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Writers: Working with Louise Cusack

Tag Archives: publishing

Kindle Scout: Reader-powered publishing

05 Monday Dec 2016

Posted by louisecusack in Getting Published series, The Publishing Industry, Uncategorized

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

amazon, Amazon publishing, books, Kindle publishing, Kindle Scout, literature, publishing, Unpublished Manuscript, writing

scoutpreview

If you’ve never heard of Kindle Scout, don’t feel bad. Until last week, I hadn’t heard of it either, but it’s shaping up to be a game changer for indie authors, as well as traditionally published authors who have a book they just can’t sell, like my unpublished novel SILK (above). SILK is book one of a fantasy romance series that I’ve been trying to sell for years, and I’d love to see it gain a wider readership than I can manage with self publishing, so I’m giving Scout a shot.

HOW SCOUT WORKS: Any Amazon customer can go to the Kindle Scout website (you can see my book on their website here: https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/GDATHRYHT8YR) and without needing special logins beyond their normal Amazon account, they can scroll through lists of unpublished books that authors have uploaded and nominate any three. If a book that they nominate is selected by Amazon for publication, the reader receives a free copy as a bonus for supporting the author.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR AMAZON: Publishers are getting savvy about ‘author platform’ and a great book is often not enough to get you a publishing contract. In the Kindle Scout model,  Amazon is not only assessing the popularity of your book excerpt and cover, they’re assessing your social networks (which should equal new readers for them if they publish you). In the “campaign stats” for your book, you can see where the page traffic is coming from. Here are my stats at day 4 of my campaign:

campaignstats5dec2016

I’ve got over 1000 Facebook friends on my personal page, and I called in favours to get shares of my post about SILK there. I also have a Facebook Author page with 1200 Likes, so I’ve boosted that post on Facebook over the next few days to those followers who I hope will take the time to check out the book and nominate it. So my traffic from Facebook is looking good so far. I imagine that as my campaign progresses, the traffic from Kindle Scout will slow as all the habitual ‘scouts’ have looked at SILK and either chosen it or not. However, for all I know there could be hundreds of new ‘scouts’ turning up on the Kindle Scout website every day, so I look forward to assessing that as I go.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR YOU: The end result of your 30 day campaign is that if your book is wildly popular, Amazon may offer you a 5 year contract with a $1,500 advance and 50% eBook royalty rate for worldwide publication rights for eBook and audio formats in all languages. (Authors retain all other rights, including print.) You’d also receive ‘featured Amazon marketing’ which I’m guessing will make your novel far more visible on the Amazon website!

HOW DO AMAZON DECIDE? No one’s quite sure at this stage, but is seems clear that the number of  nominations you receive and the breadth of your social networks play a role, as well as the feedback readers have given on your book when they nominate it (screenshot below):

telluswhatyouthought

HOW DO YOU SUBMIT? The website is simple and the upload is easy but read all the instructions before you start. You’ll need certain answers beyond the blurb and bio, so I found it easier to create a document to list all my answers so I could cut-and-paste them during the submission process. That helps ensure your answers don’t go over the character count limit because if they do, they’ll be cut.

You need to submit a proper book cover as well as the completed and proof-read manuscript in Word format (even though only the first 5000 words are shown to readers). My 5000 words ended 87 words short of a cliffhanger, so I emailed and asked if they could extend the sample that much and they did it immediately, which was great customer service.

Once you’ve uploaded all your bits and pieces, Amazon takes up to 2 days to decide if your work is of sufficient quality to be accepted. If it is, they email you with details and a link to a preview of your campaign page so you can let them know if there are any details you’d like changed (as I did with my excerpt).  Your 30 day campaign usually starts within 48 hours of that acceptance email, so that gives you time to get your “Please nominate me” emails and Facebook posts ready to go. Once your book is live on the Kindle Scout website, you can go to town, calling in all favours and trying to get your book into “Hot and Trending” for as many hours a day as you can manage! Here’s how mine went in the opening days:hottrending5dec2016

Pretty good so far, but 30 days is a sustained effort, and I’ll be away from my computer over Christmas, so I’m giving it my best over the next fortnight and hoping momentum will sustain it after that.

So, that’s where I’m at with it so far. If you’d like more info on Kindle Scout or how I’m going, please feel free to email me mail@louisecusack.com or pop a comment in below about your experiences with Scout if you’ve already tried it. If you’ve got a book in the bottom drawer gathering dust, it could be a good option for moving it forward!

 

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Motivation + Time = Maximum Productivity

20 Friday Dec 2013

Posted by louisecusack in Getting Published series, Uncategorized, Understanding Ourselves as Writers

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

creativity, doing the work, emotion, glass half full, inspiration, list, motivation, new year, process of writing, psychology, publishing, writers, writing, writing tips

I’ve chatted to writers all year, and some have had a fabulous 2013. Some, not so great. One of the things I’ve noticed (not just this year, but every year) is that those writers who have a strong motivation to write, seem to get more done.

It sounds like a no brainer. If you’re dieting for no good reason, mud cake looks good. If your wedding is in three weeks (or your book launch) and you need to fit into that special dress, carrot sticks are the new chocolate.

So motivation – for characters and for writers – is key. And at the start of a story when the idea is fresh and the potential sales appear JK Rowling-ish, delusions of grandeur can take you far. As a mentor, I never knock writers off their lofty fantasy pedestals. It motivates them to get up early and work late (creating the time factor of the equation all by themselves). In fact, I encourage writers to pick a fantasy moment: walking the red carpet, getting a big advance payment in the mail, opening the box full of advance copies of their book and loving the cover, and then milking that fantasy for five minutes every day, wringing every bit of happy/ relieved/ satisfied/ thrilled emotion they can out of it. That builds motivation too.

The reality may end up looking like this:

The Bentley you thought you'd be buying with your first advance

The Bentley you thought you’d be buying with your first advance

Here Bentley, Here, Bentley. Good dog!

Here Bentley, Here, Bentley. Good dog!

So reality can dent your confidence, and therefore your motivation. How do you pick yourself up when you’ve had rejection in the past, you’ve lost perspective on your story, and you’re starting to doubt that it will ever get published, and if it does, that anyone will bother to read/ like it? Perhaps life itself has dealt you a crap year and those muddy glasses are making everything look terrible, including your writing.

Dear Manuscript, you look like this...

Dear Manuscript, you look like this…

Sometimes you have to start back at bedrock and just work at making yourself happy. My experience as a mentor has shown me that happy writers are productive writers and I reject the cliché that starving/troubled artists write the best work. We all experience life’s ugly moments. Some writers unfortunately have had more pain than others. And yes we do draw on memories of those dark times to bring our stories vividly to life. But we don’t have to be experiencing that pain now to be writing our best. We simply need to be good at remembering what it felt like, and luckily for us, really bad moments seem to be engraved in our memories!

Publishers and agents want to work with productive writers, those who can create saleable novels year in, year out, building readership and thereby sales and profits for all. If you can get happy and stay happy, you’ll have your best shot at being that author. The delightful side-effect is that you’ll also be a fab person to be around, and family and friends will stop doing this when you walk in the room:

Has she made her word count? Is her eye twitching. For godsakes, Marg, whatever you do, don't mention the manuscript.

Has she made her word count? Is her eye twitching? I can’t look.

So here’s my tip for the end of the year, to wash away any unpleasantness from 2013 and set yourself up for a cracker super-happy ultra-productive 2014. Make up a list like mine (takes five minutes in Microsoft Word) and sit down with a pen and paper and fill it in. Honestly, I had thirty done in ten minutes:

One hundred fabulous memories from 2013As you remember each fabulous thing that’s happened to you in the year, no matter how small, it will trigger happy feelings, and before you know it you’ll be glass half full instead of glass half empty about everything, writing included. My list included everyday things like:

  • Standing on the verandah watching a thunderstorm
  • Eating a perfect lime slushy on that really hot afternoon
  • Watching the Aussies win the Ashes on tv (cricket, for those who don’t know)
  • Laughing at the cat that time he rolled in his sleep and fell off the chair
  • Watching Meg’s eyes light up when she talked about her new home

I also included some personal peak moments that really meant something to me. So you get the idea. Fill up the list, really feel the emotions, reliving all their splendor as you write, then make time with your morning coffee each day to have a glance through it again and let the happy memories make you smile.

I pinky-promise it will help you let go of the negativity that weighs you down and squashes your creative inspiration. Then you’ll be all set up for a fabulously successful, productive, satisfying and fun 2014.

Go for it!

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Perseverance: One Writer’s Journey

18 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by louisecusack in Getting Published series, Uncategorized, Understanding Ourselves as Writers

≈ 22 Comments

Tags

books, contracts, editing, getting published, literary agency, literature, manuscript, manuscript assessment, perserverance, publishing, submission, writers, writing, writing tips

I’d like to introduce a client of mine, Alison Mather, who’s recently signed with a prestigious literary agency in the UK. She’s had an interesting journey (to say the least) and has agreed to share it with you. I think you’ll find it inspiring:

Perseverance. It’s a word most commonly used when telling a person’s story of triumph, after they’ve triumphed – which is all well and good and serves as a reminder that your goal can be achieved, but is utterly horrible when you’re actually trying to do it: being perseverant. At least it is to me. I find it very much akin to what I imagine being lost in the wilderness to be like (without the constant threat of sudden death). What direction should I take? How do I know if this step is the right one? What if I’m just going around in circles? Why are the signposts so damned hard to find?

Okay, so that’s where the analogy ends because most people know that the best thing to do if you are physically lost is to stay still and that is absolutely, positively the worst thing you could do if you ever want to be a published author.

During my own journey as a writer I have asked all of these questions every step of the way, and a heck of a lot more. The results can be stultifying and very damaging to your chances if you are the sort to give up easily.

I am one of ‘those’ people who took time off to write. I am very lucky to have an extremely supportive spouse who encouraged me to do so. If you are now thinking that means I’ve had it easy, think again. Six months into writing my first manuscript I was diagnosed with thyroid disease, my husband was retrenched from his job and a 24 foot tree fell on our house during the big Brisbane storms. Add to that, I received nothing but rejection letters to every single query I sent out to publishers and agents. Things were not going to plan and it was very, very hard.

Somehow, though – and here is where the perseverance bit comes in – I managed to write a second, and much better, manuscript and tried again. Now, five years later, I have just signed with a literary agency and am starting work on editing the story – for what feels like the billionth time – in the more real hope of interesting a publisher.

Not the ideal journey to becoming an author, perhaps, but here’s what I’ve learned:

Your writing is key – do everything possible to ensure it is the best it can be, and I don’t mean asking your family. They will always be on your side and that’s not what you need. Join your local Writer’s Centre and find a manuscript assessor. I edited my own work three times and then hired Louise to edit it again. Is it really worth the expense? I sent my work, edited by me, to every publisher in Australia and it was rejected. I paid for professional advice and now I have an agent.

Listen to everything that’s being said to you by the people who know. I was rejected by a tonne of agents earlier this year but one actually took the time to write a personal letter of explanation suggesting that I was aiming at the wrong age group. I was so cut up about the rejection that I almost missed the significance of that particular crumb of advice. And they will be crumbs and you have to fall on them like they’re nuggets of gold, even if all you can hear is the criticism.

Cast a wide net – as in global wide.  My agent is in London. By all means go local to begin but understand that there are a handful of publishers and agents in Australia and a shedload of writers – unless you’ve written that must-have story in which case I’m struggling with my resentment. I smashed the internet doing research and you really have to look. I strongly recommend the following websites: www.literaryrambles.com for agents that rep in your genre, www.writersdigest.com for new agents alerts – you have far more chance with agents who are looking to build their lists, Sarah’s blog at www.greenhouseliterary.com for tips on query writing and many more that I can’t fit in here.

Remember, I was totally green, I knew nothing about the industry that I was hoping to carve a career in, but I dedicated myself to it utterly and I’ve made it this far. You can too.

Alison Mather signing her agency contract

Alison Mather signing her agency contract

Writing success really is one part inspiration and ten parts perspiration. Keep at it, and if you’ve got any tips on how to keep motivation up while persevering, do share them with us below. Cheers! Louise

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How publishers want writers to behave (professionally)

11 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by louisecusack in The Publishing Industry, Uncategorized, Writer's Self Sabotage, Writers out in Public

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

author, behaviour, professional, publishers, publishing, self sabotage, writers, writing

Harlequin Enterprises is the biggest publisher of romance in the world, and when their Australian digital-first arm – Escape Publishing – puts out a blog to let writers know how publishers would prefer them to behave, it’s sensible to take notice!

Click on the link below to find out how to interact professionally with a publisher, and note the actions that sabotage a writer’s reputation so you can ensure you’re not doing any of them yourself.

EscapePublishingBlog

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What cats can teach writers about getting published

06 Wednesday Mar 2013

Posted by louisecusack in Getting Published series, Uncategorized, Understanding Ourselves as Writers, Writer's Self Sabotage

≈ 21 Comments

Tags

behaviour, cats, contracts, entitlement, getting published, inspiration, motivation, passion, publishing, writers, writing

Winnie & Millie I’m cat sitting this week: two dear 18 year old ladies called Winnie and Millie, both of whom know and like me. Apparently these old girls have been together for most of their lives, and as they’re the same breed and size you’d think there would be some similarities in personality, but you couldn’t be more wrong. Winnie, the paler of the two, is like a timid little mouse. She makes no sounds at all, runs behind lounges when you want to pat her, hides out in the back shed during the day, and often misses out on food because she hangs back. Millie on the other hand is like a force of nature. She’s loud and proud! The darker of the two, she meows around the house in the middle of the night (in a Kathryn Hepburn voice) if she’s either lonely, hungry, bored or a bit achey. She stands beside the milk bowl until you put milk in it. She stands beside the sliding door to the upstairs deck and waits until you open it so she can sun herself – in both cases meowing if you don’t attend – and generally going through life with this amazing sense of entitlement.

I was having breakfast on the deck this morning, watching the two cats: Millie rolling around the deck admiring the ocean view, watching the Willie Wag Tails flit about, and warming her coat with some gentle morning rays. Then there was Winnie, hiding under a chair in the dining room, looking like she’d love a pat or a bask in the sun but not game to come out. What happened to her sense of entitlement? She’s just as deserving of love and sun and food as Millie. But she doesn’t get any because she’s scared.

As a writing mentor and author myself, I’ve met hundreds of writers, both published and unpublished, and I’d be an idiot if I hadn’t noticed patterns of behaviour in those who get published and those who don’t. Unfortunately it’s very much a Millie and Winnie situation. Talent is definitely not the deciding factor.

Millie in the sunMillie writers are distinguished by a sense of entitlement. They stand at the milk dish or the sliding door expecting to get what they want (read: submitting to publishers, agents & competitions and believing in their right to be published). If they get a rejection or are ignored, they don’t walk away, they meow louder (submit to more competitions, agents and publishers) knowing that sooner or later their needs will be met. Millie writers will eventually get published.

Winnie under the tableWinnie writers, however, are usually crippled by self-doubt and hide behind talk about how hard things are, how few people are getting published, how fickle the industry is, how crappy their writing is. Winnie writers don’t submit their work confidently and regularly because there’s a soundtrack in their head that says What’s the point. and how can they become published if no-one sees their work?

Now I’m not suggesting that any old rubbish will be published if you only persist. Of course you have to learn your craft and continue improving. This conversation isn’t for beginner writers, it’s for those who should be published by now. Beyond talent and writing skill, how do you develop a sense of entitlement? Firstly, work out why you think you deserve to be published. Have you been writing for ten years and have worked damn hard? Are you innovative? Talented? Fabulous at editing? Stir your ego up. Get it on the job. Be a little grandiose in your own mind. Then write that down an put it where you can see it all the time.  Mine is:

I’M THE MOST CREATIVE WRITER I KNOW

Purely my opinion but I believe it, and it gives me a sense of entitlement, particular in the fantasy genre. Of course I don’t usually advertise that because I don’t want people to think I’m a tosser. But I’m sharing it with you because defining why you deserve to be published will motivate you to write, to submit, to weather rejection, and to ultimately succeed in your career.

Don’t take no for an answer. When I was unpublished I had the Apollo 13 rescue statement pinned to my computer: Failure is not an option.  Get cranky if that’s what it takes, but beyond the anger define why you damn well deserve to have a book with your name on the cover. Get a little Millie swagger happening (in your own mind, don’t share it with others or they’ll think you’re a tosser too!). You’ll be surprised by the results.

And if you have twenty minutes to sit with a coffee and watch this amazing TED talk, I promise it will show you practical ways to become more like Millie and less like Winnie…

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Workshop Wednesday: How to self publish an ebook

25 Wednesday Jul 2012

Posted by louisecusack in The Publishing Industry, Uncategorized, Workshop Wednesday series

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

amazon, book covers, eBooks, editing, KDP, kindle, kobo, nook, promoting your ebook, publishing, self publishing, smashwords, writing

Welcome to this week’s Workshop Wednesday where indie author Patrick O’Duffy is generously sharing his expertise to help you self publish an ebook.  Self publishing is a fabulous option for established authors who can’t sell a particular project, or who want to self-publish their backlist, as they already have a readership who are likely to buy their ebooks.  It’s also a great option for unpublished authors who don’t want to go the tradition route, or who haven’t been able to find a publisher or an agent (although they would need to do more work in marketing to create a readership for themselves).

Firstly, here’s a little about our guest today: Patrick O’Duffy is tall, Australian and a professional editor, although not always in that order. He has written role-playing games, short fiction, a little journalism and freelance non-fiction, and is currently working on a novel, although frankly not working hard enough. He loves off-kilter fiction, Batman comics and his wife, and finds this whole writing-about-yourself-in-the-third-person thing difficult to take seriously.  And the blurb of his novel The Obituarist (which I’ve read and loved!): Kendall Barber is a social media undertaker with a shady past who’s returned to the equally shady city of Port Virtue. Now a new client brings with her a host of dangers, just as Kendall’s past begins to catch up with him. Can he get to the bottom of things before it’s too late, or will he end up as dead as his usual subjects?

I can highly recommend The Obituarist (and I’m not a crime reader!).  It was sharp and funny and had great twists.  Do buy it.  So without further ado I’ll introduce Patrick and let him fill you in on how you can publish your own ebooks.

Patrick O’Duffy: I’m writing this blog post from Nanuya, a Fijian island four hours north of Nadi. The water is crystal blue, the sky limitless, the beer cold and the sand warm.

I’m not saying this to rub it in that I’m having a good time, but to say that even this far from the rest of the world, and armed only with a tiny laptop and a little internet access, I could still self-publish an ebook and put it up online for sale in less than five minutes.

It’s not difficult. You can practically do it while snorkelling. Or at least just beforehand.

Self-publishing (or ‘indie publishing’) in ebook form is rapidly outpacing traditional print publishing. Success stories like Amanda Hocking and EL James have become bestsellers with their independent ebooks, and tens of thousands of other authors have also put their own work straight onto virtual shelves.

How do you do it – and how do you do a good job of it? It’s a process I’ve tackled several times now with my books Hotel Flamingo, Godheads and now The Obituarist, and I’ve learned a couple of things that I hope others will find useful.

Where to do it

The number one source of indie ebooks on the planet is Amazon, via their Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) operation. KDP allows you to create an ebook and list it alongside titles from major publishers in the world’s largest and best-known online bookstore. The drawback, of course, is that Amazon only creates and sells ebooks for the Kindle, with no provision for other file formats – so readers with Nooks, Kobos and other devices need to look elsewhere.

The other major outlet is Smashwords, a site devoted solely to indie publishing. Not only does it create ebooks in all formats, it also acts as a distributor to other major ebook markets. That alone is enough to recommend it; publishing through them takes away 90% of the work of getting your ebook into online stores. On the downside, Smashwords lacks the market presence of Amazon, and the material they publish isn’t always as polished.

So which should you choose? Well, you shouldn’t – publish through both! It doesn’t take much more effort and time, and using both sites will get your work into every major ebook store.

How to do it

Start with your final, fully edited manuscript. Don’t skimp on the editing – the world is full of badly-written, completely unedited ebooks. Be better than that, and don’t be afraid to pay for a professional editor’s services. It’s worth it.

Next, check the formatting of your Word file to make sure that it fits the guidelines of the website. And it should be a Word file, not another file format; the conversion software will either reject a different format or convert it in strange and horrible ways.

You also need a cover, and it’s worth paying a designer to create one for you rather than make it yourself. It should be a high-resolution JPG in a 6 x 9 format, and it should be readable in both colour and e-reader greyscale.

Once you’ve done all that, just create free accounts on the sites of your choice, upload the file and start the conversion. You should have an ebook minutes later!

What to do next

The first thing is to check the ebook for conversion errors, which are almost inevitable. The conversion software may introduce errors like line breaks, font changes and random italics. Fix these up and upload the corrected version, and be prepared to do this a couple of times until it’s right. These errors won’t stop people from buying your book, but they might stop them from buying your next book.

You should also determine a price for your ebook. Most indie ebooks cost between 99 cents and $4.99; look at what books of similar length and genre sell for as a guideline. You don’t want to overcharge for your book, but you also don’t want to undercharge; readers often assume that very cheap books are that price because they’re not worth anything.

Finally comes the hardest part – finding your audience and promoting your ebook to them. There are tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of indie ebooks on the market, and you need to let readers know that yours exists and is worth reading. Most authors do this through social media sites such as Facebook, Goodreads and Twitter, all of which are essential tools, as are word-of-mouth, personal blogs and good reviews from satisfied readers. Self-promotion is a never-ending job for an indie author, but the important thing is to avoid boring or annoying readers with repetition or constant calls for attention.

And then it’s time to write another book. And another. Keep improving your craft, keep developing your skills, stay focused on writing the best books you can and putting them out for your audience. Because if you write well, if you try hard and you genuinely engage with your readers, they’ll keep reading your ebooks – ebooks that you’ll find are easy to produce for them.

Go on. Give it a try. Give it your absolute best shot. And see what happens.

Louise: Thanks so much for that Patrick! Invaluable advice.  If anyone has questions for Patrick, or comments on your own experiences as an indie publisher, please post that as a comment below.  We’d love to hear from you.

Other Workshop Wednesday topics: Deep Point of View and Writers working with the Media

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Getting Published Part 1: Making the Commitment

15 Sunday Apr 2012

Posted by louisecusack in Getting Published series, Uncategorized, Understanding Ourselves as Writers

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

commitment, contracts, eBooks, getting published, opportunities, print publish, publishing, resolution, self-publish, traditional publishing, writers

Most writers will happily acknowledge that there’s never been a better time to be an author.  Opportunities to become published are rife, with new ePublishers opening almost daily.  We’re spoiled for choice, and if we’re still not satisfied with what publishers are offering, we can self-publish, which is a viable option for niche-market books or even mainstream fiction if you’ve got the time and know-how to self promote.

For those who prefer the distribution might of a big publishing house behind them, (not to mention the editorial and art departments) plus the lure of an advance on sales, traditional publishing is still a good choice.  And despite the finger-pointing from successful self-published authors, the big publishing houses are catching up with the fact that we want decent eBook royalties and eBook pricing, along with our editing and great covers.  There are still a few anomalies: I recently noted that a big Australian publishing house was charging $15 for an eBook by a debut young adult author and that’s just not sustainable, not in the current market, and particularly not when the paperback edition was cheaper: priced at $12 at BigW.  This book’s opposition The Hunger Games was only $4.76 in eBook format, so which book do you think a young adult reader is going to buy?

As an author you have to be savvy and do your research before you choose a publisher to submit to, checking the quality of their editing and covers, and the pricing of their books (both in print and digital formats), as well as scouting around to get feedback on what their advances and royalties might be.  Brenda Hiatt’s Show Me The Money website is a good place to start.  But realistically, you also have to have a good quality book to submit, because big publishers are highly discerning.

So how can you achieve that?  Well if you’re in Australia, belonging to your local writers association like the Queensland Writers Centre, NSW Writers Centre etc will help you find workshops and seminars to build your writing skills and your industry knowledge.  Joining a professional writers’ organisation like Romance Writers of Australia is also of enormous benefit.  If your books have even a sniff of a love story in them you’ll be welcomed into the fold, and RWA’s competitions and conferences have helped many Aussie authors across the line to contracts with Avon, Berkley, Harlequin, Random House, Pan Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, Penguin and more.

Having a critique partner (or CP) is also a great start, but as I found early in my writing career, the critique group you’re in is only as helpful as the skill levels of its participants.  When I started working with a published author who was also a writing teacher, I went from having short stories published to having novels published.  Now as a writing teacher, mentor and manuscript assessor myself, I offer that service to other writers, so if you think your work could benefit from a professional assessment, do have a look at my Manuscript Development webpage for an overview of how manuscript assessment works.

I’ve helped four clients become published, and many more to wins and shortlists in competitions.  Other tutors as well as myself also conduct teaching retreats with writing groups which can incorporate manuscript assessment and individual mentoring or writing workshops as required.  A quick look in the Australian Writers Marketplace will offer you a variety of other qualified tutors/manuscript developers as well.  So don’t wait for the magic to drop into your lap, go out and find it.

If you’ve been writing for years and not getting published, this might be a good time to consider that old saying “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you always got.”  Resolve to make the changes necessary to ensure 2012 is the year your writing dreams turn into your writing career!

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My new blog at louisecusack.com

08 Wednesday Feb 2012

Posted by louisecusack in The Publishing Industry, Writers out in Public

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

blog, books, eBooks, fantasy, lost world, Louise Cusack, publishing, reading, romance, romantic adventures, social networking

I have a new blog with information for my readers at www.louisecusack.com.  My Shadow Through Time fantasy trilogy is being re-released this month as eBooks by Pan Macmillan and I’ve blogged on the amazing journey the series has had in the ten years since it was first print published by Simon & Schuster Australia and selected by the Doubleday Book Club as their Editor’s Choice.

If you’re a lover of “romantic adventures in lost worlds” then I invite you to explore the new website and consider subscribing to my blog there.

Happy reading!

Louise Cusack

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Shiny new book covers

14 Saturday Jan 2012

Posted by louisecusack in Ramble, Writers out in Public

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

book covers, books, eBooks, emotion, fantasy, fantasy romance, publishing, writers, writing

Is there anything more exciting for an author than seeing their book covers for the first time?  How about seeing those same books get a second lease on life with brand new covers?

I’m in author-blissland gentle readers because my Shadow Through Time trilogy is about to be re-released as eBooks with shiny new covers which I just adore!  Momentum Books have done a sterling job of capturing the heart of the books: romantic fantasy that’s a cross between Alice in Wonderland for grownups and Excalibur.  Can’t wait for the launch next month!

   

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A significant day

28 Wednesday Sep 2011

Posted by louisecusack in Ramble

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

contracts, creativity, faith, never give up, never surrender, passion, publishing, success, writers, writing

Had one of those days yesterday you wait a decade for.  I signed a three book contract with Pan MacMillan’s digital publishing arm Momentum Books.  Early next year they’re re-releasing my first fantasy trilogy “Shadow Through Time” into a worldwide market.  My first eBooks.  My first time as an International author.

Back in 2001 when those novels were first released as print books into the Australian territories, eBooks were a novelty and I had no idea that a decade later the world would be awash with eReaders, and that you could walk into BigW and buy a Kindle.  Of course I’d dreamt of an International readership.  I think most authors do.  But the print books hadn’t sold overseas, and after a while they went out of print.

Am I allowed to give myself credit for never giving up on them?  For loving those characters and knowing that readers who’d never met them would love them too?  I’m sure you’ll give me permission for that.  In a way this deal is like being a mother and watching your child fulfil their potential, because it’s painful for a writer (or a mother) to give up on people they’ve created, and it usually only happens when it hurts too much to hang on.  Here I can thank my mother for my perseverance.  From a young age I saw her dealing with our out-there family and I realised she simply would not allow herself to give up on a child, no matter how badly they might behave, how they might disappoint her or not live up to her expectations.  I grew up with the example that you love them still, dammit!  And you hope.

So I loved my characters.  And I hoped.  And I dreamed.  I kept dog-eared printouts of fan emails, and when I felt low I’d read them and think, “These guys loved my characters.  It’s not fair to give up on them.”  I shared my despairs and my moments of inspiration and elation with my writing buddies while I wrote more books and tried to get them published, and I weathered the well meaning inquiries of family and friends wondering “Whatever happened to those books?  And when are new ones coming out?”

Well now I can answer that question.  The trilogy that was so well received in Australia is about to step onto the world stage and within six months I’ll be getting fan emails from readers in countries I’ve never even been to.  Exciting doesn’t begin to describe, and the books I’ve written in between are now lined up ready to slot into various publishing markets.  In a weird way it’s like water behind a dam wall.  It just takes one breach to let everything behind it flow out.

So yesterday was significant for me.  Not just because I signed a contract for the first time in a decade, but because it taught me probably the most valuable lesson in my life so far: faith is rewarded.

Just that.

Never give up.

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Welcome Writers!

I'm Louise Cusack, an Australian author of fantasy and romance published by Harper Collins, Simon and Schuster, and Pan Macmillan. I also mentor and tutor other writers like yourself. Please avail yourself of the resources on this website, and happy writing!

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