Oriana Leckert is the Director of Publishing & Comics Outreach at Kickstarter
Photo Credit Lauren Renner
Oriana Leckert helps creators bring a marvelous array of literary projects to life. She’s written and edited for Vice, MTV News, Slate, Hyperallergic, Gothamist, Atlas Obscura, and many more. Her first book, Brooklyn Spaces: 50 Hubs of Culture and Creativity (Monacelli, 2015), grew out of a multi-year project chronicling the rise and fall of under-the-radar creative places across New York City. Follow her at @orianabklyn on Twitter/Instagram.
Kickstarter Fundraising is an excellent way to make money off your book before you publish. Avoid the pitfalls and mistakes early users make by coming to Oriana’s session! You can learn more here.
Still thinking about registering for the 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference?
We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC22, with options to attend in person and virtually. Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America. Join us June 23-26, 2022 at the beautiful Hotel Bellwether in Bellingham, WA.
“Children understand that ‘once upon a time’ refers not only – not even primarily – to the past, but to the impalpable regions of the present, the deeper places inside us where princes and dragons, wizards and talking birds, impassable roads, impossible tasks, and happy endings have always existed, alive and bursting with psychic power.” ~ Stephen Mitchell
From the first must-be-transporting words to the shattering conclusion, readers demand layers of fantastical invention. It all begins with a captivating opening salvo.
“Once upon a time” or “A long, long time ago” makes a promise to your readers. Open these pages and you’ve been wrested from your 21st century sphere. You are about to enter a kind of dream world, encounter wonderment, and find age-old conflicts wearing fantastical guises.
While fantasy is untethered from our current world, as in real life, don’t make promises you cannot keep. You’ve got to deliver an adventure so potent it invades the reader’s senses and alters his or her heartrate. Your adventure needs a diverse cast, a clash of titans, and the wondrous–dragons soaring overhead, ancient spells and curses, night walkers, or battles fought over lands or pride or brute necessity.
Khal Drugo – Game of Thrones
Opening sentences are everything
They start the whole transporting apparatus to assure readers they’ve landed in a faraway time and place. Amid a world of richly embroidered textures, sights, tastes, smells, and sounds all while entanglements with a fascinating cast of characters are underway. A world that has a carefully built history, scenes unfolding in distinct reality replete with atmosphere, tension and mood.
Is Your Opening Delivering:
Characters tossed off balance somehow by a force outside themselves.
A nettling question emerges that demands answers.
Something is amiss. The opening acts typically create threats. Humans are biologically programed to respond to threat, but will go along for the ride anyway. Because, after all, the threat is long ago and far away.
Introduce story people we’ll never meet in the real world. Story people we just can’t quit. People we can follow up close. So close we can hear their laughter or scorn, smell the stink from their terror, or experience what has lit their fierce desires.
Readers need to care about who is threatened. Some aspect of the main characters need to be identifiable, possibly pitiful, worrying, or vexing. Has life already handed your protagonist near-starving rations or brutality? Or has a royal family member longed to escape to an ordinary life?
No matter if dreaded, or later regretted, a choice must be made. {Excuse the almost-rhyme.”}
Note from Kiffer: This is where I paused to reread the opening lines of A Song of Fire and Ice by George R. R. Martin, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, and The Flight Attendant by Chris Bohjalian. Yes, each one delivered!
“Perfect words in perfect places”
Which brings us to oh-so important first lines with those perfect words. Let’s forget about first person or third person for now.
Start with a powerful moment.
Don’t be afraid to startle the reader.
Always create a mood and perhaps a stirring dread.
As in these examples:
“The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is famous for wizards.” Ursula K. Leguinn,A Wizard of Earthsea
“Logen plunged through the forest, bare feet slipping and sliding on the wet earth, the slush, the wet pine needles, breath rasping in his chest, blood thumping in his chest. He stumbled and sprawled onto his side, nearly cut his chest open with his own axe, lay there panting, peering through the shadowy forest.” Joe Ambercrombie, The Blade Itself
“The children were playing while Holston climbed to his death; he could hear them squealing as only happy children do.” Hugh Howey, Wool
“Sometimes, I fear I’m not the hero everyone thinks I am.” Brandon Sandborne,Mistborn:The FinalEmpire
“When Lilia was four years old, her mother filled a shallow dish with her blood and fed it to the boars that patrolled the thorned fence.” Kameron Hurley,The Mirror Empire
Something is surely amiss, right? I’m especially struck by the opening ofThe Blade Itselfbecause I’ve hiked many a wet forest living here in the Pacific Northwest. But not barefoot. Never barefoot.
And what is a felling night?Feeding a child’s blood to boars? Shiver. Make that an icy shiver.
I need to know more, don’t you?
Take care. Have heart. Jessica
Jessica Page Morrell
Jessica Morrell is a top-tier developmental editor and a contributor to Chanticleer Reviews Media and to the Writer’s Digest magazine. She teaches Master Writing Craft Classes along with sessions at the Chanticleer Authors Conference that is held annually along with teaching at Chanticleer writing workshops that are held throughout the year.
Jessica Morrell’s Classes and Workshops at CAC22
June 23 – 26, 2022 at the Hotel Bellwether, Bellingham, Wash.
You can register for her Master Writing Class here – Using Film Techniques for Writers
Using Film Techniques for Fiction Writers– Camera angles, method acting for getting into a character’s pov, and creating subtext and tight dialogue
Your Brain on Writing
Captivating Co-Starsthat add depth to your work-in-progress
A Huge Congratulations to all of the Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards (CIBAs) Finalists!
Every tier of the CIBAs is an important one, though few manage to rise this far in the ranks.
For our Shorts and Series Authors, this post has links to all of the Finalist Awards for the 3 CIBA Division Lists we have for Collected Shorts, Individual Shorts, and Series. We will have a separate post for Fiction and Non-Fiction.
All Finalists in attendance will be recognized at the Chanticleer Authors Conference, and we will announce the Winners at the CIBAs Ceremonies on Saturday, June 25th at the Chanticleer Banquet. We can’t express how excited we are to be able to do this in person with our fully vaccinated and boosted staff in a healthy metro area.
Now let’s take a step back and look at where we came from to make this happen.
The remaining tiers are the First Place Winner, the Grand Prize Winners, and finally, the coveted Overall Grand Prize Winners. The Overall Grand Prize Winner takes home the $1000 and more! See the Book Award details here.
Now, presenting the links to the Non-Fiction Awards Finalists
We have badges available starting with the Short List. If you need a digital badge reflecting your tier level, please email info@ChantiReviews.com with your division and rank, and we will send you one as soon as possible.
The 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference is June 23-26, 2022
Make sure your Award gets the attention it deserves on Goodreads.com
In the Librarian Manual on Goodreads, you can go to your Book Edit Page — Literary Awards.
You want to list the Award for Chanticleer International Book Awards (CIBA) Winners, and be sure to include the year and what place you received. For example:
The year Long List, Short List, Semi-Finalist, or Finalist.
Note from Goodreads: “To add a new award or edit an existing award, you’ll need help from one of our volunteer librarians or a staff member.” For assistance, post in the Goodreads Librarians Group.
Always double check that you’ve written everything correctly before posting it. The search function for Awards on Goodreads is both case and punctuation sensitive.
The Overall Grand Prize Winner for the 2020 CIBAs was Rebeca Dwight Bruff’s book Trouble the Water
This year we introduced the Non-Fiction Division for Military and Front Line Book Awards. These books focus on Narrative Non-Fiction that highlights the lives of service members, medical workers, and generally those who engage in public service. This is a division we’ve been waiting to launch for years, and we felt this was the year to make it happen. While we still are updating our site for this division, all 24 of our other CIBAs are now accepting entries for 2022.
Remember, you don’t have to be present to win, but it sure is a lot more fun! The CIBAs Ceremonies will also be livestreamed for those who can’t attend in person. Information about how to watch will be sent out by the week of the Conference to all finalists.
The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
Featuring: International Best Selling Author Cathy Ace along with experts in the business and marketing and promotion for authors from Kickstarter to Hindenburg.
A Huge Congratulations to all of the Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards (CIBAs)
2021 Non-Fiction Book Awards Finalists!
Every tier of the CIBAs is an important one, though few manage to rise this far in the ranks.
For our Non-Fiction Authors, this post has links to all of the Finalist Awards for the 7 CIBA Divisions we have for Non-Fiction. We will have a separate post for Fiction and one more post for the Shorts Awards for both Individual Works and Collected Works, as well as the Series Book Awards.
All Finalists in attendance will be recognized at the Chanticleer Authors Conference, and we will announce the Winners at the CIBAs Ceremonies on Saturday, June 25th at the Chanticleer Banquet. We can’t express how excited we are to be able to do this in person with our fully vaccinated and boosted staff in a healthy metro area.
Now let’s take a step back and look at where we came from to make this happen.
The remaining tiers are the First Place Winner, the Grand Prize Winners, and finally, the coveted Overall Grand Prize Winners. The Overall Grand Prize Winner takes home the $1000 and more! See the Book Award details here.
Now, presenting the links to the Non-Fiction Awards Finalists
We have badges available starting with the Short List. If you need a digital badge reflecting your tier level, please email info@ChantiReviews.com with your division and rank, and we will send you one as soon as possible.
The 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference is June 23-26, 2022
Make sure your Award gets the attention it deserves on Goodreads.com
In the Librarian Manual on Goodreads, you can go to your Book Edit Page — Literary Awards.
You want to list the Award for Chanticleer International Book Awards (CIBA) Winners, and be sure to include the year and what place you received. For example:
The year Long List, Short List, Semi-Finalist, or Finalist.
Note from Goodreads: “To add a new award or edit an existing award, you’ll need help from one of our volunteer librarians or a staff member.” For assistance, post in the Goodreads Librarians Group.
Always double check that you’ve written everything correctly before posting it. The search function for Awards on Goodreads is both case and punctuation sensitive.
The Overall Grand Prize Winner for the 2020 CIBAs was Rebeca Dwight Bruff’s book Trouble the Water
This year we introduced the Non-Fiction Division for Military and Front Line Book Awards. These books focus on Narrative Non-Fiction that highlights the lives of service members, medical workers, and generally those who engage in public service. This is a division we’ve been waiting to launch for years, and we felt this was the year to make it happen. While we still are updating our site for this division, all 24 of our other CIBAs are now accepting entries for 2022.
Remember, you don’t have to be present to win, but it sure is a lot more fun! The CIBAs Ceremonies will also be livestreamed for those who can’t attend in person. Information about how to watch will be sent out by the week of the Conference to all finalists.
The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
Featuring: International Best Selling Author Cathy Ace along with experts in the business and marketing and promotion for authors from Kickstarter to Hindenburg.
A Huge Congratulations to all of the Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards (CIBAs) Finalists!
Every tier of the CIBAs is an important one, though few manage to rise this far in the ranks.
For our Fiction Authors, this post has links to all of the Finalist Awards for the 16 CIBA Divisions we have for fiction. We will have a separate post for Non-Fiction and one more post for the Shorts Awards for both Individual Works and Collected Works, as well as the Series Book Awards.
All Finalists in attendance will be recognized at the Chanticleer Authors Conference, and we will announce the Winners at the CIBAs Ceremonies on Saturday, June 25th at the Chanticleer Banquet. We can’t express how excited we are to be able to do this in person with our fully vaccinated and boosted staff in a healthy metro area.
Now let’s take a step back and look at where we came from to make this happen.
The remaining tiers are the First Place Winner, the Grand Prize Winners, and finally, the coveted Overall Grand Prize Winners. The Overall Grand Prize Winner takes home the $1000 and more! See the Book Award details here.
Now, presenting the links to the Fiction Awards Finalists
We have badges available starting with the Short List. If you need a digital badge reflecting your tier level, please email info@ChantiReviews.com with your division and rank, and we will send you one as soon as possible.
The 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference is June 23-26, 2022
Make sure your Award gets the attention it deserves on Goodreads.com
In the Librarian Manual on Goodreads, you can go to your Book Edit Page — Literary Awards.
You want to list the Award for Chanticleer International Book Awards (CIBA) Winners, and be sure to include the year and what place you received. For example:
The year Long List, Short List, Semi-Finalist, or Finalist.
Note from Goodreads: “To add a new award or edit an existing award, you’ll need help from one of our volunteer librarians or a staff member.” For assistance, post in the Goodreads Librarians Group.
Always double check that you’ve written everything correctly before posting it. The search function for Awards on Goodreads is both case and punctuation sensitive.
The Overall Grand Prize Winner for the 2020 CIBAs was Rebeca Dwight Bruff’s book Trouble the Water
This year we introduced the Non-Fiction Division for Military and Front Line Book Awards. These books focus on Narrative Non-Fiction that highlights the lives of service members, medical workers, and generally those who engage in public service. This is a division we’ve been waiting to launch for years, and we felt this was the year to make it happen. While we still are updating our site for this division, all 24 of our other CIBAs are now accepting entries for 2022.
Remember, you don’t have to be present to win, but it sure is a lot more fun! The CIBAs Ceremonies will also be livestreamed for those who can’t attend in person. Information about how to watch will be sent out by the week of the Conference to all finalists.
The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
Featuring: International Best Selling Author Cathy Ace along with experts in the business and marketing and promotion for authors from Kickstarter to Hindenburg.
Robert Smalls’ life should have been one for the history books.
Smalls was born a slave in Beaufort, South Carolina, in 1839. When the first shots of the Civil War were fired upon Fort Sumter, Smalls was an experienced helmsman aboard a small cargo ship plying the coastal waters of South Carolina and the neighboring states. Once the war broke out, he found himself working to support a cause that kept him, his wife, and their children locked in chattel slavery.
But in a daring escapade that fell somewhere between a raid and a rescue, Smalls planned, with the help of his fellow crew members (also slaves) aboard the CSS Planter, to abscond with the ship, its cargo of munitions taken from Fort Sumter, and bring their families. The plan was to sail the ship as though its white officers were still on board, pretending to be carrying out their orders—at least until the ship was out of the reach of Fort Sumter’s guns.
If they failed to fool the Confederate batteries as they passed by in the night, the crew planned to set fire to the munitions in the hold rather than return to slavery. If they didn’t manage to strike down the Rebel colors and raise a white flag of surrender before they reached the Union blockade of the harbor, they’d be killed.
But no price was too high to pay for the hope of freedom.
This is the story of Smalls’ life from his childhood enslaved to Henry McKee through his hiring out in Charleston to his well-planned, well-executed and incredibly lucky escape, told in this fictionalized autobiography as if seen through the eyes of Robert Smalls himself.
The reader is inside the protagonist’s own thoughts and feelings as he grows from a childhood of slavery under the watchful eyes of his mother to learn at a very young age that the world in which he lives is designed to keep him in a cage. The unfairness of his world is in the very air that everyone around him breathes. To the point where those who benefit from that unfairness don’t even recognize that they are perpetuating the problem—no matter how good or how righteous or God-fearing they believe they are.
The lessons are hammered home as Smalls grows up to be a man who can never chart the course of his own destiny or make his own decisions—until he takes that destiny in his own hands at the wheel of that ship.
Smalls’ well-planned escape is the pivotal point of this true story. That desperate night makes for gripping, edge-of-the-seat reading as the small ship and its anxious crew, along with their praying families, ride the edge between hope and terror for a chance at freedom—no matter the cost.
But the heart and soul of the story are in the hero’s journey from a childhood as he grasped the cruel institution of slavery through growing consciousness of his precarious place in a world set against him. It’s not just that the reader is able to walk with him, but in this first person perspective his thoughts are laid bare and the reader can feel him reach for his own truth – and his own answers. Rebecca Dwight Bruff wrote a timely and brilliant debut novel that captures the lion-hearted Congressman Robert Smalls who continued to push boundaries for the political rights of African Americans.
Trouble the Wateris an inspiring story of courage and grace under fire in its many forms. It rings with a voice of heroism along with thoughtfulness and sincerity. Stories matter.
You will not look like this by the end of this artilce…probably
While everyone has questions about social media, one of the big ones for writers is often Twitter. Founded in March of 2006, Twitter is now one of the go-to places for hot takes, cold takes, pitching agents, and generally trying to go viral on just about anything.
Plus, what on earth is Elon Musk doing on there, and what’s our number one piece of advice for social media?
One of the first things agents and publishers will do while researching an author is check to see if they have any sort of social media presence. Author platform comes first in the majority of cases, rather than an author being discovered and then being set up with an incredible platform by people who believe in their book. And a digital presence is work.
So, how do you establish a following on Twitter?
Set yourself up for success
To begin with, you’ll want a profile picture and cover photo that fits with your author brand. Your author brand should be in line with the genre of your books. This means it puts your readers in mind of what you write when they visit your site. If you’re a Non-Fiction author who focuses on social justice and journalism, you want readers interested in social justice to think of you when they think about your genre.
Of course, we’re thinking of someone specific. Check out the homepage for Dr. Janice Ellis’s Twitter profile.
We’ve added some letters to the image to help us better understand and discuss what she’s doing here.
A. Ellis is a professional journalist with a PhD, and her picture reflects that level of expertise.
B. Here we have Dr. Ellis standing next to covers of her book. The background color we can see was drawn in part from the color of her Chanticleer Nellie Bly Grand Prize winner From Liberty to Magnolia. This helps tie the whole image together. She even includes a personal mission statement: “Experience and Knowledge Fuel the Mission to Promote the Good”
C. You can search everywhere for Janice S. Ellis, PhD, and find that her name is consistent across platforms.
D. This is her Twitter handle. You can see that it clearly links to her name that appears, which is good because you want to be as easy to find as possible.
E. Here Dr. Ellis has been clever by including a website where she is frequently published and a hashtag that attaches to what she’s known for. We’ll talk more about hashtags later on.
F. Here the key is that Dr. Ellis has included her own website. Having your own personal site independent from social media is always an important component of any author platform.
Sell yourself, not your book
While this might seem counter-intuitive, it makes sense when you realize people want to follow a human being, not an inanimate object. On Twitter, you can do the following things:
Follow: Like many social media platforms, you should follow who you want to follow. Ideally, keep in mind your brand and author platform as you do this.
Tweet: Regular posting at least once a day is ideal. Mix it up with pictures, videos, whatever strikes your fancy.
Retweet: This reposts someone else’s Tweet to your timeline
Quote Tweet: This reposts someone else’s Tweet to your timeline, and you can comment on it. This is a great way to start a conversation or answer a fun question
Comment: This is simply commenting and responding to people who have either created their own post, responded to a post, or responded to your post.
Direct Message (DM): This one should only be done with explicit permission. You can ask to DM someone, or they may say “DMs open” – otherwise you should always leave a public comment.
You have a lot of choices on how to handle Twitter
The big questions that come up here are how to interact with agents and publishers on Twitter. Follow the ones who you think might be interested in your work, but as mentioned above, don’t DM them unless you have permission to do so. Interact with them like a human being, and keep an eye out for when they’re open to submissions.
One thing agents and small presses talk about on Twitter is that they appreciate it when someone continues to submit to them. This is confirmed in Jane Friedman’s The Business of Being a Writer:
“‘Getting rejected by a magazine repeatedly and then, finally, getting work accepted is, actually, fairly normal. It’s a little frustrating for an editor,’ she said, ‘when a writer submits to us five times and then just stops, and we never get a chance to read the writer’s work again.’” (78)
Persistence pays off in more ways than one.
So When can I sell my Book?
Generally posting once a week about your book is plenty. During releases, or if you’re participating in Book Awards like the CIBAs or receiving a Review, then you can post more. Just make sure there’s a reason you’re posting about it beyond “buy my book!”
Hashtags and Pitch Wars
One thing to keep in mind anytime you read something (this included) about social media is that what you’re reading is already out of date. For example, while the idea of #PitchWars is still going, #PitMad, the original founding idea, appears to be defunct as of this year. What are these programs?
You can get a thorough rundown with hashtag suggestions for #PitchWars from The Writing Cooperative here, but the short version is they’re opportunities to promote your work on Twitter directly to agents who are interested in what you have to sell. Usually the rules are you post hashtags appropriate to the pitch day, and then you go and support your friends by Retweeting their posts. Be careful not to Like any posts, because that is an action reserved for Agents, and indicates they are open to being contacted about reviewing their work. If you do Like one of these Tweets by mistake, you’re likely to receive a polite DM asking you to Retweet instead, which isn’t a tragedy, but it can feel a little embarrassing to make a faux pas like that.
What about more commonly used hashtags outside of special events?
Well, the following are pretty common:
#WritingCommunity
#AmWriting
#AmQuerying
#WritersLift
Note: Physical lifting is uncommon in a #WritersLift
All of those can be used in fairly self-explanatory ways, except for #WritersLift. A #WritersLift comes with an invitation for authors to put links to their work on your post, and then there is the expectation that you will follow them on Twitter, and they will follow you back. Making a #WritersLift post can be a quick and easy way to boost your Twitter following and maybe make new friends!
Other hashtags that are genre specific can be used fairly easily, such as #Fantasy or #Journalism. If you have a hashtag based on your book such as #TFioS (The Fault in our Stars by John Green, pronounces “tif-ee-oh-s”) those are great to use, but always pair them with more popular hashtags.
Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters snuggling up in the movie “The Fault in Our Stars”
Another great time to use Hashtags is anytime your book wins an award or receives a review. Big milestones like that can make a huge difference when it comes to getting noticed, so if your book because a finalist in the CIBAs or receives a Chanticleer Book Review, tell your friends and followers all about it!
Note: Conferences and Writing Events often have a specific tag like #CAC and #CIBAs (for Chanticleer Authors Conference and Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards). Using those specific tags can be a great way to have the organization notice you.
Blocking
It’s always good to talk about blocking people on any social media platform. On Twitter, blocking someone is often an act of self-love. Rather than getting into a fight with a stranger on the internet, just click that block button and don’t worry about talking to them ever again. Your mental health isn’t worth trying to reach someone who just wants to be mean.
So what’s Elon Musk got to do with all of this?
Billionaire and would-be-Twitter-Owner Elon Musk
Recently it came out that Musk has invested enough to own 9.2% of Twitter. If you really want to dive into this, you can check out this article from CNET here, but these are the highlights. In addition to owning a substantial share of Twitter, Musk has now offered to buy the company. If Twitter says no, he could divest his stock and drive the price of Twitter down, harming the platform. If they say yes, he’s sure to transform the platform into something quite different from what it is now. Should we be worried?
Well, probably not.
There might be a bit of an upset, but it’s more likely things will continue as they have for Twitter, and Musk might just try to make his own social media website. However, this brings us back to the importance of having your own author website. Companies like Twitter and Meta (that’s Facebook and Instagram) are eventually going to go the way of MySpace, and then we’ll all have to collectively jump onto a new social network. If all our eggs are in the basket that ends up losing popularity or shutting down, then we lose our entire author platform at one go. So, keeping your website as a hub that tells people who you are, and directs folks to your social media makes your position much more stable.
Our best advice for social media?
This might seem obvious, but always be polite. Being rude on social media is a great way to get blocked. As we tell kids, the internet is forever. When a person explodes or swears at someone online, that sort of thing has a way of making it onto Watch Dog sites like Writer Beware, ALLi, or Absolute Write. These spaces can mean the difference between someone deciding to work with an author or not, which can have huge consequences when it comes to sales.
A few words from Kiffer.
Be kind. If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t post anything at all.
And be sure not to hi-jack someone else’s post. This is just plain rude. IF someone tries to hi-jack your post, you can choose 1) not to respond – at all 2) delete the comment if it is egregious or 3) if someone is trying to sell their book on your social platform — well, that is just plain out tacky! If the person doing this persists (we all make blunders – and I would like to think most of the time unintentionally), then you may have to block that particular person. Facebook and Twitter do NOT notify the person that they have been blocked. You just won’t have to see their comments on your posts anymore. On Twitter, this is called “thread-jacking” — someone interjecting in a discussion in order to divert it in a different direction.
My advice for social media is Be kind. If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t post anything at all.
What is posted on the internet is there forever and for everyone. – Kiffer
Post note: Keep in mind, that the publishing world is a small one.
Thank you for joining us for this Writer’s Toolbox Article, and good luck out there on the web!
FLEXIBLE REGISTRATIONS ARE AVAILABLE for these challenging times.
Seating is Limited. The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
Please enjoy Chanticleer’s Business and Marketing Tips and Tools for Writers for a Happy and Productive 2022!
Start the year out right with our suggestions on the best practices for 2022.
Must-Dos for Authors and Publishers for 2022!
At Chanticleer, as many of you know, we do things a little differently. We are bringing you an author checklist, things for your author development and business.That’s why we’re here!
We suggest tackling one Must-Do a month in any order that you chose except for the first three. Also, we will have a handy checklist to print out at the end of the series for your author lair to help keep you on track.
We wish you a successful and productive year for achieving your publishing goals! ~ The Chanticleer Reviews Team
On the First Blogpost of 2022, Chanticleer gave to me…
Advice on how to care for arguably the most important tool in our toolbox. Care to guess what it is?
We will give you a hint. It stores your intellectual property, aids in getting words from your brain into little alphabet letters that add up to a story. And for most of us, enables us to create what we love most—books and stories!
Your hardworking computer – whether it is a desktop, laptop, pad, or your own Mad Maxx creation of technologies (like Argus’s), deserves a little bit of attention.
Computer Care for Authors and Publishers
We often forget how important it is to maintain a clean computer on the inside and outside, even if our desk and the surrounding area is spotless. Here are a few tips to get you started. And, yes, this is your annual reminder!
1. Clean your keyboard
If you don’t want to be like the person in this XKCD comic, you might want to clean your keyboard. Luckily, this is an easy task you can do once a week. Or at least once a year…
Ewwww!!
Wipe it down with a slightly damp microfiber cloth, dry it with a different cloth, and then use a disinfectant wipe or a cloth just damp with rubbing alcohol to finish it out (do not use bleach!). Probably best to do this when your computer and keyboard are unplugged because keyboards are actually quite delicate inside.
Gross stuff under the keycaps. Maintenance will prevent your computer keyboard from getting to this state.
Also, as the character in the cartoon that you clicked on above, turn your keyboard or laptop upside down and give it a gentle shake or two about once a week. Gentle being the operative word. You may be surprised to see what falls out of it.
Especially if you have a cat for an intern. Here’s looking at you, Janet Oakley!
Janet’s intern, Kinky Boots, hard at work.
We’ve even seen Argus vacuum his keyboards. But, that is up to you.
Really consider giving this a try. Your keyboard will feel cleaner. All the bits of dust and crumbs of food you’ve learned to ignore will be gone, and it will be such a pleasant experience for your hands.
Clean your screen
We’ve all had that experience of editing and suddenly an errant apostrophe or period appears where there ought not to be one. We click on it to edit it, but something about the way it appears doesn’t quite make sense, and then we can’t delete it from the page. That’s when it clicks. The screen is just dirty.
To clean it, a microfiber cloth is always the recommendation. Always dab any cleaning solution (Windex and/or a little bit of mild soap and water are recommended but check before trying anything else!) onto the cloth not directly on the screen itself.
Password Management
6.85 million passwords are hacked each day or 158 every second. INC magazine 2018 – this number has gone up substantially since 2018.
The concept of a healthy mind healthy body can be applied to healthy software healthy hardware. Now that you have a clean machine, make sure you have a good password system. While two-factor authentication (such as when you need to type in a code from your phone or email as well) can seem like a hassle but is also another key factor in security. For reliable password managers, see the following.
and so do numbers, characters, and upper and lower cases matter it comes to passwords
We use these here at Chanticleer —but use caution and be prepared!
Make sure that the password that you decide on is something that is memorable to YOU. The only other person who should have it is your estate executor or life partner or someone that you would trust with your bank accounts and credit cards.
If you happen to momentarily forget your master password, because someone was talking to you while you were creating it —you will need to start over. There is no way to recover your account, unless you happen to find the random piece of paper you scribbled your master password on… Experience is a cruel teacher…
IMPORTANT: DO NOT USE THE SAME PASSWORD for your business/work accounts and your personal household accounts or publishing accounts. This is how hackers can take people down by infiltrating a business password —harder but to do but then they have access to so many personal accounts because so many people use the same password for home and personal accounts.
But after hearing from several authors whose computers were hacked, bank accounts taken over, ransomware remotely installed, and other malicious activity that drained their credit card balances and credit ratings, and stole their intellectual property (as in books – published and unpublished), do not go another day without a password manager.
There is no excuse. There are several excellent password managers that are FREE or as little as $36 per year.
For more information here are three links to articles about password managers from reliable sources:
Here is a link from CNet on the Best Password Manager to Use for 2021.
[Note from Editor: Do NOT proceed to this step until you have your Password Manager project all sorted out. ]
As we barrel forward into the future there’s so much that this has started to be a bigger and bigger project. Luckily, PC Mag has a great article about how to clear your cache on any browser. While this can be a little tricky to navigate, it can be worth it for the faster computer speed. PC Mag also focuses on the security risks of the cache, but chances are most of us don’t have to worry too much about those.
WHY SHOULD YOU CLEAR YOUR CACHE from COOKIES?
This is called “Browser Hygiene.” Really.
Browsers tend to hold onto information and like a clogged drain, after a while, it will slow down the speed and performance of your computer. Where your browser holds onto this information is in its “cache.”
A computer’s cache (pronounced ‘cash’) is also where websites that you visit implement their “cookies” — that bread crumb trail that rambles through the internet linking your computer to the websites that you visit. Each and every website uses cookies — even yours is guilty of it. It is the nature of the internet…
Have you ever had this happen to you?
“I don’t see the change. You said you updated on your web page.”
That is because your computer is storing and showing you the previous cache of the website it stored in its cache. You are not seeing the latest and greatest of the website that you are revisiting, but a “shadow” of it.
To see the latest version of a website or webpost, you will probably have to clear your computer’s cache which will delete cookies.
Each computer and browser has a different system, so we advise you to search on your browser (i.e. Google it) on how to clear the cache for your particular system.
Also, you can decide how much of the cache that you want to clear. All of it? Only the cookies? Save the passwords? Clear the passwords? (the reason to do #2 Password Management first). It is probably a good idea to clean the password cache at least once a year. But remember that you will need to do a fresh login for each website that you visit. See #2 Password Management.
We clear our caches here at Chanticleer at least every three months or as needed to access new data from websites that we visit.
More info:
Remember all that fuss about Data Privacy back in May 2018? Cache and Cookies are what that was and is all about. Here is a handy link to Chanticleer’s blog post about it. Are you ready for the GDPR? (General Data Protection Regulation)
Virus Protection
What are the odds of becoming a victim of a cyber attack? One in Four
Any highly rated anti-virus and anti-malware program will update itself on a daily basis for latest hacking techniques, Trojan horses, phishing methods, ransomware, adware, spyware, and worms (I shudder to think about this one), and other malicious activity. This is different than updating the program itself. Is your antivirus program a couple of years old? If so, time to do some research.
Again, we’re going to turn to the experts here and look at CNET’s best Windows antivirus Protection. A good antivirus keeps your computer running in top shape, and it keeps your data and writing easy to access for yourself, so you don’t end up like one of the characters in Neal Stephenson’sReamde who end up with all their files locked away by ransomware.
Now for some potentially bad news.Ifmalware has made it into your computer, you will need to have it professionally removed or contact the family and friends computer geek to save your computer and your sanity. If you are computer handy, then you have probably already taken steps to rid your computer of it.
The scary thing about malware is that once it has infiltrated your computer, it may be hard to detect even by anti-virus protection. That is how sneaky and under handed malware can be.
Some symptoms that your computer may be infected with malware:
Your computer is slowing down
Your computer crashes more often or “locks up”
Your friends and contacts receive strange messages from you
Suddenly you do not have any storage space available
Your homepage changed itself without you changing it.
PUPs show up. These are Potentially Unwanted Programs that have infiltrated your system when you give your consent to install additional tools on your computer. We think “barnacles” would be a better name.
Make sure that your computer (and smart phone) has the latest anti-virus and anti-malware programs protecting it.
Now for some definite good news!
Highly rated by independent and professional reviewers of Anti-Virus and Anti-Malware programs are available from free to $59 a year. A small price for piece of mind.
Don’t think that it can’t happen to your computer. Computer viruses and malware are prevalent and widespread. Once they find a home, they tend to go systemic in a very sly and under-the-radar kind of way. Your screen will not flash or start posting pictures of Moriarty when your computer has been invaded. Today’s hacks tend to be silent but deadly.
That’s what we want to see! You are safe!
Back up your files
Anything that you’d have trouble replacing, it’s worth backing up. There are several places like One Drive, Dropbox, or Google Drive that will let you store files for free, up to a certain point. Luckily, external hard drives are getting cheaper all the time, and you can always do both. Whenever one of my free online drives fills up, I move anything I’m not currently using onto my external hard drive. I also make sure to periodically back up my writing.
This is such a great fear of mine that on my fire list (list of things that I need to immediately grab in case of fire) I have my external hard drive above everything else. I’m sure if you aren’t someone who has lost data, you know people who have, and I dearly hope to never have to worry about that.
Cyber Threats STOPS with each of US!
Once your computer and files are all protected, you’ll be free to write without any anxiety over your head. Like cleaning and maintaining most things, a routine means you only need to do a little work when the time comes to get everything squared away.
We hope these were handy reminders. We all get busy and can easily procrastinate about taking care of these mundane but vital tasks. We certainly do!
If there is something we should add to this blog-post or you have an experience that you would like to share or a question that you would like to ask about this blog post, please contact us at Chanticleer@ChantiReviews.com
We’d love to hear from you!
Thank you for joining us and please stay tuned for the next Business and Marketing Tools and Tips for Writers Article!
Thank you for joining us for this Writer Resolutions Article
Our 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference (CAC22) will be June 23-26, 2022, where our 2021 CIBA winners will be announced. Space is limited and seats are already filling up, so sign up today! CAC22 and the CIBA Ceremonies will be hosted at the Hotel Bellwether in Beautiful Bellingham, Wash. Sign up and see the latest updates here!
Because of COVID, we are offering flexible registration packages—just in case!
When you’re ready,did you know that Chanticleer offers editorial services?We do and have been doing so since 2011.
Our professional editors are top-notch and are experts in the Chicago Manual of Style. They have and are working for the top publishing houses (TOR, McMillian, Thomas Mercer, Penguin Random House, Simon Schuster, etc.).
If you would like more information, we invite you to email Kiffer or Sharon at KBrown@ChantiReviews.com or SAnderson@ChantiReviews.com for more information, testimonials, and fees.
We work with a small number of exclusive clients who want to collaborate with our team of top-editors on an on-going basis.Contact us today!
Chanticleer Editorial Services also offers writing craft sessions and masterclasses. Sign up to find out where, when, and how sessions being held.
A great way to get started is with our manuscript evaluation service, with more information availablehere.
And we do editorial consultations for $75. Learn morehere.
If you’re confident in your book, consider submitting it for a Editorial Book Reviewhereor to one of our Chanticleer International Awardshere.
Writer’s Toolbox
Thank you for reading this Chanticleer Writer Resolutions article.
Life is full of ups and downs, but you know that it’s those things that inspire and uplift us, that hearten us so we can make it through each day and onto the next. This doesn’t mean every day is easy, but it does follow the idea that every cloud has a silver lining.
The Hearten Awards came into existence thanks to the Journey Awards. In addition to burgeoning submissions of narrative Non-Fiction and Memoirs, our six Non-Fiction Awards have been exploding in popularity. The competition has never been steeper, and the time to submit has never been better. You can see the full list of Non-Fiction Awards here.
We saw the Hearten Awards as a necessary addition due to the high number of stories we receive that inspire us to live a life full of love and joy as best we can. These stories are heartwarming, empowering, and help show us a world where we are our best selves.
Tenets of Uplifting Fiction
While this fiction often has religious undertones, that isn’t alway the case, and even when there is religious inspiration at work in the text, it doesn’t proselytize or distract from the narrative at hand. The work is still meant to engage and delight readers with or without a faith background.
Handholding is a-okay in Heartwarming Non-Fiction
What the work does not include is violence, profanity, or explicit sexual content. Despite this, the emotional impact and journey taken in most inspirational texts can often lead the reader to tears, so don’t take that light-heartedness lightly. Also, don’t count out romance! Inspirational fiction has it all!
If you love writing inspirational fiction or are interested in learning to write more of it, reading it is a great way to learn more. Here are heartwarming books that we’ve read and would recommend!
A YEAR of LIVING KINDLY
By Donna Cameron
First Place Winner in I&I Awards
Donna Cameron’s guide,A Year of Living Kindly: Choices That Will Change Your Life and the World Around You, invites readers to live more richly, thoroughly, and fruitfully.
Perhaps the best way to enjoy Cameron’s guide to kindness is to drink it in slowly, for a year, as its structure suggests. Savoring one of its 52 meditations – thoughtful, introspective, resonate, and wide-ranging discussions – each week. She turns to a new topic grouping with the advent of each new month, traversing the four parts, the “seasons,” as the year progresses.
Dan Juday’s memoirWaltzing A Two-Stepis a humble and compassionate look at his formative years.
Born a few years after the second world war, Dan experiences a peaceful and happy childhood in rural Indiana, moving frequently before the family settles on a rural area of land named Springwood in Clinton County, Indiana. The Juday family were devout Catholics and enrolled Dan and his siblings in Catholic schools until the family moved to Springwood. Public school became the only option for the siblings. There Dan does his best to fit in but his status as a minority Catholic in a mostly Protestant community in the 1950s brings its own challenges.
A realistic, up-close look at life as a cancer patient and survivor. The Breast Is History is a strong tool of hope and humor in the darkest days of any woman’s life.
In September 2011, Bronwyn Hope received her initial diagnosis of breast cancer; by March 2013 she had had both breasts removed, had gone through numerous chemo and radiation treatments, taken thousands of pills, and come out of it with a gritty, positive philosophy.
Odyssey of Love: A Memoir of Seeking and Finding by Linda Jämsén is an utterly charming Eastern European take on Eat – Pray – Love.
This odyssey begins with its 40-something author exchanging her job and dead-end relationship in Boston for two years in Budapest. The goal? To explore new career opportunities, live an adventurous life as an American expat in Europe, and, possibly, hopefully, find her soulmate.
Looking to submit to our other Non-Fiction Divisions? See them all here!
When you’re ready,did you know that Chanticleer offers editorial services?We do and have been doing so since 2011.
Our professional editors are top-notch and are experts in the Chicago Manual of Style. They have and are working for the top publishing houses (TOR, McMillian, Thomas Mercer, Penguin Random House, Simon Schuster, etc.).
If you would like more information, we invite you to email Kiffer or Sharon at KBrown@ChantiReviews.com or SAnderson@ChantiReviews.com for more information, testimonials, and fees.
We work with a small number of exclusive clients who want to collaborate with our team of top-editors on an on-going basis.Contact us today!
Chanticleer Editorial Services also offers writing craft sessions and masterclasses. Sign up to find out where, when, and how sessions being held.
A great way to get started is with our manuscript evaluation service, with more information availablehere.
And we do editorial consultations for $75. Learn more here.
If you’re confident in your book, consider submitting it for a Editorial Book Reviewhereor to one of our Chanticleer International Awardshere.
And remember! Our 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference (CAC22) will be April 7-10, 2022, where our 2021 CIBA winners will be announced. Space is limited and seats are already filling up, so sign up today! CAC22 and the CIBA Ceremonies will be hosted at the Hotel Bellwether in Beautiful Bellingham, Wash. Sign up and see the latest updates here!
Writer’s Toolbox
Thank you for reading this Chanticleer Spotlight Article.
Spiritual guidance is often difficult to talk about
No matter who you are, there’s probably some baggage in your life tied into your personal development in terms of your mind and spirit than we’d like to admit.
Have you had a spiritual journey or advice for people in their own quest for well-being?
As Self-Help books become more and more popular with books about enlightenment and well-being have made mindfulness a household term. Publisher’s Weekly puts it nicely:
“Mindfulness” is everywhere in publishing — and in American society. Its roots are in Buddhist religious practice around meditative attention — focusing on fully inhabiting the present moment without attachment to external experiences or inner emotions and thoughts. But it is also grounded in modern scientific research into the mind-body connection. Thus “mindfulness” has become fertile ground for books across multiple categories, including health, spirituality, popular science, and self-help.
Of course, there’s some overlap between the Mind & Spirit Book Awards and the I&I Book Awards. You are always welcome to submit to both, but the question of spirituality is really what drives home the difference between the two divisions.
No matter what kind of spiritual book you are writing, experience is often key
Offering support, care, and advice to people in a book is huge undertaking that should be treated seriously. In writing, be sure to be mindful of the practices you borrow from and where they lead. In teaching, the strongest instructors know how to admit they don’t know something while inexperienced teachers will often try to conceal their lack of knowledge. When people read a Mind & Spirit book, they are offering the author vulnerability, and it can help for the author to be vulnerable in return.
Publishers Weekly also offers a word of caution:
The term mindfulness can be “very fraught,” agreed Lil Copan, senior acquisitions editor at Broadleaf Books, particularly if it has been “diluted in its origin” in Buddhism. Christian authors often want to avoid acknowledging the Buddhist roots of mindfulness as a practice, connecting it instead with Christian contemplative practices they trace to the early church, or merely using “mindfulness” as a substitute for words like “presence” or, in the Quaker context, “quietude.” Still, Copan said that even amid concern about using the term, mindfulness is “such a good word. It does so much work that I can’t think of another word in which you aren’t saying 30 words or long sentences to get at what most people think of as mindfulness.”
It makes sense that such a thoughtful genre would require serious thought before jumping in, but luckily, at Chanticleer, we work with serious authors who approach their writing with care.
As always, reading in a genre helps writing in that genre. Check out our recommendations below!
GUIDED to WISDOM: The JOURNEY to EMOTIONAL HEALING
By Susan D’Agostino
Susan D’Agostino has wisdom to share, garnered from a lengthy battle with cancer and the medical establishment. This is her intimate story.
“In 2002 I found a lump in my breast, maybe the size of a pea.” Like anyone faced with a possible dire diagnosis, D’Agostino was scared and confused. Her encounters with medical people left her feeling like a statistic, and when she got the dreaded prognosis after a painful biopsy, it was accompanied by the standard recommended next steps: months of chemo and radiation treatment. Fearing the treatment almost as much as the cancer, she sought alternative healing methods.
SACRED LIFE: Healing from the Virus in Consciousness
By Bedri Cag Cetin
In his biographical work, Sacred Life: Healing from the Virus in Consciousness, Bedri Cag Cetin, Ph.D. explains his version of “The Golden Key,” a phrase he uses to formulate an “Inner Guide” which seeks above all else “…peace, happiness and harmony for all involved.”
Cetin uses his advanced education, world travels, failed and then healed personal relationships, business dealings, and training under spiritual leaders to formulate his thoughts. According to Cetin, decisions based on or that cause fear, chaos, or blame reflect Ego-driven actions in one’s journey toward inner peace; whereas using one’s Inner Guide to make decisions will result in peace and harmony.
InThe YOU beyond you – The knowledge of the willing, Ramzi Najjar addresses his audience with the contemplative calm of a mystic guru and the fervor of an old-time evangelist, in a how-to guide to good health, happiness, and inner peace as a personal philosophic treatise addressing the physical and spiritual quality of life in the 21stcentury.
In the Preface, Najjar quickly captures readers’ attention with the question, “In a chaotic world, and a life of prevalent restlessness, how can we make sense of the non-sensical?”
The Druids are not just a fictional group of magic wielders in funny hats, but a people of ancient Celtic cultures that prosper to this day. If you are looking for a short, accessible guide to the history and way of life of the Druid people, Ilene Birkwood offers an easy to understand introduction to Druidry in The Druids: An Informal Read. Druidry is not a religion like some may think, but a way of life through peace and preservation of nature.
Druids have seen a surge in numbers in recent years as a result of people around the globe feeling dissatisfied in a world continually damaged by pollution, greed, and war. These people wish to promote a more peaceful and simpler way of life. Birkwood’s guide touches on different areas of the culture throughout the long history of the druids, such as their education system, various sacred sites, history of persecution, and, yes, their roles as witches. Birkwood even shows us how Druidry is practiced today.
COCOON of CANCER: an INVITATION to LOVE DEEPLY
By Abbe Rolnick & Jim Wiggins
When author Abbe Rolnick’s husband Jim Wiggins slipped off a ladder in 2013, he was told he had osteopenia and would need to rest his back. He and Abbe went to Africa, but the pain persisted, in fact, got worse. Finally, the author “…got the call, the one every person dreads.” Jim had cancer, a rare, aggressive form called Multiple Myeloma. The plasma in his bone marrow had increased, taking over the normal cells, causing anemia and acidity that began to eat away at his spine. Life for Abbe and Jim would never be the same. What followed was a total disruption: for Jim it involved chemo, radiation, stem cell implants, pain, weight loss, and even height loss; for Abbe, an exploration of basic fears, and, of course, the deepest terror of loss of a loved one.
Rolnick’s book is told for the most part in a series of emails among friends and family. Since she is a fiction writer (River of Angels, Color of Lies) she was able to express her feelings to others, especially to Jim, in a manner both poignant and poetic. She recounts the couple’s simple acceptance, the moments of despair, and the daily activities and routines they shared despite the discouraging limitations of Jim’s medical necessities. Whenever possible, the couple cuddled at night, exchanged kisses, watched funny, upbeat fare on television. The memoir is remarkable for these moments, balanced by the necessary, at times dreadful and dire medical information that impinged on their lives every day for a year. The couple had to live away from home, ask family for help, including cells donated by a brother, and rely on the kindness and expertise of strangers. As Rolnick puts it, “Cancer explodes with ramifications.” Jim’s round-robin emails form an especially touching piece of the narrative as he attempts to apply logic, masculine bravado and a mild sense of humor to the horrors he is experiencing.
Looking to submit to our other Non-Fiction Divisions? See them all here!
When you’re ready,did you know that Chanticleer offers editorial services?We do and have been doing so since 2011.
Our professional editors are top-notch and are experts in the Chicago Manual of Style. They have and are working for the top publishing houses (TOR, McMillian, Thomas Mercer, Penguin Random House, Simon Schuster, etc.).
If you would like more information, we invite you to email Kiffer or Sharon at KBrown@ChantiReviews.com or SAnderson@ChantiReviews.com for more information, testimonials, and fees.
We work with a small number of exclusive clients who want to collaborate with our team of top-editors on an on-going basis.Contact us today!
Chanticleer Editorial Services also offers writing craft sessions and masterclasses. Sign up to find out where, when, and how sessions being held.
A great way to get started is with our manuscript evaluation service, with more information availablehere.
And we do editorial consultations for $75. Learn more here.
If you’re confident in your book, consider submitting it for a Editorial Book Reviewhereor to one of our Chanticleer International Awardshere.
And remember! Our 10th Anniversary Chanticleer Authors Conference (CAC22) will be April 7-10, 2022, where our 2021 CIBA winners will be announced. Space is limited and seats are already filling up, so sign up today! CAC22 and the CIBA Ceremonies will be hosted at the Hotel Bellwether in Beautiful Bellingham, Wash. Sign up and see the latest updates here!
Writer’s Toolbox
Thank you for reading this Chanticleer Spotlight Article.
