This is something that I think about often when reading. How many people write in their books? Do you scribble notes to yourself, underline important/quote-worthy passages or do you just highlight words or sections? Does it help you better understand the material? Does it make the entire experience more memorable?

My parents collect rare books, so it has always been an unwritten rule around my house that books should be treated with care and respect…however, I have gone to the dark side. I write in books! I underline, I scribble (although I have extremely neat handwriting, so it really can’t be called scribbling), I highlight (yellow is my color of choice). I like my books to look like a version of my own personal diary. I want to always remember what struck me as poignant. I want to be able to revisit my thoughts and perceptions.

So my question is, “Do you write in books?” If you do, I would love to see snapshots of a page out of your book.

I am going to try and use this blog as a place to disperse some pertinent information regarding strong publicity tactics. With publishing houses shrinking in staff and budgets dwindling, many authors will have to put their own time and effort into an effective campaign.

Here’s an insider tip:

MAKE YOUR PRESS RELEASE COUNT!

When faced with tight deadlines and mounting article assignments, journalists need as much information as possible at their fingertips. The press release can also spark an idea or give the journalist incentive to include your book in an article or segment they are already working on.

Here are three things a good press release should offer.

1.) What problem will your book or your expertise solve.
2.) Why are you a good authority. Why should you be called on?
3.) Explain what you would like to offer to help solve the problem or bring light to a situation.

“Whatever big events have recently occurred, sure enough, I’ll see projects that are trying to capture that lightning in a book.”

-Agent Nathan Bransford on the trends he sees in queries.

Bransford wrote last year about a wave of chick lit with heavy protagonists. Sure enough, fast forward one year and that is exactly what we are seeing on the bookshelves.

From the article:

In this brave new ‘chick lit’ world, women realize that weight loss and dieting isn’t the way to happiness. If these new heroines lose weight in the books, they do so incidentally, as a result of finding genuine happiness and fulfillment in more substantial areas of their lives.

The ultimate fantasy for most women today is simply accepting themselves, whatever their body weight.

CBS News deserves a medal! Every day we hear about book sections folding and the lack of interest surrounding literature, authors and publishing, and yet it is still one of the most influential and inspiring areas of our culture. It fills me with hope when I see news outlets adding book coverage to their schedules. Jeff Glor is the host of AUTHOR TALK, a place for authors and readers to come together and learn about what is going on in the world of books. Author Talk is “a place to find the best new books, and get answers directly from the authors who wrote them.”

The most recent book covered is WHEN EVERYTHING CHANGED: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present by Gail Collins.

Neil Gaiman and Melvin Burgess are the latest authors to explore the potential of storytelling in 140-word bursts. Check it out here.

Just received my December issue of Glamour (Women of the Year). This issue is also the debut of Katie Couric’s new column focusing on inspiring women.

“People are deciding what media they want to consume out of a bewildering array of choices, and the ground is constantly shifting.”

-Literary agent, Nathan Bransford, at The Huffington Post, on why it is getting harder and harder for books to make a splash these days.

Fantastic article from the Wall Street Journal on the writing techniques, styles, nuances of famous writers!

For example:

Dan Chaon writes a first draft on color-coded note cards he buys at Office Max. Ideas for his books come to him as images and phrases rather than plots, characters or settings, he says. He begins by jotting down imagery, with no back story in mind. He keeps turning the images over in his mind until characters and themes emerge.

His most recent novel, “Await Your Reply,” which has three interlocking narratives about identity theft, started out as scattered pictures of a lighthouse on a prairie, a car driving into the arctic tundra under a midnight sun and a boy and his father driving to the hospital at night with the boy’s severed hand, resting on ice. He described each scene on a card, then began fleshing out the plotlines, alternating among blue, pink and green cards when he moved between narratives.

During the early stages of writing, he carries a pocketful of cards with him wherever he goes; as they accumulate, he stores them in a card catalogue that he bought at a library sale. It often takes two years before something resembling a novel takes shape. He eventually transcribes the cards onto the computer and writes furiously from 11 p.m. to 4 a.m.

{Thanks to Koreanish for bringing this article to my attention.}

“There’s no secret recipe for a good plot. Brilliance can be born of anything from a twelve-layered mystery to one old man in a boat trying to catch a fish. It’s all in the telling. But make sure your plot has the elements of great storytelling: believability, heart, and tension.”

— Laura Whitcomb, Your First Novel

Yes, I made my 5th appearance on Oprah on Monday! It was amazing! I actually said to Oprah, “I think we’re best friends now,” and she replied, “I think we are!” Yes. Pretty surreal.

You can watch the webcast for Uwem Akpan’s SAY YOU’RE ONE OF THEM here.

I recently interviewed Chris Bohjalian, author of the enormously popular MIDWIVES as well as many other thought-provoking and captivating novels. His upcoming release, SECRETS OF EDEN just received a starred review from Publishers Weekly.

Do you feel the subject matter of your books are ever rooted in a current event, a hot news story or a popular debate?

I don’t always relate a novel to a current event. “Skeletons at the Feast” is a love triangle set in Poland and Germany in the last six months of World War II. “The Buffalo Soldier” was about parental grief and loss and recovery. “The Double Bind” harkens back to “The Great Gatsby” and the literary canon. And even “Midwives” wasn’t about an issue that was out there in the news: No one was talking about midwifery in 1997. There was no national debate about home vs. hospital birth.

Still, I do have novelist friends who are preternaturally gifted at tapping into the cultural zeitgeist – and they sell boatloads more books than I do. So, clearly they’re on to something.

In any case, the last thing I would tell a novelist is that the key to great art is a great hook. Sometimes great art has a great hook…but I wouldn’t recommend beginning there.

Now, I think that if you are determined to pull something off the newspapers or news web sites and craft it into a novel, be sure there is some moral ambiguity or conflict to the story. Drama still needs conflict, even if your source is the news.

How do you decide what makes a good story?

Some writing professors will tell you to write about what you know; others will tell you to write about what you don’t know, but learn all you can. My sense is that it really doesn’t matter if you are writing about a subject you know all about or one that is completely foreign. The key is to explore a subject you care about so passionately that you want to get up at five a.m. to dive in. That has always been the barometer for me.

I should also note that for every novel I finish, I must go down two dead ends, some of which are hundreds of pages long.

Seventy-year-old Canadian author, Margaret Atwood, could teach her successors a few things about online promotion. To help generate attention for her latest novel, THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD, Margaret Atwood is blogging, tweeting and creating a YouTube contest.

Here is an interview she did with Reuters about her latest online activity.

Great piece in the New York Times about the price war between Walmart and Amazon over their books.

Great piece by Jonathan Fields in The Huffington Post about the changing face of self-publishing. It is especially delightful because two of my clients, Lisa Genova and Brunonia Barry, are referenced in the piece.

We worked with Brunonia Barry when THE LACE READER was self-published and we were able to secure her coverage that brought the attention of agents and a major seven figure deal with William Morrow. We were then hired by Lisa Genova to help promote her self-published novel, STILL ALICE, about a woman suffering from early onset alzheimer’s. Once again, the coverage we secured led her to a dream agent and a major deal with Simon & Schuster.

Here is a quote from the Huffington Post piece.

“What so many people don’t realize is that self-pubbed writers are not a group of frustrated, no-talent writers. Rather they include established authors like Stephen King, intellectuals like Noam Chomsky and Lisa Genova and Brunonia Barry, writers who couldn’t find anyone to publish their books, did it themselves, and landed on the NY Times bestseller list. It is my belief that there are many more great works and writers out there, just waiting to be found by adventurous readers.”

I was thrilled to work with both of these authors at the very beginning of their careers and to help provide them with the guidance and publicity they needed to lead them to immense success. As the publicist, I am the behind-the-scenes person, but I truly love seeing my hard work and dedication to my clients pay off…BIG TIME!

It seems that the magazine industry is continuing to crumble. Many layoffs have been reported from the Glamour camp. This just means more writers competing for a limited amount of freelance space…or the creation of more online magazines (Tyra’s already on this bandwagon)!

I just love that the title of this Huffington Post piece by Erica Jong is “BIG NEWS: WOMEN CAN WRITE!” Check it out here.

According to the Wall Street Journal, a new electronic book reader is expected *TODAY* from book seller Barnes & Noble Inc. that will challenge readers from Amazon.com Inc. and Sony Corp. with a color touch-screen and $259 price, according to a planned ad for the device.

The price for the reader, called the Nook, matches that of Amazon’s Kindle. The Kindle controls about 60% of the burgeoning e-book market, according to Forrester Research.

Engadget.com’s sources say the Nook will be partnering with Best Buy for sales of this device that will be available Thursday.

British author, Fiona Robyn, is going to start blogging her next novel, THAW, on March 1, 2010. The novel, which will be in the form of the the main character’s diary, will chronicle three months during which Ruth is contemplating suicide.

To help spread the word she’s organizing a “Blogsplash” where blogs will publish the first page of Ruth’s diary simultaneously with a link to the blog.

It is certainly an interesting way to get attention and the viral marketing aspect of it is sure to create some media attention. We will have to wait and see if THAW makes the desired splash.

PRNewser just brought a new website to my attention. Social Media Examiner is a web site that targets businesses who want to learn how to use social media to find leads, increase sales and build brand awareness.

From Social Media Examiner:

Social media is no more a one-off playground for brands than television advertising, direct mail campaigns or customer relationship management programs. It’s serious business and should be treated as such.

Check out Megan Kelley Hall, author of SISTERS OF MISERY and THE LOST SISTER in the October issue of Redbook Magazine.

60 Years Later: Coming through the Rye by Fredrik Colting

Fredrik Colting has selected Kelley & Hall as the publicity team for his controversial novel, 60 Years Later: Coming through the Rye (Windupbird Publishing) . JD Salinger has attempted to block the publication in this country and a decision in the Appeals Court has not yet been made. The New York Times, Associated Press, Gannett, and Tribune, as well as librarians, free speech advocates, and legal scholars are urging the Appeals Court to overturn the injunction barring US publication of 60 Years Later.

Facebook has almost 200 million active users and grows by nearly 600 thousand users daily. Women dominate Facebook, meaning there are more female users than male. Considering the fact that women do the majority of book buying, Facebook has a pretty good demographic for authors.

Authors are often confused and overwhelmed with how to make Facebook work as a strong marketing tool. The ability to reach your target audience and build a strong fan base is one of the key components that makes Facebook such a useful marketing strategy.

However, there are some tips and techniques that can be applied to Facebook to maximize its potential.

- Don’t use it to only post your release date or facts and figures about you and your book. Use Facebook as a way to interact with your readers, build relationships and create interest.
- Keep your status updates relevant to your career or writing life. Keep it focused but casual.
- Give tiny peeks into the “life of a writer” because this is something that truly fascinates readers.
- Let your “friends” know when your book is coming out, when a review is appearing in a newspaper, magazine or online. Let people know what you are reading and enjoying.
- If you have a blog, link to it on your Facebook page. Provide links to your website and any other relevant web presence you possess.
- Comment on other author pages and respond when people comment on your pages.
- Add photos.
- Keep it active and be consistent.

According to Ruby Press,

Michelle Adams from Rubie Green and photographer Patrick Cline are joining forces and creating an online decorating and lifestyle magazine that will hopefully fill that void left in your heart from the closing of Domino! It’s called Lonny and we are all DYING to see the first issue, which comes out in September.

Great article in BusinessWeek about how companies are trying to balance the important and effective efforts of social networking with the overwhelmingly public aspect of employees airing dirty laundry. This is certainly something that applies to authors, as well. Authors often question the importance of being present on social sites and weighing the pros and cons of blogging. Is it safe to turn one’s Facebook page or blog into public therapy? Is a blog absolutely necessary?

One author, Megan McCafferty, who has very successfully kept a public blog, decided to end it today so that she can channel her energy into her books. Hers is not an issue of saying too much or diluting her image, it is more about time management. But the BusinessWeek article still poses a good question, can there sometimes be too much of a good thing? Are we giving away too much information? Is an open conversation a good thing when it comes to marketing?  We are in unchartered territory here and we have yet to discern a way to navigate ourselves into the best light.  Only time will tell, so stay on top of the information and news that is out there because that is the best way to make the most informed and appropriate decisions for you.

Great article in BusinessWeek about how companies are trying to balance the important and effective efforts of social networking with the overwhelmingly public aspect of employees airing dirty laundry. This is certainly something that applies to authors, as well. Authors often question the importance of being present on social sites and weighing the pros and cons of blogging. Is it safe to turn one’s Facebook page or blog into public therapy? Is a blog absolutely necessary?

One author, Megan McCafferty, who has very successfully kept a public blog, decided to end it today so that she can channel her energy into her books. Hers is not an issue of saying too much or diluting her image, it is more about time management. But the BusinessWeek article still poses a good question, can there sometimes be too much of a good thing? Are we giving away too much information? Is an open conversation a good thing when it comes to marketing?  We are in unchartered territory here and we have yet to discern a way to navigate ourselves into the best light.  Only time will tell, so stay on top of the information and news that is out there because that is the best way to make the most informed and appropriate decisions for you.