Dear Internet,
It’s late and I’ve just come back inside after hanging out on the front deck for a bit. It’s dark out; the kind of dark that is so deep and black, even the pin pricks made by the stars seem like interlopers to the night.
The kind of night made for Jason Voorhees.
(Last night was even spookier. The master bedroom is the in the loft of the cabin, I had the windows open and heard every movement by every beast in the area.)
I keep processing how geographically isolated I am right now. The nearest town is six miles down a straight road (or six miles in the other direction over a curvy road that hugs Lake Michigan) and while I have neighbors across the road who have lights on at their place, it could be for security rather than notification someone is at home. The only sounds I’ve heard all evening are the ticking of the clock in the main room of the cabin, the water heater and fridge kicking on and off, and the accordion sound of the plastic bag hung around the internal open exit of the metal chimney that used to connect to a gas stove.
(We discovered while the chimney is screened and capped outside, moths, rain, and other tiny creatures were still getting inside so TheHusband mcguyvered the bag to catch the detritus from the outside world. It works, but the downside is the bag moves when the wind moves so it blooms and closes with each movement. It’s alternately creepy to hear but also strangely soothing at the same time.)
I was feeling exhausted after my long day yesterday and put myself into bed at 8PM, with the laptop in tow. I started doing research for my book and when I eventually took a break, it was nearing 1AM. I took melatonin for the first time as I needed to get some relief to sleep without taking Klonopin, which when taken for consecutive periods, makes me feel drugged the following day. The melatonin worked as I was out within 10 minutes.
It worked so well, I didn’t wake up until nearly 11:30AM, 9.5 hours later.
I planned my day around having dinner with my brother this evening, since I did not know how long that was going to take and I wanted to make sure I got a lot of work done before we went out.
That did not work out as well as I had hoped.
I was planning on doing more research and start working on the structure of the book when I realised tomorrow was the 16th anniversary of my online journal and I had planned on writing something to celebrate. The draft had been sitting for months as a reminder and I figured it would only take me a few hours to get it written, polished, and formatted and then I could continue with the rest of my plans.
I, regrettably, was horribly off on my time management.
I had the piece half done before my brother and his coworker showed up around 3PM and they were itching to have an early dinner. As the restaurant we were going to didn’t open until 4PM, that meant drinks until it was time to leave. On our way to the restaurant, the TPS was showing my front right tire was low on air, which was odd because I just had the tires checked on Monday before heading out of town.
After dinner, we drove to the village gas station/grocery store/pizza place/deli/butcher/movie rental place to check the pressure and all of the tires were registering at the right PSI. After picking up a few staples at the gas station/grocery store/pizza place/deli/butcher/movie rental place, I headed back to the cabin, parked, and read the owners manual to figure out what the fuck was going on. Apparently when the pressure of the tires is changed (and in this case, my tires were over inflated to 39 PSI instead of regulated 32 PSI), the TPS needs to be reset, which didn’t happen. I reset the TPS and the warning gauge finally cleared. However, my brother noted when following me into the village, my left rear driver’s tire was rotating at an odd angle, meaning it wasn’t rolling up and down but rather it looked like it was rolling more at an angle.
(The tire place I got my tires from has a store in Traverse City, so I’m going to be heading there tomorrow morning to have a check. If there is something majorly wrong, while there is no MINI dealer in the area there is a BMW one, so I should be fine.)
By the time I was done fucking with my car and getting back into the groove, it was coming on 6PM. I figured I had a good six more hours to work tonight, with maybe one MAYBE two hours geared towards finishing the anniversary piece.
That piece was finished at 10:30PM and came in at 2300 words. Then it was a break to sit outside for a bit, listen to the gods ruffle their skirts, and here we are.
Tomorrow I’m going to buckle down and start making progress on my large writing ToDo list. Right now the goal is to get up fairly early, get into town to have the tire looked at and dealt with and be back at the cabin no later than noon. Thursday, sans car issues, will be more of the same of writing. Friday I’m going kayaking with Emili, and Kristin is coming out to have bro time on Friday evening. On Saturday evening, Kristin and I are going to head up to the dark sky park to watch the stars with my telescope and camp out for the night. Sunday we head back to the cabin, and then we head to our respective homes.
xoxo,
Lisa
Tag: amwriting
writerly influence
Dear Internet,
It has been a long day.
It’s not even 8PM and I’m ready to call it a night.
My day worked out something like this:
- Up at 7:15A
- Finish packing, shower
- Run first batch of errands (four stops including a drive through breakfast)
- Shrink at 10:30A
- Run second batch of errands (three stops)
- Back home around 12:30P, bathroom, load car
- Run third batch of errands (two stops)
- Drive ~3 hours to Throbbing Cabin, arrive about 4PM
- Unpack car, get cabin open, unpack packing
- Dinner
- More unpacking
- Prep breakfast for tomorrow
And now I’ve gotten ready for bed.
Tomorrow is going to be cold, rainy, and a high of 59F, which means my plans for beaching and other outdoor activities has been curtailed. It may mean I lay in bed reading all day and then getting to work on the reason why I’m up here: to write.
Speaking of which, just found out one of the pieces I submitted for publication has been rejected. I’ve got another pitch floating out there that has a definite timeline, ergo if I don’t hear from them within a set time limit, they thank me for their consideration and please try again at another time.
[iframe src=”//giphy.com/embed/sXv0vaA4331Ti” width=”600″ height=”312″ frameBorder=”0″ webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen]
It’s strange.
I was worried once I got my first official rejection, I would say, “Fuck you!” and give up but that didn’t quite happen. Sure, I’m upset but I don’t feel defeated.
I’m still processing how this all works.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. Consolation: Eating a frozen whoopie pie as big as my head.
This Day in Lisa-Universe:
TheHusband came in and told me how much he appreciated me and is encouraging of my work. I am noting this as I am naturally suspicious.
Dear Internet,
In our household, neither TheHusband nor myself are one for blowing smoke up each other’s arses. Thus when he showed up in my office this morning to tell me how much he appreciates everything I do and asked how he could be more encouraging of my work, I was naturally suspicious.
TheHusband is a snugglesaurus par excellence, but expressing himself verbally is not his forte. Hence my suspicion when the outpouring comes because it is so unexpected that I am inclined to narrow my eyes a little and start probing him with questions.
When you think about it, I’m the one being the jerk here when he’s the one wearing his heart on his basketball shorts.
(And he is the only person alive who is allowed to call me “Pookie Bear” without irony or fear of losing an appendage.)
It has been documented we have a very complicated mating ritual.
««««»»»»
My brain is on fire. It is spinning so fast, I feel at any moment it is going to whiz out of my skull and splat against the wall.
Mania has beset me this week, which is why I’ve been negligent on the daily walks. When it gets to the point where I need to start taking Klonopin to bring me down to normal human speed, even a half dose in the middle of the day, on a near daily basis, productivity slows down to a crawl. If I take Klonopin more than a couple of days in a row, even if my head is buzzing a million miles an hour, I physically feel exhausted and barely able to function.
It becomes a delicate balance of what can I accomplish before needing to take the drugs so I can stop being in mental pain.
««««»»»»
This week was filled with Adult Responsibilities aka I had to wear pants and leave the house. I met with our new CPA on Wednesday and my lawyer on Thursday, both for the reason of completing a LLC on Pookie Bear Industries (not really the name though TheHusband was championing for it).
Why the LLC? Well, a couple of reasons with the main one being as that I’m in the process of lining up some freelance work, I need to be able to write off expenses related to the freelancing. I’m also planning on doing some self-publishing work that if I have a LLC, it will just look better professionally.
(There a metric fuck ton of homework that I need to do for both the CPA and the lawyer, so I’m trying to squeak that out when my head is not inflamed. Sometimes being an adult is hard.)
««««»»»»
I knew going into this I would not be writing every single day, at least not on a single project everyday, and I did know I needed to square out space for household activities to allow me to write uninterrupted. When I’m at home, I feel inclined to do all the domestic work needed and letting that overrun when I should be doing something related to this new adventure. But as I start to get a feel for my schedule and tackling much needed domestic things and Adult Responsibilities, it often comes to early evening before I even have that space to write. Coupled with the mania as of late, it’s all been a well managed chaos.
I will say I’m pretty pleased that even with how my brain is feeling, I set out a small goal todos every day and get those done without too much pain or stress. I’ve started documenting every single thing I’ve done for the day, no matter how minute, in DayOne so I can have better accountability and will making writing up my monthly summary easier.
Monday I’m heading up to Throbbing Cabin solo to work for a week without interruption. The goal is to get the bulk of the work I’ve outlined a few days ago started and in some sort of decent shape. This weekend will be spent doing work on the back end of the work. Without having a snugglesaurus TheHusband around or domesticity to tempt me out of my working lair, I will be able to buckle down and zone out in my worlds.
The kind of day I’m structuring will float something like this: Wake up, take a hike around the area (hence the daily walks will resume), get some writing done. Eat something. Get some more writing done. Eat some more. Do a bit of reading. Hang out at the beach with my telescope. Sleep.
If that does work, I am hoping to be travelling up to Throbbing Cabin as much as I can solo until the snows fall. And maybe, if TheHusband is very good, he can come visit.
xoxo,
Lisa
quote: Ellen Klages On Google Research
I play on the web as if Google was a pinball machine, caroming and bouncing from link to link to tangent, making notes about odd factoids that catch my eye.
Ellen Klages
WIP: July writing schedule
Dear Internet,
It’s mid late Sunday afternoon and we’re still up at Throbbing Cabin. TheHusband and I are teaching ourselves how to relax and he’s doing a fine job of it at the moment if his snoring is any indication by cleaning the gutters and other yard work.
Me, on the other hand? I‘m actually working but it’s the kind of work I love to do so it is actually fun, not work. Following him around the perimeter of the cabin with the shop vac on my shoulder so he can suck up all of the last years worth of leaves from the gutters. And isn’t this what the whole adventure was to be about in the first place?
Fuck. I was tricked into doing yard work.
Moving on. I am not allowing myself feel guilty for not getting much writing work done my first official week into this new venture. Domesticity had to be done and so it was and now that I have a sort of rhythm going to my day and making heavy use of my calendar, I’m sort of figuring out what direction I’m going in.
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. When I’m not being tricked into doing yard work, that is.
Today’s writing task was to sort through all of my scraps stored on Google Drive and Dropbox, consolidate them and remove the duplicates, then import non-journal based things into a Scrivener project I manage for such works I titled Story Ideas. Story Ideas is my launching pad for all of my fiction writing as any idea, line, scrap of something lands up here and organized into one of seven main sections, Book Ideas, Story Ideas, Stories in Progress, Outtakes, Research, Scrivener Projects (projects with their own Scrivener project file), and Completed.
Most of this is pretty self-explanatory except perhaps for Outtakes which is chunks of writing I’ve removed for whatever reason and did not want to trash and Research, which is links to things I want to dig into more but not sure what for just yet.
This task turned into the rabbit hole of all holes as I have folders inside of folders in various places across Dropbox and Google Drive. I’ve now made a ToDo item to dig more to figure out what each piece is (journal entry? prose? short story? something else entirely?) and sort it out later. Everything that could easily sorted today got moved into Scrivener to keep it all in one location.
Right now the stats are
- 46 story ideas (various states)
- 16 book ideas (mainly first few chapters, synopsis, and related material)
- 8 short stories in progress (most are near completion)
- 8 notes in Research
- 4 completed short stories
- 2 existing Scrivener projects
This does not include all the notes I’ve made in paper journals or index cards not yet transferred, notes made in SimpleMind for an Icelandic saga cycle I’m working on, or what other treasures are still lurking on my drives.
(If this all sounds impressive, it is and isn’t. I had no idea the sheer amount of prolificness BUT a lot of it is dreck. I’ve got NaNoWriMo projects dating back to 2001 (and novels started as far back as 1999) that are very clear indicators of what I was into at the time, which isn’t the same as I am into now. 95% of this will probably never see the light of day as it’s pretty bad, thank fuck.)
The big thing I need is accountability, because this current organization in its natural chaotic state is a hot mess.
At the beginning of the month I’ll put up my writing plan and at the end, summarize what I did. I’m not going to do word counts (yet) because I have no idea how to apply it realistically. From June 28th – July 5th, on the blog alone, I cranked out 9, 724 words over 13 blog posts. That’s not including work I’ve done on note taking, story editing, and anything else since I don’t have those numbers. So word counts are out (for now).
Additionally, TheHusband wants to see some kind of timeline of my work progress so he knows when he needs me to crack the whip or for me to calm the fuck down. All very civilized in our household.
Behold! Projects for July:
- Launch lisarabey.com finally
- Plow through current library loans and ARCs from NetGalley and get reviews written
- Collate notes on the Edwardian mystery, continue with research, and get most of the structure sorted
- Start fleshing out 45th parallel story
- Finish or shelve in-progress short stories and submit completed ones
- Get Vol 1 of secret Kindle project completed and online
- Continue note carding ideas / quotes / etc for future projects
Is this a lot? It feels like a lot but at the same time it feels like I’ve barely scratched the surface of what I feel what needs to be done.
When I check in 25 days, we’ll see how it went!
xoxo,
Lisa
This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2003
Writer How To: my writer website part ii
Dear Internet,
On Sunday I talked about what authors should (and shouldn’t) have on their websites, yesterday I broke down the branding, design, and infrastructure of my own author website, and today I am going to discuss main navigation and why I set it up this way, child pages, what’s left to do on my author site, and base plugins you should use for your own WordPress site.
Here is the landing page of my author site again:
Let’s take a look at the main navigation, home, bio, fiction, other writing, blog, and contact. Each of these links are to the minimum pages an author should have as I mentioned on Sunday.
Home will bring you back to the main page.
ProTip: If you include an image header on your page, make it a clickable link back to your main page. This way if people get lost in your site, they have an easy way to get back to the beginning.
Bio will contain the short and extended about me along with a headshot of some kind.
Fiction will contain all the fiction work (short stories, novels, novellas, etc) with links to purchase or to read.
Other writing will link to mainly non-fiction and academic works.
Blog will take you directly to EPbaB.
Contact will take you to a contact form.
ProTip: I’ve heard both sides of the story on whether or not to keep a contact form. One argument is that it creates a barrier with your readers, can get confusing, and you’re not entirely sure if the form was sent or not. My personal experience, having managed websites other than my own with contact forms, is you’re more apt to get people writing in using the form rather than if you provide a simple email link. I will more than likely include an email link on the form itself to give people the option.
ProTip 2: Interestingly, the sites I looked at for Sunday’s piece had a lot of the writer’s putting their reps as the contacts but no way to directly contact the writers themselves. “For foreign rights, email joeschmoe@you.com. For media inquiries email yourmom@thejeez.com.” I thought that was interesting.
Let’s take a look at one of the child pages.
I’ve clicked on other writing. We know the link we’ve clicked on takes us to the right page by a few clues. The first clue is the word other writing in the navigation bar is now white instead of grey. Second clue is the breadcrumb shows us where we are, and thirdly, we have a header that tells us on what page we’re on.
As far as design goes, all the child pages will look identical to this one. We have our main navigation at the top so we can bounce around. Our header image from the landing page has been resized to fit comfortably and allow content without (much) scrolling. The right hand sidebar has the same content as the landing page sidebar. The main content box is easy to read and links are easy to find. Header text is obvious and tells us what the page will contain. Lastly, we have a sharing bar that allows us to share the content across various social networks.
ProTip: I debated on having a share option on these pages since they will remain mostly static, but thought it might be useful if I write a trillion short stories and someone wants a printable version or share it with their BFFs across the social sphere. This is another plugin within Jetpack that allows you to cherry pick social networks you can share across. Plus I get annoyed when I find a page that does not have sharing enabled, so better turned on then turned off.
Now that we’ve got the main infrastructure in place and a design we like, let’s sum it up:
- We have (potentially) cohesive design that works with my other sites
- Each site is clearly identifiable of what it is and links to its brethren
- The design and structure are responsive and mobilized
- The layout and navigation clear and easy to use
- Pages are well marked
- Typography is pleasing easy on the eyes, link colors are bold
Over the course of a week I’ve put about five to six hours of work in with a couple more hours left to go. Since most of the work was design and infrastructure, the least bit is content which should take less time but in my case, I’m importing all the writing works over from EPbaB to the author site for consistency, so that’s taking a bit longer.
What’s left for me to do:
- Fill out content of child pages
- Flesh out widgets in right hand sidebar
- Check for grammar and spelling errors as well as verb consistency
- Tweak accessibility
- Export over to live site
Now that we’ve got the site in place, content sorted, let’s talk about the base plugins we can use to make the site even better.
- Jetpack for WordPress has over 30 plugins in one beautiful package. I use the following: contact form, custom CSS, enhanced distribution, extra sidebar widgets, JSON API, mobile theme, monitor, notifications, omnisearch, publicize, sharing, shortcode embeds, site verification, spelling and grammar, subscriptions, wp.me shortlinks, widget visibility, and wordpress.com stats. A lot of these plugins have variations available individually on WordPress’s site, but I like knowing that Jetpack is constantly updated, added to, and guaranteed to work with the latest versions of WordPress itself.
- All In One SEO Pack Search Engine Optimization is how web crawlers find you, index you, and then report back when people are searching for you. While the metrics and math can get complex, you can significantly increase your traffic by following a few simple SEO rules. This plugin does the work for you. Here is why you should use it: a few months ago I was wondering what other writer’s sites looked like, so I did some basic keyword searching and found — nothing. Well, almost nothing. Today while thinking about the same search, I wondered if there would be a difference if I swapped out the term “writer” for “author” and the answer turned out be a surprising fuck yes. I also duplicated near same results in Bing.
This tells me a lot. One, it tells me how Google (and Bing) are indexing content. Two, it tells me even if a writer type person doesn’t use the word “author” anywhere on their website, or metadata, to be indexed, Google and Bing still sort them out as “authors” and list them under that search term but not under “writer.” The search engine derivatives of “writer” seemingly refer to magazines, goods, and services. So if you prefer the term writer to author, this could hurt you in terms of SEO. Now most people interchange author/writer, but there is apparently a difference with the gist referring to a writer as someone who technically writes whatever (just as a baker bakes) while an author is someone who comes up with the ideas and plans to execute the writing. Someone can apparently be both. Another argument is a writer is someone who is unpaid while an author is a paid professional.
Whatever you believe or agree with, the bottom line is if you want to make sure you’re getting properly indexed, you need to use SEO to make sure all of your bases are covered so use author/writer in your SEO markup even if you use only one term in your content. - Breadcrumb NavXT The easiest and most complete way to set up breadcrumbs on your site.
- Broken Link Checker Nothing more annoying than going to a site, clicking on a link and discovering it was dead. This plugin actively scans your links (internal and external) and reports back which links are broken and with what kind of errors. Super handy to use and makes your site look a million times more profesh since you can clean up errors and change links from across the site in a single page .
- Google XML Sitemaps One way to make your site easily indexed by any search engine, on top of SEO, is by having a XML sitemap on the ready. This plugin generates a new XML sitemap based upon your specifications, which can get pretty in-depth. It automatically notifies Google and Bing of any updates.
- Analytics How are people finding you? How many page views are you getting a day? How many visitors have you had? Jetpack comes bundled with its own analytics, but you may want to use another one or two more as not all analytics software are created equal. I use Google Analytics (which is part of Google Webmaster Tools) and StatCounter.
This has been a quick and dirty walk through on getting a simple author website up and running that is not only informative but eye catching as well. There is a lot more (isn’t there always?), but this should give you a good understanding of why things are done a certain way and access to tools that can accomplish your goals.
Cheers!
xoxo,
Lisa
This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2010
Writer How To: my writer website part i
Dear Internet,
It seemed only fair after I doled out all that advice yesterday, I should show you the money. I’m going to throw down my author’s website, software and apps I use, as well as design thoughts and more.
As I mentioned yesterday, TheHusband suggested I keep my author site separate from Exit, Pursued by a Bear (where you’re located at now) and my librarian site. I agreed. However, since I am going to have three sites to maintain, they all need to be consistent and relate to each other in some fashion.
A couple of years ago, I designed business cards using the image of three year old me holding a phone as the main graphic, which was also the main header image at EPbaB for a long time. The cards were a huge success when I handed them out and people easily remembered who I was later on. Since it was time to make new cards, I expanded on that idea and decided to use the same concept across my sites.
(If you click on the images, it will open up a new tab with a larger image for greater detail.)
Exit, Pursued by a Bear – Online Journal (Theme: Mon Cahier child)
Cunning Tales From A Systems Librarian – Librarian Site (Theme: Elucidate)
Lisa Rabey – Writer (Theme: Arcade Basic)
The only site I’m not 100% happy with is my librarian site, which I will futz more with later. There are also couple of other things I can do to make all three sites more cohesive, but the idea is there and I like where this is going. The Lisa Rabey Empire is coming to fruition!
Now that I know how I’m branding the author site, I played with the freely available themes at WordPress until I found one that would work for my needs and required as little hacking as possible.
ProTip: I exported a year’s worth of entries from EPbaB and imported them into the test site to see how the theme handled a wide variety of posts and formating.
I looked for a theme that allowed: Custom header, adding breadcrumbs easily, two column so I could have a sidebar, and top navigation bar that wouldn’t get lost when you scrolled. I like white backgrounds with no textures, and I wanted something that was eye popping. It also had to work mobilized via the Jetpack for WordPress plugin. I settled on Arcade Basic.
ProTip: As someone who likes things quick and to the point, Jetpack for WordPress is one of the best plugins you could install and make your life insanely easy. I know a lot of my more advanced WordPress/coding friends are not a fan of this plugin for a variety of reasons, but as someone who wants no fuss, no muss and ease to use? This thing is a godsend.
When you land at my author’s site, you see a young Lisa with her pops as the landing graphic. There is a top navigation bar for home, bio, fiction, other writing, blog, and contact. Here is all the basic information I mentioned yesterday clearly listed and easy to find.
In the middle of the landing page is a box that says See More. When you click on it, it jumps down to the second half of the landing page where there is additional content (there is also a scroll bar in the right hand side if you want to use that instead).
ProTip: I’m not crazy about the wording of “see more” so I may just change it to something else, which will be easy enough.
Excuse my rudimentary Photoshop.
The navigation bar stayed in place when we hopped down the page, which is why even though I know a lot of people hate these giant graphic landing pages, I loved this one because you don’t lose your navigation.
The main content box is a quick about me / this site. There is also a search box, social media links, and a news feed.
ProTip: Having learned my lesson trying to maintain blogs across variety of sites, I found a work around that allows me to keep this site looking like it’s constantly updated without stress by using the Appearance->Widgets->RSS widget within WordPress. Every category and tag in WordPress has its own RSS feed, so I can pull a specific feeds to show up in this particular widget box. There is no limit to the number of RSS widgets you can use. For the news widget, I mark all my writing stuff under the “writing” category on EPbaB and the feed is pushed on the author site. I do the same thing on the my librarian site, under recent posts in the sidebar, which has its own category for the very same reason.
To recap: I write everything on EPbaB and the RSS feed for a specific category are fed to specific sites based on feed name. If people are interested in the whole shebang of the blog, they can click on blog in the top navigation.
I wanted two columns because I need the ability to add/remove things as necessary for whatever reason without losing the main content box or forcing people to scroll to the bottom. When I get a newsletter up and running, books to buy, or whatever, it will go in the right hand side bar. Additionally, Jetpack has a feature that allows you to show certain widgets on certain types of pages for more customization.
Tomorrow we’re going to look at the main navigation and why I set it up this way, child pages, what’s left to do on my author site, and base plugins you should use for your WordPress site.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. As my author site is not live quite yet, but I do link to it, so if you find a broken link, that’s why.
This day in Lisa-Universe:
Writer How To: the writer’s website
Dear Internet,
This is a bit of a chicken and the egg conundrum: Do I write a bit on the launch my new writers’ site and then talk about what went into it or do I write about the influences and decision making first?
I decided to go with the egg first.
One thing I wanted to get done immediately on this new career of mine, even if it was damned near empty, was my writer site. TheHusband suggested, and I agreed, that having a site dedicated to my work would make my life easier in the long run rather than trying to shove everything under the EPBaB banner or tossing it over in my librarian profesh site.
While I’ve always mentally noted what I’ve liked or didn’t like when I came across an writer’s site, I wanted to see what others thought. A couple of weeks ago, I started asking around the Internet what people liked / didn’t like / expected on their favorite writer’s websites. Do writers need one and if so, what should they include on it?
A couple of days later, Katie Dunneback asked the same thing with the intent to write a piece on the results. She and I more or less got the same responses which could best be summed up as:
Short answer: Yes. Everything but the kitchen sink.
Long answer:
(Italicized is Katie’s round up, non-italicized is my addendums)
- Information about upcoming releases
- Synopsis, book trailers, ways to get ARCs
- Excerpts from past, current, and upcoming releases
- Publication history about previously published works whether they are currently in print or not* – double points for printable (we librarians have patrons who still really prefer getting a piece of paper from us)
- Sorted by format: Short stories, novels, novellas, and so forth. Also break out non-fiction work from your fiction work. If your work has been published online, links to to the work.
- Reading order information for series* (this includes “you don’t have to read these in order!”) – again, printable
- If you write under multiple names for multiple works, make sure the sites connect or list everything in one site
- Also, book club information would be grand
- Contact information* – Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, other social media du jour, email (maybe I’d like to book you for a program if I were to book programs for my library), newsletter sign up link/form
- At the very, VERY least, a newsletter and email form for contact. Many of my friends said they mainly follow people on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr but like Katie points out, having email form for contact is great.
- Newsletter is fantastic if you don’t plan on writing a blog or have a news page
- Biography – @surlyspice suggests two: 1 brief and 1 expanded
- Every cover that your book has ever had
- Direct links to where to buy your books
- Not just to your publisher, but also any retailer (online or brick and mortar) that sells them and or you want supported
- Events /Appearances (online and off)
- Influences or “you may like me because”
- News page. Example: “I just sold the rights to Three Blind Mice to Germany — here is the new cover.” “I have a new story coming out in Fairytales Unlimited, you can read it here.” “I’ve been nominated for a Locas, Hugo, and Wednesday awards. Please go vote for me.”
- Blog. If not integrated into your site, at least a link from your site to the blog, and a link on your blog back to your site.
- Awards won and reviews
- Periodically updated
- Press kit (bio, selected list of works, professional grade headshot)
- FAQ page
- Easy to navigate, content is easy to read
The very bare bones site should contain: about (this site), bio (brief/extended), list of works, sorted by format; contact info. If you’re on social media, make sure to link to those sites. Same with a blog. Readers build relationships with the writers just as much as they do with characters of the stories they are reading. Some have said that the less they know about writer, the less likely they would be read more of their works.
With that in mind, I decided to poll the last 20 writers I have or am currently reading from my GoodReads account to see what I could find on their online presences. The genre classifications comes directly from GoodReads and I wanted to see if it had any bearing on site design or content. (Hint: It doesn’t.)
(If the embed isn’t working for you, you can view the spreadsheet in full.)
[iframe src=”https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TXSjg2dqvbImUJ8MLo7Z3HVp6t6sXcMzwudrYP6EROA/pubhtml?widget=true&headers=false”]
- 18 had websites
- 18 had some sort of bibliography available, but five of those were only partial lists
- 17 are on social media but only 10 actually linked to their social media accounts
- 16 had an about page
- 15 direct linked to buying their works online
- 11 were built on WordPress
- 11 had a contact page (not social media links)
- 11 had a news or a blog
- 6 had a FAQ page
- 6 had newsletters
- 2 had a link to donate / tip jars
A million years ago, Kristin and I started a research project on the online presence of public libraries in Michigan and the stats were kind of along the same vein. Libraries bitching no one is using their online services, but libraries aren’t putting the work into building their virtual front door.
I haven’t even dug more into SEO, branding, marketing, and maintenance of the sites either which by looking at what stats I have available now, would be a complete nightmare to untangle.
Some of you are looking at the list at the very beginning and are thinking, “Fuck. That is a lot of work.” And you’re right, it is. But being a writer these days is a lot more than sitting down and spinning stories. My pal Saladin Ahmed recently quipped that he felt like he did more administrative work for his writing than actual writing work — and he’s a 100% right. I’ve been writing for years, but as I start unraveling the pandorica of submission, editing, publishing, and more, my todo lists now have todo lists. Now I have to schedule time when admin work is done versus writing time is done.
Look, I get it. A lot of people think the Internet is a fad, some don’t give a fuck, and even more think it’s a waste of time to have a new fangled website. Or they don’t want to spend the money, the energy, or the time. But as a reader, a writer, and a librarian (not in any preferential order), I can tell you with surety if I can’t find your work, if I can’t get a list of your books without looking at the back mater of a printed copy, or you don’t have a Wikipedia page, how in the fuck do you expect the people you’re writing for to find you?
If you want your work to be read and you want to build a community around your work, you need to have an online presence and you need to keep it updated. You can’t fuck around anymore thinking having only a Facebook fan page (like Helen Fielding) is enough or that your sparsely, outdated website is sufficient. As a reader, I want to know more of what you wrote. As a librarian, I want to get printed lists of your works to my patron. As a writer, I’m looking at your practices as to whether or not model my own after yours.
Anyone with any level of technology can create a website these days. You can knock out a pretty professionaly looking site with Tumblr or WordPress.com in a few hours if you don’t want the pains of going tits to the wall and buying a domain and hosting plans. And then spend a few hours a month making sure it’s updated with all of your current work and news.
If you’re not willing to put the time in to get your work out there, how do you expect your readers to do the same?
xoxo,
Lisa
Taking A Gap Year To Write A Book
Dear Internet,
A few weeks ago, I teased there was a big announcement coming, and I am finally in a position to make that announcement:
I’m taking a gap year to write a (fiction) book(s).
Come July 1, 2014, I will officially have the new status of “writer in residence at Throbbing Manor/Cabin.”
Many of you, hell most of the population probably already knows this since I’ve had to tell people privately for a variety of reasons over the last couple of months, but I wanted something official and concrete on paper. I was holding out until I got the official rejection from the job I interviewed for in April1. I was also holding out until I could get in touch with a few close friends so they knew before it became a Facebook status update. I was able to make that last final personal connection on Friday, so here we are!
Here are some of the big questions I’ve been asked: How did I get here, what am I writing, and what is happening with library land?
How did I get here
This is all TheHusband’s idea.
Truly.
He’s known me forever (nearly two decades) and he knows the ultimate goal in my life was to write books. While he’s pretty supportive of my ideas, he also knows me well enough to know I can only handle one big thing at a time; whether that thing is a job, writing, or getting a degree. I’ve conceded long ago I’m not someone who can multitask big projects easily. Before I left my job at UUNet in 2002 to go back to university full time, I had signed up, attended classes, and either dropped or failed out of three colleges. If I wanted my undergrad degree, it had to be THE ONLY thing — I could not work full time and go to class. Once I made it the only thing, then I sailed through it with a breeze (while amping up my GPA from 1.7 to 3.3).
But you know, life happens. It always happens. I had an opportunity to write full time in between degrees, but choose not to because I wanted cash in the pocket,as I was tired of being broke, more than my dream. I had a second opportunity after I graduated from library school and I was on that dreadful job hunt where I applied for 114 jobs over 8 months before landing at GRCC. TheHusband bargained if I could not get a job within 100 applications, I could write full time. I pushed on to 114 as we had just moved to Grand Rapids and boom! Job at GRCC.
“I’ll write part-time,” I said. (Look how well that turned out.)
For the last year, I’ve been in big debate about whether or not to accept the contract when it came up for renewal. Six months ago, I found out they were not renewing my contract and if I wanted to keep my job, I had to reapply just like everyone else on the open market. In January, I knew for sure I was not going to reapply for the position. After making that decision, I started the arduous task of the job hunt version 2.0.
Even during mania, I would get crushed under the soul sucking weight of job hunting and with each opportunity came along, I did not feel elated — I felt like I was being ripped apart. TheHusband and I sat down and ran budget simulations, figures, and possible outcomes across a wide variety of scenarios. Right after I phone interviewed with the California institution, TheHusband came to me and said, “Why not take a year off to write?” His reasoning was it would be much cheaper for us to stay put while I wrote, where we could maintain our current lifestyle (with some heavy regulation), without putting us in massive debt. I lept at the chance. And mentally felt like I lost a massive weight on my soul.
Since we made this decision two days before I was scheduled to fly out for my second interview, we decided if they offered me the job and it was beyond fantastic, I’d take it. Anything else, we would not accept or if I was passed on the position then I would go forth and write.
What am I writing
I’ve got numerous projects already lined up:
- I’ll be co-editing a non-fiction book on lib/tech/gender issues that is slated to come out next year #fingerscrossed
- In the fiction realm (which is why I’m taking the time off), I’ve got two books in process (one of them my edwardian series I’ve been keen on for the last three years to finish), and one, possibly two, anthology of short stories based on two different cycles
- Graphic novel
- Other projects / ideas
- Freelance work
TheHusband and I spent some considerable time putting together a business plan (not a typo) on how create, manage, and also make passive income while I’m writing. I still need to work out a schedule, and we’re thinking of getting space at a local a co-working joint. There is a lot of back end work that needs to be done in conjunction while I write.
What is happening with library land
Or more to the point, “What happens if you fail miserably and everyone hates your books?” Easy: I’ll go back into librarianship. TheHusband and I have not defined what it means to be successful yet, but the low bar is any kind of income I can generate from writing. Then who knows.
I’m still very much want to be on the pulse of the profession, so for many of you, it will be like I’ve never left. I’m keeping my memberships and plan to still be active. I’ve got a few projects that I will be working on, but as for the day to day stuff, I won’t be there.
This is already getting far lengthier than I had anticipated, so expect more tidbits and updates on this to continue.
But I just want to say, to those whom I’ve already told and whose support was not even a teeny bit wavering on this new path: THANK YOU! ♥ Seriously, I am floored by how supportive people have been. I love you all!
x0x0,
Lisa
This Day in Lisa-Universe:
1. I met my competitor at a conference prior to our interviews and we were in simultaneous shock when we discovered we were both being flown out to do the second round. After my interview, I was told it would be 1-2 weeks for the decision. I found out within that period, from my competitor, they had offered him the job, he had already negotiated his salary, and was in the final throes of finalizing details. I had YET to hear from the institution, so I waited. Three weeks after the interview, I emailed my contact a polite follow up request and it was nearly another week before they got back to me. So we’re a month plus past my interview and I’ve already known via the Internet I didn’t get the job for nearly three weeks of that time.
the symbol of the thing in the thing itself
Dear Internet,
I want to take Chingy’s Holidae In and gender reverse the roles, something along the lines of Law Revue Girls’ Defined Lines. As I can neither rap and laughably have moves that no way indicate my decade of dance lessons as a child, someone else should get on that toot suite.
««««»»»»
TheHusband asked me how I was doing with the social media sabbatical, I found myself answering honestly — I kind of have not missed it. Oh sure, there have been times when I want to just brain dump and Twitter is a natural fit for that activity or there are times when I find this really awesome link and I can’t really share it excent on my weekly roundup, which doesn’t quite have the same satisfaction.
Before I took the sabbatical, I was often finding myself posting a link or a quote from somewhere and spending more than say 2 or 3 tweets giving my opinion on the matter. Which is, frankly, kind of useless giving the context of how Twitter works. Someone coming in on the middle of me bestowing random commentary would be confused. I was churning how to handle this since I recognize this is not Twitter’s intent and that I often get cross when others do the same trick. I came up with linking, asides of things I want to share but do not want to get buried in the weekly round-up.
««««»»»»
I’ve started Clarice Lispector’s Near to the Wild Heart and it is beyond exquisite. I injected half the book in one sitting last night and had stop because I was getting woozy on a Lispector overdose. She adroitly does things to language and words, even in translation from Portuguese to English that is just breathtaking. I am having trouble reconciling that it was published in 1943 as it reads so contemporary. Reading Lispector is breathing flames under the muse for me and I’m reconsidering how to write fiction.
I’m terrible at fiction. I always feel so damned constricted when trying to form the rules of the game, my writing comes out halting and unsure. I’ve got brilliant ideas for stories, I see the stories in my head as they are played out but getting them onto paper? No. The ease of my language sounds immature and protracted. Sure, you could argue if I practice more it would mature and grow and there is some truth into that. But I think because I’ve been reading tightly bound prose for so long, I’m near drunk on Lispector’s stream of consciousness and realising that yes, this is how you do it. This is how you give birth to a story and how it will end.
Feral. Unstructured and messy, like life.
xoxo,
Lisa