Going Out

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Claire Malcolm is the founding Chief Executive of the writer development charity New Writing North . Here, she answers some questions commonly asked by new writers. You’ll never regret—in fact, you’ll thank yourself later—for investing the time necessary to prepare for such a monumental task.

These are just some of the questions you may have. But there is not one answer, and certainly not one way on how to outline a novel. The final step of how to publish a book is marketing it to the fullest. You’ve already gotten the ball rolling with your launch plan, but here are a few more essentials to take into account: But writing a book isn’t easy. As a 21-time New York Times bestselling author, I can tell you: It’s far easier to quit than to finish. The difference between publicity and marketing is that the marketing strategy is dependent on how big budget marketers have to spend. They will look at who the audience is and how to reach them best, from the traditional, like train station billboards, to digital, e.g. social media advertising, all the while bringing out the messages of the book. I’m in awe of my marketing colleagues and the way they monitor, update and react to consumer behaviour, particularly online.Think The Hunger Games , Harry Potter , or How to Win Friends and Influence People . The market is crowded, the competition fierce. There’s no more room for run-of-the-mill ideas. Your premise alone should make readers salivate.

Publishers regularly have ‘acquisition meetings’, which is when new manuscripts for possible publication are discussed. This meeting involves people from a variety of departments who all give their input as to whether a book should be acquired, or bought for publication. Here, the team from our publishing house Cornerstone explain some of the factors which affect their decision making. The Managing Director: Susan Sandon And if you’re looking for a musclebound electronic organizing system, you can’t do better than Scrivener. It works well on both PCs and Macs, and it nicely interacts with Word files.For this reason, my first tip is make sure you enjoy it. There were certain evenings when I really felt like I should write but I didn’t want to. So I didn’t. Listen to yourself. Get off the bike. Sometimes. Your work product will thank you for it. Joel Richardson, crime and thriller Publisher at Penguin : Firstly, they did buy the book because they thought it was great! Editors are incredibly selective, so the fact that they’ve acquired your book means they think it’s something special.

For marketing, the same applies – so much is learnt on the job. As in publicity, there are many different avenues to go down to promote a book, so a marketer’s job is varied: from helping develop an author’s social media profile to designing proofs of books to send out to influencers and media to build a buzz around the book ahead of publication. Add your main points as chapters. Brainstorm the main points your book will discuss to convey the topic you’re writing about. Then, add these main points as chapters. Spread the Word - based in London, and runs schemes including the Young People's Laureate for London. If you get out on that Pantser highwire and lose your balance, you’ll thank me for advising you to have this in place.

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You may be familiar with this image of J.K. Rowling's plot lines of the Harry Potter books… Image Credit: Daily Mail If you'd like to see more novel writing software, you can read this article. Otherwise, it's time to get started with your outline! Ready to write your book outline?

Books shouldn’t, of course, be judged by their cover, but no one can deny that the way a book looks can influence our feelings about it. While a nonfiction book may not have as much action or dialogue or character development as a novel, you can inject tension by showing where people have failed before and how your reader can succeed.

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Read what you wrote - but don’t edit it. Note down any ideas you think are interesting enough to pursue in the actual draft of your book. Most of these tools were made by authors, for authors, so they can be extremely useful. However, they will cost money and they do have a learning curve. That's why we offer the free templates in a simple word processor you're already familiar with and know how to use. The conflict you introduce at the start of your book doesn’t have to be the main conflict; in fact, this might be a good time to introduce a red herring motivation - send your characters on a wild goose chase that just so happens to get them closer to the main villain’s plots and gives them a reason to want to thwart them. Eye-catching yet tasteful. Whether you choose a photo-based, illustration-based, or typography-based cover, it must be interesting enough to catch the reader’s eye, yet not so busy that it looks overwhelming or unprofessional. Here are three covers in each of those categories that achieve just the right balance: