Angela Booth's Writing Blog

You're An Author: 4 Fast Tips Boost Your Self-publishing Program

The more books you publish, and the more your self-publishing catalogue grows, the busier you become. You need to focus on your business: what do you want to achieve? I suggested to Mel that she think about what she wanted from her business, set a few goals, then create some strategies to achieve them.

Self-publishing author? Plan your strategies

Everything starts with your goals, and your strategies.

Review your progress first. What do you need to manage? How many books have you published? What are your deadlines for in-progress books?

Next decide what you want your self-publishing business to do and set goals. Once you’ve set your goals, it’s time to plan some strategies to achieve them.

Now let’s look at some self-publishing tips to boost your program.

Read the full article on Angela Booth's site here. 

 

Plotting: Writing Is Always The Fix

"Writing is always the fix for any challenges you face with your writing. Here’s why: solutions will appear while you’re writing."

- Angela Booth

How to plot a novella: keep it simple

Think of a novella as a stripped-down version of a novel. If you were writing a novel you’d have time to write leisurely scenes, expand on minor characters, create a subplot or two… in a novella, you need to stick to the point.

The point is: the story question.

These tips will help you to plot a novella so that you can breeze through your novella in seven days or less. (One writer wrote his novella in two days.)

Vital tip: this plotting strategy works for novels, too, of course. In this article I've focused on novellas because authors think that novellas are different... They're not. :-)

Read more: How To Plot A Novella: 3 Tips

 

 

Obsidian For Fiction: Track Characters, Places, And Your Plot

Over the years, I’ve used software and various writing apps to track all the stuff involved with fiction. Last year our writers’ group spent a session discussing helpful writing apps. Can apps help you to get organized and cut down on stress when you write fiction?

They can. However (your mileage will vary) I prefer “general purpose” apps for organizing fiction rather than apps created for authors.

Although I’ve enjoyed some database-type literary apps, they never do just want I want and often are more trouble than they’re worth. Not only do I need to spend time working out how to use the app, but I also need to shoehorn everything into it.

Read the full article: Write Fiction With Obsidian: Track Characters, Places, And Your Plot.

 

4 Simple Strategies For Panic-Free Writing

Several days into the new year, a writing student called me in a panic. She queried a website last October, with an idea she thought might work for them.

Their response? Crickets.

So she forgot about them. Now the site wanted the piece she’d proposed—within a week. “I can’t do it!” She wailed. “They take three months to get back to me, then they want 3,000 words in a week?! I can’t do it.”

Tempted as she was to ignore the site because she was on deadline for a couple of projects, she wanted the writing credit. So, we looked at her writing process. I knew she could take on the one-week project, and meet her deadlines too.

Angela Booth

 

Serial Fiction: 3 Easy Tips To Help You Begin Your Serial - Copywriter Angela Booth

But what’s serial fiction? A serial is episodic fiction; you publish an episode at a time, until you’ve told the story.

Writing serial fiction: questions

Questions authors ask about serial fiction include:

• How long is a complete serial? As a rule of thumb, a serial might match the number of words in a novel in the genre you’ve chosen, but length is up to you.
• What if a serial doesn’t sell? If it doesn’t, it still gives you benefits: you build readers (and fans, we hope) and you add to your publishing catalogue. You could look on your serial as a marketing exercise and an experiment.

I’ve had a couple of students who gave up on a venture into serial fiction. However, the majority found that their serial helped them to sell more books and gain confidence.

via www.angelabooth.com

Book Marketing That Works, With Free Worksheet

Back in 2020, we posted Book Marketing Ideas: 10 Savvy Ways To Sell More Books. They’re the marketing tactics I use because they’re not only simple, they’re ideal for authors without an advertising budget.

When you try the tactics, do remember the 30-day rule:

This rule states that the marketing you do over the next 30 days will pay off over the next 90 days.

Book marketing without an advertising budget

With some five million books in the Kindle Store, spending money on advertising seems inevitable. However, you can do a lot without an advertising budget.

via www.angelabooth.com

Self-Publishing In Your Spare Time: Turn Minutes Into Profit

Got ten minutes a day?

When I’m coaching students who want to write a book, I start them off slowly. I ask them to devote just ten minutes a day to their book.

Everyone can find ten minutes a day, somewhere, somehow.

You can:

• Write in your car, before work;
• Write while watching Netflix or a DVD;
• Write during boring meetings (everyone will think you’re taking notes);
• Dictate for ten minutes while you’re waiting for your kids…

Ten minutes a day isn’t a big deal. Everyone can find ten minutes a day.

Once the students are writing for ten minutes a day, I ask them to find another ten minutes… and they do.

via www.angelabooth.com

Writing Fiction: 3 Tips To Help You To Create Believable Conflict

Let’s look at some tips to help you to create believable conflict.

1. Try to make your characters’ conflicts stem from who they are

The most realistic conflicts between characters stem from who they are. The Odd Couple is my favorite example of this type of conflict. When Felix and Oscar live together they’re so different that conflict is guaranteed.

Have you watched any episodes of the long-running TV series, MASH? The series’ major conflicts came from the Korean war, but the characters were all in conflict too.

Most of the conflicts in your novel will be minor, but your major conflicts should be difficult or seemingly impossible to resolve.

via peneloperedmont.com

What’s Content Creation? Make Content Work For You

Content creation: make it work for you

You can create content. Chances are you’re creating content already. If you’ve ever written a Facebook ad, or a tweet, or posted on a forum, or blogged, you’ve created content.

When I’m chatting with a writer or a client about content, another common question is: “But what can I create? Blogging takes so much time.”

People tend to have preconceived ideas about content. It’s more than blogging, or posting images on Instagram. Whether you’re hired to create content, or need to create content for your business, choose content formats which you know you can create without stress and hassle.

via www.angelabooth.com

Journaling In 2022: 3 Easy Tips To Achieve Your Goals

1. Avoid stress: use your journal to plan your day

Are you stressed and overwhelmed by a huge To Do list?

Most of us are. And chances are that we’re journaling in 2022 to get a handle on the tasks which matter. Have you ever noticed that many of those urgent, essential, must-do tasks never get done? Life moves on. Things stop mattering.

Our group agreed that the ONE thing which had the most effect on our productivity and peace of mind was spending five minutes planning our day.

Each day, you could make a list of tasks which are:

• Top-of-mind: “due today” tasks, those tasks which have deadlines, or which you’ve promised to do today (go to the party shop to buy paper plates and balloons);
• Phone calls you need to make or return;
• Due this week.

via peneloperedmont.com

Markdown: Clever Tools To Write And Publish Anywhere

If you want to write anywhere, use Markdown

When you use Markdown, you write in plain text.

From Writing Tools: Save Time, Save Energy With Markdown:

If I’m writing for a client, I create the text (with images) in Ulysses, then save as MS Word, PDF, or HTML: whatever the client prefers. Currently I’m writing a short manual for a client. As soon as a chapter’s done, Ulysses attaches it, in MS Word format, to an email message.

Markdown frees your creativity.

Let’s look at some useful Markdown tools. Although I’ve numbered them for convenience, they’re in no special order.

via www.angelabooth.com

Edit Your Novel: Make It Easier

Edit your novel: have FUN with it

As novelists, we’re lucky. We can correct our mistakes very easily. If you find that your novel’s got a few errors — whether just typos, or more serious errors — you simply correct the errors, and upload the new version, long after the novel is published. So, don’t worry that you won’t catch all errors. Focus on making your book better, and do leave a little time before you edit.

As I suggested in this article on editing:

“After you finish your novel, write something else. You need to clear this novel from your mind, so that you can approach it as a reader would.”

Now let’s look at some big-picture editing tips. By “big-picture”, I mean macro edits which affect the whole book — deleting characters, changing character motivations, enhancing the the novel’s beginning and ending, and so on.

Let’s look at some tips.

via peneloperedmont.com

Bullet Journal Your Novel: Make Writing Easier

My process is simple:

• One notebook per novel;
• Leave the first six pages blank for the index;
• Number the pages, if you’re using a notebook without page numbers;
• Use Ryder Carroll’s basic bullet journal system: it’s a good one. The fancier you get, the less time you have for writing.

Let’s look at the tips.

1. Too busy to write? Spend five minutes with your bullet journal

On those days when there’s too much happening, and you don’t have time to write, spend a few minutes with your journal, reading through your topics.

If you suddenly find yourself writing, that’s OK. Keep going. You can transfer the material to Scrivener or Word tomorrow.

via peneloperedmont.com

Write Your Way: 3 Rules Of Successful Writing

To get you started, here are my rules.

Write your way: rules that work for me

They’re simple:

• Write.
• Be honest.
• Be clear.

Let’s look at them in a little more detail.

1. Write, consistently

Nothing happens until you write, consistently.

Consistency is vital. We talked about working memory here. If you don’t work on your projects consistently, they drop out of your working memory and doubts creep in.

via www.angelabooth.com

Writing More: How To Avoid Destroying Your Writing Over The Holidays

Many of my writing students, and my colleagues, find the holidays a challenge. They’re not writing more; many aren’t writing at all. Some kill their careers.

So think carefully before you take a long break over the holidays.

If you’re taking a break from writing, be aware that the break may cause problems you can easily avoid. It all comes down the the writing process and the way your mind and memory work.

If you’re not aware of how your memory and writing work, chances are that you’ve given up on projects which would have succeeded. You took a break. The material dropped out of your working memory and your emotions took over.

Your emotions told you stories about the project: “it’s junk”, “it was a silly idea, no point in wasting any more time on it,” or “I don’t have time for this now. I’ll backburner it until next month…” And so on, and so forth.

Who knows how many viable projects you’ve discarded, simply because you couldn’t remember them in detail?

via www.angelabooth.com