Like many of you, I’ve been operating in this space as an author for many years, and now I have the privilege of being an agent. What I’ve seen is that it’s very difficult to make a sustained income as …
Business of writing
What Happens after a Book Launches?
This week I received an email from one of my clients, Chase Replogle, whose first book, The 5 Masculine Instincts: A Guide to Becoming a Better Man, released on March 1. I’ve asked his permission to share our email thread …
Don’t Let Nostalgia Kill Your Platform
The glory days were fun, weren’t they? The heydays too. But they’ve both attempted to sideline me in my quest to build a reader platform.
Why?
Because if we stay back in the days when authors had the luxury of …
The Measure of Success
If there’s one question I’m asked more than any other, it’s this: “How do I measure success when it comes to book sales?”
I’ve heard the strangest theories of what constitutes success. For instance, this from an old Publishers Weekly, …
Looking Back to Help Others Move Forward
I still remember the day a California Bay Area newspaper featured an article titled “Accidental Author Shares God’s Word.” I smile remembering that it was in the front section of the paper as if this was news. It was true, …
The Role of Disappointment
blogger: Cynthia Ruchti
It may seem counterintuitive to consider the priceless role of disappointment, or that disappointment could bear any positive role, much less priceless. But many veteran authors–none of whom (NONE) have escaped disappointment–attest that lessons learned at the …
A Social Media Liturgy
Recently I wrote about slowing down, resting, and not getting so caught up in the machine of platform building. (I know: it’s a conundrum. We have to do it, but there are times that wholeheartedly pursuing it fractures our hearts). …
20 truths I wish I would’ve known when I started publishing
If I were able to time travel (those of you who write time travel books make it look so easy!), I would find younger writer me, prior to publishing, and tell her these hard-won truths I’ve learned. I hope these …
20 truths I wish I would’ve known when I started publishingRead More
Bookshop.org: An Online Alternative to Amazon
Bookshop.org’s founder and CEO, Andy Hunter, could be viewed as prescient. The bookstore site launched in January 2020, just before COVID forced physical stores to lock their doors. Before Amazon downgraded the priority of shipping books and upped the priority …
What Makes an Agent Say Yes?
I wrote this blog post in 2009. Because so much of it remains true today, I thought I’d retread it with updates and take it out for another spin. After all, the quest to find an agent still goes on. …