good as Kakadu, then we have our very own Aussie new infamous author at large (having her name embossed on the cover already gives us a clue as to Pan Macmillan’s opinion). This woman is gunna be infamous and we knew her first. There are no lessons to be learned in this episode, merely the sharing in the intense joy of an author who has slogged her way to the top. If we learn a little of what it’s like to worry a book to life, then that’s a bonus. Buy the book, share the joy, and remember, we knew her first. You can find Annie here and listen to our first interview here.

Audio Narration: It’s not as easy as it looks or is it? You decide…

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 09 Nov 2016 18:57:00 -0500

There are a lot of tricks to narrating your book and putting it out to a wider audience – punch recording, mic technique, breath technique to name a few – and the generally accepted equation is five hours of recording will give you one hour of finished recording. Breathing is about getting in touch with your torso; then there’s tone, tempo, flow and sonority. Still with me? Because I haven’t even mentioned audio quality. Narrating a novel requires a level of focus that some of us may just not be able to summon and by the end of my chat with professional narrator, Tina Dietz, I was starting to create a strategy to choose and hire a professional. Did I mention that Tina’s a professional? Book narration is a performance and our books deserve to be treated well. You can find out more here and don’t forget to download your free checklist. I’m going to…

Entrepreneur, thought leader, influencer: meet Tina Dietz, business coach and mentor, as she reminds us of the importance of creative freedom, fun and play

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 06 Nov 2016 20:28:39 -0500

There’s something to be said for studying the habits and processes of great writers and artists and how they kept their creative juices flowing over time. There’s a lot of burnout happening in the field of writing right now, especially among Indie authors trying to manage both their writing and their business. Tina is a mentor and coach, and she’s my kind of crazy. With a focus on values as well as mental, emotional and spiritual wellbeing, Tina guides us to be the best we can be. She’s also damned funny at times. We chat about being in the writing game for the long haul and how it’s got to be about pacing ourselves as our energies change as we grow and mature as writers. Self-care is at the top of the list, being flexible with our schedules and putting thought into those high priority creative endeavours to actually get the work done. We chat about how 80% of our results come from 20% of our efforts – it’s Tina’s job to help us focus on the 20% – and how the transitions in our lives open us up to new potentialities. And we just wouldn’t be creatives if we didn’t delve, just a little, in the fear factor that has derailed every one of us at some time or another. You can find out more about Tina and her work here.

Read Full Transcript

Tina Dietz
Duration: [00:49:35]
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. This morning I'm talking to a beautiful lady from Florida and her name is Tina Dietz. Welcome Tina!
Tina Dietz: Thank you, thanks for having me Melinda.
Melinda: Tina is the owner and founder of a business called Start Something Creative Biz Solutions. That's only one of the things that Tina does. If we tried to get into her background we'd be here for a week and a half, this is one amazingly interesting woman. So what I want to start with today Tina is a little video that I was just watching on Facebook and for everyone who's listening I've stuck it up on my Facebook live. We'll go into the background later but first of all I want you to tell me all about Secret Entrepreneurial Confessions please.
Tina Dietz: One of the things about me is everything that I try to do I really try to do it, to have as much fun with it as possible. Simply because of like you said I've got this very checkered background and I'm always interested in doing new things. I did a Facebook live last week, it was actually my first one and I threw myself into it and decided to kind of stretch myself across my kitchen table and talk about secret entrepreneurial confessions because so many of us who are out there are, we do the same kinds of things, we have this little things that we do or don't do and we're kind of like woo nobody knows but we all do the same things. So I was just having some fun and connecting with my audience. I had no idea I was going to end up with so many people laughing so hard at themselves and each other about all these goofy things we do.
Melinda: It's amazing, some of things that were on there this morning and this is why we skipped straight to it, it was all about how we feel about our paychecks, our cubical nightmares and what was it, dressing up in capri pants and why so many offices have the color gray. Now I've been a bit of a nomad throughout my working career and I've worked an awful lot of jobs, probably not as many as you Tina but the word gray really go to me because that's one word that I know that store through the place as well.
Tina Dietz: Isn't it terrible? All the cubicles are gray why would you do that to people, that's disturbing.
Melinda: Tina used to live in Costa Rica, she's from somewhere snowy, I did write it down but I've forgotten and now she's in beautiful Florida, thriving in her business and she has a team working for her. Tina would you like to take us very quickly through how you got to a position where you can live to whatever country you wish, take your team with you and have a thriving business?
Tina Dietz: One of the things I do with folks and have for many years on the business coaching and strategy side of my business is we do these five years strategic business plans. In a nutshell what those are very concise documents that connect this ideal day, this lifestyle, this outcomes that you really want to have five years in the future and it connects the dots between that and where you are today in this very moment. The whys and wherefores of why you would want to create something like that I think we can talk about a little bit later.
But basically what happened was I did one of these for myself and my family. In that five year goal one of the things was that we wanted to live a mobile lifestyle for several reasons, we wanted to live lighter, we wanted to focus more on time with each other and having experiences rather than having stuff and we wanted to bring our children up as global citizens and show them more of the world and have the sense of freedom and fun and play in our daily lives not just when went on vacation.
Three years into that five year plan we had decided to sell our home and live simpler and live lighter because homes can be a big drag on your time, energy and money and my husband was working for corporate at the time, my business was already completely mobile, that's how I had designed it. And he got a call basically saying hey we know you work from home but we've lifted the restriction on where you can live so we looked at each other and said well why don't we just move to Costa Rica because that was in our five year goal.
We ended up being able to reach our goal two years earlier and because we had had this on a plan I basically made one phone call to a contact I had made in Costa Rica and in 45 minutes I was looking at apartments on the beach and talking with schools about my kids and we had a glorious time and I'm still involved in developing a community for entrepreneurs and thought leaders and coaches and trainers down there right now.
Melinda: You can see why I've got Tina on this morning everybody, all those words are wonderful words, entrepreneurial, thought leaders, influencers, all the things that I picked up in my conference last week that we all want to know about. As indie writers and as indie businesses Tina I notice you had on your website or on your beautiful website craft your vision, create your plan, build your systems and establish your tribe.
Tina Dietz: It's kind of the steps we go through and the things that we need to be thinking about at a high level because we get so lost in the details or we get lost in what we call the tactics, all the different ways we can get things done that we can lose sight of what the next large goal ought to be for us to have something that is sustainable in our lives.
A lot of what I have brought to the table having been an entrepreneur basically since birth and growing up inside of a fourth generation entrepreneur family is I want to make sure or at least attempt to impart things or different ways of doing things or getting things done in a creative way that allows people to feel both self-expressed in what they’re doing as well as avoiding some of the common mistakes and short cutting the learning curve that we always seem to be constantly in one way or another.
Melinda: That learning curve is really, really interesting. I've been a life-long learner and now I've wondered into this new realm of audio which we'll talk about shortly. The learning curve never stops does it?
Tina Dietz: No, it doesn't. You just got to learn how to ride it.
Melinda: One of the things or the main thing that Tina does is, what it is, business development lifestyle design expert and coach. I found a little quote somewhere on Tina's website there from a lady "I had a consultation with Tina and I'm still reaping the benefits." Okay so if I'm your new customer what are you going to do with me?
Tina Dietz: We have the technology, we can rebuild you, no. Well meeting people where they're at, some of the key things, even before I get on the phone with people many times I will send them a series of questions so that I can get a sense of who you are, where you're at and what's important to you. You can really learn a lot by how somebody responds to an initial set of questions, if there's resistance, if they're one word answers or if they're many page answers to a single question. It gives a lot of insight into somebody’s inner workings.
That's really important especially when I'm looking at delving in with somebody and their business because regardless of the type of program that I'm doing whether we're publishing an audiobook or we're doing a full-on business coaching soup to nuts it's, I need to fell a resonance with my client, I need to feel that at least on the level of our values that we can have some synchronicity because if I'm coming in having these high, high values, important values of freedom and creativity and loyalty which are three of my core values and the person across from me is really looking at things from a strictly analytical dollar bill fence and isn't kind of looking at the mental, emotional, spiritual aspects of what they're doing for me personally that's going to be a disconnect because that's just kind of how I operate, it's a very holistic model of doing business because it's not just about the bottom line, it's about the lifestyle and how you're going to be feeling while you're running your business so that you can continue to do and not end up flat on your back in a hospital after working 80 hour weeks for ten years straight.
Melinda: That's a very interesting one because in some of the stuff I listen to online at the moment it's talking about authors burning out, just pushing themselves too hard for too long and not having anything left to give, filling their creative wells. So those things that you talk about, your values, your mental, emotional and spiritual, I think they're becoming more topical now do you think?
Tina Dietz: It's always been, well in the circles that I run in they've always been important and I think that it's becoming more widely accepted because with all the tools that we have at hand and we have so many there is this temptation to do as much as we can as quickly as we can. In some of the writing podcasts and some of the writing colleagues that I have there seems to be many times a large value on how many words do you write in a day, what's your level of production.
There's something to be said for that if we look at the habits and the processes of great writers or great artists throughout history, most of them had these really interesting routines or really interesting habits that kind of kept their creative juices flowing. But at the same time there comes a point where is it more important to be replenishing the creative juices and that well and the self-expression and all the things that go into it or is it more important to be simply pumping out words or content. Yeah, it's a question we all end up having to ask ourselves at one time or another.
Melinda: I think there's a, it seems to be easing off a little bit now but a whole lot of young people and young entrepreneurial types jumped on the bandwagon and started talking about this churning out books in thirty days and I constantly rant about it here on my podcast about you can't produce, you can't produce at your creative best if you're taking a template, filling a few boxes, calling it a book, putting it up there and becoming a multimillionaire. Unfortunately a lot of these young guys did, they did exactly that so now they're putting it out as a recipe for the rest of us. I just wonder if that can be a fulfilling life at the end of the day when it comes to creativity.
Tina Dietz: No, I think that that is born out of immaturity and short sidedness and I would rant right along with you about that. I think to get people kind of over the hump, you know there's that old saying about writing your first novel in the fiction world where it's like you have to almost get it over with just so you can get on to the real work or something like that, I'm paraphrasing.
I think that if somebody wants to be a writer or be an author and write a book, especially a non-fiction book it might be a great exercise to somebody to write a book in thirty day using a template, simply to get it out of the way. But I don't know that I would actually recommend that anybody publish it at least not without doing some kind of focus group or market research on it to make sure it's not crap.
Melinda: It is wonderful and it's great to see a lot more people picking up the entrepreneurial lifestyle and it's wonderful to see more and more people out there. But to say that it's easy is just an insanity.
Tina Dietz: It is, it is. Oh my goodness, you're going to get me started on that!
Melinda: The one thing we really look forward today is getting Tina started. As I said I've watched her Facebook live, there's something else about singing in a New York subway.
Tina Dietz: You've done your homework! Yeah I have been known to break out into song at random, in random places. One of those happened to be the New York subway. There was no, there were very few there I think it was about 2 o'clock in the morning on Thanksgiving, American Thanksgiving and there was no really there but a friend of mine had some choice commentary about that. I think it may have, it was show tunes, some kind of show tunes who knows what I busted into at the time. But yup, that's something you can expect from me and if you ever meet me at a conference I have a tendency to organize the spontaneous karaoke events that I call transformational karaoke because I believe that karaoke is a transformational self-expression tool.
Melinda: I just came back from a conference and not only were they out karaoke-ing at 3:30 in the morning they were putting pictures up on our Facebook group and I went oh my gosh I know you're going to turn up at 8 o'clock at the conference there and be professional but they had such a wonderful time. I'm guessing it's part of the process that you need to go to when you go to conferences. I think that was up until 9 o'clock that was my big concession. But I'll get better I promise! I'll go to more conferences.
Tina Dietz: It is one of those things, it sounds like my kind of conference.
Melinda: Now one of the things I noticed on your website was "freedom, fun and play" now we've been talking to you for the last fifteen minutes, I've noticed those words, you live and breathe those words. You've got husband, two beautiful daughters I think they were--
Tina Dietz: A daughter and a son.
Melinda: Okay, one beautiful daughter, sorry son!
Tina Dietz: That's alright he's pretty--
Melinda: He's going to kill me! Alright.
Tina Dietz: Nah, it's good.
Melinda: You're obviously a high achiever as well, I notice you call yourself an academic nerd. How do you fit it all in?
Tina Dietz: I don't, you can't possibly fit it all in at the same time, it's got to be about pacing and especially as I'm in this space of being over forty now and have been there for a while. Your energy does change, you become, I've found more and more as I have grown and matured, we'll used matured instead of aged there strategically, that I have a higher need for down time, for processing time, for even alone time and I'm a huge extrovert. I think that's just part of the process. We grow as we grow.
It's just and we don't even necessarily know how it's going to happen and sometimes I resist it but when I surrender to it and I actually give myself an experiment, I'm a big experimenter with what might work, what I might change, how I might shift things around then that creates more freedom and more and higher performance as well. But having a team is extremely important, having a flexible schedule for me is very important having structures around my self-care is very important as well which could always be better and I'm always tweaking.
Melinda: Self-care I love that one. I translate that to go to the beach more often. Just not happening at the moment unfortunately. You talk about surrounding yourself with a team, can you tell us a little bit more about who you've got, or not people but the kind of people you bring on board to support you in your business because I know as indie writers we tend to think we can do it all but it's just impossible.
Tina Dietz: I've been in that rabbit hole many times myself thinking I could do it all. It's us, people who are smart, those of us who are smart who are very capable, who can handle a lot and we go well I should just do it myself. You come to a point where it's just not a good idea, even though we can do it we don't necessarily, we shouldn't necessarily be doing it ourselves. One because it’s huge energetic drain that we need to be putting in through those high priority creative endeavors into actually getting the work out.
Then I have built a team very slowly because I had some experiences that were incredibly not satisfying with trying to hire agencies or working with people who said they could deliver who were very "high level" and what I found out that is that I was really paying for their name or really paying for their brand, I wasn't actually paying for the work. Some people have a high need to do that, they need, they feel a need to be with a guru, "guru-level" person in order to feel like they're doing something worthwhile.
I on the other hand, coming from family business and coming from more of a let's get this done attitude prefer to work mostly with freelancers or small company. What I tend to do to bring somebody on board is to hire folks for small tasks, see how we work together and then kind of let it grow from there because I am so highly tuned to relationships, relationships are so important to me, I've had a lot of people tell me that I'm kind of like an Italian grandmother in training. I'm just, that's my personality that I have to have that relationship and to me communications being returned quickly, people asking good questions and then retaining that information, people being proactive in what they're doing and those things are all really important to me.
So it takes time, you do have to filter through people but that's why I having people doing smaller tasks and then expanding their responsibilities works way better than saying hey I want you to run all of this because that usually means that we're trying to abdicate responsibility for something by shoving it off onto someone else who should "know what they're doing" and that usually will bite you in the butt every time.
Melinda: Starting small. I've got myself someone who transcribes my podcast notes and I notice with some of the newer podcasters and I noticed it a bit at the conference as well people are really reluctant to transcribe those podcast notes and I know it's a very little part of what you're talking about but I go through those things with a fine tooth comb and it helps me develop my story like I had Park Howell on here the other week and we talk about the story arc of everything that we do and even as the podcaster we have to develop the story. Without checking the small details, starting small, getting people in to help us it just would not be possible.
Tina Dietz: Yes, exactly. You are just brilliant for...

Writing, Research and Once Upon a Time: The Best time to be a Writer with Kate Forsyth

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 02 Nov 2016 20:15:59 -0500

Once upon a time lasts forever; deep, dark and complex, crafting timeless stories of magic and fantasy, bringing centuries old stories to new readers…where do I stop? Five pages of research notes and I’m just getting to the beginning of Kate Forsyth’s talents as a bestselling and prolific novelist and poet, writing across genres, for all ages – gosh, the press-release words keep on coming to describe this most amazing and generous of Australian authors. I start to get excited when I find the research notes written by Kate for her latest novel, already drafted, edited and ready to go for a September 2017 release. Beauty in Thorns, a reimagining of Sleeping Beauty, has some amazing women characters based on the passions and scandals of pre-Raphaelite circles of artists and poets. If, once again, I sound like a press release, please forgive me…capturing this woman’s spirit is only possible in the listening. All the rest is mere words. Kate shares with us how her research process has changed over the years, how she organises her research and the delight of the process itself…then she tells us how she ruthlessly cuts tens of thousands of words if it’s necessary to make a story work. As far as the craft of writing goes, we can do no better than to take notes as we listen, and listen again, to the advice of one of the most generous writers I’ve had the privilege to meet. Call me a fangirl, but I’m already saving up for a Writers Retreat with Kate in the Cotswalds, with a side trip to Oxford of course. And yes, Sam, you can come too. You can find out more about Kate, her books, and her research process here.

The Writing Life: Midnight Serenades, Tangos and Happy Endings with Alli Sinclair

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 31 Oct 2016 05:19:38 -0500

It started with a romantic High Tea and progressed to musicals, dancing the tango and all things travel. My chat with Alli Sinclair took me from Spain to Argentina to France to private Russian costume showings in downtown Canberra. Throw in some serious talk about the writing life; including writing buddies, author signings, supporting other writers, word counts, library visits, translations and respecting your readers and you start to understand that Alli has a lot to offer the rest of us. How many of us have career planning meetings? Nah, me either. But if you’re at all interested in getting down and getting serious with your author career then Alli has some advice for you. And me. You can find out more about Alli and her beautiful books here. And she might even teach you a thing or two about the tango.

Writing: Author Mindset and Faster Fiction with Alexandra Amor

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 01:30:36 -0500

Time, space and writing habits are the focus of many a good how-to-write book, and make for an endlessly fascinating topic for most of us keen to glean yet another secret weapon for our arsenal of writing tips and tricks. Alexandra offers more than her fair share of tricks with us today. Writers need to be selfish about their time and the space they need to write, whether that’s headspace or physical space. We chat about procrastination and the barriers to sitting down and actually writing. We also chat about my current bug-bear, the noise about how self-publishing is considered by some to be a road to riches and how people sometimes expect that they can start from scratch and churn out a book that will make then squizillionaires. What the rest of us are interested in is the value we place on our writing, what it means to us and why it matters. Add that to how creativity is one of the most foundational and creative drives of human nature. If you’ve read Julia Cameron then you’ll like where Alexandra is coming from when she talks about the spirituality of writing. You can find out more about Alexandra and Faster Fiction here.

Read Full Transcript

Alexandra Amor
Duration: [00:43:45]
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today I'm with a friend of mine, an old friend of mine who has turned up in a few different places over the last few months and it's Alexandra Amor who I believe is over in Canada. Good morning Alexandra!
Alexandra Amor: Hi Melinda, how are you today?
Melinda: Good thank you. I don't know whether to be excited or terrified to have Alexandra with me today simply because she's an author mindset mentor. I've been fossicking through her blog this morning and the first thing it says is are you ready to stop thinking about writing and actually writing. I'm going maybe I don't need to talk to this woman right now. Tell us all about it please Alexandra and don't asked me any detailed questions because I might have to lie to you.
Alexandra Amor: I can say the same back. Well thanks so much for having me on the show Melinda I'm thrilled to be here and I always find it so fun to talk to somebody on the other side of the world, so yeah I'm on the west coast of Canada in Vancouver and the new site that I've got up fasterfiction.com is brand new, it went up about a week ago and the intention there is for me to help writers and people who are really maybe even want to be writers, they haven't written their first thing yet to get out of their own way, to stop procrastinating, to stop thinking about writing as you mentioned and get their bum in a chair and start writing.
Melinda: What can we say about that everybody? Everyone who's listening out there we're all writers, we all know what it's like and we all have very good intentions as well. My problem is I have people on my podcast who mention things like 5,000 words a day, do I need to talk to you Kevin Tumlinson and there's lots of other people out there who are putting me to shame, I've got Joanne Dannon doesn't do a bad job either at churning out the words, I don't even want to go into my romance writers like Amy Andrew and co because they've been writing for years and they're up to 50/60/70 books and I'm going oh give me a break but I'm still out there, I'm thinking about it and I'm going to write a book. So Alexandra I need you today. Let's start with that favorite word of ours procrastination.
Alexandra Amor: I think this is such a big topic for writers and Steven Pressfield calls it resistance, I don't know if you've read The War of Art but that's a really great book to start with and to explore the topic of why we feel such a barrier when we try to sit down and write. I think especially in this day and age when we're all so overly busy and there are so many distractions in the form of social media and all the things that we can do online that writers really need to be quite selfish about their time and also about the space that they need to write whether that's head space or physical space which people very often need. I think there are specific ways to stop procrastinating and those are things that I try to share with writers to help them because I found that once I got into really good habits the easy, the writing became easier and I was able to produce more and do it more quickly.
Melinda: I've just written down some notes here everybody, I've written time, space and habits. Now I've been reading how to write books for years and the first chapter always seems to be about time, space and habits. I'm guessing all of us could do something to improve that. I read a lot of people get up and they get their writing done before the rest of the world wakes up, people who get up and write for a couple of hours, knock over their word count, then go to the gym and then play golf. Sometimes that's not reality, what about the rest of us, what about the real world? Have you got any suggestions for us?
Alexandra Amor: Yeah such a great question. I think we do always tend to idealize those people who yeah can get up at four in the morning and do two or three hours and then carry on with their day and that's not possible. The person I'm always thinking of when I'm writing a blog post or hosting a podcast at Faster Fiction is the person who's got maybe fifteen minutes, maybe a single mom with three kids and a full time job, how is that person supposed to get their bum in the chair and write.
I think what, the thing that I talk about right at the very beginning is really anchoring in with our values. How important is it to us that we write? If we can link to something that really matters to us about writing then that definitely that's the first step. One of the things I always suggest to people is that they sit down and ask themselves the question if I look ahead and think about five years from now and I haven't written anything how would that feel. Once you can kind of connect to the disappointment or the sadness that you might feel about not having written anything that might help you to get started finding even just fifteen minutes in your day to spend writing.
Melinda: I'm just about to launch a course for teenage novel writers and I've had some beta kids in there doing this course with me and I've got to tell that they're actually putting me to shame, they're up to 5/6/7,000 words and these are kids where their novels are only going to be 12/15,000 words and they're writing there, they're not scared, they're in their boots and all. I'm wondering whether we can take something from that.
Alexandra Amor: That's such a good question. I bet, like you mentioned that they're not scared, they're not afraid and I suspect that that's such an advantage for somebody at that age, we do tend to be a bit fearless and feel immortal don't when we're teenagers and then we get to be grownups and we think well it needs to be serious and it needs to be perfect and it needs to be great right out of the gate, I think that's the thought that really stops a lot of writers, this book needs to be a bestseller and take over the world when really it's your first shot at writing something. So what I like to encourage writers to do is really back way, way up and do what Anne Lamott suggests which is learn how to write shitty first drafts.
Melinda: Anne Lamott she's written a book called Bird by Bird everybody and already Alexandra's mentioned Steve Pressfield's The War of Art and now Bird by Bird these are sort of how-to bibles for most writers. We may as well just fossick through that for a little bit. Do you recommend people go to these books because there's so much online, there's podcasts, there's blogs, there's us and we're all jumping on the bandwagon with our courses, this, that and the other. Do you think sometimes the noise just sort of freezes us?
Alexandra Amor: I think it does and I think there's also a trap that writers fall into which is sort of over learning, over researching. So I think it's really important to read books about writing especially when we're getting started and even to continue doing that as we carry on our writing careers. There is a moment where we have to stop learning about writing and actually write. That's the barrier that I think a lot of writers have trouble getting themselves through or across and taking that risk and putting down their words at the beginning when they know they're going to be crappy and I can guarantee you they are and what I really suggest is that people just find a way to be at peace with the fact that the first few things that we do are going to be rubbish.
Melinda: I think I heard somewhere the first million words and I had someone on recently, one of my romance, oh I think it was, oh it was Jennie Jones romance, rural romance writer. Her first six books were practice and you just think about that and her books are like, I think they're 80,000 words long or those ones might have been 50,000 words long and you think about that and nowadays we're getting all this stuff out about churning out a book in five minutes, thirty days to write a novel, all that kind of stuff. Do you think the expectations are there right from the beginning that we do all these amazing things but it's not actually a reality sometimes?
Alexandra Amor: Absolutely, writing is a craft and I tend to use the metaphor of carpentry, if you're learning to become a carpenter or any other skilled trade like that, you don't start out making a beautiful hutch with all kinds of carving and inlay and all that kind of stuff, you start out making a table with a flat top and squared, four legs and that's it and then you progress from there.
I really do think that almost all the information that's available to us now and a lot of the noise too about that we can sometimes get caught up in about how I think there's a misunderstanding that self-publishing can be a road to riches and people expect that sometimes that they can just start from scratch, churn out a book and it'll sell a bazillion copies and that's really not the case but if again if we're anchored to the value that we have around writing to what it means to us and why it matters to us then we're willing to practice the craft and write six books as you mentioned in order to get that seventh book that we feel proud of and are willing to put out into the world.
Melinda: Sometimes we jump too soon. I was speaking to, and I just uploaded an episode with Park Howell on story, the art of story, the business of story and the story cycle. There's some really great things out there to learn because with all of us story resonates. I think it's one of the most valuable things we can do and especially with our courses encouraging people to try, trying to draw that balance between not being too difficult. We talk about creativity, what's your definition, how do you explain that?
Alexandra Amor: When I define creativity or talk about it I tend to float into the more spiritual end of the spectrum, so I really agree with what Julia Cameron says that we were all created by the great creator and therefore we are creators as well. I think creativity is such a natural human drive and desire, I think it's probably one of the most foundational and natural drives and I think when we discourage people from being creative the way that we tend to do in our western society where money matters so much more than that kind of creative pursuit we really do people a disservice and I don't think that when we teach about writing we're teaching anything new, I always think that people know how to be creative, they just have to be persuaded to reconnect with that part of themselves.
Melinda: I think Park said something about we're at our most creative in Kindergarten. I know in schools, I was talking to my students about it yesterday, they'd all come back from holidays we've got eight weeks to go until Christmas and they're not the slightest bit interesting in PowerPoints, in worksheets and data driven stuff and Park said something to me that I haven't been able to get out of my mind is we're wired for story yet we teach via data, we're expecting our kids to learn stuff by route yet we resonate with story.
Alexandra Amor: I absolutely agree I think the stuff that Joseph Campbell talks about, about the hero's journey is hard wired into us somehow, I don't know why that is but it definitely is and that's we're all so addicted to Netflix and to books and to movies and all these things. I mean it's a good addiction and it's because we are wired for story, that's and really story too is a way that we, that enables us to relate to our lives and to the world that we're living in in the present moment.
Melinda: Yeah, now Alexandra's mentioned a few books that I might just uncover, we've talked about Anne Lamott, we've talked about Steve Pressfield, we've talked about now Joseph Campbell and the hero myth, Julia Cameron is famous for her morning words where you get up and you just free write before you start thinking, I turned around to have a look at my bookshelf because I've got a whole omnibus of her books there and I've forgotten the titles of them, can you just run through a couple of the titles for me? I think it's up in my daughter's bedside table at the moment.
Alexandra Amor: So the one she's most famous for is The Artist's Way.
Melinda: That's it, Artist's Way, thank you.
Alexandra Amor: That's the one where she introduces the idea of morning pages which is something that I've been doing for years and I really believe it's part of my kind of "success" as a creative person because dumping out my thoughts and feelings and fears first thing in the morning has really kind of opened me up to be creative then in other parts of my day.
So yeah The Artist's Way is her best known one and then she has another one that doesn't get mentioned quite as often which is called The Right to Write so it's the R-I-G-H-T to W-R-I-T-E and in that one it's little short essays and then suggested exercises or invitations I think she calls them. That's one I used years ago and I would do the exercises or the invitations that she suggested and that helped to start to free me up to feel a little bit more confident about writing.
Melinda: Yeah I think the one I used, I was doing my PhD and I remember a runaway to the Whitsundays which is I guess Bay of Islands of Australia, it's beautiful up there and I remember I threw it in the car and ran away from my children and my husband to get some writing done, I think I took the one called The Sound of Paper and it was amazing, it was like this book was talking to me and that was my first book that I read of hers and then I went back and did The Artist's Way but that Sound of Paper was all about probably what we're talking about today, giving yourself permission to write, stop beating yourself up because you're not doing enough and then giving you a way through I guess your author doubts.
Alexandra Amor: Yup absolutely. I think confidence is such a big part of being a writer and at the beginning of course that's what we struggle with the most and that's one thing that I really want to focus on teaching at Faster Fiction because hardly anyone talks about that and really one of the only ways to become confident at something is to keep doing it and I think that's a step that so often gets missed. We do tend to want to take this big leap and jump from not having written at all like I said before to writing a really great book. Unfortunately that intimidates and paralyzes a lot of people I think.
Melinda: We're a fast society now, we want it yesterday. I was just thinking about I wonder if that's one of the reasons that NaNo writers becomes such a huge go-to place for people that say oh I'll go and do NaNo write and then I'll have the first draft done then I’ll be able to do this, they’ll be able to do that. There's a huge money spinning thing popping up around that courses and how top’s and all that kind of stuff around this Nano write, people are starting I guess to see it as well if I can do that I can do anything. But I'm guessing there are as many failures at Nano write as there as anything else because you've still got to do the work.
Alexandra Amor: You still have to do the work and I've never do it myself buy I always worry about people who don't have a solid writing habit set up before they start and to my mind it would be really hard in 30 days to establish the routine and the habits that you need to be a successful writer. I mean it took me several years I would say and so yeah I wonder, I think it's a great idea and there's a lot of community I believe involved when you do NanoWriMo and I do worry about people who might be sort of biting off a little more than they can chew.
Melinda: Alexandra's talking my lists of everything are growing longer here, we've talked about time and space, routine and habits and confidence and procrastination. These are all words that we could all hang on our little pin boards that we've got in our studies, I notice you've got one in the background there.
The other thing is inspirational quotes, everybody you've got to have inspirational quotes and I tell all my students to buy a T-shirt and put the name of their novel on it because every time people ask what they're doing they can see the novel. Okay, yes I'm writing a novel it's written on my T-shirt. So there are little tricks of the trade to get you in your seat each day. Do you have anything in particular that works for you?
Alexandra Amor: I think that T-shirt idea is great, I've never heard that before, I love it. I think one of the things we struggle with the most when we're starting out is feeling like a fraud, so I just wanted to mention that as well and say to people that we all feel like a fraud at the beginning then how to set up a good routine, well we've touched on a couple things so far, one of them very often writers write first thing in the morning and I think that's because they're fresh at that time but I think for each writer it's important to figure out when is the time that you have the most energy, some people are evening people, some people are morning people. So just figure that out for yourself and find the time of day where you don't feel completely sucked dry and you do have a little bit of energy.
Then the second big tip and all writers talk about these two things and it's because they work, it's either to set a word count, a goal of the number of words you're going to reach or to use a timer and to set the timer and not take your pen off the paper or your fingers off the keyboard until the time is elapsed and I would really suggest that people set those goals really, really small at the beginning. So for the timer even three or four minutes and for the word count like 200 words which is less than half a page if you're looking at a word document, set the goal small and then you can incrementally increase them.
Melinda: I'm just hearing something in the background there, I thought is it a motorbike, is it a truck, is it something.
Alexandra Amor: I live near a busy street, I think it was a motorcycle.
Melinda: That whole world count thing, it's a fascinating thing I've put in my workbook for my students, students love to count words and it's usually to get out of doing exams, so you'll see them, you've said write 250 words and they'll be going one, two, three, four

Business success is a game of inches, not a one off event, with Nigel Collin

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 19 Oct 2016 23:38:36 -0500

You can spend years learning to be a great writer but it’s only when you start writing that you actually learn. It’s a matter of starting because when you start you gain momentum and you learn as you go. Then there’s the passion, knowing and burn that drives you on when things get tough. Learning from your mistakes, making small changes wins the big results. Inch by inch. Writing is a business, we all know that, and learning the strategies and rules will get us part of the way, but it’s by being innovative, inventive and creative in our business mindset that brings the best results. And it takes time. Nigel spent a year interviewing the the best business people Australia has to offer – that he rode his motor bike around Australia to do it gave him insights into how our best succeed. Then, luckily for the rest of us, he documented all in his book, Game of Inches. You can find out more about Nigel and his business here. And if I get carried away chatting to Nigel about all the best places and characters we have to offer here in Oz, I blame Nigel…he was just too damned easy to talk to. Thanks, Nigel:)

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Nigel Collin
Duration: [00:58:04]
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I'm talking to the wonderful Nigel Collin of The Game of the Inches fame, good afternoon Nigel.
Nigel Collin: Good afternoon.
Melinda: I'd like to start our story Nigel if it's okay with you, of course I am a storyteller, I love to start at the high point of any story and I've already forewarned Nigel of this, we're moving our way up to the Daily Waters Pub and happy hour. Nigel as a businessman, as a storyteller, as a speaker I'd like to hand over to your and get you to tell us all about the success story that is the Daily Waters Pub.
Nigel Collin: It's, you know what it's probably the most famous non-famous place in Australia. I stumbled upon it virtually by accident, I didn't know the Daily Waters Pub existed until a mate of mine in Alice Springs said are you visiting the Daily Waters Pub and it's this little pub, it's been around since the 1800s not as a pub but it was a guesthouse original on the stockman's route. But it's off the beaten track, it's in the middle of nowhere literally it's between Katherine and Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory, literally hundreds of kilometers either direction there's nothing and it's off the main road so you could easily drive pass the turn-off and never know it's there.
But when you go to the Daily Waters Pub it's an experience, it's like an adventure. The place is famous because people flock to it, on any given evening, whether it's wet season/dry season, whether you've heard of the Daily Waters Pub or not, on any given evening there's somewhere around 250 people having a great time at this place and rightly so. It's full of characters, it's, you know what's really interesting, it has, it's almost the iconic outback pub that you see in movies, in fact it's featured in quite a few movies.
I say that because when you travel around the country as you know you come across these roadhouses and these places that kind of theme themselves up to look as we expect them to look, it's almost like they're, it's not that they're dis-genuine or anything but they're kind of make the effort of looking like an outback pub. The Daily Waters is the outback pub and I'm pretty sure that most places model after it. Hanging off the ceilings are people's t-shirts and underwear and caps that they've left there as they visit and the idea is that you'll come back and revisit your cap and I've got a cap hanging up in the ceiling somewhere in the Daily Waters Pub.
So it's an experience, it's one of those places that you probably don't know exist but so many people do. It's, you know what it's like? It's a bit like going to Disneyland. If you've ever been to Disneyland you can sort of say to someone, you can look at someone and go isn't it great and you have this bonding that you've both been there and you get it. You can't describe it, you get it. The Daily Waters Pub is like that, when you meet someone who's been you don't have to say anything you just go ah the Daily Waters Pub and instantly as all good visions, instantly this vision comes into your brain which triggers off these wonderful experiences and memories. It is unique and it is, it's just a great experience. I've used that word, I've overused the word because I don't know any other word to describe it.
Melinda: Yeah and I'm having a bit of chuckle and of our travelers out there will have a bit of a chuckle as well, I've been to the Daily Waters Pub and there are a lot of, I guess, similar pubs out there that don't have the reputation but they still have that authentic feel. I'm thinking of the Quamby Pub outside Cloncurry and nearby there's a one where a donkey goes up and drinks water, sorry, drinks beer at the bar. It's just part and part off--
Nigel Collin: And there's Humpty-Doo which is another experience again.
Melinda: Yeah Humpty-Doo's up near Darwin everybody. The reason I'm excited to have Nigel on today and the reason I'll get to reminisce about everywhere I've ever been is Nigel had a little project and if you'd like to tell us about that project Nigel it might make sense to our listeners while we're going to do a trip around Australia.
Nigel Collin: Yeah, yeah good one. So I grew up in a creative sector, I was a credit director in the business events industry and I would create shows and that sort of thing. I used to get really upset when people would say to me oh my ideas aren't any good, I'm not very creative. As Australians we're pretty good at putting ourselves down. So I had this brain wave, actually it wasn't really a brave wave, but I had this idea of if you just head out into Australia you'll come across the most amazingly creative, incredibly smart people. There's clever people all over this country doing incredible stuff and unfortunately through media or whatever we only hear about the Leviathans [00:05:39] (?) or the celebrities of innovation or creativity or whatever that is.
So I basically had this idea to jump on my motorbike and ride around the country just me, my bike and a video camera. As I met people I would interview them and tell their stories. The idea was by sharing stories of just everyday people who have done pretty cool stuff it would inspire other people to kind of go you know what, yeah I've always wanted to write a book or I've always wanted to be an artist and just inspire people to pursue their ideas and that was the original intent.
What happened was much more than that, as I travelled around the country I was inspired by so many different people and came back with probably the biggest business lesson I have had in my life, so it wasn't so much the many places I visited, it was the people attached to those places and their mindset, their attitude, what they've achieved, a whole concoction of lessons came from it.
So it wasn't just the experience of traveling around visiting these great places, when you talked to people it's incredible the stories you hear and how that can change you. I called the project Ingenious Oz Project, under the premise that we are an ingenious country, we are more ingenious than we give ourselves credit for. It's sort of still lurking away there in the background.
Melinda: I first came across this very idea of everybody having a story to tell and you remember it Nigel, it was called, it was a show called Australia All Over with with Macca and it used to be every Sunday morning and he'd get the truck as he'd get all sorts of people calling in and talking about the things that were happening and our characters that are out there living their lives in a way that I guess people who are out there only know how to do. I notice in your book The Game of Inches you talk about these guys, you talk about these guys in the outback being very innovative, inventive, with that we'll came back.
Nigel Collin: What a word.
Melinda: Innovative and the idea is that they don't have the resources so they have to be resourceful.
Nigel Collin: The Daily Waters Pub is the perfect example of that. So one of the interesting things having a business background, one of the interesting things people often think they can't be innovative or creative because they don't have the resources, they don't have the money, they don't have the materials, they don't have the mentors, whatever it is that that scarcity inhibits people from being innovative and creative.
It's absolute bunk, it's completely opposite and what's wonderful, the Northern Territory, although it's under 2% of the population of this country has some of the most innovative ideas going on. One of the reasons for it is when you're in the middle of nowhere you have to get creative, you have to be innovative if you want to get things done.
The Daily Waters Pub is such a great idea because they are in the middle of nowhere so they make their own tables and chairs out of old pallets from when they get deliveries and they're not just like pallets, they actually these beautiful tables, wooden tables crafted but out of materials they have lying around. I remember asking the owner at the time, her name was Robin what do you do when your washing machine breaks down because they're in the middle of nowhere. She basically said we go to Mitre 3, I thought what's Mitre 3? She went the tip! You go to the tip and you find what's available and you make the most of it. The other thing, so basically yeah, scarcity, the lack of resources puts you into a position where you have to be that, you really don't have a choice and as a result of that, many innovations, that old cliché, necessity is the mother of invention, that's why.
I interviewed the Mayor of Alice Springs, a guy called Damien Ryan he said remoteness instigates inventiveness and I love that. There's some really interesting, I can talk forever about innovation in the Northern Territory, But you're absolutely right I think there is a mindset out there that in order to create, in order for example to write that we need the newest MacBook or we have to get all of our storyboards organized and I need, oh I need to do some more interviews and we keep putting it off, and putting off and putting it off until we've got everything lined up perfectly and the truth of the matter is everything will never be lined up perfectly and if you just starts it's amazing what you'll create whether or not you've got resources is irrelevant.
Melinda: I think that's one of the key things in Nigel's book, Game of Inches, which is why small change wins big results is you need to start and you need to just take one step at a time refining things as you go. As authors I think we get a little bit, I guess overwhelmed by this whole idea of being business people as well as authors. Nigel's here to help us today, he's here to help us he's got this wonderful four step method, find a gap, take action, test and measure, and delete or improve. It's an amazing process, I have the book on my desk. Nigel and I were talking five minutes ago and he says I think there's a lot of people who've got it on their desk because you can just open it up and find that inspiration and I've put a lot of that on Instagram as I come across various pages. Nigel would you like to help me and my fellow indie authors out and tell us that it's okay to be business people and learn as we go?
Nigel Collin: Absolutely. Let me just kind of slide into that, having grown up in a creative industry of business events I used to think it was always about the big idea and I used to believe that if it wasn't done in it's entirety it wasn't worth even looking at. As I travelled around the country I learned that I was completely wrong. What's important is just to begin and to start. When you talk to creative people and when you talk to writers and you talk to business people it really is just a matter of starting because when you start you gain momentum and when you start you learn as you go.
The only way you can learn is by doing, I mean we need the strategies, we need to understand the rules of the game, we need to learn the craft of writing, I've spent years, it's interesting, I spent years trying to learn how to be a great writer and it wasn't until I actually got my head into a book and wrote it and started writing that I really learned. The three months of writing that book I learned more than I had in ten years.
So it is okay, I think, to just start wherever you are and understand that it is a process but you will learn by doing and when you make mistakes you learn from your mistakes. I think, I don't know society just has it's thing about it's got to be perfect I begin. No you just got to start. It's the one thing, you know when you look at, when you study, not just creative people but anyone who's had success in any kind of endeavor, but seriously really good at getting stuff done, they're just good at starting. It doesn't matter where they are, they just begin.
There's a Zen story I've put in the book which I'm always talking about because I love it to pieces about a businessman who wanted to become a third floor, a house on the third floor because back in ancient China that was very high status and you could look over land and over the presents so he commissioned some builders to build him a third floor home and he went off on his business travels and when he came back to his dismay they were still working on the first floor and he sacked them and they went why are you unhappy? He went because I didn't want, I don't want first floor, I just want the third floor, build me third floor. The builders like well we have to build you the first floor and he's I don't want the first floor.
It's a great, it's a great story because it illustrates that so often we just want to get the book finished and have it on the bookshelf and have it perfect. But the reality of these we got to start wherever we are and if we haven't started then we've got to start, we just got to do page one before we can get to page seven hundred and ninety four. Yeah, I think it is a very important lesson.
The other thing that you mentioned or that you spoke about there was writing is a business. It is a business! Writing is a business and it's a business from a number of perspectives. The reason I think is firstly I believe it is a financial business, if you're going to be a writer you need to support yourself. Unless you're part-time and there's nothing wrong with that but there's something wonderful about getting commissioned to do a work, to have an article in a magazine or to finish a book and to see someone to get an email from someone going hey that's a wonderful book. There is that commercial vibe of living to it that inspires us to keep going.
I think writing with a non- financial element is still a business and I think we should take the money out of it sometimes and go it is a business you need to sit down and structure yourself and to how you're going to write. You need to go well what is my objective here, what am I actually trying to achieve, what's the purpose of writing, is it just because it's good for my soul or do I want other people to read it or do I want to get published in a magazine or do I want to inspire a particular audience. Whatever that is there must be, I believe some kind of objective as to why you're writing what you're writing and from that point of view it's a business. So there is the financial side of it sure but there's a lot of really great writers out there, it doesn't have to be about the money but I think it does have to be a business in how you approach it and how you think about it otherwise nothing gets done.
Nigel Collin: You're just kind of throwing stuff around and it never, there's something good, let me be really honest with you, I love the romantic notion of writing a book, it is just the most beautiful thing of like wow how wonderful to write a book. The actual doing of it, for me anyway and I know there's other people that don't fall into this category but for me it's a chore, the actual writing, the reality of writing a book is so different to the romance or the notion of writing a book. So I had to treat it as a business, I needed the contract to get it done because it never would have been finished, it never would have got done had I not had the pressure of a deadline and a publisher over my shoulder going we need this by December 4, whenever it was. So yeah I think it is a business, it has to or you'll just, no.
Melinda: I think we've taken it one step further as well because not only are we writers and as independent-publishers or self-publishers we have to create a whole business model around that and so I'm finding myself delving more and more into the business world as I get my head around it so that I can share my knowledges with others. So we're talking, I've got the podcast, I'm about to launch an online course for teenagers and it's interesting what you say Nigel because the very first module in my course for my teenagers is Finding your Why and you've just covered that beautifully.
Nigel Collin: It's the one thing that will, it's interesting you saying that because the why is one thing that will get you through all the hardship and challenge and let's be really honest about this, if you're going to be a writer you're going to have moments of I'm going to give this up, there will be challenges, there will be times when you throw your computer against the wall type of thing. But it's that knowing, it's that passion, that burn, that drive that gets you through those challenges. If you have a publisher knock you back and you're not completely driven and don't believe in what you're doing it's very easy to go oh that's the end of that I've had enough or I can't take the rejection.
I was reading, I'm reading a great book at the moment called Grit by Angela Duckworth and I can't remember his name, she's talking about a cartoonist and very similar writers and cartoonists and he was talking about how do you get published, how do you get your work commissioned, he's a cartoonist with the New Yorker, I cannot remember his name, but he basically said you've got to keep going, you've got to just keep plugging away because and this is the great part of it he goes, business cartooning and we'll replace that with writing, cartooning is just like life, nine out of ten times it's going to go to hell. I just think isn't that brilliant! But the one way you get through that is by knowing why you do what you do, having this passion.
Anyone I, here's a challenge for everybody listening, when you come across someone, not just a writer, but anyone who's achieved anything of any level of success ask them what drives them and you'll find there's been very little hesitation, people who achieve things, people who complete the book they know what's driving them, they know what and that's what gets them up at six o'clock and that's what makes them disciplined enough between six and eight to do nothing but write, that's what disciplines them that when they get the letter of rejection to send it off to another publisher. It's knowing why you do what you do, that's what gets them through these moments.
This is my personal experience, I'm never going to nail this...

Business of (Indie) Writing – Day 5 – Novella writing and what it really means to write short with Joanne Dannon and Tracey Pedersen

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 20:09:43 -0500

You don’t have to be crazy but it helps. Welcome to Joanne Dannon and Tracey Pedersen as they battle it out with me over who’s podcast this actually is…and what it means to write short in the Indie publishing space. There are no guarantees that what we share on today’s podcast will be any use to anyone listening but we sure have fun playing in a space that is yet to be formally defined. What exactly does it mean to write short in the digital age – what do readers want, what are they prepared to pay, and how do we, as writers, slot our writing into the space that is designated ‘short fiction’. One thing is for sure, it’s a space that is creating a lot of interest, and opening up a whole new space in which to play. If Indie writers are the influences of the new digital age, then writing short, whether it be in series, serials or short stand alone fiction, then this is the space in which it is happening. And it’s a space where writers are playing with both form and delivery. You can find out more about Joanne here and Tracey here. But be warned, they are both delightfully crazy, and talented, and if you watch this space long enough, you might just find this podcaster interviewing them when they’re rich and influential – oh, okay, they may be that already, for some of us. Do I hear another novella boxed set calling?

The Business of (Indie) Writing – Day 4 – On being a professional Indie author, with Maggie Christensen

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 20:39:54 -0500

What does it take to live the life of a professional Indie author? Maggie Christensen is about to publish her sixth novel, Champagne for Breakfast, and her answer is simple: learning. ‘It’s just learning as I go,’ Maggie assures me. ‘I’m learning all the time.’ And that’s the secret. There’s so much to do and so much to learn it takes time and dedication to become a successful Indie author. Not only does Maggie dress and speak beautifully, everything about what she does as an author screams professionalism. From her website, to her book covers and her marketing, it’s clear this woman knows what she’s about. And today, she’s sharing what she knows with us. We chat about marketing, book promotions, price points, beta readers and reviews, among other things. She even tried making a business plan once. And what Maggie loves most about being an Indie author? Being in control of every part of the process with the support and guidance of a network of peers and the Alliance of Independent Authors (once she finds the time to join). You can find out more about Maggie and her novels here.

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Melinda: It's welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today I've got with me the beautiful Maggie Christensen. She's sitting here waiting expectantly wondering what I'm going to ask her. So at the moment we're just coming off our five days of the Business of Writing series that I've been running so I'm all fired up to keep prodding and poking at those indie publishers and how they get to the stage where they are, very, very successful with all the work they do on top of their full time writing job. Maggie, welcome to Writer on the Road.
Maggie Christensen: Thanks so much for inviting me, Melinda.
Melinda: Not a problem at all. If you'd like to share with our listeners a little of your story to date?
Maggie Christensen: My writing story or my life story?
Melinda: Well what would we like to hear listeners? I think we'd like to start with your life story because I know you were at some stage down in my home area of Sydney but I know you're from Glasgow and other than that I don't know a lot. So I'm curious tell us about you.
Maggie Christensen: I'm was teaching primary school in Scotland and I had the wanderlust so I, in my mid-twenties I answered a call to come and teach in the sun. The ad had this semi-naked surfer wearing budgie smugglers and a gown saying, come and teach in the sun and I tell people I'm still looking for that guy. But the interesting thing is the last author talk I gave one man at the back put his hand and said it was me, it was me. But anyway, I immigrated to Sydney to teach in schools.
Then I, after teaching for a number of years in state and private schools I moved into teacher education. That took me, first of all to Goulburn, countryside of Goulburn to a college called the Goulburn CAE which then closed and then I moved with the college and some of the staff to Wagga so it's another country town and it was there that much to my surprise at the ripe old age of 37, I'd given up hope of finding my soulmate and there he was, this gentle giant of an American guy who was teaching in the same classes as me. So I did meet my soulmate but it wasn't the guy who was advertising to come to Australia. We've been married now for over thirty years.
Melinda: That's a beautiful story. I've got a funny feeling I've spoke to you a little bit about this before Maggie. Now I did meet Maggie down at a book signing at Mitchelton, same place I met Rachel Amphlett to be honest and it's not a place I hang around a lot but I've managed to meet two beautiful ladies there. But my hometown is Goulburn and I believe we may have had that conversation because I actually started my, we did didn't we.
Maggie Christensen: We figured that you might have been a student of mine but neither of us remember each other.
Melinda: It was what, back in the late 70's, early 80's I think, way back when there was a teachers college in Goulburn, it then turned into a police academy or something. But it's amazing how our stories intertwine and that happens more often than you would think. One of the first questions that I want to talk to you about your writing today Maggie is I notice you have beautiful, beautiful beach covers and as that's my favorite topic in the whole world tell us about your obsession with the beach.
Maggie Christensen: I've always wanted to live near the beach and now I'm on the Sunshine Coast I do. My husband and I walk along the beach most mornings, we're near Peregian beach which is a beautiful long stretch of beach. So in writing my books I always have something beachy in them, excuse me. In my Sydney books Band of Gold and Broken Threads the beach features quite markedly, in fact my character in Band of Gold actually comes up to Peregian beach and goes to some of my favorite places including my favorite bookshop.
There's a story with that because there's another lady who writes about Peregian beach, a local author here Pat Node and in one of her book launches at Annie's bookshop in Peregian which is a wonderful bookshop Annie said but you have never have my bookshop in your books. So I decided okay Annie, you're going to be in one of my books. So Annie's bookshop appears in Band of Gold in my Oregon coast series well Florence in Oregon is right on the coast, the whole town is built on sand. So hence the beaches on all of my covers.
Melinda: Maggie is now talking about the Queensland coast for our international listeners, all our international listeners a lot of them are from Germany nowadays since we had Sherrie Macarthy on which is interesting I think I've quite a following over there now. But yeah, Queensland Coast, New South Wales Coast, all beautiful, beautiful parts of the world. I'm particularly interested in those at the moment because I'm about to start school holidays. It's raining buckets out there at the moment but I'm sure the sun will come out tomorrow. Now Maggie--
Maggie Christensen: Sun is shining up here.
Melinda: The latest book that I've got is called Madeline House and I picked that up, as I said recently and it looks like from what I can gather it looks like it's book six from you?
Maggie Christensen: No, it's my fifth book but it's book three in my Oregon Coast series.
Melinda: Oregon Coast --
Maggie Christensen: Although it's a series they're all standalone stories.
Melinda: There's a story with that, I wanted to bring you around to. It's dedicated to wonderful lady from what I can gather, in memory Maxine who inspired Maggie.
Maggie Christensen: Maxine was my mother-in-law and she has an interesting story in that she lived in California and in her eighties she moved to Oregon where her brother and sister-in-law were living and she moved to the little town of Florence, Oregon which is my connection with that town. My husband and I visit her on many occasions and that's what made me decide to set a series of books there.
Melinda: I remember having the conversation with Maggie about what book I should buy because they've all got beautiful covers like I said I might put them up on my blog post when we put this episode up and everyone can see what I'm talking about. But I couldn't decide which book to buy and being from Goulburn and Sydney and those kinds of places I was very tempted to buy one of those books. But this Maggie's most recent book and apparently you've been getting the best reviews from that, all your books have been doing very well but people seem to be particularly enamored with this one, is that correct?
Maggie Christensen: I think so, I get good reviews for all them, but I think this one has struck a cord with some people. A number of people have picked up on the sort of domestic violence part of it, although it's not a huge part of the book but that's the reason my character leaves Sydney and goes to Florence is that she has a very controlling husband.
Melinda: I don't think we've mentioned Maggie's heroines are mature heroines and I've spoken to someone else, oh I know it was Jenn McLeod, her heroine, or Jenn J McLeod, her heroines are mature as well. So I'm pretty sure they're not as mature as us but they might be. But it'd be very interesting to go and hear their stories because I know they've got a new selection of romances now called New-Age fiction, what are they called the new hip, everyone's that's 21 years, 20 years old.
Maggie Christensen: New-Adult fiction.
Melinda: New-Adult fiction that's correct and I thought if they're going to have New-Adult they should have middle aged as well, I think that's only fair. We all want a handsome hero, well some of us do. Actually cancel that, maybe we don't.
Maggie Christensen: I call mine my mature women's fiction and I say that I celebrate mature women and the heroes worthy of them.
Melinda: You have to be a damn worthy hero nowadays I can tell you. I'm not sure we can write romance novels with no heroes at all, but it worth a challenge I suppose. At least in books we can make them do what we want. Okay now your books are Dreamcatcher, Sand Dollar, Break Threads, Band of Gold, and now Madeline House. Now you have a very interesting story about your cover designer. Now I did try to get in touch with her but I haven't heard back yet so I might have to get you to introduce me. But apparently she's very, very good and she looks very, very good.
Maggie Christensen: She is brilliant, she really is. I came across her, I was looking, I was looking at books that I liked and I found a Welsh author actually Jan Ruth and she was using Jane and then through Jan I founded my editor and he recommended Jane and I looked at her portfolio and I just loved her covers and she's so easy to work with, she's brilliant.
Melinda: If I can track her down everybody I'd love to have a cover designer on our show. I tried to talk my cover into coming on but he was to shy.
Maggie Christensen: I'm sure that Jane would be delighted. She's just recently actually put out a book, oh gosh I can't remember the actual name but it's about cover design and formatting where she gives a lot of hints and tips without selling herself but it's a brilliant book really on that and you can get, you can download that Amazon. J.D. Smith.
Melinda: I'll certainly do that because I think it's a topic that as Indies we're all very, very interested in. I notice Annie Seaton is actually showing off her beautiful Daintree cover on Facebook at the moment. She had a beautiful--
Maggie Christensen: It's gorgeous.
Melinda: She had a beautiful cover on Kakadu Sunrise and now or Kakadu Sunset and now she's got Daintree Sunrise. But the covers are gorgeous, I know she designs some of her covers as well for other clients. So it's just such a huge feature I think of getting our books out there professionally designed and looking very good against all the other books that are out there competing, I guess for our readers attentions.
Let's talk a little bit about your Indie publishing journey because when I met you you've obviously got it down pat, you're very, very professional with the, how your store was set up, your bookmarks, your huge banner sign with you books on it, your professional demeanor. Maggie is Scottish, of Scottish descent and she just dresses beautifully and speaks beautifully and that's what attracted me, I went wow this woman really knows her stuff. Have you had to work hard to get to the point that you're at?
Maggie Christensen: It's been a huge learning curve because I started knowing nothing. I started thinking I'd go down the traditional route, I actually started writing a couple of Mills & Boone type books and submitted them but by the time I heard back from the publisher eighteen months later asking me to redo and resubmit I'd started writing mature women's fiction which is what I like to read. What I found was that the traditional publishers and agencies, I just didn't quite meet their, fit their list. So I decided I'd self-publish.
So what I did was look at other people who've self-published and what I've found and you've probably found too Melinda, the writing community in Australia is such a supportive group of people. So I learned a lot from others, I joined Romance Writers of Australia, Queensland Writers Center, The Alliance of Independent Authors which is brilliant for all Indie authors and I just learned as I went along and I've learnt from what other people do, my banner's I say Alison Stewart on Facebook with a banner like that and I found out where she got it and I decided I'll go down that track.
It's learning as I go and I learn more all the time. I'm still learning about advertising and about Twitter and I don't know anything about Audiobooks but I've set up with Rachel Amphlett, next time I met her we're going to talk audiobooks because she's just put one out. So it's just a continual learning process.
Melinda: I was listening to Rachel's, I put her up today on my podcast and she was talking about the edits of her, oh gosh white something, White Gold and it was seven hours of audio that she had to go through. I've just made contact with a lady and she's coming on the podcast next week and she's our audiobook expert so I'm very keen because this holiday's I'm going to finish recording The Minor's Wife so I might put that one up sooner rather than later because I think a few of us are interested in that whole process of audio books.
Maggie Christensen: It depends on your audio but I know with my audience there are a lot of older women who really like audiobooks. I, one of the things I do, I volunteer with our local library and I select and deliver books to people who are homebound, housebound or are living in nursing homes and quite a few them prefer audiobooks because they're getting to the stage where they can't read much anymore.
Melinda: I had an elderly auntie and she was exactly that, she used to read the large print and in the end she couldn't read at all so she could sit there and listen to her stories. I thought was a beautiful, beautiful thing to happen. I noticed on Facebook, I don't even know who put it up, someone put it up yesterday, it might have been within one of my podcast, it was within my podcasting group they've just got back from a conference, Amazon is starting to incorporate and I thought well that's very interesting as well outside Audible, I'm not quite sure what it was all about, I just looked at it and thought I'll have to come back and look at it later but apparently it's pretty exciting stuff.
Maggie Christensen: I must look into that too.
Melinda: I'm sure we'll all find out eventually, I'm sure they won't keep it a secret or it'll be spread all over the place, however works. Yeah, look I don't even know how Audible works to be honest, all I know is here in Australia we can't use it so it's irrelevant to us.
Maggie Christensen: That's all I know too. But Rachel seems to have managed that so I'm interested in talking with her.
Melinda: She may have an American address, we did discuss it briefly but I can't remember. So there are too many things. But we will find out about it and when I get on my audio friend next week we'll discuss it I guess a little bit further. You talked about The Alliance of Independent Authors. Do you have that on your website? You don't have their little emblem.
Maggie Christensen: No I don't, I keep meaning to do that, I haven't done that yet. But I just found they're invaluable in terms of advice and tips and answering any questions and it's just such a great community.
Melinda: Yeah I've put out a SOS to Orna Ross who is the business, what is she, she's the one of the directors or something.
Maggie Christensen: I think.
Melinda: I've got an invitation out to her to come on board and tell us all about The Alliance of Independent Authors. Again, because that's the stage I'm at, I'm looking at joining there, I've been saving up my pennies for a while to join The Alliance of Independent Authors because I think it's so fantastic and then Joanna Penn put out her conference here in Australia, so my two hundred dollars went to that to then.
Maggie Christensen: I also love that.
Melinda: How could we not go and see Joanna Penn when she's on our own backdoor with Rachel Amphlett and what's the other lady, I've forgotten her name.
Maggie Christensen: Belinda, gosh I met her last week.
Melinda: Yeah, well we'll get her on board as well if we can --
Maggie Christensen: Belinda Pollard.
Melinda: That's the one. I notice you have another favorite author of mine, or she used to be a favorite author back when I had time to read and it was Liz Byrski, I noticed she was on your Cafe Cala.
Maggie Christensen: Yes, she was, Cafe Cala. Yeah, she's one of the authors who inspired me partly because she writes about older women but also she started writing fiction in her fifties as well although she's been teaching creative writing in Western Australia for a number of years.
Melinda: Tell us a little bit more about Cafe Cala that, you've got some wonderful authors on there.
Maggie Christensen: Yes, I decided to start a blog and I'm not good at making up blog posts so I decided to interview authors. I got the name a number of years ago when we were living in Wagga we were on an acreage outside Wagga and we wanted a name for our property and I wanted a name that was a little bit different and I found the word Cala which is Scottish/Gaelic for a haven or a harbor so that's always been the name of our house. So when I set up my blog I decided to call it Cafe Cala.
What I've been doing is interviewing an author every two weeks, on the second and forth Thursday of the month. It is getting a bit hectic and I'm thinking of maybe twiddling it back to what one a month because I'm finding, not I'm running out of authors but not every author I contact gets back to me. But I've actually been thrilled at some of the big name authors who have responded, people like Sue Grafton and Fiona McIntosh and I have got Rachel Johns coming up next week. So Australian and overseas authors have responded very well to it and I'm thrilled with that.
Melinda: This is where that inclusive community comes in because Rachel Johns is coming on the podcast next week as well.
Maggie Christensen: Oh is she really? Perfect.
Melinda: You think that these women and men are giving up for what is essentially I guess for free and I take a fair bit of people's time, I take up as you know 45 minutes to an hour which is naughty of me. But these people are very kind and very generous of spirit. I think I've got Kate Forsyth coming up as well. I approach them with an open mind and an open heart and I understand fully why people wouldn't have the time. As I said I'm not sure what it's in it for them other than their giving back to their readers who absolutely adore them and hang off their every words. As you so very generously offered to come on and chat with me today you have quite a large readership.
Maggie Christensen: I've just thinking actually of authors, someone who was very generous with her time was Di Morrissey who came onto my interview panel.
Melinda: It's been years since I've read a Di Morrissey...

The Business of (Indie) Writing – Day 3 – Writing, editing and writing some more: how to edit your book and make it practically perfect in every way with freelance editor, Lynne Stringer

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 11 Oct 2016 19:57:16 -0500

‘I’m about to upload my story, can you quickly check for me,’ is a phrase Lynne Stringer hears a lot in her day job as a freelance editor and it drives her crazy. Her advice is we need at least two rounds of editing and preferably more, especially if it is our first book. Timeline errors, plot inconsistencies, structural problems, grammar and spelling problems, and everything else problems all get a mention during our chat today and I’m going to brave and suggest some of us may never look at the editing process with such fondness ever again. Editors are our ‘objective eye’ and their job is to tactfully and gently guide us through the process of making our babies the best they can be – after we think we’ve already brushed their hair and cleaned their teeth. You may find Lynne’s advice confronting, and some of the prices she quotes even more so, but if our work is going to be our business card, brand and representative out there in the big, wide publishing world, then we’d rather get it right, wouldn’t we? Lynne tells us how…but I can’t guarantee we’ll like it. You can find out more about Lynne and her work here.

Read Full Transcript

Lynne Stringer
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today I've got with me a wonderful woman by the name of Lynne Stringer. It's someone I've been wanting to speak to for quite a while because Lynne does the very thing that I think I'm brilliant at and I'm actually very bad at and it's called editing.
For all of you who know anything about Indie publishing the first piece of advice that any of us give you is get yourself a professional editor because no matter how many times you read your stuff you miss the mistakes and I have a case point, I've been putting a little series of podcast interviews in the last few days and I think I'm rather brilliant and my daughter will edit them for me and go through them and there are glaring mistakes that I've read ten times and those mistakes are just there. Welcome Lynn.
Lynne Stringer: Thank you very much Mel, it's great to be here.
Melinda: I'm very keen to talk to you about the editing process. But first of all would you like to tell us a little bit about yourself so that my listeners have an idea of what you're about or where you've come from, where you're going, all that kind of stuff, so that they can switch me out and tune into you.
Lynne Stringer: I've been working with writing ever since I was a child really, I've always loved writing. My father's a writer also. I gradually got into it more and I actually studied a bit of journalism, became the editor of a newspaper, just a small one, which I was the chief journalist for and editor of for seven years.
After that I started working with a company called Wombat Books doing some editing first. I was editing non-fiction works for them. Then I started editing their fiction as well because I just seemed to have a knack for being able to do that. I finished up working with them as an editor, although I still do some freelance for them when required, but I finished up that last year and started working for Amanda Greenslade at Australian eBook Publisher who I believe you had on the show recently as well. Now I do editing for her, I also do my own private editing work as well. It's not an easy task because as I like to say an editor's job is to tell you that your baby is ugly and needs plastic surgery which no one likes to hear.
Melinda: Lynn's never said that about my work because otherwise I'd hit the off button. She can actually say that my work's beautiful before we start. But the truth of the matter is, Lynne and I were having a brief conversation before we started tonight, all of us, even the best of us, even English teachers, miss the most basic of things when it comes to reading our own work because it becomes very familiar to us. That's why I've got Lynne on here tonight because I'm guessing all of us are keen to hear what an editor's got to say, what our editor's see when send off our manuscripts saying can you just give this a quick tidy up before I upload it to Amazon to make my fortune. Yeah, so Lynn.
Lynne Stringer: That is the phrase I hate hearing the most. I'm about to upload up it, can you just quickly check it because you don't do that. You've got to take editing seriously and you need to have, if you're going self-publishing, you need to have at least two rounds of editing and preferably far more before you can even be sure yours is going to be correct because so much may need to be done, especially if this is your first time.
But even if it's not, too you need to be someone who's going to be able to cope with the criticism you're going to get too and be aware that the editor, while we might say things that you don't like, our goal is to make your book better and you've got to be prepared to put the time in to getting an editor and being aware that once I've edited your book once you don't upload it Smashwords or Lulu or wherever the following week because it's not going to be ready that quickly, it's a long, drawn-out process if you want to get it right.
Melinda: I'm making a couple of notes here as Lynne is giving us that very brief introductory nightmare scenario of waiting.
Lynne Stringer: No one likes to do that!
Melinda: My students at school, they think that they start at the introduction, go through their three paragraphs, write their conclusion, they'd submit it and get an A. But as teachers we know that's not the case at all. As writers we like to think our manuscripts have gone through, and I know with my own manuscripts they can go through a dozen edits and I think I've picked up everything and I would like to think that I could just send it off to someone like Lynne and give it one go over and that would be enough.
But my own experiences even with The Miner's Wife and it was with Australian eBook Publishers. I think there was something like 400 mistakes after it had gone through the editing process because there's different levels of editing. If for my listeners who are just starting at the very beginning and you get a call saying can you just give my manuscript a quick edit, how do you go about saying well I can... but.
Lynne Stringer: I have to be very tactful about it, because as I said writing is probably one of the most personal things we do. It's an extremely personal thing and it's very easy to offend someone with things like that because none of us like to hear that what we've crafted so carefully and edited ourselves 15, maybe 100 times if you're like me, might not yet be perfect. So you do have to be very gentle and try and make people understand that it can be very difficult to get it right, you may have had problems especially with the plot as well that you might have missed something because you've got what you think is a logical sequence of events but you may not realize that you've missed a spot that your reader is going to pick up on. So my job is to tell you about those things. The goal being of course to get it fixed up before it goes to print.
I have one of my regular private editing clients, she put a testimonial on my website and said that she was amazed that I gave her back her manuscript and I found timeline errors, plotting consistencies, structural problems as well as all the grammar and spelling and everything else problems and this was in a manuscript she was about to send to the print. But she'd sent it me first and suddenly I sent it back and she goes oh my goodness, look at all these things. She's right, the plot doesn't work! She had to do a re-write to fix it up. So it's amazing what you don't see because you think you know it, but there can be things you've missed and that another eye, an objective eye, can pick up.
Melinda: I know from my own experiences I guess that there are things called story edits and line edits. So they're two completely different things. Now I don't know whether the charges are different, but--
Lynne Stringer: It depends on who you're going with and what they do. Personally, I like to try and do the whole lot in one go. With some manuscripts that can be really tricky because there's often a lot of things to deal with. Those are the people who I usually say you have to come back and have another edit because there's probably things I've missed because I've been so distracted by other elements. But I find it impossible if I'm reading a book and say I find a structural problem with the plot, I can't stop myself from doing other editing at the same time, like structural edit means that an editor with go through your manuscript and look at the plot and characterization, make sure it's paced right, make sure it makes sense, make sure you're communicating it well.
What we also call a line edit or a copy edit as it's always known means we go through the manuscript line by line, we make adjustments for what might think might work better and they are all just suggestions. But if you come to me I will actually probably put words in that I suggest you change it to because I think they communicate what I think you're trying to say more effectively. So you go through it line by line, which is why it's called a line edit and you make adjustments to try and make the flow work. That's something that I usually do, like I said, at the same time but some people will do those individually.
Some manuscripts will really require a structural edit which is best to get done first and then a line edit after that. Then, after that you should also have a proof-read as well which is just looking for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors and punctuation problems. You may find that you need a couple of rounds of those ones as well, especially when it comes to, your book has significant structural problems, like if your plot doesn't work. You might think you fixed it up, but you might not have fixed it up at all. So you might need to come back for another round or even another round. But it depends, every manuscript is different and the problems in them are always very different as well.
Melinda: We've got to remember that right at the top of the page I've written here your aim is to make our stories better.
Lynne Stringer: Absolutely.
Melinda: As Indie publishers we pride ourselves on being as professional as we can be and I personally think that the standards are improving daily as we hire cover editors, sorry, cover designers, editors, graphic designers, all the kinds of people that put us right up there with anyone else because as we know a reader doesn't care where the book came from as long as it's a good story.
Lynne Stringer: That's right.
Melinda: They don't know to look inside the cover and say oh gee that one's a penguin one or that one's this or whatever. They just care about a story. So it's our job to make sure our books look as professional as the next person's on the shelf. That came as a huge shock to me that we had to government through story edits or structural edits, line edits, copy edits and proofreading. There's a cost that comes with that.
Lynne Stringer: Yes.
Melinda: As professional writers, and like professional anything, education quite often isn't free. Life-long is something as writers that we need to embrace. Cost wise, now I know I'm going to talk to you in a minute about what you have to do to make yourself the best person for us to come to, but as a writer what can I look at and I know costs very hugely, I've got some horror stories about what happened to me when I went to America for some of these before I found Australian eBook Publisher. I was very wary by the time I got to poor old Amanda. Cost wise, what are you looking at if we wanted to put our stories through the rigors of those three rounds per say.
Lynne Stringer: It depends on who you go with and how many rounds are required. It is definitely not a cheap business. I am to the cheaper end of the scale definitely, although I'm thinking of putting my prices up because it is an incredible amount of work to do and considering I do the whole edit, everything at once, it's very time consuming and with some manuscripts it can be extremely taxing mentally. So might be doing that, but I haven't yet. But you can honestly, if you want to make sure it's done properly be prepared to spend at least a couple of thousand dollars depending on the length of your manuscript. But, some people go oh my goodness, no I can't spend that kind of money.
We had, because I work for Australian eBook Publisher as I said, we had someone the other day who' self-publishing their book and they, they're spending thousands of dollars having their books published. I said, she said I'm sure if I need to proofread or not, can you just check and see if it needs. I had a look and her book has significant problems, it's completely written with telling, she doesn't show at all, it's shockingly bad. So I'm going I have to tell this lady that I think she needs a proper edit. So I said very gently I think it might be a good idea if you get this edited properly, have more than a proofread. Oh no, no, no, I can't. I've had this, and this is something else I want to mention.
She said to me she'd been, she'd had other editors mentor her. So this is something you do need to know too, there are editors and there are editors. Some editors are unfortunately not that great and you need to make sure and it's hard because it's going to be hard who's the good one and who's the bad one. But there are editors out there who have no idea what they're doing and I couldn't believe it when this lady said she'd been mentored because her book was really not very good. So I said to her I still think you really need an edit. She in the end wouldn't even go for the proofread because of the cost. Now she's going to spend thousands of dollars producing a book that is really, really bad.
It's heartbreaking for me as an editor because being a published author myself I know how savage reviewers can be and my job as an editor is to be savage before you get your book out there. So hopefully the reaction will be less savage. I'm not saying you wouldn't ever get a bad review because that's inevitable. But the better your book is the likely that is. You've got to be willing to spend the money and if it means you have to take longer to get the book out then so be it, because it's better that you wait until it's ready before you spend all the money and find that you're left with a garage full of books that you can't sell.
Melinda: I can tell you from experience that I think The Miner's Wife, now it had gone through the whole rigorous PhD process, which I had a professor working with me and I know by the time my book got to Australian eBook Publishers I thought oh that's okay, and it cost me another $5,000 to even bring close to what we wanted. I'm an English teacher, I read it with a fine tooth comb, Australian eBook Publishers went through it and Amanda and her team went through it and even at the end of that we found another 400, they were proof edits, they were small things and that's with a professional team working on it.
This does need to happen. I'm for one I'm absolutely convinced that it needs to happen. It's, as you said telling first time authors that their baby's got wood feet that breaks their cotton-picking little hearts. But when your book is our there I've got some middle-grade novels out and again Amanda from Australian eBook Publishers said look Mel, I'm really sorry to tell you this but your structure is crap and you need to go back in and I think she charged me like $600 and a couple of conversations.
Lynne Stringer: That's really cheap!
Melinda: Yeah, a couple of conversations, she said Mel have you done those edits yet and I'm going nah, I'm going to--
Lynne Stringer: Procrastination.
Melinda: I want to bury that one in the bottom drawer and I'll move on. But without the professional experience we may as well not call ourselves publishers and we may as well not try and compete on a professional level. I know I've been dealing a lot lately with romance authors. Here in Australia we have a really, really strong contingent of published romance authors with traditional publishers and they talk about the edits and they talk about their book a year and they talk about working with teams of professionals. It's time consuming and it takes a lot of effort.
Lynne Stringer: They would still have mistakes in it at the end of it too just to say. There's very few books ever get through without any mistakes.
Melinda: That's absolutely right. But they're lucky that they can ship their stuff off and have someone else worry about all that, then they come back and make the changes and off they go. The problem that we have as Indies is we're in charge, we're business, we wear our business hats as well as our writing hats. The pressure is on, as we all know to write quickly, write regularly and publish often. So we're very much reliant on people like yourself Lynne as independent editors. But people still hesitate to pay, pay that price of a professional.
Lynne Stringer: They need to, you need to get over that really is what I have to say because I know so many people who have spent $5,000 getting their book published and then have not been able to sell it because it's bad, it's terrible. Because they haven't taken that step. I remember what you mentioned earlier that you think education is getting out there and people are realizing more and more that they need to have editors and I agree, I think it is started to get out there.
But there are people who clearly haven't got the message or at least think it doesn't concern them. They think, oh of course that's for the person who's the hack. I'm the professional here, I know what I'm doing, I don't need an editor. It's all just good. That's the worst kind of client for me to deal with too because quite often people will send me their book and expect me just to rubber stamp it, you can tell that's what they were expecting. They expect me to go oh I found a couple of little spelling mistakes, you're all good to go. Instead I come back and say okay now there's this problem, there's this problem, there's a problem. You can tell by the way they react that they were not expecting it and that they don't think that I'm right. That becomes extremely difficult to convince them. But everybody needs editing, even editors need editing.
I was recently an anthology, I wrote a short story for an anthology and I think they were three or four of us who were editors who wrote stories for it. I wrote a blog at the time, one of my blogs was titled "Even Editors Need Editors" because I was writing my story and I thought oh it's pretty, I think I've got this pretty tight and I sent it off to the women who'd been charged to be my editor for that and she came back and said okay repetition here, repetition here and I'm going okay I missed that.
She herself was edited by someone else and she came back to our Facebook group and said it seems that I've found, I've just discovered I start a lot of sentences with the word "well" which she hadn't noticed. But yeah, she apparently had "well" her dialogues were starting with the word "well" over and over again. So she had to go through and take them all out. So we were all laughing and talking about...

The Business of (Indie) Writing – Day 2 – Writing, publishing and niche markets with Indie author, Julie Schooler

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 10 Oct 2016 19:44:09 -0500

Have you ever wondered about the nitty-gritty of Indie publishing and all the small details of what makes up the life of an Indie author? Julie Schooler has done it, twice, and what’s more, she’s a bestselling author in her parenting advice niche. Julie is the author of the perenially popular parenting self-help books, Easy Peasy Potty Training and Easy Peasy Healthy Eating, and she takes us through the Indie publishing process of Create Space, pricing, proofs and ebook sales. Our conversation warms up with talk about launching, ISBNs, formatting and taxes. Then there’s editing, illustrations, reviews and promotions. On choosing your niche, you need to look at solving pain points for your customers. But most important of all are friends; ones who write and ones who publish. There’s nothing like a warts and all conversation with someone who’s been there, done that to wonder whether Indie publishing is worth all the effort. But hey, think of the satisfaction of seeing your books on the Bestseller lists and getting to keep all the profit, well, most of it, anyway. You can find out more about Julie and her website, Cherish Mama here.

The Business of (Indie) Writing – Day 1 – Writing, creativity and accountability with Jules Horne

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 09 Oct 2016 19:41:07 -0500

Jules Horne lives in the Scottish Borders and is an Associate Lecturer at Open University. She writes plays for stage and radio, and fiction with a Scottish gothic flavour. She’s inspired by Angela Carter and Mervyn Peake (of Gormenghast fame). Today, we chat about the tension between creativity and risk, the role of Indie publishers as influencers, and learning from our mistakes. Throw in offshoots on deadlines, daily goals and the Pomodoro Technique and things start to get interesting. Jules is a true creative and lives what she believes. The Scottish Borders may be isolated geographically, but academically, Jules is at the forefront. These are exciting times and even a brief chat with Jules has me excited for the possibilities for new ways of learning. You can find out more about Jules and her writing here and here.

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Jules Horne
[01:03:25]
Melinda: It's welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I am traveling around the world again today and I'm really, really excited to be in the Scottish boarders, now how beautiful and exotic does that sound? So I'm here with a beautiful lady by the name of Jules Horne and Jules welcome to Writer on the Road.
Jules Horne: Hello Melinda, thanks for me having me on the show.
Melinda: Not a problem at all. Jules put a wonderful little picture on her Facebook profile there earlier tonight and it's of this little hedgerow road that I remember from my days in Ireland, it's so romantic over there. I know you probably don't think it's exotic but to us over here in sunny Queensland it is certainly romantic and coming into winter where you get all your snug fires and red wine. But let's go back and talk writing.
Jules Horne: I have to say also I've been looking with great envy of your shots of just wonderful sunshine and you wearing your hat and looking like you're having glorious sun. So the romance has its limits and I do envy you your sun as well.
Melinda: For all our listeners I did a Facebook live cross yesterday from Circus Paradise on the Gold Coast here on the east coast of Australia and I did this lovely pan of what I thought was the beach, but all it was the sky. So I'm going to practice my panning everybody so I actually get into the shots what I thought I was, there was no beach there at, it looked really silly. But I'll keep practicing and I'll keep trying. Now over to Jules, would you like to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about the writing that you do?
Jules Horne: I'm a hybrid writer, I do lots of different kinds of writing. I started off as fiction and then I kind of made migrated into drama. So I'm actually mainly a playwright these days and I've written for stage and radio and I also have a background in journalism. I used to work in radio. So I have a bit of a mixed background, so I pull in lots of different kinds of writing techniques from different angles.
But the main thing I suppose is working with drama which means working with actors and directors so it's collaborative and that's a really different prospect from the fiction and the really kind of tight inner focus of fiction. So it's a more, perhaps more people oriented, more collaborative kind of writing.
Melinda: Jules and I were a little bit of a conversation just briefly before we started and as happens with a lot of my guests I had to stay stop, stop, stop, we'll have our interview over before we even press the record button. But Jules has linked up with another guest who we've had on our Writer on the Road and she was very, very popular and you'll all remember Sherrie and Sherrie was very exuberant and very, very popular too I might add.
I had people from all over the world, Sherrie was our beautiful motorbike rider and jumped on a motorbike after a week and wrote all these books about it. Now she's writing, just about to release I believe or very close to releasing her first fiction novel. Jules is her writing buddy and one of the things I want to talk to Jules tonight about is what it's like having someone in your corner encouraging you every step of the way.
Jules Horne: I love that analogy of there's somebody fighting your corner and being in your corner because I think that's absolutely, it's about, Sherrie is amazing. I don't know if Sherrie realizes quite how amazing she is, what she juggles because she's got two young kids as well and just the fact that she goes out on motorbike trips and then boat trips, she's very sort of intrepid like that. So really in the spirit of Writer on the Road. I feel like quite a sort of tame Writer on the Road with my little bicycle or walking or that sort of thing. Sherrie's kind of really dynamic.
So what's been amazing, and we met by the way on the Joanna Penn Creative Freedom forum and realized that we both wanted a certain kind of accountability, that's really what it's all about. We're both working, as a lot of writers do in relative isolation and you spend long hours working on your project. I found because of my journalism background actually deadlines are really good and there's nothing I love more than a deadline and a clock ticking down to the top of the hour. Just really focuses the mind. So some kind of version of that thought would be really helpful.
Sherrie and I decided that we'd work well together because we both wanted quite a hard core version of accountability not just maybe once a week that sounds a bit scary but actually in practice it's not been quite as hair raising as that, but we wanted it to be pretty consistent. So what we've done is essentially it boils down to daily check-ins in the morning. We're both in similar time zone so Sherrie's in Berlin and I'm in, well she's from Canada but she lives in Berlin and I'm in Scotland. So we check in most morning and say what have you been up to, how did yesterday go, what did you achieve in terms of what you were wanting to finish that day.
We usually have two or three small goals and want to finish this edit, do so many pages. We're great, think we used pomodoros or not a lot so then that's if something that your listeners familiar with, these 25 minute time blocks called pomodoros which I think they're a great way to focus your commitment even if you can only do one a day you've got that slot where you're doing nothing else and it really focuses the mind. So sometimes that's what our goals look like. Other times it's get this project uploaded and done. So although we don't always achieve quite what we set out to do it's always forward progress and slight and continuing.
So I think over the past long while it's getting on for a year now actually, we've actually put out quite a lot. I mean I've put out two collections of short stories, got my draft done for my copywriting book which is coming out and that's from a standing start not knowing anything about book publishing, about self-publishing. So the combination of Joanna's forum and Sherrie as a writing buddy has just been amazing.
Don't forget Sherrie, we have this metaphor of monkeys so we're kind of doing an experiment of identifying different forms of monkeys that tend to peter your creative process. So there's, the ones that are quite antsy and jump up and down and kind of defocus you and there's others that are kind of saying you can't do this, you're useless. We've sort of got this, I suppose a typology of monkeys so that might become a book, let's look into this because this is the year of the monkey as well. So that's part of the thinking.
Melinda: As Jules is speaking she reminds me very much of Sherrie, very vibrant waving her arms around, Sherrie Macarthy for anyone who doesn't know who we're talking about because she's, I think we had her on about ten podcasts ago, five podcast ago I can't remember. But I was very interested when Jules came onto night and said that there may be a book coming out on collaboration and writing buddies because I think especially in the indie publishing world we do work in isolation a lot as Jules said and having someone to bounce ideas off, now I use the Freedom Journal by John Lee Dumas and I'm really slack at that as you know I write in one day every ten days or twenty days. Whatever it is I'm up to page eight I think because I did two days in a row. Having someone every day to say to you what are your three little goals today and having someone to check up on you at the end of the day is I'm guessing a very powerful too.
Jules Horne: It is very powerful and it's evolved over time because we're both kind of experimenting with how it works. One of the books we looked at was The Twelve Week Year. I don't know, I can't remember the author of that but I can let you know that after. His ideas that years are quite a long time to be goal setting, we do this beginning of, at the New Year we think what are we going to do this year, it's too long a period to be actually be manageable and sustainable. So if you instead break it down into twelve week slots, or sort of ninety day slots it gives it more of a compact focus and you can sort of go for that time and so we've been experimenting with that.
We've just finished a twelve week year, so we had our New Year's celebration just last week and sort of worked out well what have we all done and then we're just about to start, we're in January now, so until this Sunday we're in January of this new twelve week year. So we'll be reporting back on these experiments and what's worked and what people can try for themselves.
Melinda: Have you got any tips to share, any ideas? What do you find works for you guys?
Jules Horne: I think it's really individual for different writers so it's very hard to generalize. I think that you have to experiment and try what works for yourself and depends on the kind of writer you are, so there's that kind of caveat. But what I've found is that who's, I'm quite distractible and I need headphones to work, I need to really kind of kind of close everything down to be able to get in that space. So what works very well for me, first of all headphones, you should probably see these. These for focus, I mean I'm not without these ever, they're just brilliant. They're about ten pounds and they are just ear defenders, the kind you would use if you were digging a hole in the road or if you were air traffic control or something like that. That's what you'd use. They're brilliant. So that might not work for everyone, but it works brilliantly for me.
Leading on from that, I find really granular goal setting works very well. So you have a bigger picture one which is edit that 75k book by the end of the month, but you really break it down so that for a day you're going to do five pages and you can just see the slow progress rather than trying to have a really massive goal that just looks, it doesn't have a real shape and definition whereas if it's really small and granular on a day to day basis I just find that easier to handle. So it's a personal thing, but that really works for me, this sort of granular goal setting.
Melinda: We do it with the kids at school and their homework diaries all the time. As part of this Creative Freedom course we're doing with Joanna Penn and it's where I meet some of these beautiful ladies who are so very, very talented and I think we've Cassandra Gaisford on, we've had Sherrie Macarthy and we've got Jules, I've got a couple of others coming up as well. They're a group of dynamic women who are determined to succeed in their writing businesses which is of course what our podcast's all about and Jules has got a dog, I can hear him barking in the background.
Jules Horne: Somebody else's dog through the wall.
Melinda: I took the liberty in our group and Jules has just copied down her achievements for her twelve weeks and it was labeled "The Twelve Week Year" and I didn't know what that was, so now I know what that is. What Jules has achieved and I'll just very quickly read them out because it is amazing. It's 3/4 of the edits of How to Launch a Freelance Copywriting Business: A Creative-- oh gosh, it's time for my bed-- Creative Writing for a Living. We're going to talk about that book in a moment so we'll touch on that soon. I'll put the cover of that book up on our website because it is amazing and I'll find off you when it's going to be launched.
Number two was method writing site, get a draft up. I thought well that was interesting I have to find out what method writing is. Number three was launch two fiction books, print run with Ingram but no launch yet. But the two books I'm assuming are the ones that I'm looking on, yes on Jules' website. Jules is holding up one of the books now and we're going to talk about those.
Jules Horne: Yes, and the other one.
Melinda: Beautiful covers that they are. As an aside, and they were the main thing she achieved. Now, we're talking twelve weeks here so I'm just blow away. Just on the side she put out a poetry pamphlet, a two sided melt down and, what's a two sided melt, oh you got to tell me about that and a Facebook live. Oh two site melt down. So you're sites must have crashed.
Jules Horne: Oh right, oh yes.
Melinda: And Facebook live. So in twelve weeks, I mean that's just, that's just a term at school for me where I just mark and you guys have achieved all this stuff. Tell us your sense of achievement at being able to tick those things off and write those things down.
Jules Horne: That's tremendous, it's not that I've done that from a standing start to twelve weeks, it's been kind of a yearlong process but there were certain bits we did a bit in the last twelve weeks. I think we're always, we're a bit of sort of class half empty as well, we kind of go oh well I didn't get that done and I didn't get that done. So we kind of beat ourselves up as well, so there's a sense of achievement but also I meant to do all this and it didn't happen. So we have to kind of be aware to celebrate achievement and not just kind of look at what we didn't manage to finish.
But I think one of the really great things which I've loved about last year is that the learning about self-publishing. I think there's such a feeling of empowerment and just, it just feels really wonderful to have created a book. I think publishing for me has always been something that seemed very off and something that it's very sort of mediated and there are gatekeepers to let you getting a book published, it's such a long process, publishing is something that is up there, really kind of inaccessible and to have the means now. I think this is just so exciting to have the means now to actually pull together a book, design it, commission your own cover, work with a designer, get ISBNs and get it up there as an artifact that you've made yourself. I just think that's such a game changer for writers.
I think, because I've been more in the, I suppose traditional publishing world, most of my writer friends are in the traditional publishing world, they're not yet like indie authors tuned into those possibilities I think. I think that's coming, I think they're looking at my books and thinking wow you can do this, I didn't realize. I said yeah, it's out there, it's just there for trying out. It's a kind of Wild West really, it's let's get on with it and look at these possibilities. That for me from a year ago not being able to do that to having two books in my hands which have been designed and they've got professional production values, professional editorial values. They're indistinguishable from a book that's been made by a small independent publisher. So where do you go with that? I just think that's really, really excited. That's for me felt like a massive achievement and it's just where can you go with those skills now, that's really exciting.
Melinda: I'm going to go back and I'll introduce Jules properly. I'm guessing if you're listening and you're hearing what Jules has got to say you can guess immediately that she's very learned. We've decidedly to call this podcast, very briefly we decided to call it Indie Publishers as Influencers and there's a reason for that, it's because indie publishing or self-publishing is the cutting edge as Jules says.
Jules is an associate lecture at the Open University, she's worked for the BBC, she's published with her plays and things, she's got degrees in German and French and she has a love of language and learning and she was I think influenced by one of our favorite authors who I tried to speak about last podcast but I got the name wrong, it's Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake.
Jules Horne: Okay, yeah.
Melinda: Angelina Carter was another one. So we're talking about a woman who's stepped in education, who is working as a tutor, she mentioned very briefly and we were just talking before about how Facebook live is a game changer for tutors and educators, how we can reach our students so very easily nowadays and how we're only on, I guess, the cusp of opening up the opportunities in that sphere.
Jules Horne: I think that's right and I think one of the reason's I'm so excited education and being a teacher is because of the horizons it's opened up for me when I was learning and discovering, coming from a border town, very quiet. Then the world of books opens up and then the world of education opens up and it's mind expanding. That's phenomenally exciting. So that's why I want to share with people when I, I think teach writing's not the right word because I think it's hard to teach but then you can facilitate people learning about it. So that's where I try to approach it because I think voice and all these things are very individual, process is very individual.
But I think what you're saying about the cusp of changes in teaching, I think that's so true and I think it's really not fully appreciated within the Open University which is a distance learning program, it's very old, one of the earliest, I think it may be the earliest distance learning universities in the world, we have quite lot of international students on that and as part of that I teach creative writing. So there's a new MA course as well which is just starting which very exciting, there's not a been a degree course with the Open University in creative writing before so that's being launched as we speak and one of the things there is they are at the cutting edge of technology for distance learning.
They use lots of things like we work on forums with students and we have face to face but I've been interested in using video too and perhaps I think what it lacks is the face-to-face element for students. So video is great and now that we can do it at home we don't have to have massive production crew creating a studio and standing there in your corduroy and pointing at a board or something. You can actually do it a much more intimate and friendly way and I think that's really nice for the students.
Facebook Live is another thing entirely. I mean I've been really impressed, actually I've gone and tried based it on your experiments, I thought wow this is possible and seen one or two online training sessions that have been done in that way that are live, not time displaced like a lot of forums are, it's just amazing. The Open University isn't going to that quite yet, it's sort of a leap but we do have live sort of screen shots type programs. We have live forums that work but not with this video element.
...

#27 The Power of Story to Strengthen Your Business Brand, with Park Howell

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:23:46 -0500

Story is the software that drives the hardware of our brains, says today’s guest, Park Howell, as he takes us through the ten steps of the story cycle process based on Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey. We learn to super focus on ourselves and the stories we tell ourselves, and from the outset of this interview I was busy doing my homework on my business brand. If you want to own both your personal and business brand, I strongly recommend you download the notes for this interview, so you, too, can get on with your homework to make sure you’re telling the right story at the right time to the right people. Ever generous, Park shares a couple of resources to get you started. These are the 12 Primary Personality Archetypes, here and the 10 questions you need to ask to brand your story here. You can find out more about Park and the business of story here.

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Park Howell
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today we're traveling across to the U.S. and I have the master storyteller himself with me, I have Park Howell and he is the owner of the business of story. Welcome to Australia Park!
Park Howell: It's great to be here, I appreciate you taking the time especially so early on your Saturday morning kicking off the weekend. So it's an honor to be here.
Melinda: As my listeners know I end up all over the world, I've spoken to people in Germany, I've spoken to people in Newfoundland, I just love getting around the place. So Park it's a pleasure, one day I'll get to see you all in person but in the meantime I just have to talk to you at these ungodly hours over here in Oz. If you'd like to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your story.
Park Howell: Absolutely, thank you Melinda. Again, my name is Park Howell as you mentioned with The Business of Story. I'm in Phoenix, Arizona it's 95 degrees out right now at one in the afternoon on Friday, so you've got a full day ahead of me here. I have been in the advertising marketing world for thirty years, working for other agencies, I've run my own ad agency for twenty of those years, one of our specialties was really in brand strategy development, we did everything from traditional advertising, TV, radio, print, outdoor, that sort of thing when we got our start. Of course everything has moved into the digital realm.
For the past ten plus/twelve years, I have really studied storytelling especially starting out of Hollywood, what does Hollywood know about telling a great story that we all can use in our own lives to really own that story, our personal brand and our professional brands so that we can connect with people on a more human level and Melinda that's important in this day and age because as you know as we're doing right here the masses are the media, brands used to own that influence of mass media of TV, radio and print but now because the masses are the media there is an absolute cacophony of communication out there and it's really, really difficult for brands whether it's a solopreneur, entrepreneur, mid-market company or very large brand to cut through the clutter, rise above the noise of the attention economy and really stand out.
I found through kind of a hypothesis of using The Hero's Journey, Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey, and we can talk a little bit about that, created a process that we could use in business, kind of simplifying it but very much approaching our brand stories like an author would so that we can create more of a human connection with our audiences and get away from the features and benefits din that's happening out there that we're all competing with and going back to literally the irony of this is the ancient power of story how our brains are hardwired to create meaning out of the madness around us through story so that we can overcome our technological advances that makes us all a broadcast station. So that's kind of the quick synopsis of traditional advertising, having to understand story just to be successful with ourselves and our brands to, again rise above the noise.
Melinda: Thanks Park. What you've done, you've summed up what our problem is as indie authors, defining our stories, getting our name out there, being heard above the noise. Now I've had another guest on, Brian Crisp, he works for Newscorp here in Australia and he's head of their digital content marketing. Brian has already talked a little about what Park's talking about and it's that power of story, how we tell our stories, how we define ourselves.
Today Park's going to talk us through a little bit how we do that. He doesn't know that yet, he's looking at me saying am I? Yeah, so yeah that's what we'd like to know pal, we want to make sure that we get it right because we, our businesses are I guess miniscule in the big realm of that digital world but a lot of us are storywriters, we're novelists and a lot of us are in that, I guess that romance writing world and adventure thriller writing world and there's a lot of noise out there. But that art of story seems to allow us to break through I guess a little bit more easily then some.
So what it'd like you to do is you take us through that story cycle because you’re very good at it. I've listening to Park, if anyone wants to go back it's, I think it's episode 39 with Daniel Gefen, we've had Daniel on guys and Park actually took Daniel through that whole process, I'm not going to let him to do that to me today because I might cry. So Park go for it!
Park Howell: Sure, oh thank you. Melinda let me start by saying it's really important what I've learned in this processes of proving out this hypothesis that what Hollywood knows and the story structure that we need to know and use is that we're all dealing in this world of abundance, there are abundance opportunities for our clients and customers to choose from abundant different people and the only way, ironically enough that we can really stake out our own claim as we have to get super focused on ourselves and that begins with truly understanding our story.
I tell my classes I teach at Arizona State University this process and all the brands I work with, the most potent story you will ever tell is the story you tell yourself, so make it a good one, let's start there. But number two really understand how you are unique in what you bring to the market. Anybody can use this process on themselves, as a writer, as a communicator, as a leader to help start separating you from the ocean of people out there that are doing the exact same thing but I guarantee you we are all unique in our ways and what we bring to the world and when you understand and are able to quickly articulate that story you will start separating yourself from the pack.
The little bit of a history lesson on Joseph Campbell and you may well have covered this on your show, he was America's foremost mythologist. He studied story starting with Native Americans over here and he found that the tribes shared a lot of the same stories they were just told in their own language and their own region with their own characters but he realized that there was this absolute pattern to story. He started digging deeper into that and he found that this dates back to the beginning of time, Aristotle talked about it, the Apostles, Shakespeare, up to Spielberg in this day and age. It's this universal structure he calls The Hero's Journey.
I've boiled it down to this ten step processes I call the story cycle, very much inspired by The Hero's Journey and again what I say how Hollywood was using it and how screenwriters were using to make just some of the most magnificent movies out there but there is a formula to it, there's a from, there's a pattern to it. So what I do is, I'll take you very quickly through it, the ten steps.
Step number one is simply the backstory, you got to set the stage for you story. If it's your personal brand you just ask yourself where have you been, where are you now, where are you going and ultimately want to get to that point of what are you the best at. Now I don't mean by bragging, I'm just saying what is your personal passion that drives your professional pursuit. When you find that, you find that now you're rising above people because you're just doing something you naturally love and you're probably already pretty good at and you're willing and have the grit to pursue it. So that's the backstory for your own personal stories to try to define what is your number one position in the marketplace.
Number two is who's your hero, chapter two. So we have to know who this story is for, in this case the story is about you but you're not the hero, you are the guide and we'll talk about that in a minute. So you want to identify who your hero is, who's your hero. It's not only for your brand but for big brands we ask them to identify who are your top three audiences that you're talking to and what is it that each one of them wants. Alright, so every story has a protagonist that we can live vicariously through, relate with, and cheer for them as they are on their journey to achieve something. So in this case your protagonist hero needs to match up with your audience, so you have to really know who they are.
Step three is what's at stake. You don't have a story unless you have something at stake, something you are willing to go after no matter what and knowing that you're probably going to have to pivot a couple times along the way is, the universe has a way of punching us in the nose when we go after something to test ourselves. But you want to know what's at stake in this journey, hat do you stand to gain when you go after it and what do you stand to lose if you do nothing, if you stay in status quo.
Number four then speaking of status quo is what Hollywood calls the inciting incident. I call it, that's sort of jargon-y, so I call it simply the call to adventure. Now what is happening in the marketplace out there that is changing either a disruption that's going on that your brand is responding to or a disruption that you are actually creating in the marketplace and this is really important. It's as important if not important than stakes because if we stay in status quo nothing changes we have no story. We need this inciting incident to propel us forward.
Get into chapter five of the story cycle process and we are talking about what I call villains, fog and crevices or the obstacles and antagonists that are in our way. So I break it down into these three Melinda because they're kind of fun, I find it really works for the business mind to get them out of their left brain and into their right brain and into their hearts and have some more fun. Who are the villains that stand in your way? Could be competition, often competition someone who's trying to keep you from succeeding or taking your market.
There's also internal villains, that little voice inside of us that says oh I'm not so sure you're smart enough, fast enough, good enough to pull this off. We even have loved the ones that become the euphemism of a villain in that they have our best interests at heart but they're going to say well are you sure, hasn't somebody already done that or if this idea's so good someone would have already done it. They're always trying to protect ourselves. So we have to recognize those folks in this story arch and understand how we're going to deal with them.
Then we have fog, the blind spots, what it is we don't know that we don't know. If we're talking about our customers what is it that they don't know about us that are blind to that we need to illuminate through how we share our stories. Then finally the third part of this is the crevices. What are the gaps in our story and in our performance, we may say one thing but are actually doing something else. That will destroy a story faster than anything else. When we work with big brands this is really a kind of come to Jesus part of the process because often they will tell us an aspirational story of where they want to be but then they have to come to grips that they aren't operationally delivering on that yet. So they have to get their story and really understand it internally and deliver on it before they can talk about it externally.
Alright, so five chapters right there, very quick. Do you have any questions before I go to the second half of this?
Melinda: Yes, my question is Park what's my podcast about again, I've forgotten now. I'm starting to think oh I've got to go back, I'm going to have to do some homework team. Bear with me I'm going to the end of Howell's, sorry, Park's little talk here and then I'm going to redefine myself and all my audience will probably go away and I'll get whole new one. Keeping going!
Park Howell: Well what we will do after this, I've got ten questions, I can boil these ten steps down to the ten most basic questions that you can use and you listeners can use very quickly to kind of write down the answers to and you'll see gaps in your answers, you'll see areas that you don't know that answer is and that's totally cool. But that's where you use this process to truly author your story. So I'll get to that in a minute after that.
Let's review, we went through the backstory, the setting of the stage or your number one position in the marketplace, what do you do better than anybody else. Number two, who's your hero. So you are your audiences that you are sharing this story with and what do they want because you have to share the story from their point of view, not yours. Number three is what's at stake, what is it that they want to achieve in the hearing of the story that you can help them achieve? You help your audiences get what they want, they will go out of their way to help you get what you want. Number four you can't sell them the status quo unless you're the low price leader like Wal-Mart so what disruption is going in the marketplace that makes you more relevant and more urgent than anybody else out there because of how you helped them answer that disruption. Number five you got your villains, fog and crevices, the obstacles and antagonists.
This is where you as a brand really step in honestly. This is called chapter six enter the mentor, the guide. Now a lot of people think the protagonist is the most important part of any story but if you think about it, you know Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz she was the protagonist we could live vicariously through her, we could experience her. But without the mentors that she has Glenda Good Witch of the North and her sidekicks that went along the way, they were hugely important for her to find herself and find her journey. Same is true with Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda with Luke Skywalker, Luke was of course at the center of the story but without those folks aiding him he would get nowhere. So that's the beautiful thing about this is you are not the center of the story your audience is because you are the guider, the mentor.
What I do is ask the guides and mentors to really think about three things. What emotional promise do people get by simply interacting with you and the brand? Is it peaceful, is it confidence, is it excitement, I mean what is that emotion that they get when they interact with you? Number two what gift do you provide them? So as a writer a lot of people might think well my gift is I am a wonderful romance novelist and I focus on Queensland area, to get it really focused that's what I do, so my gift are these wonderful books I write. My argument would be that's what you make but what do you actually make happen in their lives.
Your gift really might be the gift of transport, you are transporting them into another world. It could be the gift of freedom, you're allowing them to get out of their own lives and enjoy something different for a while, it's escape or something. So ask yourself as the mentor you're building this personality around it, what is the emotional promise people get every time they interact with you and what is the gift they receive that goes beyond what it is you make, it's what you make happen in their lives.
Then thirdly in this area is what personality do you take to market and how authentic is that personality. So we use in our branding process the famous Swiss psychologist Carl Jung's twelve architypes, everybody knows about them. The people that really geek on archetype take these into thirty-four, thirty-two, sixty-four, I mean you can go deep, deep, deep. I have found twelve primary archetypes are a great way to go in and look at the different archetypes and how they relate to you and you will probably find one that is your absolute primary archetype and then you might find one or two that are supporting archetypes, most people typically do.
Melinda I can tell you I've got a Slideshare and I can send you a link to this so you can have it in the notes of these twelve archetypes spelled out, it's really quick your listeners can go and pull up a slide per archetype, very quickly understand, seem some examples there of what each archetype is and start trying to define which one is good for them, right for them and this is important because the archetype now informs the personality and the expression of your brand. So for instance one archetype is the jester archetype, the fun archetype. Do you have Ben and Jerry's ice cream out there? Is that an ice cream brand?
Melinda: We do, yes, we do.
Park Howell: So that's a jester brand. Premium, they have fun with it, very much with jester brand. Do you have Haagen-Dazs out there?
Melinda: No, I don't think so.
Park Howell: Okay, another very high end, premium brand but that's a lover brand. They are selling the same commodity of ice cream, both of them are delicious but one of them has very much this jester personality, Ben and Jerry's, and one of them has this lover personality. Just to be able to cut through the clutter, separate themselves on the shelf just like we all need to do when we're talking out there. It's really important to because it helps guide our content creation on our websites, the visuals we want to use, it gets out of just thinking of features and benefits and bullet points and listicles and that kind of thing because your voice needs to resonate through to really spell out your brand.
I've been going on and on, any questions? More questions so far? I know I'm throwing a lot at you.
Melinda: I want lover's ice cream, I'm still hung up I haven't got, and I know the fun one I'm doing it all wrong. Park I'm fascinating and I'm listening with avid ears and I'll certainly transcribe this everyone and get it up there. I immediately started jotting Carl Jung's primary archetypes for all us everyone, but we're really spoiled here today because Park's going to supply it all for us. I'm guessing that this will be one podcast that we can take so much from that we'll probably listen to again and again. I will of course refocus on my three gifts to my audience and my reasons for being here. But we all know I'm here so that we can bring on guys like you to help us make, be better story tellers. So look don't let me interrupt you, they'd rather listen to you then me today.
Park Howell: We'll move into chapter seven, and chapter seven is...

#26 Listen to Your Clues: Writing Advice From Australian Rural Romance Author, Jennie Jones

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 29 Sep 2016 21:39:29 -0500

Just write the book is author Jennie Jones’ advice on writing. You may get laughed at and it may be rubbish but you’ll have done it. With so much advice littering my inbox telling me how to write, it sounds like a damned fine idea to me – simple in its execution and exciting in its results. And Jones ought to know. The first six books she wrote were practise books and at 50,000 words a pop, that’s a lot of practise. Nowadays, Jones has ten novels to her name, including the International Bestseller, The House on Burra Burra Lane, with more on the way. Our discussion today ranges from writing routines, outlining, word counts, and giving readers what they want to marketing and promotion. Jones is an intelligent, gracious and generous guest, and if we sidetrack into chatting about grand old theatres and possible novel settings in the UK and Scotland, I blame it on the romance. You can find out more about Jennie Jones and her books here and if you check back in a little while I’ll have the transcript notes ready for you to take away and study for your own writing journey. Oh, and for the Rural Romance readers among us, Jones has set up an Australian Rural Romance webpage here. Thanks, Jennie.

#25 Something a bit more real than Happily Ever After: Writing in a Gilded Cage with Rachael Johns

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 27 Sep 2016 06:30:47 -0500

Secrets sell, and none know this better than Rachael Johns, Australia’s number 1 Rural Romance author, and more recently Life Lit author (a term coined by Johns’ publicist to explain Johns’ latest book, The Art of Keeping Secrets. Reviewer, Debbish dotcom – I love that name and you can find out more about Debbish and her love of everything Jane Austen here – describes Johns’ novel as contemporary and uplifting even though it is not traditionally happily-ever-after-ish. But make no mistake, Johns has published more than her fair share of romance novels, twenty books in total in five or so years, with her most exciting moment being when her name was called out as winner of the 2016 Australian Book Industry Awards with another of her Life Lit novels, The Patterson Girls. Now, my all time favourite author is Jane Austen and if Johns writes, as Debbish states, with warmth and humour about issues most of us face in our daily lives, then I’m all keen to read Johns’ backlist, including Book 4 of her Bunyip Bay series – and yes, to those of us who are loyal followers of Outback Dreams, Outback Blaze, Outback Ghost and now, Outback Sisters, that makes four, and I’m guessing an email or three to Johns begging for more may go some way to persuading her to continue the small town series with books five, six and seven (sorry, Rach). Oh, and Johns’ own secret: writing is work, hard work, and sometimes it isn’t the fun the rest of us imagine it to be. Yes, Johns may write in her jarmies, and enjoy the odd Diet Coke, Maltesers and glass of wine (not all together) but she admits to a certain laziness when it comes to re-writing and more re-writing. Unlike some of us, she prefers to get it right the first couple of times. For the real truth about Johns, her books and her upcoming appearances, you can find out more here.

#24 The power of word-of-mouth: how to launch your book in the digital age with Valerie Francis

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 19 Sep 2016 22:52:51 -0500

There’s a lot of advice out there when it comes to launching your book and often it’s difficult to decide exactly how to go about seeing your baby off into the big wide reading world. Val Francis has worked out her own way to launch her romantic suspense series, using her background in media and corporate communications, common sense, and some sound advice from Bella Andre, International Bestselling Romance Author. Word-of-mouth is three tiers deep, explains Val, and she has built herself a strong team for the launch today of Masquerade: Part 1, released under her pen name, Robin St. Croix. You can find it here. Val’s is a launch plan any of us can follow, using a bit of networking, professionalism and a whole lot of damned hard work. Oh, and don’t forget having a great book with a great premise: What would you do if you knew you wouldn’t get caught? Masquerade is a novel in 12 parts and you can find it here and more about Val and her middle-grade fiction, Nature Knights, here.

#23 The Business of Writing – Day 5 – Draft2Digital with Marketing Manager, Kevin Tumlinson

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 15 Sep 2016 20:56:47 -0500

You’ve typed THE END on your story and now it’s time for the hard part – publishing it. But, if you’ve been listening to our series this week, you know there are all kinds of experts to help you. I’m chatting with Kevin Tumlinson today to get the low down on Draft2Digital, and as Kevin promises, it sounds kind of easy. But hey, I’ve been fooled before. So, my dear listeners, is Kevin telling us the truth? Is Draft2Digital the answer to our digital publishing prayers? Well, if I can work it anyone can and if you listen to the end you’ll find that D2D has all kinds of extras that promise to make our lives easy, well, easier, the most exciting of which is the introduction universal distribution links (and there’s a book reviewing service in the pipeline but I’m not sure I can mention that yet). I’ve decided to give it a go for my soon to be launched novella series so watch this space. To find out more, you can find D2D at www.draft2digtal.com

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Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I have the very delightful Kevin Tumlinson back with me and I think it's going to be a regular thing. He's very waving to us here, very, very politely. Last time I spoke to Kevin it was via, it was, what was it called, it was a program called Zencastr, this time I've got this face looking at me and very young and handsome he is as well. Unless I'm just older than the rest of the world, good morning Kevin.
Kevin Tumlinson: Good morning, good afternoon, how are you?
Melinda: I'm good thanks. First of all the very first thing we have to ask you because when I put you up last time I put you up and the man who's moving into his RV and travelling around America. Would you like to give us an update on where you're up to please?
Kevin Tumlinson: So we're like a millisecond away from that. We put the RV in for a bit of maintenance and repair just to get everything perfect before we move in full time and we're looking at probably, I said mid, but probably late September we'll be moving full time. The official date will be October 12th, that's officially the day that we no longer have an apartment, we no longer have any other place to be live and we'll be living full time in the RV. But we'll probably be moved in a couple weeks before that.
Melinda: Yeah and as I'm looking at Kevin here he's in his little flat or unit at the time and it's not much bigger than a caravan either by the look of things. So I don't think things are going to change much.
Kevin Tumlinson: No, it was a challenge downsizing into this apartment actually. We went from a four bedroom home, house with very large additional working spaces that were my office and studio and that sort of thing and we downsized to this apartment for the last year. So that was step one.
So we're, I think, we're sort of half-ready I think to be living in a tin can on wheels.
Melinda: Yeah, now I never do anything one step at time. I just sort of jump in boots and all and see what happens. So you're doing it the sensible way, you must be a very, very patient man.
Kevin Tumlinson: Well, maybe.
Melinda: Okay, not so patient.
Kevin Tumlinson: Well we wanted to jump right into the RV, we wanted to. But we knew there were a few steps. We didn't have the RV yet when we sold the house, so that was challenge number one. So this past year has really been about getting the RV, getting used to the idea. We took some trips, tested it out and we're pretty confident we're going to dig it. So I don't know about patient, but we definitely, we ended up accidently doing this via plan I think.
Melinda: Yeah, my last, I was speaking last night to a lady here in Australia and she's got, her and her partner are traveling around Australia in a 25 foot 5th wheeler and they've certainly got it down pat with their parking and, oh I was going to say mooring it because I've been talking yachties as well. Everyone's out there having fun Kevin it's not fair.
Kevin Tumlinson: I know.
Melinda: But Kevin has been busy with his writing. He does have a new novel coming out, would you like to tell us about the new book and that magic cover design.
Kevin Tumlinson: I would actually, yeah. I have written a follow up to my most popular book, I wrote Coelho Medallion and published that back in May and actually I hit publish on that while we were on first really big RV trip. So it's kind of the symbol of the work we're going to be doing on the road.
But I've written now the first draft of the sequel to that book called The Atlantis Riddle and I have the cover ready, I'm all set, now it's in edit and I'll be handing it over to my street team as soon as I'm done with my initial pass. We'll be passing this guy along to pre-order soon after that. So I'm looking forward to it, I think this is, I say this about every book but I actually this is my best book to date. I'm very excited about how it turned out, it's very much in the genre that I'm enjoying most now. So I'm thrilled about it and the cover apparently looks great because everyone has committed very positively on the cover.
Melinda: I heard a little bird told me yesterday that Kevin does design all his own covers and maybe we'll have him back one day just to talk about that.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah, I do.
Melinda: Now he does write in the thriller genre, he does churn his words out and I also heard that his first million words are considered practice words so you can imagine what this guy gets up to at 5,000 words a day I believe it was that we spoke about last time.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah 5,000 a day. I will confess since taking on work with Draft 2 Digital that number went down a little temporarily, but I've been slowly building back up to 5k a day and it's not as difficult as people think, really but it's not required. If you're struggling with word count don't be discouraged by someone doing 5k a day, just go do what you can do.
Melinda: Oh I think it sounds very exciting and I think last time we spoke Kevin's got a book out there called The 30 Day Author and that's full of motivational stuff and that helps the rest of us get to that point of completion and ready to publish. That's why I've invited Kevin back today because he snuck in a new job while we weren't looking and after we spoke to him last time he's gone and picked himself the grand title of marketing director of Draft 2 Digital and of course I immediately wanted to know about that. So congratulations Kevin.
Kevin Tumlinson: Thank you very much. If I remember right, I was actually being courted for this while you and were chatting last time. So it happened almost immediately after we talked. So I wasn't able to announce it or anything at that time.
Melinda: Look we'll forgive you.
Kevin Tumlinson: I'm glad to come back, I'm glad to be back. Good, good.
Melinda: Alright, what we want to know is what do we do once we've hit the end to progress from using your service and we're, treat us all as complete novices, I've been to speaking to several other ladies and we're all interested in coming aboard with you, we are all captive, potential customers. So you have to do your best to sell us right now.
Kevin Tumlinson: Okay, so what Draft 2 Digital will do for you in a nutshell? So one of the things we handle for you is conversion your manuscript to eBook format and we make that really easy. So it's literally sign up for an account, upload your manuscript, upload your cover, type up your, you can cut and paste this by the way, you can drop in all your metadata which is your book description, the key words that you're using, everything that you would set up and say Amazon KDP platform you would do here and then we'll convert that book for you and it takes a few seconds really, I mean it doesn't take very long at all. Then you actually, at that point you have the option of being able to download an ePub or even a .mobi file or even a PDF of your book that you could use anywhere really. So if you were only using it for conversion it would be great for that.
But one of the big benefits of the service is that we actually have a whole network of venders that you can distribute your book through. So you come to us and we'll do the formatting for you, automatically and then all you got to do is hit the publish button and you get to choose from a large selection of venders including Barnes and Noble, Apple iBooks, Google Play, Kobo, everyone you've heard of, some of the bestselling book distributers on the planet and you'll be able to publish with those guys all in one place and with the world's easiest and coolest dashboard.
I'm going to just confess to you. I was really excited when these guys approached because I was already a huge fan boy of this service, based on that dashboard I was extremely excited about that and I really wished that Amazon had something similar at the time. The only service we don't publish to at the moment is Amazon, well there are others we don't, but we are very picky about who we will distribute to at this point and we work very hard to make sure we're in line with all their various guidelines, they're content restrictions, that sort of thing. So there are companies out there that won't publish erotica for example. So we take care of all that stuff for you.
If a company isn't going to publish something that you write we let you know and help you work around that in some way. In other words you can still publish with all our other companies but not this one in particular for example. If you upload your cover and it doesn't meet the cover requirements, first of all we do a lot to automate that process too, but if it doesn't meet it we'll let you know right away then we can work with you to get the right type of cover up, the right size and make sure it's not-- for example Apple doesn't allow you to do the whole book set.
By the way, I'm sorry of course for some reason, this is as is traditional lawn guys have showed up, this is like the third day in a row during a podcast that these guys have shown up. So if you're hearing all that buzzing in the background that's what that is.
Melinda: Okay and we're talking to Kevin Tumlinson about Draft 2 Digital, we had to have a little stop there because of yard maintenance happening over there in his home town.
Kevin Tumlinson: Apparently in my living room I think.
Melinda: Yeah, he's got pot plants on the veranda that needed mowing. Okay please continue Kevin, we're very keen to hear about Draft 2 Digital and its lawn mowing service.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yes, so okay, so the long of the short of Draft 2 Digital is, we will help you with the formatting and distribution of your book, that's where we start. That's not the entirety of what these guys will do for you but that right there alone is a huge help for most authors. Because of our vendor relationships and because we're very picky about who we actually have a relationship with you're going to have some of the best opportunities to reach a broader audience globally.
That's a big advance that’s what's interesting and I talk about going wide a lot now because a lot of authors are in, they're in the KDP select program with Amazon, which means they're exclusive to Amazon. I understand why, because I did the same thing but that's great way to make a lot of money much faster if you're trying to do this for a living and I cannot blame anybody for wanting to be in that program.
But what I've come to discover and what I'm seeing evidence for time and again now is that you're actually much better off strategically if you plan to go wide. Meaning that rather than being exclusive to one service and thus subject to all of their rules and any changes they might make to those rules you're actually broadening your scope and getting out and reaching a big, wide global audience through a bunch of different venders.
Draft 2 Digital isn't the only company doing this, they're not the only company that helps you by aggregating these services and then don't even have the largest catalogue of vendors but what they do have is probably the best customer service I've ever encountered in a service like this and a continual growth. We're always looking at new vendors, we're always looking at new tools we can develop, we just recently released universal book links which are something we can talk about but that's a brand new, amazing tool to help authors market their work even if you're Amazon exclusive you can use these things to reach a much bigger Amazon audience, they do what we call globalization so that even if you're exclusive to Amazon you can reach readers worldwide with just one link because every time they click on that it'll ask them if they want to use the regional Amazon store as their default store. So you can send readers to the exact storefront that they want to use for their region. So there are lots of little tools like that in development, already kind of sitting here as well.
On the whole I was really excited about joining these guys because this is the kind of stuff I liked being a part of as an individual, as a sole proprietor with my own business. So it was just kind of a natural fit for me to come on and start helping this to promote this to authors who really need this stuff. I mean there's some cool things happening and some of it's just almost overwhelming. There's so many, that service does so many things behind the scenes that no one even knows about which is part of my, that's part of my challenge is to start letting people know, like here's what we can do for you.
Melinda: Now Kevin is a great talker and he will be traveling around the place and not only will his books be painted on the side of his rig so will Draft 2 Digital.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah, probably.
Melinda: Just get that word out there. The thing that excites me and the thing that I keep hearing from you even speaking with you today is the word universal, because we're out here in Australia being able to access lots and lots of different countries, probably if you're in America I could understand that straight to Amazon, but over here in Australia the fact that you've got the universal links, the fact that we can upload to you and you can get out us there into the big, wide world that's got to be an advantage surely.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah, I actually have talked to people in the past who actually don't have access to Kindle Select or any other Kindle program. So they're, for them to be able to reach the same general audience is kind of a big deal for them. A lot of them, it's an amazing to me how many authors don't realize there are more online retails than just Barnes and Noble and Amazon. Even knowledge of services like Kobo for example, which is Canada's big dealer, eBook retailer. There are a lot of authors who don't realize that exists. It’s a little bit mind boggling but then not everyone is entrenched in this the way I am. So I have to give them a little bit of a leeway there.
But one of the things that happens when you sign up with Draft 2 Digital, and it's free by the way, nothing Draft 2 Digital does costs the author any money directly, they make all their money on a percentage of the sale of the books. So we literally do not succeed unless we help the authors succeed which is probably the best business plan I've ever heard of. You want to set up that kind of symbiotic relationship because then the authors are benefiting but they're also more interested in helping you succeed because it means their own growth.
But when you join Draft 2 Digital you gain access to all these different venders and all these different countries. Just today, now this is tied to the universal book links, but just today I had to write a description for an Italian eBook distributor and I was pretty, I had to basically translate the page so that I could get the information I needed and it kind of struck me that I don't think I would have to do something like this for Amazon, Amazon has their own presence in those regions, but no one really knows about these companies in the U.S., no one knows that any of them exist. So we're connecting you with a whole new landscape, a whole new ecosystem really of book distributors.
Melinda: Yeah and I noticed even with my podcast I've got a little circle on all the countries that listen in and like 50% is Australia, and the American percentage is 30, but there's 20% of countries that's growing every day and I look at those countries and I go wow, and I had a German lady on, or a lady who lives in Germany, I think she's American and I think it added another five countries to my listening base and I just went isn't that amazing that the world is becoming smaller and smaller and I know when you mention things like Amazon and then you go Amazon UK, Amazon America, Amazon Australia and I go oh give me break this is all too hard.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah, that's the way I feel about it too. That's one of the frustrations I had just with my own work is keeping track, this is like the whole dashboard experience by the way, I like being able to look at one dashboard to see what my book sales are like and keep track of all the different Amazon stores alone was like a full time job that I don't have time for. You read articles and you listen to podcast from people like Joanna Penn and some others who are just brilliant, but they'll tell you need to be on top on what are your sales like in India, what are your sales like in the UK, don't just concentrate on your U.S. sales.
I just never could keep up with any of it. Getting that information through kindle's or KDP's dashboard was kind of tricky, you have to do all this reshuffling and everything. So I'm very appreciative of what Amazon's done to open up the market that I now use for my career. But I was just entranced by how simple things were once I brought all my work over to Draft 2 Digital.
I'm still with KDP because Amazon's a huge market, I would never walk away from it entirely, but being able to go wide with my work provides me with a bunch of benefits, not the least of which is I'm no longer at the whim of Amazon. Amazon's got a history by the way about changing its mind about certain policies and you have no power. You have no recourse. If Amazon decides tomorrow we're no longer going to sell eBooks, a lot of people that I know are out of business, I don't think anything that extreme is going to happen, but the equivalent has happened several times with different parts of that business. So I can't rule it out, I'd rather be safe.
Melinda: Look you mentioned Amazon earlier. So when I upload my little novellas to you guys it will still go on Amazon but just not in its Kindle Direct stuff, is that correct?
Kevin Tumlinson: The way that it work is you would still need to upload directly to Amazon because we don't upload to Amazon.
Melinda: That's what I thought you said and I thought have I misunderstood that, no.
Kevin Tumlinson: Well Amazon likes exclusivity, they want all their authors to be with them and them alone, and so they don't play well with the idea of an aggregate service. We used to have Amazon way back when we first started but then things got complicated we'll say and we're constantly working to see if we can figure out a way to get back to working with those guys because they are a...

#22 The Business of Writing – Day 4 – with International Thriller & Suspense Author, Rachel Amphlett

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 14 Sep 2016 21:57:25 -0500

Welcome to the world of International Thrill & Suspense author, Rachel Amphlett, as we chat about all things Indie publishing, from mailing lists to Facebook advertisements and being your own motivator, inspirer and hard-nosed boss. Not only does Rachel work a 9 – 5 job, she writes full time and runs her her own publishing business. The word discipline comes to mind just thinking about it. Bum-on-seat, is Rachel’s secret, and in her case it’s a train seat as she commutes to and from work on a daily basis. Forty minutes there and forty minutes back has seen Rachel notch up more than a few thrillers, including eight Dan Taylor novels and several stand-alone novels. But there are more in the planning. And therein lies another secret, because, if there’s one thing I learnt whilst talking with Rachel, is that nothing is left to chance. Planning out her year is what Rachel does best, and with a schedule like the one she has set herself, it’s the only way to survive. But survive, and thrive, she does. You can find out more about Rachel and her novels at www.rachelamphlett.com

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Rachel Amphlett
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I'm getting fairly excited here because we're getting fairly close to episode number twenty, so I thought that it'd be a good time just do a little recap of what we've achieved so far and where we're heading in the future. I'll be doing some blog posts on some of the things that we've learned, I've started that with the top twenty things I've learned so far from podcasting and I'll be looking further at our transcripts and making some notes so the rest of us can have a bit of read and take from it what we can.
I've got a conference coming up in early October, I've booked my ticket and I'm pretty excited to get down there and see what everybody else is up to. It's on the Gold Coast and of course the ticket cost me so much I'll probably be staying in a tent. But I do believe that most of the attendees will be living it up in 5 start accommodation, but we'll get there, maybe next year we'll have that.
I'm in the process of writing my first newsletter, we've got quite a few subscribers now only waiting patiently for their newsletter but I'm going to change from AWeber to Convert Kid, the main reason for that is I can't AWeber, it's awfully complicated for me. But the real reason is Convert Kid is built especially for authors like us. So once I work out how to get it going, I'll share that experience with you. I'll try and get some of the guys from Convert Kid to help us. It's certainly taken off in the writing world and gets mentioned on a lot of the writing podcasts that I listen to.
So that'll be newsletters, that'll be one up to the conference. I'm almost ready to launch my teenage story writing course which is, well it's called Voices in Your Head and it's going under the title of Story Slingers, so we've recorded of the videos for that and they've all been really, really good fun and we're moving ahead with that.
I'm working on a novella with a couple of ladies here in Australia from the romance writers group that I'm with and I'll be putting out, I guess a little mini videos on how to write a novella and the pitfalls that I found and the excitement and challenges and how to get to the end in 90 days or less. It's taken me probably 30 days, which is a little bit scary but I was under pressure but I made a promise and I had to keep it.
I'm looking at starting a female entrepreneurs, what do you call it, membership group and I'm looking at the software that I need to do that, I've got quite a bit of interest in that, several ladies have put up their hand and we'd like to join together and to use our stories to grow our businesses. So that'll probably happen sometime between now and the end of the year and I'll probably get that up and running early in the New Year. But all our founding members for that one will come on board for free, after Christmas we'll probably charge a small monthly fee for that.
Other than that I'm listening and learning every day, listening to lots and lots of podcasts out there, sometimes I think that there's way too much out there and I get a little bit overwhelmed, and if I'm getting overwhelmed I'm guessing you're getting overwhelmed as well. So maybe it's time as we approach episode 20 of our podcast to sit back and just listen to how others do it. Today's guest is Rachel Amphlett and she is an amazing lady and she's certainly making a success of her career. So sit back, and enjoy!
If there was a changing even now as we speak like Facebook have changed their analytics and stuff--
Rachel Amphlett: And they've completely overhauled Power Editor and when we get to that I'll talk a bit more about it. But I'm finding that whereas you've got people like Adam Croft that are going great guns with sales adverts, sales adverts don't really work for me, it's mailing list adverts, that's where I'm seeing strength and I, to be honest, I spent a lot of money at the beginning of this year trying to make it work for me and get the same sort of results that Adam and others were getting and then just sort of gave it up and went no that's not working for me.
But what is working is getting, people that are invested in me on my mailing list and my mailing list has just gone from strength to strength and the sort of emails, I sent out a survey to my mailing list, launch team, so I got about 75 people just sequestered to one side that also read all the ARCs and stuff like that and provide feedback and expert advice. I sent out a survey about a week ago to them because I've got some new things up my sleeves going forward and I wanted their input into my production schedule for the next 18 months. The feedback that I got from them was that they're not finding me necessarily through Facebook advertising, there are other, I'm happy to talk about this, when we start recording, there are other elements that I hadn't even thought of that it's only in the past three months that I'm learning more about that they are basically saying yeah, this is the bits that catch our attention.
Melinda: I think we will, I'm almost tempted to record that last bit, but we'll start again because this is what happen, you know that day I met you at Mitchelton, I had two minutes, I bought your book and within two minutes we were talking all the nitty-gritty stuff. I thought yeah, okay.
Rachel Amphlett: I'm thinking we need to do this over a coffee and not over Skype that way sounds nice. We've got each other's mobile numbers now so we should do this.
Melinda: I've written that at the top.
Rachel Amphlett: I did the same with another author friend of mine Belinda Pollard, who's Small Blue Dog Publishing. She's local and we've got a few canny things up our sleeve for the coming months, so I won't disclose at the moment because it's still in the early stages but yeah, we met up for coffee and it was just like an hour of just like blah!
Melinda: We should make it civilized, we should go out for Friday afternoon.
Rachel Amphlett: Well a drink, yeah.
Melinda: Yeah.
Rachel Amphlett: I was going to say Samford's always good. Went there yesterday, couldn't be bothered to cook lunch, other half looked at me and went pub?
Melinda: Well I know you're linked up with Amy Andrews because Amy was telling me that you're in a bit of a group together. So I'm only just starting to make contacts because I've been so very, very busy. But it can become time consuming, you know that social media's a nightmare. I'm just sorry, it's a nightmare.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, I've actually a bit counted because I've neglected my blog at the back end of last year because I was so busy and I needed to concentrate on getting those three books out to Doug at the Back Catalogue [00:07:03] (?) and I kind of let the blog rest and I was, I think there's a danger of, it's information overload isn't it and you're trying to do everything that everybody else, that's working for everybody else.
This year I've kind of more taken it, well this time this year, this last few months I've just hit the breaks. I've just gone okay I know I need to write more, I know I need to have a presence on Facebook, I know I need to do my blog and my mailing list. So what I've done, I've kind of cheated with the blog. This year I decided that I wasn't going to write any more blog posts, well here and there, I write guest posts for other people's blogs and then link to them through my blog and I interview other client for the authors because I'm much more interested in what they've got to say than anything I've got to say on my blog and I just fire off questions to them and they do all the hard yards. I get the questions, sit there and go well it's great, I'll post it. I guess that's a great time saver.
Melinda: Yeah well I just put, I put out feelers for a VA, because I'm not doing, I'm not doing my newsletter, I'm not doing my blog posts and I'm not getting my transcripts with my podcasts and I think they're all the bits that I hate, so I'm just going to get some else to do all that, just for the next few months.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, that's something that I will probably need to look at year, is letting go. I mean I look at like this writing malarkey, a bit of a project manager anyway aren't you, I mean you farm out your editing, your cover design, Brian Cohen I got him to overall the description for White Gold for me because I was getting people onto my landing page through the Facebook ads, but they just weren't, they weren't signing up. So and he has a nice little package, after reading his podcast with Mark Dawson and reading his eBook, I thought well okay let's just, let's pay some money let's get a head start. I'd rather pay Brian the money to do this than me spend the hours trying to work how to do it, which could be a bit hit and miss.
He overhauled it and there were a couple of things that were just too Americanized for my liking, my biggest audience is the UK and I changed it all and it has picked up and so it's, I think I'm okay with the rest of them, it was just getting that initial product follow book perfect so those sign ups come through.
Melinda: Yeah and I'm noticing, I'm getting lots of people visiting, I'm getting lots of people downloading but I'm not getting as many people signing up because I haven't streamlined that process either.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, well it's definitely worth reading Brian Cohen's, he's got an eBook, let me just see if I got my Kindle app here, and he's got a new one. I think it's called--
Melinda: What I'm going to do while you're--
Rachel Amphlett: Yup, go on.
Melinda: No, what I'm going to do while you're bringing that up, I'm actually going to introduce Rachel. We've been talking now for 10 minutes and rather than go back and start again and make Rachel repeat everything I'm probably just going to put up what we've already talked about because what I'm talking to Rachel about everyone out there I'm sure you're going to be interested as well.
So Rachel is obviously a fountain of knowledge, that's why I've brought her on to the podcast today, I met her down at Mitchelton at a book signing and within we were talking everything Joanna Penn, everything Mark Dawson and everything to do with indie publishing. So I'm actually thinking that what we've been talking about you might like to listen to as well, Rachel are you okay with that?
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah that's fine, yeah you might have to edit out some ums.
Melinda: I counted, how many did I count, nineteen ums in my last podcast and I thought oh I'm getting quite attached to my ums but I did make a rule that I'm not going to do it anymore. So Rachel is a thriller author and a very, very good one at that and she does have quite a backlist now which is pretty exciting and I'll get Rachel to tell us about that in a moment. But for now, let's continue that very interesting conversation on funnel books with Brian Cohen. Did you find the little eBook?
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, I have, it's called Writing a Sizzling Synopsis or synopsis I should say. But yeah, overhauling the product description for that first funnel book which is also the first book in my Dan Taylor series. I have noticed, it just captures people's imagination a bit better. I think the problem is that five years ago I published that book and I hadn't really revisited the blurb since then and this is the beauty about being an indie you can go back and fix stuff. I was much happier with the blurbs that I'd written for my other books and they weren't funnel books. So once people are in the funnel they're going to go and read them anyway.
So paying Brian to, he's got these awesome packages for indie authors. If you don't have time to read the book sit down and tweak your book blurbs, he can do it for you. It was a really good learning curve. Looking at what he'd written for that product funnel and seeing the actual effect of people not leaving the launch page or the landing page for that book and actually signing up, it's been incredible, it's really good.
Melinda: Yeah and I think that's the trick, to get people to sign up before they leave the launch page, give them lots of free content now which is becoming very, very popular. The more we give them for nothing the more people are interested and the more they trust us and it actually works the opposite to what some people are thinking, don't give anything away, why should we? But it's actually the opposite, the more you give the more you get.
Rachel Amphlett: It's such a mindset change isn't it, from going but I wrote this I don't want to give it away for free. What I'm doing now is giving away White Gold, the first in the series and then a week later I'll send people an extended extract from Under Fire which is something like the first 20 chapters. It's more than you'll get on the preview for Amazon and the week after that I do the same with one of my standalone books, Before Nightfall and it's given people a really good opportunity to see, try before you buy. Do you like my writing? I've got nothing to hid here, if you enjoy it, great there's seven books. There's one! If you don't, that's fine, I'd much rather, and I think that that's the thing.
I'd much rather have people sign up, read the book in the extracts and decide no this isn't really for me and leave the mailing list then a) have them on there because they're costing me money or b) leaving a review, leaving a bad review on Amazon because they didn't enjoy it because it really wasn't up their street and they shouldn't have been reading it in the first place.
So I'm making so many friends through the mailing list as well. There are people that will email me after I send out one of monthly newsletters and we'll go on to have a completely separate chat over email about writing stuff and what they're doing in their life and comparisons to travel and what they enjoy and music we like. That's a hidden bonus I think of mailing lists.
Melinda: Yeah and we were talking at the very beginning there before we decided to record and Rachel's a very good sport about that, I'm not having to start again. So mailing lists and advertising through your mailing list is far more successful than the traditional, when I say traditional we've only been doing Facebook advertising for a few years, but times are changing.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, I think, I definitely need that Facebook advertising to get people on the mailing list, it's all very well say yes mailing list is key. But you have to use a mechanism to get people to discover that mailing list in the first place and without Facebook advertising that just wouldn't have worked for me. I had, before I started Mark Dawson's course I just did the initial three courses last year, and I think it's about July I did that and prior to that I think I had about 70 people on the list, in the months following that course, and I did the paid course as well I think I jumped about 2,500 genuine, quality subscribers on that list and it just keeps going up.
Melinda: Yeah and that's the trick too isn't it, quality subscribers, getting people who actually love what you do as opposed to people coming on to get a freebie and disappearing again.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah you will always get those, like I said. But I sort of factor that in, I know perhaps for every ten people that two are be freebie chasers. But I'd rather they did that and then just left. But you just sort of factor that in. You know that you're going to get, out of those ones that leave, the ones that stay are probably going to stay with you and if they don't buy all the books at full price you know that when you send a newsletter out that to do a promotion.
I mean I did a 99 cent promotion on Look Closer, one of my standalone books at the beginning of this month, in August. Before the book, I had, I actually scored a Bookbub, 99 cent promo and I keep my cost down by not advertising to the US, that's the key with Bookbub, if you want to do it cheaply just select the international option. Apologies to anyone in America but it's blooming expensive given our exchange rate there.
So the newsletter went out with the link to the 99 cent promo, I can't remember if I've ever done a 99 promo on that book before, which may have helped. The two days before the Bookbub promo, because of my mailing list that book was a best seller and then the Bookbub promo kicked in and then a couple of other newsletter subscriber based promos kicked in and this month, even when the book went back to full price after a week as been phenomenal for sales and it's because the mailing list kicked it off. I don't think I'd have seen the same sort of success if I'd just relied on the Bookbub promo.
Melinda: Yeah and I think as we're listening to Rachel we can gather that you work very hard at your marketing and your business. But you're always working very hard on your writing. These things don't come easy, it takes time and dedication over years.
Rachel Amphlett: Yeah, I think also I'm very lucky in that my other half, Nick, supports we me as well. You've got to have to the support of the people around you because I work, I write on the train, I get up early in the morning, I spend an hour before I even get on the train replying to emails and doing what I need to do marketing wise, I come at six o'clock, half past six, I sit in front of the computer for another two hours and I do the same at weekend. This weekend I'm in the middle of the having the audiobook for White Gold recorded, I now have to sit through 7 1/2, 8 hours of audio checking everything and there goes the weekend!
So it's, yeah you do need the support of people around you, it's not, it's like I said before I thought I become a bit of a project manager and I've got people around me that I can turn to just say can I do this or Nick, Nick here he makes sure I eat. I'll be in the office of an evening and Nick sticks his head around the corner and goes I'm cooking veg do you want some?
Melinda: Yeah and that's the thing that Rachel started talking about and got us carried away is when do we call in people, how many people do we call in to help and I'm looking at this whole VA space and getting someone to do in to do all the stuff that I'm really bad at...

#21 The Business of Writing – Day 3 – with Small Business Specialist and Founder of Excellence Expected, Mark Asquith

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 13 Sep 2016 20:17:36 -0500

The business world knows my guest today as a straight talking small business expert who helps early stage entrepreneurs navigate their lives and optimise their results. I know him as the guy in the TALK HARD t-shirt who tells me all my ideas are wonderful, then gently reminds me to focus on one thing at a time. Mark Asquith, author of ‘The 14 Day Guide to Cutting Your Working Hours and Increasing Your Impact’, has been working in digital technologies since 2001, and is founder of Podcast Websites, the hosting service for my podcast. His Excellence Expected podcast is the #1 small business podcast on iTunes and in his spare time he runs his design, brand and web agency, HACKSAW. He is the go to expert for all things branding, marketing and start-ups, and his speaking gigs this year alone included Belfast, London, Chicago, Barnsley, Philadelphia, London, Liverpool and Nottingham. A free take-away before we begin: the number one secret to any successful business is relationships. Your clients need to know, like and trust you before you sell ’em a thing, and the way to do it is through content, free content, lots of it. The old adage, give and you shall receive, is alive and thriving in the small business world, it seems. Oh, alright Mark, send me a TALK HARD t-shirt if you must and I’ll send you a pic from my very first Conference on the Gold Coast, We Are Podcast, 2016. Sound exotic, you reckon? Watch this space…

#20 The Business of Writing – Day 2 – Cultivating a Successful Mindset with Cassandra Gaisford

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 12 Sep 2016 19:53:45 -0500

Cassandra Gaisford is an entrepreneur, creativity coach, public speaker and author of the Number 1 Bestselling series, Mid-Life Career Rescue. Her most recent release, The Art of Success, merges business and art through the lens of Leonardo Di Vinci and focuses on how to cultivate a successful mindset. What does success mean to you is a question that keeps popping up as Cassandra and I chat about importance of believing in yourself and reminding yourself that you have the freedom to make the choices that define you. Our conversation ranges from the magic of New Zealand’s Bay of Isles to the fascination that is Di Vinci’s Renaissance world of beauty and inspiration, to Cassandra’s soon to be released historical novel, Mona Lisa’s Smile. To find out more, visit Cassandra at www.cassandragaisford.com

Read Full Transcript

Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I have a beautiful woman with me this morning and she's all made up and sitting here all glamorous, Cassandra Gaisford. Cassandra is from New Zealand and she's a couple hours ahead of me. I'm going to put it down to that I've just staggered out of the shower at 6 o'clock in the morning but she's there at 8 o'clock.
Before I let Cassandra introduce herself I'm just going to say that we've just had a bit of a scan around her house and not only has she got on her walls, which we can't see anymore, I had to turn her around for the sun, but a beautiful emblem from her latest book called The Art of Success which we're going to focus on a lot today, which is why I've got Cassandra on. But also out her window she's got the most amazing view of a river or a lake or something that just goes for miles and it's just stunning. So now I'm going to go and visit her as well. Welcome to Writer on the Road Cassandra.
Cassandra Gaisford: Thanks so much Melinda. You're actually looking out at the Bay of Islands. So I'm up here in, just out of KeriKeri up in the Bay of Islands and yeah we're blessed to have that beautiful view.
Melinda: I should have guessed the Bay of Islands, I have been there, unfortunately I was in a tent at the time with two children, camping out of a car.
Cassandra Gaisford: Probably different experience.
Melinda: Oh it's still beautiful, still wonderful, biggest thing that shocked me was the place was crawling in backpackers and we've got these magnificent views and everybody's taking photographs on their iPads and journaling and teaching, I'm thinking look up, see what you're missing. But they never, ever do. They're too busy saying look where I am and look what I'm doing and I'm going how about you enjoy it.
Cassandra is the founder of Work Life Solutions and I'm reading this so it sounds a little bit formal and I'm sure we don't want to be formal this morning. She's the best selling health, self-help author, so she's going to help me, and she's a romance and historical novelist. I was reading that she's just gotten back from the New Zealand Romance Writers Conference and I want to talk a little bit about that as well. She's got some tips for us on creativity I believe. She's a creativity coach, public speaker, and entrepreneur.
Cassandra Gaisford: Thank you.
Melinda: Tell us about yourself Cassandra, have I missed anything?
Cassandra Gaisford: I think the main thing and it sums up it and I know in my work that I do with people they often say well just don't you have to do one thing. When I say them you could do what I've called a career combo, you could do marry your passions and do multiple things, people are always pretty surprised. I would call myself, in fact others have called me a Renaissance woman, it's just trying lots of different things and most of them centered around passion and creativity.
Melinda: We're going to kick into that in the Art of Success which focuses very much on the words of Leonardo Di Vinci, so I've got to admit that I've spent a bit of time this morning fossicking through that book. I think I downloaded it last night in preparation for this interview. If there's anything you do, my listeners, go out and buy that book because your life will be changed forever.
We're going to talk a little bit this morning and I'm looking at cultivating the successful mindset because I thought that's one of the things that would interest us the most. But before I do that, because again I'm jumping all over the place because it's exciting to have Cassandra. The first thing I want to speak to you about is midlife career rescue. Cassandra has three books out on this very subject. Now being a bit passed midlife it's sort of too late for me, but Cassandra a lot of people want to change where they're at, and move to where they want to be.
Cassandra Gaisford: It's interesting the topic of what is midlife. For some people tragically midlife is, could be in their twenties, some people don't make it to fifty. Some people are more and more we're living into our nineties and quite well and wanting to contribute productively.
So midlife career rescue was really invented to turn your life around, that ageism that exists both in the minds of say recruiters and employers but also in people themselves that they're too old to change. Yeah, it's a book very much, well the series was inspired by my own experience. I'll show you on the cover, you can see this is book three about employing yourself and that bird flying from the cage.
Melinda: That's me, that's me!
Cassandra Gaisford: That was me and it's actually many people. It was my experience when I was working in, I worked for big global consultancy and I actually got shingles, it was such a stressful environment where the pursuit of the dollar was more important than working collegially with each other. It was such a values conflict. But by then I'd become so sort of demoralized that I actually lost my whole confidence and self-esteem which again is what happens with a lot of people when they're trapped in jobs and they feel hopeless.
The organization sponsored me to see a career counsellor and she used a creative techniques and I later went on to train to be a career counsellor and used the same techniques because they were so powerful. One of the techniques she did was to get me to draw a picture. I drew this picture of this poor, old grey bird stuck in this cage. She said put some words on the page and I said oh she's forgotten how to fly. This poor, this career counsellor burst into tears. But I thought okay she helped and she helped me understand that actually that [00:06:30] (unclear) value, that I did have [00:06:32] (unclear) and I used that experience and I think that's the thing, a message of hope I contain in all my books and self-empowerment is that you have to, negative experiences can be wonderful gifts if you use them constructively.
So that was such a gift of being so miserable and knowing unlike other colleagues who'd had heart attacks and some had actually died, I didn't want to die for my job. So I've helped many, many people escape terrible, very stressful roles and the first book in fact, called The Call for Change was inspired by a client who came and he was suicidal because of his career unhappiness. So no job deserves your life.
Melinda: Cassandra herself started out as a bank teller so she knows what she's talking about. I think I was a bank teller in my day as well. We’re continually I guess searching and something I read was always move towards your mountain and some of the stuff I was reading this morning Cassandra people don't move towards their mountain, they don't make decisions that take them closer to where they want to be.
Cassandra Gaisford: What would put that down to?
Melinda: I'd call it security or people call it security, I've never had that problem myself. I tend to ignore security, that's why I'm 55 and dirt poor. But having had a wonderful life.
Cassandra Gaisford: Exactly, you're having a wonderful life. It's not always about chasing the money.
Melinda: I'm going to suggest that, and my sister will agree with me here, there's got to be some kind of balance, they've got to be something in the middle or nothing, that's why you're Art of Success is so very, very powerful. You don't have to live like me, selling my novels out of a caravan, yes it is romantic and you can be like me if you want. But most people require more certain in their lives than that and you can follow your dreams, you can get where you want to be without selling your soul.
Cassandra Gaisford: That's right. It's all about just having the grand plan, but as you say the grand plan, having that long range view of actually going for your mountain or tasting what some people might call the impossible dream. You mentioned this properly here, well we always thought that would be really impossible. Impossible for us to live way out of a major center to uproot our lives from Wellington, my partner's in a traditional, he's a mortgage broker and they're traditionally in bricks and mortar, they have office fronts and you've got to go in and see them. We thought that would be an impossible dream to actually live remotely, then we started to think well what if, what if it's not impossible. How could it be possible?
These are the sorts of questions people forget to ask and they forget to sort of be what we call generative questions to start to ask open ended questions and going back to The Art of Success, well that's very much what Leonardo, and his whole success was formulated on that questioning you mentioned earlier about curiosity. Having curiosity when something didn't work he didn't sort of think gosh I'm a useless person because a lot of people have this negative self-talk if they stumble or fail. It's kind of like they're such terrible, useless people.
Leonardo will just think well what else am I learning or how else can I do it or what else can I move onto, this is boring now, I'm going on to something else. So he, many people would criticize him perhaps for not finishing projects, but the projects that he did finish were very much part the ones he followed with his heart. Look, 500 years later there's still the, whether they're paintings or inventions they have this longevity that when you chase peoples they never really have that kind of magic.
Melinda: Yeah and you're Art of Success is built on the life of Leonardo Di Vinci or something like that, I've just got something telling me I've got to go school here, I won't do that.
Cassandra Gaisford: Time to go to school? Yes, well.
Melinda: This lady says I don't have to, I'm allowed to stay.
Cassandra Gaisford: You're schooling yourself, your podcast is very much schooling yourself which is another thing of Leonardo was very self-taught. So even at the romance writer’s conference I heard people saying but I don't know how to build an email list. Well people, the world is your oyster. There is the internet, there are people you can ask, you can school yourself.
So Leonardo's, the book The Art of Success yes it's about, it's well I've always been inspired by Leonardo and you mentioned by related historical novel Mona Lisa's Secret and you'll see she's on the wall behind me and one of Leonardo's paintings, a very little known one called Saviour of the World-- Salvator Mundi is behind me.
I've always been intrigued by Leonardo and I thought well you know he's like so many of us creatives, isn't he. He's not necessarily focused completely. He's got divergent interests, he doesn't always finish things, he's infinitely curious, he's got so many things, what one will he choose. I just thought gosh it would be inspiring just to combine my interests, my background's psychology and counselling but also I'm an award winning artist, I wanted to merge art and business together and I thought who better to look to then the lessons of Leonardo.
But to make it, they're all time challenge, so the art of success you can read it in one hour or two hours and your life could be radically reengineered and you're right, there's a lot of balance in there, the balance of not sacrificing your work for your family, the balance of making sure that you move and that you eat well and that you exercise because so many people neglect that in their quest to success, you hear stories all the time. I heard of Elle Macphersons burning out because she was questing after success, totally frying her brain and had to take years to recover. Well why waste all that time in recovery when you can get, you can manage the art of success by, call it life work balance not work life balance, life first and your health is your wealth isn't it. We've heard it, it can sound cliché but it's so very true.
Melinda: Yeah and a lot of the reading that I do there's huge focus and it's mostly single guys I've got to tell you who spend the first three of their hours powering through their workload so that by nine o'clock they're out on the golf course and they stand by the fact that they have their fancy juices and their virtual trainers and I'm going give me a break and then they make it all sound very easy and they think why aren't we all doing it and I think well, kids, cats, dogs.
Cassandra Gaisford: That's right, and Leonardo didn't certainly, well he didn't, not necessarily, he didn't have children, but he certainly had, he had very close confidents and people he was responsible for who lived and worked with him. So in a way he had a lot of responsibility to others, the bills were paid by him, their wages were paid by him.
But many of these years, not just men, there were woman too who perhaps, I know recently, what's the name Zaha Hadid, she was an architect, British Iraqi born architect and said if you don't' die for architecture you're no good. She had no children, no relationship and yes she died for architecture way too prematurely I think, 62 was she, 62.
So but again, the Art of Success the big part of it also Melinda is saying to people well what is success to you, you define success. If success is not having a relationship well all credit to you, go for it. But if success to you, my next is on Coco Channel and the art of success and she died saying her biggest regret, the single mistake she made was giving all her devotion to work and dying without a man to love her, I thought that was terribly sad because that was her regret. So you want to get to the end of your life not regretting you quested after something that at the end doesn't really matter.
Melinda: You've moved on to your next book Coco Channel which is very, very interesting. I think I'd like to read that one as well. It's interesting that you're talking about this remote lifestyle, you're living in this beautiful, beautiful spot but you're surrounded by art and culture, you can research this woman from where you're are. We're very, very spoiled and when it comes to choices and success and all that kind of stuff we actually can do it from anywhere, we can get that balance more easily than a lot of times in the past I would suggest.
Cassandra Gaisford: A lot of people, especially midlife’s and I don't know maybe it's just trapped in that olden mindset where they don't, they don't recognize the world for possibilities, they're still trapped in this kind of 9 to 5 mentality, this sort of Monday to Friday. I might work 8 to 11 one night and skive off the next morning, I might work on Sunday because I feel like it and not on Monday and Tuesday.
We have so much freedom that it always, it just surprises me that people don't recognize, especially in our culture, in Western culture, particularly women, we have a whole load of choice and it's kind of like we're wasting out opportunities. In fact I always said, and I think I said it in the Art of Success someone once told me that paintings are the way that spirit speaks to you through art. I remember standing in front of this painting and it was a Renaissance painting and it was a picture of this nun and I was still dithering on finishing Mona Lisa's Secret and it was as though the nun said to me well what are you waiting for? You've got more freedom than me.
Melinda: And that word freedom, it came up in a podcast, I think I was listening to John Lee Dumas on the way to school and he was speaking to a fellow and at a top of a lot of people's list is that word, what is the thing you want the most and it's freedom to make your choices, not the freedom to work less but to work on the things that you're passionate about and that's a key element of your book as well.
Cassandra Gaisford: But it was certainly Leonardo's main quest to have the freedom to think as choose to because there was a lot of censorship and many of his thoughts would have been considered heresy. So he always said some of the things he researched he'd keep quite and that's why you have so much mystery about perhaps symbolizes in his paintings and particularly that last painting that's only been discovered a few years ago Salvator Mundi and the things contained within that picture of Jesus holding the world around an orb in his hands, it was chucked out by the Medici pope, there was no way he was, he had to be Christ on earth, he had to be portrayed. So Leonardo very much quested after his freedom and freedom to think as he wanted, freedom to work as he wanted and so yeah, he loved birds, he loved flights, he was a very free spirited man that couldn't be contained.
Cassandra Gaisford: Who wants to be tamed?
Melinda: That's a key part of the Renaissance period if you like and as writers we know that's when we got a lot of our romantic poets of Blake and words worth and all those kinds of guys as well and you're tapping into the artists of the same period, it was very romantic but it was almost heresy because it was very restricted back then. I wanted to know though as we're going through the same thing because we've got such a consumerist world, let's draw the parallel and say we have to be the Renaissance women and get out there and fight for our freedom and take back our creativity because it's not valued as much as it once was.
Cassandra Gaisford: In many ways Leonardo was quite lucky because creativity began to be valued and the artists themselves began to be revered whereas before his period the artist were just, even Michelangelo was swept by his father for bringing dishonor by being a lonely artisan, they were seen as sort of like, no disrespect to people who are plumbers and electricians and carpenters but they were just seen as sort of the, whereas actually the men are the craftsmen, they make the magic.
The Art of Success also goes into the significant obstacles that Leonardo had to face and many, because he was still questing after freedom in a time they weren't totally free and he had to work just as many of us do. Some of us still have to work for tyrants, a bread and butter job might be working in a role that we don't like or that we don't have the freedom. He would have to work for say popes and other people who would dictate what he was going to do, what pigments he was going to use, what it was going to look like, all sorts of things.
He often felt despair, so many people they just succumbed to their despair instead of like, Leonardo would write affirmations so we have records of these in his journals. He would say I do not part from my farrow, meaning there was no way that

#19 The Business of Writing – Day 1 – The Art of Networking with Business Expert and Entrepreneur, Daniel Gefen

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 11 Sep 2016 09:06:20 -0500

Daniel Gefen has picked the brains of the best in the business world on his Number 1 Entrepreneur podcast, Can I Pick Your Brain?, and 20,000 downloads since January is testimonial to the popularity of this man’s expertise. Today, he shares the 6 Steps to Great Networking with us. We also get to hear about his new book to be released in April, 2017, titled The Self Help Addict (you heard it here first:)). To find out more, visit Daniel at www.danielgefen.com and don’t forget the offer to join Daniel, and me, in Daniel’s private Facebook group to access his network of goal setting entrepreneurs. The Can I pick Your Brain? Entrepreneur Business Podcast can be downloaded on iTunes and I highly recommend it. I’m heading over there now to re-listen to Episode 39, 10 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller with Park Howell, and with any luck, we might be able to get Park to chat with us here on Writer on the Road. Over to you, Daniel, we await your introduction:).

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#18 Have books will travel with Jenn J McLeod

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 05 Sep 2016 20:35:51 -0500

Life’s an adventure and this ex-corporate, now multi-published, author is more than happy to share her adventures with anyone who happens to be around. Think happy hour somewhere, a fifth wheeler, a partner to do the driving and a country as big as Australia in which to play. It’s not hard to imagine what my conversation with Jenn J McLeod disintegrated into…yeah, whose been where anecdotes, but we talked writing, too. Jenn is as generous with her advice as she is with her stories and I can’t wait to bump into her out in the big paddock somewhere, camped in the star hotel that the Australian outback does so well. Throw in a few stories, a glass or two, and maybe swap a few novel ideas, and I reckon it’s an adventure that’d be worth talking about. In the meantime, if you’re out there and you see Jenn, don’t forget to pop over and say hi – oh, and buy a book or two. You can find out more about Jenn and her good life over at www.jennjmcleod.com

#17 Setting a time and making it happen – unleashing your inner writer with Sherrie McCarthy

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 30 Aug 2016 10:55:26 -0500

Welcome to the world of the wandering gypsy princess, also known as my friend Sherrie McCarthy, who, having gotten her motor bike license one week and ridden a motorcycle from Germany to Turkey via Romania and Bulgaria, and back via Greece and the Balkans, is now setting her sights on new horizons with her husband, two children and a dog call Mango (with his own book title), and a yacht called…err, you might have to listen to the podcast to find that out. Sherrie’s motto in life is, yep, you guessed it, ‘Just do it!’ I can’t wait to follow her family’s adventures as they sail off into all kinds of sunsets, with Sherrie already determined to carve out a spot for her writing self, no mean feat on a yacht at the best of times. Throw in a couple of young children and I’m thinking deserted islands in the dinghy may be Sherrie’s preferred escape/writing option. Creator of The 7 Day Creativity Jumpstart Videos, and author of various travel motorcycle books, Sherrie is working toward releasing her first thriller which I’ll be the first to put my hand up to buy for the research alone. If it’s inspiration you’re looking for then this podcast episode is for you. I could also throw in motivation, fascination, and enthusiation (if you can come up with a better word for this woman’s personality, I’m listening – when I grow up I want to be just like her).

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#16 When all you have to fear is fear itself – how to grow your business with Angus Nelson

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 25 Aug 2016 09:19:35 -0500

Angus Nelson is a Top 20 INC podcast host, motivational speaker and coach. His focus is bringing transformation to business models, creativity, inspiration and networking. And he turned up in my life just when I was asking the questions. He also walks the talk. He has a new book coming out, titled Empowering Work, encouraging you to find your purpose and to be the most effective you that you can be. Live in the present and unlock your amazing future, encourages Angus, and he is very persuasive in his arguments. It was when I heard Angus speak that I knew I had to have him join us on our journey. After all, don’t we all want a life of experience and fearlessness? Sit back and enjoy Angus telling us how…

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#15 Author, pilot, sailor, plot…there’s gotta be a writer behind this story, hasn’t there?

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 23 Aug 2016 09:32:38 -0500

Interviewing this woman has me rushing for the post-it-now button. Part inspiration, part motivation and part mentor, Helene Young is a podcast interviewer’s dream. Successful author of six novels (with one in the oven), sailor of some of the most spectacular reef landscape in the world, and adventurer in the true sense of the word…give me a reason not to post our podcast the same day I chat with this amazing woman!! Okay, I’m doing it. An added bonus is Helene has just returned from Australia’s premier Romance Writers of Australia Conference in Adelaide and I want you all get the good oil on this most prestigious of events. Welcome, Helene, and let it be known at the outset, I’m jealous of the life you live, and excited that, one day, you and your handsome hero are going to join me on the inland route of Oz. To find out more about Helene, please go to her website, www.heleneyoung.com – but her Facebook page is where to head for the most amazing pics of her coastal Oz photographic bonanza. If the cover shot on this interview keeps changing, don’t blame me…

Assisted Publishing – knowing when to call in the experts to help us on our self-publishing journey

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 17 Aug 2016 07:42:47 -0500

We all want our books to not only look professional but to be professionally edited, produced, and marketed, don’t we? Join me as I chat with Amanda Greenslade of Australian eBook Publishing as we discuss assisted publishing – how much should we, as indies, attempt ourselves and how much should we hand over to the experts. Of course, the answer is different for everyone and it’s Amanda’s first job to discuss with her clients this very question. There’s a huge amount to learn once we type ‘The End’ on our manuscript and in some ways we can find ourselves right back at the beginning, this time learning all there is to know about the business side of publishing and marketing our precious works. Or, we can outsource some or all of the next stages of the writing and publishing journey to the experts.

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Wanna run away with the circus in Oz and tell a story about it? Working around Australia may be the answer to your storytelling dream…

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 15 Aug 2016 10:16:50 -0500

Can you think of a better way to create a story to tell? Travelling around one of the most magical of landscapes, doing a little work, playing a little, eavesdropping on the locals’ lives. Sounds idyllic? For a writer, it’s grist of the mill, storytelling in the making if you like. Warren Williams, of Work Around Australia fame, can tell you how to make you working around Australia dream come true and I can help you tell that story. Now, one would assume that would make Warren and I a great team, except for one small problem. I wanna run away too, in fact, it’s been a long held dream of mine to run away with the circus and Warren, damn him, has made that dream come true, at least, it could come true if I dared to run. Check out www.workaboutaustralia.com.au for Warren’s tips, tricks and newsletter.

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A Numbers Game – How to Succeed at this Writing Gig with Amy Andrews, Romance Author

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 09 Aug 2016 09:17:32 -0500

That title is a tad facetious, I know, but when I’m chatting with a woman with over fifty books published and a million or so sold what else can I say? The numbers speak for themselves. And a little aside, I knew this woman under another name – in another life – when we were both aspiring romance authors and attending conferences to glean titbits from those-who-knew-the-secret-of how-to-get-published. Well, one of us found the answer and the other one of us is interviewing her. Welcome to the writing life of Amy Andrews, and the only thing we have in common nowadays is that we both believe it’s 5 o’clock somewhere most of the time. But seriously, this is one success story you don’t want to miss. It’s a story of determination, focus and damned hard writing work. You can’t get successful any other way, I’m afraid, and that’s a secret I’m happy to reveal even before you listen to Amy give us the real truth.

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The Romantic and the Pragmatic – Two Indie Publishers Unite to Discuss the Business Side of Writing

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 07 Aug 2016 09:35:28 -0500

Meet a man who’s ‘out there do’in’ it’, living the life we all dream of, a life filled with adventure, the great outdoors, and a little bit of much needed solitude in this crazy commercial world we call the twenty-first century. Gerard Abrams, part philosopher, part inspiration, part practical and part intellect, has carved out a life that includes a man-cave-tent where he can write and while away the midday hours in some of most spectacular outback country New Zealand has to offer and call it work. He also manages to squeeze in more than a few ‘office hours’ here in Oz, too, where he makes his home with the ever patient and supportive Susie. Susie is Gerard’s wife, editor and support team. Most of the time, while he’s out doing what adventurers do best, she’s at home doing what support teams do best, monitoring the findme app and feeding the chooks (okay, I’m not sure if this pair have chooks, but if they did, it would be Susie doing the feeding ’cause Gerard has serious hiking, contemplating, photo taking and yeah, some writing, to do). Gerard calls himself a simple man but I’m going to let you decide for yourself. After an hour in this man’s company, I’m gunna be brave, and beg to differ. This man has one serious kind of business brain. He suggested we link up and collaborate on a few projects, which sounded like a damned fine idea ’till he had to go and blow it and talk business proposals and such. Gerard, I’m a simple girl and just like to write…and talk. Let us know what you think about the crazy hour with Mel and Gerard, the romantic and the pragmatic. You never know, we may team up yet.

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The secret to writing success is hard work! Insights into the business side of writing with Annie Seaton, Romance Author

Melinda Hammond — Mon, 01 Aug 2016 10:14:57 -0500

Make no mistake, I adore Annie Seaton. This is one author I’m proud and excited to have met and can now call my friend. Let me go one step further…when I grow up I wanna be just like Annie, and if I had ever actually laid claim to the term ‘grown up’ I would be her. Annie is me, except for one small detail. She’s done everything I set out to do, and finished it!! And, therein my listening and reading friends, lies the difference. Annie had done what we all dream of doing. She has taken the last five years and propelled her writing dream into the stratosphere. And there’s nothing stopping the rest of us doing the same. Except hard work, dedication and application. Are you ready to achieve your writing dream? Make yourself comfortable and listen as Annie tells us how. To find out more about Annie and her extraordinary success, pop over to www.annieseaton.net and while you’re there, don’t forget to admire the cover of Kakadu Sunset. Coming hot on its heals in November is Daintree Sunrise (an exclusive release date – remember, you heard it here first) and one about the Kimberley (can’t remember its name:))

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How to start a business and write a book about it

Melinda Hammond — Wed, 27 Jul 2016 10:32:43 -0500

Have you ever wondered how your stories can act as inspiration to others? This week’s guest, Mandy Rowe, not only guided Broads Abroad Travel Network from idea to successful travel network for solo women travellers, she wrote down the details so that others could learn from both her mistakes and triumphs. Her memoir is titled A Broad Abroad, One Woman’s Journey, and it offers a detailed account of Mandy’s efforts to see what started as a dream through to fruition. Make no mistake, Mandy is a perfectionist and she oversaw every detail of her brand with a meticulous eye. Her driving passion? To get women out there making new friends and sharing their stories as only true friends can. An added bonus is a second book that illustrates the success of Mandy’s vision for members of the Broads Abroad network. Broad’s Abroad – Worldly Wise brings together a group of amazing women sharing their stories to both inspire and instruct us in the benefits of travelling with new eyes to exotic places. Mandy has given me several copies of A Broad Abroad, One Woman’s Journey, to share with you. The first five subscribers to my list after listening to Mandy’s story will receive a copy of her book (just send me your email so we can organise delivery). If you want to know more about the Broads Abroad Network, and the inspiration that is Mandy Rowe, visit Mandy at www.broadsabroad.net

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Enthusiasm, Entrepreneurship and Indie Publishing

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 24 Jul 2016 10:48:56 -0500

Joanne Dannon is an Indie author who is as generous with her advice to others as she is with her enthusiasm for everything to do with the business of writing. It is Joanne’s enthusiasm that attracted me to her while I was completing Mark Stephenson’s online marketing course for writers, Your First 10k Readers. If you’re interested in building your writing business then listen to Joanne’s journey where, through sheer tenacity of spirit, she is succeeding in building a loyal fan base and keen readership. She speaks of how networking with other writers sees her collaborating on a book bundle project and how she donates a proportion of her sales to worthy causes of her choosing. Being in control of her own destiny matters to Joanne and if sheer bloody-mindedness and determination is what it takes to be noticed in the ever-burgeoning online ebook space, then this woman will be not only noticed but talked about in the most positive of ways.

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Joanne Dannon
Duration: 52.00
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. Today I have with me a beautiful romance author Joanne Dannon. Joanne's website says some very nice things about her that she writes "sparkling sassy romances with sigh-worthy endings."
So in order to set the mood to talk with Joanne tonight I've lit my candle in the background so that we have the romance, I've got my glass of red wine sitting over here so cheers to you Joanne. The only I haven't got is a handsome hero, but Joanne's hubby has been helping us set up tonight. So we do have our handsome hero floating around in the background here. Welcome Joanne.
Joanne Dannon: Thank you, thanks Melinda. Nice to be chatting with you, I do like your podcast so thanks for inviting me to part of one.
Melinda: Well I couldn't resist, Joanne and I are members of some writing courses that we're doing online together one of those is called "Your first 10,000 Readers" with Mark Stephenson. Joanne has been experiencing quite a level of success although she'd be a little bit shy about that, with her promotion and marketing of her work.
Joanne and I, before we started tonight were discussing the concept of overnight success and we had a little bit of a chuckle because although Joanne is now an overnight success, there's been ten years of hard work going on behind the scenes. So Joanne the quote that I wanted to start with tonight, which I've lost in all the chaos that we've been experiencing, is she writes handsome, "She wrote a story about a handsome, mysterious Englishman, a feisty nanny, an exotic setting, what more can you ask for in a romance novel?" So welcome, would you like to introduce yourself for our listeners please?
Joanne Dannon: Okay, my name is Joanne Dannon, I'm an Australia romance author, I love romance, I like romance books and romance movies. So when I started writing it was pretty easy that I would go into the genre that I most liked which is romance.
I like to write contemporary romances and I like to make my heroes a little bit different, I've been a long time fan of Mills and Boone, to the presents or the sexy line as it's known in Australia. But most of the heroes are bankers or business man or tycoons and I just wanted to do something a little bit different, so my heroes a little bit different.
So with my book that's coming out in October for example he's a scientist looking for a cure for ovarian cancer. I've got the reporter which is obviously with the one that you're talking about with Falling for Mr. Wrong, I've got a lawyer, okay but he's a pretty sexy lawyer. I try to shake it up a little bit and make it a bit different, I just, I write the books that I love, that I want to read.
Melinda: I think one thing that we have to remember here is that writing romance is one of the biggest genres in novel writing all around the world. Second, I think coming second are thrillers and adventure novels but romance is right up there. So Joanne has, I guess, cracked it in a market that is considered to be the biggest and the best. Joanne the two novels that I found for you were Falling for Mr. Wrong and Wanting a Mr. Right. So I'm assuming there are going to be more novels in that series.
Joanne Dannon: So Falling for Mr. Wrong is actually a standalone book which is lots of fun, it's set in Israel, we have a nanny who's on the run from the London press and she goes and hides out in Israel thinking no one will find her and of course not only does the hero find her but the London press find her. So they're sort of on the run, running across the country. So that was, that's really fun.
Then I start off with a series and at the moment two books have released. The first one is Kisses Under the Spotlight and we have a superstar as the hero, again something a little bit different, so he sings, he tap dances, he can tap dance upside down, he's a superstar, he's got billions of fans, everyone loves him and I've put him up against a very feisty physio who looks after him. Then Wanting Mr. Right is the second book in the series. That one's set in Hong Kong, again lots of fun. I just, I really like doing what I do and I like to put the fun of what I like to read into my books. The third book in the series is the one that's out in October.
Melinda: I think the interesting thing as I'm sitting here chatting with Joanne and we had a bit of a chat as we were trying to get the technology working as usual, Joanne felt a bit bad that we couldn't get things working but what she doesn't know is that I've been in her position for the last 10 episodes. Nothing ever goes to plan Joanne, it's normal and we all push on and we all get there eventually. But what you said I'd like to pick up, you said everyone loves your stories because they're feel good and as I'm talking to Joanne you guys can't see it, but she's glowing, she's happy, she's vivacious, she's smiling. Writing romance is obviously something that suits your personality very well.
Joanne Dannon: I think so. If you see on my Instagram and my Facebook pages I have things that are romantic, I got to weddings dressed in '50s dresses with my hair done up. It's just,
I dress the way I like to dress, it suits me and I'm not trying to make a statement, I just wear things that I like so I like things with hearts on them, I like things with big skirts and petticoats. So the things that I love I put into my life, I put it into my writing as well. So this is me, I don't create an image to try and fit into this romance genre, this is me.
I am part of a romance, I love the [00:06:57] (unclear). Every time I go and get new shoes that have got hearts or something on them my friends will go oh that's so you because that's how I am. I mean people don't know me yet because as a public persona, but my friends who know me know exactly what I'm like, they know that I like these 50's style shoes and big skirts with the petticoats because that's who I am.
Melinda: If you look at Joanne's website, which I'll put in the transcript notes so that everyone can go and have a look, it's this beautiful bright pink color and it says that Joanne's interested in reading, writing, cooking which I thought yes give me some cooking, vintage inspired dresses and all things romantic. I'm guessing that brings us into why I've invited you on today and it's, or tonight because it's now 9 o'clock at night here. If you write and you write successfully, you have to write from the heart.
Joanne Dannon: I've said that. When I first started writing I tried to put my writing into a box. So because as I said before that I love these Mills and Boone books with these amazing alfa-heroes and I tried to replicate that, and every time I did I didn't get a good story because I was writing something that wasn't me. So I think, I can't remember exactly when it was, but it was a few years ago and I took six weeks off work, I did a Margie Lawson course and I sat down and I wrote the book that I wanted which was a superhero, basically someone like Michael Bubble mixed with Adam Garcia, so he can dance, he can sing, he's got millions of fans.
Everyone said to me no one will buy it, no publisher will buy a hero that dances (tap dances) and sings. They were right, no one bought it. It was rejected by every romance publisher but the thing is that I love that book, I poured my heart and soul into it, and because I love jazz and I love the tap dancing I but all the stuff that I loved into this book. So yes it never got published by a traditional publisher, but I was able to publish it myself. If you have a look at the reviews people love it. The thing is people also like bankers, but they also like something a little bit different and that's why I think that my readers really like that I'm writing things that are little bit quirky, a little bit different to what is out there for romance.
Melinda: I'm just picking up on what you're saying there. You talked about courses, you talked about reader reviews. So I want to pick up on both of those things because a lot of our listeners will be on their own writing journey. You mentioned a Margie Lawson course. Who is Margie Lawson?
Joanne Dannon: She's awesome. She's been out to Australia a few times and if you do her course she's amazing. I couldn't afford to do her courses when she comes out to Australia, but I know people have done them and she is really brilliant in what she does.
She helps you in editing, but not editing as in picking up words, but how to make things really good in your sentences and how to really lift it and make it a little bit interesting and exciting. So I did her course, which is an online course and I did it with a couple of friends and we worked together and I learned some amazing techniques from her.
I think that started me off, I'd done a lot, I've belonged to Romance Writers of Australia, so once a year I go to their conference and I learn and they've got amazing people who come out. But I think you still got to keep learning especially when you're a new writer, you've got to keep learning, you've got to keep doing courses and finding what suits you. So you got to keep reading your craft books, I mean if I spin you around you'll see my cupboard there and it's full of craft books and I've read a lot of them and I think it's really important to do courses and also to find the ones that work for you.
So Margie is amazing and when I became a self-published author I've been told oh it's really easy, you just stick a book on Amazon and the money just come in. I'm like yeah I wish, can I tell you how many people have got books on Amazon and they make no sales unless you do a course. Unless you know what you're doing you may as well just go and find a job working in a shop because seriously it's so hard, it's hard to write the book, it's also hard to sell the book as well.
There are a lot of courses out there, some are better than others. I've done a number of them, some are really good and the one that's been the best one is the one where I met Melinda, which has been great. Not only was the course amazing and you could do it at your own speed I should say, is that there's an online community so you can chat to other people and I've also met other romance writers, so also self-published that we can work together. So really what I always recommend to people who want to be self-published is that you need to work with someone. If you work on your own you won't do as well as if working with someone else.
Melinda: I've got to tell you Joanne your cheating here. I actually did a lot of research today and I read Joanne is a contributor to an online magazine called 'Savvy Authors' www.savvyauthors.com. A lot of what Joanne has just told us has just thrown my notes into the bin because all of the things that she just told us are the things that I was going to draw out of her tonight. So Joanne already is being very, very generous with us. Don't write alone, get support, prioritise your education. As Joanne said the course we're doing together is Nick Stephenson's First 10,000 -- or 'Your First 10,000 Readers.' The reason I brought Joanne on tonight is because she's having success with her marketing. Now a lot of us have novels finished some of us have novels up on Amazon, but not all of us are seeing that monetary success for our very hard work. I'd like to take you back to the beginning of your marketing journey and tell us some of the things that you've tried and what worked and what didn't.
Joanne Dannon: A lot of it was I became a self-published author and I had no idea what I doing to be honest. I belonged to Romance Writers of Australia as I mentioned before and most writeres are traditionally published, so that means with a publisher and the publisher does all of that marketing for them. Then you have those who are hybrid. So they're basically traditionally published and they may do one or two books on the side, self-publish but they have a name for themselves as well. That makes it easier to sell their books.
Then you get people like me who come along and have no support and don't even know what they're doing and have been told oh it's so easy, money's going to fall from the sky once you go and you put a book on Amazon, which couldn't be further from the truth. So I tried some paid advertising, which did quite well, not hugely well, but it did quite well. But the thing is it's expensive. You can run an ad with these companies and you pay $70 USD and you'll get some sales. But I found that sales didn't cover the cost of paying for the $70. So it's a way of getting you readership.
I was sort of doing this things and these companies promise you, then you find them on Fiverr and they promise you oh we'll do this and I can sell this and they promise you the world and I didn't see one sale from it. So I went through this whole, it was just really exhausting and I got to the point where I thought you know what I don't know if this is what I'm going to be able to do, maybe I do need a publisher because I can't sell my books. Anyway, then I found this promotion, I don't know how I found them. Anyway, I found this one called Loved Kissed and they've been amazing and the writers, we all work together and the other thing is that once you start working together then you hear about others that are working well.
For example with one of my friends that I met from the U.S., she was doing really well on another, with another organization, I guess it's an organization company doing marketing and promotions. So she invited me to hers, I invited her into mine, we're working together. We're doing boxed sets together. So by working with other writers in the genre you can do better that way then just paying for a marketing. So there's heaps of these companies out there. They take your money, but most of the time they don't really deliver.
Melinda: We've written our novels, we're looking at how to promote them, we're creating our networks, but really we're here for the long haul. Joanne is very young, compared to me, I'm 55 and I can give Joanne quite a few years. But, I should imagine Joanne that you'll be writing for many years to come.
Joanne Dannon: I hope so!
Melinda: I don't think it's the immediate sales that you're trying to build here, I think it's that you're trying to build a career.
Joanne Dannon: Correct, definitely trying to build a career. So at the moment I have three books, I have four more coming out. What I'm trying to do is build my subscriber list. So what that is when I send an email out I send it out to people who are interested in my writing and want to buy my books. It's sending out through paid advertising, where again you can pay 70, 100 U.S. dollars. You don't know if you're targeting the people who really want to read your books.
That's where Nick's course comes along and really does a great job. Nick, the reason why he is so good is because he's a writer. He started off like us not making any sales. He worked out a really good way of making sales and obviously now he sells that information to other writers but then he has a community so you can all work together.
As I've said so many times that if you don't work together you can't do well. You have to work together. The thing is I always said you had to work in your own genre, romance. However, I've actually just joined up with another group of non-romance writers and we've been working together and that's actually going really well.
For example I love thrillers, I like James Patterson, I like John Grisham, all of these big names I enjoy their books as well as romance. So there are also other readers out there who may like these thrillers, but may like a romance. So we're actually all working together. So I have to clarify that sometimes working with someone in a different genre, yeah for a different genre can still work as well as working in the same genre as yourself.
Melinda: I think all of us are starting to get the idea now that Joanne may have more energy than some of us, but she's not sitting flat-footed. She's out there, she's pushing, she's promoting, she's networking.
I'm a recent convert to social media. I fought against it for so very, very long. Now I have more best friends in the world that I could ever count, but I'm starting to make some genuine relationships and Joanne you, I'm hoping are one of those genuine friends that I'm connecting with. I'm guessing that a lot of your success is through your social network.
Joanne Dannon: Definitely. So obviously Facebook is really important. I went to, again going to courses learning from learning from experts is really good. My local council had this amazing speaker who spoke about social media. One of the things that she said is that you can do everything but not all of us have time to do it, so she said focus on two.
I chose Facebook and I chose Instagram. Firstly I love taking photos and Facebook is fun. So not only do I have my personal page, which is separate, that's for family and friends and pictures of my kids. I'm not going to put that on my Joanne Dannon page because my Joanne Dannon talks about my writing. It talks about what I love, which is vintage stuff, cooking, dresses, my books. I don't talk about my kids because that's my personal stuff, so that's pushed aside and I get surprised at how many people on their public persona will talk about politics and things because really that's not what people want to know about you, they want to know about your books in my opinion, maybe I'm wrong.
I think developing your social network is really important and people want to be, sorry to interrupt you, but they want to get to know you, they want to know what you're like. Do you like cats, do you like knitting, do you like coloring in? What do you like? Because they want to get to know you as a person, once that and they get to know your books as well.
Melinda: We were talking earlier about success and what it takes to be successful. Again we're hearing it in Joanne's voice, I'm just blown away by your enthusiasm. You were talking about some fellow writers who have written 15, 16, 20 books over several years and they're still writing. It reminds me of a quote that said "You will only fail if you stop."
Joanne Dannon: I agree. The thing is you've got to keep the momentum. Being a writer is actually really hard. I know people think it's just so easy, we're just sitting...

How to write, publish and sell your next ebook

Melinda Hammond — Tue, 19 Jul 2016 10:46:01 -0500

You can’t do everything but you can do anything, one thing at at time, says Derek Doepker, bestselling author, success coach and self-publishing consultant. Derek dreamed of being a rockstar but, instead, empowers writers to be the best they can be in order to position and market their books for the best results. Derek is ever-generous in sharing his advice, motivation and inspiration to both aspiring and published authors – and I’ve just hired him as my mentor and writing coach. Listen, and take notes if you can, as Derek takes us through the self-publishing process from getting our books written to publishing and marketing them to the best effect. Don’t forget to check out Derek’s website at www.ebookbestsellersecrets.com for all the advice any self-publisher will need to succeed in the exciting new world of digital publishing.

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The Great Escape – from Travel Writer to Digital Content Marketer

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 14 Jul 2016 22:53:24 -0500

What would make a man give up the best job in the world? A better job, of course. Meet Brian Crisp, former National Editor of Escape Travel Magazine for News Corp here in Australia. I set out in my chat with Brian to find out why a man with the most romantic job in the world, I mean, really, getting to holiday in exotic places and then write about it, and then give it all up? Well, it takes about five minutes into our conversation to understand that this man has found the answer. Brian is a born storyteller and he now crafts content for social media, again with News Corp, and he has positioned himself to be at the forefront of a new business marketing era, where story is king.

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One Writer’s Transition to the RVing Lifestyle

Melinda Hammond — Sun, 10 Jul 2016 06:21:38 -0500

Episode 5

Kevin Tumlinson needs no introduction in the Indie publishing world – or in the podcasting world for that matter – and there’s a growing interest in his transition amongst his followers, including me, to full-time RVing. Kevin and his wife, Kara, will be travelling in style and for a while in this interview I forget about writing as I get lost in the detail of his new lifestyle. But, never fear, Kevin is as ever generous in his writing advice as he is in sharing the excitement of his new lifestyle. This man writes 5000 words a day, which to me, makes Kevin one prolific writer. I can’t wait to see how he maintains the schedule when life outside his rig proves too tempting. He has visions of sitting inside at his already designated writing desk as he churns out his words. Good luck, Kevin, there’s a big wide world of distraction out there waiting to tempt you. For more about Kevin’s writing and writing journey, visit www.kevintumlinson.com. His latest adventure thriller novel, The Coehlo Medallion is available in all the usual places and his non-fiction book, The 30 Day Author, has become this wanna-be-prolific-author-when-I-grow-up’s bible of sorts.

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Kevin Tumlinson
Duration: [01:05:49]
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. I have a very, very special guest with me today who I've been courting, I guess, for several months now. My guest is Kevin Tumlinson and to most of people in the podcasting world he's going to need absolutely no introduction whatsoever. Good morning Kevin!
Kevin Tumlinson: Good morning, good afternoon. Let's see, I'm, I don't know how many hours opposite you that I am, but it's 3 o'clock here and 6 am there. So I guess, good afternoon here, good morning there.
Melinda: There's another difference as well that I'm going to point out, my business is called Tropical Writing Services and I've just moved down from a tiny place called Magnetic Island off Townsville in far north Queensland and I'm down in Brisbane, which is still tropical, but it's 5 degrees here today.
Kevin Tumlinson: Oh really?
Melinda: And I'm not a happy writer. So I'm sitting here in UGG boots and coats and mittens with a cup of Milo in my hand and Kevin you're from Texas?
Kevin Tumlinson: Yes. It is not 5 degrees here. It is very warm here right now. I believe it's somewhere in the high 90s right now and the humidity is killing me.
Melinda: I think there was something, I think one of the times I contacted you, you were quite happy to be in the air conditioning and it was 30 degrees and very sweaty outside.
Kevin Tumlinson: Right, right, exactly. That's what happens when you're in the general Houston area, that's one of the reasons why my wife and I were keen to get in the RV and get on the road full time so that we can choose comfortable places to live.
Melinda: There's a mass exodus north as we speak this time of year, anyone who has any sense of all is in their RV and heading north, the tried and true track is you go up through Brisbane up north to Townsville, Cairns, Daintree, and across to Darwin where it's very comfortable, thank you very much, and that's where you stay for the winter. I'm assuming when you travel that big wide country of yours that you will have plenty of choices.
Kevin Tumlinson: We do. One interesting thing is the way the mountains actually sort of dissect the country at one point, so there's kind of a definitive east and west here and then once you go a little further west there's a big huge dessert. So we haven't really ventured beyond the mountains yet, but we do like to get up north into the mountains and kind of find a relaxing place. I'm a mountains guy, I'd much rather be in the mountains than say on a beach or in the tropics or something like that and I'm really looking forward to spending months at a time on a lake or somewhere where I've got a, sort of a vista that I can check out. I want my front yard that just stretches out forever and is filled with mountains and lakes, that's what I'm looking for.
Melinda: Of course the best thing of all is you'll get to ditch an awful lot of stuff when you're out there you just don't need the stuff.
Kevin Tumlinson: That's one of the things we've been working on is downsizing and we're so much closer in fact we just had a huge garage sale, I think our forth garage sale total at this point over the past weekend where we're just selling off everything we can. We can use the money, that's really handy but mostly it's about just getting rid of this amassed junk that we've held on to largely most of our lives. I mean, I brought a lot of stuff into our marriage, I know. I was not a hoarder by any stretch but I was raised by people who believe in keeping everything, hold on to everything so that you could use it whenever you needed it.
So I had a lot of stuff to sort of cull through. We're finally getting to a point where I think we can move into the RV full time and not worry about whatever we're leaving behind. It'll fit in a small, a smaller storage unit than what we had before I think.
Melinda: One of the things they say and I'm sure you've heard it many, many times is put a little red dot on everything that you pack into your RV and if it's still there into a year, toss it out.
Kevin Tumlinson: We're going to do something very similar to that, actually that's a very good idea, I may do something like that because we're doing something like that with boxes and things that we're keeping in storage. I write a date on it, I don't write the contents of the box, if I haven't looked in that box in a year the deal is we're going to take it and donate it without ever opening it. So we're doing something very similar.
I think that that's a wise plan because there's a tendency for us to over pack, as it were, and RVs of course have limited space and we've managed to we're, Kara and I, I'm very blessed in that Kara and I are both organizers, we both love to, well we're organizers in different ways actually. She likes to go shopping for organizational tools. I like to find new and better ways to use things we have.
So there's a little head butt there, but for the most part we're both really good at optimizing our space. What we're not so good at, collectively, I'm going to take as much of the blame as she does in this, is determining exactly what it is we actually need vs just things we think we might need and just really want in the space for this. We're having to kind of come to some decisions.
Melinda: It's interesting because right from when I was a little girl and I notice, and we'll move on to your writing credentials shortly, all you need to write is, metaphorically, a pen and a paper which I guess nowadays is our iPads or our iPad pros and a chair and a vista. I'm guessing when you set off with your travels you're not going to take all your gear and that you will be downsizing that as well.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah, okay. So I'm actually, I've done a great deal of this already. Before, we had a home, we had a four bedroom home and it was about 2,500 square foot which is fairly large. It has like four bedrooms, plus I had my study/office, there was a dining room, there was a lot of space in this house. I had a full-fledged recording studio where I did the podcasts and I did other work.
We decided to sell the house so that we could get moving toward this journey and temporarily we moved into an apartment, that's where we are now. But we've purchased our RV, so we've taken steps.
In those steps I downsized the equipment I needed, that was kind of painful in a way. I have a background in media and I used to own a small production studio and I had a business creating video and audio and other materials for clients. I had all this equipment, I still have it technically, it's still in storage, I've been selling pieces of it. But getting everything down to like a small MacBook air and I have an iPad that I use as kind of a back-up writing tool and in a pinch I can just use a Bluetooth keyboard with my iPhone, I can get online, do whatever I need to do.
Then the recording stuff I really culled that down, like I'm talking to you right now on a, it's a Zoom H4N handy recorder, it's a small, smallish recorder. It's kind of fancy looking, but it's a self-contained unit. I can record on it or I can use it as a microphone, which is what I'm using now. That was kind of, a little bit of a transition because I had this mixer and I had a professional mike on a swing arm and I had a whole bunch of equipment that I had to kind of trim down, so that's been interesting and it's been a little heart breaking a times, only because I like stuff but it's also been kind of liberating because I've realized now I really can fit all of my work into a backpack.
I've had a dream of doing that forever, as far back as my early 20's. I always tried to do that and it was always impossible because it was just, you know, there were too many things I needed to do and too much processing power I needed. So I always needed a large computer and then later a large laptop and, yeah all the things I do now I do on a very small footprint and it's been liberating. I'm actually kind of enjoying it. Now my wife, we're getting her trimmed down too, we're selling her larger laptop, I gave her one of my old MacBook’s, she's pretty happy with that and so computing-wise we're pretty slender at this point.
Melinda: I think there's, I said to, previously I think, that cutting down and running your podcasts on the road without even your MacBook air is starting to become very, very, possible. Now, I've got my iPad pro and I've got my portable mics and things, but that power issue is still huge and apparently apple just starting to deal with that now. Have you heard anything about that?
Kevin Tumlinson: Well power wise, I've never really had an issues because I've always got, I'm paranoid about power, my wife and I are polar opposites on this, she'll use her phone without plugging it in all day long until it's just dead and I can't stand that. I actually have my phone plugged in almost all day. If it's not plugged into a wall or a USB port it's plugged into one of these external battery packs. So I keep everything charged up because I'm just paranoid about power and the laptops are the same way and luckily the RV is convenient for power. We have plenty of places to plug in, so I never have to worry about things running down. We have a full generator in this thing, so we can even boon dock and run the whole show off grid if we need to. But the bigger thing for me, honestly, is data. Which I'm sure we'll talk about.
Melinda: Well the other, you were talking about going off grid and now I live, or have lived the last couple of years in a 17 foot caravan. Now your definition of RV and my definition of RV I'm guessing are quite different because I was listening to one of your podcasts and you were interviewing a lady and she was about to travel around America advertising her books and she had the pictures of her books plastered all over the outside of her RV. Now I'm, saw pictures of that RV and I think yours is very similar.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah.
Melinda: Would you like to describe your new home to us?
Kevin Tumlinson: Sure, okay. Well what we did, originally we bought a very small, A-frame pop-up that was our kind of, that was our dingy, that was our lifeboat while we got ready to go bigger. By sure, shear, I mean shear I didn't mean sure, shear happenstance, we just sort of happened across an RV that we had actually looked at about a year ago, two years ago or so that at the time we weren't able to afford. This time we sort of, we came across it at a price that was fairly reasonable for us and we were able to finance it.
The one we ended up with, it's a, it's like a, it's a 38 foot motor home with like three slide outs and everything. I don't know the actual square footage of this thing, because they don't really, they don't really give you that information, I'll have to measure it, but I can tell you that it's roughly the same size as the very first apartment I ever lived in, so it's actually fairly large. And of course,we don't, we went back and forth.
At one point we were talking about maybe getting like a fifth wheel trailer and towing it behind our pickup truck, which would have been, it has it's ups and downs, but with this we actually, I don't know, we can stop anywhere and without ever exiting the vehicle, we can have, we can heat up lunch, I can get the generator going and microwave something for lunch if we want and restrooms are right there, we don't have to exit and go use a dirty truck stop restroom or something. We have all the conveniences of home anywhere we decide to stop.
So that's one of the reasons we went with, we went big is really what we did because our plan is come October we will, we are already moving into this, there's no going back at this point, like we've already arranged our lives so that come October we live in this RV full time. We practically live in it full time now and if it were any smaller I think Kara and I might murder each other. No, I joke about that because we actually had no problems what so ever, this is a very large space once it's all set up, it's very comfortable. It's not like the caravan.
Melinda: I was going to say I lived in my caravan, my 17 foot which is what half, more than half your size.
Kevin Tumlinson: Yeah.
Melinda: I'm very much an outdoor person, so I've got two teenage daughters, and they were insight 90% of the time and I was outside 90% of the time because there's nothing nicer at this time of the morning having your cup of Milo and listening to the kookaburras. There's some things and I'd love to come back and talk to you as you begin your journey, that you just can't find inside your rig, you have to get out there. Another thing I just want to talk to you about is you keep mentioning this magic word, generator. I'm not quite sure how popular you would be in some of outback places.
Kevin Tumlinson: Possibly, well it just depends, I mean, it's a very quiet running generator actually. For one thing, it's a Cummon's generator it's actually completely sealed in it's own sound, not sound-proof but sound dampening container and then that's installed inside another sound-dampening container in the RV. So it has, it makes all the noise of a running car engine, it's very quiet. We've, when we are out and about and we have to boondock, and it happens, when we take longer trips, like this last trip we took was around 2400 miles. We stopped several times and boon docked for the night in like gas station parking lots and Cracker Barrel parking lot, places like that, very odd places at first but then you get kind of used to it.
The great thing was we could run that generator, it wasn't loud, we slept fine. It does kind of dampen sound from outside, it's like a white noise thing, but I don't think anybody would be disturbed by it. I could be wrong, there's, if you're out in the woods and you got an engine running the whole time, maybe people would be upset and I can understand that. But that's why we're typically going to go to campgrounds instead of trying to camp in the woods, yeah.
Melinda: Now, I wonder if that will change as well because there's a real push here in Australia at the moment to free camp, at the caravan parks and the campgrounds have become quite expensive and to travel from campground to campground can really limit your budget, a lot of, I guess we call them gray nomads, they live on the road full-time and they have to stretch their money from fortnight to fortnight.
So there's a plethora of books coming out saying free camping here, free camping there. I'm a little bit more restricted than you in that along with my two teenagers, I've got two cat, oh sorry, two dogs and a cat and a fish. So, we actually get kicked out of a few campgrounds.
Kevin Tumlinson: I bet.
Melinda: So we've done, yeah we've done a lot more free camping. But we've got solar, have you got solar? Can that run all your gear and gizmos as well?
Kevin Tumlinson: Well we, so we're going to, we're going to actually look into that because I have a solar panel kit that I will, I'm going to use to try to run part of it. It's, really it's all about the batteries, right. I could technically run off of a battery and invertor for a while, the generation, it just keeps things continuously charged and there are, our generator has this sort of auto-start system that I haven't quite figured out yet. But we can set it up so that, you know, if the RV reaches a certain temperature, for example, it can kick on and power everything until it cools down or heats up or whatever the goal is.
Haven't mastered that yet, that's something I'm looking into because it's, we bought it used and it didn't come with every manual we needed and we're going to do a whole boot-camp training thing come, I think November.
You're, I mean, we honestly as much as I claim to be outdoors frequently, the goal for us was mostly to have a home that could change our physical location as often as possible. It wasn't really about, I love being outdoors but I knew my wife was not going to be on board with that, like she was not going to be on board with tent camping or having a small trailer in the woods or something and so that changed some of the parameters of what we were after, there are solar kits for this thing that I do think will power the whole unit. We're going to build up to that slowly though. I've got one kit now and I figure I'll use that to power certain, like, well for example as long as I've got power going to something that can provide internet and to charge the devices that need to use that internet, that's going to help us a lot.
So the rest of the panels we'll eventually upgrade, I mean my goal would be to run this thing completely off-grid full time if I could. It's just it's such a big unit and there's so many things to consider. I don't know how easy that's going to be to pull off right away. But solar panel technology has gotten a lot better. I've been looking into it and talking to some people and I think there's a possibility of doing that, probably within a couple years.
Melinda: They have this wonderful group of people out there, they're called the laundry mafia and wherever you are, whatever you do they have advice for you, from where to go next to wow you've got that set up all wrong in your rig, how about I come over and help you. I noticed traveling as woman alone very rarely do I find myself in a spot where some husband or other will come over and sort me out pretty quick smart.
The traveling fraternity seam to very, very generous, which brings me to something that, and it's one of the reasons I've really touched base with you and want to keep in touch with you is there seems to be a trend for more of us to seek our freedom and I notice in your resume or in some of the stuff I've been digging up with you, there's this wonderful world word called unemployable. Are you find as you talk more and more about your experiences that there are more people out there doing it than you actually thought?
Kevin Tumlinson: Oh absolutely and it's actually kind of, it's both shocking and entertaining. We,...

Insights into what it takes to be a successful romance author – a conversation with Regency Romance Author, Melinda Hammond

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:18:54 -0500

Episode 4 – A conversation with the other Melinda Hammond

If you love Georgette Heyer and Jane Austen, then you’ll love this week’s guest to whom I refer fondly as the other Melinda Hammond, Regency Romance author, as she generously shares her advice for authors at all stages of the writing journey. Melinda has been writing for over thirty years and published her first romance with Robert Hale in 1980. She continues to work 8-9 hours a day, most days, with 4-5 of those hours dedicated to actual writing and the remainder to research, marketing, correspondence and all the other things that go with the territory of being a full time author. Melinda also writes contemporary romances under the name of Sarah Mallory. Be warned, once hooked on Melinda’s novels, you won’t get much else done for awhile. You can find out more about her at www.melinda-hammond.co.uk

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Episode 4: Melinda Hammond
Duration: [00:46:23]
Melinda: Welcome to another episode of Writer on the Road. It's episode number 4 in our series and I've got with me today a very, very special guest. Her name is by chance Melinda Hammond. Now Melinda and I have had a chance to chat and we both agreed that we're both infamous and we both have very important names, but unfortunately Melinda's been writing since 1980 and she has a lot more novels under her belt than me. So in this particular instance I'm going to step back and have over to the expert, but before I do I'd like to go through a little bit of an introduction that I found and it was a quote by I guess someone who publishes Melinda, I'm not sure, by Single titles and it says "Melinda is one of the brightest stars in the Regency Firmament. Her plots are fast paced, her characterization impeccable and her ability to evoke the past in a vivid and colorful way superb."
Welcome, Melinda, to Writer on the Road. What do you say about that very wonderful quote?
Melinda Hammond: It is a wonderful quote, it's from a website that reviews Regency and historical novels. I'm clear they like the ones that I like, so that's quite useful. It's, yeah, it's very good when you write something that obviously hits the spot and people relate to it. I write, I'm a great fan of Georgetta Heyer and Jane Austen and absolutely love their books, so that's the style that I write in and obviously somebody, luckily someone agrees, some reviewer agrees which is great news for me, very affirming.
Melinda: Yeah, and you said you write in the style of Georgetta Heyer and that she inspired you and I also noticed Jane Austen and Melinda and I were talking before we recorded this and ever since I've been a little girl I read the Georgetta Heyer novels, I've studied Jane Austen throughout my academic career and as soon as I picked up one of Melinda's novels last night to read it was called Winter in Harrington's. It took me right back to those days where I had nothing else in my life to do but read beautiful romance novels.
Everything that I've picked about you Melinda is romantic. I'm sitting here looking at her now, beautiful blonde haired lady, beautiful English drawing room, bookshelves in the background. Melinda, you've created a persona for yourself, but I'm guessing it's also the real you, would you like to talk to us about your love of romance?
Melinda Hammond: I'd love to think it was the real me as well. It probably, it must be a facet, I don't think it can all be false, but I've loved romance it's escapism, everybody needs a certain amount of escapism in their lives I think. It's just the sort of books that I've always wanted to write.
I'm lucky enough to live in a very romantic part of the world, upon the Yorkshire moors, literally in stone's throw from Haworth where the Bronte's lived and wrote their books. So very much Wuthering Heights country, which is great. We live up on the moors in an old farm house, so I can go out, I can walk on the moors literally I don't have to drive anywhere, I just take the dog out, go for a walk over the moors when I want inspiration which is wonderful. For this other world, this 18th and 19th century England, which is the world I like to write about.
Melinda: Now, Melinda and I again have already talked about the difference in our temperatures, but we both agree that it's 18 degrees where she is and 18 degrees where I am in Brisbane Australia. But she's in the middle of summer and I'm in the middle of winter. Now you're out walking on the moors at the moment Melinda, how beautiful would that be at this time of year?
Melinda Hammond: It's incredibly beautiful, you have, we have curlews and lapwings nesting upon, in the fields. Then when the sun comes out, which it does occasionally the sky larks are singing during the day which is beautiful, so there's, it's we all soak and have the bad weather and the cloud can come down and the wind and the rain, so it's not all brilliant. You have to be a bit hardy as well, a good pair of boots I think and a rain coat are essential. But it's a lovely place to live and it's so good to be able to get out and just let your brain wonder away into another world and just leave the cares of this modern one behind, even if it's only for a while.
Melinda: When you're out there and you're walking, there seems to be a tendency now for writers to use, I guess, technology to help them get their stories down faster and faster. But I'm wondering in the world that you describe that you still do it the old-fashioned way, that you still think your stories through and you come home and you get them down, or are you one of these people that carry a recorder in your pocket.
Melinda Hammond: No, I actually hate the sound of my voice, if I record it I can't listen to it afterwards, I don't like listening to myself, the recorded version, so I tend to think up the story, I'm actually, there are, I don't know whether you've heard it, but the term's plotter and pantser, two sorts of writers. The pantser writes by, it's like flying by the seat of your pants, you set off, you're never sure where you're actually going and you're not sure if it's going to work and you just hope it does. That's my type of writing.
The other type is the plotter who goes through, sets everything down perfectly, knows where the story is going every step of the way. I never know that. I always know it's going to be a happy ending but how they're going to get their I rarely know and that's what the walking does, it sorts the bits out in my head and then I come home and type it. I used to write into, onto paper with short hand but now I type, usually goes straight onto the computer which saves some time. But the stories, it's sometimes they're just bubbling in your head and you just have to get them, get it onto paper or onto a computer screen really.
Melinda: That leads me, and I'm sure we all want to know the answer to this, this is a lady who's been writing since 1980 and we'll take you through that journey shortly, how long each day do you spend working?
Melinda Hammond: I have actually, I've tried to be a bit scientific and time this occasionally. I don't think I do more than four hours actual writing because if you turn the timer off every time you get up to do something or you get interrupted or you go onto the internet and check Facebook or Twitter, you'd be surprised how much of a day you can lose.
I tend to try and keep office hours, so I get up and start working either 8 or 9 o'clock and finish, sometimes I can go on until 5 or 6 but very often there's time taken out for research, for reading, for checking facts and figures and things. So the actual, I do work a full day, a full 8/9 hours day but sometimes, you probably find it as well, that thing called the internet can be quite seductive at taking up your time which is quite naughty and then of course the dog has to be walked and the phone has to be answered.
Melinda: Melinda let us in on a little secret, her husband actually works away some of the time, so she has an advantage over, I guess, some of us in that she doesn't have to worry about him coming home, but having said that I'm guessing when he is home he make take up more of your time then maybe he would otherwise be expected, perhaps.
Melinda Hammond: I think we try to make the most of the time we're together. So I think from that point of view it works very well. I think for any writer you have to shut yourself away, don't you? You have to be a bit organized, so if he was home more often it would, I would have to just close the door on the office and say now is my writing time.
Melinda: Yup and I think that's something that we all need to remember, in order to succeed we need to dedicate time, and not just a little bit of time, like Melinda, it's a real job. I think there's a book by Steven Pressfield called Turning Pro, if we're serious about the writing game then we have to give it priority and I think there's a lot of stuff floating around the internet at the moment that makes me cross that says you can write a book in 30 days, you can do this wonderful thing in two weeks, writing kids is easy, and I'm going from where I'm sitting I think it's really hard work and you really have to dedicate your time and your mind to it.
Do you find when you're doing your research and you're doing writing, that you don't churn things out and send them off quickly, that it actually takes, I guess a fermentation period where you work really hard at it, when you're waking, when you're sleeping, and when you're out walking.
Melinda Hammond: Yes, definitely. You can't, I don't think you can just dash off a book, you might have the story in your head, but when you get it onto the paper the grammar, the punctuation, the actual story itself has to be polish so that the reader understands what you are trying to say because sometimes the words that are in your head aren't the words that get down onto the page and you have to, you have to hone that to make it the best possible story that you can and sometimes that can take several drafts and if you can put it away, it's always a great idea, it's something that I tell new writers all the time.
If you've got time to put the book away for a few weeks and then come back to it, you can look at it with fresh eyes then and you can see the flaws in the story much better and also the typos, the actual practical physical process of producing a good piece of literature, which is quite important even though I write very light romance, it's still important that the writing is good because if there's problems, for me anyway, if the writing isn't good it pulls me out of the story very much so.
Melinda: There's so much focus on, I guess indie publishing nowadays, but you started in the 80's, you've been writing now for 35 years, 36 years, it's scary isn't it?
Melinda Hammond: I think I was writing, I've been writing since I was a teenager, but I was published first in the 80's. So I think a writer always, I've always written. I think it was one of those things at school I would always write. I'd make up stories before that, I remember sitting in the playground with my friends making up stories for them. So I'm a storyteller rather than a literary writer I am a story teller. But you have to get that over so you have to, you have to know your craft of writing and language, which is fairly important, I think for communicating, communication.
So yeah, it's and when I started you had to publish, you had to find a publisher if you wanted to get out there and I was very lucky that I found Robert Hale, first of all, who published my Georgian Regency novels and since then I've published with other publishers and moved on to Harlequin Mills and Boon but now for my Regencies I'm tending to go towards the indie and I'm republishing my back list, the books that were published by Robert Hale, now I'm putting those out myself Winter in Harrington's is one of those that was published originally by Robert Hale, but being historicals they don't date the same as contemporary books.
So, and there is still a market for the Regency and Georgian novels which is great and all sort of Georgian romance and Regency romances from the very hot to what they call the sweet traditional Regencies, which tend to be my Melinda Hammond's they tend to be more sweeter, sweet romances, clean romances, there's several titles for them.
Melinda: I think the one I was reading last night, and even listening to you I have so many questions, so if I jump around a bit I have to apologize.
Melinda Hammond: You're welcome to do it again, we'll do it more often.
Melinda: I was reading last night about Rafe and Verity in Winter Inheritance, Mr. Bannerman and Miss Shore. Now fill in love with of course with Rafe as one must immediately, it was very clear from the outside that your baddies were baddies and your goodies were goodies. Talk to me about the research process that goes into these novels.
Melinda Hammond: Research, I've been doing research for decades of the Georgian Regency period in England, so that is where I'm most comfortable, but every time I do a novel I have to read, I have to find more, there's always a few details that I need to check up on or read more about most of, lot of it comes from historical novels that, or sorry, historians, historical books, history books, non-fiction books that I've read over the years, little gems that you pick up that you don't think are going to have anything interesting in and then you find a little point that you enjoy.
With the internet there's an awful lot more information now, a lot of newspapers have been digitized, the old ones, there's one called the Georgian Newspaper Project, which is Bath newspapers from the 18th century have been all recorded now and they're now all online for anybody to go in and have a look. All the information is there and you can pick up lovely little snippets in there of information and then you just follow that up with research, the old way of going to libraries or getting books and maybe stuff on the internet as well, looking that up. But it's, I love the research part.
The problem comes stopping the research and starting the book. But it's very much a background for my characters. I like the history to be correct, but I don't want it to take over, I'm not writing historical novels about real people, so the history is the background, it's the tapestry and I weave my story and my characters onto that tapestry.
Melinda: Yeah, and that came through very clearly in Winter Inheritance. I was walking down the street with the characters, I was seeing, I guess the shops, although I don't think you called them shops in those days, the mills and all that kind of thing. But it was very much a background and I'm guessing that that's a skill that you've honed over all those years of writing, you do it effortlessly. When it comes to your research, just before we let that go, your website says you have always had a love of history, you've spoken about how you do it, what's your advice to someone setting out, how to control that research process and not let it take over your writing?
Melinda Hammond: That's a very difficult one, you have to avoid information dump. It's very easy, especially for new writers to do that, you get so involved in your subject that you suddenly find yourself, you could write pages and pages on little point. But if it doesn't move the story forward, probably it can go, you have to explain, the thing about history is your reader may not be familiar with some of the terms that you use so you have to make it plain what you're talking about but you don't have to go into reams of detail.
You tend, what you're writing is a story and the story has to move on without boring your reader. That's the main thing. If they're interested in the history they'll do what I did when I was young and I read historical novels, they will then go out and read the history of it and if your novel's good enough it'll stand up and they will say yes, that's right, that's the feeling I got from it.
But we're also creating a world that doesn't exist, so it's, so there's a fine line between the fantasy and the history. I don't really think readers of my novel would want their heroines to have no teeth by the time they're 40 or to smell the smells that were probably around in age that didn't wash that much or even when you go back to the Regency times, the Georgian times and they had their hair put up with pigs lard and held into place with big false hair pieces and things and then they would sleep with it up like that and would have to have combs, special sticks to get right into the head to scratch where the lice where itching, that's not romance, that's not romance. So it's nice to know, but it's not really the story that I'm telling.
Melinda: And remember for all of you out there listening, choose your details wisely.
Melinda Hammond: That's a good one, I shall remember that one, yes.
Melinda: I want to pick up on, and again jumping around you mentioned the word indie publishing which is very dear to my heart and the reason I've started this podcast is because I've been an English teacher for forever and it's very important to me that everybody has the opportunity to get their stories out but in a way that is professional. Now you've come from a traditional background and I'm assuming you will continue to publish traditionally, but you're also making a move into that indie publishing. Can you take us back and tell us what you made make that decision and where you think it's going to take you?
Melinda Hammond: The beauty of indie publishing is the freedom is it gives you to publish what you really want to do and much as I love writing my books for Harlequin Mills & Boon, but there are other books that wouldn't fit into that Sarah Mallory mold that, my Sarah Mallory books tend to be more about the romance, the history is background but it's the main, there's two main characters. With indie publishing you can do, you can expand slightly maybe have more characters, things that aren't so quite commercially viable for a mainstream publisher.
Publishers these days, there are so many people writing, it's even for a established writers, it's difficult if you want to break out and do something slightly different. I've done a couple of books that are contemporary and historical, a mix a duel time stories, not quite time slip but maybe ones with more of like a slightly paranormal ghostly element.
Getting those published by a mainstream if you have a formula that works as a writer and your name is known for one thing, sometimes publishers aren't very keen on taking a risk, whereas with indie publishing you can because you're the one taking the risk, you're not risking all the investment that a publisher, a traditional publisher will put in.
So it's an exciting time but there's a lot of people out there in the market, that's one of the problems, it's the beauty of it and also the problem that there are so many people now publishing their own stories and it's lovely that they're all out there, so yeah it's an exciting time for writers I think, and for the publishing industry.
Melinda: I've heard some horror stories and mainly through reading blog posts and listening to podcasts and listening to writers talk about how traditional publishers aren't releasing their backlists and not allowing writers to move...

How to Be an Entrepreneur with Colin Jones

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 01 Jul 2016 17:04:17 -0500

Episode 3 – How to Be an Entrepreneur

Join Colin Jones as he talks us through the thinking process necessary to succeed using the entrepreneurial mindset. Col has a Phd in Entrepreneurship and has been teaching young entrepreneurs and an undergraduate and post graduate level for nearly twenty years. You can hear more of Col’s thought on what it takes to succeed in an increasing and ever-changing world in his podcast, The Reasonable Adventurer.

Read Full Transcript

Episode 3: Colin Jones
Duration: [00:41:17]
Melinda: Welcome to Writer on the Road Colin. Where we're all at different stages of the writing journey but our destination is the same.
Colin Jones: It's a pleasure to join you.
Melinda: Okay. Introducing this man who I know through listening to his podcast "The Reasonable Adventurer" and I've been listening for some weeks and I've gotten to know Colin as a thinking man. He's very much into, I guess,
[00:00:30]
philosophy of thought.
So, my introduction today is one of my more challenging undertakings where I set out this morning to prepare for this interview, I thought I'd fossick around Colin's LinkedIn site and educate myself, teach myself a few things about you Colin and then we'd be on our way. Having met Colin a couple of weeks ago now, I've taken over Colin's house and he's moved on to bigger and better and
[00:01:00]
closer things to the local school, I knew that he was interesting man and I wanted him on my podcast. So I thought I had a fair idea and I knew where to start. My notes to myself are how very, very wrong can a girl be.
So here's my effort in introducing Dr. Colin Jones from Queensland University of Technology. He's an entrepreneur educator, a senior lecturer at QUT, prior to that he was fifteen years
[00:01:30]
in the same position in Tasmania. He's got a PhD in entrepreneurship, he's an author, podcast, a blogger, and he's the ultimate thinking man about thinking itself. Colin would you like to tidy up that introduction for me please?
Colin Jones: Well I think you got it right Mel when you said that difficult to introduce because depending on what angle you're coming from I could be introduced as a lot of things. I remember when I first started working at the University of
[00:02:00]
Tasmania, an occupation or vocation which not many people would have predicted only a few years earlier than that. I bumped into someone in the supermarket and they said "Oh what are you doing with yourself these days?" I said, "Oh I'm working at the university." They said, "Oh, what do you there?" I said "I do the rubbish." They said, "Oh fair enough," and they walked off because that seemed like a fair enough thing. They could picture me as a rubbish guy.
So I think that's one of the things that
[00:02:30]
actually cherished actually is that I very, very comfortable talking to people from the Prime Minister down to the person who's doing it the hardest in life. I always say hello to people when I walk past people even if I don't know them, whether that's a Tasmania trait or just a me trait, I don't know.
But, I turn fifty a couple of weeks, three weeks I think it is and I'm looking forward to reflecting on all the
[00:03:00]
different phases that I've had in my life and then thinking well so what are the other phases that might lie in the remaining years. So that'll be, that'll be interesting. But I actually, I'm very happy, I'm very happy that I've done a lot of different things in life so far.
Melinda: Yeah, it will be happy birthday to Colin in a few weeks and I was having a little listen to one of his podcasts recently and now we're talking about a very highly educated man who travels around the world talking about entrepreneurship and
[00:03:30]
he's decided to get a tattoo.
Colin Jones: Absolutely.
Melinda: If you want to know more about Colin's reasons for getting that tattoo you've really got to go and listen to the "Reasonable Adventurer" because it's an interesting story all itself. I said to my daughter's Colin that I'm going to get myself tattoo, if it's good enough for Colin it's good enough for me! Now, my youngest daughter goes to school with your younger son.
Colin Jones: That's right.
Melinda: She is totally mortified at the fact that her mother's going to get a tattoo.
[00:04:00]
Colin Jones: Well it depends where you get it, I don't know, it depends how many people can see it.
Melinda: I said I would be really discrete and it'll be very little. So moving onto the first thing I wanted to talk about in our podcast is you have on your website some questions about thinking about thinking.
As my audience are writers and would be writers and hopefully we think very deeply about what we do to share
[00:04:30]
with our readers, the questions that you've got are take the time to think about your thinking. Why you're doing what you're doing, what are your motivations and are you on a path with a heart. Would you like to talk about some of those ideas?
Colin Jones: Yeah, look, I mean we all get choices in life and a lot of the choices we get are not so easy, like we could all decide tomorrow to go off and do something totally different other than the fact that we're tethered to
[00:05:00]
responsibilities of bringing up our children, of paying our rent, and the other sort of things. Writing is one of those pretty cool things that actually enables us to go into any space that we want to.
We can, and I'll give you a quick story. It's actually in one of my podcasts, I can't remember which episode but it would be roughly, well, in fact it must be right back near the beginning because I actually was in Malaysia when I met this young lady at the airport who was doing a tourist
[00:05:30]
survey, exit survey thing.
She, after we did the survey, she asked me could I help her. She said that she had a MBA, she had a business degree, but she was doing surveys and because she was of Indian background in Malaysia she was quite disadvantaged in terms of her natural progression through life. She wanted to escape the country. I said to her that I, I was very limited in how I could actually help her to escape the country
[00:06:00]
but she could escape it in her mind and actually she could start writing a series of books about escaping the country, Penang as it was the place.
If she really did some research on this and she wanted to go off and really start thinking about it she might actually become quite a well-accepted writer of e-books, no barriers to stopping her getting these published and who knows, she may find the wealth to actually get the freedom to leave.
[00:06:30]
So I gave her an idea of how she could think about moving on from her current situation, but she still felt very trapped in being in that space and unable to sort of take the first step towards thinking about how she might have this process of emancipation to sort of say well I'm going to do it for myself rather than be saved by someone, I'm going to release myself. So that's part of the challenge.
The second part of your question was about the path of the heart.
[00:07:00]
I think this is most probably the biggest challenge for us all because there's got to be something we do in our lives that is the authentic us, it is the bit that actually says well no it's some me time, even if it's just dreaming, but there's got to be something that actually allows you to actually say well you know I'm here on the planet for a reason, and I'm going to use my writing, I'm going to use my thinking to go off in that journey where it impacts other people or it's just for you.
[00:07:30]
A lot of people are not on a path of the heart. It's not because, it's very easy, life isn't something that sort of just naturally lets everyone follow the path of the heart. Life gets in the way of everybody's aspirations and dreams and we end up having good luck, bad luck. All of those things that visit us, the average person in their life, sort of stop us from just saying how wonderful life is.
But,
[00:08:00]
when I work with my students, especially my postgraduate students I ask them, and very interestingly the majority of the women who I teach, who are sort of aged 30 to say 60, they typically say well I'm not am I? I'm not on a path of the heart because I've made so many sacrifices for my husband, for my children, I never actually got to give a hundred percent at having a go at doing what I actually wanted to do. I thought I hadn't really thought it through. It was only when I,
[00:08:30]
this pattern kept happening that it really made me realize just how much of a sacrifice women have to make to live in the world we live in and we live in a pretty good world. This is no Pakistan or Afghanistan or something like that where women have a much harder life of it.
So this notion of a path of the heart, I think it's sort of, it's a good starting point to try and get people to locate themselves, where you're actually at, what are you trying to do, what could you do.
Melinda: Colin you're speaking
[00:09:00]
to me directly as you say those words. It's the purpose for the podcast, "Writer on the Road" is to explore the very issues that you've just spoken about, so articulately. Now I could jump around to about three of the things I want to talk to you about now, but I'm going to stick rigidly to my script. But also...
Colin Jones: As long as you do it, we'll be fine.
Melinda: We're all about publishing here and we're all about writing our stories and already you're speaking about those things that I just
[00:09:30]
want to go straight to that. But I'm going to stick with the schedule and one of the things you attended the conference in Finland a few years ago and it was very much an educational or educational key note speech or I'm guessing.
But one of the things you said, and you're talking about education, but again it could apply to us very, very closely that we all need curiosity, passion, trust and vulnerability. With a huge emphasis on that vulnerability. Would you like
[00:10:00]
to talk to us about that?
Colin Jones: Yeah, look it's a funny thing. Growing up as a kid I missed out on the whole education bit. I loved going to school, I was always ready to go, I couldn't wait to see my friends. For me, education was purely about social interaction with my friends and I got older being a sport [00:10:19] [?]. But I didn't learn to write and I didn't learn to read, to what you would call an acceptable level for someone who left high school, you know grade, when I just turned 15.
[00:10:30]
I just went off and started working.
As a result of knowing I couldn't write very well and I certainly couldn't read very well, I became very good at talking because that was the easiest way to either bluff around things or to just communicate in a way that was believable. But as I went through life, I found myself having these moments where I would really stuff something
[00:11:00]
up in life, it could be a relationship, it could be a financial thing, it could be a whole range of things which then when you look back at it you think, that was a really silly thing to do.
By the time I probably got sort of age 30, I became a very reflective person. I'd lost a million dollars in a business, really sort of life just came to a screaming halt and everything was different for quite awhile, I readjusted and found myself accidentally becoming an academic.
[00:11:30]
I engaged in this thinking about my thinking.
That's where it all started for me. I started thinking about things that, everything was always about tomorrow up until that point. Whatever happened today won't matter because there's tomorrow. Then I started thinking about the consequences of where I was at and started looking back, not right back, not looking for anyone to blame, but just looking back at trying to make sense of things. I found that I just seemed to have, for whatever reason, a very natural
[00:12:00]
inclination to be vulnerable.
I know what I want my students to do, and I know for many of them especially my international students it's not easy. It's not easy to reflect and just go through those why's, you know, oh I feel angry, well why do you feel angry. Oh because this really upsets me. Why does this upset you? Oh because and by the time you get to the seventh and the eighth why you found out that something happened in their house when they were growing up as a kid.
[00:12:30]
Or something along those lines. Something very personal and intimate.
But until we get to that level of intimacy, it's very hard for me to do what I want to do, which is engage in transformational education because transformational learning says that what two things are going to happen? A student is going to be different at the end of it and their ability to see the world is going to be different. So none of that can happen if we're only working on the surface. We have to get inside.
So for me,
[00:13:00]
to try and create the conditions for that to happen, I have to become very vulnerable, become comfortable to do to them. I have find different ways and just react to the situations I'm in and find ways to be very authentically vulnerable to them. So that might be me telling them about my history, it might be just, yeah, just not being the power person in the room. I'm the educator therefore I'm the powerful person in the room. So I've always worn t-shirts to class. I've always been trying to be
[00:13:30]
the worst dressed person. I don't want to be center of attention, I want to be the least obvious.
In fact, a lot of times students walk in, they think there's no educator there in the first class. They start saying oh when do you think this persons going to get here? Then I just stand up, after I've been talking to people and say hi guys well I'm glad you're here, type of thing and it's like oh he's the educator. Wow, okay.
So for me, the vulnerability is very important because there's a barrier of self-protection that I think everyone naturally has and it's a barrier which gets
[00:14:00]
reinforced I think in a lot of traditional schooling. It's a barrier that stops people from being able to learn about themselves and therefore about the other experiences that they might be able to have.
Melinda: That brings us, I guess, directly to the next part of it and it's about a different kind of student for the 21st century and entering into a different kind of world. I know you were in Tasmania, I think last week or the week before, at a conference
[00:14:30]
and you were talking about the changing world and the need to adapt at a quicker rate.
Colin Jones: Yeah.
Melinda: Preparing ourselves for that change takes a certain kind of learning. I was just wondering if you'd like to talk about that.
Colin Jones: Yeah, well I think what you're doing now is a classic example. I mean, if someone said to you six months ago do you know what you need to know to have your own podcast show, you might have sort of said well, no I don't.
[00:15:00]
But you have the courage to work through the process. You muck a few things up and it's a learning curve the whole way through, yeah. It's that type of, it's that type of approach to life that we're all going to need to be embracing because you know I remember 1980 I left high school and my girlfriend who I met just after that at the time, she was 15, she went and did the public service exam, which in those days you just did the Comoff [?]
[00:15:30]
Public Service exam if you were finishing grade 10. Then she got a job, she's still there today. In a couple years time she'll be retired, in her mid-fifties with forty years of service. She'll be on a wonderful [00:15:44] unclear. You could do that when we were young.
When we were young those sorts of long opportunities for employment existed. They don't exist anymore if you want to be a teacher, my daughter wants to be a teacher, well there's lots of contracts works and
[00:16:00]
not a lot of job security for a lot of people trying to get into that space, especially if you want to do what you want to do.
The knowledge that we use in the workplace, it's changing all the time. We're on Skype today, but maybe in six months’ time people will say, ah that's no good, there's this new one called XY and Z. We'll have to go over and migrate ourselves over to that, or whatever the case may be. Everything is changing.
The knowledge that we, assume if you go to the doctor you'll say oh I think you've got this problem, you know the
[00:16:30]
doctor might, you might have had the problem twenty years ago. Well the chance that the doctors going to give you the same remedy is not very great because in the last twenty years everything in medicine’s changed. Everything. From the way we think about a patient, to the way we treat a patient or the symptoms to the way all those things, what we understand, everything's changed.
I think the only thing that hasn't changed in medicine the last twenty years is what we know about the elephant man because we still only got that one
[00:17:00]
single case study of John Merrick. That's the only recorded case, but that's it, everything else is just exploding and exploding.
So I want my students to be excited about a future that can't be known in advance. So that's something that they actually have to be able to work through. So 21st century skills really are about helping people to people work through something. There's that lovely African saying that if you want to go somewhere quickly,
[00:17:30]
go now. If you want to go far, go together.
That's a big part of these 21st century learning skills, we’re always about can you work with other people? Can you communicate in effective ways, can you solve things, can you solve problems together that type of thinking and people don't do a lot by themselves. When someone succeeds or fails they tend to be a hero by themselves or a failure by themselves but actually
[00:18:00]
in the middle of all of that is a lot of people working together.
Melinda: I think that, sums up very, very succinctly the indeed publishing world. Again, the next point that I bring up is the enormous opportunities in the global marketplace for people who you've just described. Who are prepared to upskill if you like and as you said I'm in the process of doing that and had I
[00:18:30]
been that person and joined the public service in my late teens, as my sister wanted me to be, I would be very secure, very stable and retiring right now. Unfortunately I didn't, I haven't, and I'm not. But, I think I'm very well placed to embrace what's happening next and to teach my daughters that there's nothing as sure as change and you need to keep moving forward.
You talk about
[00:19:00]
where is it, it was fifty percent of all the workforce will be freelancers by 2020 and you referred to a book by David Price about how we'll work. Now he listed do it yourself, do it now, do it with friends, do on to others, do it for fun, and

Travel Writing with Graeme Kemlo

Melinda Hammond — Fri, 01 Jul 2016 17:01:46 -0500

Episode 1

Meet Graeme Kemlo, Australasian President of the International Food Wine & Travel Writers Association and broadcaster of the Travel Writers Radio Show in Australia. Listen in while Graeme talks us through his journey from Canberra Press Journalist to travel writer to broadcaster of his own travel radio show.

Read Full Transcript

Episode 1: Graeme Kemlo
Duration: [00:46:17]
Melinda: Alright, welcome to Writer on the Road where telling stories matter, writing them down is even better, and publishing them is the greatest goal of all. But it's important to remember through all the toilities and testing times (and there'll be plenty of those), it's the journey that matters and it's the journey that we're here to talk about. The who, where, what and why and how of storytelling.
During these podcasts I'll be sharing my journey of building and monetizing my writing business as well as inviting others from all stages of the
[00:00:30]
writing journey to share their stories.
For this, my first podcast, officially titled "Podcast Number 1," I've invited the master reencounter himself, Graeme Kemlo travel writer extraordinaire, Australasian president of the International Food, Wine, and Travel Writers Association, host to the ever-popular travel writers radio show, intellect, business writer, singer, and grandfather. Welcome Graeme, have I missed anything?
Graeme Kemlo: Well, thanks. How do I live to that intro? I thought you were talking about someone else.
Melinda: No, it's how I've come to know you and how I've come to think of you. As you and I were discussing earlier you are my go-to person whenever I need a little piece of advice or I guess, moral support. So I thank you for coming on and being my very first interviewee.
Graeme Kemlo: Well, it's been a pleasure to watch you develop as a writer and a
[00:01:30]
storyteller Melinda. So I'm flattered that you should ask me to be your first guest.
Melinda: Well, look Graeme I've got to tell you in six months’ time if you're still saying that I'll be really, really pleased. But I promise I'll try not to...
Graeme Kemlo: Of course, yeah, I'm sure I will be. I'm sure I will be.
Melinda: Alright. Over to our first question. As I've said the purpose of my podcast is to follow people's
[00:02:00]
journeys, follow people's stories. Now, I know what you do know, I know what you've been up to lately. But I'd like to take you right back to the very beginning. Everyone has a story to tell and I'd like to know what your story is and what your journey is been.
Graeme Kemlo: Well, I'm a journalist, I've been doing that for more than four decades and I actually consider myself to be very lucky. I've found myself in many
[00:02:30]
instances in the right place in the right time.
I was just talking to, someone else interviewed me the other day on Jay Air, the radio station that we do Travel Writer's radio from, and I had forgotten some of this, but I was reminded that I was very lucky to be a journalist in Canberra on the very day that Gough got sacked. So I stood, I stood in front of him, you don't see me in pictures
[00:03:00]
because I'm where all the photographers were, I'm holding up a recorder, a little tape recorder to take down what he was saying to the assembled crowd and maintain the rage and all the rest of it and at the time I was working for the Melbourne Harold, which was an afternoon newspaper. We were in fact we were the afternoon paper for, not only for Melbourne, but Canberra and also for Tasmania. So we kept reporting into the afternoon as
[00:03:30]
the crowd built outside parliament house and Gough got sort of red with rage and all that. But earlier in the day I'd watched the governor general's private secretary David Smith stuff some bits of paper into the pigeon holes at parliament house. This is the old parliament house. I just picked it up pretty casually and sort of looked at it and wandered back to the office. And as I read it, as I was walking my pace quickened as I recognized what it was actually saying. I ran into the boss
[00:04:00]
and asked, because I was young, one of the younger reporters sent to camp and said to him "Hey, we got a good story, Gough's being sacked. What's more there's no care-taker government. Malcolm's been given the job. He's actually been named as the prime minister."
That's highly unusual and of course my boss couldn't believe it, a guy called Tony Hill. Anyway, we sat about starting to write the story and so it was one of the days that I remember vividly
[00:04:30]
in journalism and how the crowd sort of materialized virtual from nowhere and then all these media heavies came in from[00:04:40] unclear and one of them caused a bit of a fist fight down on the non-members bar, which is an area of the old parliament house we used to be able to overlook from our office window. So it was all a bit of fun. So, yeah I count myself very lucky to have been in Canberra. I subsequently wrote a thesis on the role of the media in the downfall of the Labor government
[00:05:00]
that got me a bachelor, now I had primary in journalism as it was in those days, I later got a bachelor of arts in Journalism.
So I was lucky doing that. I was also lucky in one of the first areas that I started to write in after I left daily journalism was in technology. I was right there to witness the birth of the PC industry. So I've actually interviewed virtually all the heavies in the PC
[00:05:30]
industry at that time. Since when you had access to the boss of IBM, the boss of Lotus 1, 2, 3, although that's probably not terribly well-known now. The other person I interviewed and you won't believe where, was I interviewed Bill Gates. I was at BIW actually at the time, I was the technology editor. I interviewed Bill Gates in his hotel room at the Los Vegas Hilton and he sat on the fluffy
[00:06:00]
stool under the mirror and I sat on the end of the king sized bed. I was doing radio at the time too, I was working for 3AW, just one night a week doing a technology program.
So I had a recorder there to sort of take Bill down and to save me writing copious notes and Bill rocked backwards and forwards so badly, like a savant, that I couldn't keep the microphone in front of his mouth and he was oblivious to the fact
[00:06:30]
that I was trying to record this. I got back to Australia and the actual recording wasn't good enough to put to air, but I was able to use it right my story.
So I could put up with the fact that he drifted off the mic and I could barely here what he had to say, but I had enough to write about my time interviewing Bill Gates. He invited me that night to the Chili Cook-off, which was a traditional thing in Vegas, which every year stage
[00:07:00]
this big IT Expo called COMDEX, it's now dead. It became so big it cannibalized itself. So that was one of the other moments I supposed that I remember well. So there are a couple of things I've done in my life. Then I went and lived in the USA, something I'd always wanted to do and I was there, I was there for a year. I expected to be there a bit longer, but working for a Singapore based company and they decided to pull
[00:07:30]
their horns in a bit, so I came back to Australia. Then I took up travel writing, this is back in '95. So I've been doing that now for over twenty years as well. So that's my kind of story in a nutshell Melinda.
Melinda: I didn't have any idea. All I knew was that you went on junkets to broom [?] and I think you were fishing up that way and I thought you were a
[00:08:00]
travel journalist all along. I didn't realize you were as infamous as you are.
Graeme Kemlo: Oh, infamous, oh yeah that's really the right word actually. Look, in journalism you have to be prepared to do anything. One of the beauties of it is you turn up to work and you don't know who you're going to talk to or where you're going to be sent and Canberra’s a classic example. I went, I was flown to Canberra to fill in for someone who was off sick during a Parliamentary seating
[00:08:30]
week and in those days we used to have to go and sit in the house and take down the proceedings, just like the hand side [00:08:41] [?]reporters except we didn't use their technology. We used whatever means we had and I had reasonably good short hand that was one of the things I was taught as a cadet. So I was sent for that reason.
I ended up staying there three months. Which turned into four years and the last year
[00:09:00]
I was married. My wife was up, was here in Melbourne and I was in Canberra on my own and I'd sort of turn up back in Melbourne about every second weekend.
That was the one concession the company made, they'd fly me back every second weekend and if I was desperate enough I suppose I drove the other weekends. But you sort of left on a Friday and you got to Melbourne at midnight-ish or something and then you had Saturday and then half way through Sunday you had to turn around and drive back. So, that was I guess
[00:09:30]
I was desperate, I did that a few times. But, yeah. So I've done a few interesting things Melinda.
Melinda: I can see how the transition to travel writing would have been quite a luxury after that hard-core, I guess, journalism would have been good to, keeping [00:09:53] [?] the five star luxury.
Graeme Kemlo: Yeah, look in my days of journalism there weren't many junkets offered to
[00:10:00]
to us as traditional daily newspaper reporters. We did have a travel editor, one of the very first travel writers in the country, guy called Eric Paige, who I think now's passed, but so I wasn't used to being put up in five star hotels or anything like that.
So travel writing seemed like a wonderful idea, and I started off actually working with Universal Press who published a magazine called Quorum. Now, that was a business-
[00:10:30]
focused magazine and quorum obviously has to do with meetings. So I used to write about meetings and conferences and big expos and incentive trips and things. That's when I sort of started off.
Then Telstra bought the company, not because they wanted the magazine, because they wanted the digital mapping. So you would in Queensland know the UBD street directory that came from Universal Press in Sydney, with whom I was working.
[00:11:00]
So Telstra bought the digital version of all the maps that Universal Press had been creating over many, many years. It was a family owned company at that stage. Having bought all the maps they used it to create their where is application, which was around before Google Maps, if you think about it.
Then they decided ultimately that magazines weren't core and that they would get rid of the. So they announced the closure of Quorum, a twenty-one
[00:11:30]
year old title, and that must have been worth something. But they announced the closure one day and then two days later they announced they were going to try and sell it.
Well, that doesn't work. They'd just devaluated in on the first day and then two days later decided it had some value. So it didn't get sold, it just folded unfortunately. But I was picked up by a woman with whom I'd worked at Universal who had gone out, left them, gone out and set up their own magazine, Helen Batt-Rawden has a magazine
[00:12:00]
group called BT Publishing and the magazine I write for still is called Mice Nation. Mice is the acronym we use in business travel or business tourism, it stands for meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions or expos.
So I've been really focused on the business side of travel writing, but I do also do some leisure writing and of course the radio show is probably 90% leisure and 10% business focus.
Melinda: I was very interested, I was
[00:12:30]
doing some research for this podcast last night and I saw an interview that you did in Kalgoorlie, it was business focused about holding conventions and conferences around the diggers and dealers conference.
Graeme Kemlo: Yes, I've known about this conference, but none of us at the magazine had written about it and it seemed that the conference weren't all that fussed in attracting media. They would be some
[00:13:00]
financial reporters there because this conference attracts 2,000 people, a number of them are from overseas and they are the heavy hitters in the mining industry and all the name suggests it also attracts the finance industry who are out to fund exploration here in Australia and off shore. So it's held in Kalgoorlie because Kalgoorlie's got some big mines and are largely based around gold. They're owned by
[00:13:30]
off-shore companies and Kalgoorlie's a great place. So given the chance to go and visit, I jumped at the idea.
I joined, I connected it with another trip to Perth, I regularly go to Perth and I report what happening in the meetings industry over there, working with the Perth convention bureau, they're the government, semi-government body that helps organizations in Perth bid for international conferences and events. So they
[00:14:00]
flew me to Perth for their story and then I was flying to Kalgoorlie.
Now, I'd never been there, but I had a member of the family going way back, I didn't know him, but a fellow who'd come out from Scotland was involved in the mining over there, so I've always had a fascination about Kalgoorlie and it's a great, great, great city and I know in you're question you're asking, well the question you sent me you're asking about doing the research.
Well really for Kalgoorlie I did the research on the spot.
[00:14:30]
I just listened hard as Laurie Ayers, who's a local identity and who runs a meeting planning company over there with his wife, Arianne. He was talking hard and I was listening hard and he knows everyone in town, he knows all that's going on, he's a publican as well. So he's the eyes and ears of the joint for me. Kalgoorlie got a lot of promise.
But right at this point they hold this one big event which absolutely
[00:15:00]
stretches the resources such that the town mostly packs and goes to Bali and rents their house out to delegates to this conference, because I think there's something like 600 hotel rooms and there's 2,000 delegates. So there's obviously a shortage.
So lot of homes get rented out for serious money and the owners fly off to Bali and spend the money before they've earned it, having a rest over there and not only does it fill the biggest place in town, but they use the carpark next door
[00:15:30]
to put about a half-acre marquee up and there's an overflow of delegates who sit in the marquee watching what's going on in the hall next door. So it really dominates the town.
So the Kalgoorlie people got together and decided listen we can do one big event, what if we had the chance to do a bunch of smaller ones, we could actually get this town rocking. It's a great place to visit Melinda, I commend it anybody. It'd be a good place for you to take
[00:16:00]
yourself on the road because it's got some fantastic attractions up there including what they call the super pit. The huge big mining operation that Bondi actually put together and there's some great yarns up there, there's a police squad that deals specifically with gold stealers, and it's based in Kalgoorlie, I suppose for obvious reasons, not that the town's full of crooks. There's a two-up school, that they tolerate up there, it's out of town a little bit, it's made of corrigated iron
[00:16:30]
and we went out and had a look at that, that was a bit of fun. There's some magnificent stories over there.
So I really enjoyed going to Kalgoorlie and I would just commend anybody whose interested in what the backbone of the mining industry looks like go and have a look at the place, it's tremendous. It's got a gold leafed dome on what is now the court house, I think it used to be the post office. So the local mining companies got together and they
[00:17:00]
bought this gold leaf, I think there's quite a few thousand dollars’ worth of gold leaf and if someone went and got up there and stuck it down onto this prior to the gold, it might have been a copper dome or something. But it glints in the sunlight, it looks fantastic you can see it from all around the place.
It's actually one of the little quirks of Kalgoorlie which has got a good food and coffee culture and some great pubs and serves good meals and you can get fresh seafood, comes in everyday. So Kalgoorlie go for it.
[00:17:30]
Melinda: I've got to tell you Graeme, I had a little smile while you were telling that story, as you talked about the Kalgoorlie gold stealers, what I lived with my husband at the time, who was the underground manager at Norseman...
Graeme Kemlo: Oh, right.
Melinda: ... at the mine down there. My novel, The Miner's Wife which I wrote as part of my PhD., was set in Norseman. So it....
[00:18:00]
Graeme Kemlo: I had forgotten...
Melinda: everything you were telling me...
Graeme Kemlo: I had forgotten that.
Melinda: Yes.
Graeme Kemlo: You did tell me that, but I remember you'd written the novel, but I didn't remember the detail of it. That's a great story. You did obviously, you have other stories to tell.
Melinda: Well the one thing I will tell you now I guess is the gold stealing squad in Kalgoorlie were very, very interested in my novel when I was writing it because as you do with stories and as you pick up things as you travel around, I used to play golf at Northburn with the blokes
[00:18:30]
on the golf course down there and they used to tell me yarns and they didn't know I was a writer. So I used to go home and recraft, I guess, their stories into my novel. Unbeknownst to me, the gold stealing yarn that I was writing, turned out to be true. So what they were telling me was true and what I was writing down was true and the guys who told me the story are now unfortunately in jail.
[00:19:00]
So it became very, very interesting to me how truth in fiction can intermingle what I thought was yarns about buying tea tree farms in Port Stevens with ill-gotten gains panned out to be very, very true.
So when I published my novel I was very excited, I thought I'd go back to Norseman and say look I've got this great novel and it was actually not received very well by the locals of Norseman because it had prostitutes
[00:19:30]
at the local railway hotel. It had drunken brawls and it had this wonderful gold stealing heist. It's not exactly how they saw themselves in Norseman.
Graeme Kemlo: No.
Melinda: I know find myself with the problem of, yeah I've got a great story and yeah it's based on truth and yeah it's got all these exciting things that really, really happened. But, the local don't want to know about it. I did try to gate-crash the Diggers and Dealers conference on a couple of occasions and,
[00:20:00]
oh are you there?
Graeme Kemlo: Yeah.
Melinda: Hello?
Graeme Kemlo: Yeah, I'm listening.
Melinda: No, it's alright. My computer went off. It looks like I may be able to get into that...

Campfire Tales with Romance Author, Victoria Black

Melinda Hammond — Thu, 30 Jun 2016 07:50:41 -0500

Episode 2 – Campfire Tales with Australian Romance Author, Victoria Black

If you’re into feisty heroines and handsome heroes then this is a podcast for you. Victoria is not only living the travelling dream with her own handsome hero, she is generous in her advice to aspiring writers following along behind. And what a setting she has to weave her tales. Join Victoria as she travels across the top end of Australia, through the remote Kimberley region and beyond, and shares her experiences with the rest of us. Every writer needs great settings and there’s nothing more inspiring than the Australian outback. Welcome to one writer’s travels as she pens stories for her anthology, Campfire Tales. But if you like to know what goes on behind closed doors then Victoria is not the kiss-and-tell type. For that, you have to buy her books.

Read Full Transcript

Episode 2: Victoria Black
Duration: [00:26:22]
Melinda: This is a podcast about telling stories and the journeys we take on the way to making out stories. It's about beginnings, middles, and endings and where each of us is on in our writing journey. My guest today is Victoria Black, she has the wonderful job about writing about lusty heroes and their feisty heroines. I've been having a fussic [00:00:24] [?] around on your Facebook page Victoria and having a lovely time. I can't wait to read some of your stuff. But to start,
[00:00:30]
like any good story we always start with our orientation. We start with where we're at the moment, and I was wondering if you'd like to share with us your current journey.
Victoria Black: Well hi Melinda. My current journey is really very much tied up with what I'm doing at the moment which is being a writer on the road. So whenever we're driving along, for a long, long trip, I'll get
[00:01:00]
my notepad and pen out, because I'm a notepad and pen gal, I don't type the first draft on a keyboard. I write my story and it's all based on everything I'm experiencing on the road. So I'm writing a series of little short stories called Campfire Tales and they're all based on this my lovely, lovely couple Ellie and Michael who are a newly-wed couple and just their
[00:01:30]
experiences on their way to Darwin. I went to Nitbit [00:01:33] [?], that's where they're going.
Melinda: Yeah, just for a bit of background for our listeners, Victoria started her journey in Brisbane with her husband and I don't even know your husband's name Victoria.
Victoria Black: Darrel.
Melinda: Darrel, so Victoria and Darrel are traveling in their caravan. I was supposed to catch up with them in Long Reach and because I'm new at this, so I had
[00:02:00]
technical troubles so we decided we'd catch up as Victoria and Darrel headed to Darwin. But they've moved so very, very quickly that they're now in Western Australia over at Rainbow Beach which I'm guessing is in the Northwest somewhere, south of Broom maybe?
Victoria Black: Yeah, 80 mile beach it is and yes it is, it's just south of Broom.
Melinda: Which is a magic part of the world. But, right from Long Reach through to Mount Isa and the Queensland
[00:02:30]
northern territory boarder, then through up to Darwin, through Catherine Gorge, and back down down across Kununurra all the way through the, oh what are the called, the Gibb River Road.
Victoria Black: I haven't done that. We went to the Bungle Bungle [00:02:51] [?] so on a helicopter ride and then up to, was it Wyndham and
[00:03:00]
Derby and Broome. So we're now in Pilbara officially now.
Melinda: For those of us who don't know Australia really that well, Broome is famous and infamous for it's camel rides along the beach. It's famous for it's pearl divers and it's famous for it's magic, magic sunsets. Victoria being a romance writer obviously has a wealth of stories to draw on for her Campfire Tales
[00:03:30]
and I'm just wondering Victoria, and this is something that will come up time and time again as I chat to writers as they make their way around our beautiful country. The time to write, as you said you write while you're in the car, you write with a pen and paper, but what about the distractions of what's out there to see and do?
Victoria Black: Well once we get to a place my god I find it so difficult because there's so much to do and see.
[00:04:00]
It almost has to be a long, long trip with lots of boring bush in-between. If it's a fairly short trip, I just can't do it. I'm not producing huge amounts of writing at the moment. Then, like today we're at a place where it would have been perfect to sit down and actually do my second draft on the computer and it was a case of oh let's
[00:04:30]
let's go for a drive along the beach, oh okay. So there are a lot of distractions.
Melinda: I think that's one of the biggest problems that we face as travelers and writers at the same time is prioritizing what's important and when you're on a road trip like Victoria and Darrel are, you only have so much time that you want to dedicate to the work part of your trip because I'm guessing
[00:05:00]
you're taking lots of notes and photos and that you'll have all that when you go back home.
Victoria Black: Yes, exactly, yes. I do a daily diary so there's everything in there that I'll be able to draw on and as you said photographs, yes, yup.
Melinda: That's, I think that's one of the biggest benefits that we have of being mobile is the inspiration is around us everywhere we go and we can find inspiration every time
[00:05:30]
we step outside our rigs. One of the downsides that both you and I have noticed is technology and being able to access the internet. How have you found that as you've traveled?
Victoria Black: It's not too bad in Western Australia. Northern territory wasn't good. Parts of Queensland weren't good. Yeah, it's up and down.
Melinda: That's not so much of problem when we are writing with our pen and paper
[00:06:00]
and even when we're working on our computers. But so much of our social interaction now is done via Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and keeping up with our readers who love to stay in touch and love to see our photographs, I've thoroughly enjoyed your photos Victoria as you've traveled across and some of the places have made me quite homesick. What's your solution to that social media, keeping in touch with your fans dilemma?
[00:06:30]
Victoria Black: There are, so for me what all I'm interesting in really is Facebook. I tried Twitter, don't like it, I'm not a huge blogger. What I really like is Facebook, I can talk to people, they're real conversations, it's not just promote, promote. So yes, the internet isn't that bad in this country, just whenever I can
[00:07:00]
I get on and chat away. So it's all I can do.
Melinda: For those of us who are going to travel on the road and stay on the road, there is a solution coming along. It's going to cost us about $800 and it's called mobile go and it's something that we fit to our rigs and we will have internet access wherever we are. Apparently that's not too far away, so I'll keep you informed on that one because as I said
[00:07:30]
I'm doing a trip across the Nellarbor at WA at Christmas and I certainly want to be able to tell everybody about what I'm doing all the way across. What I'd like to do Victoria is take you back, because like we all have orientation, we all have a beginning to our stories. Now your Facebook started in 2010, is that when you started writing?
Victoria Black: Yeah, that'd be about then, yes, yes.
Melinda: Okay and you've been quite productive since then.
[00:08:00]
Victoria Black: Yes. Started writing mainly fairly sexy things and just of late I've started doing short stories, that's probably mainly where I want to go, short, sweet, kind of sexy stories. Not overly erotic stories. Yes, I've self-published quite a few.
Melinda: Sorry.
Victoria Black: I should say too that at the moment I'm published as V.K. Black. I am thinking of
[00:08:30]
changing back to Victoria Black because I talk so much on Facebook as Victoria Black. But at the moment I'm published as V.K. Black.
Melinda: Okay. I found you on Facebook as Victoria Black's Sexy Stories. I found some books, one's called Heavenly Revenge, which is your newest novella. The one before that was Lies and Seductions about a World War II Captain Adrian Carruthers and his
[00:09:00]
maybe spy, maybe not heroine.
Victoria Black: That's right.
Melinda: But my question, it has to be because I started my writing career as writing romance novels and I got with Mills and Burns I got as far as almost before I went onto more academic serious writing and never made a cent since. But I'm curious because when it came to the bedroom scenes, we're talking twenty years ago here
[00:09:30]
and we used to shut the door. But I notice on your page it says you leave the door wide open. Where those scenes and from memory, most love scenes have to go for five to ten pages, where they fun to write?
Victoria Black: They were, yes, they were kind of fun to write, yeah.
Melinda: I hope Darrel's not listening in the background here. But, talk us through,
[00:10:00]
not a scene, but talk us through how you set the scene for the actual, I'm assuming it's explicit, how you would set that up in a romantic kind of way. Because there's a huge difference between erotica, romance and just plain sex. I know when I was writing romances there were people like Valeria Palve out there giving us wonderful insights
[00:10:30]
into the less you say quite often is better. But nowadays it seems to be out there.
Victoria Black: Yeah. I'm not writing as much erotic romance as I was. I'm fairly interested now in sweet, kind of sexy romance. The Heavenly Revenge was published by Secret Cravings and they've gone out of business as so many are doing so I've got to
[00:11:00]
publish that under my own steam again. But going back to your question how I set up the scenes. Well, Heavenly Revenge was the man and it was a separate, it was another world, it was science fiction/fantasy story. He was convinced that the woman he'd stumbled across was a spy. So you have to have a whole sexy set up
[00:11:30]
if you're going to write an erotic romance and so there was, he insisted that she come with him to be his partner in every way and then he gradually fell in love. So you, every scene, you're developing really, I was developing the romance more than the sex. Started out super sexy and then as they got to know each other, he got to know her, it became more and more romantic.
Melinda: I have a friend who writes
[00:12:00]
gay erotica. She makes a very good living out of doing that and she's paid off her mortgage and has retired to full time writing through writing gay erotica. My question to her was how do you do gay erotica? She says it's easy. Two couples are two couples however you go about it, or two people. Yeah. Okay.
[00:12:30]
Something interested me when you were talking there, you said your, one of your publishers had gone out of business as a lot of them are and that you're having to go back to doing your, doing things yourself. This podcast and I guess me, I'm firmly in the camp of indie publishing and my guru is Joanna Penn, who has the creative Penn website.
[00:13:00]
She is firm believer in keeping your rights and exploiting them to your own benefit. Are you looking forward to being an indie publisher and being in control of your career from here on in?
Victoria Black: Oh god, I love it. Love it! I've already self-published a couple of anthologies of short stories and it is really so freeing. You can say right I want to put this up on Amazon for free for a few days
[00:13:30]
just and promote that. You can, you really can do whatever you want and it is wonderful. It's so freeing and yes that's really the way I want to go.
Melinda: Yeah, Hugh Howey and the Data Guy released their latest figures recently, which you can find on my podcast website that say that nearly fifty percent of the e-book market now is indie published and it's growing more and more. Do you see that as a way
[00:14:00]
forward for a lot of us? Because I know what you're, or what I think you're heavily involved in the romance writers in Australia.
Victoria Black: Yes. It's amazing this publishing industry how fast things have changed. I think that's the way it's going to go but who knows. Maybe people will get sick of indie publishing and want to go back to official publishers. I
[00:14:30]
really don't know. It's in a very exciting time to a writer I think.
Melinda: Look, it is and do you think you'll be looking at publishing in the U.K. and America and exploiting some of those foreign rights that are so topical at the moment?
Victoria Black: Well I guess when I publish with Amazon, people in America and so on and England can buy my books. So
[00:15:00]
that's about all I can do. With Facebook, a lot of the people I know on Facebook are from overseas so they could buy my books if they wanted to. That's about all.
Melinda: Do you advertise on Facebook?
Victoria Black: I have done and when I get my next book up I'll do so again.
Melinda: Yeah, I've just signed up for Mark Dawson’s Facebook ads course and it's very, very popular and
[00:15:30]
there are a lot of people talking about it in the indie world. Apparently Facebook advertising is the way to go. But there are ways of going about it like everything I'm discovering in this indie publishing world, that is a huge learning curve, right from learning how to turn on microphones for podcasting to learning how to create my own audiobooks now to learning how to advertise them. How much time do you put into the marketing and business side of your work?
[00:16:00]
Victoria Black: Initially, I put a lot of time into it and it drove me up the wall. So at the moment my feelings are I'm just going to go purely with Facebook because that's what I like. I'm not really going to do too much else because there's so much you can do, there really is. You can do the whole blogging thing until you're blue in the face, and Twitter, there's so many avenues in Twitter you can do, and I did them all and
[00:16:30]
it just drove me nuts so I'm just going to go with Facebook for now on. That's what I like, not everyone does, that's what I like.
Melinda: Yeah, and I think too Victoria we can very easily get lost as indies in the noise of publishing and forget that we're writers first and that is what I like so very much about living in a van and traveling because we can block ourselves off from the noise and actually get some good writing done,
[00:17:00]
should we choose to do so.
Victoria Black: That's very true, yes I agree very much with that, yeah.
Melinda: Okay. Here's a toughie for you and it's going Victoria's drinking a glass of wine as we speak. I'm sitting there looking quite envious, I've got my last day at school tomorrow Victoria, but I'd love a glass of wine, but maybe tomorrow night I'll join you. But that's what you do in the caravanning world, I'll tell you now that happy hour is tradition and it's always five o'clock
[00:17:30]
somewhere. So whether it be 11 o'clock in the morning or five o'clock at night and you're sitting on Cable Beach over at Broome, there's always an excuse for a glass of wine. Again, I think we earn it as writers. I think we work very, very hard. We concentrate very, very hard and we give up a lot of site seeing to get those words on paper. So we deserve our rewards. How many campfire stories do you think you'll have in your,
[00:18:00]
I'm assuming you're putting them together for an anthology.
Victoria Black: It's for an anthology and because I'm going to be gearing it towards the 99 cent market I'd say it's going to be about to twelve thousand word anthology and some stories are really, really short and some are, there's one that's three thousand words, there'll be another one about that, two more rather, that and another little short linking stories as well.
[00:18:30]
Melinda: You know there's a lot of murder and mayhem out there in the outback. You know that stretch from Darwin down to Alice Springs is notorious for dastardly deeds, not romance.
Victoria Black: You reckon that's a possible plot there, okay, okay.
Melinda: Well, I'm not convinced that the thriller writers make more money than we do because they say that romance writing is where all the money is
[00:19:00]
but I quite often see these mystery writers and thriller writers are right up there on the top of the best selling list. So one or the other, I hope the romance continues to dominate and win out because that's where I'm firmly placed, but it must be tempting at times to throw in some baddies.
Victoria Black: Well I guess one of the stories in my Campfire Tales there is a baddie, but as I say, every single thing in that Campfire Tales has actually either happened to me
[00:19:30]
or I've been speaking to people at caravan parks and they've told me about something and then it's made it into a Campfire Tale.
Melinda: Yeah, we have a secret weapon when we travel Victoria where it's called the laundry mafia. How many stories have you had delivered to you from the laundry?
Victoria Black: Yes, or just generally around the campfire or around the
[00:20:00]
yeah, there's usually a group and you get talking and they'll say so-and-so, this happened and they met something and yes, oh good, good, I'll use that.
Melinda: Eventually people get suspicious of you because they hear that you're a writer and they think what's she taking away from this and what's she going to write down, which is actually good fun because it makes them a little bit more suspicious of you and they see you going and they go oh what she's going to do to me
[00:20:30]
this time. I say oh nothing. Do you find that people are curious about what you do?
Victoria Black: I've been fairly reticent so far. I haven't told too many people that I'm a writer. I suppose I should, it sort of just hasn't come up in conversation. No, I know I've mentioned to a couple of friends, some of things you've told me and some of the things you've done they've made it into stories. They're oh my god.
[00:21:00]
Melinda: Well I've plastered my books all over my caravan so that when I do travel, people actually come up to me and start the conversation. Is that something that you may consider in the future?
Victoria Black: I could I suppose, yeah, it's a good idea. Yeah, yeah.
Melinda: I'm interviewing a fellow called the Word Slinger in America and he
[00:21:30]
is a thriller writer and he about to move into his RV full time. He interviewed a woman and she's traveling around America in their bus, or in their motor home and she's turned her whole bus into a walking billboard. I thought it doesn't matter what we do here in Australia, the Americans do it bigger and better all the time, don't they.
Victoria Black: Yeah, yeah.