The Gryphon's Feather Studio

Next Step In My Book Process

Typically, once I have an idea for a book, the next step is to see what my editor thinks of the idea- is it viable? marketable? has someone else already beat me to the punch? what does she think? From there, if the response is favorable, I write a book proposal.  A book proposal discusses:

• topic-what the book is about,
• the purpose of the book,
• the content and approach you will use
• who is the target audience
• market analysis- competition
• what sets this book apart

A book proposal also includes a table of contents, and sometimes, but not always, a sample chapter.  Sample chapters may be needed to show how the book might hang together or to demonstrate your written voice and/or writing skills.  Your editor might need a sample chapter with images to sell your book to the Acquisitions Committee.  (Acquisitions decides what books will be published- they work according to a publishing schedule based on seasons/sales numbers.) My editor compiles all this  and some book sales statistics into a book brief.

If I didn't already have an editor, I would talk with my agent.  An agent can sell your proposal to a publisher.  I found my agent by word of mouth- someone I knew writing a book had used that agent.   Then, another friend used that same agent, so I sent an inquiry (which listed my books, and the books and magazines to which I have been a contributor) about whether they'd be interested in representing my work. My agent said yes!, and we began a series of conversations culminating in my signing an agreement with their agency for the book I am currently writing.

Why did I obtain an agent?  After writing a couple books and knowing my editor, I felt very comfortable that I was doing okay with the relationship with my editor, and the advance (the money one receives for writng the book before the book is published) portion of the contract.  But I had no way of knowing whether I was doing okay with the rest of the terms in a book contract.  And, I lacked the language and information to ask the right questions.

Important advice:

An agent should never ask for money from you before they will represent you.  They earn their money by selling your work to a publisher and taking a percentage of your earnings.  

If I didn't have a relationship with an editor and I didn't have an agent, I would do what comes next, I would submit my book proposal to the publisher.  Quarry, F&W, and Lark all accept submissions and have information posted on their websites about how to proceed.

It seems like a good time to talk about money.  From talking with other teachers that write books for various publishers, I can tell you the publishers handle remuneration differently. People have mentioned numbers that range from $4000 to $10,000, and of course the rest of their contracts are unique to their book deal as well.

I don't feel comfortable giving a specific number, because well, somehow that seems unprofessional.  I do fall into the middle to upper range of the numbers I just mentioned.  I earn more in my advance now than I did with my first.  I have not earned any royalties from any books to date.  I'm certainly not getting wealthy writing books. 

Writing is one aspect of my business.  I travel to teach at venues (some of which bring in more income than my first book)  and I teach online classes.  I have other ideas that I may begin to pursue.  People have asked about how this art/writing/teaching life compares financially to what I earned when I left my university position; my gross income is about half of what it was in my old life. 

Happiness is worth a great deal, though.  And, for me, being home with my children is worth a great deal. 

Next, we'll talk about what happens after your proposal is accepted.

Love Story by James Doyle : American Life in Poetry

In an earlier post, I recommended some great poetry resources available through the Library of Congress. One resource is this weekly column by former Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser. 

 

American Life in Poetry: Column 288

(column content and photo reprinted here with permission.)

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE 

I’ve spent my seventy years on The Great Plains and have lived all that time amidst vivid and touching stories about the settlement of our area, lots of them much like this one, about a long ago courtship and marriage, offered to us in a poem by James Doyle, who lives in Colorado. 

Love Story 

The kitchen door opens onto dirt

and the second half of the country

all the way to the Pacific. Rusted

prairie trains out of the tall weeds

elbow the last century aside, rumble

from every direction towards Chicago.

My great-grandfather, who would be

150 years old today, put on his one

tall hat and took the big trip

to Omaha for my great-grandma

with the family ring on his vest

and winter wheat lying wait in seed.

He gave her all the miles he had

and she gave him the future I walk

around in every day. The mountains

were too far west to count so they

doubled back over the land and century

and the real weather kept coming from them.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2009 by James Doyle, whose most recent book of poetry is Bending Under the Yellow Police Tapes, Steel Toe Books, 2007. Poem reprinted from theNimrod International Journal, Vol. 53, no. 1, Fall/Winter 2009, by permission of James Doyle and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2009 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. 

 

How it comes to be

Since I mentioned last week that I am writng a new book, I thought it might be interesting if I took all of you along with me as I do so.  While I can't really share the actual content of the book, I thought you might want to know about how the whole "write a book" process unfolds. 

I'm often asked how I came to write books for Quarry, how I approached them with my ideas, etc.  Truth be told, I didn't approach them- they approached me.  Now, a year or two before that happened, I did indeed have an idea for a book.  I had been emailing with Sharilyn Miller, who was then the editor for Somerset Studio, and she put me in contact with someone at another publisher.  At that time, that particular publisher had a very firm set of guidelines- their craft/art/hobby titles were made up of an introduction and then 25 how-to projects. This was not the book I had in mind, so I thanked them and let go of the idea. 

At this point I had been a contributor to a few books,  had some magazine articles published and had been the artist portfolio feature in Somerset Studio.  I taught each year at Artfest, but because I was still working fulltime and had two weeks of vacation annually, that was my only teaching engagement each year. 

I was teachIng at Artfest in 2006, and had run into Holly Harrison.  Holly had authored books to which I had contributed.  She and her editor, Mary Ann Hall, were attending and having a great time.  Mary Ann had been by my classroom over lunch, and then on vendor night, she approached me about doing a book.  Now, one thing I can tell you for sure about teaching at large venues is that people say all sorts of things about various and sundry opportunities.

  So, based on a number of experiences which I won't dish about, I assumed Mary Ann was being kind.  Then, once we were all home again from our Artfest adventure, she emailed me.  "Oh," I thought, "she meant it!" We had a couple of meetings over the phone to discuss what she had in mind for me and what it looked like to write a book for Quarry. 

Mary Ann had a firm concept for the book- it was based on the classes I taught that year at Artfest and became Mixed Media Nature Journals. Mary Ann wanted me to write a book drawing from the work  in my class samples, and from work in the pile of personal journals that I had out (for folks to look at) on my teaching table in the classroom.  She had perused my work and looked through my class handouts one day during lunch.   During those initial phone calls, since I was totally new to the process, we discussed what the book process entailed, and what was needed to put together a book proposal.  Each subsequent book was based on conversations I had with my editor about ideas I had, books they were looking to have and then a proposal I put forward for consideration.

I'm going to take you all through the process with me this time.  So, more soon!

Art & Soul Portland!

and speaking of giveaways... the two winners of my giveaway during The Really Big Sale are: Jennifer De Ville and Karen Dorcas!  I'll be mailing those out next week!  Congratulations!!

while I work...

Sent from my iPhone

While I work, someone is listening to Disney's Cinderella. The sunlight filters through the sheers, and her curls somehow look even softer, although I know that is impossible.  Her head is still covered in the fluffy silk of baby hair.  Isn't there some way to slow time and let me bask here just a little longer?  And in a moment, the record is finished, the story over, and she is on to something new...

 

listening to this, now

 

on vinyl.

EAT THIS POEM

How to Eat a Poem

by Eve Merriam

Don't be polite.
Bite in.
Pick it up with your fingers and lick the juice that
may run down your chin.
It is ready and ripe now, whenever you are.

You do not need a knife or fork or spoon
or plate or napkin or tablecloth.

For there is no core
or stem
or rind
or pit
or seed
or skin
to throw away.

 

The Library of Congress offers a couple wonderful program related to poetry that were designed by our former Poet Laureates.

The Poet Laureate, a position began in 1937, I think, is charged to "serve as the nation's official lightning rod for the poetic impulse of Americans." During his or her term, the Poet Laureate seeks to raise the national consciousness to a greater appreciation of the reading and writing of poetry.  They receive a stipend of $35,000 for their year of service.  During their one-year tenure, some Poet Laureates create programs designed to foster a love of poetry and a way of broadening the audience for this art form.

One of these programs, called Poetry 180, was designed by former Poet Laureate Billy Collins,  and offers a poem a day for 180 days. This program was designed for high school students - hence the format of 180 days (the length of the typical US school year).   Subscribe by email, and enjoy a poem each morning.  These hand-picked poems are delicious with morning coffee and a sweet roll. To subscribe, follow the link above the photograph of Billy Collins.

.

Today's selection:

Numbers

Mary Cornish

I like the generosity of numbers.
The way, for example,
they are willing to count
anything or anyone:
two pickles, one door to the room,
eight dancers dressed as swans.

I like the domesticity of addition--
add two cups of milk and stir--
the sense of plenty: six plums
on the ground, three more
falling from the tree.

And multiplication's school
of fish times fish,
whose silver bodies breed
beneath the shadow
of a boat.

Even subtraction is never loss,
just addition somewhere else:
five sparrows take away two,
the two in someone else's
garden now.

There's an amplitude to long division,
as it opens Chinese take-out
box by paper box,
inside every folded cookie
a new fortune.

And I never fail to be surprised
by the gift of an odd remainder,
footloose at the end:
forty-seven divided by eleven equals four,
with three remaining.

Three boys beyond their mothers' call,
two Italians off to the sea,
one sock that isn't anywhere you look.

 

Another program, called American Life in Poetry, was designed by former Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser for newspapers.  A free, weekly column that includes a poem by a contemporary American poet, and an accompanying brief introduction to that poem by Ted Kooser.  To have this delivered to your inbox, sign up here.

This week's column:

American Life in Poetry: Column 287

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

I love to sit outside and be very still until some little creature appears and begins to go about its business, and here is another poet, Robert Gibb, of Pennsylvania, doing just the same thing.

For the Chipmunk in My Yard

I think he knows I’m alive, having come down
The three steps of the back porch
And given me a good once over. All afternoon
He’s been moving back and forth,
Gathering odd bits of walnut shells and twigs,
While all about him the great fields tumble
To the blades of the thresher. He’s lucky
To be where he is, wild with all that happens.
He’s lucky he’s not one of the shadows
Living in the blond heart of the wheat.
This autumn when trees bolt, dark with the fires
Of starlight, he’ll curl among their roots,
Wanting nothing but the slow burn of matter
On which he fastens like a small, brown flame.

 

 

Robert Pinsky, another former Poet Laureate, created The Favorite Poem Project. Robert Pinsky this beautiful project during his time as Poet Laureate, where Americans from ages 5 to 97 submitted their favorite poems for consideration.  Many were recorded onto video and there are compilations and other materials available.

Be sure to watch fifth-grader Karen Mechler reading Roethke's The Sloth. Okay, perhaps I am partial to confident middle-schoolers. and oh, her hat!! (...sending prayers to the One that I do raise children who are so confident in their fabulousness... )

The Library of Congress Poetry home page offers video and audio records for viewing online, as well as webcasts, resources for teaching, learning, writing and of course, poetry to read.

GO!!

thoughts

Two years ago, I deleted four years of blog posts, and pared down my written content, pulling back & creating distance.  I had reasons, and it was a good decision.   That distance became a habit, a necessary habit- for reasons that many of you understand. 

Trying to find that balance where I give enough to my husband, my children, our love, my home, my creative life, made me realize something HAD to give.  This summer, the first summer in four years which didn't have a manuscript deadline, still found me with to-do lists that seemed impossibly unending. I was taken aback.  I hated feeling like there was far more to do than I could get done, and I had been so hoping to spend the summer differently.  Something had to go, so I slashed the amount of time on the computer, limiting it only to the necessary, took a hiatus from designing new online classes, and really, for lack of a better word, withdrew.  I wanted to be in the physical moment with my family rather than trying to stay connected virtually.  I also wanted to do something about how many errands and tasks life required this summer, so I needed the brain space to solve that problem.

This summer was really full.  And oddly, so many major "things" have come up in just the past month- family issues, household organizational issues and tasks, creative work assignments, and of course, the regular chaos that comes with starting school, along with a few surprises.  I can't tell you much about some of the family stuff as it affects others. But, I can tell you these significant and insignificant things about life right now:

• Joe's folks sold the home they have nearby, and did not buy a new place, rent an apartment, or a storage locker.  Their house sold very quickly and closing was expedited. Getting his folks packed, moved, and calmed down was a big priority here. The closing on the sale of their house coincided with the beginning of the school year.  Joe's parents are staying here with us when they are not at their place in Florida. They will be selling that home also, and deciding what to do next.  This situation is a big change for everyone, and I think Joe's folks are in a little bit of shock.  There's also still a good bit of rearranging and reorganizing to be done.

• My gorgeous, brilliant niece is staying with us a few days a week to reduce her commuting expense - she attends a local college and it is significantly closer to our home than hers.  It is a pleasure to have around.  She has a nest on the third floor, in what used to be the playroom before Sunny decided that the shelving was great for climbing and the windows were interesting to open.  I love seeing her come in with her big stack of textbooks.  The littles love seeing her, too.

• The river had a ton of company this summer because it was wicked hot this year.  At one point, I felt as though I were running a B&B- changing sheets on ten beds and doing laundry every Monday (loads and loads of household linens!!), running for groceries and beer, planning meals, cleaning up  ... and sheesh, the expense! I can tell you I do not aspire to being a hotelier, but I truly loved having company.  So, putting my counseling skills into play, I thought it through.  How was I responsible for my situation?  What could I change to shift my feelings?  It occurred to me that most of the weekend guests were family who call and ask if they can come, not people I ring up and invite. And what was bothering me was that I was doing a good bit of work every week that was beyond my normal workload.  I looked at how to change the scenario to reduce the workload (the part I hated) but keep sharing the place with family (which I love.)  Now when family call and ask to come up, I ask those folks to provision themselves- towels, sheets, adult beverages, and provide one lunch and dinner for the group (including cooking & clean up.)  When I invite folks as guests, they need not worry about any of that.  I joyfully take care of them- it has put the pleasure back into the whole process of having company at the river.  It did take until mid-August for me to figure this out, but now I am set for next summer!

• My oldest littles are packing their lunches this year, as the school food is really unappealing.  Yes, it is a little more work, but I am enjoying coming up with lunches that they actually eat, and making the whole lunchbox process fun. 

• I am building a stone wall along the front edge of the patio/pond at the river house. I have about seven feet done. I have built a "seat" into the wall that is so sturdy I can jump up and down on it without nary a move or wobble.  I have a nice pile of smaller, beautifully shaped stones for making standing sculptures- very fun to play with- along the base of the wall.  Last weekend, I made a freestanding, stable, stacked stone bench/table along one corner of the pond.  I'll try and remember to take a few snaps to show you. Not sure if I will work on the wall this weekend or not, but I do need to pull some more stone before the dam has its release and the river rises for the fall/winter.   If I build as much as I can this fall, then it will be easy to finish in the spring and there to enjoy.  (and of course, I'll have new things to build as soon as the water level drops... as the winter ice will remove my current rock garden & pool in the river. )

• Lilah Bean was hit by a car last Saturday and is doing fine so far.  We were really lucky.  The 86 year old driver really was going far faster than he should have been and his eyesight is very poor.  It was on our dirt road at camp, and the road is very ummmm, unfinished (a creek, large holes, etc.), so we are often amazed at the speed at which he drives. (we drive at about 2 mph down this road. in trucks.)  Sometimes, it is possible to be too old to drive.  Thank goodness she is okay and it wasn't one of the children.    

• Three weeks ago, I signed a contract to do a fifth book.  I am very excited.  I want to talk about this more in detail, but I'm out of time for today. <grin>

 Have a great weekend!!

vinyl muse

Sent from my iPhone

 

The new needle for my Magnavox Micromatic console stereo (circa the late 60s) arrived.  So, yesterday,  I finally took the time to wash all the vinyl I've gathered from flea markets and thrift stores over the past few weeks.  While I looked over each album before buying to be sure it was in good shape, years of storage wherever had left them very, very dusty, in some cases outright cruddy.  Even the albums that looked as though they had not been played, ever, were dusty... So, after a bit of internet research, I washed them in a dishpan in lukewarm soapy water.  In the most pristine albums, the water still brought up fine, iridescent rivulets of dust.  I do have the regular old record cleaning solution kit, but to do that to a hundred or so old albums seemed a tad over tthe top, and really pricey. Now, if I were an audiophile, or a record collector, I might have chosen to spring for something more expensive.  But, I intend to play these records on a 60s console stereo.  The albums just needed to be clean.  I can fuss 'em up with the record cleaning stuff as I play them. 

Like many things, this process took far longer than I had anticipated, so three hours later, I called it done and decided I could do the classical and christmas albums another time.  It was a lot like doing dishes by hand for four holiday dinners. I would know as we don't have a dishwasher, or a mechanical one, anyway.  I'm the dishwasher. Anyhow, you know how during really tedious chores, your mind wanders?

I found myself noticing the labels- Bell, MGM, Columbia, Sun, Motown, Gordy...and the wide range in weight of the vinyl...   some like the Columbia & Motown pressings are so thick, and others like the Bell and Warner Brothers are actually sort of flexible.  And, I was reminded that my musical tastes are rather broad- quite a range of artists and titles. I'd tell you but you'd think I was crazy- crazy. New vinyl is pretty cool, too.  Did you know that most of the new vinyl albums come with a free mp3 download or cd of the entire album?  They are sort of a two-fer-one deal, which is wonderful. 

The music is a treat for myself, an incentive to joy, a whistle-while-you-work opportunity that I am very much enjoying.  Have vinyl you want to unload?  Let me know!  Any suggestions for new vinyl? Love to here 'em!