conferences

“The Edge of the World” hits close to home: Review of Gail Vida Hamburg’s political novel in stories

Tuesday, March 27th, 2012

The Edge of the WorldThe Edge of the World by Gail, Vida Hamburg

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I finished this slender book last weekend after having met the author at the San Miguel Writers Conference. Through a series of brilliantly political, interconnected short stories, the novel is a tragic epitaph for a fictional Southeast Asian island nation that Westernized during Kennedy’s presidency, and through a strangling forty-year relationship with the US, found itself on the wrong end of the military-industrial complex.

The novel’s final moments represent the very worst of cynical American foreign policy, perhaps to a degree that betrays the writer’s political bias. My own sympathy for some of these views aside, the fictive dream wavers in a critical moment. It’s the only heavyhanded portion of the book, committing what Virginia Woolf once criticized in Emily Bronte’s writing–the error of putting one’s own convictions on the page so strongly that the story must step aside for a moment.

Yet the book is lyrical, beautiful, and sharply researched and imagined. Vida Hamburg has a journalism background, and her exactitude and broad knowledge combine with a cast of well-drawn characters. The characters are secondary to the social and political life of Chomumbhar during its relationship with the US, yet even the reader who shies from politics will enjoy the novel’s foreign flavor.

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When an editor hires an editor.

Friday, March 9th, 2012

At February’s San Miguel de Allende writer’s conference, agent Kathleen Anderson had some great advice for writers. One of the unexpected good fortunes to shake loose from the publishing industry’s  layoffs is the sudden abundance of freelance editors for hire.

Let me clarify exactly how good this is. There have always been lots of freelance editors. I am one. In my ten years of full-time freelancing, I have had to work very hard to distinguish my website from the sites of unscrupulous people who say they know how to edit, but don’t know the difference between an em-dash and an M&M.

The editors that Kathleen Anderson is talking about, on the other hand, are hard to find on the web. They have little websites that are as plain as vanilla pudding. But buried on those HTML-coded dinosaurs is a list of successful authors that scrolls, and scrolls, and (remember, these aren’t high-tech websites) keeps on scrolling.

You’ll find some of them on Facebook here and here.

You’ll pay a lot for these editors’ services. You’ll get unvarnished honesty, and a frank opinion of how salable your manuscript is. The advice is worth it. I have sat through hundreds of workshops in my writing career, and edited hundreds of manuscripts since I left the Carnegie Mellon University Press to start my own business. I don’t trust editors easily. I may not have hired one had my mentor, Jane McCafferty (First You Try Everything, One Heart), not personally recommended her now-freelance editor, Marjorie Braman, to me.

And let me say, Kathleen Anderson’s tip is right on. Marjorie is now probably the only person in the world who can tell me to change everything, and I’ll listen. I am sixty pages into a revision of a novel I never thought I would rewrite, and I love what the advice is doing for the story.

Being an editor gives me some advantages as a writer, but I still need outside help. If I didn’t love my characters enough to overlook a few of their shortcomings, I wouldn’t have felt compelled to tell their stories in the first place. As my wife’s academic advisor once told her about medicine, “You don’t have to know everything. You just can’t be stupid.”

And it would be foolish indeed to ignore the wealth of editorial talent out there right now.

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Conference notes, part 1: Writing tips from Naomi Wolf

Thursday, March 1st, 2012

The San Miguel de Allende Writers Conference wrapped up last week, along with a panoply of workshops and big-name writers headlining the conference catalogue. It was my first opportunity to hear Margaret Atwood speak in person, but I’ll write about her later in this series of workshop recaps. I’ve needed a week to catch up on everything I left at home–work, Arabic lessons, writing, and the ryegrass jungle beyond my office window. Therefore, I am starting off with Naomi Wolf’s workshop because it lends itself so well to an organized summary.

First let me say: I love this woman. She has an enormous amount of raw energy. She moved back and forth across the stage and into the front of the aisle, as if we were standing in a big town square instead of a packed lecture hall. And she’s a lively and organized thinker, too, moving her talk from the intellectual atmosphere of her childhood, to the sexual harassment scandals at Yale and Cambridge, to the necessity of finding one’s true voice.

So, for a seminar about political writing, she walks the talk. The talk was about shedding the invisible rules we’ve grown up with. (I felt the message was addressed to women, especially, but it was inclusive.) And the “walk” is powerful, persuasive writing that comes from questioning and/or rejecting those rules, speaking your truth, and using it to create change in the world.

She offer six pointers for finding your true voice, and some tips for good activist writing.

1. Get used to being weird.

2. Don’t seek approval, because approval is stifling.

3. Practice the belief daily that you are entitled to your own opinion. Seek to know what you think.

4. Divest yourself of anyone who trivializes you. 

5. Avoid jargon, complications, Latinates, and hiding. 

6. Use clear structure. Logic is your friend.

Other tips include changing the frame of your opponent’s argument; appealing to empathy; appealing to moral coherence; subversion, mischief, and humor; using the individual story to get at the big story; and addressing your audience, no matter who they are, as “us,” not “them.”

She offered the example of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s political writing as a perfect case of this last point. He used “us” even though his audience were white racists. Like him, we must practice thinking in terms of common humanity when arguing for human rights, and avoid divisive thinking.

Naomi Wolf is unabashedly principled, and unabashedly smart–qualities that give her the courage to not only engage in important political battles, but elevate the quality of argument. I read The End of America in 2005-ish, and was impressed by its succinct, ten-point argument that the Bush Administration’s security policies overreached the U.S. Constitution so grossly that they constituted an existential threat to American freedoms.

She reminded me in her talk that taking a side isn’t a matter of political affiliation–it’s about deriving the truth from the facts around you, and having the courage to step into the ring.

In honor of Tip #6 above, here’s a brilliant little reference tool for learning all about logical fallacies. If you have the mettle for tuning in to the presidential campaign rhetoric, you’ll find many opportunities to practice identifying them.

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Next stop: Mexico

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012
What: San Miguel Writers Conference
Where: San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
When: Thursday, February 16 to Tuesday, February 21

Details: I’m attending the conference to see Margaret Atwood speak, and to attend a variety of classes. As I work through a period of writerly soul-searching, and to combat the predictable side-effects of omphaloskepsis, I’ve signed up for workshops on everything from humor writing to travel writing to poetry. Travel and curiosity, two cures for the foggy mind.

More information on the conference at www.sanmiguelwritersconference2012.com.

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Social Media for Authors: Week 4 of 4

Monday, October 3rd, 2011

This is the final of a four-part series of class notes from the Social Media Bootcamp course, whose lessons I’ve adapted for authors. Whether self-published or traditionally so, you will be responsible for your own promotion, and this course has been an invaluable resource on how to use the Internet’s no-cost social media networks wisely–in other words, (1) without mindless cruising, (2) without resenting the Internet for eating your writing time, and (3) without the frustration of posting stuff that people ignore.

Week 4 was all about tying together the first three weeks’ lessons on how to find your audience, discover what they care about, enter the conversation, gauge your success, and correct course. The big takeaway should be a Plan-with-a-capital-P, in other words, a simple but specific schedule of what you’ll post, when, and where. So, you can put a checkmark by (1)–no mindless cruising. At the end of this post, I include Exhibit A, the schedule that I developed for myself so that you can work on one of your own.

In adapting the course for authors, as an author, I will be the first to confess my initial view of social media marketing as a hybrid monster-cross of bleak duty and embarrassing self-exhibition. Therefore, I am now a vehement advocate for Goodreads as the most under-appreciated social network for writers. Facebook and Twitter have their place, but as a network that actually gives me energy, Goodreads is my home base. My self-promotion there is limited to occasional book giveaways and a portal to some of my free resources (like YouTube tutorials and this blog). I spend the rest of my time enjoying its smart and active forums (such as the one on Middle Eastern and North African literature), and taking book recommendations.

That’s to say, Goodreads makes me strike a balance between social media participation and quiet hours offline. So, you can put a checkmark by (2)–no resenting the Internet for eating your writing time.

Finally, one of the most annoying and dispiriting aspects of social media marketing are the crickets. You know, the ones that you hear chirping after you update your status, post to Twitter, or write something on your blog. By building an intelligent plan for social media engagement, you can eliminate some of this silence. Not everything I’m trying right now is working, but my consistent attempts to improve has almost inadvertently increased my Twitter followers and blog traffic. The byproduct of an imperfect plan is information, and ultimately, more success.

Here are the three lessons I will live by for the rest of my social media life:

1. ALWAYS LISTEN FIRST!

2. The operational definition of social media is “a conversation about what my audience wants, on networks they go to anyway.”

3. Be creative!

For my detailed breakdown of what I learned and how I made my plan, see below. Note, too, that I scheduled time to take a three-day break from the Internet every month. I’ll leave you with this parting thought from the course planner, Penelope Trunk, whose advice I paraphrase here with apologies:
Blog on the border between your expertise and your curiosity. Don’t write about what you already know. You’ll come across as condescending rather than vulnerable.

+++++++++++

EXHIBIT A: SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY AND SCHEDULE

October 1, 2011

Networks, purpose, metrics

  • Blog (SC.com), to create a thoughtful and entertaining corner of the public forum that welcomes fellow web-savvy readers and writers. Measure success by hit count, comments, and invites to guest blog.
  • Blog (3PE), to provide a warm and understanding resource for unpublished writers, and promote EdLex. Measure success by hit count, Editor’s Lexicon sales, RFIs, client successes, and new clients with really great manuscripts.
  • Blogs (others’) via Google Reader, to connect with like-minded readers, writers, athletes, MENA thought-leaders, and queer women. Measure success by response to my comments, hit count on SC.com, subscriptions to my blog, and number of real connections through blog visits.
  • Goodreads, to share the passion of reading, to offer giveaways, interviews, and exclusive content. Measure success by growth of friend numbers, SC.com traffic, comments on my reviews and forum thoughts, and my own continuing desire to participate.
  • YouTube, to share knowledge in short tutorials, promote Editor’s Lexicon and 3PE. Measure success by number of views and shares.
  • Google+, to post the most interesting material from my other networks. Measure success by circle adds, engagement.
  • Twitter via Hootsuite, to stay part of the book industry conversation, share resources, find new blogs, and promote material in other networks. Measure success by followers, Klout score, engagement, share of blog and YouTube hit count.

 

Goals

  • Sell Editor’s Lexicon copies: (5-7 per week)
  • Improve engagement across the board
  • Get great clients: (1-2 RFIs per week, projects I love, client successes)
  • Establish a consistent, smart presence: (3-4 guest blog invites per year, steady increase in engagement everywhere)
  • Enjoy my reading and writing life: (Manage my time well, 1-2 hours of reading per day after writing and work)

 

The Schedule (8 hours 40 min per week)

MONDAY (1h 50)

  • Blog (mine): Resource or relevant thoughts, 1.5 hours
  • Twitter: 20 minute cruise and sharing, scheduled blog mention if applicable

TUESDAY (1h 40)

  • YouTube: Record 1-2 lessons, 1 hour
  • Blog (3PE): Share video and/or Monday’s resource, 20 min.
  • Twitter: 20 minute cruise and sharing, scheduled random weekend finds if applicable

WEDNESDAY (1h 00)

  • Blog (mine): Book review from Goodreads, 10 minutes
  • Goodreads: Write book review, post YouTube video, cruise forums, 30 min
  • Google+: Share cross-posts, 10 min
  • Twitter: 10 minute cruise and sharing

THURSDAY (0h 40)

  • Blogs via Google Reader: 40 minutes

FRIDAY (1h 40)

  • Blog (mine): Literary or thoughts, 1.5 hours
  • Twitter: 10 minute cruise and sharing

WEEKEND (1h 50)

  • Goodreads: Fun participation, 1 hour
  • Blogs via GoogleReader: Find, read, comment, 30 minutes
  • Twitter: Find and schedule for Mon. and Tues., 20 minutes

MONTHLY

  • Guest blog post or interview on SC.com
  • Three-day social media blackout, stay offline for sanity’s sake (Wed. through Fri.)

 

Random Observations:

- Twitter: posting interviews with popular novelists is almost always successful.

- Goodreads giveaways give a book a HUGE exposure advantage over any other tactic.

- SC.com blog visits on Saturdays lowest of week; don’t waste my time blogging. Go outside and have fun.

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