Category Archives: Networking

A Game of Horns

Conflict Mary Pletsch Superstars Writing Seminars No Comments

 

game of horns            If you’re one of our newer readers, you might not know that the Fictorians were formed at the first Superstars Writing Seminar in 2010, or that our regular members are all alumni of the course.

There are lots of writing courses out there.  I took a creative writing course in university, which was a great way to explore new ideas, work outside my previous comfort zone, and receive feedback from both my fellow students and my course instructor.  But this course didn’t do anything to teach me how to sell the stories that I had written.

Superstars is not a course on how to write.  It is a course on how to write as a career.

The best way to learn career craft – how to get an agent, how to read a contract, how royalties work, how to present yourself, how to create buzz about your work, how to turn your hobby into a career – is from the people who do it for a living.  That’s what Superstars is all about.  The instructors are not making a living from instructing; they’re making a living from writing.

Superstars Writing Seminars took me from a fanfic writer with a desire to publish original fiction, to a multi-published short story writer who now has a book contract.

I was able to go thanks to the generosity of those who helped me afford the trip.  We know that not everyone is able to afford the tuition fee, and not everyone is lucky enough to have people in their lives who are able, or willing, to help.

That’s why WordFire Press and Superstars Writing Seminars, with Lisa Mangum as editor, launched the Unicorn Anthologies.  Inspired by a quote from Kevin J. Anderson – “if you agree to write a purple unicorn story, write the best purple unicorn story you can; that’s professionalism” – the proceeds from these anthologies goes towards a scholarship fund, named for Superstars alumnus Don Hodge, to assist writers who want to go to the seminar and need help affording the tuition.

One Horn to Rule Them All:  A Purple Unicorn Anthology was the first.  Now A Game of Horns:  A Red Unicorn Anthology is available!

The second anthology focuses on stories involving strong conflicts.  Red is the colour of war; the colour of blood; the colour of passion and will. Conflict is an essential aspect of plot.  It drives the story forward; it takes place when characters confront obstacles.

My contribution, Queen of the Hidden Way, is the story of Anpu, a royal daughter whose kingdom is under another’s rule.  A third player wants to take the throne by capturing and ensorcelling a karkadann, a desert unicorn.  With death and treachery all around, Anpu must choose her conflicts wisely, and in the end, decide what battles are truly worth fighting.

You can pick up A Game of Horns on Amazon in either paperback or ebook.   Proceeds will help provide Don Hodge Memorial Scholarships for future Superstars attendees in financial need, and provide you with a showcase of the excellent talent of the Superstars.

To Con or Not To Con: The Write Question

Conventions Guy Anthony De Marco Rewriting Self-Motivation No Comments

For years, I’ve gone to conventions all over the continental United States. Some were genre conventions such as MileHiCon, Radcon, and Archon. Others were more media-centric, such as Denver Comic Con and Salt Lake Comic Con. Toss in a World Horror and a few writing conventions such as Superstars Writing Seminars and you’re looking at most of my traveling expenses over the years.

I’ve decided to pull back on the conventions this year. I’m only going to go to two – MileHiCon, because of a series of panels on anthologies that I help to produce with author Sam Knight, and possibly Archon St. Louis. Going to conventions has helped to get my name out there, and I sell enough books to offset some of the costs of traveling. I made quite a few friends along the way, and was able to get on panels with some of the best authors and editors in most of the genres that I write in.

Now it’s time to start getting work out the door. I wrote rough drafts for five novels during NaNoWriMo last November, finally breaking through one million total NaNo words. I am working on getting at least four of my novels finished, polished, and sent to publishers. I’m halfway through two non-fiction books that are new, plus a rewrite of a short handbook that will be republished soon. Add in some short stories for different anthologies and I’m on my way to having my name in at least eight titles this year. If that isn’t enough, I’m working on the artwork for a graphic novel script that I wrote last October.

It’s going to be a very busy year, assuming there are no medical issues.

I’m sure you’ve read authors saying that you just need to sit down and write. This is the year I focus on that task. Hopefully, one of those projects will be the kernel that pops, according to Kevin J. Anderson’s Popcorn Theory of Writing. If one of the projects can get some viral recognition, I’m hoping that the inertia will get my name in front of convention programming directors for the 2017 convention circuit. It would be nice if they were asking me instead of the usual me asking if there were any panel slots available. I’ve been the Guest of Honor for one convention so far, and several others have paid for my hotel. I’d enjoy the opportunity to visit places I haven’t seen yet, and there are still seven states I require to get all fifty — and luckily, I’ve already been to Hawaii and Alaska, although I wouldn’t turn down a return trip.

So, for me, it’s time to put up and shut up. Much of the hard work is done, since I have so many rough drafts to polish and rewrite. If I take breaks from the long works by cranking out several short stories or poems, I expect to increase my title count from the current 47 to well over fifty. Who knows, if I have enough short works, maybe I’ll also put together a collection to get closer to 60 titles to start off 2017.

Wish me luck!

About the Author:DeMarco_Web-5963

Guy Anthony De Marco is a disabled US Navy veteran speculative fiction author; a Graphic Novel Bram Stoker Award® finalist; winner of the HWA Silver Hammer Award; a prolific short story and flash fiction crafter; a novelist; an invisible man with superhero powers; a game writer (Sojourner Tales modules, Interface Zero 2.0 core team, third-party D&D modules); and a coffee addict. One of these is false.
A writer since 1977, Guy is a member of the following organizations: SFWA, WWA, SFPA, IAMTW, ASCAP, RMFW, NCW, HWA. He hopes to collect the rest of the letters of the alphabet one day. Additional information can be found at Wikipedia and GuyAnthonyDeMarco.com.

And Now for Something Completely Different

Conventions Denouement Interacting With Professionals Nathan Barra Networking Plot Structure Professional Behavior Publishing Starting a Career The Writing Life No Comments

When it comes to giving advice regarding plot structure, I have found that most everyone seems to focus on the time from the beginning of the book to the climax. In a way, I completely understand. After all, that’s where the majority of your story happens. However, I find that some people seem to forget that after the climax the story must come to a graceful ending, and that this resolution is as essential to the story as any other part. You’ve made the characters struggle and suffer for their triumph, so they deserve a little time off right?

The denouement is more than just sympathy for a cast you’ve spent years torturing. It’s a matter of practicality. The climax of a story is supposed to be the defining challenge of the protagonists’ life and potentially for the entire world they live in. It doesn’t matter if the story takes a single volume or a twenty part series to tell, once the climax is resolved, the story is done. Young authors need to learn to let go even when, or perhaps especially when, you don’t want to.

I really admire a storyteller who knows when to take their bows and move on to the next work. After all, we are writers people! We are not limited to a single story. Sometimes the best endings for an old story is the beginning of a new one. The more one writes, the better the stories get. Often it is best for our career to work on something else for a while and then return to an old project when the time is right.

Over the past couple years, I’ve been pursuing a deal in traditional publishing. For the first time, I’ve had a story that I knew was good, and that friends who I trust to be honest with me say is near publishable. I’ve devoted all my time and attention to this single story. Not just drafting and editing, but also networking and promoting myself in an attempt to secure a traditional publishing contract. I’ve been obsessed with the idea, and in my attachment forgot to move on.Don’t get me wrong, the story’s not dead to me. I still believe in its potential and will continue to shop it until I find a good home for it. Publishing takes a long time. With eight months to a year between submitting the story and hearing back, I just can’t afford to wait for it anymore. It’s like trying to fish with only one line in the water. You might eventually catch something, but you may be waiting a while for that first bite.

So, in 2016 I’m going to work on something completely different. Up until now I’ve written fantasy, both the sword & sorcery and urban varieties. In order to force myself to grow as a writer, I am trying my hand at a bit of science fiction. So far, it’s been a fun ride and has forced me to rethink many of the assumptions and tropes I had grown used to relying on. Even better, once I finish drafting and polishing this new manuscript, I’ll be able to cast a second line into the pool. Then I’ll start again. And again. Eventually, I’ll get a bite.

Ten WordPress Plugins for Author Websites

Annik Valkanberg Interacting With Fans Marketing 4 Comments
A Guest Post by Annik Valkanberg

Authors need readers. Readers need authors. Why is it so difficult for them to get together?

From the author’s perspective, it’s tough to be seen through all of the smoke and distractions. We have to compete with video games, movies, instant gratification websites, and sometimes even naughty websites. How can we be found in a sea of meh?

One thing we can do is to make sure our author websites have some form of stickiness and interactivity. Like the Fictorians, if there’s something new and interesting, or if there’s some cool little method to interact with others, the readers will keep drifting back to see the latest post or to interact with the authors and visitors.

Here are ten useful WordPress plugins that help the reader to connect with an author.

Contact

Contact means a method to either get in touch with the site authors or to get a bit of feedback when users post. I use both of these plugins in all of the websites I build.

Contact Form 7
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/contact-form-7/
A contact form in general is a grand thing to have on an author website. It allows people to contact us, and it can lead to convention invitations, anthology requests, and even signed book sales. Contact Form 7 is one of the better contact plugins available. It is regularly updated and is easy to configure and customize. This free plugin supports a CAPTCHA system to dissuede spammers and Akismet spam filtering.

CommentLuv
http://comluv.com/download/commentluv-wordpress/
Comments are a wonderful thing to receive on your blog, with CommentLuv for WordPress you can give something back to your community straight away by including a titled link for their last blog post or tweet on the end of their comment.

The plugin fetches the feed found at commenters site URL while they type their comment. It extracts the last blog post title with link and displays it below the comment form. When they submit their comment, the last blog post link gets added on the end of their comment for all to see! This gives your web visitors more reason to leave a comment on your site.

This free plugin also creates cross-links that can help your Google/SEO ranking.

Speed

WP Super Cache
http://z9.io/wp-super-cache/
Nothing screams “go away” like a slow website. The free WP Super Cache plugin takes snapshots of your website and feeds those to the visitors. This way, the server does not have to run everything over and over on each page view, significantly lowering the time it takes to forward the data. It does this by generating standard HTML files that are served directly by the web server without processing comparatively heavy PHP scripts.

Typography Sophistication

Typography is something that gets lost in the rush to get a website up. Planting a flag in a field of flags might help the ego, but one must figure out ways to differentiate. Playing with the typography is an easy way to look unique.

Google Web Fonts for WordPress
http://codecanyon.net/item/google-web-fonts-for-wordpress/242339
Google Fonts Pro is an $11 WordPress plugin that allows you to instantly access over 200 of Google’s Web Fonts. Installation is a snap, and it gives you full control over the font and typography used on your site. Instead of sticking with Times New Roman, Verdana, or even Comic Sans, you can make the typography part of your image.

Security

This set of plugins is the first to get installed, configured and activated. Once your site is hacked and starts handing out malware and viruses, you can guarantee people will never return. Keeping these installed and updated will remove your website from the thousands of low-hanging fruits.

BulletProof Security
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/bulletproof-security/
The plugin is designed to be a fast, simple and one-click security plugin that creates, copies, renames, moves or writes to the provided BulletProof Security .htaccess master files. It protects both your Root website folder and wp-admin folder with .htaccess website security protection, as well as providing additional website security protection.

It is a bit more sophisticated, and really locking down your website will take some tweaking, but it is worth it in the long run. My website receives an average of eight hacking attempts per hour, all automated. The main system is free, but there are extra perks for the $59.95 Pro version, which includes self-configuration, self-healing, and self-repairing. When it is self-aware, expect the price to go up.

Limit Login Attempts
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/limit-login-attempts/
This simple and free plugin limits the number of login attempts possible both through normal login as well as using auth cookies. It blocks an Internet address from making further attempts after a specified limit on retries is reached, making a brute-force attack difficult or impossible.

Wordfence
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordfence/
https://www.wordfence.com/?utm_source=repo&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=pluginDescCTA
From their website:
Wordfence starts by checking if your site is already infected. We do a deep server-side scan of your source code comparing it to the Official WordPress repository for core, themes and plugins. Then Wordfence secures your site and makes it up to 50 times faster.

Wordfence Security is 100% free and open source. We also offer a Premium API key that gives you Premium Support, Country Blocking, Scheduled Scans, Password Auditing and we even check if your website IP address is being used to Spamvertize. The premium version is a monthly fee, never over $4 a month.

Email List Building

This is another area that authors tend to skip. Building an email list is vital to your author brand, but it’s the one piece most authors don’t think is important. You want a way to politely market to folks who have already expressed an interest in your work.

WP Opt-in
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-opt-in/
WP OptIn is a WordPress plugin that allows your commenters to subscribe to your email newsletter or autoresponder simply by checking a box automatically placed in your comment forms. The plugin integrates with Aweber, ConstantContact, or MailChimp to subscribe commenters without an extra subscription step. This is an easy way to build a newsletter email list.

Search Engine Optimization

SEO is boring for the average bear, but getting on the first page is important for folks who are looking for you, particularly if you have a nondescript name.

Google XML Sitemaps
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-sitemap-generator/
This plugin will generate a special XML sitemap which will help search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and others to better index your blog. With an accurate sitemap, it’s much easier for the crawlers to see the complete structure of your site and retrieve it more efficiently. The plugin supports all kinds of WordPress generated pages as well as custom URLs. Additionally it notifies all major search engines every time you create a post about the new content.

Yoast SEO
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/
The free version of Yoast SEO is all you need to get excellent results with search engine optimization with keywords. When you author a new post a new section appears below the text window. After you select a keyword or a key phrase, the system will give you instant feedback as to how search engines will reguard the post before you even hit the publish button. It gives suggestions such as adding in outbound links or images, and it allows you to customize the text that appears on search engines.

These are what I consider to be the minimum one can use to have an efficient and visible blog. Maybe it’s time to give your blog a critical eye and bring it up snuff for 2016.