Helping to Change the World…Word by Word
The Steve Laube Agency
Helping to Change the World Word by Word
If readers don’t care about your characters, they won’t care about your book. If your characters are wooden, generic, or forgettable, readers won’t buy, read, finish, or recommend your book. If you want to write a book people not only finish but recommend to friends, you must craft compelling characters. So how do you do […]
You can listen to this episode How to Craft Unforgettable Characters with James Scott Bell on Christian Publishing Show.
The publishing experience is rarely done in isolation. This means working with other people. And if their performances or efforts do not meet your expectations, conflict can occur. Over the years I’ve seen more conflict than you can imagine–of all types and variety. But the majority of issues boil down to four areas: Editorial Production (cover design?) Marketing and publicity Getting …
We all need a smile break. What better than a puppy train? But since this is a blog about the writing industry, which one is the editor? Which one is the agent? Which one is the writer? Which one is the reader? And why? (Don’t forget the person behind the camera!) Smile!
The “Your Questions Answered” Series __________ PLATFORM. I read a lot of conflicting ideas about the importance of having a substantial platform: (1) It used to matter more but its importance is declining, but also that (2) a writer must have at least 5k followers on social media to even be considered for agent representation, and (3) some kinds of social media “count” more than …
In the beginning was the Word, says your Word, Lord. You identify yourself as Word and Writer, Speaker and Spoken. You are the Source of all things. Beginning. Alpha. First. So let it be in me, and in my writing, Lord. Be my first thought as I put pen to paper, the Source and Supplier, Word and Writer, Speaker and Spoken. Grant that I may pretend to no originality, no creativity of my own, but to …
The Christian Author’s Guide to Cancel Culture This post first appeared here and is shared with permission. Last month tens of thousands of Twitter accounts attacked J. K. Rowling. They tried to get her books pulled from publication. Her books were burned, and people promised to never read one of her books again. This was perhaps the fourth time this has happened to Rowling in the past few …
The Christian Author’s Guide to Cancel Culture This post first appeared here and is shared with permission. Last month tens of thousands of Twitter accounts attacked J. K. Rowling. They tried to get her books pulled from publication. Her books were burned, and people promised to never read one of her books again. This was […]
You can listen to this episode How to Survive Cancel Culture As a Writer …
It takes 12 strikes to achieve a perfect game in bowling. (See last Friday’s video.) It made me think there are 12 things that need to happen in the publication process. Each must knock down all the pins to achieve publishing success. With that simplistic idea in mind, I came up with the following: Idea – A book has to start somewhere Write chapter – if not the whole book …
A perfect game in bowling is a score of 300. To achieve that you have to roll ten strikes in a row, then roll two more in the bonus. A total of 12 strikes. It is really, really, really hard to do. This guy, Ben Ketola, rolls 12 strikes in a row, in less than 90 seconds. Watch and be amazed. It does give me a moment to brag on my grandfather who bowled a perfect 300. He had the gold belt buckle to …
The “Your Questions Answered” Series __________ I’m a former crime reporter and trauma survivor with lots of counseling writing a suspense novel. I’m trying to balance Christian fiction guidelines with the speech and behavior I’ve seen in police stations and at crime scenes. I’ve come up with some of my own ways to show through action that a cop is angry or frustrated, but can you guide us to some …
