Holidays

I hope your holidays are filled with family, good friends and lots of cheer.

I brought my husband home from the hospital after his Tuesday knee replacement. So, our Christmas will be quiet while he exercises, recuperates and watches sports.

I am, however, still working on marketing. I bought cookie cutters - boot, cowboy, cactus and horse. At some presentations I plan to have kids decorate their own cookies. I also found lots of recipes for cowboy cookies - hardy oatmeal cookies. After Laura Resau said she took French pasties to a signing and had lots of people, I began to consider what I might do.

Along with the above, I copied the book cover on 8" x 11" cardstock, cut the picture into large puzzle pieces and plan to hand out as prizes.

The next post will be January 3rd.

No New Ideas

As writers we are told there are no new ideas only old ones rewritten. I discovered that by mistake this weekend.

Turner Classic Movies and AMC showed many old Christmas movies including "In the Good Old Summertime" with Judy Garland and Van Johnson. I love old Christmas movies.

A young woman becomes a pen pal with a man she doesn't know. Then she takes a job in a music store. The two people decide to meet. She carries a book and a flower and waits for a long time. As it turns out, her music store boss is her pen pal and discovers as much when he looks through the window of the restaurant to see her sitting there with a book and a flower. He leaves but returns and sits down. Sound familiar?

I have watched "You've Got Mail" so many times I know it by heart. A scene in the picture duplicates the one in the Christmas movie. As I think about the two movies, I recall more and more duplications.

Further research discovered the first version "The Shop Around the Corner," 1940, starred James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan was set in Budapest. "In the Good Old Summertime" came out in 1949 as a remake set in Chicago. "You've Got Mail," 1998, takes email, AOL, Pride and Prejudice and the old versions to a new level set in New York City. Silly me thought the last to be a "new" movie. Little did I know.

Although not always reliable, Wikipedia gives a good account of the three movies.

The moral of this writing is don't give up on your story just because you discover it has been done before. Give it a new twist - change the setting, tweak the plot, add something new and go for it. If writing non-fiction such as advice, remember today's generation doesn't know all those past ideas.

Happy writing!

HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Author events

I've been told that if you want to be a hit with your publisher, you should commit yourself to marketing. The School Manager of Pelican Publishing commented how excited she is about all the events I've lined up for the book's release. What can you do?

Perhaps I've listed some things before. Contact as many people as possible. Start a Facebook Fan Page. Network wherever you go. Make business cards and pass them out liberally. Consider making bookmarks. I gave a recipe for that before. Since then I've decided to have them done professionally at a local business. Join social media groups. Work with your publisher. Check out other markets such as, in my case, businesses that deal in cowboy clothing. Join author events. I have access to one but it costs a small fortune to have a booth. I'm thinking about it. Think publicity. Plan now for interview questions. Update your website. These are but a few suggestions. If you have more, please comment.

Things are heating up for the release. News from the publisher indicates the Denver Art Museum has backordered books already. Pelican says response has been great.

Local events include book signings at several locations.

• February 17th, 506:30 pm, Small Business Development Center Networking Event in Loveland
• February 26th, 1:00 p.m., Old Firehouse Books 
• The Loveland Museum/Gallery hosts a signing/presentation on March 19th, 1-3.
• March 26th, I'll conduct a teacher workshop on how to get children to enjoy, interact, look thoroughly at art, and how to incorporate art into other curriculum subjects.
• April 13th, Primrose School in Denver

For more information and locations, check my website.

I'll be adding a signing at Reader's Cove soon.

Books and Christmas

Sales! Sales! And more sales! Even my book with a release date of February 15th is already listed at a discounted price for pre-orders on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble website. Last time I looked Borders and Pelican had it at full price.

Books make wonderful Christmas gifts. I've given The Polar Express and The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey to all my grandchildren as well as other children I know.

I've written articles on giving books. "Book of the Month Club" gives a book each month in honor of a child's birthday or to extend Christmas throughout the year. Depending on the child's age, Newbery and Caldecott books make great gifts. To make it easier, buy stamps ahead of time and mailing envelops. You can even buy the books early. I once found one in a grocery store sale bin - Click, Clack, Moo which was an honor winner.

Another darling book for younger children is Ellen Javernick's The Birthday Pet. Check for local authors and try to fit their books with the children on your list. Getting an autograph is also a plus. For special children, give the gift of an author visit to their class. In my case, I'm offering free presentations for launch of the book for the remainder of the 2010-2011 school year. I still require reimbursement of travel expenses for out of town.

Series books are always a hit. Libraries have lists of popular series by age. Just ask the resource desk. Think the Bailey School Kids, Magic School Bus, and many others. Check Debbie Dadey's website for several series.

Think books for gifts. Start a child's library at a young age. They'll become avid readers.

End of year

As the end of the year approaches, I begin to analyze what publications printed my works in 2010. Course, my husband gets on my case to print it all out for our taxes.

That said, what is your method of record keeping?

Some record keeping programs make the job easy. However, after trying one, I decided my spreadsheet works fine. I set up a spreadsheet with a submission listing - publication, article title, date, email or snail, what was sent (query, book proposal, whole article, etc.), acceptance/rejection, follow-up, editor, address, promised pay, expense and actual pay. Below all that, I list what expenses I accumulate as they happen.

Unfortunately, I'm a book junky. Instead of borrowing all my resource materials, I tend to purchase them from amazon.com or wherever I find them. If the books are out of print and expensive, I borrow them. My shelves are loaded. Many books have sticky notes along the edges. I'm not good at note taking but everything is marked in each book.

With the approach of the New Year, I'm considering what writing goals/resolutions I can make. The first will be better note keeping - footnotes particularly. If anyone questions a statement or fact, I'll have instant access to the source rather than spending time going through sticky notes.

What 2011 goals are you setting?

I think I'm pretty much finished with my website. Check it out. Let me know if you have suggestions.