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Is a personal brand important for an author?

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 A buzzword in the business world is that of a personal brand. When we think of a brand, we think of a product that we know and we either trust or don’t trust. Maybe that brand has a unique taste or works really well at what it’s supposed to do compared to others in the same market. Whatever the case, that brand stands out. A personal brand is the same thing. In business a person stands out from others by their work ethic, their ability to make sales, connect with customers or clients, always be early to work, be enthusiastic, or other traits that help the company or fill out that person’s resume.  For authors, a personal brand is the same thing. There are about 40,000 books published yearly and while a saying goes “don’t judge a book by its cover” for things other than books I’m sure many are sold on the title and imagery alone. However, if an author wants to make a name for themselves, they must stand out from all the others. Yes, this could be accomplished by their work, but audien
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What are the pros and cons of self-publishing versus traditional publishing?

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 M y seventh self-published book (and eighth overall) is just about to go into global distribution and marks my first published novel. My first six books were non-fiction, and I was fortunate to be a part of an anthology with a short story published in the fall of 2023 by a small publishing company. My latest effort was marketed to literary agents as well as to a few small publishing houses with a little interest but not enough to push the book into the traditional route of publishing. My patience diminished and having the knowledge of the self-publishing route led me back to Lulu Press which is where I had published all my non-fiction works. Having already weighed many options I’ll share my thoughts about the pros and cons of self-publishing versus the traditional method. Every author dreams of having their book published by the big five, doing interviews on podcasts, book signings at bookstores and libraries, and of course collecting royalties on book sales and that Netflix series ba
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Is there a specific order a plot must flow in fiction?

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 T he short answer to this question is yes, but also no. For your story to flow traditionally and entertain your reader it should generally follow the traditional method that is known as the Freytag Pyramid. It may sound rigid, but this flow of parts is used in nearly every book, movie, and television show and once you begin to relate this to media you know it will become clear that this is the expectation of readers. That being said, there is no hard rule that says you can’t move this around or even throw it out the window completely. It’s worth noting that in viewing this graphic that the lines representing the parts of the pyramid are not to scale with how long the parts of the plot should be. Some aspects might vary from story to story, and you shouldn’t view the Freytag Pyramid as a rigid structure that you are bound by with your plot.  The first part of the pyramid is the exposition . This is where we are introduced to the story, characters, setting, and begin to see how things a
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How do I start writing a book?

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 A book is nothing more than just a bunch of words on a few hundred pages. It can’t be that hard to write one, right? Most people don’t like doing taxes since it takes hours to complete. Imagine if your taxes took you a minimum of six months to file. Writing a book is a long laborious process that isn’t just writing out a story, it involves rewriting and editing and many times you never feel like it’s ever complete. Image by nensuria on Freepik Many people dream of writing a book someday. In the United States about 15% of the population has started writing a book. Of those only about 6% make it halfway through. Those who keep pushing might become published and about .15% of people in the U.S. are self-published. About 0.001367% of the U.S. population are published traditionally. If you make it to the point of holding your book in your hand no matter who publishes it, you are in small company. It might not feel that way when you see just how many books are published weekly and yearly,
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New Release! "The Beast of Friday Lake"

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I t’s finally here! I have published six non-fiction books and had a short story published in an anthology in 2023, but nothing beats my first novel. This book has been in production for many years and was not the first book I had intended to publish. It’s been a long journey from developing the characters and plot and certainly rewriting and editing as well as editing and rewriting and then editing some more and then fomatting for release. My first book idea was about a ghost group in a fictional setting. I developed what I thought was a good story, but the plot fell apart and I got stuck nearly halfway through it. In the book I had created a character that was friends with one of my main characters. His name was Henry Malone and was a motocross rider as well as a cryptozoologist (those who study unknown and undiscovered animals like Bigfoot). My initial idea was to have a character established in this book that could be used in a forthcoming book in a series of the ghost group or eve
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Which is harder to write: fiction or non-fiction?

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 I have been fortunate to have published both non-fiction and fiction as well as many articles over the years. My first publishing came with non-fiction as I self-published six books before focusing on writing fiction. I’ve been asked this question a couple of times and I want to get my opinion out there before focusing on specific topics. The big difference between these types of books is that one is based on facts and information and is objective and the other is entirely or almost entirely made up and is subjective. At first thought you might think that being able to write about your own characters and plot and making a story up from scratch sounds easier than adhering to writing about facts and information, but both have their easy and hard aspects. Books in the non-fiction genre tend to be shorter than those in fiction depending upon what type of fiction you are writing.  In writing a non-fiction book (I’ll talk about how to write them in a future blog post) there is more structu
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How do you get your ideas for stories?

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A former co-worker of mine and I were having a discussion on story ideas for books. He was stuck early on in a book and didn’t feel like the idea would be able to make a full-length novel. It was one of those great discussions I enjoy having with other writers whether they write comics, short stories, novels, novellas, or even music. Story ideas are easy to come by for me. Sometimes the idea comes from a location like a vacation that inspires something based on the setting. Sailing in the Caribbean on a cruise sure inspires me to want to write a story about pirates which is already a topic I enjoy. I might visit a historical port or learn something historical that inspires an idea. Granted, traveling is fun and inspiring, but not always an option when you’re trying to gather book ideas. I have inspiration of locations through reading books on travel or even other novels that take place in interesting locations. This museum in St. Thomas gave me many ideas . Story ideas might form
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