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Brian

Publishing

Fiction Hits the History Books

Writing a book is hard work, regardless of the genre.  It takes patience, focus, perseverance and passion.  Historical fiction, in particular, requires a bit of extra OOMPH.  Why?  Research … You gotta hit the history books and internet to get your facts straight. Dig Deep and take your time for a thorough research. And Be Advised: You Can’t Believe Everything You Read on the Internet or everything you’re told in interviews. Are you aware that anyone can edit a Wikipedia page?  Knowing that, be careful what you document in your book based on your internet findings.  In addition, you should always cross-check information you obtain during a personal interview.

Most historical fiction works involve a fictional character who is interacting with something that actually took place in history.  Markus Zusak is the author of The Book Thief.  His main character is a nine-year-old girl named Liesel Meminger living in Nazi Germany in the year 1939.  The town she lives in is also Zusak’s creation; it’s called Molching.  Zusak has done a brilliant job of balancing the freedom of creation with the restraints of historical preservation.  I highly recommend that you read this novel.

In my book, Extra Innings: The Diamond  Thieves, my goal was to paint nostalgic accuracy around the innocence of youth in the old American South.  It was important to thicken the plot in order to straddle the age gaps between older readers who would enjoy reminiscing over some of the specific throwbacks I’ve peppered throughout the story and younger reader who may enjoy discovering what the old south was like prior to our laws protecting equal rights among races.

Research for the Extra Innings trilogy was both fun and exhausting.  I had the blessed fortune of meeting multiple sets of twins who provided me some fascinating perspectives into their unique environment.  This was by far the fun part.  The exhausting part was getting all the facts correct that I wanted to include in this book.  Peppering in accurate historical facts are what help to bring a historical fiction novel to life as well as keep the critics at rest.

For example Book 1 includes an extensive baseball trading card debate that required layers upon layers of research.  It was important to me touring the tastes, sights and sounds of the old south to life in all three books.  This information was gathered both through interviews and internet.  The chocolate cream pie mentioned in Book 1 was actually one of my Grama’s famed contributions to dinners when my dad was growing up.  I plan to share this recipe (with photos – finally) in a future blog.  The story gives considerable references to popular music of its time – particularly “the blues.”  Authors should be careful not to use any defaming terms when mentioning real people who actually existed.  Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson and John Lee Hooker are all referenced in Book 1.  Frank Sinatra and Tommy Dorsey are mentioned in Book 2.  Since I am NOT writing for the purpose of documenting their specific lives, it’s wise to either mention them in a positive or indifferent light.  The books also mentions numerous products like Palmolive, Gay Furlough cologne and Camel cigarettes. Two points I want to make here:

These names are trademarks of their respective owners. Their owners would have to claim for infringement if I was using them for promotional purposes.  Which I am not, so again, as long as I am not disparaging the product, then I most likely will not encounter an issue.

Double and triple check that the products you are mentioning not only existed during the time in which your book is set but also that they were used.  For example. I was planning to mention a specific furniture dusting product in Book 1 to illustrate how the twins’ mother, Ellen, kept the house clean and smelling fresh.  However, I learned through my extensive research that it was far more common, especially for a middle-class family, to use a vinegar and water solution to clean furniture.  Only one in a while was a special product like Pledge or Old English used.

I want to thank all the folks at Ole Miss (The University of Mississippi), especially Langston Rogers, who provided me specific details to campus life and the Rebels baseball team that I could have never dissevered online.  For example, Langston was able to inform me of the dining hall most on-campus residents used along with where the pay phones were that students used, since today’s handy-dandy little cell phones & iPhones hadn’t even been conceived back then.

Part of Book 3 takes place in Lackland Air Force Base and in Korea.  Over this 10 year period of writing this trilogy, I med some wonderful guys who were directly involved in the Korean Conflict (the more accurate title for the otherwise popular Korean War).  I actually even got to hold and load an M1 Garand rifle (which is the specific gun illustrated by Adam Lichi on the book’s cover).   I heard some great stories from these guys and will be paying my respects and thanks to them in the printing of Book 2 (A Hero Among Thieves).

Compiling all of these facts were key building blogs to capture the authentic feel I was going for in the Extra Innings trilogy.  However, a tip for historical fiction writers is to look out for overkill.  Don’t inundate your readers with so many facts that your story becomes a snooze fest.  Remember that it’s also fiction.  So don’t feel too constrained by feeling like your High School history teacher is standing over your shoulder or that they’re going to grade your book like it’s a term paper.  HAVE FUN!  It’s okay to paint a place or time in history with a more color if it lends to the direction your book needs to take.  One tip to increase your flexibility is to create your own immediate setting.  Just like what Zusak did in The Book Thief, the town is fictional although we all know Nazi Germany (sadly) existed.  If you need the setting to be an actual place that exists like New York City or San Francisco, for example, perhaps have the building where the main character lives be your complete creation or where they work or go to school.  This just helps ease the workload required in researching as well as keeps you clear of any defamation complaints in case there is an negative or risqué incident that takes place in the specific location that the building’s landlord or business owner feels might be a possible threat.  Perception is reality so it would be horrible if one of your characters lives in a specific building that actually exists somewhere and they are attacked or raped in your story and that building’s landlord gets word of this and perceives it as a threat to future tenants being afraid to rent there.  Make sense?

I would love to hear some comments from other historical writers?  And definitely your feedback on the first book in the Extra Innings trilogy (The Diamond Thieves) which is AVAILABLE NOW.  Keep in touch!

July 22, 2014 by
Publishing

Niche Rhymes with …

Completing this sentence: “Niche Rhymes with …”  all depends on how you pronounce the word “niche.”  Some pronounce it “neesh” but I’ve always pronounced it “NITCH.”

Today’s blog title is referring to niche (‘nitch’) marketing and I’ve’ phrased it this way to suggest that this particular type of marketing CAN be a real pain in the @$$.  Allow me to explain myself  …

The goal of offering a new product or service is sales and customer satisfaction.  In order to optimize this effort you must have a clever marketing campaign which communicates the value of your product or service to potential customers.  Your niche is whatever category or area you specialize in.   And within the entire marketplace there is a subset  interested in your niche.  The trick is effectively reaching these folks with the right target marketing.  Some writers and bloggers may have a niche that makes it more difficult to reach their specific subset and when you’re a novice like me, it can feel like you’re fighting a losing battle.

Let’s start with bloggers.  One of the most popular blog sites on the internet today is called bloglovin.  Bloglovin makes it easy for blog enthusiasts to “follow their favorite blog as well as discover new ones.”  Bloglovin features the most popularly searched blog categories on the internet.  These niche categories include: Art, Beauty, Design, DIY & Crafts, Music, Books, Film, Fitness, Family and Travel to name a few.  Nowhere among this list the most commonly blogged about categories do I see “Marketing” or “Target Marketing” or “Historical Fiction.”  There’s not even a category for Writers & Poets.  There is a category for “Books” but it’s is more for book reviews.  I’m not blogging about book reviews.  Since my blogs do not match one or any of those “most popular” categories I am, therefore, climbing a much steeper hill towards gaining followers.  (My goal is to gain at least 2,000 followers by the end of this year).   So see what I mean by the title I’ve chosen for this particular blog?  If you’re not marketing within a popular niche it can become a struggle.  I’ve been researching dozens of credible bloggers to help enhance my knowledge to write a good blog that will hopefully help or inspire new and emerging authors, however, my topics are not in a category that produces a large volume of followers.

For example, Celebrity updates and gossip is a very popular niche market.  Just look at American Blogger Perez Hilton and the fame he’s self-generated.  He’s stepped into the real of television personalities based on his blogs which generated hundreds of thousands of followers because he blogged about what people want to hear: Celebrity Gossip.  Unfortunately, for me, identical twins Jimmy and Billy McGee of my books from the Extra Innings trilogy are not celebrities – although they do have some very interesting drama between them (especially in Books 2 and sadly Book 3).

Now let’s talk about writers.  Marketing Expert in Small Business Success Kim T. Gordon recently wrote a great blog titled “3 Rules of Niche Marketing.”

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/49608

The first rule she talks about is “Meeting Unique Needs.”  I’ve read this article numerous times and I believe I am doing this with my blogs and especially my book.  I spend a lot of times in Barnes & Noble perusing the historical fiction and young adult fiction aisles to study my competition.  I feel this is a critical task for a new authors.  These are some of the questions a new author should be asking themselves while they are researching their competition:  Does your story provide something that is new and compelling?  Are you speaking in the language of your niche market?  Are you matched up to the key selling points, pricing and distribution method that your niche market requires?  If not, you have some revamping to do.

I feel my books are well-tailored to the young adult readers who enjoy historical fiction, are family-oriented and concerned with racial injustice and social issues.  Of course, it does help that the relationship between the 2 main characters, Jimmy and Billy, sparks some pretty juicy drama.

The difficulty I am having is communicating this to potential readers.  Primarily because Book 1 focuses on a different theme than Books 2 & 3 which are more about young adult issues.  What readers mostly perceive when they see the cover of Book 1 (The Diamond Thieves) is that it’s a baseball book.  This is the primary theme of Book 1 but it’s wrapped around a much deeper and more controversial context.  The boys are trying to secure usage of the school’s baseball diamond but their best friend, T.J., is black.  Being that the Extra Innings trilogy is set in the Deep South circa the late 1940’s, T.J. becomes a main focal point with respects to the enemies (known as “the mob”) who are trying to take over the diamond from the twins and their friends.  Much of our nation’s current morale foundation has been shaped by our past struggles with racial injustice.  I wanted to show this town as a beacon of hope during a time of extreme intolerance.  I like that the character who steps forward as the principle hero around this topic is not who the reader is expecting.  It’s very endearing.  This is actually one of the best parts of the story (aside form Chapter 12 which I have mentioned in past blogs is one of my favorite chapters out of every book I’ve ever read).  The trick is, at face value, the book screams baseball.  So I am missing a more important subset of the market.  Baseball fans are not particularly going to get a re-invention of “The Sandlot” – if that’s what they’re looking for.  So when targeting my niche marketing efforts I need to find a clever way to reach the young adult subset that would be interested in a story pertaining to social injustice in America without confusing them by the book’s title.  I’ve been considering blogging more about topics followed by young adults.  Although this would not help provide advice to new and emerging authors, which is my goal, it would help attract more followers from the subset of the market which is more likely to read Extra Innings.

Thoughts?

 

July 19, 2014 by
Publishing

The Extra Innings Trilogy’s Target Market

The EXTRA INNINGS Trilogy Target Market:

Young Adults (ages 16-28 females and males) who are in High School or are, at least, High School educated in the United States. Primary interests include staying active, family-oriented, social disorganization in communities, social prejudice and environmental racism in America with a particular focus on the United States Deep South.

Secondary Target Market includes family-oriented adults who grew up in the United States during the Cold War period with at least a high school education.

Genre:  Historical Fiction

THE TRILOGY Breakdown:

BOOK 1:     The Diamond Thieves (AVAILABLE NOW on this site or at Barnesandnoble.com, Amazon.com and Kindle.com.   Send you reviews to Goodreads.com PLEASE)

Book 2:       Race of the Gemini

BOOK 3:     A Hero Among Thieves

I will be submitting this along with my marketing plan to Barnes and Noble stores next week!   Bookstores are usually supportive of local artists.  My goal is to get this into stores nationwide.  Currently, The Diamond Thieves is available via their website (see above).

July 16, 2014 by
Publishing

Does Your Book Have Charisma?

Webster’s Dictionary says the word ‘charisma‘ comes from Greek meaning of “a divine talent or a gift.”  So if charisma is a gift from God, it begs the question:  Are you born with charisma or can it be developed?

Let me first give you a little background on my inspiration for today’s blog.  My local Chamber of Commerce  had a luncheon today at the Hilton Hotel.   The speaker was Kordell Norton aka “The Revenue Mechanic.”   Kordell is a motivational speaker, business growth and marketing expert and author of 5 books.  The topic of Kordell’s discussion was “charisma” being the “secret sauce” behind the worlds most successful organizations.  Kordell brought some some very interesting points about how businesses use charisma to increase sales and profit margins, motivate employees and build a world-wide brand.  Of course, my mind immediately synced what Kordell’s ideas with my book Extra Innings:  The Diamond Thieves.  I asked myself: does my book and it’s characters have charisma?  I feel confident in answering “YES” to this question.  Although the story, set in the Deep South, is based on a period in our nation’s history (The Cold War), the characters are fictional.  I believe they possess a unique charisma that will hopefully capture the hearts of young adult, as well as adult, readers.

So I took a mental inventory of which writers inspired me the most?  Two authors came immediately to mind: Mark Twain and Nicholas Sparks.  I then asked myself, did the books of these authors have charisma?  ABSOLUTELY YES!   Two of my favorite books of all time are The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  What I love about these stories is the dichotomy of Tom versus Huck.  Tom, the extreme extrovert, is outgoing and thrives off the energy of other people.  Tom Sawyer was the epitome of social charisma.  Socializing is where Tom gets his energy versus Huck, the intense introvert, is shy and reclusive.  I always thought, how selfish of Tom to suck the energy out of Huck who strives to be on his own and out of the public eye.  This concept of conflicting personalities is so interesting to me that it influenced the dichotomy between my main characters Jimmy and Billy McGee.  These are identical twins who couldn’t be more different.  These differences are evident in Book 1 but the story really digs deeper into theses different personalities as the twin’s relationship struggles more and more in Book 2 (Race of the Gemini).  I believe both Jimmy and Billy act in selfish ways each one practically demanding the other twin to be more like him.

Mark Twain has a very distinctively sophisticated style of writing.  Mark Twain was a realist, although the popular style of the time was more romanticism.  Stylistically, I think my writing is more influenced by Nicholas Sparks.

Overall, Nicholas Sparks does not have a distinct writing style.  His style of writing is more theme-based.  However, he does have a natural gift for narration.  It’s as if, the main character or Mr. Sparks is sitting right there at your beside telling the tale.   For me, Nicholas Sparks is a charismatic writer.

As I wrote, revised, proof-read and tidied up the Extra Innings trilogy, I found Spark’s style of writing to be inspirationally motivating.  A few my favorite Sparks books are “The Lucky One,” “Dear John” and “The Notebook.”   There is no doubt that I am a slow reader.  However, when it comes to most Nicholas Sparks books, I’m able to fly through them.  He has a natural charisma for storytelling.  It’s eloquent.  I hope my readers are experiencing a similar charisma with Extra Innings:  The Diamond Thieves.

I shop for books at Barnes & Noble and when choosing my next book to read, I usually read the first two paragraphs.  First off, they have to flow and secondly there has to be something interesting that makes me want to continue reading.  Frankly, this topic could be a  whole other blog (and most likely it will be hint hint).  For example, Chapter 1 – Paragraph 1 & 2 of “The Notebook” are brilliantly written.   They almost sounds poetic:

WHO AM I? And how, I wonder, will this story end?

The sun has come up and I am sitting by a window that is foggy with the breath of a life gone by. I’m a sight this morning: two shirts, heavy pants, a scarf wrapped twice around my neck and tucked into a thick sweater knitted by my daughter thirty birthdays ago. The thermostat in my room is set as high as it will go, and a smaller space heater sits directly behind me. II clicks and groans and spews hot air like a fairy-tale dragon, and still my body shivers with a cold that will never go away, a cold that has been eighty years in the making. Eighty years. I wonder if this is how it is for everyone my age.  Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook)
This simply flows. It is not at all choppy or awkward. It’s charisma is how it captures readers with its natural flow into a cadence and before you realize it you’re onto page 2, 3 and so on as the plot grabs you by the gut. Sparks possesses a unique gift granting his stories worldwide success.
Chapter 1 – Paragraph 1 & 2 of The Diamond Thieves, as my editor Mary Kay Landon knows, underwent major overhauling revisions until I felt the same way as when I read the beginning of a good Nicholas Sparks or John Grisham novel (John Grisham is my 3rd favorite author).  I am so proud of what has finally come to be the beginning of the Extra Innings trilogy.  Take a peek:

Today was their thirteenth birthday.

It was Saturday, June 21, 1947 and summer was off to a great start. Identical twins Jimmy and Billy McGee were upstairs in their spacious, attic bedroom of their parents’ three-story home in Eugene, Mississippi. Both boys would have preferred to be outdoors playing baseball with their friends but the McGee family house rule was that birthdays were to be spent at home with the family. This year, however, Billy designed a plan that would allow them to see their friends. In order for it to work he and Jimmy needed to be upstairs in their bedroom. They would have to make enough noise to wake their toddler brother, whose bedroom was downstairs, directly across the hall from the attic door. If this happened, their mother would want them as far away from the house as possible.  B.W. Gibson (The Diamond Thieves)

Today’s Chamber of Commerce speaker, Kordell brought his charisma talk in for a landing with the following question:  “Are you going to be successful or are you going to be significant?”  I believe Twain and Sparks, although quite successful, are more importantly significant to the history of literary.  Their style of writing and creative storytelling exceeds readers’ expectations.  I can only hope to achieve this sort of significance with my works.

Thank you Kordell for your inspiring words of wisdom!

July 15, 2014 by
Publishing

3 Key Qualities to a Successful Blogger

First, let me begin by saying that I would not (yet) consider myself a successful blogger in terms of a following or any sort of fanfare.  However, I do have 15 years marketing experience along with a degree in marketing from Sonoma State University.  (NOTE: I also took a marketing and advertising semester-long course at the UMASS Amherst.  This foundation has gained me the ability to recognize effective qualities executed by a blogger.  Below, I’ve bulleted the top three qualities that I believe are critical to an effective blog.

  • INTEGRITY

Be honest with your readers.  Don’t spew on the screen keystrokes full of b.s. this will turn away readers.  If you are not an expert in the field in which you are writing, at least admit it.  This will actually gain you more respect than trying to be someone you’re not.

I talk a lot about gaining favorable attention by an appeal to pride.  Favorable attention only works if you truly mean it.  Although, it may gain you a short-term boost in reader traffic, these readers will eventually catch on.  If you’re not dishonest or the compliments you’re delivering are just an illusion to gain more followers, your long-term retention percentage will be extremely low.

  • CREATIVITY

This can be broken down into 2 elements:

  1. UNIQUENESS:  What sets you apart from other bloggers in your category?  Do you stand out or do you blend in with the rest of the crowd?  Keep in mind, the crowd I speak of is a rather sizable blogosphere of 152 million (as of July 2014) with more bloggers  adding to this population on a daily basis.  Is the topic of your blog creatively engaging?  One of the best ways to answer this question is by following other bloggers within your targeted market?  Are you repeating the same things they’re saying in their blogs?  Or is your blog teaching them something that they can get nowhere else?  Or if the purpose of your blog is to entertain, does your blog have a uniquely magnetic personality?  Kurt Mortensen is the author of the best selling book “Maximum Influence” where he explores his ’12 Universal Laws of Power Persuasion.’  This is a great book for salespeople and I have learned a tremendous amount by reading Kurt’s work.
  2. WIFFM:    What’s in it for your reader?  To answer this question, you need to step outside of yourself and review your blog from your targeted customer’s point of view.  You should be able to identify at least one WIIFM within each of your blogs.  What are some take aways from your blog?  Is there at least one take away that’s either changed or enhanced there reader’s perspective in a way they’ve never looked at that idea before?  As your blog gains popularity you will know if you’re achieving this based on the comments your followers are leaving.
  • ATTENTION TO DETAIL

This is the area in which my blogging struggles the most.  Interestingly enough, attention to detail is a considerable strength in my Extra Innings trilogy.  Of course, writing in the genre of historical fiction, I better pay close attention to detail for if any of my readers were alive during the period in which this story takes place, they would surely call me out on any oversights.  Granted, the McGee twins are fictional characters so that does give me, as the writer, some wiggle room.  As for blogging, I struggle with attention to detail mostly because I am a new author trying to build a popular reputation and so I feel rushed to produce an eruption of blogs.  My advice is to slow down.  Take your time.  Make sure your spelling and grammar are correct before clicking publish.   Review your blog for rambling.  Are you repeatedly repeating yourself?  Repetitiveness and rambling seem to be common mistakes in many of the blogs I read.  In today’s fast-paced society, ain’t nobody got time for that.   Especially, my YA target market.  I’m lucky if I’m able to capture five minutes of their undivided attention.  I recommend saving your blog as a draft, sleeping on it or walking away for a little while.  Then, go back and review before publishing.  Ask yourself: Are you making your point clear and concise?  There’s nothing worse than having a captivating title to your blog but the body that proceeds it is irrelevant.  The details of your blog must be relevant to it’s title AND to your target market.

Hope this helps boost traffic to your blog!  Please let me know and stay tuned for more marketing tips!

July 13, 2014 by