Fear of Failure

Failure is not falling down but refusing to get up ~ Chinese proverb. Many people attempt to become successful writers from a prone position. That makes failure a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you are so terrified of receiving a rejection that you don't expose your work--to agents, a market, even a peer group--then your goal has really been to protect your fragile ego.

Or perhaps you are already seated at your computer but can't find the words to get started, to finish, to put into a query or cover letter. Again, this is fear of failure/rejection in the guise of rampant perfectionism. As so many other writers have advised, just write the damn thing! Of course you'll make mistakes and they can be corrected. Making mistakes isn't failing, it's learning.

Think of a baby learning to walk. Step, crash. Step, wobble, step, boom. How does a child ever learn to ambulate? Not by falling down, but by getting up and trying again, learning most of the time to improve coordination.

We all fear failure and would rather avoid the unnecessary pain of rejection. The pain is unnecessary because we inflict it on ourselves. We say (silently) that having our writings rejected means that we are rejected as human beings. Nothing is farther from reality. An editor or agent doesn't know you, she only knows your work, the letter or submission sent.

Are you just going to lie there and make yourself a loser? Or are you going to rise, shake it off and proudly take another step on the road to writing success?

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Writing & Publicity Planner

Freelance writing and book publicity successes depend on planning ahead, knowing editorial calendars and fixed event opportunities.

Paul Krupin of Direct Contact PR says:

Each year I create an annual publicity plan to help people look ahead and map out their ideas for acquiring publicity throughout the year. This unique publicity planner provides a month-at-a-glance roadmap to holidays throughout the year and identifies the lead time for each holiday. The special design makes it easy to develop a detailed personalized framework of key dates and events so that you map out your strategy and ideas to promote your book or your writing in 2010.

Download your free copy right here.

Krupin is also the author of Trash Proof News Releases, available in hardcover at Amazon and from his website and in many electronic fomats from Smashwords. You can obtain a free copy there, too, or on Krupin's website.

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Improve Your Blog

5 Quick & Easy Tips For Improving Your Blog from the December Blogcatalog.com newsletter:

1. Purchase your own domain. This will dramatically increase your design and functionality options.
2. Connect with other bloggers. Forming these connections can help inspire you, get you over hurdles and provide a sounding board for new ideas.
3. Try a new theme. While content is king, looks are important too. Catch readers attention with a slick new theme.
4. Find clarity. Clearly defining the purpose of your blog will make decisions about content and design simpler.
5. Always be writing. Good writers are always writing. It keeps your mind limber and gives you a stock pile of good post ideas.

Number 4 is the logical starting point. Too many people feel an urgent necessity to blog but have no idea what to write about. Then they whine and complain about it, about a lack of readers, followers and comments. Why would anyone besides the writer's mother read a blog with no focus? The goal need not be overt, but it guides and shapes your writing.

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LOLtech Strikes Again!

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

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Happy Holiday

Here is one of the best seasonal salutations I've ever received:

Happy Holidays from Google

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Mini-Review of PULL

Years ago but right before the Web was woven, I had a vision. I'd been meditating on solutions to the problems of homeless people here. I knew the resources existed to help them, but help was often inaccessible for those who need it the most. It was and still is uncoordinated. Thinking about what little of the Internet I knew, I saw these discrete services circling the homeless, electronically interconnected so that from one dumb terminal or a fantastic PC, someone could customize a help plan for each person in need, providing the requisite paperwork, vouchers for transportation included.

"Why do charities have to duplicate efforts and waste so much money?" I complained to the only group that would (pre-blogs) allow me to publish my rambling rants, the local Mensans. Without leadership, sadly, any ad hoc collection of geniuses produces more hot air than hot action.

David Siegel has shown how this type of "cloud" computing is being realized to pull in the resources needed by a client-centered plan. In Pull: The Power of the Semantic Web to Transform Your Business, Siegel explains in very approachable terms how businesses like the book industry are struggling to not only shift paradigms but transform themselves into more efficient and effective business models.

This is exciting/scary stuff! It is a clarion call for the transparency I've advocated for several years. I hate screen names and avatars as identifiers for people. Be who you are wherever you are, I've been saying. Soon it will become inevitable reality. What effect, I wonder, will it have on white collar crime that relies on computers to game any system, when the entire system becomes standardized? Only those intent of committing felonies have anything to fear from, say, RFIDs embedded in all products, pets, people.

Siegel predicts the end of dead-end jobs like cashiering at the local supermarket and predicts that large main libraries (like the one being shoved down San Diegan's throats while the homeless freeze on the sidewalk in front of the old one) will cease to exist in a few decades. At last! I cheer. Someone else who sees that libraries are for information, not physical books, which are all becoming digital anyway. He says:

Small branch libraries are the libraries of the future. They will provide a good place to sit quietly and research online , a place for kids to learn, and meeting spaces for learning-related events. They will have minimal staff and probably won't be open all day. [This is happening already with a fiscal crisis demanding cutbacks.] There may not be very many, schools will do just as well. Our monstrous downtown libraries with their stacks of books and huge staffs won't make it to the middle of the century.

I haven't finished reading the book yet, but the chapter on "Pulling Books" alone is worth the price. It provides a clear depictions of how the industry operates, which any author needs to understand. It will be available in the next couple of weeks in hardcover and for the Kindle. Pre-order at Amazon by clicking on the image at the right.

Any products reviewed on this site may have been gifts of their producers.

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Best of Recent Retweets

Even better the second time around: @GLHancocks tweets and retweets, retweeted.

RT @DanGordon: I said it once, I'll say it again: Authenticity. Transparency. Passion. Patience. Perseverance. = Results. #blogchat 7:06 PM Dec 20th from TweetChat Retweeted by C J Jackman Zigante

RT @RKCharron: The word you choose reflects the tone you wish to convey and the image you wish to invoke.| Except in chats! typok #writechat 2:08 PM Dec 20th from TweetChat Retweeted by C J Jackman Zigante

New at AWE -- Santa arrived early for some bloggers! Today Amazon announced Amazon Associates for Blogger, a direc... http://bit.ly/4BrZHI 10:13 AM Dec 17th from twitterfeed Retweeted by Melinda Emerson

Checked out new Google search, found Listorious & a list for NewNewmedia by @PaulLev http://listorious.com/GLHancock/memberships 7:13 PM Dec 15th from Echofon Retweeted by Paul Levinson

Blogs feel very private to you, alone, hunched over your keyboard; but when you hit "Post" you're a naked, plucked chicken to all #writechat 1:24 PM Dec 6th from TweetChat Retweeted by kimberly gonzalez

I have a free article available on Copyright on the Writing Help page of my site: http://www.writers-edge.info/writing-help.htm #writechat 1:19 PM Dec 6th from TweetChat Retweeted by David Gerbino

@WritingSpirit Actually, writing articles is one of the ways recommended for fictionalists to get their names known-adjunct to book #writechat 12:29 PM Nov 29th from TweetChat in reply to WritingSpirit Retweeted by Writing Spirit

#blogpostfail: "If the man you are discretely having an affair with..." Right, only one affair at a time, girls! #copyediting #editing 8:25 PM Nov 25th from Echofon Retweeted by Jane Smith

RT @editorialdept Writers learn from what they're doing right as much as from criticism. Good editors cheer a writer on.#litchat 4:12 PM Nov 20th from Power Twitter Retweeted by pberinstein

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Discount and an Upgrade

Don't be shocked. I've upgraded the looks of the emailed version of A Writer's Edge to more closely resemble the blog pages. A Writer's Edge uses FeedBlitz to manage some email deliveries. I'm thinking of switching all email subscriptions to this service.

Now that I am using FeedBlitz at an "elite" level, I am happy to be able to offer readers a special, time-limited 10% Lifetime Discount on FeedBlitz services. All you need to do to secure a 10% lifetime discount is to sign up for FeedBlitz using this promotional code: Writer's (yeah, not my choice!) before 21 January, 2010 (US eastern time). Use it for sign-ups and to automatically send anything you want!

How it Works

1. Start an evaluation account before January 21, 2010 at http://www.feedblitz.com/f?NewAccount using the promotion code Writer's.
2. FeedBlitz automatically applies a lifetime discount.
   
   Small Print - Limitations and Restrictions
   

• The discount is available to new accounts only.
• The lifetime discount applies to all FeedBlitz paid services for that user, until and unless the user cancels their account, there is a payment default or the user later switches to a different FeedBlitz plan.
• The offer must be used before 21 January, 2010.
• Once this offer expires it will never be made again to the readers of A Writer's Edge.

If you don't receive this blog via email, and you'd like to, visit http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=349955 to sign up.

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Communication is the Foundation

Guy in bar: my wife doesn't understand me. Cougar: come again?

---

Mr Mousebender: And I thought to myself, 'A little fermented curd will do the trick,' so, I curtailed my Walpoling activities, sallied forth, and infiltrated your place of purveyance to negotiate the vending of some cheesy comestibles.

Henry Wenslydale: Come again?

Mr Mousebender: I want to buy some cheese!

This little scene is the intro to L. Diane Wolfe's 12/18/09 blog post, Spunk On A Stick's Tips: And Now For Something Completely Different!. It often typifies the resultant condition when I verbalize. See? I meant, "When I talk, people don't understand me." Or else they laugh.

Mr. Mousebender and I have in common large vocabularies, and we're not afraid to use them. In my case, the big words spring readily from my tongue before consciousness is engaged. I know what I'm saying and the meaning is perfectly clear. A much better state would be for the reader/listener to find the message perfectly clear and understand it.

Enough barriers exist between sender and receiver. Vocabulary, or lack thereof, need not be one of them: sender ---> MESSAGE ---> receiver = communication. The message cannot be MeSsAwgee! or any other corruption. Listen up, because clear communication is the foundation for all writing. You thought I was going to say spelling or good grammar, didn't you?

What is "clear communication?" Word choices. The more important the message, the simpler the choice. That's why traffic signs read "Stop" and "Caution." These are basic words most all English speakers know. Does that mean I advocate Dick and Jane sentences? Sometimes. They certainly hold up well for news reports and other journalism aimed at audiences that include those with the least education.

Finally, we get to the message receiver, the reader. This is the person to have in mind when you write. For example, if you write a novel to please the critics, book reviewers, you might produce a literary masterpiece and a commercial flop. Write for the masses who still buy and enjoy quick reads, and your book won't appear in the NY Times reviews, but you may make a little money and a lot of people satisfied.

Who is your audience?

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Free Book with Gift

Buy an AWE gift certificate and receive a free holiday book. This novel is perfect for the season. Popescue's Girl Mary depicts how a maid from a wandering Hebrew tribe encountered God and married her true love, Joseph. The description of the holy land, especially mountain scenes, may jar traditional views of the setting for the Christmas story. Depiction of daily life for the people of that time is interesting to learn, and the intrusion of Roman politics may shock your view of Christian history.

To qualify for the free book, give yourself or writerly friends gifts of editorial services. You can design them with me. Here are some ideas: an hour (or less) of publishing consultation, any type of editing or a manuscript evaluation. How about a combination package for your loved one's first novel? Advice and services for self-publishing are also possibilities. Email me for details and arrangements or call 858-571-5390 for faster service. A certificate can be sent overnight and redeemed by email.

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Find News about Magazines

Magazine freelancers need to know about their markets. A good source for news on them is MediaWeek.com. The site covers multimedia, but the section on newspapers and magazines is especially handy. Scroll down the page past news articles to find white papers. Are you a specialist? Perhaps you could write a white paper for this site. MediaWeek is part of Nielsen Business Media, serving the publishing industry with multiple sites, including Editor and Publisher, another source of information for freelancers, too.

A third website you might want to hit when you make your "rounds" is FOLIO, possibly even more comprehensive in its coverage and services. I see there every technical version of ways to deliver information and breaking news. I am especially drawn to the blogs. I noticed one by Jason Fell on this week's Twitterversy #afropw about the Publishers Weekly cover shot and title because I vigorously participated in forcing the @PW senior editor Calvin Reid to apologize for his choices.

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Amazon Integrates With Blogger

Santa arrived early for some bloggers! Today Amazon announced Amazon Associates for Blogger, a direct integration between the site's sales service and Blogger. This new collaboration enables Blogger.com bloggers to monetize their content by adding relevant Amazon products to their blog posts without interrupting the blog editing process. I can attest that hopping over to Amazon to find a book cover photo, adjusting and adding it to a post and monkeying with the associated HTML is a pain and takes too much time.

Amazon Associates who don’t have a Google Blogger account can set up a free Blogger account with their Associates ID right away. The new tool allows Blogger.com bloggers to add links and images to their blog posts in just two steps:

1.Highlight the relevant text and the Amazon Product Finder will search Amazon’s millions of products and recommend the ones that are most closely associated with the text

2.Insert a link or image to that product which includes their Associates ID, enabling them to earn up to 15% in referral fees from Amazon

You will also be able to show dynamic content in their blog sidebar using a new set of integrated Sidebar gadgets, such as gadgets for MP3 clips from the Amazon DRM-free music store, an Amazon Deals gadget, and an Amazon Search box.

So they say. I haven't tried it yet. I'll let you know how it works for me.

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What is Awhile?

Quite often online, you'll see someone write about "awhile," as if it were an adverb as well as a noun. "Wait awhile," they write. "It took awhile to get my visa. I'll be with you in awhile." All these uses are incorrect, of course. The word is "while."

"While" is a versatile word. It can function as a noun, an adjective, a preposition, or a transitive verb. The only adverbial use, according to Merriman-Webster Online Dictionary is in the phrase once in a while, indicating now and then or occasionally.

The most common use of "while," however, indicates a period of time. Why some writers prefix the word with an a befuddles me--except, that having once seen it online, they may think it is correct. You wouldn't write "anhour" or "aday" would you? Does "afortnight" affront you?

My favorite use of "while" occurred many years ago when I was teaching my daughter to talk. She had heard me say (too many time, probably), "a little while." When I asked her to come to the kitchen for a meal, she responded, "in a couple of whiles." Well, it is a noun, why can there be a couple of them?

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Facebook & Twitter on Google

Privacy issues on the Internet. They're baaaak! Since Google announced the inclusion of real time returns from Twitter and Facebook on the first page of search results, the virtual world has been atwitter with arguments pro and con. Some of these in a #blogchat last night revolved around *if* you want material from parts of a FB account to show up. Another question that went unanswered in the crush was about how much of a Twitter profile Google is privy to.

I have news for these newbies: everything but your Twitter password is readily available to anyone, and obviously passwords can be hacked, too. Hence, Twitter account and website hijackings, and I suspect FB corruptions also exist. How can there be another generation already that needs to learn never put anything online that you don't want seen by everyone in the world?

One incensed participant tweeted back at me: "@GLHancock That's no different than someone breaking in your home and stealing pictures. Are u saying there's no privacy ANYWHERE? #blogchat" No, I'm just sayin' there's no such animal as "privacy online." Maybe I should say "security?" Especially with free programs! Poor grammar aside, I wonder how these kids have been raised? Don't they pay attention to news about this or that supposedly secure database being hacked and resulting identity theft?

Writers who use social media as part of their promotional and marketing plans need to understand there is no separation between a "personal" account and one for your business of writing, whether you're an author with books, a freelancer with services, short story or poetry writer, an essayist or a working journalist. I'd expect writers, more than most people, would understand how identity and writing are inextricably entwined. Internet demands for transparency are doubly intense for writers.

When a search engine scours the Internet for information about you, it does not distinguish among sources for material. No human peeks and says, "Uh, oh. Naughty pictures. I'd better not snatch those. It might hurt this person's reputation." Search engines do not always observe a "no index" command. Drop bits of your identity around the web and they will be assembled to display perhaps a less than flattering, if more accurate, view of you.

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Book of Tweets

Apparently TweetBookz aren't as popular as expected. The price has dropped from the announced $30 hardbound and $20 softcover to $25.50 and $17 according to the site's FAQ. To be fair, the home page says it's a "sale" until January 1, 2010.

I was disappointed to find little customization available, and the quantity is limited to the last 200 messages. I was hoping to be able to concoct "The Best of GLHancock's Tweets" or something like that. Panning through an entire RSS feed for nuggets of wisdom is daunting, to say the least. There must be a better way to search your own material, like with a feed reader and Word or Excel? There must be an app for that!

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"Twilight" by Cats

Oh, Lord! You must see this LOLcat send-up of Twitlight! Keep scrolling down.

Microsuede: Movie Review: The Twilight Saga: New Moon

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Gifts for Writers

Looking for inexpensive new books? In my Amazon Storefront are a few recently published novels and nonfiction, as well as older books. Some of the new I haven't even yet reviewed. For example, I'm still savoring The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing Business Books: Get your business wisdom into print by veteran ghostwriter and agent Bert Holtje. It's a fascinating insider's guide for traditional and self-publishers, chock full of tips that are close to being termed "secrets" about publishing.

I know you are all writers and want to get published, so another great gift for yourself is a chunk of my time devoted to helping you along the path to success. Or for your writerly friends, give a gift certificate for writing, editing or a publishing consultation. Tell me what you'd like, and we'll customize the perfect present.

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The eBook Matrix

Enter the ebook matrix, a multi-dimensional space-time where format meets device, designed and updated by David McClintock, who sees himself as a word economist and sometimes writes in the third person. He overcame that to say in E-book Matrix in Progress | The Wordsupply Writers' Network:

I posted a rough matrix of e-book formats and devices, hoping folks will help me build it.

I also want to keep track of which e-book retailers sell which formats – and to help visualize which platforms are most versatile. A format war will surely heat up in the next few years.

See the chart online and help fill in the matrix with offerings to david@wordsupply.com

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Writers Born December 8

Celebrate the birthday of fellow Buckeye James Thurber and others:

• Roman poet Horace (65 BC; d.8 BC), born Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace in Latin)
• 1903 Nobel Prize winner, Norwegian dramatist, poet, novelist, and politician Bjornstjerne [Martinius] Bjornson (1832; d.1910)
• British writer of travel books, zoological treatises, novels, and an autobiography, [George] Norman Douglas (1868; d.1952)
• Irish novelist and poet Padraic Colum, born Patrick Collumb (1881; d.1972)
• Pittsburgh native and novelist Hervey Allen (1889; d.1949), author of Anthony Adverse
• Ohio humorist James Thurber (1894; d.1961)
• Welsh/British novelist Richard Llewellyn aka Richard David Vivian Llewellyn Lloyd (1906; d.1983)
• NYC-born poet, short story writer, and critic Delmore Schwartz (1913; d.1966)
• NY-born novelist Mary Gordon (1949), who wrote Final Payments (1978) and The Company of Women (1981)

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Pronounciation Dictionary

Everyone gets a kick out of "WhorePresents.com," the website for finding the agents of rich and famous people. If you're still scratching your head over this, the joke is in the capitalization of the domain name. In a name registry, a site name is in all caps: WHOREPRESENTS.COM is the domain for the site that calls itself "Who Represents." It is our dirty minds that see the word "whore" first.

What if you could avoid such a faux pas? Wouldn't it be handy to have a place to check before you cleverly chose a name that means "no go" in another language (Nova)? That was not exactly the genesis of Pronounce Names - Dictionary of Name Pronunciation, as they explain:

The idea of this website is to make your name easy to pronounce. The dictionary does not have your name, how do you get people to pronounce your name right?

How many times have you been in this situation when you have heard your name mangled, twisted, contorted into something you yourself can barely comprehend?

Yes, I see or, rather, I hear every time an Asian call me "GAY-OR-GANNA", but I forgive because they are phonetically correct.

At Pronounce Names, you can:

* Lookup pronunciation of a name.
* Submit pronuncation of a name so that others can pronounce it correctly.
* Request pronunciation of a name that you don't know and would like to find out.

And that's exactly what I did. They tell me to return in a few days to learn how to pronounce my own name. This should be good!

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Blue Pyramid Book Quiz II

You're Much Ado About Nothing!You're not really sure what all the fuss is about, but it seems like it's all a lot of overreaction. Light and playful, you tend to be the one making dirty jokes in the corner, or even in front of a whole bunch of people. You end up being more or less unable to keep a straight face, even when something serious seems to be on the line. Despite this, you still have something to say about gender equality. In the end, you're just looking for a hero.

Take the Book Quiz II at the Blue Pyramid.

Oh, this is so NOT ME!

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Twitter Mistakes

Guy Kawasaki does it again with Twitter Cluelessness at OPEN Forum:

Generally, if you’re wondering if you’re about to do something clueless, just don’t do it. This is because people might not know that you’re clueless, but if you do these things, you’ll remove all doubt. However, the last rule, and the most important, is this: Don’t be afraid to break these rules. Like I said, there is no right and wrong on Twitter. There’s only what works for you and what doesn’t.

1. Don’t tell other people how to tweet.
2. Don’t tell the world that you unfollowed someone.
3. Don’t ask people why they unfollowed you
4. Don’t constantly tweet mundane updates and babble.
5. Don’t use a small picture for an avatar.
6. Don’t use an avatar that makes you look too hot.
7. Don’t go crazy with hashtags.
8. Don’t use ALL CAPITAL LETTERS.
9. Don’t use long links.
10. Don’t call yourself a “guru” or an “expert.”
11. Don’t send out automated “welcome” direct messages.

Read his great article for explanations of each item. I'd add another: Don't use any Twitter feature until you are certain what it does. I did and offended someone I've known for years. Of course, if you are only using Twitter to communicate with friends and family, none of the "rules" matter. As always, this post concerns writers who are trying to build businesses or careers.

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DailyLit Now All Free

Easy reading: bites of books in your email or RSS. And now it is all free, according to the DailyLit Blog's DailyLit Announces Move to All Free:

With the support of our sponsors, we’ll do our best to continue to present series of the highest quality and will strive to continue to earn the reputation we’ve recently received as the #1 Book Website (as selected by The Sunday Times).

The service offers over 1000 classic and contemporary books that you can read in 5-minute installments on any device that receives email or RSS. DailyLit began in May 2007.

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World AIDS Day 2009

#WorldAIDSDay and #red via @AnnCurry on Twitter.

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