Sifting through Blog Land

An interesting blogger decided to follow Sea Venture’s Journey (my sailing blog). Being the curious sort, I wandered over to see what I could see and found a repost from Catherine, Caffeinated. I’m sorry that the linking blogger didn’t leave any way for me to contact her. Still, I submit Catherine’s two cents because she’s a young woman who writes with wit and wisdom. No, I don’t plan to self-publish. But that doesn’t mean I can’t glean a thing or two as a writer. As an editor and a reader, I hope authors take heed.

We can’t read everyone’s words, but this gal has pizzazz. You know what I mean.

It’s too bad, really. I come across blogs like this, and I wonder what else I’m missing. I bemoan the lack of time to wander the blogsphere: I imagine I could learn and laugh and have an absolutely grand time.

Perhaps I’ll stumble on yours next. And won’t that be fun?

Check out Catherine’s advice for self-publishers in the post below.

Fading into Silence?

What does it mean when a cruiser’s sailing blog slips into silence?

Sometimes, the sailor is busy sailing. He can’t write, because he’s at sea. She doesn’t post, because she’s too busy living the seafaring life.

Wouldn’t it be jolly if that were my excuse?

Well, I’m sorry to say, silence reigns here because Sea Venture is still on the hard.

I know. Amazing.

But true. So, here’s the update. She looks terrible. The poor dear has her stuffing pulled out and her mizzen still off, and there’s dirt everywhere. Nothing is as dirty as a boatyard.

I’m hoping this is the storm before the calm. A mess on its way to clean. The beast about to become a beauty.

Sigh.

So, that’s why I’ve been silent. Not because we’ve been too busy sailing.

I will say that I’ve also been just a tad preoccupied with my writing.

Oh, didn’t you know that I write women’s fiction from a sailor’s perspective? I do. And my first Beaufort story will be released sometime toward the end of the year or the first of next year in both print and e-book format. You can keep track of that by coming by to say “Hey!” on Facebook. Or hanging out at the writing blog: Writing on Board

Looking forward to seeing you there!

 

A Marketing Revelation

Fine, this won’t surprise the networking gurus, but as I commented this morning on a post over at Writer Unboxed called “Networking for the Cowardly and Terrified” (that would be moi), I saw it.

I rarely buy books when someone begs me to. I rarely buy based on advertising. But I do head over to Amazon when I read a thoughtful post or a comment by someone who intrigues me, some word that makes me want to know the writer better.

So, if that works for me as a buyer, perhaps it will work for me as a seller?

Oh, my, I can wrap my mind around that sort of marketing. The friendship thing.

And not because I want something from you or you want something from me: that will never work. I’m going to spot your insincerity after the first few conversations, and you’ll see mine just as clearly. No. I’ve got to want to know you—you, the person—before you’ll want to know me. And if you and I can interact on some real level, won’t that be fun?

I enjoy people. Yes, I’m basically shy, an introvert. But years ago, a voice whispered in my head that if I let my shyness impede my access to others, I was being self-centered, worrying more about me than about the other person. I’ve tried to hold on to that, to remember it when faced with a room full of folk. Not everyone is going to want to know me or talk to me. That’s fine. We’re all so wonderfully different, so uniquely made, and we come from such varied backgrounds and experiences. I enjoy richness in my relationships, and that’s not going to come if I surround myself only with clones. You don’t agree on some aspect of life? So what. You don’t share my faith? Fine, I’m used to that. You’re young? (I’m not, except at heart.) Then maybe you’ve some extra energy that you’ll share with me. You’ve a different perspective on things? Excellent—as long as you don’t expect me to agree and don’t get offended by our differences.

Right now, I’m a book buyer. (Hey, I’ll always be a book buyer!) And I’m going to follow interesting comments and interesting posts and anyone who reaches in my direction with some bit of compelling insight.

Connecting with Folk: That Tribe Thing

In my last post, I wondered about tribes and finding one. Perhaps that sense of isolation came from so many years as a gypsy cruiser on Sea Venture, connecting with boat people or via social media. Here, at home in NC, taking care of my mama, I’m miles from town, tethered to more than a few by that same Internet.

And then came a recent writers conference (OWFI). I’d been invited to sit on an editor/agent panel and asked to take appointments. They gave me a shepherd so see to my comfort. Oh, my, what luxury.

And, lookee there, so many lovely new faces. Scads of eager writers and a slew of editors and agents. Most wore friendly, eager expressions, those writers, hoping that someone would want them and their work.

This blog is not about Normandie the editor. Here, I’m a writer, hugging my own stories to my breast, waiting with eager eyes for someone to love my children as much as I do. I’ll just say that I’m glad I know that angst: it gave me compassion for those sitting on the other side of the table with their hopeful eyes and sometimes quavering voice.

I came away from that conference smiling. Fatigued, yes, but with the assurance that my tribe had enlarged. That lovely young shepherd, Robin Patchen, who brought me Starbucks every morning, probably had no idea that we’d bond so well or that her eager enthusiasm would cajole me into asking for a sample edit. Based on that sample, I offered Robin a place on the Wayside Press team. But the circle Robin and I formed moves beyond the publishing house, overlapping into friendship and the symbiosis of one writer helping another.

We make friends and enlarge our circles for any number of reasons, but friends should have each other’s back. That conference also allowed me to meet and enjoy another new friend, C Hope Clark, who hails from the state to the south of NC. I’m reading her first story now, Lowcountry Bribe, published by Bell Bridge Books. Her next will be set in Beaufort, SC. Hope and I decided we’d market books together: she, using the Beaufort (Bewfort) setting, and I, using my Beaufort (Bowfort) crew; she, telling about shrimp boats, and I, about sailboats. She’s a hoot, which is what Southern gals who write ought to be.

I made other friends and renewed acquaintances at the conference. Between them and a new Facebook clan at Writer Unboxed, I’m kicking up my heels.

Do you live in a city or someplace crowded with people? If so, do you connect with them, or do you feel isolated among the masses, an unseen face and an unheard voice? How do you reconcile your life with the need for connections?

If you live in a remote area, far from neighbors or in a small town with only a handful of friends, how do you reach out and enlarge your tribe?

I’d love to hear from you.

Tribes: Who Needs Them?

 

That fellow’s pointing at me. He’s a marketing guru (I’m sure), and he says that my next job is to make scads of social media friends. I must blog, tweet, speak, call, make myself heard somewhere, by someone. By enough someones that my book will sell. I’m supposed to have a tribe.

As an idea, a tribe sounds welcoming. But if your school years were anything like mine, tribes and posses meant exclusion for those on the outside looking in. Too bad the lonely couldn’t form their own clique, but outsiders are usually outside because they’re either too shy or too introverted, too tall or too fat, or, as I often felt, too bored by the trivia of it all.

Now, being on the outside isn’t always a bad thing. Isolation and loneliness often propel one to creativity.  It forced me into books and art and writing and made me the person I am today.

Who, frankly, would much rather write another story than try to sell anything.

Have I told you about my friend, Ray? Ray worked in another department back when I was editing in the DC area. Evenings, I’d return to my apartment and sculpt big bodies to hang on walls — big, life-sized bodies using friends as models. One night a week, I taught aspiring artists what I’d learned in school and in the doing of my art. When Ray and his family came into my life, I’d just finished a pair —  John and Sue — and moved on to the next sculpture, this time a torso only. Ray showed up at my office door and asked if I’d let him submit my work to a contest to be judged by none other than the sculpture curator of the National Gallery of Art. I shrugged, secretly delighted, especially when the pair won First Place. All because of Ray, who’d invited me into his tribe and done for me what I couldn’t do for myself.

I love people. I like to talk to people and make new friends, but I’m the one who’ll want to get to know you, not just your name or your place in the hierarchy. At the cocktail party, I don’t want to flit. I want conversation.

Here’s the deal. I don’t have a clue how to create a tribe or to beat my chest. But I’d like to know you. And if together we end up in a club together, it won’t be an exclusive one. You hear?

 

I’m in. How about you? Are you coming with me? I’ll help you up and you can help me?

(Perhaps there’s even a Ray out there for my writing who wants to show me how and pave the way.)

Oh, and, Ray, if you ever read this, I hope that you and your wife and your quiver full of children are doing well out there in Utah. Because you certainly showed this then-agnostic all about the love of God. Be blessed, my brother. Be blessed.