Tag Archives: Writers Life

The Need for Speed – Ask Alice Saturday

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Road Runner imageQuestion. You talk a lot about the positives of Indie Publishing. Is there a negative for you?

Answer. For me there definitely is one negative. The emphasis on frequency of publication.

The three requirements for Independent Publishing success as a fiction writer – according to what I’ve been told – are these.

  1. Write in a popular genre.
  2. Write a series.
  3. Publish every 3 to 4 months. Preferably every 3 months.

I’ve got the first two covered. Romantic Suspense is a popular sub-group of a very popular genre. I’m also writing the Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series.

I was doing all right with number three for a while. A Wrong Way Home launched in February. A Year of Summer Shadows in June. Four months apart not three but still in the frequency ballpark.

That looked okay on the calendar but I knew better. Making book number two’s publication date was a stretch for me. An uncomfortable stretch. To accomplish it I did a truly stupid thing.

I rushed the manuscript straight from my editor’s hands into production. I didn’t do the final crucial read-through myself.

I’ve been around way longer than enough to know there are edits only the author’s eyes will see. I rushed it anyway. Because I didn’t want to commit the allegedly deadly sin of letting five months pass between published books.

Since then I’ve committed other sins that also toll the death knell to my frequency of publication. Specifically I’m guilty of wanting and having a personal life. Complete with family and friends and even some fun.

In the 1990’s I set all of those aside to pursue a career as a literary agent. I was all business all the time and the goddess of commerce awarded me well.

What I seem to be experiencing now is a case of Been There Done That when it comes to All Work and No Play Make Alice a Successful Woman.

Whatever the cause may be – I’m just not feeling the need for speed. I fully understand this flies in the face of my having told hundreds of writers in my workshops that they must be Warriors on Behalf of Their Careers.

All the same – I’ve decided not to renew my fast lane pass. Which also flies in the face of the three-prong program for independent publishing success.

I’ve been fortunate to experience a number of worldly successes in my life. Maybe I’ve fulfilled my required quota of those.

Maybe it’s time to seek another kind of success. The kind that perhaps doesn’t involve being a warrior at all.

RR

A Wrong Way Home – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book 1 – the eBook – is FREE at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00T9RVGGC. It’s also free at Barnes & Noble and iTunes and KOBO and other online platforms. A YEAR OF SUMMER SHADOWS – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book #2 – is also available at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ZBOTH5O. These are my 12th and 13th novels. Number 14 will probably take longer to arrive. Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com.

 

Giving Thanks – Riverton Road Monday

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Thank You imageA Year of Summer Shadows is the second story in my romantic suspense novel series set in a town I call Riverton that is reminiscent of North Country New York State where I grew up. We didn’t have murders at every turn like you find in my stories but we did have warmhearted people. I thank those people for giving me a strong start in life as both a storyteller and a person. Thank you Homies.

A very special thing happened to me during the writing of this book. My husband Jonathan Orr became my editor again as he was with my former novels before the hiatus preceding this series. We worked together well back then and we’re repeating that now. Our new partnership is a gift I didn’t expect and I’m extremely grateful for it. Thank you my beloved Jonathan.

I once again acknowledge Kristen Lamb author of the wonderful book The Rise of the Machines. This time because her blog writings got me to step all the way into the Twitter river at last instead of timidly dipping my toes there. She’s the social media maven we all need to follow. Thank you Kristen.

I don’t have to look further than my local RWA Chapter to find another media maven – one of the best – Maria Ferrer. She guides RWA/NYC and she has guided me with a marketing mind like few others I’ve seen. One Idea After Another – that’s the pace at which she thinks and her generosity with those ideas has helped me more than I can say. Thank you Maria.

I also repeat my thanks to the amazing writers of selfpublish@yahoogroups.com. They continue to offer all of us the benefit of their experience every day. Plus another yahoo group I’ve discovered more recently – mfrw@yahoogroups.com. The initials stand for Marketing for Romance Writers and that’s what they help us do. They’re surely helping me. Thank you generous writer friends.

And what would I do without the topnotch professional look of my books? The Killion Group Inc gives me exactly the covers I envision from multi-talented Kim Killion herself. Not to mention hassle-free formatting and uploading and just enough hand-holding from Jennifer Jakes. As if those weren’t blessings enough – Killion’s Shawntelle Madison makes my website what it needs to be. You can actually follow me now at www.aliceorrbooks.com. Thank you Killion.

My cup also runneth over and always has from the writers’ community that embraces me despite my history of consorting on the other side of the desk for a while as an editor and agent. My writing buddies at RWA/NYC are especially supportive along with the other RWA chapters that invite me to present workshops for them. Thank you romance writers.

Nor can I forget the International Women’s Writing Guild and its members who enrich my life in so many ways. As do my other writer friends – including the members of Liberty States Fiction Writers – and my civilian friends as well. Thank you all.

Leaving the best for almost last I begin always with my grandma Alice Jane Rowland Boudiette who has left this earth but not my heart. My daughter Kathleen Zea and son-in-law Luis Zea. My son Ed Vesneske and daughter-in-law Deborah Edison Vesneske. My grandchildren Maya and Julian Vesneske. Thank you my beloved family.

Finally I thank my God and the faith she inspires in me. It takes a village to create my Riverton and she dwells on every block and every page. I would be nothing and nowhere without her. Amen.

RR

 A YEAR OF SUMMER SHADOWS – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book #2 – Mark & Hailey’s Story – Launches with summer on June 22nd at amazon.com/author/aliceorr. The paperback is already available at www.amazon.com under Alice Orr. This is my 13th novel and I’ve had a world of help to be thankful for with every single one. Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com.

 

A Whole Lot of Being Nice – Ask Alice Saturday

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Question: What does it take to get the most out of a writers’ conference?

 Answer: “What it takes is a whole lot of being nice.”

Hug imageI put that response in quotation marks because I heard those words from another author. Sabrina Jeffries giving an uplifting talk at – you guessed it – a writers’ conference.

Summer is conference time. Small retreats and huge gatherings punctuate June through August for many writers. Civilians – as in non-writers – are off to the shore or the mountains or the campsite. But we pack up our notebooks and our hopes and head for a convocation of scribes.

What most of us are hoping is that we’ll find the key to getting our work published or better published. I say that isn’t the most important thing we find at these gatherings whether they take place in a grand hotel or a modest cabin or anywhere in between.

The most important thing we find is each other. We make the most of a writers’ conference by maximizing that discovery. We writers are our own most natural allies. Why is that so true? It’s true because we understand one another from the inside.

We understand what it’s like to labor in the formidable publishing marketplace. We understand what it’s like to struggle toward getting our work published and keeping it published. We know how it feels to suffer rejection and disappointment. We also know how it feels to experience the joy of our accomplishments whether they’re large or small.

We also understand we need support in these hard struggles we’ve chosen. We understand that because we need the same support ourselves. With this understanding comes an obligation. Our obligation is to reach out and give what is needed – a little bit of niceness to our writer friends.

All it takes is a few words in a few sentences of encouragement and kindness. Over the several days or even the single weekend of a conference these few words at a time will add up to what Sabrina inspires us toward – a whole lot of being nice.

Our need to succeed tells us to be nice to the max to the agents and editors and instructors we line up for to pitch our projects or sit in front of taking notes. We long to recruit them to become our allies on the inside of the publishing world. In the meantime let’s not forget the allies we already have on the inside of the writing world.

Give what you can. A word of advice or a commiserating ear or a shared laugh – and definitely a hug. As you scurry from class to class or from appointment to appointment take a moment to touch another writer ally with your own whole lot of being nice. I guarantee you will experience a whole lot of feeling good in return.

RR

P.S. My biggest writers’ gathering gig this summer will be teaching a course titled How to Stop Shooting Career in the Foot. Six sessions of sharing everything I know about how to get out of your own way and get what you need out of writing and publishing. That happens July 24th through 31st at the International Women’s Writing Guild 38th Annual Summer Conference in Litchfield CT. For more information visit www.iwwg.org.

RR

My next novel is A YEAR OF SUMMER SHADOWS – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series Book #2 – Mark & Hailey’s Story. Launching with summer on June 22nd at amazon.com/author/aliceorr. This is my 13th novel and I couldn’t have done it without a whole lot of being nice from my author allies. Alice Orr – www.aliceorrbooks.com.