1. The 50 Most Unacceptable Sentences in "City on Fire", In Order
City on Fire was named a Best Book of the Year by: New York Times, Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Vogue, The Atlantic, and Newsday. Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times calls it: "A novel of head-snapping ambition and heart-stopping power—a novel that attests to its young author’s boundless and unflagging talents.” It was published by a major New York publisher, Knopf. Fellow writers, however, are less than impressed with the actual writing. There are 50 pretty good reasons why in the linked piece above.
2. One star book reviews
Once you publish a book you open yourself up to criticism. Just read the comments section below anything ever written (or, ironically, item #1 on today's list of articles). It's often needlessly harsh, nasty, and/or wrong. Even when you know it's coming, it still hurts when that criticism is directed at something you've worked on for a year or more. The writer of this linked piece has some good advice for how to handle it. It happened to him, and it can and will (probably) happen to you. Learn to embrace it and have fun with it. A little self-deprecating humor goes a long way.
3. The Social Media Skills Gap
Technology is moving at a ridiculous pace, and social media is leading the charge. As writers we need to stay on top of this, or at least make an effort not to turn into dinosaurs. The CEO of Hootsuite talks about the social media gap, and encourages business people to invest time in learning it. (We are, after all, also business people, right?)
4. Some writer humor
5. What do you mean you'll Tweet My Book?
I know that you'll be tweeting all about your book, but did you know there are inexpensive ways to get others to tweet about it too? Some even specialize in reaching book readers. The link above will take you to one of those book tweeters. They call themselves...Booktweeters. Easy to remember.
6. 25 Debut Authors Share Their Advice for Getting Published
This comes from a literary agent's blog, so it features debut authors who have been published by traditional publishers. For those of you who still want to go this route, there is some good advice here.
7. Another Way of Branding Your Podcast
Lots of authors have chosen to promote their works through podcasts. This article examines the effectiveness of the podcasting world in general, and gives tips on other ways you can brand your podcast.
(Dave and I are meeting with a podcasting company on Thursday. Look for news about our upcoming podcast very soon.)
