sallymurphy.com.au

Sally Murphy, Australian author

Poetry Friday: Salfie

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It’s Poetry Friday and I’ve been thinking about selfies: you know, those photos people take of themselves. I got a new mobile phone a couple of months ago, chiefly because I wanted a better camera – and gosh I’ve had fun snapping all kinds of things on my walks, my excursions, and at home.

Like lots of people, some of the photos I take are of myself – and I’ve coined the term Salfie (a bit punny, but there you go). I share these photos on social media, and text them to family and so on, but I always double check that I’m happy with the shot, and am quick to delete those I don’t like. It’s one of the wonders of digital photography – the ability to take dozens of shots and simply delete the ones we don’t like rather than waiting till after the film is processed, as in the not-so-0ld days.

Thinking about this self-editing (or Salf-editing) lead to today’s poem which, since it’s about photos, I’ve made into a Photostory.

 

Have a great Friday. This week’s roundup is at The Logonauts.

Five Minute Promo: Day 8

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Welcome to Day 8. If you’re here for the first time, every day in July I am offering a five minute promotional task you can do to promote your latest book and, since I have a new book out myself, I am completing each task myself. Today’s task involves a little writing, but, since you’ve just published a book, that won’t be hard at all, right?

5 Minute Promo #8Quote3

Write a blog post about the writing process (or illustration process if you are an illustrator)  for your new book. You’ve only got five minutes remember (though feel free to take longer) so don’t try to cover every aspect of your writing: choose one. People love short blog posts that tell them something.

For my post, I decided to focus on the creation of a series. You can see my effort here (or just scroll down).

Once you’ve written it, post in your blog – remember to include a picture or two, and to add links to where the book can be purchased. Then, tweet and facebook about your new post, and pin one of the pictures. Easy peasy. And, if you leave a comment here with the link I will head over and read it.

See you tomorrow.

Writing a Series Vs Writing a Stand Alone Story

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Cover Sage Cookson 1I’ve written over 40 books (actually, hundreds if you count the ones I’ve written that haven’t been published) and the writing of each one has been different. But Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape is the first book in my first ever series and, as such, I was keenly aware as I wrote it of how different writing the first book in a series is from writing a stand alone story.

  1. Firstly, before I could write story number one I had to have a strong premise for the whole series: strong enough to cover at least four distinct stories (since that was the number specified in the initial contract). I needed a premise that would give my characters opportunity to experience conflicts (problems) which would be varied but revolve around the same characters. I came up with the idea of a girl whose parents were television chefs, since that would allow me to use varied locations and scenarios.
  2. Secondly, I had to plan my characters. Every story needs characters, but again, in a series, I had to plan not just the main characters – Sage, her parents, and her best friend Lucy – but also minor characters. In the first book I decided there would be two ‘baddies’ and I had to decide if they would be recurrent characters and whether they would be bumbling baddies or really nasty. This would set the tone for the rest of the series and was really important. In the end I decided my baddies would be not comic-book bumbling, but still a bit silly rather than horribly bad.

    Sage Cookson, the title character, is a girl who has lots of adventures.

    Sage Cookson, the title character, is a girl who has lots of adventures.

  3. Thirdly, I needed to consider the level of self-containment. Some series must be read in the order of release to make sense, with each title leaving the reader on a cliff-hanger so that they want to read the next book to find out what happens next. Others are so self-contained that each book stands completely alone, and there is no need to read one to understand the others. I decided I wanted to sit somewhere between those two extremes: I want each story to be resolved so that a reader is left satisfied, and I also want a reader who picks up book 2 or 3 or 4 not to feel lost. But, at the same time, I want my characters to develop over the series. So, the books are sequential, but after Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape, each book will include enough mention of back-story that a reader isn’t left confused, without those earlier stories being ruined for a reader who wants to go back and read them out of order.

 

I am still working on the series, and the exciting news is that there will be at least six books in all. And, as I write each book I think back over these three points, and continue to learn more and more about series writing. I hope Sage Cookson won’t be the only series I write in my career.

In the meantime, Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape is now available online and in good bookstores.

Five Minute Promo: Day 7

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Day seven of the five minute promo challenge means we are more than a quarter of of the way through. Thanks for coming back – and, if you’re new here, thanks for dropping by.

Today’s task is one which could be done in as little as five minutes, or could take a whole lot longer. But, because I promised that each task would be five minutes (or less), I did a test run to make sure it was possible. So, here goes:

5 Minute Promo #7: Make a Book Trailer

A book trailer is a short ‘film’ adverting your book – like a movie trailer, though usually much shorter. It can be as simple or as complex as you, your talents and/or your budget will allow, including sound effects, acting, voice overs, visuals and more. If you are going to do all that, it will likely take you much, much longer than five minutes, but, if you use a simple tool such as Photo Story, and images you already have on hand, it can take as little as five minutes. Here’s my five minute effort:

I like using Photostory because it’s free, very simple to use, and creates it’s own music, so there are no copyright issues. I use my own pictures or ones from my books, so that again there are no copyright issues – and, in this case, because I already had them, it only took me five minutes to arrange them, add text and music, and create the video. The end slide I created in Paint. If I had more time I would have made it longer and probably included a voice-over, which is simple to do in Photostory.  There is a good explanation of how to use Photostory here.

 

As I said earlier, if you want to take longer than five minutes, there is no end to what you can do. Here is a longer trailer I made several years ago (in fact, the very first book trailer I ever made):

And here is much cleverer Booktrailer made by a wonderful teacher:

( created by Julie Hembree and shared here with permission.)

Anyway, the timer is ticking, so off you go and make your own booktrailer. When you’re done, upload it to Youtube, then post it on your website, your Facebook page and Tweet the link. As always, if you leave a comment here, I will check out what you’ve done. Have fun!

Five Minute Promo: Day 6

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Set your timer and get ready for today’s 5 minute task, because I’m going to jump straight into it. Yesterday I promised the last day of getting you to sign up for social media platforms, so today I want to suggest you do something quick and easy – and it’s about signing something rather than signing up.

Day 6: Creating an Email  Sig Line

If you are like me you probably write and send dozens of emails every week. Some are writing related and others aren’t. But every one of those emails can bear an advertisement for your book or books. If you email your child’s teacher about her homework -and there’s a signature line? Your teacher learns about your book. If you forward a referral to your doctor? Your doctor learns about your book. If you send a query to a new ediotr? The editor learns about your previous book AND sees that you are willing to promote your work. It’s win win.

So, today’s task is to open up your email program and create a signature line which advertises your book (or books). Here’s a screenshot of mine:

EMail Sig Line

You can see mine has pictures, my name plus the URL of my website. You could use text instead of pictures, and you could add more links (for example to online bookstores). There’s lots of possibilities.

 

There’s a quick guide to creating a signature for Outlook: here. If you use a different program, use a search engine and you will find a similar guide.

So, what are you waiting for? Your five minutes starts now. As awlays, feel free to leave me a note, or tweet me and let me know how you go.

5 Minute Promo: Day 5

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Gosh. It’s Day 5 already. July is whizzing by. and, hopefully, if you’ve been following along, you’ve been busy spending a whopping 5 minutes of each day promoting your book(s).  If you haven’t, just twenty minutes (give or take a few) will bring you up to speed, ready to tackle day 5’s task which is (drumroll please)…

5 Minute Promo #5

Set up a Pinterest account. Yes, you’ve got it, I want you to join another social media platform. This is the last one, I promise (for now!). So, after you’ve read my few words, head over to Pinterest, sign up and you are ready to Pin. There’s simple instructions on how to get started here and instructions on how to set up a board and start pinning here. You might extend your five minutes and set up a board about your book. Here’s one I’ve set up for Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape here.

Already on Pinterest? Your five minute task is to make sure your profile and account is up to date and, once that’s done, use the rest of your time to pin two new pictures to one of your exitsing boards. Easy peasy. Feel free to follow me, Sally Murphy Author, while you are there.

Pinning is easy and fun. Here is a sample of things I’ve pinned from this site:

Read a kids Book

A quote with photo – and, of course, my web address so people know to visit me.

And:

Looking at You 3

A poem I wrote, added to a photo I took and again with my URL and twitter handle.

 

 

sallymurphy.com.au