Steve Laube

Fun Fridays – May 22, 2020

By Steve Laubeon May 22, 2020

Today’s video is rather startling to watch. Titled Every Covid-19 Commercial Is Exactly the Same, it speaks a lot to the challenge of cliche vs. creativity.

If you have some thoughts on how you can avoid sounding like the previous proposal in an agent’s stack or like another author in your genre, feel free to weigh in!

This is a reality we agents face when working through proposals, both unsolicited and those from existing clients! How do you say the same thing–but in a different way?

[If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline and go directly to our site to view it.]

What Is the Best Way to Submit My Self-Published Book?

By Steve Laubeon May 18, 2020

Since it has become so easy to self-publish, many authors are creating their own books, both in ebook and print form. Later those authors are not quite sure what to do if/when they want to approach an agent. Or pitch to an editor at a conference. Should they just send a copy of the book with a letter? Or should they create a proposal? Or do both? Is there truly a right way and a wrong way? And if …

Category: Book Proposals, Indie, Self-PublishingTag: book proposals, Get Published, Self-Publishing

Fun Fridays – May 15, 2020

By Steve Laubeon May 15, 2020

What makes this video even more amazing is that the singer released it eleven months ago. Who knew how “timely” it would be in 2020? And he works in a large community hospital as a nurse! [If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline and go directly to our site to view it.]

Category: Fun Fridays

Do You Have a Backup Plan?

By Steve Laubeon May 11, 2020

by Steve Laube

The question is not if your hard drive will fail, it is a question of when. At least twice a year I have a client who has lost their hard drive to equipment failure. There was a recent story of an editor at Wired magazine who got hacked via a security hole in his Amazon and Apple accounts. He not only lost data, he lost all the digital pictures of his baby girl. He wrote the …

Category: Book Business, Book Business, TechnologyTag: Backup, Technology

Fun Fridays – May 8, 2020

By Steve Laubeon May 8, 2020

As things begin to resume, there are some things where bargain shopping is not a good idea. Day care is one of these. Enjoy today’s satirical video for a day-care service that had unexpected results! [If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline and go directly to our site to view it.]

Category: Fun Fridays

Fun Fridays – May 1, 2020

By Steve Laubeon May 1, 2020

Are you one of those parents trying their hand at quarantine homeschooling? Enjoy today’s fun video! I heard one shelter-in-place-homeschooling parent proclaim, “I hereby declare that elementary school teachers should forthwith be paid one million dollars . . . per day.” Hah! [If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline and go …

Category: Fun Fridays

How Are You Reading?

By Steve Laubeon April 27, 2020

by Steve Laube

I collect books. I graze through them like I'm at an all-you-can-eat buffet. I sample this tidbit and that. Eventually I get enough to eat or have found the right morsel to consume until it is finished.

It helps make me an eclectic sort. But there are days, even weeks, where I must discipline myself to become immersed in extraordinary writing. It is there where the soul …

Category: Reading, TheologyTag: Reading, Theology

Fun Fridays – April 24, 2020

By Steve Laubeon April 24, 2020

I suppose there are a couple of ways to find a metaphor in this video. Some authors respond to their editor with forceful compliance. Good clients do what they are asked to do. But they can be vocal about it. You all vote on which one you think fits best, or add your own story to make this all about writers! [If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline …

Category: Fun Fridays

Use Your Thesaurus and Dictionary Correctly

By Steve Laubeon April 20, 2020

Today we look at how one writer uses his thesaurus and dictionary in a fascinating way. The following is a five-minute video from Martin Amis, one of Britain’s well-known literary novelists and essayists. I recommend clicking the “cc” close-captioned on the bottom next to the settings button. That way you can read his words while also hearing them. Below the video I have a couple …

Category: Craft, Editing, The Writing Life, Writing Craft

Fun Fridays – April 17, 2020

By Steve Laubeon April 17, 2020

Time on your hands? Learn a new skill, like this fellow. Imagine the possibilities! [If you cannot see the embedded video in your newsletter email, please click the headline and go directly to our site to view it.]

Category: Fun Fridays