Principles To Help Any Writer

Over the last couple of days, I've been writing about the children's book market. While this portion of the marketplace continues to be highly competitive, there is opportunity for writers. Let me draw several principles to help you in your efforts.

1. Get acquainted with the various nuances of the children's market. The books are targeted for specific age categories and you should become familiar with these ranges. You need to have a specific target market for your book manuscript. The vocabulary and topics will be different for each age group and your manuscript will have a better reception if you understand these rules.

2. Be flexible in your goals and dreams. Show your writing talent by writing for the children's magazine market. If you don't have opportunity with books, then try in a different area such as magazines. Also be flexible and be willing to take any opportunity. For example, many writers are only looking for a royalty book deal arrangement or where they earn a percentage of the sales from each book. Many children's publishers only offer the writer a work made for hire agreement or a flat fee for the writing. Are you willing to write under these conditions? I have written a number of books with a work made for hire agreement.

3. Join children's organizations. One of the best for children's writers is the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. You don't have to be published to become a member and they have an extensive array of resources and helps to teach you more about the children's marketplace.

4. Take training such as courses from the Institute of Children's Literature. The ICL has been training writers for many years. I love their course materials and their style of instruction. For over two years, I taught at the ICL and had many students which I mentored through the process of writing children's books. As an instructor, I critiqued their lessons and returned them to the students encouraging them to move ahead with their dreams and plans for children's writing.

5. Continue to build your relationships with editors and explore their needs. Can you write to one of their needs? Many writers are only focused on writing what they want to write. In general these writers ignore the marketplace and the needs of an editor. In the process, they are missing many opportunities for their children's writing to be published and to hone their craft.

6. Be persistent and keep working at it. You never know where you will find the open door for your next opportunity to write a children's book.

Are you open to new possibilities?

I've Written Children's Books

Because the bulk of my work over the last fifteen years has been in adult books, many people don't recall that I've published a number of children's books with traditional publishers. I've written anything from full-color 32-page simple stories targeted for three to five year olds to older 32-page books for four to seven year olds. Also I've written more than half a dozen biographies targeted to 8 to 12 year old readers.

Why biographies? I have always been fascinated stories about other people. The summers of my youth were often spent living several months with my granny in Frankfort, Kentucky. I made frequent trips to the local library and carried home stacks of biographies about various leaders throughout American history and others. With this background, I was a natural to write stories about other people and write a variety of youth biographies.

While I wanted to write books in the early days of my writing, I did not jump immediately into books. I honed my writing craft in magazine articles and other shorter forms of writing. I learned to write a query letter to pitch my idea then when I got an assignment, I wrote the article and sent it into the publication. Throughout those early years of my writing, I was building a reputation for excellence in the magazine area and learning about books through writing book reviews. I was the original book review columnist for Christian Parenting Today (which went out of business a few years ago but originally had a circulation of about 150,000 each month). I reviewed books for a number of other publications. I read a broad sweep of children's books, teenage books--fiction and nonfiction.

In general, writers do not get much pay for writing book reviews, but you do get free books from the publishers. I read and considered many more books than the ones I ended up writing about for the various publications. At that time several publishers added my name to their list of media who received review copies of all of their new releases. It amounted to hundreds of children's books which came to my mailbox and taught me a great deal about the marketplace in the process of reading that material.

Besides reading children's books and writing magazine articles, I was also starting to attend writer's conferences and meet book editors. It is a critical part of the process to form relationships with different editors. Why? As you get acquainted with these editors, they will tell you more details about what they need for their particular publishing house. One of those conversations gave me the opportunity to write my first book--a children's book.

While talking with the editor during a writers' conference, she said to me, "Terry, as a part of our company mission statement, we are to challenge children with the needs of the world. Yet in our full array of children's books, we don't have a single book which addresses this issue. What types of ideas do you have?"

I had never heard or thought about this question before--but unknowingly through my writing and reading, I had been preparing an answer. At the time, Lion Books had a popular series of children's books from author Stephen Lawhead which combined real pictures with a cartoon character. This imaginative series evolved around a character named Howard and the books included: Howard Had A Hot Air Balloon or Howard Had A Space Ship by Steve Lawhead.

After thinking for a few minutes about what to pitch to this editor for her need, I suggested, "What if we combined pictures from around the world with a cartoon character to show children they could grow up and go anywhere in the world?"

Instantly the editor resonated with the idea and said, "That's a good idea, Terry. Please write that up and send it to me." I made a little notation about the idea and in the subsequent weeks I wrote a manuscript with the idea and sent it to the editor. While we went through a number of different versions, eventually that publisher offered me a book contract--my first. In 1992, a hardcover full-color children's book for children ages 4 to 7 was released. It combined real photographs from around the world with a cartoon character who moved into different occupations or jobs and was called, When I Grow Up, I Can Go Anywhere for Jesus. A long-time jungle pilot told me once, "We fly everything from pigs to Presidents." That phrase ended up as one of the occupations and panels in the printed book.

This title marked my entrance into the world of book publishing.

I Could Have Written That Book

When my sons were small, I made almost weekly treks to the local library. In the children's area, we checked out stacks of books together. Some of them I carried home and others I read to the boys right on the spot in the library. Every now and then as I read through the pages, I thought, "Well, I could have written that book." Or "I could have told a better story that this one."

If you've said this statement (or even thought it), keep reading because I want to give you some insight about the children's book market.

Many of those authors will go to their computers, open a blank file and write this story, then go to a market guide and fire that manuscript off to a publisher and earn their first rejection form letter. While their enthusiasm for the children's book market is admirable, these writers have violated one of the first principles to getting published. They have not studied the market.

Until I worked inside a publisher who made children's books and acquired them for the publisher, I never understood the huge expense related to producing simple 24-page or 32-page full-color books. While the advances for these books to the writer are often in the modest $1,000 to $2,000 range, the actual cost can easily reach over $100,000. You can see how the decision to publishing a children's book is not made lightly--at least if the publisher wants to remain in business.

Did you notice in the previous paragraph where I mentioned 24-page and 32-page children's books that the books have standard lengths? Even this type of detail is important to understand about the market if you want to write children's books.

Understanding and insight into the current marketplace will put you way ahead of the other submissions for a children's book editor.

A Rare Opportunity For You

Unless you travel to a writer's conference or a trade show, it's often difficult to reach an editor with your questions--especially if you are new to the world of book publishing.

There are several challenging areas of the book marketplace for writers. First, the children's market is a challenge. Many beginning writers read dozens of children's books to their own children and decide, "I could have written that book. In fact, I think I'll try." These writers throw down some words on a paper and begin sending out their materials to publishers. Before long they receive a nice little stack of rejection notices--which they don't understand. I'll admit that I didn't understand much about this market from the publisher perspective until I worked as an acquisitions editor and brought children's books into the publishing house. It is not easy and full-color printing is expensive. I've seen the financials for some of these children's books and to most would-be authors, the numbers are staggering. I know a number of writers who would like to have some inside information about how to get their own children's books published.

And what if you are an illustrator for your own children's books? It is possible but it is even rarer for a writer to make the words and the illustrations for their own children's book. I want to tell you about a new children's book called Rainy Day Games by Andy McGuire. I've read this book and Andy's artwork combined with his elegant words is remarkable.

Here's the rare opportunity for you: you will get to ask Andy some questions about this work through a live virtual book tour on Wednesday, June 18th. Just go to AskAndyMcGuire.com and ask your question and sign up. If you can't attend the event, it will be recorded and you will receive the replay link and be able to download it to your computer or iPod. Rainy Day Games is Andy's first children's book which he wrote and illustrated.

Andy has a fascinating day job as the fiction editor at Moody Publishers. Whenever I set up these teleseminars, I ask the author for something which we can give the participants as an "ethical bribe" or gift. It turns out Andy had four unpublished chapters of a how-to book on how to write a novel. I poured this material into an Ebook template to create Novel Writing Curriculum. Everyone who asks a question and signs up for next week's event, will be able to download this 47-page book on the confirmation page. In addition, at the bottom of the confirmation page, you will be able to tell your friends about this event.

As the host and creator of next week's teleseminar, I'm excited about the opportunity to interview Andy and learn about his children's writing but also about how he handles his fiction editor role at Moody Publishers. I hope each of you will sign up and take advantage of this learning opportunity.

Use Power Words In Your Writing

Are you using power words in your correspondence to editors or your news releases? How do you learn these techniques of persuasion with words?

Or you may be saying, "I don't need to learn how to make my words sell because I'm a fiction-writing storyteller. All I need to do is writing a pageturner."

Yes it is important to be a good storyteller but will you be able to compel the literary agent or editor at a publishing house to even read your novel in the first place? That particular push will come from your query letter or email pitch letter. What are you doing in that letter to grab attention and persuade?

Then after the book is written and a publisher has contracted the book and gets it on their schedule, how are you persuading people to buy your book? Again it will come down to learning how to make your words sell.

OK, I used the most remote and difficult writing example in my introduction but persuasive writing is important for every writer at any level of experience--beginner or professional. I've found there is always more techniques to be learned in this area and I wanted to point to a FREE 258-page Ebook resource called Make Your Words Sell! Over the last eight years, thousands of people have purchased this Ebook for $29.95 and now you can download it without charge.

Here's a peek at what you will learn in this book:

*Why Most Web Copy Fails

*How To Write To Fit The Big Picture

*Thrive Or Dive With Your Unique Selling Position

*The Power Of Headlines

*How To Read A Mindset

*Words That Trigger Automatic Response

I recommend you follow this link and download the full Ebook saving it to your computer.

This Ebook is one that you will want to print out the full copy, then curl up in your favorite chair with a yellow highlighter and study it. Occasionally the book includes links to other websites. You will want to go to the version you've saved and check out these additional resources.

Whether you are attempting to convince a magazine editor to assign you an article or snag a top literary agent with your latest nonfiction book idea or you are trying to get a children's editor interested in your children's book, Make Your Words Sell! will help every writer--and the price is right.

Find The Right Puzzle Pieces

It's been years since I've put together a complicated board puzzle. As a teen, it was something we did on some rainy summer afternoons. The time disappeared as we twisted the different pieces and attempted to fit the right piece into the right place.

It's the same sort of process with our writing and communication. It is often a matter of putting together the right combination of pieces to form the completed picture. Are you looking for the right combination or stuck trying to put two pieces together which are not destined to fit?

For example, over the last few weeks, I've been pulling together another book project. For this particular book, I have a wealth of raw material yet I want to make sure I put it together in the "right" package. The big structure of the book needs to be in place as well as the details of the paragraphs and the chapter construction. In many regards, it is like a giant puzzle that I'm constructing. In some ways, I need to be careful and not mix in some pieces from a completely different puzzle so the overall picture is complete. I've enjoyed this fitting process yet one of the keys is to continually focus on the reader. Who is the target market and what does that reader need? How will the words on the page meet the needs of the reader? When it comes to nonfiction, it's the consistent focus on these questions which will keep the book on track.

When I write a nonfiction book, it starts with a solid outline for the book. If I'm writing a book proposal, then I need this outline for the proposal and the chapter by chapter summary section. If I'm writing the book, then this outline will still be critical to the creation process. The outline provides the map of where the book is headed. It keeps me focused on the overall target audience. Plus the outline helps determine the sequential flow of the contents. If I'm writing a shorter magazine article, I still need this outline to know the beginning and end of my article.

Your writing situation and life will be different from mine. I have a mixture of work in the print realm and in the Internet space. It's again like a giant puzzle where you have the big picture in mind (or the end result) and you need to constantly fit the various pieces together into the right mixture. What is the right mixture for your writing life? For some people, they will be strict children's writers or young adult writers while others will be able to write stirring copy for a brochure one hour and a chapter of their current book project the next hour.

My encouragement today is to keep looking for that perfect mixture for your writing life. And don't be surprised if it changes from year to year. It's part of our ever evolving world of publishing.

Possibilities Abound--If You Persevere

As we approach the end of another year, I've been thinking about some of the great things which happened this past year--and some of the things which I attempted and fell flat. Yes, each of us have things on each side of that situation. Can you major on the possibilities and look for new opportunities? They are certainly out there yet only if you keep your eyes open for the possibilities and persevere. Many people along the way seem to drop off, give up and quit. Are you one of those people? You can make a choice not to be one of their number.

One of the continual discussions in the publishing community is whether a particular piece of writing is publishable or not. With the variety of possibilities from Internet to print-on-demand to traditional publishing to magazine work, there is always a way to get something to the audience--provided you reach the right audience. Publishability is a question the publisher will always ask--because they are investing a large amount of money into your project--just to produce it and also to market and sell the book.

I see many projects which don't have the depth or substance to be a book--and instead they are a longer magazine article or a substantial magazine article.

Who will you reach with this particular book AND does this publisher have the ability to reach that audience? Some publishers are better equipped to reach into an audience than others. Some times a publisher will consider your potential audience and reject the project because they are ill equipped to reach that audience and know it would be a mistake and misguided use of their resources. The answer about your audience returns to the age old question of researching the market and knowing how you will reach that market.

For example, if you are a children's author and tell me your book is going to be for any child from 3 to 12, your project gets immediately slated for rejection. You have no understanding of the divisions of children's literature and how that is handled in the bookstores and libraries of the nation. Your project is way too broad in scope from the beginning. Keep reading if you are a children’s author because I have some resources for you in a minute.

The same concern is true in the adult market when you say in your book proposal or query letter that your target market is women from 25 to 80 (as one which came across my screen this week said.). You have not done your preparation as a writer to see the true possibilities. So do not be surprised when that idea doesn't hit too broad of a target.

Who are you targeting for the sales of your product? If it is the brick and mortar bookstores, then you need to work toward a traditional publisher for your product because no one reaches these stores better than the traditional publishers. I love traditional bookstores and try to spend as much time as I can in them--browsing the books and purchasing them in the store.

If you have read these entries, you will know that I have encouraged you to get a copy of Brian Jud's 304 page book called Beyond the Bookstore, How to Sell More Books Profitably to Non-Bookstore Markets. Most writers do not understand that more than half of the books sold each year are sold outside of the bookstores. Jud helps authors understand some of these out-of-the-box markets. Here's a rich resource of training for authors which I have not mentioned. Booksurge is an Amazon.com company and Jud has been holding a series of free webinars which you can watch--and learn a great deal.

If you can show a publisher a large market (even if outside of the bookstore) and you have the ability to reach AND energize that market to purchase your new book, then you have moved out of the rejection pile and into a publishable category worthy of a publisher's consideration.

And for the children's authors, as a resource, you should subscribe to the free newsletter, The Children's Writing Update. Late last night I was reading the current issue and to my surprise found my blog on The Writing Life mentioned. They have produced a new ebook called I Wish Someone Had Told Me That! ebook where 64 published children’s writers give inside tips about what they wish they had known before they made the journey. Here's a YouTube video about this resource:

I've learned the hard way to add this link for my Feedblitz readers. Otherwise they have no idea what I’m talking about unless they return to the Internet entry.

Finally no matter where you are in the publishing process, I want to encourage you to listen to this Mp3 called The Strangest Secret by Earl Nightengale. It is the only gold record ever achieved for the spoken word and absolutely free from Mark Victor Hansen. You have to enter your first name and email to get the link--and you can opt out at any time. If you are wondering about success and how to become successful, this recording is loaded with sound tested wisdom. I've heard it a couple of times. It will encourage you that the possibilities abound if you persevere.