JUNE 2012 WRITERS TRICKS OF THE TRADE now available

Whoo hoo! The platform for publishing the Writers' Tricks of the Trade eZine has been fixed. Gotta love those cyber-glitches. Check out this month's issue, as usual, packed with lots of helpful information. We will be setting up a fan page soon on Facebook.

June 2012 issue 

Cartoonists have fun with writers today

Ah, one of my favorite pursuits--reading the morning comics. Well, it hasn't been as much fun in recent years because many of the strips  I enjoyed have disappeared from the L.A. Times and others have simply become silly.

In my humble opinion, two that stay consistently funny or timely are Pearls to Swine and Doonesbury. Today didn't disappoint as they aimed their humor at the writers' community. Better than talking about it, let me show you what I mean.

How true! The father tries to get his point across that shipments and sales are two different things, but the son who is high on presumed success views it as jealousy. As authors and publishers know, book stores can return unsold books, without having paid the bill, months after the shipment. 50,000 books. If only 20% were sold, imagine the impact. Returns can arrive in any condition, resaleable or not.

If you are not a New York Times bestseller, or have a high profile or a ton of fans, try to head off possible heavy returns by cautioning a bookstore to order light for a signing. Most of them will allow you to supplement from your own stock, then they order that amount of books to replace the stock you've "lent" them. Of course, we all hope every book they order sells out, but that is not always the case.

There are so many blogs out there now, how do you get yours noticed? Like everyone else, I've been addressing the issue. Interesting content brings people back once they've found you, but how do they find you?

I just took some of the advice Stephanie Campbell offered in her article about blogging in the November issue of the Writers' Tricks of the Trade newsletter and have begun listing my blog with blog directories. Putting the news of new posts on Facebook and Twitter is important, of course, but for the most part I think the same people see them each time.

Directories expose you to new "eyeballs" and hopefully they will like what you have to say, come back often and share your link with their friends.

TWO GUEST BLOG APPEARANCES

Yesterday I was a guest on M.M. Gornell's blog. We had a great chat, and instead of going into details, I'd like to invite you to click the link and read all about what I had to say:

http://www.mmgornell.wordpress.com

Tomorrow I'l be guest blogging at the Thoughts in Progress blog. It's all about how an idea became a column, then a book, a blog and a newsletter. Check it out and post your comments.

Thoughts in Progress 

THE SEPTEMBER NEWSLETTER JUST POSTED

A Special Message from Morgan:

Thanks to everyone who sent me such great comments about the first issue of Writers' Tricks of the Trade Newsletter. Even though the newsletter publication date is set for the 15th of the month, ISSUE 2 was ready, it's great and I wanted to upload it before I leave for Australia. So here it is---2 weeks early! The October issue WILL be published on the 15th of October.

It is exciting to see all of the terrific articles this month from across the country, with a wonderful lineup of contributors currently being calendared for the rest of the year. There is also a listing of good writers' conferences at the end. You can have blog posts and the newsletters delivered directly to you in a variety of ways. Just click the SUBSCRIBE TO on the right to see what's available, or click FOLLOW. 

If you enjoy the newsletter, and I know you will, please pass it on to your writer friends. If you belong to a writers' group, please post it on their message board or Yahoo group. And, if you write articles or have brags, please contact me about submitting for future issues.

With the exception of some Facebook posts, I will be doing very little posting to social media during the month of September while I'm traveling, so please check back often if you aren't a subscriber.

WRITERS' TRICKS OF THE TRADE: 39 Things You Need to Know About the ABCs of Writing Fiction has just been released in paperback, Kindle and eBooks. More and more websites are picking it up and you can also order the paperback at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore. Currently also available online in the UK and Canada. Soon in Australia.

Writers Tricks' of the Trade is a great handy reference for fiction writers at every stage of the game. The list price is $16.95, but Amazon currently has a super introductory price of ONLY $13.22 for the paperback. I don't know how long that will last. If you enjoy my columns and newsletter, do yourself a favor. Add it to your bookshelf.

Morgan St. James
www.morganstjames-author.com

About mispronounced words

.Sometimes there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to the way certain words are pronounced. Because of that, when listening to an audio book, it isn't unusual to hear cities, streets, places, descriptive words pronounced wrong. It happens in some really wonderful books. Because I listen to lots of audio books while driving between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, I might be more aware of it. Books recorded by powerhouse publishers are no exception, by the way.

I'm currently listening to Loitering With Intent,  a good book by Stuart Woods featuring his attorney/sleuth Stone Barrington. Stone and his former buddy on the police department, Dino, are investigating in Key West, Florida.

Now, most of us have seen the word "conch" and if I'd never been to Key West, I wouldn't have realized it's pronounced wrong many times throughout this book. They want conch burgers, they talk about all things conch and the reader, who is a good reader, pronounces it just like it's spelled--con-sch. Therein lies the problem. When I was in Key West I did the same thing and was quickly corrected. The correct way to say it is "conk" like a blow to the head.

It's not a big thing unless you know how it should be pronounced. Then it is really annoying, kind of like fingernails on a blackboard. As I said, it happens to the best of them. Four of my books have audio editions also with fabulous narrators. However, there are a few mispronounciations in them, too. Mostly street names and a few Yiddish expressions the Silver Sisters' mother likes to use.

That raises the question, and I've thought about it before:  If there are words that are a little off the standard, should the author provide a short glossary clearly showing how to say the word when submitting the manuscript so the reader knows how to say it? In the case of a word like kugel, (which is a noodle pudding)  should it include a note about what it is?

I've decided to do just that if any more of my books are recorded. What do you think?

An invitation to join Morgan St. James in the Chat Room at www.Savvy Authors.com on Thursday evening, August 4

I’ve recently become involved with www.savvyauthors.com and am delighted to say that I’ll be hosting some online workshops for them in the future.

 In the meantime, I’ll be hosting an online chat about WRITING TIGHT this week on Thursday, August 4. It’s free, interactive and runs from 9:00-10:00 p.m. EST, 8:00 – 9:00 p.m. Central, 7:00 p.m.-8:00 p.m. Mountain time or 6:00-7:00 p.m. PST

 WRITE TIGHT ONLINE CHAT ON SAVVY AUTHORS –CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO

 This is a great website for all authors to know about and utilize. Savvy Authors started with a simple conversation between two writers trying to figure out how writers at various stages of their career could help one another to achieve their goals. Whether it be promoting their new release, or finding a way to break through chapter three on their first book, the idea was to create a website where authors could network and gain motivation.

See you there,

MORGAN ST. JAMES 

THE COMMENT BOX IS NOW WORKING

As I've discovered, there is quite a bit to setting up an interactive blog. The Guest Comment box is now working in the right-hand column. Moving right along to August 15 when the first newsletter will post. Just click the SUBSCRIBE button. In the dropdown box, just click which of your feeds you would like posts to go into, or be sure to visit Writers' Tricks of the Trade each month to see the latest one.

Guest bloggers are lining up both to contribute to the newsletter and this blog with all sorts of "Tricks of the Trade." Check back often.

AFTER YOU'RE FINISHED PROOFREADING, REALIZE YOU'RE NOT FINISHED!

How is it that those double or missing two letter words manage to skip right past our searching eyes. Words that appear to be spelled right on the first round suddenly don't look right. Was that phrase really supposed to be in italics?

I wish the eye would quit thinking it sees what it wants to and pick up on those faux pas the first time through instead.

The moral of the story is if you haven't been down this road before, be prepared to proof your book or story several times!

Important Information if you're designing your own blog or website

Wow! Did I learn something today and I want to share it. If you're designing your own website with a do-it-yourself template or setting up your own blog, be sure to look at it or better yet design it in MOZILLA FIREFOX. It may look absolutely fine on EXPLORER, but that doesn't mean it will look good on Firefox.

I found out the hard way and spent hours redoing certain things. This header had no problems in Explorer, but when I opened it in Firefox a big chunk of the right side was cut off. Back to the drawing board...and back...and back! I wasn't going to give up and finally made it fit correctly. It seems that if it looks good on Firefox, you're home free.

Many of us are setting up our own sites now with easy to use software, so take the little bit of extra time and check your sites on both browsers.

It is getting exciting. We now have several wonderful contributors ready to share their knowledge in the Writers' Tricks of the Trade WRITE ON newsletter launching April 15 and many will also write posts for the blog. New posts can be delivered to a choice of the sites you may use by simply clicking SUBSCRIBE in the right column and choosing the one(s) you want from the dropdown box. I'm having mine delivered to My Yahoo for easy access.

That's all for tonight.

July 22 Writers Tricks of the Trade in the Los Angeles edition of Examiner.com -

It's all about how important proofreading is. All of us have picked up books or read posts filled with errors that should have been caught---and weren't. The eye sees what it THINKS it sees. Read the column: http://exm.nr/proof-LA