Writing Children’s Books
Writing children’s books is not an easy business; it demands swiftness, characters that appeal to the age group, fitting dialogue, and factual explanation. Many people today claim they don’t like to read, although there is a marked revival among young people who are finding works by contemporary writers appealing, as well as books from the past by well-known authors. While some non-readers are diagnosed as Dyslexic and may experience specific learning disabilities in reading, most others who seldom if ever pick up a book or magazine to read admit to finding reading for leisure boring, too difficult, not important and a waste of time. Children, in particular, with poor reading habits usually get poor grades at school; they are easily distracted, exhibit anti-social behavior, fail to achieve ego-identity during adolescence, and often fail to develop to their full potential. Writing Children’s Books In our modern society most people are categorized as “paper readers” or “electronic readers”; even before they start pre-school, children today are already skilled in some or other form of multimedia through access to computers, electronic games and cellular phones. Most pre-teens have fun exchanging messages with friends on mobile phone, send e-mails, take pictures, listen to music, watch videos, browse the Internet, and check their schedule as if it was a palmtop. Download free e-book, “11 Steps to Writing Your First Children’s Book”. The habit of reading should begin at an early stage – starting with parents or caregivers reading to the child on a regular basis — and should be pursued throughout one’s lifetime. Writing children’s books can be a very rewarding and profitable leisure pursuit or career for writers. Any writer who wants to write and publish children’s books should spend an hour or more in the children’s book section of any public library or book store, to familiarize themselves with the type of children’s books that are well-liked or currently being published. —————————————————– Kwarts Publishers invite anyone who wants to try their hand at writing a short children’s story, to send it in for their ‘Mini-Stories’ writing opportunity. Stories must be aimed at children between the ages of 4 and 10 years and should be simply written, full of fun and definitely with a happy ending! You do not have to be an experienced writer to send in your mini-story. The purpose of this writing opportunity is to stimulate writing talent, and provide a platform where you can begin to realize your writing dream. This opportunity is for anyone, young and old! Selected entries will be posted on the blog page, and published in an e-book compilation. >> Read More Imagnary House is a new boutique publishing house for children’s literature in Cape Town, South Africa. Founder and CEO, Brad Harris, says: “We are focused on building a larger market for African children’s authors and illustrators by both igniting the local readership and engaging with international readers.” Visit their Website: https://imagnaryhouse.com/. Imagnary House has just opened their submissions after launching their debut publication (Seven by B. D. Harris), and is now looking to build up their publication list for the next 2 years. What are they looking for? “We love stories that are fun and imaginative, but also address current societal issues for children. We want simple stories that mean something and can feed positively into our children’s futures,” says Brad Harris. Imagnary House will consider submissions in the following genres: Children’s long form fiction (think Roald Dahl and CS Lewis narratives) Picture books Rhyming verse books (think Dr Seuss) Writers and illustrators can submit their work on Imagnary Houses’ submissions page at https://imagnaryhouse.com/pages/submissions. ——————————————————– For example, the Harry Potter series of story books by J. K. Rowling have had a positive impact on children’s reading habits. It is also beneficial...
Read MoreAIDA Your Blog Post!
An attention-grabbing blog post gives the reader a reason to want to read the piece. The opening statement should leap off the page. Communicate the benefit of reading the rest of the article. Include a shocking statistic to engage readers. Make sure the first couple of sentences make a claim that sparks curiosity. Ask an insightful question. Provide a rational solution to a noteworthy problem. Back up your viewpoint with sound advice from a respected public figure. The goal is to construct your blog post into a concise tutorial guide or how-to piece to encourage readers to reflect on the ideas you are proposing. The acronym AIDA is a clever tool for ensuring that your blog writing attracts attention. The acronym stands for Attention, Interest, Desire and Action. These four steps point the reader in the direction you want them to take. It pays to put time and effort into creating a blog post. Talk directly to your readers. Get their attention by using powerful words or visuals (images, links, and embedded videos) that will further reinforce their attention. The next challenging step is building on readers’ interest. Stay focused on their needs by elaborating on relevant issues. Use bullets to make your points stand out. The Interest and Desire parts of AIDA are synonymous; as you build the readers’ interest you also need to help them recognize how what you are offering can benefit them in a real way. Finally, your blog post should conclude with a call to action. You may want to add a URL and invite them to subscribe to your newsletter, browse your Web site for more information, or view a new product. Be inventive in your closing; think outside the box, and then go a massive leap further to make a lasting impression on your reader. Remember, you don’t get a second chance to make a good first impression! Convert new readers into loyal readers by building a brand that is attractive and draws people in. Make your blog interactive by inviting comments. Include competitions, polls and projects. Involve your readers as much as you can by way of social media, and maintain posting frequency to a daily update. It’s not impossible to make every post a hit, especially if your goal is to make your blog post go viral. Achieving this position demands consistent effort on your part to put your blog out there and connecting with an extensive following. Before you post your blog check for any errors, put your main topics into Google Keyword Tool (to optimize the most popular keywords), and add pictures next to key items. After posting use the following guide to connect with as many readers as possible: Add to your email signature Add to your next newsletter Add to your signature in forums Directory submissions Forum comments Link to our own past and future blog posts Post on Forums in niche Post to Face book Post to Google + Post to LinkedIn Post to Pinterest, if applicable Post to Twitter Post to YouTube, if applicable Press releases Provide SEO keywords for images Refer to posts on LinkedIn Refer to posts on Quora Refer to posts on Yahoo! Answers Relevant blog comments Request other bloggers to mention your post RSS directory submits Social bookmarking Submit to Delicious Submit to Digg Submit to Reddit Submit to StumbleUpon Submit to Technorati Submit to Yahoo Buzz Words by Theresa Lutge-Smith (ecottage@gmail.com) Via: blogpros.com...
Read MoreSelf Editing
What separates mediocre writers from good ones? Clearly it is their ability to come up with fresh ideas, spot gaps in chapters, delete content that does not fit, and flesh-out incidents that will entice the reader to pay attention and continue reading. Another key characteristic is the quality of their editing. Most writers rely on an appointed editor to check their work for clumsy or ambiguous phrasing, typos and inconsistencies, but if you are working on your first manuscript, feature article, or publishing posts to a blog, you may not have the time to outsource your work for proofreading. However, some writers find it difficult to edit their own work; they argue that they would not have written in the way they have if it wasn’t their intention in the first place. Consequently, many end up skipping editing altogether because they simply don’t recognize any errors or purely because they find the process objectionable. Then again, there are writers who demand perfection and spend hours trying to get a paragraph just right. It is acceptable to want to write perfectly the first time, to side step editing, but self editing as you write is often a mistake many emerging writers make. Ray Bradbury, American fantasy, science fiction, horror and mystery fiction writer (1920 – 2012) believed that when it comes to first drafts, we should just write [and not pay attention to grammar, typos and viewpoint]. He said, “The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. In delay comes the effort for a style, instead of leaping upon truth which is the only style worth dead-falling and tiger-trapping.” In short, what he meant was that we should write with gusto; get it down fast, even if it doesn’t quite make sense at this stage – you can always patch up sentences during the revision [editing] phase. It’s good advice; it’s fine to correct a typo, or restart a sentence while creating the first draft – but avoid going back to delete whole sentences or re-write paragraphs. Once the article or book manuscript is complete, put it aside for a while before you re-read it to check the content for errors. You will approach the work in a more objective manner and will notice problems that didn’t stand out before, such as too many short/long paragraphs, glaring typos, moving chunks of material to facilitate the flow of your piece, adding missing information, and cutting repetitive copy or unnecessary adjectives to reduce word count. Read your work out loud; if you need to read a sentence more than once to understand it, change it. Run your work through a spell-checker, but don’t blindly follow every suggestion. Finally, print out your work. Give it a quick read-through. It is important to arrive at a stage where you feel thoroughly confident about your work. The best writing sounds fluent, like you’re speaking. Contact Theresa (ecottage@gmail.com) for editing services. Order our Editing & Proofreading Tutorial (e-book)....
Read MoreInteresting Infographic: Most popular books
Storytelling has throughout history been an effective means of communication and a deliberate tool for sharing knowledge. However, modern technology has altered — albeit enhanced — the way stories are delivered today. While some believe that modern technology — through television, computers, the Internet, and film — might have robbed society of the intimate bond between physical storyteller and intimate group of captivated listeners, many recognize that books and modern technology allows us to re-visit experiences and insights through printed literature or access information at the touch of a button, whenever we want. Modern technology also allows us to speak with thousands of people about their opinion of a topic and explore different authors’ perspectives in books or electronic media to remind us that storytelling today is an important communicative and educational activity as it ever was. Peruse the infographic for an introduction to popular books. Imagine if generations of civil society were not exposed to books and other forms of information-sharing to enlighten their curiosity for historical facts and knowledge, they would be forever ignorant and unable to understand their past or their future; history and life are nothing but a series of stories. The destiny of the world is determined by stories that have a positive impact on how humanity approaches its future. Those who do not have power over the story that dominates their lives, the power to retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, joke about it, and change it as times change, truly are powerless, because they cannot think new thoughts. —Salman Rushdie. Australian Aborigines say that the big stories—the stories worth telling and retelling, the ones in which you may find the meaning of your life—are forever stalking the right teller, sniffing and tracking like predators hunting their prey in the bush. —Robert Moss, Dreamgates Stories are how we learn. The progenitors of the world’s religions understood this, handing down our great myths and legends from generation to generation. —Bill Mooney and David Holt, The Storyteller’s Guide Contact Theresa (ecottage@gmail.com) for any queries about writing, editing or publishing. Explore more infographics like this one on the web’s largest information design community – Visually....
Read MoreWrite a Novel that Sells
Before you even organize the framework to start writing your manuscript, there is one very important factor to consider. As in any industry, to succeed you must have a quality product to sell that will attract enough customers to buy it. To create a marketable product—in this case, a salable manuscript that will motivate a book publisher to offer you a publishing contract —you need to follow these basic steps. Step 1: Read other writers’ work before you start writing. Read everything you can lay your hands on – magazine features, classics, comics, science fiction, biographies, and romance and fiction books — and see how they do it, just like a novice crafts person that works as an apprentice and studies the master. Become an avid reader. Carry a book with you wherever you go. Spend every spare moment learning your craft. You will learn different writing genres when you read. In brief, a genre is a form of text that uses a particular format and structure. Once you recognize that there are different genres, you will discover how to navigate through each kind of text to find the information you seek. In this way, you learn that how-to text often includes a list of materials and a list of steps; biographies are generally organized in chronological order; and persuasive text often has attention-grabbing features to attract a reader’s interest. In-depth knowledge of different genres will help you to recognize what you are reading and help you to quickly identify pertinent information. Step 2: Start writing. You’ll know intuitively if it is good. If it’s not, delete and start again. Editors and publishers urge authors to be aware of their target readership and to focus on a typical reader profile when writing. This approach will give you a good chance of selling your manuscript and publish books aimed at a solid fan base. The style of writing publishers generally look for is ‘relentlessly commercial’; familiarize yourself with publishers’ title lists to gain access to the right publisher to have your manuscript considered. Read books and magazines on the genre you are interested in. Pay attention to emerging target markets and trends. If you don’t work hard at the business end of your writing, you’re just setting yourself up for rejection. Don’t write in a genre unless you enjoy it. Step 3: Write for yourself. This instruction sounds as if it contradicts the course of action suggested in step 2, but it doesn’t really. Writing to please your target market and writing for yourself can co-exist. It’s a fine line however, but it is important that you know how to blend both elements. The writer must shape the writing process ‘on the inside’ to be believable to the reader. Writing with integrity requires a great depth of skill; you need to combine what you like to read with what sells. Be true to what you want to write; if you have a novel in mind, you should write the best story possible. If you write about something you’re really interested in, it’s going to show. Step 4: Learn how to write well. You might be an avid reader and feel confident to write a manuscript, but writing a manuscript for publication demands much more than a personal desire to tell your story. It is important to know how to bring your work up to professional publishable standards before submitting it for consideration. Writing a manuscript is not something that happens instantly, even if you are an avid reader. Learning the craft of writing is an ongoing process: HOW-TO BOOKS are the textbooks of...
Read MorePromote Your Book
To publish and market your book by yourself can be a bit overwhelming, but it is not as daunting as you might imagine. A good place to start is to have a review professionally written to use as a marketing tool to generate publicity and organize a possible book signing. It is wise to promote your book at least one year before it lands in the book stores; start by establishing a Web site to showcase extracts from the book and to run a blog; build your social network community. Post content that will inspire people to ‘spread the word’ about your forthcoming publication, so that they will want to buy your book when it is launched. Always keep your publisher and editor in the loop as to your marketing efforts. Other PR activities: Put together a press kit (synopsis, author biography, photo of author holding the book, invitation to launch) that is distributed to media representatives to set up newspaper, magazine and radio interviews; Print and distribute leaflets or chapbooks (to publish a image of the book cover, photo and bio of the author); Display size A3 contact posters in retail stores that agree to stock copies of your book; Run a compact mail order advertorial in a community newspaper; Have an edition of bookmarks printed that feature an image of the book cover, brief outline of the content, retail price and list of outlets where the book is available for purchase. Leave bookmarks at libraries and stores that stock the book; Showcase the book on a dedicated web site. Provide online payment facilities that makes ordering easy; Create a video where you discuss your book (tell your audience about yourself, why you wrote the book, what the book is about, mention who the target audience is, why readers will benefit from reading this book) and post it on your site; Post the video on your social media links; List your book online on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kalahari, Bidorbuy and Loot; Negotiate with Book Clubs like Leisure Books to review your book for inclusion in their catalogue that are mailed to members; Depending on the type of book, you could run seminars or workshops on the subject and sell copies to delegates; Use social media to attract users to your web site; Include a free gift when packaging your book, such as a bookmark, plantable seed-embedded paper cut-out, printed post card). Contact Theresa (ecottage@gmail.com) to write a review, compile a press kit, design and print leaflets, chapbooks, posters, bookmarks, post cards; Web design and content; or create seeded paper...
Read MoreAbout Theresa
I’m a published author of four business books and have written a number of self-study tutorials [creative writing; editing and proofreading; business writing; and self-publishing] and an eBook [Workplace Harmony]. I am an experienced writer, editor and publisher. 
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