Tag: editors

How To Market Your Book On YouTube – Episode 14

In this series author Mark Stay & video marketer Jeremy Mason lift the lid on how to market a book. The series is a real-life case study – as we catalogue the book marketing journey of Mark’s latest book The Crow Folk (Simon & Schuster). Each episode comes laden with book marketing tips, offers insights into book publishing as well as ideas about author marketing.

In this episode we cover: book blog tours (and why they’re critical to a post-launch book marketing strategy) – how to find your dream book editor – beta readers (why you need them, and how to find them) – using StreamYard for virtual book launches…

My Chat With Ian W Sainsbury

I was delighted to gatecrash Ian W Sainsbury’s Friday night chat last week. We discussed Alpha/Beta Readers, book covers, Facebook Groups, the joy of editors, the wonders of notebooks, Ursula Le Guin and why whenever Ian hears my voice he thinks of dog poo…

Where’s my bloody book?! (part two) – An update on The End of Magic…

After a bit of a lull over the summer, my new fantasy novel The End of Magic has survived the edit and is now with the copy editor Lisa Rogers.

“What the hell is a copy editor?” you may ask… Well, after working on structural and character stuff with Simon, we now move onto what is sometimes also called the line edit, where another editor goes through the book line-by-line and looks for errors in grammar, punctuation and continuity. Even the most diligent author will miss stuff and we all go wordblind after a while, so it’s essential to get a fresh pair of eyes to give it a thorough going over.

I was determined to get Lisa for two reasons.

  1. I worked with her on Robot Overlords and she’s blimming amazing and has incredible knowledge of science fiction and fantasy and has a brain roughly the size of a planet.
  2. She’s a wonderful human being and we should all work with wonderful human beings whenever we get the chance.

This should all be sorted in the next month or so, and then we move onto the proofread and maybe… just maybe… we might have news on a release date.

In the meantime, if you’re keen to dip in before the main event I have a free short story/prequel to the novel available when you sign up to my newsletter here.

And if you haven’t pre-ordered The End of Magic, you can do it here and there’s still time to get your name in the book along with some other cool extras! And here’s me pitching it on a windy day…

Till next time,

Mark

The End of Magic edit update

Over lunch today I finished the latest phase of the edit. I’ve been picking away at my editor Simon Spanton’s notes (over 350 suggested changes and comments) for a little over three weeks now.

I started with the easy stuff, namely all the extraneous crap marked ‘Delete’ by Simon. Suggestions to re-word awkwardly phrased sentences, clarity where there was confusion, repetitions…

… and a whole section where I had a character eating stew from a plate instead of a bowl (d’oh!). I find this is a nice warm up before the main event, and a good way to reacquaint yourself with a book that you might not have looked at for weeks or even months.

There was a whole debate about rats on a ship, how fast a ship would sink, and how many lashes with a cat ‘o nine tails would kill a man (Simon is an extremely genial and friendly chap, but knows an awful lot about naval punishment).

We went back and forth on the size of armies, weaponry, lethal farm tools (who knew that the cutting edge of a scythe blade was on the inside of the curve? Simon did, thankfully), dog bites, poisons, rats, crops, injuries, the efficiency of messenger pigeons, the physiology of merpeople…

… putting a saddle on the back of a wyvern, and the mental and physical cost of using magic.

There were a few moments where my characters rushed into action without much thought of the consequences and it was great to have the opportunity to dig a little deeper and think about why they made those impetuous decisions.

It’s been fun if hard and intense work, but there’s no question that it’s improved the book. And it’s not over yet! I’m sure Simon will have a few more notes for me, and then we’ll move onto the copy edit where it gets really forensic.

I’m hoping to have a revised version of the opening chapter that I can share with you soon, in the meantime thanks to everyone who has supported the book so far, and if you’ve not yet pre-ordered you can do so here.

Son of a Beach

It’s been a fun week with a trip to the beach at Whitstable to interview Julie Wassmer. I had hoped to get some lovely audio atmosphere with waves lapping on shingle and gulls screeching overhead, but the tide was out so I had to settle for a gentle breeze buffeting the microphone. Fortunately, Julie is great fun to chat to and she told me all about working on EastEnders, bumping off the locals in her novels, and why all writers should live in fear of a cup of tea and bacon sandwich. Listen here.

I finished the John Yorke Story for Screenwriting course. 16 weeks of pretty intense work. Was it worth it? Check out my thinkings over here…

I also got to visit Hachette’s new warehouse in Didcot. While this may not sound like everyone’s idea of a fun day out, I did get to ride on one of their pickers, which went some 25 metres in the air and the queues were shorter than Disney…

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Getting a lift in the new Hachette warehouse…

A post shared by Mark Stay (@mark.stay) on

Also, if anyone’s concerned that print books are on the decline, this vast palace of storage and hi-tech distribution should allay those fears. This place was built to pump books out into the world and they’ve left plenty of room for expansion.

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I finished a short story this week. It’s a prequel to The End of Magic in which we meet our antagonist. My agent Ed read it and enjoyed it, though he did have one note: “Maybe the humour could be a little less lavatorial…? But that’s probably my shit to deal with.”

I do seem to have a thing about bodily functions… What do you say? Should I take this crap?

Also, I’m going to be on the new Dominic King arts show on BBC Radio Kent next Tuesday 12th at around 8pm. He asked me to put together a montage of voices from the podcast, which I did, but I’ve also made a “Guess the voice” quiz, which you can play here…

Till next time!

Mark

Cavan Scott – Licence to Write

I really enjoyed speaking to Cavan Scott on this week’s episode of the Bestseller Experiment. He writes on licence – that is, he writes for some of the biggest franchises and series in the world, including Star Wars, Doctor Who and Star Trek. Listening to how he worked his way up from sending pitches to Big Finish Audio to becoming an influential writer of these beloved universes, and now writing his own fiction, was inspirational stuff. And moreso, now I’ve just learned that Cavan is bringing back Jaxxon the Rabbit, a cocky gunslinger who featured in one of the first ever Star Wars spinoff stories in the weekly comic.

It’s a fun episode, and you can listen to it here.

My co-presenter this week was the wonderful Jenn McMenemy, whose own podcast The Ancient History Fangirl, has just launched its second episode and it’s a blast. Check it out here.

In other news, I hit 60% funded on The End of Magic this week! A huge thanks to everyone who has supported the book so far. As a reward (punishment) here’s me reading from the book with another terrible “comedy” accent…

If you haven’t pledged yet, then please visit here and hit the big blue ‘pledge’ button: https://unbound.com/books/end-of-magic/

A ghostwriter, an archaeologist and a wizard walk into a bar…

On this week’s Bestseller Experiment podcast I spoke to Ghostwriter Roz Morris, who gives a very thorough breakdown of how a ghostwriter works, and also describes a fun way of developing story ideas that involves scraps of paper and a box.

Mark Desvaux has had to bow out of the podcast for a few episodes due to a family illness, so I was ably assisted by Jenn McMenemy who, as well being on the podcast as a guest previously, has also launched her own podcast Ancient History Fangirl, which is huge fun and proves once again that history is a great resource for writers.

This week’s Deep Dive podcast is a cracker, looking into audiobooks, the fastest growing sector of publishing. We talk to Orion Audio’s Paul Stark about mainstream audiobook publishing, and we also get contributions from indie authors Jo Ho and Michael R Miller. It’s choc full of ready detailed info, so if you’re not a Patreon supporter pop over to our Patreon page and get on board!

And finally, at the time of writing I’m 59% funded on my book The End of Magic. A thousand thanks to everyone who’s pledged so far, and if you haven’t joined the adventure yet, why not be the hero who nudges me over to 60%? Click here and hit the blue pledge button.

Till next time, happy writing!

 

Mark

The End of Magic – week 2

Another week passes and I’m currently at 35% funded with 73 wonderful backers. A big welcome to everyone who’s joined the adventure in the last week. Your pledges mean the world to me.

I’m also amazed to see that the ‘Be in the book’ pledges have sold out! Thank you Craig, Phill and Andy… I look forward to giving you all glorious deaths on paper very soon.

I’m currently hitting my target of 1% per day, and if we keep this up then we should be fully funded on 4th May, so if you’ve already pledged please continue to spread the word and let any fantasy fiction fans you know that the book is coming. Word of mouth is the best way to help make this happen. Here’s the link: https://unbound.com/books/end-of-magic/

We discuss The End of Magic and how Unbound work in this week’s episode of The Bestseller Experiment podcast. Have a listen here… http://bestsellerexperiment.com/unbound-and-the-end-of-magic/

 

 

We had one of those Youtube live show thingies on the podcast this week…

I’m often stopped in the street and asked, “Hey, Mark. How do those Youtube live show thingies work on the podcast? They look so much fun. How can I get involved, man?”

And I say, “Dude, it’s an exclusive for our Patreon thingy supporters. They get first dibs on all sorts of cool stuff, like the Youtube live shows where they can ask me and Mr. D questions about writing and publishing and stuff, and interact with us via the miracle medium of the Youtubes. We talked about how long your project should be, how to find other writers who will give you feedback, the kinds of deals a debut author can expect from a publishers and tips on building your mailing list, and there’s a whole long debate about swearing. It’s a fuckin’ gas, baby.”

“But can’t I just download the edited highlights a week later on the podcast?”

“Yeah, and that’s a stone groove, but nothing beats actually being there, and you get live pictures on the Youtube and sometimes people get naked.”

“Really?”

“No. Tell you what just check out the highlights of the last show here, and then sign up to our Patreon. It’ll totally wang your doodle.”

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PS. We wrote a book. You might like it. Others do…

SHANNON MAYER

Liz Pichon on this week’s podcast

Late last year I was invited to the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators conference at Winchester University, and the organisers kindly allowed me to stick my microphone under the nose of anyone passing by. As well enjoying some very instructional and inspirational panels, I got to talk to some amazing authors, including Liz Pichon, author of the bestselling Tom Gates books.

We talk about all sorts, including how she uses flowcharts to outline her stories and how The Sopranos was an influence on the Tom Gates books!

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN NOW

Liz was very generous with her time and I must thank the organisers of the conference for being so accommodating. There will be more interviews like this with the likes of Patrice Lawrence and Alex T. Smith and more. Subscribe to the podcast on your podcatcher of choice to make sure you don’t miss out.

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If you liked that episode and want some more, we’ve started having post-podcast deep dive discussions for our Patreon supporters. And last night we had a Youtube Live show, where we answered our Patreon supporter questions. You can support us and get the extra content here.

And if you’re looking for something new to read in 2018, then grab a copy of our novel Back to Reality on Kindle now!

MARK DAWSON