Hunger Games Lessons

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Kindle topping pile of books

Last summer the Bemidji Library Book Festival invited me to be a guest author to talk about speculative fiction. What a joy to introduce others to a genre that I read as a student, but really embraced with the 1986 release of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy may bring young adult readers and their parents together for a summer of interesting discussions about a not so awfully distant future where the powerful elite spiral out of touch with an impoverished nation.

Embracing Katniss Everdeen, a practical tomboyish character with premature responsibilities for the life of her small family, is a healthy movement (particularly for girls) away from the years of vampire-inspired romanticism. In District 12 where Katniss lives, survival is a daily challenge. Young adults, both boys and girls, are embracing speculative fiction because it asks “What if”…” without filters of politics, gender or nationality. The genre offers space for readers of all ages to be entertained and intellectually challenged, to close a book and open their eyes, to challenge the writer’s world through discussion with others.

For most kids and adults this great recession stripped away the assumption of comfort. Almost everyone knows someone who lost a job, a house, a college education, a dream. To some extent we can identify with Katniss and, while fearing our lives might ever look like hers, we can aspire to her nobility. Kids who are reading the trilogy have grown up in a world where bullying can lead to deadly action, rich men can destroy the livelihoods of common people, war is a daily killing ritual shown on the nightly news. They are not innocent about the slender distance between the family life where they whine for new sneakers or video games and the reality of other kids who sleep in grandparents’ basements while parents rebuild from financial ruin. They know modern day Katniss teens walking through their schools.

Now if adults flock to speculative fiction, there are wonderful discussions to be held:

If you’re a book reader, try Hunger Games. If you don’t want to invest the three or four hours it would take to read the book, see the movie. Bring a young adult. Talk on the way home. What if….

Bookstore Appearances 2012

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Publishers like writers to do the traditional bookstore tour. Friends have traveled as far as the Virgin Islands to do readings. With the right combination of store personnel and audience, a bookstore reading is a wonderful experience. In 2009, as a debut writer, I wandered around our metropolitan area visiting independent bookstores as well as the big chains. Then the new era began and in 2010 as we planned the launch of my second novel, over one third of the stores I visited one year earlier were gone. Twelve months turned small publishers’ traditional marketing plans upside down.

This week at the Minnesota Book Publishers Round Table representatives of two remaining independent bookstores said that in a crowded arts world the writer reading event has died. They accommodate fewer writers who request readings because the admiring family and friends who attend don’t truly add to sales of the book. More common, even with a bigger name writer and good local press in advance, there are virtually no audiences present for these events.

I’m partially relieved to hear these booksellers call the truth. Working my contact list to fill folding chairs at a bookstore is not a real natural activity. Facebook invitations, evites, emails, phone calls can generate a false tally of expected attendance and a disappointed bookseller. On the other hand, reading from your work is the ultimate experience. Words come alive, a character takes voice, what was all elusive is concrete in the stacks of a friendly environment. Years of solitary work are rewarded by a sparkle in the eyes of one listener, in the nodding of heads at a key turn of the plot, a chuckle at the right moment.

So what next? Blog tours are multiplying and provide possible readers with more insight about a new book. There’s no dressing up and driving three hours so blog tours are more efficient for writers. But you can’t get visual feedback when looking into a laptop camera for that Skype quality video. Booksellers suggest that they might consider opening their doors and devoting staff time if a writer can come with a significant event including promotional plans. Some books are naturals like cookbooks writers staging a tasting evening. I haven’t figured out the exact draw for speculative fiction. But stay tuned.

 

 

 

Submishmash Thoughts

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Electronic submission has simplified one part of my writing work. No more following contest rules about size of self-addressed, stamped return envelopes and multiple copies prepared multiple ways. No more writing checks sometimes not cashed for months. All good. Add a central submission site like Submishmash to the mix and the process becomes even less time-consuming.

So what’s my angst? I spent years as a corporate staffing manager and heard the lament of unsuccessful applicants who felt the lack of a personal rejection email was disrespectful. From my assessment of the quality of the applications at least half of the hopefuls did truly spend time preparing a good resume and cover letter that was accurately geared toward my employer. The other half sent their credentials to any employer with any opening creating a backlog of junk applications. Think of a public relations coordinator applying for an assistant treasurer opening. With no support staff and hundreds of applicants, we frequently let silence be our rejection letter.

With the spread of systems like Submishmash it appears more literary journals are following the corporate staffing groups’ path. Writers must check their account for the ”Ëœdeclined’ status. Feels cold. The time spent matching works with a publication’s audience plus paying reading fees means each submission is a business decision for a writer. Like those disgruntled careful job hunters, I would appreciate an email from the publication. It’s nice to receive a copy of the journal as part of the reading fee, but it would be nicer to have an acknowledgement that my interest in their publication is appreciated.

Let’s be less than subtle—writers, MFA students and writing faculty present the largest readership pool for literary publications. Editors of those magazines, whether traditionally printed or online, would do themselves a long-term favor to treat their hopeful writers as potential readers. Add fifty cents to the reading fee and pay an undergrad to manage the database or engage Submishmash and its peers to take that last step in closing the process in a way that engages a potential subscriber.

The future of literary publications is interesting. University sponsored magazines are struggling with funding challenges while regular people doing day jobs are launching a variety of local or genre journals. If you’re interested in literary journals, a recent blog posting by Nick Ripatrazone in The Millions is worth a few minutes of your time. http://www.themillions.com/2012/02/on-getting-paid-literary-magazines-and-remuneration.html

Work Travel

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For two decades we’ve slept in different cities at least half of the work year. First it was me traveling as a corporate college recruiter and trainer. When our babies arrived, he picked up the frequent flier mile accumulation until a national consultant lured me back onto the road. Whether sitting in economy class, first class, or on a corporate jet, a family person is always alone at the end of a day of business travel. Hundreds of airline miles wait for us to take a trip together. But who wants to get on a plane?

Crisp sheets in a nice resort suite or worn linens in a chain hotel never have the familiar smell of our family clothes detergent, the pillows are always too flat or too puffy. I picture you sitting in front of your laptop too late into the night when you call from Paris or Rome. I picture you lounging in your favorite leather chair when I call from Ireland or Chicago or Milwaukee. When you’re gone I work crazy hours and sleep lightly.

Tonight the house is extra quiet. We tried to squash everything we needed to discuss into the twenty-four hours between the time I got home Sunday and your departure Monday—taxes, house repairs, parents’ health–and fell asleep holding hands. I worked in my office Monday with the sounds of you carrying up the stairs. Sometimes that interrupts the flow of my writing and I complain, but usually your voice on phone calls merges with the music in my office like home-brewed white noise. A dog can’t make those kinds of sounds.

Things click and crack. The washing machine buzzes in the basement. Lights give empty rooms a false sense of waiting for someone’s arrival. Nothing to watch on television. A new book doesn’t grab my attention. Back to work. If it’s ten o’clock here, you’ll be awake in two hours. We’ll talk in the afternoon as you get ready for bed. Have a good day.

Redesign the MFA?

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One message from the halls of AWP 2012: Writers are now responsible for developing their unique following long before sending a first query. Publishers and editors told session attendees that good writing on its own is not enough to land that first contract. A writer must have a positive electronic presence including impressive numbers of followers on Facebook or Twitter, activity which is being used as a surrogate for customers ready to buy their book.

In the sales world the ratio of cold calls to meetings to qualified prospects to an actual sale is data analyzed then used to develop strategic marketing plans. Experts in social marketing know the sales net must be thrown significantly further to land a customer. More than one published writer has been disappointed to find that hundreds of Facebook friends didn’t really equate to hundreds of book sales. How to turn social media contacts into active customers may be a puzzle solved by the big internet marketers, but still is a mystery to most small publishers.

Today I began writing about ten key messages discovered during AWP. Beyond a significant number of sessions devoted specifically to social media, the topic crept into many presentations. But I sensed a bigger question: What in the traditional MFA curriculum prepares writers for this new expectation of developing a strong potential audience while mastering their craft? How many courses do MFA students take where they learn marketing skills—identifying potential markets and developing strategies? If publishers would rather accept a pretty good manuscript from an author with a thousand friends on Facebook, an attractive blog and hundreds of Twitter followers than a great manuscript from someone with more normal social media presence, shouldn’t MFA programs be paying attention?

Medical schools learned late in the game that their graduates would have to be astute business professionals in an environment controlled by big insurance or healthcare corporations. Amazon, Apple, and others have pushed the publishing world into a similar situation. The discussion has moved writers from artist to producers of possibly profitable content. Listen to debut writers talk about publishers’ expectations that the writers maintain market excitement for their books.

How to bring this reality into the MFA world could be as simple as offering solid course material on today’s publishing business, as creative as requiring that graduates display social media competency, or as innovative as collaborative ventures with other academic areas. At the least, MFA programs owe it to their students to provide space for individuals to discover their own definition of success as a writer along with faculty-led guidance for how to build a course of study to support those goals. Schools have proven they can help talented people produce amazing creative work. Getting that work to into readers’ hands needs different support.

Final AWP/Involvement

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Two more sessions on my schedule before leaving AWP 2012. There have been truly high points: panels that presented riveting approaches to craft or promotion. A playful Margaret Atwood keynote address. Sparkling readings. Camaraderie, collegiality and collaboration. And there have been sessions that didn’t quite hit the mark, presenters who feared a microphone, crowds that occasionally discouraged raising a hand. A sign of how well this conference is organized is that even the weaker sessions were valuable for some participants. All part of the staging of a large, complex conference. Jerod Santek and his team did a grand job.

This morning’s session about preparing and submitting proposals for sessions in the 2013 AWP Boston conference drew a decent group. The guidelines are online and the process isn’t that difficult. As I see it, people who value this community and save up the money to participate as often as possible also have an opportunity (maybe responsibility) to volunteer their time to building future conferences through the proposal process. Whether academic or writer, publisher or editor, many AWP members have experience and knowledge that would benefit others.

So think about what sessions you would like to attend in Boston (or Seattle or Minneapolis) and visit the AWP site to learn about how to make the next conference as successful as the one you’ve attended.

Thanks again to everyone who gave of their time to make AWP 2012 happen.

Social Media/AWP

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For everyone jumping into the social media water, the pool is crowded. No reason to get back on the beach, just lots of motivation to find your own voice and work it.

As a digital content writer I’ve watched this explosion. In late 2009 for a graduate project I researched the electronic presence of three dozen writers who represented a cross section of genres and career maturity. About one-third relied on their publishers to provide a generic website and a handful had none. The others really owned their websites, including Stephen King, Jodi Picoult, Jennifer Weiner, Jonathan Safran Foer, Margaret Atwood, Nick Flynn, and Todd Boss. These sites invited readers to stay for a few minutes with frequent personal blog writing, games, interesting graphics and such. Of course book promotion also wound through their sites, but in a support role versus the main attraction. Take a look at their sites.

What do you need your website or blog to do for you as a writer? Stay focused—does the world need to become aware of your prose, your poetry, your teaching expertise? And how do those screens about your pottery or dog breeding or state fair award winning pickles support that image? It’s tempting when spending so much time to ask your website or blog to do too many things.

I don’t have anything against pottery or dogs or pickles and once I get to know you as a writer, I’d love to have you share something about you as a person. But for those of you beginning social media involvement today, I’d recommend writing yourself a ten word description of what you want your audience to know about you, or why someone should visit you online. Today I’m interested in finding a few new writing bloggers. Let’s get to know each other.

Working AWP

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Everyone comes to a big conference with expectations. AWP, one of the largest gatherings of creative types in the country, has its own interesting cast of characters walking the halls. Talk to anyone in an elevator and stories pour out: newly minted Ph.D.s with job interviews, out of work editors with resumes hoping to hear about opportunities, poets interested in grant money, novelists searching for the elusive agent, small publishers with hopes of expanding subscriptions, presenters unsure their materials are still relevant in the always changing world of literature, successful writers willing ready to share their formula for staying on top. There are books to be written from what can is heard.

From the first sessions at nine in the morning through sessions and conversations with absolute strangers, in the Bookfair where story ideas are shared hesitantly with a publication’s editor, to the cafes and bars where an absolute stranger becomes a friend for two days, AWP is a giant whirl that can refresh the spirit while the body wears down. Except for the students who travel in miles from their friends’ homes where they bunk for free to the Chicago Hilton venue and stay until the last microphone is turned off.

Day 2 for me will include time at the Stonecoast MFA table where hopeful students bring their aspirations and former colleagues will ask about where writing has taken my life. I plan to attend sessions around the old chapbook format that has found new audiences, to hear readings and learn about the future direction of literary journals. I wish I could use my notebook to draft new characters from the nuances of the swirling crowd.

The World is Over/AWP

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So what is the future of publishing? While at AWP, it’s great to dance to the happy beat of indie publishing busting down the gatekeepers and finding their own readers. It’s daunting to hear a semi-traditional small publisher say he wants new authors who bring an established audience with them as demonstrated through Facebook and Twitter stats. And then there is the Bookfair where only a small fraction of the thousands of unique small publications are available ranging in quality from one that comes out whenever the four guys have time to impressive names with deep history.

So it is a brave new world or it is a totally crazy world.

For those who have the time and a high sense of comfort with their work, publishing a completed book is possible in the next few hours. For those with high social media aptitude there will be an audience for that book. And from what writers are experiencing, the main difference in that equation for traditional publishing is assurance from pros that your book is of quality, some assistance in learning about social media and a 90 day window to hit the sweet spot in finding readers plus losing rights to your content. I have to think that owning the content might become the name of the future game.

Amazon has created a new playing field and millions are playing and paying. Sell a million books at 99 cents and make $300,000. Yikes! Sell one hundred books and make $30.00. If merely publishing is what makes your career successful, the entry point is easy. If feeding the kids is what you need, the bar is higher. A totally personal question.

 

Windy City/AWP

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Wet, sloppy spring snow slowed travel in the Twin Cities this morning, but weather reports from Chicago prompted a last minute change in packing from heavy sweaters to lighter items. Temperatures in the Windy City on Leap Day 2012 reached sixty as AWP check-in began. True to its reputation, Chicago’s wind pulled hair in every direction, yanked doors wide open and blew the dust and dirt of city’s streets everywhere. By six o’clock temperatures began to fall and cold rain added to the thrill of walking from the Chicago Hilton to dinner.

The flavor of this year’s crowd is beginning to show in the early registration groupings—young people carrying duffle bags and string sacks. Presenters and book fair participants already at work, middle-age attendees dragging roller bags with one hand and holding on to their Caribou cup with the other. Thanks to my husband’s Hilton stays we’ve snagged a room on the executive suites floor, a quiet place for the coming days. Just the sound of the wind around the building, the El tracks a few blocks away, horns and sirens twenty floors below. Chicago.

AWP is all about social media this year. At times on Thursday more than one session on the topic has been offered at the same time. Waiting to see how many people will be blogging or tweeting during sessions. Eager to hear what others have discovered about creatively using technology in their work.

More in the morning.