What do Donald Trump and Dr. Oz have in common?

They both love Dr. Eric Kaplan's books!

Dr. Kaplan and his wife were 100% paralyzed from cosmetic injections but fought through the pain, fear and suffering to complete healing!

Now here's the book that resulted as they turned Tragedy into a dream come true ... And the Simple-Yet-Powerful Steps YOU Can Follow RIGHT NOW to infuse your own life with greater joy, abundance, and happiness than you ever believed possible.

Dr. Kaplan believes you were born with everything you need to heal yourself. After millions of years of evolution, your body is equipped for any challenge that comes its way: germs, cancer cells, you name it. But a huge, profit-driven medical establishment has been built around healing from the outside in, instead of inside out. When you buy this book today, you'll also receive Dr Kaplan's other book - Imagine two books for the price of one plus 150 bonus gifts! 5 Minutes to Wellness will open up your Power of Self-Healing and The 5-Minute Motivator, will motivate you to do so. Dr. Kaplan outlines a step-by-step, approach by committing "5 Minutes a day."

From Such Seeds of Adversity Can Come your Greatest Triumphs...

CHECK OUT THE GREAT BONUSES!

JUST THINK... In "5 Minutes" a day:

• you can live the life you dreamed.
• you can be healthier.
• you can be happier.
• you could remove the toxins that are in your body.
• you could lose 10 pounds--and more.
• you could help others.
• you could own your own business.
• you could make a difference in your life and the lives of others.

Make yourself a winner. Buy this book today. Learn how five minutes a day can change your life. Take that one step further; follow in the great steps of Michael Jordan and make winning a habit. This book will teach you how.

Check it out now! http://bit.ly/y0nJVi

With The 5-Minute Motivator, you will soon outgrow all of your former problems and you achieve success you never thought possible before. You don't reach great heights by making more money—you make more money by reaching great heights through personal growth.

Sincerely,

Yvonne Perry,
Author of Whose Stuff Is This? Finding Freedom from the Thoughts, Feelings, and Energy of Those Around You

Transform Your Life in Twelve Weeks

I’ve been invited to speak at an extraordinary online event called the "From Trauma to TransformationTelesummit."

Some of the additional speakers on the panel include Joe Rubino, Dr. Sue Morter, and Dr. Reese. And the best part is, this event is totally free!

Find out all the details here…

http://thesimpletruthcoachingandcounseling.com/telesummit/

From Trauma to Transformation Telesummit is an online event providing a wealth of information from happiness, self-esteem to health and much more. Together, all Thirteen speakers will cover current challenges such as depression, roadblocks to success, domestic violence, co-dependency, lack of ability to control emotions and addictions.

All my best, Yvonne Perry

P.S. Feel free to pass this email onto anyone you know who might benefit from this information!

Query Class for Writers

WITS Team Member Kristen House is holding Query Classes for Writers her message is below:

Queries are the one and only way to pitch your manuscript to a literary agent and/or publisher. The query process is complicated and requires a really specific set of skills - both writing and organizing. When I started the query process on my own several years ago, it took me more than 6 months to figure it out. By then, I'd already messed up so many contacts from playing my hand wrong that I had to stop querying and start on a new book! I'm putting together a curriculum now for a 2 day class that would cover all the ins and outs of querying agents. The information is below.

Now, if you'd like to take the class, be sure you can attend both sessions for the whole time. Be sure to bring note-taking implements and/or a laptop computer. Parents, if you'd like to enroll as well, you're welcome to do so. I'm also not segregating middle and high school students from adults for this class. In the publishing world, we're all playing on the same field, so the same rules apply. This class will be taught with the same general Kristen-style enthusiasm, but on a college-level. Bring your A-game, authors!

Also, if you're not ready to query your novel right now but you think you may want to in the future, you should sign up for this session. Why? Because I won't be offering another one for quite some time (Maybe October).

Class Dates:

Saturday, February 11
Saturday, February 18
1:30 - 3:30pm
Cost: $200, Discount of $50 for multiple family members
Location: Parent Resource Room at Abintra Montessori School
Part 1: The query process: what to expect. Parts of the query: writing, drafting, and creating a query portfolio

Part 2: Organizing your query efforts: spreadsheets, email folders, and paper trails. Workshop of participants' query letters.

Be sure to eat lunch before you come, and bring a little snack or a bottle of water if you'd like.

Be sure to register with me ASAP - To hold your spot, I need your name and a 50% deposit via PayPal or check.

Awesome! I look forward to demystifying the process!

Kristen
Chief Executive Muse
A Novel Idea
http://www.anovelideanashville.com/

Writing for the Web

By Elaine Hirsch

Thanks to the Internet, writers have had more opportunities open to them. Before the Internet, a writer would have to either work with a publisher or write a book on their own book or apply for various writing jobs. A degree in journalism or English would often be required to be qualified for any writing job.

Today, writers can literally work from home by writing for clients and magazines. Other opportunities may come through copywriting, ghost writing, or just general content writing for a variety of online outlets. However, writing trends have changed thanks to the convenience of the Internet. If you plan to write for the Web, there are some key things you need to know.

Niche

If you are a creative writer or a fiction writer, then writing for the Web may not truly be for you. Yes, there is a place for fiction on the Web, but the audience for Internet fiction stories is small, as well. People usually read online content to find answers or information for popular niches, such as technology, love, travel and health. If you want to reach an audience, you must create content that they will want to read. According to MBA Online, understanding your market and gauging interest through social media is just as important today as the content you write. Regardless of pursuing a fictional or current events niche, you will need to connect with your readers and gauge interest through social media outlets. After doing so, you'll have conducted the adequate research to write targeted content for your audience.

Short articles

When people search for content on the Web, they are often looking for a quick answer; hey don't want to read an online masterpiece. Typically, content that is between 300-500 words is optimal for a single article or blog post. Content that is below or above this word count will usually be considered too long or too short for most people. Since article length is tailored to engage readers, having an optimal length will give people reason to share the article through their networks.

Additionally, even major search engines rank sites based on average word count. Google has much data on user behavior. It knows what people want to read and how they want to read it. Therefore, it ranks sites based off user behavior. If you want Google to rank your blog or site, you need to keep your posts at an optimal length, as well as incorporate other SEO ranking factors.

This is especially true among social network users. Twitter posts are never more than 140 characters. Even text messages only allow for so many words.

Style guidelines

If you wish to work for agency sites, you will need to learn a specific style, most often AP style. AP style (Associated Press) is the journalistic style of writing, designed to help save paper space. Most journalistic freelance writing sites require writers to abide by that style. Although many freelancers covet the ability to set up their own work schedules, motivating themselves to write consistently is one of the toughest parts of the job.

Conclusion

Take these points to heart and you will be a fine Web writer. Writing online is completely different from writing for yourself. However, with a little work, you can make the transition.

Elaine Hirsch is kind of a jack-of-all-interests, from education to technology to public policy, so she is currently working as a writer for various education-related sites and writing about all these things instead.

Automation and Interaction: Why We Need BOTH in our Social Media Platform

By Lynn Serafinn .
At long last we have reached that prophetic (if not hyped up) year of 2012 so many of us have been awaiting. According to many futurists, this year will mark the beginning of unparalleled expansion of awareness and global consciousness. And based upon the explosion of social media over the past few years — and most especially its evolution in 2011 — we do indeed seem to be ever-increasingly expanding our potential for awareness of our world. How many of our grandparents could possibly have imagined being “friends” with people from every corner of the planet, or having possibly tens of thousands of “followers” who know your name, what you do, and what you stand for?

But with our expanded capacity for connecting with others, we also find ourselves with an information overload. Sometimes there is just too much coming at us all at once, and we can get overwhelmed. We’ve all tried different ways to organise both our incoming and outgoing data. When it comes to organising our social media, integration and automation seemed like “the” solution, but we find ourselves yet again in an information overload situation. There are just so many different options on the market that we often find ourselves asking, “Isn’t there one RIGHT way of delivering and filtering through my social media information?”

In my work, I help business owners (primarily authors and holistic professionals) set up their social media integration and automation, and train them how to use it. But the induction process into the world of Twitter, Facebook and the like can often shake up many emotions and challenge many beliefs. Some people who are new to social media might have a pre-conceived idea that automation takes the “social” out of social media, and therefore eschew the convenience automation has to offer. These people end up working harder rather than smarter, and risk burning out on social media before they reap the rewards. Others, who don’t really like the idea of social media at all, but see it as a “necessary evil”, want to automate everything and don’t want to bother connecting with their audience. As a result, these kinds of people frequently become convinced that the lack of response they are receiving from their audience means, “Twitter (or whatever) is simply a waste of time!”

Yes, I’ve heard it all before.

Regardless of whether you recognise yourself as being similar to one of these two personality types, or you are already an enthusiastic social media devotee, let me assure you, social media can have a massive impact upon the success of your business. My own business was utterly built upon it! But in order to make it work “smart” for you, and to ensure you receive all the benefits it has to offer, you need to understand that BOTH automation AND interpersonal connection are EQUALLY important to running an efficient and effective social media platform because:

Automation is needed to deliver your content.

Interaction is needed to build relationships.

Learning the balance between these two can be a steep learning curve for many of my new clients. As demonstrated in the previous examples, those that depend upon one and fail to implement the other tend not to reap the results they seek.

But what makes the learning curve even more challenging is that to stay on top of things, you need to get used to changing your strategies all the time. This is because the social network platforms themselves (i.e., Twitter, Facebook, etc) are always in a state of evolution, and the plethora of third-party applications available to support these platforms are also always in a state of continual change.

The plain truth about social media:

Sometimes clients come to me expecting to learn the definitive system for social media. And while I tend to do things in a systematic way for myself, the truth is: there is NO magic “one size fits all” way to “do” social media. Your situation is not the same as mine. Your business is not the same. Your communication style is not the same. Your audience is not the same. Sure, there will be many similarities, but if ANYONE out their claims to be a guru, and tells you they have “the” one-stop solution for your needs, you’d be pretty safe to bet it’s a scam. Don’t spend your money on such claims (I’ve lost more than a few quid on such false promises back when I was a newbie).

But the fact that there are so many variables is not the only reason why there is no end-all magic bullet for social media. It is also because all the social media tools out there are all continuously changing, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. And as they change they create a butterfly effect upon each other. So you really have resign yourself to the fact that social media is a fluid system, and that there will be a continual process of learning involved. Even a Rubic Cube is easier to figure out, because the cube is a stable system that doesn’t change.

But the good news is, the more you know, the easier it is to adapt to this ever-flowing sea of change. For that reason, I thought it would be a good idea to write an eBook, going through some of the currently most popular social media tools for distributing your content:

Buy Kindle edition on Amazon US/Canada for only $2.99
Buy Kindle edition on Amazon UK for only £1.98

Don’t own a Kindle? You can download a FREE Kindle Reader App for PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, Windows Phone 7, Blackberry or Android (and new ones being added regularly) from Amazon:

Amazon US/Canada: http://amzn.to/FreeReadingAppsUS
Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/FreeReadingAppsUK

In Social Media on Autopilot: Nice, Necessary or Nightmare? [Kindle edition], I bring you 5 details product reviews intended for business owners on five of today’s most popular social media applications: Ping, TweetDeck, Twaitter, HootSuite and Tweet Adder. Each product is evaluated on virtually every feature it offers, and ranked in terms of its usefulness, reliability, automation capabilities, interaction capability and mobility.

Accessible reading even for the “newbie”, this report and help you find out how the pros use Twitter, Facebook and other social networks without selling their souls or spending every waking hour at their computer. At the end of this report, you will also find some useful bonus materials covering options for integrating your media, and some ideas for using social media apps on your mobile phone.

I have helped dozens of authors and online business owners reach the top of their field through social media. Nearly all my learning has come the “hard way” by spending countless hours at my desk, trying to find products and figure out what was best. For a mere $2.99, this detailed report (at 15,770 words, it would have been about 50 pages if I had printed it in paperback format) you save yourself months of research and trial and error.

There are even a few free gifts for you at the back of the eBook.

I hope you find this booklet useful. If you do, please do come back and leave a comment on my blog (or better yet, post it on Amazon!). Also, if you have any suggestions for eBooks you would like me to write, please let me know that too in the comments on my blog. That would be REALLY helpful to me!

And do please subscribe to the Spirit Authors blog for more info and insight into the world of writing, publishing and book promotions.

Enjoy going on autopilot!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lynn Serafinn, MAED, CPCC is a certified, award-winning coach and teacher, marketer, social media expert, radio host, speaker and bestselling author. Her eclectic approach to marketing incorporates her vast professional experience in the music industry and the educational sector along with more than two decades of study and practice of the spirituality of India. In her work as a promotional manager she has produced a long list of bestselling mind-body-spirit authors. She is also the creator of Spirit Authors, which offers training, coaching, business-building and inspiration for mind-body-spirit authors, whether established or aspiring. Passionate about re-establishing our connection with the Earth, she supports the work of the Transition Town network in her hometown of Bedford, England.

From Screenplay to Short Story

by Linda Hayes

Mostly, if not always, people transcribe their story, short or long, into a screenplay. Just once in a while it’s good to go the other way; from screenplay to short story. As this transition is rare, here are some tips about how you could carry out this task, although it should be noted that most writers have their own way of planning and writing.

It is not just a matter of looking at the methods of adapting a story to screenplay and performing it all backwards. There are specific tasks to look at before you can even consider the beginning.

The rules and the size of the task

With a full screenplay, you are probably writing between 90 and 110 pages in screenplay format, with each page equaling about one minute of screen time. This means you have definite headings to work with:

• scene heading – the location; inside or outside shot and the time of day setting the scene

• action – what’s actually happening when the story moves along

• character – who is going to speak

• parenthetical – information about an immediate action or a direction for the actor

• dialogue – the character’s speech

• transitions – how one scene moves to another

The rules of the short story

You will look at the length of your short story to give you a guide to what you can leave in and what you should leave out of the screenplay. If your target is twenty pages, you won’t just be shaving 70-90 pages from the screenplay, but rather looking at the screenplay’s major elements and deciding which parts of the story are to remain.

It might be that you choose to make your short story cover only part of the screenplay. That way you might be exchanging 40 pages for a new 20 page version. That might make the cutting down and cutting out an easier task.

If you are entering a short story competition or have been asked to write the story for a specific purpose, there will be some rules attached. You'll need to consider engraving certain themes into your pristine ideas. This will dictate the length of your project and might offer extra information which may tell you that no dialogue is allowed. If your story is to be part of a selection of stories for print, there will be an overall feel to the book you will need to adhere to.

Story guidelines

Just like your screenplay, the opening scene must have an immediate impact. You will need to show your protagonist quickly along with your antagonist and other major players. You won’t have long to grab your reader’s interest.

You will need to know how you are going to end your story. Will it have the same ending as the screenplay or, as a short story, do you require a different ending? Once you know your ending you will be able to plan out the middle section, the 14-16 pages which will take you through more and more intense unexpected consequences leading up to the dramatic ending.

You can use dialogue directly from your screenplay - if you wrote it - but you’ll need to have permission to change or use the dialogue if you have been asked by the writer to present the short story.

The action scenes in the screenplay are always in the present tense. In your short story you will have options of using all the normal tenses available to fiction. From third person to first person, you may be taking away the current tense and replacing the action with either the past tense or perhaps the story telling tense from a personal point of view.

The action scenes from the screenplay need to be given more descriptive detail to make a story work well. In a screenplay they are set to their bare minimum to give an indication of what is happening. In your story they will be the backbone of your presentation to take your reader on an adventure.

Treatment

If you are the type of screenplay writer that writes a treatment of your script, you will already have a shortened version of your screenplay which could help with your short story adaptation. Treatments are used to present a short version of the whole screenplay so a producer or reader for a studio can get a feel of the script in short-form and only ask to see the full 90-110 pages if it matches their requirements.

While treatments can be from one page to 30 pages long, they are usually closer to a synopsis version of around 5 pages. This gives you the task of expanding the five pages up to twenty for your short story. Let the writing begin.

Linda Hayes is a stage-trained wordsmith and passionate thespian. She has recently turned her attention from acting to short stories, and hopes to get published this year.

Writers in the Sky Expanding Team

Daily it is a privilege to get new inquiries about our writing, editing, and book marketing services. Over the past few months, two of our team members have taken full time jobs and this has left a vacancy in our network that I would like to fill with at least one (maybe two) qualified writers/editors.

Here is what I am looking for:

1. Nashville resident (preferred)

2. At least one year of experience writing for hire

3. Someone who can edit as well as write

4. Someone who knows the book industry and can write a knock out publisher query letter 

5. Someone with experience in writing resumes and business documents

6. One willing to be a team member and contribute material for this blog at least once per month

7. Experience in metaphysical/self-help non-fiction genres or an expertise in developing/editing novels

If you are interested in being considered as a prospect for assisting clients with writing, editing, and book marketing projects, please submit your resume and a few writing samples via the contact page of Writers in the Sky's Web site: http://writersinthesky.com/contact.php.

Yvonne Perry,

Owner of Writers in the Sky Creative Writing Services

Using "I" As a Conceit

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success

I don't know when I learned the word "conceited." I was raised in Utah where most of us didn't use "conceit" in the sense of an elaborate or strained metaphor but rather to mean that someone thought they were extra-super special. The little girl across the street who snubbed me because I didn't wear long stockings with garters (which was an immediate tipoff that I was not her kind) was "conceited" rather than prejudiced. The kid who was quick to make a point of how bright he was when I made a mistake was "conceited" rather than arrogant (or insecure). Gawd!I loved the word "conceited." I could apply it to so many situations and avoid learning new vocabulary words.

Of course, in a culture where being extra-super humble was valued, I soon noticed that our English language is, indeed, "conceited."

I'm speaking of the way we capitalize the pronoun "I." None of the other pronouns are capped. So what about this "I," standing tall no matter where you find it in a sentence? Recently as I tutored students in accent reduction and American culture I noticed that some languages (like Japanese) seem to do quite well without pronouns of any sort. I did a little research. Some languages like Hebrew and Arabic don't capitalize any of their letters and some, like German, capitalize every darn noun. So, English—a Germanic language at its roots—just carried on the German proclivity for caps.

But the question remained. Why only the "I?" Why not "them" and "you" and all the others. Caroline Winter, a 2008 Fulbright scholar, says "England was where the capital "I" first reared its dotless head . . . .Apparently someone back then decided that just "i" after it had been diminished from the original Germanic 'ich' was not substantial enough to stand alone." It had to do with an artistic approach to fonts. The story goes that long ago in the days of handset type or even teletype machines little sticks and dots standing all alone looked like broken bits of lead or scrappy orphan letters.

Then there is the idea that religion played a part in capitalizing the "I." Rastafarians (and some others, too) think in terms of humankind as being one with God and therefore— one has to presume—it would be rather blasphemous not to capitalize "I" just as one does "God." Capitals, after all, are a way to honor a word or concept.

Which, of course, brings us back to the idea that we speakers of English are just plain "conceited."

------

Carolyn Howard-Johnson is an instructor for UCLA Extension's world-renown Writers' Program, and author of the HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers including The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success. It is a USA Book News award-winner as well as the winner of the Reader View's Literary Award and a finalist in the New Generation Book Awards. She is the recipient of both the California Legislature's Woman of the Year in Arts and Entertainment Award and is a popular speaker and actor. Her website is www.HowToDoItFrugally.com.

Class Act, An author interview with Barabra Techel

Celebrated author Barbara Techel brings her latest book, CLASS ACT: Selling Books Through School and Library Author Appearances, to listeners in this informative interview on how to pitch to schools, how to determine appropriate fees, what to include in your presentation, and much more.

Barbara Techel is the award-winning author of the Frankie the Walk ‘N Roll Dog book series. She has shared her story of hope and inspiration about her dachshund, Frankie, who is in a wheelchair, with thousands of children and adults since 2007. To date they have made over 300 appearances in Wisconsin and many more via Skype to classrooms across the US and Canada. Barbara is also a speaker and publisher. Barbara and Frankie are avid volunteers as a therapy dog team. They routinely visit a local hospice community, hospital and senior assisted living facility, where they “walk their talk” about the inspirational nature of perseverance in the face of challenge.

Since before her first book was published, Barbara has worked tirelessly to promote her books and the positive message they embody. She has garnered coverage for her story from local, regional and national media through these efforts, and continues to develop and refine her marketing message and approach. CLASS ACT is her first book about what she’s learned, but not likely her last.

My Life with a Narcissist ~ Podcast Guest Sarah Tate

Writers in the Sky Podcast presents an interview with author Sarah Tate about her recently published book, Web of Lies - My Life with a Narcissist. The interview offers information about NPC (narcissistic personality disorder) and about the author's experiences publishing her work through CreateSpace.

About the Author 

Sarah Tate is a single mother living and working in Switzerland. She arrived in Switzerland ten years ago and apart from a brief stay in France, has remained ever since, as Switzerland has become her adopted homeland. Sarah has three young kids, who take up most of her time, but she still managed to find time to write her first book Web of Lies - My life with a Narcissist. The book is an auto-biographical novel which describes in graphic details, the ups and downs of life with a person who suffers from (amongst other things) narcissistic personality disorder. Web of Lies takes the reader on an emotional journey and gives a deep insight into what it's like to be sucked into the world of a disordered individual, and more importantly, how to escape with your sanity in tact.

Her second book, with the working title Renaissance - A Journal of Discovery, is a work in progress. It describes the road to recovery from narcissistic abuse, and charts the progress of Sarah and her children as they rebuild their lives following the breakup of the family, and slowly come to terms with the devastation caused by Sarah's ex. Her third book, In the Shadow of an Angel is a psychological thriller. It will be out next year.

Join Us for a "Conversation" with Malinda Dowsett

This week's podcast guest is Malinda Dowsett, the writer and motivational speaker who, along with co-author Lani Barna, transformed her life from tragedy to triumph.

How did these two amazing women do this? They used a tool that we all use everyday: our conversation. Now, in their new book, Change Your Conversation, Change Your Life, they explain how everyone can manifest the life they want by altering the way they speak to each other, and themselves.

This book serves as an easy to follow guide, beginning with shifting one's consciousness from negativity to gratitude. "It is impossible to feel negative," Dowsett said, "when you are feeling grateful for the good in your life."

Click Here to Listen

Like what you heard? Order Change Your Conversation, Change Your Life today at www.changeyourconversation.com

Microsoft Word Feature and Keyboard Shortcut

Pressing Ctrl+F together will open a box that allows you to type in the word or exact phrase you are looking for. Click OK and Word will start from the point in your document where your cursor is located and find the next word or phrase that is exactly as you typed in the search.

To replace that word or word phrase, click the “replace” tab at the top of the search box and type in the word or phrase you want to substitute. Word will replace one at a time so you may review each change or all of the occurrences at the same time.

In this same search box, you may click on the “go to” tab and locate a particular page number. This is very useful if you have many pages to scroll through but you know that you want to be on a certain page. Just type in the page number and Word will take you there. This option is also accessed by Ctrl+G.


Tweet

Author Blogging 101: Blog Infrastructure

by Joel Friedlander

What defines a blog is a matter of opinion, but in my mind the basic element of a blog is a stream of posts that are usually presented with the newest one first. This reflects the very first blogs that were really online journals.

What makes a blog a part of “Web 2.0″ or an interactive social-media site is the comments. Blogs without comments are still blogs, but they aren’t part of the social media landscape since there’s no way to interact with them.

But blogs have evolved quite a bit since their beginnings, and can now be the center of a multifaceted web presence with sophisticated content management and e-commerce capabilities.

How you set up your blog, the size and number of your columns, the specifications for your type fonts and headings and emphasis settings are all part of the infrastructure of your blog. All together its the bits and pieces, many of them behind the scenes, that make your blog “go.” Let’s make a list:

Blog Infrastructure

1.       Platform—This blog runs on software from WordPress.org. You can also blog on Blogger, Tumblr, Posterous, TypePad and numerous other platforms. I like WordPress because it’s widely used and supported, it’s open source and freely shared, and it’s easy to find resources from training to technical help.

2.       Header—The area at the top of your blog. On most blogs this is going to be used for a logo, the title of the blog, and where the visual branding is strongest.

3.       Text column—The main text display area, usually somewhere in the middle of the screen. You can set the width of this on lots of blog software, but keep in mind that the length of your text line has a crucial impact on overall readability. The optimum will show about 10 words per line.

4.       Sidebars—These are the narrower columns next to your main text column. You can have no sidebars, one or two or three sidebars, really it’s up to you and the limits of your software. Sidebars also hold more infrastructure items likes widgets.

5.       Posts and Pages—Many blogs, including WordPress blogs like TheBookDesigner can contain both pages and posts. These are handled quite differently by the blog software.

6.       Pages—These are fixed pages like those you will find on any website. They have a place in the hierarchy of your pages and subpages. Being able to create both posts and pages gives you the ability to create a hybrid site that contains both your sequential, dated articles (posts) and your fixed articles or other content (pages). For instance, most blogs contain an “About” page, and that is a fixed page of content.

A separate type of page is one created on demand by your blog, which is really a content management system. What does that mean? All your posts are stored in a central database, and can be shown on screen in response to different choices a reader makes. For instance, if you use categories to organize your posts, a reader can click the name of the category and your blog software will create a page that displays the most recent posts in that category, with the rest just a click away. These on-the-fly pages are also created by clicking on a tag, or by doing a search for some specific word or phrase. Clicking the headline of any article will create another type of page, the single post page, that shows the entire article and nothing else.

There are many kinds of pages that can be included in your blog.

·         Informational pages, like those that describe your services or link to other resources in your field.

·         Sales pages, for displaying one or many products for sale directly from your site.

·         E-commerce pages, where you sell a whole selection of goods, like an Amazon page of books and products you recommend.

·         Landing pages, often used in internet marketing to focus attention on one specific action the reader is supposed to take. These are often stripped of page navigation and sidebars. When the design of the page leaves only the option of taking the action or leaving the page, they are called “squeeze” pages.

·         Opt-in pages are a special type of landing page used solely to allow a reader to sign up for a product, a service or some special offer.

7.       Page navigation—Most blogs have a navigation bar (or “nav bar”) that gives you access to the fixed pages you include for display.

8.       Footer—Down at the bottom of your blog you’ll see your blog footer. This area may be very small, just one line, or it might be quite deep, with links, opt-in forms and other content. What you can put in the footer is mostly a function of which software you’re using.

9.       Plugins—On WordPress blogs, plugins are small programs that can be added to your blog’s software to perform even more duties. Some of these plugins are almost mandatory. An example is Akismet, which catches spam comments and sends them to a spam folder for you to examine. Another is Google Site Maps, a plugin that allows your evolving blog to be more accurately indexed by Google’s roaming robots.

10.   Widgets—These are more functions you can add to your blog, often created by third party providers. Widgets mostly live in your sidebars and do things like display ads, or your recent Twitter stream, or the books you recommend, or your mailing list opt-in form.

11.   Themes—Software like WordPress is mostly behind the scenes, managing your content for you and displaying it for readers in response to their requests. At their simplest, themes add a “skin” or visual style to the underlying framework. At their most complex, they contain lots of software themselves that allow you do perform functions not included in the basic platform. These themes might be free themes you can install any time you like, and change at your whim, to alter the appearance of your blog. Premium themes have a lot more variety and sophistication, along with more features. Premium means they cost money.

Parent/child themes like Genesis create another level of software run by the parent theme that adds functionality to the blog, and also allows you to swap out child themes to change the look and feel of the site. When you get started, it’s fine to stick to a free theme. Just add a header to personalize it and start publishing, there will be plenty of time for all these other improvements later.

12.   Syndication—Your blog generates a feed when you publish your content. This feed can be picked up by a third-party service and sent to lots of different places. This syndication is a powerful way to multiply the impact of each article you publish. For instance, people can subscribe to your feed and get your posts delivered automatically. You can also direct your feed, with a little help, to other locations like your Facebook page. The beauty of this is that it’s easy to do and mostly free. Usually referred to as RSS for Real Simple Syndication, and is represented by the RSS icon you’ll see on most blogs.

13.   Categories and Tags—I found the difference between these two mystifying at first, until I ran into an explanation from another author. They said they considered their categories like chapters in a book, and tags like items in an index. Categories give you a high-level organization, while tags are more useful to describe the terms in an article that people would be searching for.

14.   Under the hood coding—Of course there’s a lot you can do by creating custom code for your blog software, but that’s not something I spend any time on. I hired a great blog designer to create the look of my blog and the style you see in the headers, heads, typography and sidebars.

It’s important to know the parts of your blog. It will save you a lot of time when you first get started just trying to figure everything out.

Article by Joel Friedlander

Joel Friedlander is a self-published author and book designer who blogs about book design, self-publishing and the indie publishing life at TheBookDesigner.com. He's also the proprietor of Marin Bookworks, where he helps publishers and authors who decide to publish get to market on time and on budget with books that are both properly constructed and beautiful to read.

Tweet

This Week's Podcast Guest: Author and Speaker Malinda Dowsett

Be sure to listen to the WITS podcast this week when we speak with Malinda Dowsett, co-author of Change Your Conversation, Change Your Life. This transformational book is a must-read for anyone seeking to overcome anxiety, stress and depression and manifest the life they truly desire.

For years, Malinda and Lani Barna leaned on each other as they struggled with tragedy, disappointment and upheaval in every facet of their lives. They knew there had to be another way, and they decided that they must begin with "changing their conversation".

Our words have immense power to shape our lives. When we speak negatively about our circumstances, we reaffirm and perpetuate them. Change Your Conversation offers guidance on how to change the dialogue that you have, not only with others, but with yourself.

Join us this Friday to hear about how Malinda and Lani transformed their lives, as well as their goals to help millions of others do the same. To order the book now, visit www.changeyourconversation.com/

Author Jennifer Chase Joins Us to Discuss Dark Mind

Award-winning author Jennifer Chase sat down recently with WITS team member Sarah Moore to discuss her release Dark Mind.  Jennifer has visited with WITS in the past to discuss her other novels--Compulsion, :Dead Game, and Silent Partner and it's always great to catch up with her.

In Dark Mind, Emily Stone and Rick Lopez, who readers of Chase's other work will know well, visit the island of Kauai and become entangled in the hunt for a serial killer who has tortured and murdered woman in order to please his god.  Chase knows the island well and envelops her readers in the physical beauty, culture, and language of the area.  She also takes us into the dark and remote areas of the island that become a terrifying breeding ground for suspicion and violence.




During the interview, Jennifer Chase discusses what it is like to carry a character like Emily Stone over several novels, how she separates after writing a particularly difficult scene, and how her marketing efforts have evolved over the past several years.

Click here to listen to the entire interview.

Dark Mind can be purchased through Amazon.com.   

Book Review for Dark Mind by Jennifer Chase
written by Sarah Moore

To share that the most recent offering by author Jennifer Chase is my favorite means that I really love this novel, as I have enjoyed every book that she has published. Dark Mind is the fourth novel by Jennifer Chase, and through its pages Chase takes her magnificent ability to put her readers inside the mind of a serial killer and to produce plot twists that literally take your breath away to a new level of thrills and intensity. Whether or not you are already familiar with Jennifer Chase’s work and have eagerly been anticipating this new release (like me), or she is an author you are discovering for the first time, you will not be disappointed by Dark Mind.

Chase brings character Emily Stone back to the forefront in Dark Mind. Still happily connected to Detective Rick Lopez in an endearing romance, the two arrive on the island of Kauai to investigate a child abduction that is part of a larger, disturbing trafficking network. Once there, the couple becomes drawn into the search for a serial killer who has been attacking women and then sacrificing their bodies in grotesque and public ways to please his god. Joined by former FBI investigator and good friend Jordan, who fans of Chase will recognize, and local investigator Sergeant Lani Candena, Emily and Rick explore the darkest and most remote locations in Kauai in their hunt to bring a vicious monster to justice.

For the first time in her writing, Chase involves the physical environment as a major character in her writing. The island of Kauai provides an amazing backdrop for the storyline, with its gorgeous beaches that create a sense of peace and pure beauty, as well as the uninhabited woods and caverns that can be terrifying to those not familiar with the land. Chase also displays a deep knowledge of, and respect for, the local culture and traditions. The readers are not just placed on an island and asked to accept the storyline; they are transported into the language and mystery and mysticism of the land, making the authenticity of the work thoroughly believable.

As has been a particular strength through all of her books, Jennifer Chase continues to put forth a powerful psychological component in her writing. We are asked to delve into the thoughts and fears of a serial killer, even taking breaths with him and walking with him as he stalks his prey. I found myself having to shake off the intensity of these episodes before moving forward with the next scene, which speaks to the strength of Chase’s writing and her obvious background in criminology. And, Chase also succeeds at another critical element of a thriller novel . . . she keeps the reader guessing. The suspense is effectively built so that you never know when danger may strike and the twists in who the “bad guys” are in the novel evolve wonderfully. It’s not an instance in which you read a scene and think, “Oh, she wants me to think this guy is the killer, but he won’t be.” The revelations really are unexpected and make for a great climax to the book.

Jennifer Chase does not disappoint with her new novel, Dark Mind. Far from it. Instead, she proves that her creative mind continues to generate fresh and compelling story lines and characters. If you are looking for a book that is smart, beautiful, and even a bit frightening at times, you need to pick up a copy of Dark Mind.

Tips on Self-Publishing an E-Book

Getting a contract with a regular publishing house is more difficult than ever, even if you have a dynamic story. With E-Books rising to prominence and increasing competition from others, book publishers have become increasingly risk-averse when selecting authors to work with.

You may have done market research and tried to interest a regular publisher only to be rejected. To find a regular publisher, you have to write up a book proposal with a letter, a synopsis, and up to three chapters of your book. It can take years to even receive a nibble or rejection. In addition, many publishers look to recycling undergraduate and master's degree textbooks as a means of profits instead of publishing new works. Publishing your e-book, however, provides a great alternative to help you meet your aspirations as a writer.

When you publish your book with a regular publisher, you relinquish your leverage by signing over many rights of your book to the publisher. To get that seal of approval from a regular publisher, you'll receive an advance and royalties. Some publishers only pay royalties or purchase the book outright, while others pay advances and expect the author to use the money to promote their book. The negotiation process is a laborious and complicated one which can be mind-numbing.

When you publish your work as an e-book, you receive the primary income from the book, not the publisher. You don't have to wait for the next quarter to see money from your book nor will you have money withheld against print book returns.

Publishing your book as an ebook yourself means you have full control of the look, cover, format and contents. Of course, if you want the book to sell, you'll still want to have it professionally edited, formatted, and have a dynamic cover created for your work. Nevertheless, the final result is yours and yours alone. No editor is going to change your vision into something acceptable to a large, faceless publishing company.

In addition to the creative aspect of your work, you will also be in charge of formulating and executing a marking plan that best works for your particular book. You decide what percentage of a sale you'll give to different vendors for promoting or selling your book. You have much more say in the pricing of your book than if your e-book were released by a regular publisher, where you'll have little to no say in pricing

The CNET article "How to self-publish an ebook" provides tips on publishing an ebook. This includes setting the price on your book low enough, sometimes less than $4.99, in order to incentivize weary readers to take a look at your book instead of sticking to bestseller lists.

Smashwordssimplifies creating your ebook and getting it into circulation. It features e-books published by little know, independent publishers to one of the largest independent publishing networks in the world. Self-publishers such as Booklocker, CreateSpace, and Lulu can also help get your e-book to market. While you can do much of this yourself at CreateSpace and Lulu, you can also buy packages to ensure that your book has a professional appearance.

The ABC article, "EBooks: Could You Be the Next Self-Published Star?" shares stories of authors who actually made money as self-published e-book authors. E-book sales are on the rise. According to the article, although book sales across all platforms grew just 3.8% between 2009 and 2010, e-book sales grew a whopping 164.4% over the same period. While writing, self-publishing, and marketing a book as an e-book is not for every author, e-books are a positive way to get your story out to the public by your own means and on your own schedule.

Elaine Hirsch is kind of a jack-of-all-interests, from education and history to medicine and videogames. This makes it difficult to choose just one life path, so she is currently working as a writer for various education-related sites and writing about all these things instead.

Tweet

Book with a View December 2011

Title: Millennium Slave: Part I
Author: Sijuan King
ISBN: 978-0-984-65790-2
Published: W.E. Smith Co., 2011
Available on Amazon.com
Reviewer: Dana Micheli

Sijuan King has always dreamed big, and she never shies away from the hard work necessary to make those dreams a reality.  As a child, she performed for her family and friends, and even sang with a female singing group at local nightclubs. As an adult, inspired by the success of her uncle, boxing icon Don King, she received her MBA, ran several successful businesses, and still found time to raise a family of her own.  She also remained active in the arts, and even wrote, produced and performed in her own music video. Now she has attained yet another lifelong goal with the release of her first novel, Millennium Slave, Part I.  

 Millennium Slave is the two-part story of a man who—like Si—will stop at nothing to reach his goals.  When the novel opens, Charles Allen Hart has reached the pinnacle of success. Armed with brains, charm and an MBA, he is appointed CFO of one of the world’s largest corporations while still in his thirties.  When he purchases his dream home-- a penthouse apartment near Central Park-- he knows his hard work has finally paid off.

He also has wonderful family and friends, as well as the love of Trudy Henderson, a brilliant and beautiful civil rights attorney. When, as part of his promotion, he is offered a cruise on board the corporate yacht, Charles accepts and asks Trudy to go with him. Their first night at sea, he asks her to be his wife, and her acceptance is the final piece of his perfect and well-deserved life, falling into place.

But there are evil forces at work that Charles cannot even conceive of, and he is about to get caught up in their centuries-old plan to preserve their way of life. These forces are powerful enough to make a two-hundred-foot yacht disappear into the Atlantic, and its passengers and crew declared legally dead.

Now locked in bondage thousands of miles from home, Charles works tirelessly to formulate an escape. He will need every ounce if his physical, mental, and spiritual strength in order to defeat the secret society of powerful men who have enslaved himself, his beloved Trudy, and so many others he has grown to care about; some of whom have never known the taste of freedom.    

Throughout the course of the novel, Charles learns that control is an illusion, for everything he had was ripped away. He also learns that freedom is more important than materialism, and that wisdom can be found in the most unlikely places, and from the most unlikely people.  Millennium Slave is an epic story of both heartbreaking tragedy and triumph of the human spirit.

While this novel is a “what if” story, it is also representative of injustice—including human trafficking and enslavement—that is still happening throughout the world. This issue is close to Si’s heart, and she plans to use it as a platform to advocate for social justice, both in the United State and around the world.  

“The storyline came to me fully-formed,” Ms. King says, “Its characters were inspired by people I’ve known and who have inspired me. The subject matter is representative of injustices going on in the world, injustices that I would like to work toward eradicating.” 

Millennium Slave, Part I ends with a painful cliffhanger, but readers won’t have to wait for long to find out what happens to Charles. Si is already working on Part II, which is due out in early 2012.
You can purchase your copy of Millennium Slave: Part I at www.sijuanking.com  It is also available at Amazon.comand www.barnesandnoble.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Title: Be Still: And Let God Be God
Author: Robert Paul Baeyens
Publisher: Deep River Books
ISBN: 1935265121
Reviewer: Dana Micheli of WITS
Available on Amazon.com

Robert Paul Baeyens’ book, Be Still, is a Life Changer

“Be Still, for I am God”. . . these words changed Robert Paul Baeyens’ life, as they will everyone fortunate enough to read his book. It stands alone among the thousands of books on spirituality, religion, and the path to eternal life, and is simply a must—read for anyone seeking a closer relationship with God.

Be Still and Let God be God chronicles Baeyens’ journey from depression to triumph. With the raw—and sometimes painful—honesty of a private diary, it takes us through the tragic loss of his father, the loving, inspirational support of his sister, and his battle with the inner demons that caused him to keep God at a distance for so many years.

The book explores nearly every facet of the human condition—from our relationships with family and friends to our habits, beliefs and temptations—and their connection to God’s role in our lives. It also delves into the beliefs of several different religions, as well as prominent individuals throughout history. In this way he shares the wisdom of great people—from Ralph Waldo Emerson to Pastor Joel Osteen—and reinforces the point that God has truly placed teachers in our paths, at every turn.

But Be Still is not armchair theology; Baeyens courageous “experiments”—from walking in the shoes of an atheist to see life from the “other side”, to living as a homeless person to better realize the blessings in his own life—make this book incredibly moving and like no other I have read.

Perhaps the biggest reason this book is so special is that Baeyens shows us—not how to follow his path, but to find our own.
Be Still is available at Amazon.comand www.barnesandnoble.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Title: The Disturbing Effect on Moonlight
Author: Mia Zabriskie
Publisher: Mia Zabriskie Books
ASIN: B005FXHOE2
Reviewer: Dana Micheli of WITS
Available on Amazon.com

Mia Zabriskie, author of The Disturbing Effect of Moonlight, Returns with Another Nail—Biting Thriller.

Her new thriller, Fraidy, captures not only the timeless suspense of the murder mystery, but the appetite of today’s reality—obsessed TV viewer.

Twenty-two-year-old Deanna Lovelock is striking, brilliant, and haunted. As the story opens, she is leaving the dorm of her Boston university and heading home. While there, she plans to solve the vicious murder of her beautiful but troubled mother. Ten years ago, Deanna found Gracie Lovelock’s bloody body on the floor of that house, and it has shaped every moment of her life since. As an attempt to pay tribute to—and surpass—the work of the filmmaker father she adores, she decides to chronicle her investigation with a video camera.

But not everyone is happy that Deanna is back in town. For the Lovelocks were not the only family destroyed by Gracie’s murder; their neighbors, Zack and Harlan Booth, still live under the shadow of suspicion cast upon their father, who had been Gracie’s lover.

As Deanna, Zack and Harlan try to piece together the events of that horrible night, each has a different theory as to who had the most to gain from Gracie’s death. Was it a stranger, a serial killer presumed dead, or even Deanna herself? Should they believe the ravings of the feeble—minded yet psychically gifted man who predicts the actions of a monster named Fraidy?

Zabriskie’s writing is so vivid, you can smell the rot of death in the old Victorian house, hear the sound of a brutal killer creeping up the stairs, and feel the impotent rage of Harlan Booth as he speaks of his broken, suicidal father. One’s only regret in reading this book is the knowledge that “all good things must come to an end”; one’s only solace is that Zabriskie will undoubtedly outdo herself the next time around. Fraidy, along with her other books, are available on Amazon.comand www.barnesandnoble.com


Tweet

TODAY: The 7 Graces of Marketing by Lynn Serafinn New book asks: Can we heal humanity and the planet by changing the way we sell?

The 7 Graces of Marketing (paperback and Kindle) is available from Dec 13th at http://the7gracesofmarketing.com/book

Today is the official book launch of the brand new book The 7 Graces of Marketing: how to heal humanity and the planet by changing the way we sell by my friend and colleague, Lynn Serafinn. I wanted to share this news with you, because this book truly stands out as a title many are calling "ahead of its time". 

While Lynn is known as a leading online marketer, this book is definitely NOT a "how to" book on how to "do" marketing. Rather, it's a book about how we can "be" with marketing, both as business owners AND consumers.

A bold, holistic and often spiritual examination not merely of the world of advertising, but also of our entire worldview, The 7 Graces of Marketing reveals how our relationships with Self, others, our businesses, our economy and the Earth impact every aspect of our lives. Addressing both the conscious and unconscious mechanics of marketing, Lynn shows the impact consumer culture has upon our health, our economy and the delicate ecological balance of our natural world.

The book is intended to be a starting point for discussion, hopefully leading to global changes in the world of commerce. Here are Lynn's poignant opening words from the book:

This is a book of questions, not a manual of answers. And I shall make no apologies for the fact that you are quite likely to have many more questions after you have finished reading this book than when you began...Instead of needing to find all the answers, let us agree to engage in the free dialogue of ideas. Let us unlock any barriers that may lie between us. Let us see and respect each other for what we all are: sentient, intelligent beings, who are made of the same 'stuff' and who share the same planet. Let us see and hear each other. Let us allow ourselves to be seen and heard. And now, with that in mind, let us begin with the first question of this book, and the one that will underpin all the other questions to follow: 'Is marketing making us ill?'

From this point, Lynn invites us to dive into a fascinating dialogue spanning 400+ pages of extensive research, historical examples, a wide variety of philosophical and sociological perspectives, refreshing humour and masterful storytelling, as she takes us on a compelling exploration through "The 7 Key Relationships", "The 7 Deadly Sins of Marketing", and ultimately, "The 7 Graces of Marketing".

The book is already receiving a lot of critical acclaim from other authors and speakers from the world of business and marketing, who are earmarking it as "the new paradigm" for the future. Here are just a few samples of what others have said:

*  *  *  *  *

"At last--here's a brilliant reframe of marketing and selling. Lynn Serafinn offers a brave new world, where competition and scarcity give way to collaboration, abundance and greater connection among all humanity--and we still profit and prosper as we help each other. I love it!"
~ DR. JOE VITALE, author of The Attractor Factor, Buying Trances
"The world NEEDS this book! Lynn is ahead of the curve, and leading us toward how we will ALL look at marketing in the future."
~ RICHARD S. GALLAGHER, author of How to Tell Anyone Anything and What to Say to a Porcupine
"This is what the world has been waiting for! Finally a marketing book that guides us out of fear, lack and limitation into love, prosperity and abundance."
~ DR. ERIC PEARL, author of The Reconnection: Heal Others, Heal Yourself

"An amazing book…It's so ahead of the times, and is the kind of book that can set a new paradigm altogether."

~ WILLIAM GLADSTONE, Founder Waterside Productions Literary Agents, author of The Twelve, co-author of The Golden Motorcycle Gang

"Natural, fresh and original, The 7 Graces of Marketing is the defining organic approach to marketing…" ~ LIZ GOODGOLD, author of Red Fire Branding: How to Create a Hot Personal Brand to Have Customers for Life!

*  *  *  *  *

Buy The 7 Graces of Marketing from Dec 13th at

http://the7gracesofmarketing.com/book

I am pleased to be supporting Lynn in the launch of this book, which is taking place on Tuesday December 13th.

When you buy The 7 Graces of Marketing during the launch, you can receive dozens of personal and professional development gifts from Lynn's friends and colleagues, as well as the complete set of MP3s (over 10 hours of audio) from Lynn's 7-part "7 Graces of Marketing Telesummit", with 24 internationally renowned guest speakers discussing all of the "7 Deadly Sins" and "7 Graces" of marketing. Nearly 2000 people registered to attend this exceptional live event which took place last week, and now you can get the complete audio set as a gift, simply by buying the book, along with nearly 50 other free gifts.

To pick up your copy of the book (in paperback or Kindle)

 and claim your bonus gifts, go to:

http://the7gracesofmarketing.com/book

I hope you'll check out The 7 Graces of Marketing by Lynn Serafinn this week, so we can begin the dialogue for a more connected way of doing business and marketing that will serve both humanity and the Planet.

Tweet