Word Nerd Knight is Amazon Bestseller!!!

One of my Word Nerd Knights - Dan Holloway - is in the TOP 15 ON AMAZON!

Back in 2009, Dan told me that we need a literary sensation. Well, we have one, and the personification of it is right there on Amazon. This moment, in case you hadn't realised, is historic. We are living through quotable times. People who realise there was more to William Morris than chintzy wallpaper are looking on with interest. There's a movement. Those people involved are not all alike in style, but they are alike in purpose. This is a revolution. No doubt about it. You're living through it. Cool, huh? I wrote more about it on Groupon's blog.

Buy Dan's book. It's not going to be cosy reading - that's not Dan's style - so if you scare easily, buy it for a friend, but buy it. You're part of history. Remember when we did this? Remember when we did this? We can do this. We can get Dan to number one. I'm probably going to see Dan next week. Give me something great to tell him.  Share this post. Tell people on Twitter and Facebook. Tell people on Goodreads. If you want to say you were part of this - when it's all over the news and the telly - then you have to get off your arse, cough up 70p, send out some tweets and BE part of it. Are you with me, Word Nerds?

Writers Need a List

One of the tools I use for list building

Well, hello, my word nerd chums!

For a long time, I didn't realise what I now do, and I collected faces on blogs. Hundreds and hundreds of them. Probably over 1000 now on my various blogs. What a wasted opportunity.

That's not what I want now. What I want is for people to opt-in to my list. For that reason, I didn't even put up a follower gadget here for AGES. In fact, I only put it up at the request of others. If you're scratching your head about that choice, wait until my course on building a list for your books comes out. All will be revealed.

Suffice to say, this blog puts LOTS of people onto my list. That gives me a much better relationship with them. I get postcards from people in different countries. This week, I got a beautiful, handwritten letter from one of my readers in America. Why? Because I build relationships with my readers via email. If you're on my list, you'll know that. If you're not, you're missing out! Every time I send out an autoresponder email, I get replies. Not just one or two. Not just short replies. I get letters, and I email back as many people as I can. That's how you build real relationships with people. I love that.

Obviously, click 'follow' if it makes life easier for you (it's a handy way to follow the blog, after all) but the way to get the inside scoop is to put your details into my opt-in box. That gives me the opportunity to share things with you that I wouldn't share with others. Everything that goes up here is free and easy for Google to access. Sometimes, I have special info I want to share with only a few, special, readers and writers. The only people who get that are the people on one of my lists. 

By the way, if you want to get started on building a list on your own blog - or on social networks like Facebook - you can use the tools I use without any up-front payment. Try them out for 30 days for free. You can leave any time, but use those 30 days wisely and start building a list. You can download that list at any time. It's yours whether you keep using the list building tools or not. It's a set of tools I've used for months, and I've recommended it to stacks of people. I haven't been paid to do so, either. I've done it purely to help out other people. Check it out and see what you think.

Flower Power ~ A Poem

Flower Power

If I am not your cup of tea,

What makes you think that bothers me?

A jasmine flower would not aspire

To be a snowdrop or a briar.

Yet every flower finds its bee.

It doesn't have to try, you see.

Its perfect self is all it is.

My message to you, dear, is this:

I will not change to match your mood

And so, not wishing to be rude,

Please fly away and find your flower:

Shading mine won't dim its power.

~ Rebecca Woodhead

How Do You Label Yourself?

Here's a new article I wrote for literary e-zine, Words with JAM on the subject of labels and writers. Check it out, here.

5 Steps to Becoming a Novelist

So, you want to be an author? I gave you five steps to writing a novel a couple of weeks back. Now, here are five steps to getting it published.

Find agents and publishers

The standard approach is to submit your manuscript to an agent you find in the Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook, but agents and publishers are people too. These days, you can ‘meet’ them first, online, if you know where they hang out. Find the names of the people you’d like to meet, in the book mentioned above, and look up their blogs. Do not ask questions. Watch for a while. You need to understand what they are looking for and how they think.

Meet agents and publishers

After you have a clear idea of the people you would like to work with, as the relationship you have with your agent and publisher will be a professional one, begin to talk to them. DO NOT PITCH THEM. Comment on their blog posts. Follow them on Twitter, and add to the discussion when it is appropriate and helpful to do so.

Follow influential lists on Twitter, to get a feel for the kinds of conversations that are happening between writers and the publishing industry. One of the most influential writing lists happens to be one of mine – read the rest of the article here (Groupon's blog) but don't forget to come back and comment!