The Creative Penn Podcast For Writers

How can you future-proof your author career by being careful with the publishing clauses you sign? Why are NFTs so interesting for intellectual property? How might DAOs help authors with estate planning? Copyright and trademark attorney Kathryn Goldman talks about these things and more. In the intro, I talk about my art NFTs [JFPenn & OpenSea] and using generative AI through Conjure.art. This podcast is sponsored by Written Word Media, which makes book marketing a breeze by offering quick, easy and effective ways for authors to promote their books. You can also subscribe to the Written Word Media email newsletter for book marketing tips. Kathryn Goldman is a copyright and trademark attorney, and has worked in intellectual property for over 30 years. She runs creativelawcenter.com, which offers resources, workshops, and advice for creative professionals, including authors, artists, designers, and more. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Why are NFTs so exciting for intellectual property?Clauses in publishing contracts that might stop you creating or controlling NFTs in the future — and what language to watch out forSpecial editions, smart contracts, and other possibilities for contractsWhat does the end of the term of copyright mean for NFTs?How DAOs could be used by authors and the publishing industry — estate management, author organizations and collectivesAcceleration of blockchain regulations due to President Biden's Executive Order (signed March 2022) You can find Kathryn Goldman at CreativeLawCenter.com and on Twitter @KathrynGoldman Transcript of Interview with Kathryn Goldman Joanna: Kathryn Goldman is a copyright and trademark attorney, and has worked in intellectual property for over 30 years. She runs creativelawcenter.com, which offers resources, workshops, and advice for creative professionals, including authors, artists, designers, and more. Kathryn's been on the show before, talking about estate planning and protecting your intellectual property. Today, we're talking about web3, NFTs, and DAOs. Welcome back to the show, Kathryn. Kathryn: Oh, thank you for having me. Joanna: I'm so excited to talk to you about this. Let's start with more of an attitude question. Why are you so interested in this intersection between web3 and intellectual property? Because I've seen so many people shying away from it and saying it's just not happening. But you embrace the change. So, why is that? Kathryn: I embrace watching the change. It is happening. You cannot turn your back on it right now, but mostly what's intriguing me is that people's imaginations have caught fire in a way we really haven't seen for a couple of decades, or maybe a decade. People are taking this technology and doing things with it that are just limited only by their imaginations, and that is what is fun to watch. It's the creation, from imagination, that is the basis of intellectual property. That's why I am just loving what's going on these days. Joanna: I love that you say that, that imaginations are catching fire, because I feel like the talk in the space has been so focused on finance and cryptocurrency and the financial industry that the creativity side is often under the carpet, in a way. It's not being talked about that much. I love that — ‘creation from imagination is the basis of intellectual property.' I hope people listening are excited about that. Let's get into the publishing industry, specifically, because you have a fantastic blog, and people who sign up for your email list get notified of your new posts, and I'm a subscriber. From a recent article [read it here], you said, “Authors who have signed publishing contracts may have already given up their right to control their work in the metaverse.” Let's say metaverse/web3/whatever we're going to call it in the future. What do you mean around that? What do you mean by given up their rights? Kathryn: Publishing contracts are license agreements between an author and a publisher, and in that license agreement, the author grants to the publisher a group, a bundle of, or part of their copyrights in their creative work. And publishing contracts are dense with language. In those grants of rights, there are these broad provisions that encompass future technologies. And so, if there is a publishing contract that was drafted and signed 10 years ago, that includes language that encompasses future technologies unknown at the time, then the author may have already agreed, with that language, to allow a publisher to mint an NFT of her work without even knowing what an NFT was at the time. So it's possible that there's language embedded in the contract already, covering future technologies, that would give the publisher control over the creative's NFTs. This analysis, this concept, is not without precedent. The same thing happen

How do we tell the deeper story that matters in a way that engages readers? How can we tackle the inner critic, self-censorship and fear of judgment? And does social media actually sell books? Nikesh Shukla talks about why Your Story Matters and gives his writing tips. In the intro, Amazon opens up Ads to traditionally published authors; How to Make a Living with your Writing; Ultimate Guide to Multiple Streams of Income [ALLi]; Cemeteries and Graveyards [Books and Travel]; Death's Garden Revisited Kickstarter. Plus, From $0 to $1K in book sales, free book marketing webinar with Nick Stephenson. Today's show is sponsored by IngramSpark, who I use to print and distribute my print-on-demand books to 39,000 retailers including independent bookstores, schools and universities, libraries and more. It's your content – do more with it through IngramSpark.com. Nikesh Shukla is a best-selling novelist as well as a screenwriter, editor, podcaster and essayist. He has been named one of Time magazine's cultural leaders, Foreign Policy magazine's 100 global thinkers, and he's a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His latest nonfiction book is Your Story Matters: Find Your Voice, Sharpen Your Skills, Tell Your Story. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Learning a hard publishing lesson early onFinding our author voiceHow to deal with fear of judgment and self-censorshipPlanning a novel and shaping a storyThe two different types of writer procrastinationSearching for the emotional truth of a storyDoes social media sell books? You can find Nikesh Shukla at Nikesh-Shukla.com, Nikesh.substack.com and on Twitter @nikeshshukla Transcript of Interview with Nikesh Shukla Joanna: Nikesh Shukla is a best-selling novelist as well as a screenwriter, editor, podcaster and essayist. He has been named one of Time magazine's cultural leaders, Foreign Policy magazine's 100 global thinkers, and he's a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His latest nonfiction book is Your Story Matters: Find Your Voice, Sharpen Your Skills, Tell Your Story. Welcome Nikesh. Nikesh: Hello. Joanna: Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Nikesh: I was quite a shy and awkward teenager, and I didn't really like going out and doing all the sort of miscreant deeds that teenagers do. I just sat in my room and listened to a lot of rap, I read a lot of comics, and I would transcribe all of the rap lyrics and I would read the comics again and again and again. After a while, I started writing my own rap lyrics and writing out my own arcs for Spider-Man and for Batman. I guess some sort of fan fictiony type route is what brought me into writing. And then from that I graduated to what most teenagers do, which is write appalling poetry. Joanna: Woohoo! Nikesh: I think that's probably where it all started for me is just being a shy teenager who had a lot to say about the world and the world was against me, but I could write down how I felt about the world. Joanna: Obviously, you're not a teenager anymore. So how did it go from terrible teenage poetry into Fellow of the Royal Society. Obviously, we're both British, and I don't know if Americans will realize this, this is a really big deal. How did you cross that gap? Nikesh: Who knows? A series of unfortunate events, probably. I don't know. Here's a thing that happened to me when I was a teenager, sort of my origin story. I write about this in Your Story Matters. But at some point, during my teenage years, I saw an advert for an international poetry competition. I think I was 15 or 16. And you have to submit a poem, and you could win a lot of money and go into an anthology. And I thought…I'm a sick poet. So I sent off a poem that was your very standard teenage fare. Teenager goes for a walk, spots nature and nature reminds him that we're all going to die someday. Really bad stuff. It was really bad. And I sent that poem, it was called Train of Thought, or Trail of Thought. Get it? Because he was on a walk, a trail and he was having thoughts and the thoughts were wandering. At some point, I got a letter back from the International Poetry Foundation, or whoever it was saying, ‘You haven't won the International Poetry competition, but we love your poem, and we're going to include it in our anthology, Awaken To A Dream.' And I was like, ‘Oh, my God, I'm going to be published. This is amazing. Yes, this is happening. I'm on my journey now!' Then it said, if you wish to be included in the anthology, then you have to buy a copy of the anthology which costs 50 pounds, but we will give you a discount of five pounds, so you just have to pay 45 pounds, and then you can be in the anthology, and we'll send you a copy.' I didn't realize what the listeners are probably realizing right now, I was a teenager and I was desperate to be published. I was a pro

What if the traditional publishing model is not the best way to publish a book in a digital age? What if publishing it as an ebook on Amazon is not the best way, either? Elle Griffin questions the established ways of publishing a book and explains how she is using SubStack and NFTs for her words. Elle Griffin is an author, editor, freelance journalist, and creative entrepreneur, using new methods of publishing to reach readers and make multiple streams of income with her work. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Why the economics of publishing most books don't add upTips for authors who want to use SubStackHow SubStack differs from PatreonIdeas for authors who want to get into blockchain and NFTs with their wordsEmbracing change and technology as a creator You can find Elle Griffin at ellegriffin.substack.com and on Twitter @novelleist Transcript of Interview with Elle Griffin Joanna: Elle Griffin is an author, editor, freelance journalist, and creative entrepreneur, using new methods of publishing to reach readers and make multiple streams of income with her work. Welcome, Elle. Elle: Thanks, thank you so much for having me. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you today. Before we get into more of the technology, tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Elle: I've been a writer for a really long time. I actually started my career in the content marketing side of things, and then moved my way over toward editorial. Now I've been an editorial journalist for a number of years. While I was working on that, on the side, I wanted to write a novel. So I wrote a gothic novel called Obscurity and when I finished it, I did all the normal things first. I sent it out to agents and I was thinking maybe that would be a good idea. But as I was doing that I was researching publishing as my own, like a journalist would, researching the industry, trying to figure out how my book could best be successful. That's when I decided that my book was not a mass-appealed kind of book, it was not going to have 100,000 followers, or buys, purchases. So I decided that it would be better off for a couple of thousand people that would really love it. And if that was the case, I was interested in doing that as part of the Creator Economy, which is a newer idea where the idea is that the author or writer gets paid monthly. People subscribe to that author monthly, as opposed to, ‘Let's pay this author $10 every time, every five years when they have a book come out.' The idea is you subscribe to an author ongoing, and they provide behind-the-scenes access and things as you're going there, similar to your strategy because I know you have a blog and a podcast on the side of writing fiction. So that's what I've been doing. I did a newsletter on SubStack, about a year ago, which has explored all of this and has been a very interesting experiment. Joanna: I want to start with the SubStack experience because one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you is I've had so many authors ask me about SubStack. Now, of course, when I started doing this, I started writing in 2006, it wasn't around, but I grew an email list as one does. I've always kind of felt SubStack is just an email list that someone else manages for you. So I've been like, ‘Okay, I've got to ask someone why it's so good.' So let's start with the fiction and we'll get back into the nonfiction. You serialized Obscurity on SubStack. What are your tips for authors who want to use SubStack for fiction in particular? Elle: When I first started serializing fiction on SubStack, I pitched the idea to my readers, I said, ‘Look, okay, publishing doesn't work. Here's all the reasons why. What if we bring serialized fiction back in the form of a SubStack newsletter, I'll send out a new chapter of my novel every single week, you can subscribe to it for $10 a month or $50 a year and get the whole book. For an added tier, you can pay $200 and get access to the hardcover very first edition of the book when it comes out.' That article just went insanely viral. At the time I wrote that article, I had done a lot of research on SubStack and, basically, everyone was doing nonfiction there. You're not wrong, SubStack is pretty new and it only really started reaching mass appeal in the last two years, when they got funding and started investing in it a lot. So it's fairly new, but it's picked up steam really quickly. And that article saw 60,000 views in one day. One of the co-founders of SubStack reached out to me and was like, ‘We want SubStack to be a place for fiction. We love your idea.‘ All of these fiction writers started following me at that time, and were like, ‘Whoa, like, this is such a great idea. My books have been published on Amazon, and nothing's been happening to them at all. So this is such a cool idea. I'm going

I've spent the last 15 years building an author business on Web 2 — digital publishing, blogging and podcasting, social media, and more. But as Web 3 begins to emerge through blockchain, NFTs, AI, and the metaverse, I want to make sure I still have a thriving business over the next 15 years. NFTs are an important part of the future business model in the Creator Economy and in this presentation, I explain why they're important and how authors can consider using them. In the intro, I give an update on my first couple of NFTs, minted on OpenSea, the potential impact of President Biden's blockchain and crypto Executive Order [The Verge]; In the main section, I go through: Who am I, and why am I talking about NFTs? My technical background and how I've embraced technology early in my author career so farWhat is an NFT?Different blockchains — and energy requirementsWhy do we need NFTs? Ownership and resale; flexing in the metaverse, and erosion of royalties + paid ads + inflation = we need more income streams from our IPSix different types of NFTs that authors can consider, and how they are being used in other industriesWhy digital scarcity enables more creativity and collaborationHow smart contracts enable easier collaboration and a simplified payment systemHow blockchain and smart contracts (and DAOs) could change royalty payments, estate management, and moreWhat we need in an NFT solution for publishingHow do NFTs fit into the current business model? What is a potential future state once the technology goes mainstream?What action should you take right now? You can find more resources at thecreativepenn.com/future For a broader look at web 3 and emerging technologies, check out my book, Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, and Virtual Worlds: The Impact of Converging Technologies on Authors and the Publishing Industry.  If you have any comments, tweet me @thecreativepenn or leave a comment under the video or on the post. Thanks again to my patrons who sponsor these futurist episodes, and if you find them useful, you can support the show at patreon.com/thecreativepenn and get the monthly Q&A coming soon for March.  Or if you don’t want to commit for a monthly payment. you can also buy me a coffee or two at BuyMeACoffee.com/thecreativepenn  Transcript of the introduction I put the main section out as a video on YouTube and on the blog, but I know many of you prefer audio only — I do too! So I wanted to put it out on the audio feed as well, but I also have an extra section upfront, an update — as I mentioned on Monday’s show, I minted my first NFT on Opensea, and it sold immediately, so I minted another one, which also sold immediately! I wanted to talk briefly about this before playing the presentation as things move on apace. First of all, the book-specific NFT platforms aren’t ready quite yet, although many are almost there, so I decided to mint some of my AI generative art, which I’ve been playing with for a while.  This is not out of the blue for me. My family are primarily visual artists. My dad’s a printmaker, one brother is a photographer, my other brother is a 3D fashion designer, and one of my sisters designs textiles and interiors for superyachts. We are indeed The Creative Penns!  I already dabble in visual art. I take thousands of photos during my research trips (some of which I share on Instagram @jfpennauthor ). My fiction is very visual and sense of place is important to me, as you can also discover through my Books and Travel Podcast. For my AI generative art, I’m using my own photos of places combined with words from the books about that place, and then remixing those images and curating until I find one that resonates with me.  Of course, art is subjective, but since I’m the writer and the photographer, I can curate the output based on many iterations of AI images. I love love love playing with generative art. It is so much fun! On 11 March 2022, I made my first NFT, Rain soaked the ashes of the dead, by combining one of my pictures from the burning ghats of Varanasi, India, which inspired the first scene of my first novel, Pentecost (later republished as Stone of Fire) with a prompt of the first line. “Rain soaked the ashes of the dead into the winding Varanasi streets as rivers of mud ran down to the holy river Ganges.” The image is the NFT, and the special edition of the ebook of Stone of Fire is ‘unlockable content.' There is a smart contract attached to it that says I get 5% on any resale.  I used OpenSea as it's known as ‘the Amazon of NFTs,’ and it has an Art category. I chose the Polygon blockchain, which is less energy-intensive than Ethereum, but OpenSea still prices in ETH. I couldn’t use an auction for this setup so I just priced at 0.1ETH (around US$250 at the time of minting). The first NFT was bought quickly, so I made another one, Inscribed in an ancient hand, from a picture

How can we improve our creativity and release our self-censorship to write more freely? Dan Holloway talks about aspects of creativity as well as physical challenges, neurodiversity, and how technology might augment us in this interview. In the intro, thoughts on Brandon Sanderson's Kickstarter [Kris Rusch]; Guide to Multiple Streams of Income [Self Publishing Advice]; Thoughts on President Biden's Executive Order on crypto and blockchain [The Verge]; My first NFT — Rain Soaked The Ashes of the Dead; Crypto Business Podcast; The AI-Assisted Author and generative art (50% off with coupon MARCH22) This podcast is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo eco-system. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors. Dan Holloway is the author of 9 books across dark fiction, poetry and non-fiction, a performance poet, professional speaker, podcaster, and creativity consultant.  He’s won the Creative Thinking World Championships three times as well as the World Intelligence Championship. He’s also the founder of Rogue Interrobang, dedicated to helping individuals and companies expand their creativity.  You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes From performance poetry to using storytelling and communication as a way to engage audiences with non-fictionWhat is creativity and how can we develop more of it?How Dan's creativity game, Mycelium, can helpHow physical health underpins creativityDan's physical transformation and how he stays consistent over timeNeurodiversity and how writing ‘rules' don't applyHow we are augmented already — and thoughts on VR, AR, and AI You can find Dan Holloway at Rogueinterrobang.com and on Twitter @agnieszkasshoes Dan has chapters in The Healthy Writer on writing with depression, and also in Public Speaking for Authors, Creatives, and Other Introverts on performing your work. Transcript of Interview with Dan Holloway Joanna: Welcome back to the show, Dan. Dan: Hi, it's fabulous to be back after many, many years. Joanna: Many years. We were just saying before I hit record, it was 2013 since you last came on the show, and I'm going to assume that most people possibly haven't heard that episode. So let's start with the basics. Tell us a bit more about you and your author journey and how it's progressed. Dan: Right. I was one of the very early self-publishers back in the days. On Smashwords, in the olden days, you used to get a forward slash and then the number of the book according to which in order you were, and my books were all in three figures. I was amongst the first few 100 books published on Smashwords. So that's how I judge myself as a sort of an early indie author. Back in those days, in 2006, 2007, 2008, I was writing all sorts, thrillers, literary fiction, and after that, I got into poetry, performance poetry. I spent quite a long time on the slam scene. And obviously, that has been harder of late, the last two years. There hasn't been much in-person slam poetry. Most recently, I've gone back to my absolute roots in writing nonfiction. When I say my absolute roots, when I was a kid I grew up as most people – I don't want to say our age, but my age – my hero was Carl Sagan. So that was what I always wanted to do. I was given a copy of Cosmos, I think it was my eighth birthday when the hardback came out, and I read that and I decided that was the kind of thing I wanted to do. I wanted to be the Carl Sagan figure, this public intellectual, for want of a better word. So it feels like writing nonfiction now has gone back to those roots. Joanna: That's really interesting. Obviously, the performance poetry scene, as you say, because of the pandemic has dropped off in person. Obviously, we've known each other through various incarnations of ourselves. In my mind, you're always a performance poet. That's how I think of you in my mind. I see you performing. But it's funny because you say the public intellectual, and you've won these creative thinking championships, and you do have a sort of almost polymath ability to explore things. The poetry side and the performance side; is that going to come back into your life or do you think that was part of it? Dan: Absolutely. And performance is very much still there with nonfiction, and that goes with the public intellectual thing, I think. I love the engagement speakers. I don't know if you know the sci-com community, for example, science communications. People who speak passionately and present incredibly well their nonfiction work, I think that there's a real performative element to that that I love to bring those sides of what I do in. I'm very lucky being still in Oxford. We have quite a lot of people who are exploring this space and quite a lot of fundi

How can we overcome self-doubt to write the books we really want to? How can we move past writer's block? How can we reshape our definition of success and return to the joy of writing? Dharma Kelleher talks about the author mindset and more. In the intro, Brandon Sanderson's Kickstarter, Bookstore consolidation [The Guardian]; Amazon closes bookstores and a thought experiment about what else they might do [Digital Trends]; Pen-names [6 Figure Authors]; Wise for business multicurrency income [Wise affiliate link]; Plus, it's my birthday month! Get 50% off my courses, ebooks, and audiobooks. Use coupon: MARCH22 at TheCreativePenn.com/learn (courses) and Payhip.com/thecreativepenn (ebooks & audiobooks). Valid until 31 March 2022. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, where you can get free ebook formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Get your free Author Marketing Guide at www.draft2digital.com/penn Dharma Kelleher is the author of crime and action-adventure thrillers featuring queer women across three different series. She's also the author of Breakthrough, Overcoming Creative Self-Doubt, Writer's Block, and Imposter Syndrome. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes From traditional publishing to indieAddressing low self-esteem and imposter syndrome as writersWriting with beginner's mindGetting past writer’s blockLearning to accept our imperfectionsFinding the joy in writing againBalancing self-care with getting things doneWriting in an era of ‘cancel culture’How to write about characters outside your lived experienceIs success a delusion? You can find Dharma Kelleher at DharmaKelleher.com and on Twitter @zenpunkdharma Transcript of Interview with Dharma Kelleher Joanna: Dharma Kelleher is the author of crime and action-adventure thrillers featuring queer women across three different series. She's also the author of Breakthrough, Overcoming Creative Self-Doubt, Writer's Block, and Imposter Syndrome. Welcome, Dharma. Dharma: Thank you so much for having me. I've been a fan of the show almost since the beginning, so, it's such an honor to be here. Joanna: Oh, thank you. I'm excited to talk to you. First up, tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and the indie world. Dharma: I started writing fiction back in the late '70s. I was a teenager at the time, writing on a manual typewriter. I kid you not, it was a manual typewriter. I just played around with it for several years through high school, college. And then life issues got in the way and I came out as transgender. And so, I spent a few decades, basically, dealing with that and the fallout from that and just trying to rebuild my life. Then, in 2007, someone mentioned to me something about National Novel Writing Month. And I'm like, ‘What is this?' And, so, I got excited, I was like, ‘Hey, I could start writing again.' Because at the time I had quit my day job to take care of my in-laws, they were elderly and they needed some help. So, I had some extra time on my hands, so I started doing that. My first two books were published by Random House in 2016. And when they didn't renew the two-book deal…I've been a fan of your show for a few years by that time, and I'm like, ‘Well, maybe Joanna's on to something here.' So, I said, ‘Okay, I'm going to do this myself.' Eight books later, 10 books later…I've lost count at this point, so… Joanna: That's fantastic. Tell us a bit more about your indie experience then. Because, obviously, you were traditional with those first books and then you had to learn all this new stuff and a lot of people coming out of traditional publishing at the moment really and trying to see what it's like. Any thoughts on the transition from traditional to indie publishing? Dharma: My goal was to put out books that were every bit as professional as the ones that Random House published. It's important to get a professional editor and to get a professional book cover designed. But there are so many wonderful tools out there. I use Scrivener; I use Vellum; I use just all these really great tools. And actually, I've gotten to the point where I'm doing my own covers now just because I have some graphic-design background so I understand the principles and I understand the tropes of my genre, as far as covers go. Joanna: And then the other thing that I feel people coming from traditional publishing don't quite understand is how the money works. Because, of course, with trad, you (usually) get paid upfront. Or maybe if you don't get paid upfront, you get royalties eventually. Whereas indie, you have to pay some money upfront and you might get some every month, but it might be really small. How did you adjust to the way the money worked? Dharma: Well, I wasn't getting a lot of money upfront, anyway. So, at le

The creative journey is often a winding path to success, but our experiences along the way can enrich our writing and help us develop a unique author voice. Johnny B Truant talks about his journey from scientist to non-fiction/self-help, to over 100 books and a TV show based on his novels. In the intro, What Sells Books in 2022: at Kobo Writing Life [ALLi]; How to Survive Book Marketing Burnout [Kindlepreneur]; Introvert Writers Summit; Self-Publishing Show Live, London in June; Chirp Audiobook special on Map of Shadows; plus book recommendations: Life Force by Tony Robbins and Peter Diamandis, and The Genesis Machine by Amy Webb and Andrew Hessel. Today's show is sponsored by IngramSpark, which I use to print and distribute my print-on-demand books to 40,000+ retailers including independent bookstores, schools and universities, libraries, and more. It's your content—do more with it through IngramSpark.com. Johnny B. Truant is the author and co-author of over 100 books across multiple genres, and the co-founder of Sterling & Stone, a multimedia story studio, along with Sean Platt and David Wright. One of Johnny's books, Fat Vampire, sold to NBC Universal for production in 2021 as a SYFY original. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes No experience is ever wasted — and may end up inspiring your writingFrom copywriting and courses to writing fictionA very slow first novel — to writing fastCollaboration and writing partnershipsLetting go of what might be working in order to do more of what we loveKnowing when a business relationship needs to endOn planning and following an inner compass You can find Johnny B. Truant at SterlingAndStone.net. Transcript of Interview with Johnny B. Truant Joanna: Johnny B. Truant is the author and co-author of over 100 books across multiple genres, and the co-founder of Sterling & Stone, a multimedia story studio, along with Sean Platt and David Wright. One of Johnny's books, Fat Vampire, sold to NBC Universal for production in 2021 as a sci-fi original, and some of you might even remember when he came up the idea live on the ‘Better Off Undead Podcast' years ago. Welcome back to the show, Johnny. Johnny: Hey, Joanna, it's so great to be back here. You and I go back just about as long as I've been doing internet stuff. So it's so cool. Joanna: We do. We're going to come to that in a minute. Because I was your fan way before you were a fiction writer. But I want to take us all the way back. We're focusing on creative pivots. When I first heard about your journey, you talked about doing a Ph.D., I think it was in genetics. So talk about that. Why did you stop doing your PhD in genetics? And how has that knowledge still ended up in your fiction? Johnny: This is actually really appropriate timing. First of all, I've recently revisited one of our smaller books, nonfiction books called The Story Solution, which is like how life is like a story. And so I revisited a lot of this. Also, I did my daughter's Career Day where I talked about, they asked for, like educational requirements for your job. And I was like, ‘Well, none, but I have these credentials. And guess what? They filter into my work. So very appropriate.' I was always a good student. And I created that as my identity. I was valedictorian of my high school class, and I got a lot of validation from just kind of being good scholastically. And so it was natural for me when I went to college, aim high, and high, by my definition, was the ‘most prestigious degree.' So this was basically an ego move, if you're getting this. Plus, I did like science a whole lot. And so it just seemed logical to me, in the absence of any other viable considerations, including writing, because who in the early aughts was able to make a living as a writer? That was absurd at the time. So a nice respectable job to me meant, I don't know, following my trajectory and getting a Ph.D. And it was genetics, it was molecular genetics. It was about, I would say, six months into it before I started to realize, ‘Oh, this is a really, really bad fit for me.' I wasn't like the people who were doing the work. I didn't enjoy the work itself, I didn't enjoy the environment. The schedule did not fit with all my other interests, I didn't have time for other things, because it was a lot of time, and it was far away. I realized that I had made a misstep when I made the calculation of how many fruit flies I had looked at under a microscope. So we used to do these cultures, these stinking yeast-smelling cultures of fruit flies. And there was a gene that would express with red eye color. I would know that they took up the gene if they had the red eye color. And so we used to knock them out with gas and use a little paintbrush to move them across the stage of a compound microscope and look for flies with re

In January 2022, I re-edited my first novel, Stone of Fire, which I started during NaNoWriMo in 2009 and published in April 2011. In this episode, I explain why and how I re-edited the book, as well as some lessons learned from revisiting my writer self of over a decade ago. This episode includes: Why I decided to rewrite when so much advice says ‘never go back’How Stone of Fire developed from 2011 to 2022 My re-writing process Practicalities of publishing a new editionCraft notes from rewriting, including character, pacing, grammar and sentence structure, author voice, dialogue, and moreWas it worth it?! Why I decided to rewrite when so much advice says ‘never go back’ There’s nothing really wrong with the book. As I write this, Stone of Fire has 1374 reviews on Amazon US with a 4.1 star average (and many more reviews on other stores and platforms) so clearly, readers enjoy it. But I know I can improve it.  Stone of Fire was my first novel — but it’s also the first in my 12-book ARKANE action-adventure thriller series. It’s my permafree first in series ebook, the one I repeatedly put ads on to bring readers into my writing. It’s pretty important for my fiction marketing efforts! Morgan Sierra, the main character of my ARKANE series, is also my alter-ego. Sure, she’s an ex-Israeli military psychologist, Oxford University professor, and Krav Maga expert — but her thoughts are often my own, or at least represent some facet of my personality. Like me, Morgan is fascinated with religion and travels the world, but of course, I just visit exciting locations, whereas she investigates supernatural mysteries in each one alongside Jake Timber and the rest of the ARKANE team.  The advice from many writing coaches and experts is to leave your old series behind, and write a new one. In this way, you can improve your work without rewriting old books.  But I can’t leave Morgan behind. And neither can my hardcore readers who love the ARKANE series and demand a new one as soon as I deliver the next story! In Jerusalem for book research! (Is that Morgan or Jo?!) I’ve written other series — my Mapwalker fantasy trilogy, my Brooke & Daniel crime thrillers, and various stand-alone stories. But in terms of action-adventure books, I’m invested in Morgan and the ARKANE team.  The ARKANE series appeals to fans of James Rollins’ Sigma series, Steve Berry’s Cotton Malone books, Lincoln & Child’s Pendergast, and thrillers by Greig Beck, Matthew Reilly, Ernest Dempsey, J Robert Kennedy, and R.D. Brady. They are action-adventure/conspiracy thriller with aspects of the supernatural.  I wrote them because I love these kinds of long-running thriller series and always set out to write something for the ‘old me’ who used to read thrillers on the commuter train every weekday to a job I hated.  My writing has improved after almost 13 years and writing over 35 books, as well as taking all kinds of writing classes, reading many thousands more thrillers, and learning my craft. Plus, I’ve worked with professional editors and proofreaders, and now augment my craft with ProWritingAid. Since I won’t “just start another series,” I decided to rewrite the first three books to bring them up to my current standard.  Importantly, I have not changed the story at all. The plot and characters are the same and if you’ve read the book, you don’t need to re-read it. But as I outline below in the craft section, I have made a lot of changes for pacing, reader flow, character depth, and author voice. Being an indie author simplifies the technical side of re-editing and re-releasing. I don’t need to ask anyone’s permission for a new edition. I just rewrite, republish, and carry on.  My plan is to rewrite the first three (Stone of Fire, Crypt of Bone, Ark of Blood) because they are linked by the antagonists, and also readers who get to book 4 tend to continue the series, anyway. The read-through is much stronger after they are hooked on Morgan and Jake’s adventures! I also need to get on with the next book and don’t want to spend any more time on older work, but never say never. Maybe by 2035, I’ll want to rewrite some more! How Stone of Fire developed from 2009 to 2022 I started the story during NaNoWriMo 2009 and joined The Year of the Novel at Queensland Library in Brisbane, Australia, where I lived at the time. After finishing the draft in 2010, I worked with several professional editors. I self-published Pentecost (as it was originally called) in April 2011. You can find my experience detailed here with some amusingly old videos! I wrote two more ARKANE novels, Prophecy, and Exodus, all under Joanna Penn.  The original cover for Prophecy by Joanna Penn, which eventually became Crypt of Bone by J.F. Penn! But my early reviews proved a couple of things.  Readers enjoyed the books — they have always had good reviews. But the branding and book titles looked like Christian Fiction, and although the stor

It's never too late to start writing and there are many pro writers ahead of you on the path lead the way. Craig Martelle shares tips on writing, self-publishing, and book marketing, as well as how he believes in the rising tide that lifts all boats, and how helping each other is the best way for indies to prosper. In the intro, the Findaway Voices Marketplace for audiobook narrators is now live; and I recommend Skip The Line by James Altucher. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just typos and grammar checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing, and integration with Scrivener MS Word, Chrome and more, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna Craig Martelle is the author of over 70 books alone and co-author of over 50 more, spanning science fiction, thrillers, and fantasy, as well as nonfiction for indie authors. He also co-hosts and runs the 20BooksTo50K Facebook group and live events. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Transitioning from the Marines, to law, to consulting, to writing From struggling with the first book to finding a process that works Quality control as an indie author Collaboration and building a team Tips for success in self-publishing Feeding your readership without having to write a book a month What happens at 20BooksVegas and can an introvert survive? Check out the free replays of 20Books Live events on YouTube here You can find Craig Martelle at craigmartelle.com  Transcript of Interview with Craig Martelle Joanna: Craig Martelle is the author of over 70 books alone and co-author of over 50 more, spanning science fiction, thrillers, and fantasy, as well as nonfiction for indie authors. He also co-hosts and runs the 20BooksTo50K Facebook group and live events. Welcome, Craig. Craig: Thank you. Thank you for having me. Joanna: I'm really interested to talk to you. So before we get into now, let's take a step back because you have some really interesting former careers in the Marine Corps, the Military Intelligence, law school, and business consulting. Why, with all of these different things, did you get into writing and publishing? Craig: I've always loved stories. I've read thousands of science fiction books. I always had a book with me wherever I was, no matter what I was doing. And I wrote my first book when I was 13 or 14, and that book languished. Then I joined the Marine Corps and went off. And last year, my sister who had the book because my parents made her type it up, and I didn't know that and she found it, she found my whole first manuscript that I hand wrote, and like a quarter of it is typed. And so, I got that. So, I wrote, but whatever I'm doing at the time, I commit myself to it. I didn't write again until after I retired from the second career, being a lawyer. And then just started writing, and I wrote full time because I already had my retirement income, and I was okay, and I needed to take some downtime. Now, of course, I have a freak level of workload, as an author, and with the conferences and with 20BooksTo50K. Joanna: So, reading was always part of your life. Why did you think when you retired, ‘Oh, I know, I'll become an author?' Craig: Oh, well, that was very pragmatic and fairly pedestrian, in that I retired from being a business consultant, as a lawyer. So, I got into the corporate offices. And I was deployed all the time. I was up on the North Slope and inside the Arctic Circle in the oil fields. And so, I retired from that. I came back down to my house here, outside Fairbanks, Alaska. And the yard needed cleaned up. I needed to do some of this outside work. So I went out there and I'm doing stuff, I built this big brush pile, and I tried to light it. And I lit myself on fire. So, the pragmatic nature is me sitting here inside, vowing to not do outdoor work again because the manly stuff was beyond me. And with bandages on the second degree burns on my leg and said, ‘Hey, I think I'll write that book that I always wanted to write.' So, it was pragmatic. I didn't set myself on fire a second time. Joanna: What's funny, though, is you say manly stuff. You were in the Marine Corps and Military Intelligence. Many people consider this quite manly, even though I'm sure there's lots of women as well. I think you do write military sci-fi amongst other things, don't you? How is that previous career coming to your writing now? Craig: In the Marine Corps in a lot of extremely tense situations, that is when you hear some of the funniest things ever. I've worked all of those into my books since. I've gotten fodder from a 20-year career in the Marine Corps to include in all of my boo

Smashwords was the original distribution service for indie authors and Mark Coker has been an advocate for wide publishing for over 14 years. Draft2Digital has been a fantastic service for indies over the last decade, moving into new markets, providing great tools, and helping authors sell more books. On Feb 8, 2022, Draft2Digital announced they were acquiring Smashwords. Mark Coker and his team would be joining Draft2Digital and the combined company would consolidate systems and processes, improving services for authors. In this discussion, I ask Mark Coker and Kevin Tumlinson about the acquisition and how it will impact indie authors who publish with either service, as well as discuss the opportunities ahead. Mark Coker is the founder and CEO of Smashwords, the original ebook publishing platform for Indies, established in 2008. Kevin Tumlinson is Director of Marketing and Public Relations at Draft2Digital, established in 2012. Both Mark and Kevin are also authors and they understand the author perspective when it comes to publishing.  You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What the acquisition of Smashwords means for authors who publish on Smashwords — and what it means for those who publish on Draft2Digital Some of the concerns and how they will be addressed The implications of a company serving over 250,000 authors and how it shifts the power imbalance in publishing Why Mark was excited about the possibilities for authors when we met in 2010 (video here) and why things are even more exciting now Opportunities ahead for the bigger Draft2Digital You can contact Draft2Digital with any questions at [email protected] Transcript of the discussion Joanna: Mark Coker is the founder and CEO of Smashwords, the original ebook publishing platform for indies, established in 2008. Kevin Tumlinson is director of marketing and public relations at Draft2Digital, established in 2012. Both Mark and Kevin are also authors, and they understand the author perspective when it comes to publishing, and we've got some exciting things to talk about today. Welcome, Mark and Kevin. Mark: Hi, Joanna. Kevin: Hey, there. Joanna: Hey. It's good to have you both on the show. So, let's start with the news. Kevin, what has just happened or is happening? Kevin: You may or may not have heard by this point, but Draft2Digital is acquiring Smashwords as of March 1st, 2022. So, very big, very exciting news. We have been keeping our lips sealed for the past couple of months, but we are very excited to have that out there in the wild now. Mark: I'm really excited about this. I think that our two companies coming together that sprouted from the same seed. Both of our companies were founded by authors, for authors. We are an author-first company. We share common business models. Both of us chose the most difficult business model to pursue, and that's only making money when the authors make money. And both of our companies have managed to build profitable companies with this difficult business model, and we really fit well together. We both have the same attitude. We both believe that authors should be the center of the universe, that authors should have total control over their pricing, promotions, distribution. By joining together, we can do more together. We want the same thing for authors. And if you look at the last decade that Draft2Digital has been in business, we've created duplicative systems, systems that do the same thing, systems that can easily be merged together, well, maybe not easily, but they will be merged together, and that frees up engineering and development resources for us to develop new next-generation tools. So this is all about doing more for authors. Kevin: I have come to think of this: we're the peanut butter and jelly of the self-publishing world now. Which of us is peanut butter? I think Smashwords is the peanut butter, actually, because they're the foundation. They started it, delicious all on its own, and along came Draft2Digital just to sweeten the deal. So that's the way I perceive the whole thing. It's just all around going to be something really spectacular for the indie author community, self-publishing community, just because each company on its own had its strengths, had their weaknesses too. We're puzzle pieces, and we fit each other very well. I know everyone always thought of us as rivals, and in some sense we were, but we were sort of that friendly competition thing, where we were always just making each other better anyway. So, really, when you look back on it, it's sort of an inevitable journey to see this all come together. Joanna Yes. So inevitable, in fact, that when I found out, I wasn't surprised at all. And in fact, anyone I've talked to, everyone's like, ‘Yeah. Well, of course. That's kind of obvious.' I don't think anyone's been surprised. I do want to

The self-publishing movement is just getting started in Jamaica and the Caribbean islands, and authors are discovering they can tell their stories in their own way. C. Ruth Taylor talks about how she became an authorpreneur and why she believes in an indie-first, empowering ecosystem. In the intro, Draft2Digital acquires Smashwords [D2D; Mark Coker]; Impact of streaming on audiobook revenue and AI narration [Ask ALLi]; Stone of Fire and thoughts on your ‘writing age.' This podcast episode is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo ecosystem. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors.  C. Ruth Taylor is the author of over 20 nonfiction books and a leading Jamaican authorpreneur. She's also a publishing consultant, podcaster, course creator, and founder of Extra Mile Innovators. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes From writing to heal a broken heart to authorpreneur The rich literary tradition of Jamaica and the Caribbean diaspora The reading and publishing ecosystem in Jamaica Turning your books into multiple streams of income Creative marketing when you can't afford paid ads The importance of telling your story and valuing your experience You can find C. Ruth Taylor at extramileja.com and on Twitter @cameka12 Transcript of Interview with C. Ruth Taylor Joanna: C. Ruth Taylor is the author of over 20 nonfiction books and a leading Jamaican authorpreneur. She's also a publishing consultant, podcaster, course creator, and founder of Extra Mile Innovators. Welcome, Ruth. Ruth: Thank you, Joanna. It's good being here. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you. First up, tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. Ruth: Oh, that's a good question. I'm going to give you the short version. I am from the island that has produced the fastest man and woman in the world. That's Usain Bolt and our own Elaine Thompson-Herah, and the island that has given birth to reggae music, Bob Marley. And guess what? The island that gave birth to James Bond. This is where Ian Fleming wrote James Bond, and that's the beautiful island of Jamaica. How I got into writing and publishing. Well, I've been a bookworm all my life. I'm an introvert, so I found it difficult to make friends, as a child, and teenager. And so books are my best friends, I would read two, three books per week, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Mills & Boon. And then I used to write poems. At a particular point in time, I would turn those into postcards and sell them. But in terms of writing and becoming an author, I did not see myself as an author. When I was finishing my first degree, the president of the seminary, Jamaica Theological Seminary, told me to do a particular graduate degree. And he said, ‘I want you to do this because I believe you can write.' And then a friend from Trinidad wrote in the year prospectus because I was applying to go to Yale, she said, ‘I look forward to seeing your books in the future,' but I didn't believe. Fast forward 10 years later, on the heels of a broken engagement in 2014, one of my mentors says writing is therapeutic. And then I remembered a quote from a note from a theologian from the UK, William Barclay. He said, ‘Endurance is not just the ability to bear a hard thing, but to turn it into glory.' I knew how I would turn my traumatic experience into glory. It would be through writing. And so within 11 days, I wrote almost 68,000 words and nine months later, the book was published. So that is how I got into writing and publishing. Joanna: Okay, so you started with poetry? So you have a degree in theology, do you? Ruth: Yes, I have two degrees in theology, just like you. Joanna: Well, I've only got one. So you've already beaten me there. But no, that's fascinating. The traumatic experience into therapy; was that a memoir? Ruth: It was a memoir, but I wasn't just writing about the trauma. I wanted to help others to be healed from broken relationships. I wanted to share some of the tips that I learned because I was still standing, I did not go crazy or something like that. Joanna: And then, a couple of things that you said, you turned your poems into postcards. So you were already thinking about business, even with poetry, which I think is quite rare. And now you help others through your businesses. When did you decide to be an authorpreneur? Ruth: Like most authors, I fell into the trap of thinking that my first book would make me a millionaire. Joanna: It didn't?! Ruth: It didn't. Because in my first experience, similar to you, I did a bulk run. I thought I could print 5,000 books and sell them in no time, but I didn't have the funds. And so I printed 1,200, and it took about a year to sell those books. I

John Kremer's 1001 Ways to Market Your Book was the first book I ever bought on marketing way back when I started self-publishing in 2008. He has revised it several times since and is still a prolific content creator around book marketing. I'm thrilled to discuss long-term book marketing for authors in this interview. In the intro, Best Book Promotion Sites for 2022 [David Gaughran]; Dean Koontz talks craft and publishing [Writers Ink]; Indie Authors and the Creator Economy [ALLi]; What to give up [SJ Pajonas]. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, where you can get free ebook formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Get your free Author Marketing Guide at www.draft2digital.com/penn John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books, as well as other nonfiction titles, and founder of the Billion Book Initiative. Over the past 37 years, he has helped thousands of authors, including me, to sell more books. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Why time in the market is so important Building relationships as the key to long-term book marketing Pitching vs attraction marketing How to decide what to focus on with marketing — because you can't do everything!  Why we both love audio and podcasting for marketing How do you know when to give up on a particular way of marketing? Ideas for Substack email Streams of income from your book Take one marketing action a day — and keep going You can find John Kremer at BookMarketingBestsellers.com and on Twitter @JohnKremer Transcript of Interview with John Kremer Joanna: John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books, as well as other nonfiction titles, and founder of the Billion Book Initiative. Over the past 37 years, he has helped thousands of authors, including me, to sell more books. Welcome, John. John: Thanks a lot, Joanna. Joanna: I'm so excited to talk to you. And you were one of the first people I learned about marketing from, back in 2008, when I self-published my first book. In case people don't know you, tell us a bit more about your writing and publishing background. John: I can't believe it took you 20 years to find me, since I've been publishing since 1984 or 1986, I forget which now. I think it was 1984 when I first started publishing, and writing about publishing and marketing books. So it's been a while. People find me when they are ready to do something. And that's what you hope will happen with your book, whichever kind of book you're publishing, you hope that when people are ready to find an entertaining read, they find your novel, or they're finding a book for their kids and they find your children's book. Your goal is to stay out there long enough that the people that need you or want you or hope to find you actually do find you. Joanna: Absolutely. We'll circle back to that, but just on your own writing journey, way back in 1984. Why did you get into publishing in the first place? What is it about the book industry that you love? John: I was writing books, and I wanted to get them out somehow. And so, at first, I was just pitching to different publishers, but you know how that goes with a lot of authors. It's like, if you're not well-known, the publisher doesn't pay attention to you. So I decide to self-publish, and then I found, well, gosh, there's nothing out there about how to get your books printed. Back when I started out, we didn't have print-on-demand. We didn't have Amazon. What we had is book printers that called themselves short-run book printers, which meant, ‘We'll print 10,000 copies for you,' when, as a poor starving artist, you don't want to print more than 500 or 1,000. So I created a directory of book printers. That was one of my first books, because I needed it. That's how a lot of us end up writing a book, is because we actually need the information. Joanna: That's amazing. So, you wrote that nonfiction book, and self-publishing back then, obviously, was just the print copies. 1001 Ways to Market Your Books is on its sixth edition, I think? John: Actually, it's on the seventh edition, the ‘Real World Edition.' Joanna: The ‘Real World Edition.' Oh, okay. Why did you call it the ‘Real World Edition?' John: Because, for the most part, I took out the information about marketing online, because the book would've been too big with all of that information. So I wrote a book about how to market in the real world. How to work with bookstores, how to get distribution, how to do publicity, how to get on TV or radio, get into magazines, things like that. I spent a lot of time actually writing about marketing in the real world. I was planning to do a follow-up book on marketing online, but the world has chased me around like a little rabbit or something, and I haven't gotten to it yet. I've done little pieces of it. B

J. Thorn and I are both authors and passionate about helping writers find new ways to create, collaborate, reach fans, and make more money in the Creator Economy. We're also both excited about the creative and financial possibilities of emerging blockchain technology, including NFTs. J. Thorn and Joanna (J.F.) Penn in New Orleans, 2017 In this discussion, we cover: Explaining NFTs for non-technical people. Some metaphors that might help. Why are we so excited about NFTs? What are the benefits to authors and other Creators? Why resale of unique digital assets using smart contracts on a blockchain is such a radically new prospect for authors and the publishing industry — and why it could be so exciting for long-term creators who own and control their intellectual propertyWhat are some of the different kinds of NFTs that authors could use — both for fiction and non-fiction? How might AI-generative art and music play a part in that?Fractionalization of royalty rights and how this is emerging in the music industry through new platform, Royal, where the co-founder is an independent musician, 3LAU and knows what creators wantHow we envisage unique digital originals (NFTs) sitting alongside unique physical products like hand-bound books, or vinyl music, and other ideas for how this could introduce so many opportunities for authors to create more in their worldsSome of the companies emerging in the NFT for book space and our thoughts on what we want to see before we commit to a platform — since smart contracts can represent a long-term commitment.Open questions about the financial and tax implications of NFTs that we're still investigatingOur recommendations if you're interested in NFTs for books and blockchain [Please note: We are not financial or legal professionals, and this is not financial or legal advice. Just a discussion among enthusiastic authors learning along the way!] This podcast episode is supported by my wonderful Patrons at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn and by tips at BuyMeACoffee.com/thecreativepenn. You can find more futurist episodes, including more on NFTs and blockchain at www.TheCreativePenn.com/future. J. Thorn is a best-selling horror and dark fantasy writer, and he also writes non-fiction for authors. He's a podcaster at Writers, Ink, and The Author Success Mastermind, as well as an editor. J and I have co-written several books together, including Risen Gods, Co-Writing A Book, and American Demon Hunters: Sacrifice, the inaugural Authors On A Train event with Zach Bohannon and Lindsay Buroker. Joanna Penn writes non-fiction for authors and is an award-nominated, New York Times and USA Today bestselling thriller author as J.F.Penn. She’s also an award-winning podcaster, creative entrepreneur, and international professional speaker. Transcription of discussion Now, today, we're talking about NFTs, and in particular, what we want to see in a platform for NFT books that will help authors sell more books, make more money, provide value to readers, and build community. So welcome back to the show, J. J: Thanks, Joanna. I'm excited to be back. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you. So you and I talk about this topic offline away from the mic. J: Yes, quite a bit. Joanna: I mean, amazingly, we actually have conversations away from a microphone. People might not believe it but we do. So let's start with the basics. How do you explain NFTs to a non-technical audience? J: Not well! But I just read something today that I think really crystallized it for me. An NFT is proof of ownership. That's all it is. It's a receipt. And I think when you frame it that way, things start to make a lot more sense. So it's not necessarily a physical object. It's not necessarily even a digital object. It's proof of ownership. Joanna: I think that's one good way of explaining it. I talk about it as like a box. A box that you can put stuff in, and we'll be talking about some of the examples of the stuff you can put in the box. But the NFT is essentially like the receipt showing you have access to the box, and then there are all the different kinds of things we can put in a box. I guess we should also say it is programmable in some way. So when you say a receipt, I might think in my mind, just a one-liner, which says, ‘I paid J some money and he edited my book,' or whatever. And that's like a one-liner. Whereas NFTs can contain, let's just use the word, smart contract which makes it more programmable, right? J: Yes. It's an immutable digital ledger that is spread across many different computers. We'll leave out the highly technical stuff. But the idea is with an NFT, from the time it's created or minted for its entire lifespan, you can track who's owned it and when by the address of the wallet of the owner. So yes, it's much more detailed than a single-line receipt, and it does contain the history of that particular NFT. Joanna: And then I guess we have to use the term blockchain. But, again, as we always say, you don't nee

Welcome to episode 600! I’m doing a solo show today, answering some questions from my recent podcast survey that cover the different aspects of the author life. From episode 1 in March 2009 to episode 600 (Jan 2022) How do you balance the artist/writer/creative side with the pragmatic business and marketing side of being an author? How do you improve your writing craft, both as a beginner and also as a later stage writer? What services and tools do you use right now for writing and publishing? What are you doing for marketing fiction and non-fiction now and how has that changed over time? It feels like an impossible job to stand out in such a crowded marketplace with millions of other books, as well as TV and film, games, music and other entertainment options. How do you deal with the mindset of feeling like it’s all pointless sometimes? What are the different streams of income that you have right now from your author business — and how would you like that to change over the next few years?  Questions for you as we head toward episode 700 From episode 1 to episode 600 I recorded episode 1 in March 2009 when I lived in Ipswich, just outside Brisbane, Australia. I phoned up a bestselling author on a landline, put it on speakerphone, and held an MP3 recorder next to the phone. With some of my early books in 2009 (no longer available in those editions!) At the time, I worked as an IT consultant specializing in accounts payable within an SAP implementation for an international mining company. I had a couple of non-fiction books out and a few people on my email list. The international Kindle hadn’t yet launched, print-on-demand was only just emerging as a viable option, there were no digital audiobooks — and there was certainly no empowered indie author movement as we have it today.  Back then, self-publishing was mainly done by professional speakers and business-people who had their own distribution channels. Otherwise, it was considered ‘vanity press,’ and certainly not a viable business option for an author. 2009 really was before the dawn of the Creator Economy — which just shows you how things change over time! In 2009, I had no author friends, and I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I saw podcasting as a way to connect with writers and somehow market my books. I had a one-page business plan on my wall for The Creative Penn with all the different ways I could make money based around my writing. I absolutely intended to leave my job and run a profitable business as an author, but I had no idea what lay ahead. I was just enthusiastic to get started!  I created this business plan in March 2009 I started making some money and left my job a few years later in 2011 to focus on the business. I started making six figures in 2015, and then quickly surpassed my old salary with a multi-six-figure annual income, which I’ve sustained since then. You can read and listen to more of my historical lessons learned at TheCreativePenn.com/timeline  Almost 13 years after that original episode, The Creative Penn Podcast has now been downloaded over 6.4 million times across 227 countries, with the top countries being US, UK, Australia, Canada, and Germany. Most episodes get between 9000 – 16,000 downloads per episode, varying by the popularity of the topic, rather than the author, which I think is really key. You don’t have to be a “big name” author to be a great guest on a podcast. You just have to offer valuable content to the audience of the show.  The podcast has many functions in my creative business. I still love talking to people and having conversations about interesting things, which you have seen develop in my future of creativity series of interviews over the last few years. It also connects me with the authors in the community, and many of my friends in real life are people I met on Twitter, invited on my podcast, and then eventually met in person. I met Orna Ross on Twitter years before we met in real life and became friends — and she started the Alliance of Independent Authors. The podcast is also important for my business income. I have consistent corporate sponsors of the podcast including Kobo Writing Life, Draft2Digital, Ingram Spark, FindawayVoices, and ProWritingAid; as well as occasional sponsors like PublisherRocket and ScribeCount — all of which I use personally as part of my author business. I also have 727 wonderful Patrons on Patreon who support the show every month financially and emotionally, and many others have bought me a coffee. [www.buymeacoffee.com/thecreativepenn]. I also talk about my ongoing writing process and promote my own books, both fiction and non-fiction, and I direct you to useful things with my affiliate links, which many of you visit. Thank you for using my links! And of course, if you want to know more about how a podcast works from the technical, craft, and business angles, check out my book, Audio for Authors: Audiobooks, Podcasting, and Voice

How can you take back your rights when publishing conditions change? How can you make sure you sign contracts that make it easier for rights reversion in the future? Katlyn Duncan talks about these things and more. In the intro, the splits in indie publishing [Kris Writes]; Burnout and Writer's Block [6 Figure Authors]; Publisher Rocket now has audio data; Blood, Sweat, and Flame, my glassblowing short story; Atomic Habits and the threat of boredom. This podcast is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo eco-system. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors. Katlyn Duncan is the author of women's fiction, YA, thrillers, and nonfiction under several pen names as well as a ghostwriter of over 40 novels. Today, we're talking about Take Back Your Book: An Author's Guide to Rights Reversion and Publishing on Your Own Terms. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What is rights reversion and why is it so important to consider — even before you sign a contract (or upload a book as an indie)?Clauses to watch out for in publishing contracts — and how to make sure you can get your rights backHow to approach a publisher for rights reversionWhat you actually get back when rights are reverted (i.e. it's not your cover or layout)What to do once your rights are reverted — and why you should stop and think about the long term before re-publishingWhat if you're embarrassed or ashamed that it didn't work out with a publisher? You can find Katlyn Duncan at KatlynDuncan.com and on Twitter @katlyn_duncan Transcript of Interview with Katlyn Duncan Joanna: Katlyn Duncan is the author of women's fiction, YA, thrillers, and nonfiction under several pen names as well as a ghostwriter of over 40 novels. Today, we're talking about Take Back Your Book: An Author's Guide to Rights Reversion and Publishing on Your Own Terms. Welcome, Katlyn. Katlyn: Thank you so much for having me, Joanna. Joanna: I'm excited to talk about this topic. It is a fantastic book, so much in it. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. Katlyn: Absolutely. So I am one of those authors who had that storyteller bug from day one. As a child, I tended to focus a lot more on movies and television. I was very much into acting and screenwriting. And as much as my family has always supported my hobbies, I was encouraged to get a ‘real job.' I was really good at math and science. So I went to school for forensic science. I didn't really do a lot of reading or writing when I hit my college years. After I graduated, there was that big YA boom with Twilight and all these fantasy books and I started following these authors on Twitter. And I realized that a lot of them had full-time jobs. See, I was always of the mindset that writing had to be a full-time job, so I never thought I could really do it for myself while I had a job. So after that I had the bug hit me again and I was so excited and this time I went to novels because I was really inspired by all of these authors who were working and also writing. YA wasn't a thing when I was a child at that age. I started writing my own YA books and I wrote in the mornings and the evenings, and I participated in NaNoWriMo for many years, and then in 2012, I submitted my first book to Karina UK. It was a new digital-first imprint with Harlequin and they were taking unagented submission. So I am an author who's never had an agent. I submitted and I actually got a deal for a trilogy and then the rest is history at that point. Joanna: Well, it's interesting too that you said you had a day job. What was your day job? Katlyn: I actually worked in a fertility laboratory for many years. Joanna: Oh, wow. And you have a background in forensic science. Have you used that science background in your writing at all? Katlyn: I think I use more of the mindset of fertility, but as I'm going into thrillers and everything, I find that absolute love for solving cases and solving mysteries is definitely starting to come back. So I definitely use that in my writing. Joanna: And then also being a ghostwriter with so many novels, how did you get into that as well? Katlyn: When I had my child, I was home for a bit. I was very lucky to be able to stay home. And after about three months, I really wanted to start writing again. I was in between contracts at that moment and a friend of mine was talking about how she was a ghostwriter and I was like, ‘Oh, what's that?' And I got into it. Then I mostly worked on upwork.com. It's a freelance website. I started off with very poor-paying jobs, but they were very generous with five-star reviews. And so I was able to build myself up to that point and then I had for about a couple of years, I had two consistent c

How do you turn an idea into a poem? What are the publishing options for poets, and how does marketing work? Rishi Dastidar talks about his life in poetry and provides tips for taking your creative work further. In the intro, What Readers Want in 2022 [ALLi]; Ads for Authors (affiliate link); Submission on AI and copyright [ALLi]; How will Creatokia publish NFT books? [Creatokia Podcast]; AI for Voice series [VO Boss Podcast]; This episode is sponsored by ScribeCount.com, which provides automated sales aggregation from multiple publishing platforms, all combined into user-friendly charts and features, accessible in seconds. Whether you publish wide or exclusive, ScribeCount allows authors to customize reports to fit their individual needs. Check it out at ScribeCount.com. Rishi Dastidar is a poet, journalist, copywriter, and brand strategist, as well as the editor of The Craft: A Guide to Making Poetry Happen in the 21st Century, and co-editor of Too Young, Too Loud, Too Different: Poems from Malika's Poetry Kitchen. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How sound, images and word phrases affect Rishi’s poetryTips and tools for capturing ideasCan we trust our subconscious to provide us with ideas?How to deal with dry creative periodsThe traditional publishing process for poetryThe performance side of being a poetPivoting to performing online during the pandemicThe benefits of writers’ collectives You can find Rishi Dastidar's books at online bookstores and on Twitter @betarish Transcript of Interview with Rishi Dastidar Joanna: Rishi Dastidar is a poet, journalist, copywriter, and brand strategist, as well as the editor of ‘The Craft: A Guide to Making Poetry Happen in the 21st Century,' and co-editor of ‘Too Young, Too Loud, Too Different: Poems from Malika's Poetry Kitchen.' We also both went to Mansfield College, at the University of Oxford back in the '90s. So it's been a while. Welcome to the show, Rishi. Rishi: Hi. Good to see you. And, yes, it hasn't been a while. We're not going to dwell on how many years precisely, I hope. Joanna: I know, it seems crazy. And it's funny because I always ask, my first question is tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. I still want to know that, but it's funny because I feel like I know you from a snapshot in time. And of course, things have moved on for both of us. Tell us about you and how you got into poetry. Rishi: I arrived at college with the intention that I was going to do some form of writing once I'd left, and I just had no real idea of what that might be. I ran around and did a lot of student journalism. I edited the student newspaper, edited the Student Handbook. And then after graduating, did a bit of journalism here and there. And that was fine. Then I found my way into copywriting for brands and making ads. That's the thing that really got me interested. That was all pottering along. And then, one day in about 2007, I had a proper Damascene moment in a bookshop in London, just off Oxford Street, where I picked up a book called Ashes for Breakfast by a German poet called Durs Grünbein. I started flicking through it, and I'd never seen language doing what it was doing on the page. It sounds really naïve and strange to say that now, but I'd never read any contemporary poetry until that point. I didn't know that you could do that with words on a page. I didn't know that you could not go to the right margin, I didn't know that you could leave lots of white spaces everywhere. I bought the book there and then. I was just completely entranced and completely hooked. I knew right at that moment that that was the thing that I really wanted to write. By the end of that week, I'd signed up for a course at City Lit, a college in London, the introductory to poetry course. That's where the journey really started for me. I've been pursuing it and trying to get better as a poet ever since. Joanna: Wow, I love that. I love how you said a Damascene moment, the pulling the book out, and your whole world was transformed. I love that. Because we know books can do that. You said about the words on the page, and you didn't know language could do that on a page. Of course, the layout on a page is only one aspect of poetry. So how does that shape the way you write? Are you thinking visually? Or are you thinking sounds? How do you think about poetry? Rishi: I'm going to give an annoying poet answer, which is, it depends on what you might be doing and what the language is doing at any given moment. Different poets will take a different view on this. For me, it generally always starts with a combination of a phrase that is doing something unexpected to me, new to me, and the poem will emerge out of that. The phrase will start to suggest itself, you maybe free write into it, you maybe start to put oth

How can we recognize self-doubt and create alongside it as part of the author journey? How can we write with confidence and double down on what we love the most? William Kenower talks about these aspects and more. In the intro, planning for 2022 [Ask ALLi]; Your publishing options [6 Figure Authors]; Need an audiobook narrator? Use the Findaway Marketplace; The Successful Author Mindset. Today's podcast sponsor is Findaway Voices, which gives you access to the world's largest network of audiobook sellers and everything you need to create and sell professional audiobooks. Take back your freedom. Choose your price, choose how you sell, choose how you distribute audio. Check it out at FindawayVoices.com. William Kenower is the author of nonfiction books on writing, the editor-in-chief of ‘Author Magazine' and the host of the Author2Author podcast. His latest book is Everyone Has What it Takes: A Writer's Guide to the End of Self-Doubt. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes A winding route to writing and publishing Validation — and the need to find it within ourselves The different ways that writers experience self-doubt Learning to recognize self-doubt and create, anyway When is self-doubt justified, and what can you do about it? Does everyone have what it takes to be a writer? Commonalities among successful writers You can find William Kenower at WilliamKenower.com and on Twitter @wdbk Transcript of Interview with William Kenower Joanna: William Kenower is the author of nonfiction books on writing, the editor-in-chief of ‘Author Magazine' and the host of the ‘Author2Author' podcast. His latest book is Everyone Has What it Takes: A Writer's Guide to the End of Self-Doubt. Welcome to the show, Bill. William: Thank you, Joanna. It's good to be here. Joanna: It's great to have you on the show. Tell us a little bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. William: Writing, I got into very young. I knew the arts were really the only path I was interested in. And though I dabbled in theater pretty seriously in my early to mid-20s and I went to Hollywood briefly with the idea of being a screenwriter. Prose was really where I was most comfortable and writing and prose was where I was most comfortable. And so that was really always the plan for me. I knew people did want to be things besides artists, but it was hard for me to understand why. It just seemed like the best possible way to earn a living if you could do that. I was singularly set on that. As far as publishing though, when I thought about being a writer, publishing was simply what other people did; it was like a giant oven run by agents and editors, into which I inserted a manuscript and out popped mysteriously, a fully baked book. I didn't see myself as getting into publishing. Although interestingly, Joanna… Actually, I was thinking about this beforehand in a way because I know this podcast, a lot of your listeners are indie published. The theater I did when I was in my early 20s, my brother and I put on a sketch comedy show and it came about because I was doing poetry readings that were very theatrical, and my brother and I said, ‘Let's do a show.' And part of the reason we did it was I was writing stories and poems and sending them off to magazines and was not enjoying. Of course, I just didn't like the rejection, but also, I was frustrated with the gatekeeper set up, what I thought of as the gatekeeper. I thought, ‘Well, why does this one person determine who gets to read my stuff?‘ It seemed weird. When I found myself standing on a stage because it was sort of like I was going to just art spaces and areas where anybody could just get up and do stuff, sort of like open mic type situations. I thought, ‘Well, why not just find some place where I put the thing up and anybody who wants come can come and they can decide if they like it or not.' So it was essentially self-publishing theater. I wrote it, my brother and I directed it. We found the venue, we put up the posters and people started coming. So it was independent. It made sense to me at the time. Joanna: I would also argue you're a podcaster and this is publication. We create a product with our voices. We hit publish and no one else gets in the way, right? How long have you been podcasting now? William: I've been podcasting for 10 years. And even before that, this is what I was going to say, is I was writing and submitting. And remember when I started writing fiction, this was in the early '90s. Self-publishing was such a hard sell because it didn't have the digital world, right? Joanna: And there was a big stigma back then. William: And it was a stigma around it. I just had zero interest in it. So I was wanting to publish traditionally and not having much luck. When I started ‘Author Magazine,' I

If the pandemic has affected your sleep, you are not alone! If you want to sort out your sleep issues and improve your creativity — and your life — as we head into a new year, this episode with Dr. Anne D. Bartolucci will help. In the intro, publishing industry trends for 2022 [Written Word Media; Stark Reflections; Mark Coker Smashwords]; my Sell Direct Tutorial; Mark Dawson's Ads for Authors, which now includes Booktok; GPT-4 [Towards Data Science]; AI-Assisted Author course. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing, and integration with Scrivener MS Word, Chrome and more, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna Dr. Anne Bartolucci is a licensed psychologist and a certified behavioral sleep medicine specialist. She's the author of two non-fiction books, including Better Sleep for the Overachiever, and she's also a best-selling steampunk and urban fantasy author under Cecilia Dominic. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Why sleep matters, especially for creativesHow the pandemic has affected sleeping habitsThe different sleeping issues we can encounter at different times of lifeBusting sleep mythsDifferent kinds of insomniaHow to improve your falling asleep timeWhy the ‘rules’ are less important than what works for us individuallyDo mindfulness and meditation help with sleep?How Anne manages her day job and her author life — and lessons learned You can find Dr. Anne Bartolucci at OverachieverBook.com and on Twitter @CeciliaDominic Transcript of Interview with Anne D. Bartolucci Joanna Penn: Dr. Anne Bartolucci is a licensed psychologist and a certified behavioral sleep medicine specialist. She's the author of two non-fiction books, including Better Sleep for the Overachiever, and she's also a best-selling steampunk and urban fantasy author under Cecilia Dominic. Welcome, Anne. Anne Bartolucci: Thank you so much, Joanna. I'm really excited to be here. Joanna Penn: Well, this is super important, but before we get into the topic… Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing, as well as how you split your creative self between the two different careers. Anne Bartolucci: That last part of the question is definitely the challenging bit. So I apparently have been writing since I was very little. My mom claims that I wrote my first story when I was two. And I'm sure she has it somewhere. Apparently, what it lacked in plot and character development, it more than made up for in enthusiasm. I've written all through school and, of course, creative writing was always a pleasure thing, really more than a career path for me. I got the message that many people get, ‘That's a fun hobby, but you can't really do it for a career.' So I let it lapse a bit when I was in high school and definitely in college. And then when I got to graduate school, I had a little bit of a setback that I do talk about in the book. I went to the bookstore to console myself as we writer types do. And I stumbled across an issue of ‘Writer's Digest Magazine.' And it just blew my mind because I was like, ‘Holy crap, people get paid for this.' So I picked up my creative writing again and did it through grad school as a self-sanity thing. And then started working on my novel, which, of course, that first novel took me like four or five years. And then I pitched that for a long time, and wrote some other novels. Finally, that one sold to Samhain Publishing in 2013. So I started out traditionally published, and they were a mid-sized genre outfit out of Cincinnati, Ohio, mostly doing romance and associated genres. I had 7 books with them when they closed in 2017 when I got my rights back. I have been indie pubbed since then until just recently, when I signed a three-book contract with Flagstaff Publishing for a time-travel action-adventure series, and those should start coming out next year. So I guess at this point, I can call myself hybrid. And for splitting my creative self between the two, I used to try to keep the two very, very separate, hence the pen name. I started my online writing with a wine blog. And, of course, I live in a part of the United States where some people have some very interesting attitudes towards alcohol. Like in my state, Georgia, we weren't even allowed buy alcohol on Sundays until about 10 years ago. Now we still have to wait until 11:30 on Sundays. Joanna Penn: After church, but, of course, I guess if you have communion, you do get your wine! Anne Bartolucci: Yes. Especially for those of us in churches where they do have real wine for communion, although not since the pan

“We make plans, God laughs.” The old Yiddish proverb will no doubt stand true for another year, but I just can’t help myself!  I need to make plans to have something to aim for, but given how 2021 didn’t turn out as expected, for 2022 I will hold my plans and goals loosely and won’t be surprised if they change. If I start off with lower expectations, perhaps it will turn out to be a spectacular year for us all (fingers crossed!). Here’s what I’m planning, and I’d love to hear about your goals, so please leave a comment here if you’d like to share and we can keep each other accountable. Embrace multi-passionate creativity — and optimize for curiosityBooks for authors — Joanna PennFiction as J.F. Penn — thrillers, dark fantasy, crime, horror, short storiesThe Creative Penn website and podcastThe Creative Future — putting new technologies into practiceBooks and TravelMore tech, less tech. Health, travel, and connectionFinancial Goals  Remember, I am a full-time author-entrepreneur so I have a lot going on — if your goals are simpler — like finishing your book, or publishing for the first time, or selling 1000 copies, then fantastic! You don’t have to have such extensive goals as me! Embrace multi-passionate creativity — and optimize for curiosity Every year, I think that I “might be more successful” if I can focus on a limited number of things, but as Walt Whitman said, “I am large, I contain multitudes.” As much as I try to say ‘no’ more, life proliferates and I find so many things interesting along the way that I want to do it all, or at least investigate things further.  As Lisa Cron pointed out in episode 592, “Emotion telegraphs meaning.” If I am excited about a project or a topic, then I need to give it some time, even if the practical application (and the revenue) might not be obvious. I’m an author (across multiple genres). I’m a podcaster. I’m an audiobook narrator. I’m a course creator. I’m a speaker. I’m a futurist. These days, I optimize more for curiosity than for maintenance of the status quo.  Following my curiosity, J.F. Penn book research trip, Lisbon 2019 — featured in Tree of Life Yes, there needs to be a balance, but I’ve been a full-time author entrepreneur since 2011 and so it cannot just be the same old, same old. It can't just be ‘write, publish, repeat.' I cannot write to market, and I cannot write because I have to. I refuse to grind it out. I have so many things I want to create in 2022, and so many more things I want to learn about and share with you. I know I can’t do it all, so I will embrace my multi-passionate creativity, follow the paths my curiosity takes me down — and see where the year takes me. Here are my creative and business goals — some of them will happen, some won't, and I am far more accepting of that these days!  Books for authors under Joanna Penn I have three current works in progress, all with significant words in draft form:  How to Write a Novel — 95KThe Shadow Book (working title) — 30KThe AI-Assisted Author — 50K Although I’d love to say I’ll write and publish them all, each is a significant piece of work, and I have a lot of other things I want to do, so there will be at least one non-fiction book for authors— but I don’t know which as yet. There might also be a surprise book since that sometimes happens. I won’t second guess my Muse this early in the year. Some of my many journals I also have a LOT of words in draft — so I might also need to revisit Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield and consider what my Resistance is to finishing these projects. In terms of marketing for non-fiction, my main focus continues to be a weekly show on The Creative Penn Podcast, my Blueprint and email list, and Twitter @thecreativepenn (to a much lesser extent). I’ve been paying an excellent freelancer through Reedsy for managing my Amazon Ads for non-fiction, so I will continue to do that in 2022.  Books under J.F. Penn: Thrillers, dark fantasy, horror, crime — and travel! I have quite a few books I want to write:  Travelogue / travel memoirs — The Pilgrim’s Way (currently at 30K draft) and also The St Cuthbert’s Way (20K draft). It makes sense from a marketing point of view to put these out together, so hopefully, I will have both done this year. I’m also considering a Kickstarter for a special print run as I’d love to have some beautiful paper editions, and it’s something I am talking to White Fox about as they help with bespoke publishing projects (as we discussed in episode 566).Short stories — I have so many ideas, so I need to get some of these out of my head. I’d like to do one short story a month. I’ll also record the audio versions myself, and I might even have enough for a collection by the end of 2022.ARKANE thriller #13 — the story opens in Vienna, which I hope to visit in person depending on Covid restrictionsI have 13 more fiction projects sitting in Scrivener files — including several standalones that are half-formed id

As we all look back at the past year, it feels like it’s flown by — but also that time has warped in a way and it feels like we’ve been stuck in this pandemic for much longer than we expected. So here’s my 2021 year in review and an update on whether I managed to meet my goals. I hope this helps you with your own annual review, and feel free to share your achievements and lessons learned in the comments so we can all celebrate (and/or commiserate) together. A year of physical and mental health issues — for all of us. You are not alone!Joanna Penn — books for authorsThe Creative Penn website and podcast The Creative FutureJ.F. Penn — thrillers, dark fantasy, crime, horrorBooks and TravelHealth, travel, walkingFinancial goals I hope that you can look back and celebrate whatever you have achieved — even if that is just making it through alive! Writing remains for all of us a haven for our thoughts, not just words for publication — so I hope you have some time to step back, think and write about the year that is almost over.  If you’d like to share your thoughts, please do leave a comment, or blog about it and tweet me the link. I’ll be back soon with my plans and goals for 2021. Ever the optimist, I wrote on 1 Jan, 2021: “I’m expecting it to be at least a full pandemic year — from March 2020 to March 2021, but I am really hoping to be back in the world in the second half of this year.”  I also intended 2021 “to be a year of expansion — creatively in terms of what I write, mentally in terms of the things I learn about, and physically, in terms of my health and where I travel (once we're out of the woods with the virus, of course.)” Well, this year did not turn out as we all hoped, did it?! Part of me doesn’t want to do this round-up because I don’t really want to relive most of the year. But I’ve always found it incredibly useful to be accountable to you as my audience, and by looking back, we can be thankful to have made it through — and if you’re reading/listening to this, you have made it through — and hopefully, gain some perspective on what might be possible in the year ahead.  I will talk about some of the creative goals I achieved — and missed — but I want to start with something far more important. If you’re utterly exhausted and struggling with physical and mental health issues, you’re not alone.  I’ve talked about my various issues on the podcast over the year but essentially, it’s been one of my worst years ever in terms of mental and physical health. I share these things not for sympathy, but in the hope that it helps you if you have felt or are still feeling the same way, because we are certainly not alone. The UK winter lockdown (6 Jan – mid-March 2021) was brutal. I always have some form of SAD (seasonal affective disorder) but it was compounded by sleep issues, resulting from a combination of age-related hormonal changes and pandemic anxiety.  Sleep issues have been reported across the world during the pandemic (APA, The Lancet), but that doesn’t make it easier for any of us experiencing lack of it. That hasn’t resolved, but my anxiety about not sleeping has lessened, and in fact, I have a sleep psychologist on the show in early January since I have a feeling many of you are struggling with it, too. Another common pandemic issue is feeling constantly tired, on the edge of fatigue, and almost burned-out from the bad news, uncertainty, and anxiety. I didn’t really have this in 2020. Yes, the fear was real, but I was able to rally all my energy and go hard in making sure my business would survive. In 2020, I wrote a lot of books, did a lot of marketing, worked super hard — and all that probably contributed to feeling even more tired in 2021! That kind of energy is unsustainable and as the pandemic grinds on, it grinds us all down. We might feel a flurry of hope at some good news, and then it sinks away again as the next wave hits and we can’t help but doomscroll, looking for just that tiny bit of news that might change things.  Then, I contracted the Delta variant in mid-July 2021 along with a ton of other people in the UK. (Yes, I was double-vaxxed. No health or political comments, please!) I didn’t experience breathing issues and didn’t need hospitalization, so I am grateful for the vaccine — but it was still a very difficult few weeks of sickness (the sickest I have ever been) followed by around two and a half months of recovery. I still don’t have my sense of smell back entirely, and I have more difficulty getting my breath on hills that used to be easy. But given that my cousin was in a coma on a ventilator in the first wave, again, I am very grateful for the vaccine. The physical symptoms of Covid also came with a surprising amount of mental health issues — depression, anxiety, fear of ever getting better, inability to concentrate, weeping — and I’m not sure that has entirely receded. I read Kris Rusch’s book, Writing with Chronic Illness, while I

Our publishing, marketing and author business tasks are important — but at the end of the day, it all comes down to writing. We are authors. We are writers. So as we head toward a new year, how can you find the time to write? How can you make the most of your writing time? In the intro, The Big Split [Kris Rusch]; thoughts on long-term creation and serendipity in marketing [Tim Ferriss, 4000 Weeks, Johnny Truant]; Web 3 opportunities [Yaro Starak]; A Midwinter Sacrifice; Risen Gods. Plus, 30% off my ebooks and audiobooks at Payhip.com/thecreativepenn with coupon: 2021 — and 30% off my courses for authors on Teachable with coupon: 2021 (valid until end of 2021.) This podcast episode is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo ecosystem. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors. Today's show features two chapters from Productivity for Authors, written and narrated by Joanna Penn. Joanna Penn writes non-fiction for authors and is an award-nominated, New York Times and USA Today bestselling thriller author as J.F. Penn. She’s also an award-winning podcaster, creative entrepreneur, and international professional speaker. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How to find the time to write — schedule your writing timeTrack how you spend your timeHow much do you really want this?Where can you carve out time?No one said this would be easyMake the most of your writing time — find the right locationGet into the right mindset — quicklyTurn off distractionsUse timed writingStop procrastinatingMeasure your progressQuestions to help you You can find Productivity for Authors: Find Time to Write, Organize Your Author Life, and Decide What Really Matters in ebook, print, workbook, and audiobook editions on your favorite store. Click here for all the links. How to find the time to write Finding time to write is the most important step in writing more, but how do you find the time? In the previous chapters, we started on the process of culling your To Do list, and now we’re going to take it a step further. Because after over a decade of writing and more than 30 books published, I’ve found there is only one answer. Schedule your writing time Seriously, this could be a transformational step if you’ve not done this before. It’s not complicated. Get out your calendar or your smartphone app or however you schedule your time, and put in slots for writing. Then show up for that time to write just as you would show up for a business meeting or a gym class or anything else that is time-sensitive. Stop making your writing slot optional or showing up late as if it doesn’t matter. As Stephen King says in On Writing, “Don't wait for the muse. Your job is to make sure the muse knows where you're going to be every day, from 9:00 till noon, or 7:00 till 3:00. If he does know, I assure you that sooner or later he'll start showing up.” You can understand the muse as a metaphor or as more literal if you prefer. Steven Pressfield, author of The War of Art, invokes the muse before he writes in the classical sense of asking the divine to help inspire his work. Whatever works for you. I know that if I show up to the page, eventually something's going to happen. When I’m working on a first draft, I sit down for my scheduled writing session from 7:00 am until around 9:30-10 am. I take a break, then maybe do another session later on in the day. If I’m sitting at my specific table in my local café, my creative brain knows I’m there to write or edit. I don't have any other tasks booked in for that time. If I turn up for my scheduled writing slot, I’m far more likely to write something than if I wait until I have a spare moment. Because let’s face it, no one ever has a spare moment! If you don't already use a planning calendar, then it's time to start You must, must, must schedule your writing time. Presumably, you schedule other things in your life, like going to the day job or your kid's school events, or your dentist appointment, or going to the gym regularly, or whatever. That's how you need to schedule your writing. But what if you try to schedule your writing time and can’t find a slot?  Track how you spend your time now This can be challenging and can also be a shock. I did this back when I wanted to write my first non-fiction book in 2006-2007. I looked at my time and realized that I went to the gym in the morning, then I went to work, then I would come home exhausted, make dinner, and sometimes we’d watch three hours of TV before bed. That was every night, or at least most nights in a week.  When I discovered the amount of time I was watching TV, consuming rather than producing, I decided to cut back. TV is a lot better these days, but if you're watching three hours a night,

Why is story so important — no matter what genre we write? How can we use emotion to hook readers — and also tap into what matters in our own lives? Lisa Cron talks about these questions and more in this discussion about Story or Die. In the intro, Ultimate Guide to Copyright [ALLi]; How do you see your book — is it a baby, is it art, or is it a product? [Jane Friedman's blog]; The History Quill convention online; The Creative Penn Podcast Survey (by 21 Dec); Today's podcast sponsor is Findaway Voices, which gives you access to the world's largest network of audiobook sellers and everything you need to create and sell professional audiobooks. Take back your freedom. Choose your price, choose how you sell, choose how you distribute audio. Check it out at FindawayVoices.com. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Lisa Cron is a story coach for writers and a story consultant for film and TV, as well as a professional speaker. She’s also the author of Wired for Story, Story Genius, and her latest book, Story Or Die: How to Use Brain Science to Engage, Persuade, and Change Minds in Business and in Life. Show Notes Why story is so important for humans — and why it's present in every area of life What stories are really aboutThe brain chemicals that a good story will activate — and how to write so they are triggeredStory principles in non-fictionEmotion telegraphs meaningThe three biggest lies that are taught about writing You can find Lisa Cron at WiredForStory.com and on Twitter @LisaCron Transcript of Interview with Lisa Cron Joanna: Welcome back to the show, Lisa. Lisa: Thank you. It is an utter pleasure to be here. Joanna: I'm excited to talk about this again. So, quoting from the book, you say, “Story far predates written language, and evolved as an essential survival tool, long before it was mis-classified as fiction,” which I love. Why does story matter in every book we write, no matter the genre? Lisa: Well, because first of all, story is story, regardless of genre, regardless of the format, whether you're talking about a two-word tweet or War and Peace, it is always the same. And it predates, really, everything. It really goes back to, if you want to think about it, our brains' last, as we've all heard, big growth spurt, which was about 100,000 years ago. What we were taught, what evolutionary biologists thought for a long time, was that the reason for that growth spurt was because that was when we got the ability to think analytically. That analytic thought became possible at that time. And that's true, it did. But what they know now is that that wasn't the reason for it. The reason for it was because by that time, and we were, at that time, in the middle of the food chain. And by that time, if we were going to leap to the front of the food chain, which we did, we needed to learn to do that thing that we've been told to do since kindergarten, since primary school, which is, we needed to learn to work well with others. At that time, the need to belong to a group became as hardwired as is our need for food, air, and water. You often get people who go, ‘I'm a lone wolf. I don't need anybody else. I've done everything on my own. I'm totally self-made.' And I always want to go, ‘Well, you do know the wolves travel in packs.' In the wolf community, a lone wolf is a wolf that has done something that was so egregious to the pack that they're ostracized and left to die. The point is, is that we really are wired to need to work with other people and to band together in order to figure out literally how to survive. That's where story comes in, because story is the thing that lets us step out of the present, so we can envision the future and think about what would we need to do in order to survive the next wolf pack attack or saber-toothed tiger attack, or how to bring food together. And that's really what stories are about. At that time, it really became wired that stories aren't just about how to solve something logistically, like how to survive a wolf attack. Stories are really about how to survive in the social world. When I say in the social world, I don't just mean the world of dating. I mean literally the world of other people. Because that's what we come to story for. Now, for the past 100,000 years, and in every story, what we're wired to come for is asking that question, ‘How is this going to help me make it through the night?' How is it going to help me achieve my agenda, given what I want? Is it going to help me? Or is it going to hurt me? And stories are, again, about the internal workings, literally of the mind. Why is somebody doing what they're doing? Story is never about what someone does, because what someone does on the surface, and the reasons we attribute to it, are almost always wrong. Stories are about why they're doing it, and how they're making sense o

Readers buy or borrow your book based on your cover and book description, so how can we make sure the description is the best it can be? How can we make readers want to click Buy Now and start reading immediately? Michaelbrent Collings provides useful tips — and tough love! — for authors who struggle with book descriptions (which includes me!) In the intro, I talk about being back in Auckland and reflect on the passing of time. This episode is sponsored by Publisher Rocket, which will help you get your book in front of more Amazon readers so you can spend less time marketing and more time writing. I use Publisher Rocket for researching book titles, categories, and keywords — for new books and for updating my backlist. Check it out at www.PublisherRocket.com Michaelbrent Collings is an internationally best-selling novelist, and the only author to be a finalist for a Dragon Award, Bram Stoker Award, and RONE Award. A Ranker survey recently named Michaelbrent one of the top 100 Greatest All-Time Horror Writers, but he's written bestsellers in a dozen different genres. His latest book, Malignant, debuted on Amazon's bestseller lists all over the world.  Michaelbrent is also a screenwriter — and helps authors with their book descriptions over on Fiverr Pro/mbcollings.  You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Why is an effective book description so important? What authors get wrong with book descriptions Thinking about your book like a movie — what are the high points of the trailer? Tips for writing a great hook How a good book description can help with advertising You can find Michaelbrent Collings at WrittenInsomnia.com and on Twitter @mbcollings. You can hire Michaelbrent on Fiverr Pro here. Transcript of Interview with Michaelbrent Collings Joanna: Welcome back to the show, Michaelbrent. Michaelbrent: Hello, I'm so happy to be here. Joanna: It's great to have you back on the show. And you have been on the show a number of times. Michaelbrent: Yes. Joanna: So we're not going to go into your backstory, we're going to get straight into the topic today, which is all about book descriptions. And this is a very interesting topic. You have a ton of books, I have quite a lot of books, and I still feel this is an issue. Why is an effective book description so important, and why are they so difficult? Michaelbrent: Oh, my gosh, okay. Well, I think, first of all, the reason they're super important. There's the obvious; it's one of the first things people see. So like, your cover, as much as authors hate to admit it, because we're like, ‘My book should sell this book.' People are shallow. If I go on to an Amazon book page, and the cover looks like it was done by like a five-year-old using Windows Paint on a Commodore 64, or some godawful combination like that, people are just going to be turned off, because they know you're not operating at a level of professionality. I compare book purchases to dating. But it's almost worse because with a date, you're committing to a couple of hours with a person and it goes badly, and you never have to see or think of them again. With a book, you're committing to potentially a lifetime with that thing because if it's good, it's going to live in you forever. And if it's bad enough, you will always remember. I can tell you exactly the one book I hurled across the room because I was so upset. And that happened when I was 16, so, these things stay with you. And so the cover is a big deal. Then the next big deal, assuming you've gotten them to your book page because most people buy books electronically, we just have to face that, is the book description. The difference there is you're like, now I'm starting my job because most authors, the book cover is going to be outsourced, which is a wise thing to do. For most authors, you get to that book description, and it's like, here's me, I'm appearing for the first time. And so it's super important because if you're reading a book description, and it's terrible, well, you already know the author is not a wordsmith. Because they have failed to accomplish their primary objectives in this first couple of paragraphs. Or even the first couple sentences. I have a couple of book descriptions that are five or six sentences short. And if you can't do that, why am I going to let you into my brain for 100,000 words? Joanna: It just seems so unfair. It's unfair that we have to sell ourselves, our book, not ourselves, we don't attach ourselves to the book, obviously. Michaelbrent: It's not that kind of book. Joanna: It's so unfair that we have to write a whole thing. And then we have to come up with a pithy, whatever, book description that is the thing that represents us. It feels so hard to me because I have written a book and it's all this massive thing in my head, and it's full of cool characters and

How can you cultivate patience for your long-term author career? How can you figure out your personal, creative and financial goals and make choices toward them? MK Williams talks about these questions, as well as podcast marketing and turning a blog or transcript into a book. In the intro, my reflections on the UK FutureBook conference, and Tomb of Relics is out this week. This episode is sponsored by ScribeCount.com, which provides automated sales aggregation from 7+ publishing platforms, all combined into user-friendly charts and features, accessible in seconds. Whether you publish wide or exclusive, ScribeCount allows authors to customize reports to fit their individual needs. Check it out at ScribeCount.com. MK Williams is the author of eight books across multiple genres, including dystopian sci-fi, literary suspense, and non-fiction for authors, as well as a coach and creative entrepreneur. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes The importance of peer support and community for authorsStop waiting for permissionCultivating patienceFinancial independence on your own terms — and figuring out what you really want. You can find my list of books on money here.Tips for pitching podcasts and giving great valueHow to turn blog posts or interview transcripts into a book You can find MK Williams at AuthorYourAmbition.com and on Twitter @1mkwilliams Transcript of interview with MK Williams Joanna: MK Williams is the author of eight books across multiple genres, including dystopian sci-fi, literary suspense, and non-fiction for authors, as well as a coach and creative entrepreneur. Welcome, MK. MK: Hi, Joanna. Thank you so much for having me on the show today. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you. So let's get started. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. MK: Well, it was a snowy day in Indiana when I was born! … but I've loved reading my entire life. I was an only child, so books were a great source of entertainment. I love to write. I had my angsty teenage poetry phase, which… Joanna: Oh, me too. MK: Yes. So many of us do. And I got to college, and I picked the safe major that was supposed to guarantee me a great job. But I was still able to take some creative writing seminars. I was very fortunate in my writing killer fiction, which was the title of the course, to have a professor who really encouraged me to keep writing. And so when I graduated into a lousy economy with no job prospects, my hobby just became writing. I really enjoyed starting to do longer-form fiction and felt with that professor's encouragement that I could write a novel, and I kept going for that. And that novel was finished, and I did what I had to do and go start pitching agents, right? That's what you're supposed to do. Every rejection and every bit of silence was, okay, well, that's just one more no, until I finally get my yes. Then I wrote another book and did the same thing. And surprise, surprise, I never heard anything. I finally went to an in-person event with a local author here in Florida. I was just thinking this is it, somebody else who's an author, we're going to become best friends, we're going to do writing together, we're just going to commiserate. This is it. I'm finally going to have an author friend and the opposite of that happened. She looked at me and she said, ‘You're what? 23? What could you possibly have to say?' Joanna: Oh. MK: Yes. To my face, she said this. I was 24 at the time. So I was flattered for maybe a minute that she said I looked like I was 23, but then the rest of it was pretty horrible. I just was very defeated from that. Traditional publishing wasn't responding to me that I wasn't getting any agent responses, it was more that lack of author community that really shut me down. My husband at that time noticed I suddenly wasn't writing, I wasn't spending every free second trying to get things into my Word document. He asked ‘What's going on? And traditional is not working, why don't you try self-publishing?' It was 2013 and so I told him, ‘No. You don't understand. I can't self-publish because then all these reasons.' He said, ‘Okay. Well, prove me wrong.' So I went online and tend to prove him wrong. And I found information on KDP and Smashwords, and this entire sea of information about self-publishing, and I said, ‘You know what, I think he might be onto something.' That's where my journey as an author really kicked off. Instead of asking for permission to be an author, I just said, ‘I'm going to learn this and become an author.' So, that's how we got here. Joanna: I love that. I did a blog post about really early on in my career; stop asking for permission. We've known each other for a while, I think maybe you're a bit like me. We're good girls, right? We want to do the right thing. And traditi

Is digital narration with AI voices good enough for non-fiction or fiction audiobooks? Can human narrators benefit through voice licensing? What are the options for sales and distribution? Taylan Kamis from Deep Zen explains digital narration for audiobooks, and I share some samples from my digitally narrated books through Deep Zen. Taylan Kamis is the CEO and co-founder of Deep Zen Limited. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What is Deep Zen?How good is the quality of AI narration for non-fiction — and for fiction, where emotional resonance is so important?How AI narration may benefit human narrators with voice licensing, and Deep Zen's Ethical StatementWhere can you distribute and sell AI narrated audiobooks — and when will this expand for indie authors?Cost and revenue related to AI narrationWhen will AI narration become mainstream? You can find Taylan Kamis at deepzen.io and on Twitter @DeepZen4 I also included samples of my fiction and non-fiction books that Deep Zen has digitally narrated. You can listen on the links below: Co-Writing a Book: Benefits of Co-Writing. Digitally narrated by Alice (British female)Sins of Violence, a short story. Digitally narrated by William (British male) If you'd like to listen to the entire books, you can purchase the digitally narrated audiobooks for 30% off using discount coupon: 2021 (until the end of Dec 2021) directly from me at Payhip.com/thecreativepenn. [Here's how to apply the coupon.] The audiobooks are delivered by Bookfunnel and you can listen on their free app. Transcript of Interview with Taylan Kamis Joanna: Taylan Kamis is the CEO and co-founder of Deep Zen Limited. Welcome to the show, Taylan. Taylan: Thank you. Thanks for having me. Joanna: It's so interesting to talk to you. What is Deep Zen and why are you so passionate about AI for voice? Taylan: Deep Zen is a synthetic voice company focusing on creating human-like speech and emotion using AI. As a background, I was always interested in human-machine interaction. So the starting idea was to build a system that can read any text as a human would do, and it will be indistinguishable. Then we start looking into the technical side; what are the obstacles, whether the technology is there. And in the last three, four years, the deep learning, the AI has come so far that we achieved what we were aiming for three, four years ago, sooner than we were expecting. I think it is about productivity, making it easier to create audiobooks. So if you think about the content production on six, seven hours of recording, editing for one hour of finished content. Historically, I think it's hampered growth on the availability of audio content, especially non-English languages. I would like to remove the barriers around audio content creation and make the content available to a wider audience with a better and wider selection. So it is about I think, the high level, it's about having a choice and availability. And it's also, I think when you introduce a new technology, it also opens up new ways of looking at different businesses. So publishing is one of our verticals. We also work as a platform company supporting online education businesses, synthetic video companies. But even in publishing, for example, there are some use cases that some publishers are actually experimenting with having an early audio version of the books that are going to be released next year, for example, next season as an advanced copy and send them to the buyer. If you're a buyer who needs to go through 12 books a week, it is also about convenience. I think making those content available to the wider publishing community in different use cases is also about improving productivity, making life easier for people. Joanna: I love that idea of the digital ARC. I've heard that a couple of times now and we all think about selling them later on, but you're right. There are these other use cases. Let's talk about what some people call the ‘quality,' because you said that what you envisioned three or four years ago has now come to pass. And certainly, I'll be sharing my examples from Deep Zen on this show. Where do you think we are? People seem to think that nonfiction is better than fiction. Is that about the technology or is that about expectations of listeners around actors and that kind of thing? Where's the quality right now with AI narrated audio? Taylan: Currently we get great results with nonfiction with little editing. We have human inputs in our processes, so you get the first natural language processing and the speech system giving you the first version. Although we are a voice company, we also build a system that can analyze the context, looking into the characters, identifying the genre. So all that information is also passed to the system. Then we have the human inputs in terms of the editing, but more and mo

How do you know when an idea is a short story, a novella, or a full-length novel? How can you turn one story into multiple streams of income? Alan Baxter talks about a long-term craft-centered approach to the author career and how his short stories have won him multiple awards. In the intro, State of Indie Authorship 2021 [Written Word Media]; Sessions from 20Books Vegas conference [YouTube]; $0 to $1K a month in book sales webinar [Nick Stephenson]; This episode is sponsored by my Black Friday Promotion. You can get 30% off my ebooks, audiobooks, and courses when you buy direct. Use coupon: 2021 at Payhip.com/thecreativepenn for ebooks and audiobooks (here's how to apply it), and TheCreativePenn.com/learn for my courses. Valid until end 31 Dec 2021. Alan Baxter is the multi-award-winning author of horror, supernatural thrillers, and dark fantasy across more than 20 books as well as many more short stories. He's also a martial arts instructor and his latest book for writers is The Martial Art of Writing. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Multiple streams of income from short stories, and tracking your intellectual propertyWhen is an idea a short story vs a novella or a novel? Does short fiction help to sell longer work?Award submissions and a long-term approachHow writing is like martial arts You can find AlanBaxter at AlanBaxterOnline.com and on Twitter @AlanBaxter Transcript of Interview with Alan Baxter Joanna: Alan Baxter is the multi-award-winning author of horror, supernatural thrillers, and dark fantasy across more than 20 books as well as many more short stories. He's also a martial arts instructor and his latest book for writers is The Martial Art of Writing. Welcome back to the show, Alan. Alan: Thanks for having me again. It's good to chat with you. Joanna: We've been doing this once every couple of years for a decade now. Alan: I know, such a long time. Joanna: It is. And of course, you were one of the first people I met on Twitter and we've talked over the years, but we've never met in person, which is kind of crazy. Alan: I know. Joanna: Give us a bit of an overview of your writing career because you've really combined traditional publishing, indie, co-writing your own book, short stories, novellas. Give us a potted history of how your author career has unfolded. Alan: This is sort of difficult to put into a snapshot, but the short version is I started indie back in the day. Well, I started trying to get a traditional deal on my first novel. And I got an agent, did all that stuff. Twice it went to acquisitions and twice it didn't quite make it. This was right in the early days of Lulu for self-publishing and right in the early days of e-books. My first book is on Smashwords and the end of the Smashwords' URL for e-books is the number of the book it is and they're up into the multimillions now. My first book is number 378. So I was kind of there in the early days of that. That went okay. Subsequently, I've been working with small press. I've got a trilogy with HarperCollins here in Australia. I've got novellas and short stories collected and published by various small press and indie publishers. And I still keep a hand in a little bit dabbling with some self-publishing bits and pieces here and there as well. I'm a big believer in hybrid and having many threads to the bow. I co-write with David Wood as well. We write cult thrillers and monster thrillers, he and I together. And the 3rd Eli Carver book is coming out in December and I think that's my 25th book. Joanna: And people always say, ‘Why don't you know exactly how many books you've written?' And I'm like, ‘Well, you know, it gets difficult with reprints and new editions and things.' Alan: Yeah, that's it. And then what do you count? There's a novella that was published in the U.K. that was a book that was published that was in the book count, but it was a limited edition hardcover that's now in a sort of a collected edition that sold out. Still available as an e-book, but do I count that or do I not count that? At some point, that'll go into a future collection as well probably. It gets a bit muddy, but I like the way you put it, more than 20 books. That's usually an easy way to put it. Joanna: You're also a really prolific short story writer. And that is a totally different kind of kettle of fish, I think, in terms of management of how many stories. Do you know how many short stories you've written? Alan: It's more than 80 that are published now. There's a variety. And again, some were published in magazines or in online journals that are no longer available that might have subsequently been republished. I've got two short story collections out. ‘Crow Shine' and ‘Served Cold' are both collecting across the more than a decade that I've been writing short stories. And so I think ov

The relentless news about climate change can leave us despondent — but what if we can use fiction to help people with positive ideas of what the future could look like and the actions we can take to change things? Denise Baden talks about the power of eco-fiction and explains the Green Stories Novel Prize, sponsored by Orna Ross. Denise Baden is Professor of sustainable business at the University of Southampton in the UK. She's also a screenwriter and novelist and founded the series of Green Stories Writing Competitions. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How stories can change mindsHow to smuggle green ideas into stories rather than preachingWhat is eco-fiction?The Green Stories Novel and Short Story CompetitionsEnvironmental issues in publishing Click here to check out the Green Stories Novel Award and remember, there are short story awards and more, so even if the novel one isn't for you, maybe enter something else! You can find Denise Baden at DABaden.com and on Twitter @DABadenauthor Transcript of Interview with Denise Baden Joanna: Denise Baden is a professor of sustainable business at the University of Southampton in the UK. She's also a screenwriter and novelist and founded the series of Green Stories Writing Competitions. Welcome, Denise. Denise: Hello, nice to be here. Joanna: Oh, great to talk to you about this topic. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and also sustainability and environmental issues. Denise: I've had a bit of a butterfly background. I actually worked as a sales rep for publishers many years ago. But I couldn't do that once I became a mum, so I went back to university and I did a bit of psychology. I was harassing them on their green policies and not having a recycling bin. So when the person teaching business ethics, which is one of the things we're also doing, left, I got put in charge of that, and then I ended up doing stuff on sustainability. So that's my academic career, and also I've done articles on that. I think I was inspired to be a greeny by a fictional book myself, which is why I'm quite interested in writing fiction. So I read Stark. It must have been back in the early '90s by Ben Elton. Joanna: Oh, me too. I remember that one. Denise: I'm not sure if it still stands the test of time, but I thought it was brilliant at the time. It was really fun. And right in the middle of this love story epic adventure, he says something like, ‘Dave was a water birth, but he died soon after being born.' It turns out that Dave is a dolphin that got caught up in a tuna net. And I thought, ‘Hang on a minute. I can buy dolphin-friendly tuna.' I never would have chosen to read a green-themed book. I read for fun. But that really made me think and I think it awakened my green conscience. I realized what we're doing without really realizing it. It had loads of examples like that. And it gave me the idea that perhaps I might like to write fiction and perhaps smuggle green issues in myself. Joanna: I love that. And I think it's so important what you said. We read for fun. And if people haven't read Ben Elton, his books are funny. Well, most of them. His more recent ones are less funny, but his early ones are really funny. And you're right. Reading for fun. We read for escape. And the news is, let's face it, full of pretty dire stuff and people feel anxiety around the environment and just feel like it's too big. So obviously, you did psychology as well, which is great. Why are stories a good way to, like you said, smuggle these ideas in? Denise: Everyone turns to science as a way to address the climate crisis, but I think it's stories that engage our imaginations. It's stories that enable us to see things from other points of view, especially things like sci-fi and ones set in the future. They also say how things could be. I think it's a real shame that actually a lot of stories set in the future are dystopian, because we think, ‘I don't want to go there.' And I thought, wouldn't it be nice if we had some stories set in the future that were utopian, that gave us a positive vision we could aspire to perhaps. I love stories, and I also think, because I teach in the area of sustainability, you're always talking to the same people. So you're teaching those who have chosen to take that course and people who are putting the word out about climate crisis and so on. They're only reaching those who are choosing to watch that. We're preaching to the converted all the time. I quite like the idea of using fiction to engage a wider audience, and also, perhaps focus a little bit more on what we can do rather than just on what's wrong. If you know what I mean. Joanna: I'm still reading, because it's got many levels, The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson. Have you read that one? Denise: I have. Yes. It's an epic book. J

With so many technological advances in recent years, can publishing keep up? Michael Bhaskar and I discuss AI tools for writing, blockchain and NFTs, digital narration, and impacts on intellectual property rights licensing in this wide-ranging interview. In the intro, Spotify acquires Findaway and my thoughts on what it means for authors, narrators, and rights-holders [Spotify; Findaway; TechCrunch]; Storytel buys Audiobooks.com [Reuters]; Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with Scrivener, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent, or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna Michael Bhaskar is a writer, researcher, and co-founder of publishing company, Canelo. His latest book is Human Frontiers: The Future of Big Ideas in an Age of Small Thinking. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How much does publishing embrace technology?Why a long-term view is important for both indie and traditional publishing worldsImplications of Natural Language Generation tools like GPT-3The need for both creative play in terms of attitude to AI creation but also ethical guidelines around statements of use. [See the Alliance of Independent Ethical Guidelines.]Thoughts on AI narration for audiobooksBlockchain and NFTsIntellectual property rights and new technological possibilities You can find Michael Bhaskar at MichaelBhaskar.com and on Twitter @michaelbhaskar. Want more futurist episodes? Check out my resources at www.TheCreativePenn.com/future Transcript of Interview with Michael Bhaskar Jo: Michael Bhaskar is a writer, researcher, and a co-founder of a publishing company Canelo. His latest book is Human Frontiers, the Future of Big Ideas in an Age of Small Thinking. Welcome, Michael. Michael: Thank you very much for having me. Great to be here. Jo: I'm excited to talk to you. First off, I wanted to ask, how have you managed to combine your interests in technology and publishing. Tell us a bit more about you. Michael: Well, with some difficulty, it has to be said. I often feel like I'm slightly leading two lives and endlessly trying to find little bridges between them, not always successfully. It is a bit of a struggle. I've always loved books and reading and storytelling, but I have always also been really interested in technology and how people invent new things and then what technology does to change the world. And those have just always been things that I've been fascinated about. At various times, one or the other seems to nudge ahead. And I always thought there would be a bit of a divide and one would have to choose. I guess the thing that brought them together for me was when I'd had left university and I was doing a few jobs and then that was just before the digital publishing wave hit in kind of the middle of the last decade…or, well, two decades ago now, 2005-2006. That created a few openings to work on ebooks, to work on digital publishing, to work on interesting digital experiments. That was the first way really that I felt like these two things could work together. I've always tried to maintain writing about both, writing about publishing but also writing about technology, working on publishing but always trying to use technology in interesting ways. So, it is an odd struggle and often they feel like very different worlds. When I'm doing my writing, it feels very far away actually from being a practicing publisher. So, I try and find these bridges between the worlds. But it doesn't always quite cohere even for me, to be honest. Jo: As I was saying before we started recording, I'm so glad to talk to you because I feel this too. I feel like I lead these two lives between being the artist and then being the business person who loves technology. It's hard to find people to talk to you because a lot of the bookish people seem to have some kind of disdain for technology. And yet, what we basically do now, as publishers, is so bound up in technology. I feel like finally publishing might be embracing this stuff. What do you think? Michael: To some extent. When I first started to work in digital publishing, 16 plus years ago, it astounded me how hostile the entire publishing industry was to technology. I found this a very unusual attitude because actually the publishing industry, and one of the first things I noticed about it is obsessed with newness and new things. It's always, ‘What are the new books? What are next year's books, next year's writer, next year's hot ideas?' And, so, on the one hand, I just thought, ‘Wow, there can't be many industries that are just as constantly open to a sea of new products and new

Dave Chesson provides many useful tools and information for authors at Kindlepreneur and he has recently launched Atticus, writing and formatting software that will output both ebook and print formats, as well as providing collaboration and ARC management tools. Dave Chesson is the founder of Kindlepreneur and producer of Publisher Rocket and Atticus, amongst many other useful resources for authors. He's also an author and a military veteran who used to be a nuclear engineer. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How self-publishing has changed in the last decade and why the ‘stigma' no longer existsTips for reviving a back-listIs A+ content woth implementing?Types of keywords for non-fiction books, and also for fiction. You can do more of your own research at PublisherRocket.Strategies for keywords across different book formatsKey benefits and features of Atticus including design and output of various ebook and print formats, as well as collaboration and ARC management You can find Dave Chesson at Kindlepreneur.com and on Twitter @DaveChesson. Transcript of interview with Dave Chesson Joanna: Dave Chesson is the founder of Kindlepreneur and producer of Publisher Rocket and Atticus amongst many other useful resources for authors. He's also an author and a military veteran who used to be a nuclear engineer. Welcome back to the show, Dave. Dave: Hey, thanks so much for having me, Joanna. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you today. More than a couple of years ago, 2018, you were on this show. We talked about your backstory so we're not going to go into that today. Before we get into some details, let's have a bit of a wide overview of the industry because you and I have been doing this for probably over a decade. What are some of the significant changes that you've seen? Because you've paid a lot of attention obviously to the whole industry, but Amazon in particular. What's changed in self-publishing and why is it still interesting? Dave: There's two big things to it. We'll start with Amazon and then we're going to talk about the industry. You remember back when the reporting from Amazon was just heinous? There was not even a chart. You had to look at instantaneous data. The fact that Amazon really stank at just telling me how much money I was making was just indicative of their lack of attention. And they were very slow to roll out or do anything whatsoever. I would say if we're taking a really 20,000-foot view here, I think that over the past couple of years Amazon has been ramping up a lot and changing and adding and doing a lot of things. This to me gives me a lot of hope in the future because if Amazon is really focused on this, hopefully, great things are going to come of it. The fact that they've introduced A+ content, whether I like it or not, Kindle Vella, whether I like it or not, at least they're doing something there. They're always adding to the Amazon Ad system. Clearly, they like that. And they did an overhaul on their analytics and their reporting. Plus, they're constantly doing things with their categories, and one of the things as the creator of Publisher Rocket, much to my chagrin, they're constantly testing things all over the site. One day you'll wake up and maybe a group of people in America or in one particular state might see that there's this new button, or a color, or they've gotten rid of the also by and they've moved it down, and then they're constantly seeing what is helping them to sell more. I like the fact that they're giving that attention. I love Barnes & Noble, don't get me wrong. And the people who run B&N Press are phenomenally super-smart, great people. I mean, really cool. And they've got amazing ideas. But I get the feeling that Barnes & Noble looks at B&N Press and does not give them the attention, does not give them the authority to make a lot of changes or the changes that they really want to do. So, from an organization side, at least Amazon is doing things that are affecting indie authors, whether they're awesome yet, at least we're seeing something. So that is one thing I'm very hopeful about for the future. The second thing though is to turn to the industry. Back when we started as indie authors, the publishing companies, the publishing agencies, the publishing side looked down at us. I'm just generalizing here. Joanna: The stigma of self-publishing. Dave: Exactly. Like, ‘Ah, couldn't hack it in our industry. They're just letting really bad books onto the market and just crowding.' But here's the thing though. And again, I'm just generalizing. They're starting to look at indie authors and saying, ‘Huh. You know what? Here's an author that clearly wrote a good enough book because there's a lot of reviews. Clearly, they know some marketing. Clearly, they have an email list and they have a presence. Why take a chance on some

What projects are worth pitching for film and TV? What do you need to include in your pitch? Why are there more opportunities for writers now? Chrissy Metge talks about these questions and more. In the intro, the US Justice Department sues to block the Penguin Random House acquisition of Simon & Schuster [The Guardian]; Kobo Plus launches in Australia and NZ [Kobo]; Audible launches unlimited subscription in India [The New Publishing Standard]; Check your print prices for Ingram [IBPA]; Is it time to raise ebook prices? [6 Figure Authors] This podcast episode is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo ecosystem. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors. Chrissy Metge has 20 years animation experience working on projects including The Hobbit, Superman Man of Steel, Fast and Furious 7, and Jungle Book. She's the co-founder of Fuzzy Duckling Media and Duckling Publishing, specializing in books and shows for children, and is also a creative brand consultant. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Changes in the film and TV industry in the last 20 yearsThe kinds of content that animation studios are interested inHow and when to pitch an idea to a studioTips for good pitching techniqueDo you need to write the scripts for the stories you’re pitching?The importance of figuring out your target audienceHow does the financial side work?What the future of entertainment may holdBalancing business and creativity You can find Chrissy Metge at ChrissyMetge.com and on Twitter @ChrissyNZ Transcript of Interview with Chrissy Metge Joanna: Chrissy Metge has 20 years animation experience working on projects incluing ‘The Hobbit,' ‘Superman Man of Steel,' ‘Fast and Furious 7,' and ‘Jungle Book.' She's the cofounder of Fuzzy Duckling Media and Duckling Publishing, specializing in books and shows for children, and is also a creative brand consultant. Welcome, Chrissy. Chrissy: Thank you. So excited to be here. Joanna: Oh, there's so much for us to talk about. First up, tell us a bit more about you and why you have moved into books alongside your animation work. Chrissy: I've been in the industry for almost 20 years now. I'm a Kiwi from New Zealand, living in London with my son and husband. And my son was born six weeks early. I was actually working on ‘Jungle Book' at the time at Weta in Wellington. And I was supposed to finish up the next day and have my leaving flowers and all of that. And my son decided to come with a crash and a roar and a bang, six weeks early it turned out, and they sent my leaving flowers to the hospital. But we're both fine, by the way, just in case you're wondering. I always wanted to write, I always did write, and around so many creators and writers and directors and producers, and I always had a few ideas at the back of my head. When my son was born, my brain hadn't had a chance to stop. He slept a lot as newborns do and I just was like, ‘What do I do with my time?' So, while he was sleeping, I decided to write some books, and it went on from there. Joanna: Wow, and I'm sure there're some parents listening going, ‘How on earth did you manage all that?' Your career does make me feel tired! Let's talk about right now. Because you're currently working on a show for Netflix. You've worked for Disney and other big studios. How has the film and TV industry changed over your nearly 20 years? Chrissy: It has changed so much, obviously, with all the streaming giants that have come in and the other big companies buying each other. I was at ILM when Disney came and bought them out for I think it was $4 billion for the ‘Star Wars' brand. And, they've changed a lot. I think with the streaming, you've got access to so much more choice. You're not going to the theater, spending $50 for 3 people to go see a film or anything like that. You can turn on your TV and your streaming channel and you've got so much access to that. And then because of that, so much more content is needed. We're all aware of what's going on around us. And we want to be involved with all of the content around us rather than going to see a great big ‘Transformers' blockbuster or something like that. We want to watch things that are part of everyday life. It's been a really interesting ride, that's for sure. Joanna: Do you think the changes have accelerated due to the pandemic? Chrissy: Oh, absolutely. I work in the animation film industry just to distinguish that. So we've never been busier because you couldn't film with the pandemic. So all of a sudden, all of the animation studios are absolutely swamped while our sisters and brothers in arms in the live action studios are struggling a lot. It was like a catch-22. Here I'm

Creatokia is one of the first book-specific NFT platforms and in this interview, co-founders Jens Klingelhöfer and John Ruhrmann explain what NFTs are and why they are an opportunity for authors and rights-holders. They are also the co-founders of Bookwire, which already provides digital publishing solutions for the publishing industry. After the interview, I reflect on key aspects of our conversation, and talk about why the recent YA NFT project Realms of Ruin didn't work, and why we need to ‘jump the S-curve' into a new business model. Jens Klingelhöfer and John Ruhrmann are the founders of Bookwire, which provides digital publishing solutions for the publishing industry. They have recently launched Creatokia, the world of digital originals, with an accompanying podcast (currently in German, but will soon be in English.)  You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What are NFTs and what is Creatokia?How will royalties on resale of digital originals help authors and publishers to make more money?What can go into an NFT? (for example, a limited edition ePub, a virtual ticket, community access, and more)Will the language change around NFTs? Will it become a normal part of the publishing landscape as ebooks have?Addressing environmental concerns about NFTsIntellectual property rights and why you need to specify ‘digital' or ‘ebook' or ‘audiobook' rights in a world of digital originalsHow will Creatokia work, and when will it be available? You can find Jens and John at Creatokia.com and on Twitter @creatokia Transcript of Interview with Jens and John Joanna: Welcome to the show, Jens and John. John: Hello, Joanna. Jens: Hi. Joanna: I'm so excited to talk to you today. Let's start with a question that might be basic for us, but maybe not for the listeners. What are NFTs, and what is Creatokia? John: I think the interesting things about NFTs are it's the short version of nonfungible tokens. The thing is that NFTs are on a blockchain, and you can collect them, and you can own them, and you can trade them. It's a decentralized technology. It does mean maybe for the publishing industry that you don't need another organization than the technical idea of the blockchain to trade a book or to trade very rare stuff and to give it to someone who can say, ‘I really own a digital original.' And that's the idea of Creatokia. Creatokia is the possibility — in a time of limitless supply in a digital era — to bring the original back into our world and connect two worlds, a digital world and a real world. And it's something for fans and creators and for storytellers and out of the perspective of Bookwire, the company that Jens and I founded 10, 11 years ago, the next step of digital publishing. Jens: 12 years ago when e-books came into the business, I think we all thought about, ‘Wow, this is a technical revolution.' I thought it myself. And in some ways, it was. But in some ways, it wasn't. It was just like transforming a physical book into a digital book, but it's not really a technical revolution because we are still reading, we're still using the same distribution channels. So you can buy a book on Amazon, you can buy an e-book on Amazon. That's no big difference. You just need a device for it, but looking at it like the opportunity to create digital originals in a world like John said, where everything digital has become totally available for everybody. We are in an endless sea of music, pictures, books, so having something that means something to you in your life, a digital version of something that you would've collected maybe as a rare item physically, previously, I think that's a real revolution. Joanna: What I'm also interested in is the idea of smart contracts and resale, the resale market and the fact that you can put a percentage royalty into the resale. This is completely new, right? We haven't had this. Obviously, there's been resale of physical books, but we've never been able to figure out the supply chain for money for that kind of thing. How do you think that royalty potential for the life of copyright on a blockchain might work and might bring more money to rights-holders? John: It looks like the blockchain is more collaborative in a way. So when you are on the blockchain with your product, as you said, with a smart contract, you are able to participate in the resale of your product. So it means when I buy an NFT book and I resell it because maybe it's a limited edition from a fantastic author, even from an unknown author, but now a very well-known author, it's possible to resell that NFT, and you can implement in the smart contract that the originator, the author, gains again let's say a percentage of…if it only may be 5%, but if it's sold again and again and again, you have your own distribution system on the blockchain. And tha

How can we balance creative passion projects with work that brings in an income? What are the different types of poetry and how can we bring them alive through the spoken word? Mark McGuinness talks about how poetry is at the center of his universe, fueling his creativity as well as informing his coaching business. In the intro, Facebook rebrands as Meta [Facebook]; The metaverse for authors and publishing; Is the metaverse already here? [Unchained]; You Are a Writer, You Create and License Intellectual Property Assets; IP is the new frontlist [Kris Rusch]. Plus, Books2Read now has print links; How to Write for Markets That Sell webinar [K-lytics]; and the NaNoWriMo Storybundle for Writers. Mark McGuinness is an award-winning poet, non-fiction author, and creative coach. He's also the host of two podcasts, The 21st Century Creative, and his new poetry show, A Mouthful of Air. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How poetry is the center of Mark's creative and business lifeBalancing art and commerceWhy launch a poetry podcast?Different approaches to poetryIntellectual property issues with poetryEgo and validationFunding a podcast You can find Mark McGuinness at AMouthfulOfAir.fm and on Twitter @amouthfulofair Transcript of Interview with Mark McGuinness Joanna: Mark McGuinness is an award-winning poet, non-fiction author, and creative coach. He's also the host of two podcasts, ‘The 21st Century Creative' and his new poetry show ‘A Mouthful of Air.' Welcome back to the show, Mark. Mark: Thank you, Jo. It's always nice to be here. Joanna: Indeed. You've been on the show a number of times, so we're not going to get into all of that. Today we're focusing on your poetry, which is exciting. I wanted to start by asking about the integration. You've been running a successful creative business for many years. What part does poetry play in your life in terms of creativity, and does it play any part in the business side? Mark: For me personally, poetry is the bedrock. It's the foundation of who I am in everything that I do. In terms of writing, it's the most fulfilling kind of writing that I read and also to write. There's nothing else that comes close really. All my writing about creativity, my work as a coach, they're really side effects of the poetry. And that's not to diminish them because I absolutely love doing them and I love the fact that I get to do lots of different things, a bit like you. But really, poetry is at the center of my universe. If there was no poetry, there wouldn't really be much point to the rest of it. So, they really go hand in hand in that way. Creatively though, I think of poetry as completely separate from everything else I do. I love the fact that it's a different world and I can do what the hell I like there. There are no commercial considerations, there's no money at stake. I don't think that's any great secret about the poetry world. So, I have a lot more freedom than a writer who has to keep an eye on the market, their business is maybe based on selling a certain volume or something like a movie studio where there's a committee making decisions in a very risk-averse basis. With poetry, I can basically do what I want. I think the only thing I would say about the poetry and the business, having a relationship, is that it does inform the kind of coach that I am. Because I'm a poet, I've got a very strong affinity with creatives of all kinds. And that's who I like to work with, that's my tribe. On the other hand, I hear from a lot of my clients who say, well, the fact that I'm a poet was attractive to them when they were looking for a coach. They knew they weren't going to get the usual corporate-style coaching or even necessarily mainstream life coaching. I've never thought of myself in those terms. They like the idea of working with a fellow creative because they know we'll have certain values in common. Joanna: It's so interesting. You said at the beginning there that, ‘Poetry is at the foundation of who I am,' which is pretty hardcore. I've read all your non-fiction. I knew you before you knew who I was back in the day, over a decade ago, because you were I think about five years ahead of me and I bought one of your courses early on. I've read pretty much all your stuff. You do share a lot of personal stuff in your non-fiction books, in your blog, in your podcast. And yet, you're basically saying that your poetry is the far more personal side, the more fulfilling side. So, to me, this is really difficult and I think about writing a memoir and something I'm kind of struggling with. Do you think that your poetry is your more vulnerable side? Are you more vulnerable to criticism? And you've written a book on criticism. How do we find the strength to tap into these more personal sides of writing and put ourselves out there in this ve

What are the different ways that authors can use NFTs to reach readers and earn money with blockchain technology? How can we address the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that is inevitable when faced with new technological options? Jessica Artemisia Mathieu explains some of the business models with NFTs. In the intro, and in a longer segment after the interview, I talk about some of the things I'm considering around what could be the ecosystem of the next iteration of online business. This episode is sponsored by my wonderful patrons, who give me the freedom to investigate the future of creativity and share it with you here. If you find the episode useful, please consider supporting me at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn or buy me a coffee (or two!) at BuyMeACoffee.com/thecreativepenn Jessica Artemisia Mathieu is a sci-fi fantasy author and digital marketing agency owner. She's also the creator of The Sovereigntii, which uses NFTs on blockchain as a new form of storytelling, community, and income. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Business models that authors can consider with NFTsThe language of NFTs and blockchainHow Jessica manages The Sovereigntii, and her collaborations with other creators in other worldsHow fear, uncertainty and doubt hold creatives back from what is already a thriving creator ecosystemCopyright and NFTs (Note, it will all depend on your contract, smart or not!)Addressing the ecological and environmental issues with blockchainIn the extended segment after the interview (at around 42 mins), I talk about what I learned and recap the business models, adding extra ideas around practicality, mindset, and licensingThe 3 things you need to do regardless of technological platform: Create IP, License it, Reach readers/Find an audience You can find Jessica Artemisia at TheSovereigntii.com and on Twitter @JessArtemisia Transcript of Interview with Jessica Artemisia Joanna: Jessica Artemisia Mathieu is a sci-fi fantasy author and digital marketing agency owner. She's also the creator of ‘The Sovereigntii,' which uses NFTs of blockchain as a new form of storytelling, community, and income. Welcome, Jessica. Jessica: Hi, thank you so much for having me. It's an honor to be here. Joanna: Oh, I'm excited to talk about this. First up, tell us a bit more about you and your background in writing and publishing. Jessica: Writing I started as soon as I could read and write. I've been a fantasy nerd my entire life and I've always dreamed of being a fantasy author. But I didn't start really, really writing until about 10 years ago. I still didn't share because I never really felt that it made sense to try to pursue it professionally. Because the business models at the time … you could be a best-selling author and still need a day job. And for me, I didn't have enough energy, honestly, to be a best-selling author and have a day job, like a full-time job. It just wasn't realistic for me. I did end up starting to take writing seriously a couple of years ago anyway because it's a passion, it's kind of just in my soul and I had to try it. I started actually getting published. But the problem remained, so I decided to dive into marketing, digital marketing, to find an alternative business model. And that's how I ended up getting into NFTs. Joanna: You're talking about getting published and marketing. Is that traditional publishing and book marketing or other forms? Jessica: I did get traditionally published and I also had some interest from a really big agency in L.A. for a manuscript I was working on. But I still didn't feel that the publishing industry was right for me. I've been doing marketing since 2005, but it wasn't really focused on digital marketing. So, I started learning marketing in a general sense to understand the industry more deeply. And I did that for the purpose of finding a new business model for authors. Joanna: I think it's really interesting. And mentioning that publishing wasn't really a good fit and feeling like it's strange, I often feel that some independent authors, us included, have perhaps more in common with the tech industry than we do with the publishing industry. Even though product comes out of a book manuscript, I feel like there is quite a big difference between some of the people in the traditional industry and some authors — and then authors who are more comfortable with technology. Do you think that's the basis of why you were feeling that way, it's just your interest was much more developed, in a way? Jessica: The tech is okay for me. I feel very native in the digital environment and marketing. I just didn't think that it was a good business model. For me, a good business model means you do it and you make a lot of money. That's what it means. So, if I do it and I do it well and I'm successful and I still don't make a lot of money, to me, t

On July 4, 2020, Kory Shrum received two phone calls. One from her uncle, saying her mother was found dead in her bedroom from an overdose. A second from a homicide detective saying he believes it was murder—and her uncle is the suspect. In this interview, Kory talks about how she turned her trauma into a true-crime podcast and memoir and how writing helped her process the experience. In the intro, 6 ways that this is the best time in publishing [Publishing Perspectives]; Content Creators deserve a bigger slice of the pie [Kristin Nelson]. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, where you can get free ebook formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Get your free Author Marketing Guide at www.draft2digital.com/penn Kory Shrum is a ‘USA Today' best-selling author of science fiction, fantasy, and thrillers. She's also a true-crime podcaster. Her latest book is a memoir, Who Killed My Mother? You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.  Show Notes Studying poetry as a way to develop skills for fictionMaking the choice to write a memoir about a very difficult subjectWhy sharing feelings is so important in memoirTips for healthy ways to experience emotions while writingSeeking the truth in memoir and how memory plays a partTelling one story in multiple formats; podcast, book and audiobook You can find Kory Shrum at WhoKilledMyMother.com and on Twitter @koryshrum Transcript of Interview with Kory Shrum Joanna: Kory Shrum is a ‘USA Today' best-selling author of science fiction, fantasy, and thrillers. She's also a true crime podcaster. And her latest book is a memoir, Who Killed My Mother? Welcome, Kory. Kory: Thank you. I'm so glad to be here. I have been a fan of yours for years. I've been stalking you on the internet for years. And then I tried to steal your assistant, Alexandra. So it might be getting a little creepy at this point! Joanna: I really appreciate your support. And also what we were saying before we started recording that, because of our connection, I've discovered your novels and our readers, but we share some readers in the fiction space. I think a lot of this stuff is about connecting with people and people who are like us in some way. We've never met in person, maybe we never will, but it's so great to connect across the world, isn't it? So let's start. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Kory: I had loved books and writing and everything about the world of literature all of my life, but I didn't really get serious about it until college. I changed majors so many times because I had so many interests. Like you, I'm a multi-passionate, creative, and there are just so many things that I love about the world. And I love learning. I think it was like the fifth time that I went to my advisor's office and was like, ‘I'm thinking about changing my major.' And she was like, ‘Kory, Kory, Kory, listen, I just want you to go down to this office and take this test, and it will tell you what major you should be.' Joanna: Cool. Kory: And so I was like, ‘Okay.' Yeah. So you take a test, and it matches your interest to a field. And so I went down there, and I took the test. I matched an English major with, like, 94%, or something ridiculous. It was really clear that I should be studying literature, books, and things. I already had a creative writing minor at that point that I had basically completed, but I didn't think of the English major, because I was like, ‘Are there English major jobs?' But it turns out there are, and so I completed that. And then I went on to get an MA. And then I had to make the decision if I wanted a PhD in creative writing, or an MFA in creative writing. And you don't really need to do this in the real world. But it's like what people will tell you, ‘Oh, if you want to be a writer, get an MFA.' And so I did that. I chose the MFA because the Ph.D. seemed more like literary theory, whereas I just wanted to learn how to write really well. And MFAs are studio degrees. They want you to be writing. But the issue is, is that I like a lot of genre fiction and genre tropes. And it's not as accepted in academia as literary fiction. They have the high-minded…you could see it in capital letters, literary fiction. And so I was like, ‘Well, what am I going to study?' Because I can't really do vampire novels. I've had a teacher in class say, ‘I will accept no vampire novels this semester.' So I chose poetry instead. Because I thought, well, if I could master poetry, that's a mastery of description, and language and flow. I think that that would really help my fiction writing as well. I don't think it would be a waste of my time to learn how to write poetry. I chose to study poetry for my MFA. And it was great, I had amazing teachers, it was a wonde

How do you research a book in the most appropriate way? How can you keep track of your sources and attribute them correctly, as well as avoiding inadvertent plagiarism? How can you get your book/s into libraries? Vikki Carter talks about all these questions and more. In the intro, Has Amazon Changed Fiction? [New Republic]; The Bigger the Publisher, The Blander the Books [The Atlantic]; A basic income pilot scheme for artists [Irish Times]; Struggles we face as authors [6 Figure Authors]; My 5-day solo walk along the St Cuthbert's Way. This episode is sponsored by Publisher Rocket, which will help you get your book in front of more Amazon readers so you can spend less time marketing and more time writing. I use Publisher Rocket for researching book titles, categories, and keywords — for new books and for updating my backlist. Check it out at www.PublisherRocket.com Vikki Carter is the author of Research Like a Librarian: Research Help and Tips for Writers for Researching in the Digital Age. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Overcoming dyslexia and learning to love booksResearch as a disciplineChoosing where to focus researchDifferent ways to research your bookHow do we know when a source is good enough?How to avoid accidental plagiarismHow to cite sourcesHow to get your books into libraries — this article will also help. You can find Vikki Carter at TheAuthorsLibrarian.com and on Twitter @theauthorslib Transcript of Interview with Vikki Carter Joanna: Vikki Carter is the author of Research Like a Librarian: Research Help and Tips for Writers for Researching in the Digital Age. Welcome, Vikki. Vikki: Hi there, Joanna. Hi, everyone. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you today about this because I think it's so important. Before we get into it, tell us a bit more about your background because I know you struggled a bit in your early experiences with books. Vikki: Oh, I did. And it's such an interesting part of my story and I just actually started to talk about it with people as I wrote my first book. When I was younger, in elementary school, I had a speech impediment and I also was a very slow reader and very slow learner. We didn't discover this until about halfway through first grade. When I was in school, I didn't talk very often, which surprises everybody when they know me now, like all she does is talk. I really struggled with reading and seeing words formulate on a page or on a chalkboard. My brain couldn't quite grasp that concept. Now we know it's dyslexia, and it was very severe dyslexia. But at the time when I was little, I didn't know that. And then compounded with a speech impediment, I just turned super shy because I would get teased all the time, as kids do that. So when I was little, I wouldn't go out and play on recess very often. I would hide myself away in the libraries of our schools because the librarians were awesome. They let me come in, get books, and I'd always get picture books. I would sit and I would look at the picture books, trying to decipher how the pictures were related to the words until I did get some help. I had two amazing teachers that identified that there was some possibility of some help for me, and I started with speech therapy and then we started with reading and writing therapy. So about the fifth grade, I caught up a little bit with everybody else but I've always been painfully slow reader and a very painfully slow writer. That experience of being around the library and the librarians, it became a sanctuary to me. So books have become my sanctuary now. Joanna: I think for many of us, the library is a sanctuary. It certainly was for me as an introvert child, totally bookish. I spent a lot of time in the library and I think that's why so many of us care about libraries now. It's because of how they've affected us in earlier life. You actually became a librarian, is that right? Vikki: I did. I had this interesting journey to a librarian. It was a little later on in life. I went back to college/university as an adult student with two children in tow and I wasn't sure what I really wanted to do. I kept going back to the idea of books, writing, researching, but I didn't know how that would work out into a career. It didn't really dawn on me as a librarian until I started to work in the school district where my daughters were and I worked in the school library, and I'm like, ‘Oh, this could be a thing.' It dawned on me. I started to go back to school and I ended up working at the public library in our area while I was working on my bachelor's because I really felt like I wanted to have a broad experience. I worked in the public library, and I loved that. And then finally when I started on my master's, I was recruited to work at the community college library in our area in the library department. I finished my master's and stayed w

How can anthropology — the study of human cultures — teach us to build richer and more convincing worlds for our stories? What questions do we need to ask of our characters and settings to bring them alive? Michael Kilman talks about how anthropology can help with world-building in this episode. In the intro, the late Sue Grafton's books licensed for film and TV even though she stated otherwise before she died [BookRiot]; Tina Turner sells IP rights [The Guardian]; Estate planning for authors; NaNoWriMo Storybundle; Pics from my St Cuthbert's Way walk on Instagram and Facebook; Relaxed Author interviews – 6 Figure Author and The Indy Author; Focus on your strengths [Ask ALLi] Today's show is sponsored by IngramSpark, which I use to print and distribute my print-on-demand books to 39,000+ retailers including independent bookstores, schools and universities, libraries and more. It's your content – do more with it through IngramSpark.com. Michael Kilman is an anthropologist, filmmaker, artist, science fiction author, and musician. Today we're talking about Build Better Worlds: An Introduction to Anthropology for Game Designers, Fiction Writers, and Filmmakers, co-written with Kyra Wellstrom. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How knowing even a little bit about anthropology can support fictional world-buildingHow artifacts reflect what matters to a societyImportant features of urban anthropologyCautions about info-dumping when describing a world you’ve builtThinking of cultures in terms of how the pieces work together to form a cohesive wholeWriting about different cultures without straying into cultural appropriation You can find Michael Kilman at LoridiansLaboratory.com and on Twitter @LoridiansLab Transcript of the Interview with Michael Kilman Joanna: Michael Kilman is an anthropologist, filmmaker, artist, science fiction author, and musician. Today we're talking about Build Better Worlds: An Introduction to Anthropology for Game Designers, Fiction Writers, and Filmmakers, co-written with Kyra Wellstrom. Welcome, Michael. Michael: Hi. Nice to be on the show. Joanna: It's good to have you here. Tell us a bit more about you and your background and how you got into anthropology and writing. Michael: I fell in love with anthropology in undergraduate after trying many majors, and really trying to figure out who I was. And on a whim, I took a class called Anthropology. I said, ‘Anthropology, what in the world is anthropology?' Reading the course description it says, the study of human cultures. I was like, ‘Hmm, okay, all right.' I took the class and fell in love. After that, I was just set on a path for studying other cultures around the world. I had already been writing for quite a while. I started writing when I was about 14, 15 years old, I started my first attempt at a book. It was terrible, of course, and so was much of my other work for quite a few years, I really didn't publish anything fiction-wise until my 30s. So it was a long process for me. But in the meantime, I went off to grad school in my mid-20s, and I started working with other cultures, I've worked with a lot of Native American tribes. Over the years, I lived and worked in a rural village in Mexico, and a lot of like urban anthropology, which means we study populations, and cities, and stuff. My area of focus in anthropology ultimately became media systems and representation. So looking at how media represents people, and why is that problematic? Or why is it good? All those various things, trying to uncover exactly what happens when you represent people in spaces like fiction, for example, although video production was in my background, and so I focused a lot on that kind of media at the time. And then, a couple years ago, Kira and I ran into each other again. Ironically, we went to the same college as an undergraduate, but we never actually met each other until we were both teaching again at the same college we were both undergraduates in. So we met there, and we became friends, and we started talking. Kira, she's a biological anthropologist, which means she focuses on the biological side of culture, how does biology and environment impact humans? And her area of specialty is in forensics. If you've seen the show, ‘Bones,' that's the kind of stuff she does, although she doesn't really like to be compared to ‘Bones,' because there's a lot of problematic science in that show, forensics is not so magical. And there's a number of other things that are troublesome with that. Although on the other hand, ‘Bones' has made physical anthropology very popular, so we can't fault it for that either. But we were both talking about how representation in fiction, or how a lot of these fictional worlds, they just don't work, or they have big problems, they're not holistic,

How can you use elements of mystery to hook your readers, regardless of the genre you write? How can you make sure your writing process prevents errors or plagiarism? Jonah Lehrer covers these aspects and more. In the intro, KDP Print available in hardback; Bookvolts book-specific NFT platform [Medium]; Books for writers in the NaNoWriMo Storybundle; ALLi self-publishing conference; Tomb of Relics. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with Scrivener, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent, or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna Jonah Lehrer is a New York Times bestselling author of non-fiction and a journalist. His latest book is Mystery: A Seduction, A Strategy, A Solution. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How children’s Surprise Egg YouTube videos inspired the bookHow do we know when an idea is big enough for a book?Practical ways of bringing mystery into any storyHow spoilers aren’t always badUsing the rules of mystery in non-fictionRecovering from a career-changing writing mistake, and how it has changed Jonah's writing process You can find Jonah Lehrer at JonahLehrer.com. Transcript of Interview with Jonah Lehrer Joanna: Jonah Lehrer is a New York Times bestselling author of non-fiction and a journalist. His latest book is Mystery: A Seduction, A Strategy, A Solution. Welcome, Jonah. Jonah: Thank you so much for having me. Joanna: Oh, I'm excited to talk to you. So, let's get right into it. Why a book about mystery? What was it that drew you to write about this topic? Jonah: The book is full of examples drawn from the canon, from great works of literature, from ‘Hamlet' to Emily Dickinson, but what actually inspired me to write this book was watching my son watch YouTube videos. He fell down the rabbit hole, this specific genre of kids YouTube video called ‘Surprise Eggs,' which, to make a long story short, if you haven't had the pleasure of watching these inane videos, it's essentially parents make these giant paper mache eggs and stuff them full of toys. And what a child does is he punches a hole in the paper mache egg, and then pulls out the toys one by one. It's like a slot machine for toddlers, they never know what toy is going to come next. So it's incredibly exciting. I watched him watch these videos and just become enthralled by them. And then I quickly realized he wasn't the only one that a lot of these ‘Surprise Egg' videos on YouTube. The ‘Surprise Egg' genre is now one of the most popular genres in the YouTube Kids world, that he was just enthralled by this narrative trick of not knowing what toy was going to come next. And you can look at these videos and their stats on YouTube, and they have billion plus views. Ryan's Toy Review in particular, he's one of the most subscribed YouTubers in the world. He's credited with pioneering the ‘Surprise Egg' and it's the 33rd YouTube video of all time. I became fascinated by this idea of why kids were so entranced by mystery, by these mystery boxes. And that is really what led me down this long, winding path, this investigation into mystery, not just on YouTube Kids, but in Shakespeare, but in poetry, in advertising, in magic tricks, and so forth. Joanna: For all the people who want to write non-fiction who are listening, or do write non-fiction, I'm one of them, how do we know when an idea is big enough for a book? Because you're pretty academic, from what I read, and you go deep into it. Mystery, in one way, it's really massive, and in another way, it's really small. How did you know that this idea was big enough for a book? Jonah: It's such a good question, and I wish I had a better answer. But for me, I don't know. I just kind of follow the thread. It began with me thinking about why my child was so entranced by the YouTube videos that I found so inane, and consumerism at its most banal, just like a kid tearing up in toys, and not even playing with them. So, that's where it began. Then I start to see connections everywhere, and I just start putting them together, I create these massive Word files. Then give it some time to breathe. And I see what hangs together. Slowly, over the course of, I think for this book, probably two years, a structure gradually emerged. But at the beginning, what I'm really looking for is a subject that's capacious enough, that's wide-ranging enough that I guess is vague enough, where I can just start to collect stories that fit. And then I fall in love with the stories. Joanna: So, diving down a publishing rabbit hole already, we'll get back to the book in a minute. When do you pitch the

How can you expand your creative and financial opportunities with audiobooks and podcasting? Will Dages from Findaway Voices talks about options as well as introducing the new Marketplace. Will Dages is the head of Findaway Voices, which helps authors produce and distribute audiobooks to a global network of platforms and listeners. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Current trends and stats in the audiobook industry Subscription services, libraries, and the future of audiobook consumption Social audio The crossover between podcasts and audiobooks and the potential for new forms of creativity when an audio product doesn't have to match a ‘book.' Introducing Findaway Voices Marketplace, where authors can find and work directly with pro narrators You can find Will Dages at FindawayVoices.com and on Twitter @FindawayVoices Transcript of Interview with Will Dages Joanna: Will Dages is the head of Findaway Voices, which helps authors produce and distribute audiobooks to a global network of platforms and listeners. Findaway Voices was recently announced as London Book Fair's Audiobook Publisher of the Year in 2021, which is fantastic and well-deserved. Welcome back to the show Will. Will: Thank you so much, Joanna. Always great to talk to you. Joanna: We always geek out on audio. You were last on the show in early 2019. And the world has certainly changed since then. Can you give us a high level overview of what the audiobook market looks like right now? And how has the pandemic changed things? Will: Absolutely. Man, that feels like a lifetime ago. I'm sure you agree? Joanna: Yeah. Will: The world has been through a lot in those last two years. Luckily, though, one thing that has been pretty constant is the growth of audiobooks. The latest APA stats show another 16% growth in sales year over year, which means eight straight years of double-digit revenue growth for audiobooks, which is fantastic. Talking about the industry, they also have some interesting stats like 50% of audiobook listeners say they're making new time to listen to audiobooks. And I think the interesting thing there is, more and more surveys are coming out that the home is the most popular place to listen. Where a few years ago, I think that would be much more skewed towards cars and commute. A lot of people think of audiobooks as being this kind of commute buddy. But more people are really carving out time in their leisure time at home, while doing chores, or housework, or exercising, or going on walks and finding time to listen there, which is helping grow the entire industry. The other trend that we've been seeing industry-wide is shorter books getting more traction, people picking up books that are one, two, or three hours long. And as the market grows outside of Audible, where the credit model demands longer books. You want to get your credit's worth out of that credit by looking at the number of hours. When the market grows around that and the books are appropriately priced, or they're in subscription models or libraries like shorter content is having its day. And we're seeing a lot more trends towards shorter content being really profitable. Joanna: What about on a global basis, because a lot of the stats seem to be U.S. focused, as usual. But it feels to me from some of the things I've heard at London Book Fair and other things that there's been growth in other languages and also other countries, whereas the market probably was more dominant in the U.S., UK, Canada before. Have you got any feeling for the global market? Will: It is unfortunate that most of the surveys and the organizations that pay for the research are in the U.S. So it is a little U.S. focused. But we release every year, the ‘Headphone Report‘ is what we call it, and this is on our blog and stuff. And you can see some of our stats where the Findaway Voices reports we put out are not including big publisher data. So it's a little bit more representative of what this audience of your listeners is seeing. We're seeing growth outside the U.S., especially in Canada, Australia, Sweden, England, Mexico, and different languages that are really growing. Spanish, obviously is our fastest non-English language that has been growing like crazy. And then behind that, German, Italian, Russian, and French are all really picking up steam. So our catalog is still really weighted towards English content, just because that's where the market seems to be more mature. But these emerging markets are really growing at a fast rate. We're seeing a lot more diversity in sales worldwide for authors. Joanna: You mentioned subscription models and libraries, and this seems to be a very big discussion both amongst indie authors and traditional publishers. And on the one hand, people say, subscription models are going to kill everything. And they take every

How can you be a more relaxed author when there is always so much more to do? How can you co-write a book and retain different voices in written text as well as audio? Mark Leslie Lefebvre and I discuss how we co-wrote The Relaxed Author and how we're publishing and marketing it. In the intro, Netflix buys the Roald Dahl catalog [The Verge]; Chuck Palahniuk launches a Substack [LitReactor]; Gillian Flynn launches her own imprint [New York Times]; Tomb of Relics in edits; ProWritingAid tutorial Do you want to be a more relaxed author? The Relaxed Author: Take The Pressure Off Your Art and Enjoy The Creative Journey, out now in all the usual formats in all the usual places. You can also buy it direct from us here, as well as bundle deals. Mark Leslie Lefebvre is a horror writer, publishing consultant, speaker, author of books for writers, and my co-writer for The Relaxed Author. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What matters when choosing a co-writing partner Why a legal agreement is so important — even if you're friends Sharing the various roles while writing and publishing How royalty splitting works with Draft2Digital Different styles of working The benefits of recording conversations to use as a first draft — and the resulting challenges Sharing launch duties and marketing tasks Principles for the long-game You can find Mark Leslie Lefebvre at MarkLeslie.ca and on Twitter @MarkLeslie Transcript of Interview with Mark Leslie Lefebvre Joanna: I'm here with Mark Leslie Lefebvre, horror writer, publishing consultant, speaker, author of books for writers and my co-writer for The Relaxed Author. Welcome back to the show, Mark. Mark: Hey, Joanna. It's great to be here. Joanna: So here we are finally. We both have the book The Relaxed Author and it's actually very pretty. I'm quite pleased with it. Are you happy with it? Mark: Oh, you know what? When Liz saw it, she…because she hadn't seen anything. She just heard me talk, ‘You know what? I'm working on this book with Jo.' And when she saw it she went, ‘Oh, my god. That is so gorgeous.' Your cover designer did such a brilliant job. Just absolutely gorgeous. Joanna: Oh, good. I'm glad you like it because I feel like it's difficult with co-writing…well, lots of difficulties. We'll get into that. But let's go back to the beginning. How did we even come up with the idea for this book? It's not like we had other things going on and we were like, ‘Oh, here's a surprise book.' When did we come up with the idea and why did we go forward with it? Mark: Was it back in March that I was being interviewed on your podcast? Maybe the episode aired in March, or was it April? I'm trying to remember how far back it was. Joanna: It was the ‘Wide for the Win.' You came on to talk about ‘Wide for the Win' basically. And I think we said, ‘Yes, going wide makes us more relaxed.' And we started to laugh about how we were relaxed authors. And then we got so many emails about it. I emailed you and said, ‘Hey, should we do The Relaxed Author?' So when I did email you and asked you, you already had a lot of books planned for this year. What were your feelings when I asked you that? When we're offered a project or we come up with a project, when should we say no? When should we go for it? Mark: Honestly, that's one of our chapters in the book. We talk about the importance of saying no because there are so many great ideas you have to say no to and so many opportunities. For example, you are very selective in not just going and speaking anywhere. It has to be something. Maybe you can tie in…well, post or pre-pandemic, travel to a place because you want to research it for a novel or something like that. But I think I remember saying, ‘We can have some easy listening music and smoking jackets and just go chill and relax.' But your listeners responded in a big way saying, ‘Oh, my, I need that book.' I had a lot of projects already. I had four other book projects between then and the end of the year that I had on my plate. And I'll always get all of them done. Some of them are up for pre-order already, which causes stress but also causes me to work better at it, which is part of how I work. I think what happened is when that came and you emailed me, I had already been chewing on it because I saw those comments on Twitter and went, ‘Yeah, you know what? I think a book like that would be needed. Wouldn't that be helpful?' But here's the thing, and I want to throw this question back at you, Jo, because I think we agreed on it actually. So I immediately thought, ‘This is a brilliant idea. We have to do this book.' So I was in 100%. Let's do this. How about you? How did you reply to that? Joanna: It was funny because I was also feeling this is a necessary topic before we even ca

The opportunities for creation and marketing in audio format continue to expand and the lines are blurring between audiobooks, podcasts and other forms of audio storytelling. In this episode, Sarah Werner talks about writing for audio first and the challenges of full-cast audio drama and podcast fiction. In the intro, problems with publishing distribution and supply chain for print books [Kris Rusch]; Reader Reach [Written Word Media]; Do authors need to advertise? [6 Figure Authors]; AI-narrated audio and NFTs from virtual Digital Book World sessions; AI 2041: 10 Visions for our Future by Kai-fu Lee and Chen Qiufan; all the future creativity episodes; The Relaxed Author out now; and my pics from the Wye Valley and the Forest of Dean @jfpennauthor. Today's show is sponsored by Audio for Authors: Audiobooks, Podcasting, and Voice Technologies. Do you want to create, publish and market your audiobooks? Are you ready to use podcasting to grow your author brand and reach more readers with your books? It's still early days for audio and opportunities are expanding all the time. This book will help you get started — or expand your audio reach. Available on all the usual platforms in all the usual formats (and yes, I narrated the audiobook!) Sarah Rhea Werner is a writer, professional speaker, and executive producer of Girl In Space, a multiple award-winning sci-fi mystery podcast, as well as the host of the Write Now podcast, and executive producer of fantasy audio drama Omen. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Switching from blogging to podcastingHow writing for audio differs from writing a bookDo different kinds of novels work better as audio drama?Is having a narrator an option for audio drama?Options for monetizing a podcast or audio dramaOn the potential for using AI voices for audio dramaFinding actors, sound effects and music, as well as important copyright issuesMarketing tips for podcasts and audio drama You can find Sarah Werner at SarahWerner.com and on Twitter @SarahRheaWerner or check out her Write Now Podcast. Transcript of Interview with Sarah Werner Joanna: Sarah Rhea Werner is a writer, professional speaker, and executive producer of Girl In Space, a multiple award-winning sci-fi mystery podcast, as well as the host of the Write Now podcast, and executive producer of fantasy audio drama Omen. Welcome, Sarah. Sarah: Hi. Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here. Joanna: It's so interesting to talk to you today. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing for audio? Sarah: I feel like I fell into it, like I've fallen into so many other things in my writing career. I started out as just a novelist, a writer, a blogger, and never really published anything, never really did anything with what I was writing for myself. I decided I wanted to start a blog that would help other writers. This was back in 2013, 2014. And so, I started this blog, and it was not getting any traction. At the time, I was working for a marketing company, a digital marketing company. A good friend there said, ‘Why don't you start podcasting?' And I was like, ‘I don't know. That sounds really intimidating. And it has a lot of dials and levers and stuff, and something I'm not really prepared for.' But eventually, I ended up experimenting with auto and I changed my blog into a nonfiction podcast called ‘Write Now.' I just really loved both the experience of speaking into a microphone. It felt so much more authentic, despite being a writer and despite identifying as a writer, it just felt better to speak than it did to write this blog. It also saw a lot more traction than my blog. I think that was partly due to the time, with there being a very saturated blog market, and back in 2014, 2015, not a ton of podcasts. So, then, after the success of the ‘Write Now' podcast, and given how much I enjoyed doing it, I was like, ‘Oh, man, what if I spoke a fictional story into my microphone? Oh, wait, maybe I should script it.‘ And so, I started just writing for audio, and turned some ideas that I had had floating around for a novel into the ‘Girl In Space' podcast. I started it as an experiment, just to see if it would be fun, if it would be viable. And when I launched the first episode, fortunately, it took off, and I was like, ‘Okay, I guess I'm going to write some more of these episodes.' And so really, I stumbled and flailed my way into it, and realized that I just really enjoyed it. Joanna: I like that you said you were intimidated, and then you gave it a try, and you enjoyed it. I feel like so many of the things, especially in this new world, with this tech, and you have to master a little bit of tech, but the main thing is, ‘Oh, I'm scared of it. And then I try it. And then I enjoy it.' And you don't know unless you try, do you? Sar

What are the different types of travel books and how can you blend them within the genre? How can we tackle our imposter syndrome when writing in a genre we love? Jeremy Bassetti explores these questions and more in today's show. In the intro, my 10-year author entrepreneur lessons learned; the different stages of an author business [Ask Alli]; London: A Personal History. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, where you can get free ebook formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Get your free Author Marketing Guide at www.draft2digital.com/penn Jeremy Bassetti is a travel writer, editor, teacher, and author of historical fiction. He's the host of two podcasts, Travel Writing World and Sonus Loci: The Sound of Place. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.  Show Notes What drives the human desire for travel?The different types of travel books. Jeremy has a great article on this: 10 Travel Book Sub-Genres with ExamplesIs an emotional journey necessary in a travel memoir?How nature writing and travel writing overlapPitfalls to watch out for in travel writingSensory descriptions that bring readers a richer experienceHow to deal with travel writer imposter syndrome — and how practice can help you break through it (and I have some personal reflections on this in the show introduction!) You can find Jeremy Bassetti at JeremyBassetti.com and on Twitter @jeremybassetti Transcript of Interview with Jeremy Bassetti Joanna: Jeremy Bassetti is a travel writer, editor, teacher, and author of historical fiction. He's the host of two podcasts, Travel Writing World and Sonus Loci: The Sound of Place. Welcome, Jeremy. Jeremy: Thank you for having me. I'm so happy to be here, Jo. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Jeremy: I'm a teacher and I've been doing academic research and writing for literally half of my life since university. My plan was always to turn my attention to creative writing, to creative nonfiction when I finished grad school. I always said that like I didn't want to be a secondary source. I wanted to be a primary source. I wanted to create the type of things that I was studying. But anyway, so that's what I did around 2015. I was studying and researching about the business and craft of writing in my free time and that's when I founded a podcast. I dabbled a little bit in self-publishing. I published a book, Denounced. It's a historical fiction set in Seville and Renaissance Spain. What I'm really interested in now is travel literature because I found out during the writing process of my historical fiction, I was drawing on a lot of my personal experiences living in Spain for that book and it dawned on me that this is a type of travel writing, I read and travel writing. This is what I'm interested in, that's my home. So I found my home in travel literature. That's where I belong. That's my story in a nutshell. Joanna: We met a couple of years ago at Podcast Movement and share this love of travel and with my Books and Travel, we share our podcasts. We're both working towards our own travel memoirs, but as we speak, the pandemic goes on and on. And we're both passionate about travel. You mentioned setting a bit there, but maybe go a bit deeper on that. What do you think drives our desire to travel and how can traveling help our writing regardless of genre? Jeremy: I think travel springs from deep within us, movement and migration are part of the human experience now. It's in our DNA. We have legs, right? We walk and I think the modern travel industry plays off these instincts a little bit. Movement is a necessity, people follow food, right? They follow the herds and maybe people move for spiritual or economic necessities and reasons, but I'm not sure that that's travel. When those needs are met, I think what drives our desire to travel is adventure, or curiosity, or boredom or marketing agencies or something like that. I can speak for myself here, but what drives me and my desire to travel was a little bit of curiosity and I think a little bit of restlessness. You talk about from time to time, Jo, about refilling the creative well. And like you, I think I need routine, but I also need to break away from the familiar because I need to be inspired, and traveling exposes us to new people and places and things. And I think it's cliché to say this, but travel can be transformative and inspirational. So you asked about how can this help with writing? People say write what you know. And I think that the curious traveler knows a little bit more. Travel can expose us to new ideas, and experiences, and settings, and situations, places, and character can renew our energy to write and live. So I think it's inspirational, transformative, and it exposes us to much more. Joanna: Let's get in

We all have different strengths as writers, but sometimes we don't know what they are. Or we get frustrated because we try to succeed at something that just won't work for our personality. In this interview, Becca Syme explains how our strengths can help us and how to ‘question the premise' whenever we face different career choices and varied writing advice. In the intro, 14 Reasons Agenting is Harder Now than 20 Years Ago [Kristin Nelson]; Salman Rushdie will release his novel on SubStack [The Guardian]; Tree of Life on special; Transience and Permanence on the Pilgrim's Way [Sacred Steps] This podcast is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, which helps authors self-publish and reach readers in global markets through the Kobo eco-system. You can also subscribe to the Kobo Writing Life podcast for interviews with successful indie authors. Becca Syme is an author, coach, and creator of the Better-Faster Academy. She is a USA Today bestselling author of small-town romance and cozy mystery and also writes the ‘Dear Writer' series of non-fiction books. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Lessons learned from burnoutWhy we need to be aware of how we spend energyQuestioning the premiseHow knowing our individual strengths can help us as writers. Becca and her team specialize in the Clifton Strengths assessment and coaching. You can also just do the assessment at Gallup, but it's not specifically for writers. [If you're interested, my top 5 strengths are Learner, Intellection, Strategic, Input, and Futuristic.] How Becca uses video for content marketing and prefers word of mouth to ads for her business. You can find Becca Syme at BetterFasterAcademy.com and on Twitter @beck_a_tron. Check out her QuitCast on YouTube. Transcript of Interview with Becca Syme Joanna: Becca Syme is an author, coach, and creator of the Better-Faster Academy. She is a USA Today bestselling author of small-town romance and cozy mystery, and also writes the ‘Dear Writer' series of non-fiction books. Welcome, Becca. Becca: Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here. Joanna: I'm looking forward to talking to you. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Becca: I've been one of those people who wanted to write my whole life. But I actually got into writing romance specifically because I was a reader. Because I loved reading and I loved the stories and the characters. So I definitely came to writing from a love of reading and then realized just how much I actually love the process. Beginning to end, I just love the process of writing books. And so I started full time in 2012, 2013, and then just never looked back. I really love it. Joanna: Did you have a previous career? Becca: I did. What I'm doing now in terms of I write fiction and nonfiction. The nonfiction is really aligned with what I used to do. Which is a combination of strategic leadership development, consulting, or leadership in nonprofits. My background is very much in what I'm currently doing with writers, which is success alignment and strengths coaching. We use the CliftonStrengths program. I've been a certified CliftonStrengths coach for almost 16 years now. That's definitely what I loved doing before I was writing, and then I fell into doing it with writers after I became a fiction writer because there was so much need for people to understand how and why they're successful. It's not something that's innate for a lot of us and so I found that there was a big need for that, and fell into that second career after also having been a fiction writer. Joanna: I've read a number of your books. And in Dear Writer, You Need to Quit. Which, it's a very provocative title… Becca: Right. Joanna: …which I'm sure you designed on purpose! But I think it's very interesting. And, of course, you go through a number of different things that writers should think about quitting. But you talk about how you burned out. Can you talk about that experience of burnout and how you got through that process in order to change things? Becca: The way that I burned out initially, I was an executive director at a nonprofit at a very young age and I didn't understand that there was an end to energy. I didn't understand that you couldn't just keep overworking. I think a lot of us are like that. We learn about burnout from having burned out. What I realized through that experience, the initial burnout that I went through which was very devastating. I was not able to, really, even get up off the floor out of bed. It was a very, very thorough burnout. But what I learned was that there is an end to how much energy I can expend. And if I'm not cautious about how I expend energy over time, that I'm going to end up right back there. Because, of course, I burned out again in 2013. There is absolutely a learning curve to burnou

How can you design a story that branches into multiple directions? How does writing for games help with writing a novel? Ed McRae explains narrative design and the opportunities for writers in the gaming industry. In the intro, ‘the inevitable decline of open platforms' [Seth Godin]; pros and cons of different print distribution models [Adam Croft; ALLi]; Canterbury: A History of England Written in Stone. Do you need help with editing and cover design, marketing, or translations? Find a curated list of vetted professionals at the Reedsy marketplace, along with free training on writing, self-publishing, and book marketing. Check it out at: www.TheCreativePenn.com/reedsy Edwin McRae is a freelance narrative designer for the games industry. He's also a game design teacher, and writer of nonfiction for authors, including Narrative Design for Writers. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What is narrative design in video games?Why is gaming important to the entertainment industry?How writing for games differs from writing a linear bookCreating many options for story beats and character actionsWriting like a readerThe skills needed to break into different areas of writing for gamesThe increased opportunities for writers with gaming, AI, VR and AR You can find Edwin McRae at EdMcRae.com and on Twitter @edmcraewriter Transcript of Interview with Edwin McRae Joanna: Edwin McRae is a freelance narrative designer for the games industry. He's also a game design teacher, and writer of nonfiction for authors, including Narrative Design for Writers. Welcome, Edwin. Edwin: Kia ora Joanna, and tena koutou to your audience. It's really cool to be here. Joanna: You should probably just explain that. Edwin: I just said, basically, ‘Hello,' and ‘Hello everyone,' in Maori. Joanna: It's because you're in New Zealand, right? Edwin: Exactly. Joanna: Just so everybody knows. Edwin: Yeah, it's quite nice. A lot of people here we try to use Te Reo, which is Te Reo Maori, in everyday conversation as much as possible these days. So, we're all gradually becoming bilingual. Joanna: Interesting. Tell us a bit more about how you got into writing and what your job actually is like. What is narrative design? Edwin: I'll start with the second part of that question, to discuss where I've got to. Narrative design is effectively the design of story elements that then go into video games. I steer away from the general term of writing for video games, because often within the industry, the games industry, writing gets siloed into things like dialogue and flavor text. And the player-facing material that you would see in a video game. Whereas narrative design, there's a lot more behind the scenes than that, creating the story experience for a video game, which I'm happy to elaborate on more what a story experience for a video game is. I started out writing a novel, pitched that around, almost got picked up by HarperCollins at one point, but to no avail. And then shifted to doing theater for a while, and then studied screenwriting for film. And then on that course, which is at Victoria University in Wellington, I managed to get a work placement on New Zealand's soap opera, ‘Shortland Street.' I ended up as a storyliner and script writer there for four years, which taught me a lot about churning out a lot of story and the best practices for that kind of fast-paced storytelling. And then I got to the end of my tenure with writing for soap opera, I wanted to do other things. I started to hang out with some game developers in Auckland at the time, at a game developers meetup, met the guys at Grinding Gear Games who make the game ‘Path of Exile.' They Facebook messaged me one day and said, ‘Hey, do you want to try writing some dialogue for us?' And then that kind of, the rest is history. Joanna: It's so interesting. You've done lots of different types of writing, obviously. But I wonder if you would also maybe start by giving us more of an overview of the gaming industry, because I feel like there's a lot of misconceptions. I'm 46, and a lot of the gaming I know would have been the really old games that were around 20 years ago when I watched my brother play things. But gaming is such a huge industry now compared to the author industry which is also part of entertainment, we're all part of that. Why is gaming so important in the entertainment industry? Give us an overview. Edwin: It's certainly become a large industry. It has eclipsed cinema as an industry. I was looking a few things up, I think cinema is around $110 billion, games are around $150 billion as an industry internationally, which you compare that to books. Publishing still sits around over $200 billion, but of that, books I think are around the $120 billion mark. I would see games as a platform being as large as the

Writing can help us process trauma — whatever that means for you — as well as help others through our words. In this episode, David Chrisinger explains why stories can save us. In the intro, thoughts on print distribution [Jane Friedman]; Hachette's acquisition of Workman and why backlist is key [The New Publishing Standard]; Your Author Business Plan; The Magic Bakery. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with Scrivener, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna. David Chrisinger is an award-winning nonfiction author and teaches writing at the University of Chicago. His latest book is Stories Are What Save Us: A Survivor's Guide to Writing About Trauma. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What is trauma and how is it different for different people?How to write about trauma without suffering furtherIs it possible to write a factual memoir?Tips for creating space between you and the ‘character’ you are writing aboutHow do we deal with people who might be hurt by what we write? You can find David Chrisinger at DavidChrisinger.com and on Twitter @StrongerAtBP Transcript of interview with David Chrisinger Joanna: David Chrisinger is an award-winning nonfiction author and teaches writing at the University of Chicago. His latest book is Stories Are What Save Us: A Survivor's Guide to Writing About Trauma. Welcome, David. David: Thank you so much for having me. Joanna: It's great to have you on the show. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. David: I sometimes joke that I'm about a million miles from where I thought I was going to be when I started college because I went to college initially to be either a wildlife or a forest manager. And I even got certified to fight wildlife and forest fires. For whatever reason, I realized halfway through that, it was more of an interest or a hobby, it wasn't really a passion. And there were so many students that I was in classes with who I knew I was going to have to compete someday for a job and they were going to win. And so, I tried to think of, well, what do I think I can be the best at? What can I put everything into? I settled on art and history. So, I did 3D art and focused on modern American and European history, and wrote lots of papers, obviously, in college. And it was my sophomore year that I took a historical methods course, actually doing historical research. And that's where I think I really caught the writing bug. I started to see history as this story that people told that was based on evidence, and interviews, and dozens of other kinds of records. And it was a way of people making sense of something. And there was just something about that, that really connected with me. And so I decided I wanted to be a history professor. I graduated from college as the great recession was starting. And it turned out to be a pretty bad year to apply to graduate programs. I got in to the University of Chicago. I did my Master's degree and then had a heart-to-heart with an advisor who said I think the academic job market's not coming back and you should really think of doing something else. I had no plan B. But he suggested I start looking for jobs in the federal government, maybe in public policy. A lot of social science folks end up in that sort of route. And that's what landed me at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, which is basically the research department, the evaluation department for Congress, and wrote a lot of reports and testimonies and had to really learn how to connect with an audience, with a reader that doesn't have the same expertise or the same experience that the researchers have. And I started doing my own writing. It's been a very serendipitous journey to writing, and not something I intended to do from an early age. Joanna: I think that's fascinating. And it's interesting because you mentioned history as a story. And I guess that's also what we're talking about in terms of what survivor means, and what trauma means, and what our writing is because when we write our writing's only ever from one perspective, but as you say, we are connecting with an audience. I can see how your various interests have come together, which is fascinating. Let's get into the topic of the book because I think the word trauma, particularly at this time in history, is quite a difficult word. When people say trauma, it has very, very heavy connotations, maybe a very bad injury or experience of war. What is trauma? How can the experience of what is traumatic differ between people, especially in these times? Davi

If you write fiction in any genre, you need to build your world. Whether it's the cozy coffee shop in your romance, or a complete fantasy world, or a post-apocalyptic wasteland, world-building can strengthen your plot and bring depth and conflict to your characters. Angeline Trevena gives plenty of tips in this episode. In the intro, the inevitability of unlimited subscription [The New Publishing Standard]; Scarlett Johansson vs Disney [BBC]; Notes from a small London publisher [Publishing Perspectives]; the rise in ecommerce and opportunities for authors [Kris Writes]; my tutorial on selling direct; Continued difficulty in writing during the pandemic [@writermels on Twitter] Today's podcast sponsor is Findaway Voices, which gives you access to the world's largest network of audiobook sellers and everything you need to create and sell professional audiobooks. Take back your freedom. Choose your price, choose how you sell, choose how you distribute audio. Check it out at FindawayVoices.com. Angeline Trevena is the author of urban fantasy and dystopian fiction, as well as nonfiction for authors. She's the co-host of the Unstoppable Authors podcast and organizes events for authors. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Different types of world-building Ideas for how to build different worlds Creating cultures and characters that make good stories The importance in a culture for the potential for conflict Guidelines to follow when creating a magic system The three things world building needs to achieve in a book Tips on the use of maps and where to find map illustrators or learn how to DIY Mistakes to avoid when world building How to backwards engineer an apocalypse You can find Angeline Trevena at AngelineTrevena.co.uk and on Twitter @AngelineTrevena Transcript of interview with Angeline Trevena Joanna: Angeline Trevena is the author of urban fantasy and dystopian fiction, as well as nonfiction for authors. She's the co-host of the ‘Unstoppable Authors' podcast, and organizes events for authors. Welcome to the show, Angeline. Angeline: Thank you very much for having me. Joanna: I'm excited to talk to you today on the topic of world-building, which we're going to get into. Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing. Angeline: I'm one of those people who has been writing stories since they were old enough to hold a pen, really. But it was never my dream. It wasn't my childhood dream to be an author. I always wanted to act, so my whole childhood was spent doing theater and singing lessons and dance lessons. Then went to university, and I did a degree in drama and writing, and about halfway through my first year, I realized that I hugely preferred the writing side to the theater side. It was a really strange moment to do that, because my whole life to that point had been so focused on theater, so it was like setting aside my entire being, and focusing on something else. I graduated university back in 2003, so the first Kindle wouldn't even come out for a good few years yet. So, being published, being an author was sort of pipe dream territory, and I never would have ever imagined that I would end up doing it for my job, for my living. When I finished uni, I started out writing short horror stories and submitting them to anthologies that were put out by small presses, so that's where I started out. And in about 2012, 2013, it would have been, I said to my writing group that I was a member of, I said, ‘Why don't we self-publish our own anthology of short stories together?' They actually turned around and laughed at me. They actually laughed because back then, it was still quite widely thought that self-publishing was still the last desperate attempt of someone who couldn't get a publishing deal. Joanna: And also, you're in England, right? Angeline: Yes. Joanna: Which I think is definitely, much, much worse. I moved back to England in 2011. 2012 was the first year I felt like, oh, maybe things are changing, but definitely, England was well behind the U.S. and Australia in terms of acceptance of indies. Angeline: Yeah. Luckily, I didn't let it deter me. I walked away from that conversation, and it made me think, ‘Do you know what? I'll show you. I'll show you.' And so, I self-published my first book in 2015. I actually hand-coded the ebook. It was really important to me that I learn how to do everything. So I hand-coded this ebook, because there weren't all the fancy programs that you get now. Now, all these years later, I have 18 books out, and I make my living out of being an author. So I'm pretty sure I showed them. I think I proved my point. Joanna: Well, what's funny though, is you probably didn't show them with that first book! Angeline: Oh, no. Joanna: That's the truth of it and it's probably the truth of most careers, you're just like, ‘Wel

Web 2.0 enabled the digital revolution that transformed the possibilities for authors and creators, so how will Web 3.0 transform it again over the next decade? This is a special futurist in-betweenisode on what many are calling Web 3.0 which encompasses virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), the metaverse, and the spatial web. It’s intended to give you an awareness of what’s coming as opposed to specific advice on what to do about it since this really is an emerging area.  Thanks to my patrons whose support enables me to do these special extra episodes. If you find this useful, please consider supporting the show at patreon.com/thecreativepenn or BuyMeACoffee.com/thecreativepenn  You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Definitions of AR, VR, Web 3.0, the metaverse, and the spatial webVirtual worlds and augmented reality for authors and publishing — Chapter 5 from Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain and Virtual Worlds: The Impact of Converging Technologies on Authors and the Publishing IndustryDevelopments since December 2020 — and the potential opportunities for authors and publishing in the next few yearsWhat you can do now to prepare Recommended books and resources You can find more of my future of publishing episodes here. Definitions of AR, VR, Web 3.0, the metaverse, and the spatial web AR (Augmented Reality) — AR layers digital over physical reality and this is already available in limited ways through your phone. For example, you might have played with filters on social media changing the color of your hair, or adding ears or other features.  AR hair and makeup filters will make it SOOOOOO much easier to do video! IKEA has an app that will place furniture in your house. Just choose the furniture, hold up your phone and you can see it in your living room.  There is a 3D option within Google Maps where it will layer directions over the real world, pointing you in the right direction.  Google Maps 3D overlays directions on top of the real world You can also use Google real-time translation. Open the Google app and use Google Lens. Choose the Translate option and hold the camera over some text in another language. Here’s one of my ebooks in French which you can see translated in real-time. translation in google lens. the formatting isn't great but the meaning is clear AR applications can be accessed through mobile devices with cameras and also wearables like glasses or even contact lenses in coming years. This is already being used at the enterprise level with devices like Microsoft Hololens in manufacturing, healthcare and education. VR (Virtual Reality) — VR is about immersing yourself in a fully virtual world. The real world disappears. Think Ready Player One, which is a great movie even if you haven’t read the book. This is the experience economy where gaming and entertainment are taken to a new level, but it’s also a virtual space for commerce, networking, training, travel, and more. VR is currently accessed through headsets like Facebook’s Oculus, HTC Vive,  You might also hear terms like mixed reality or extended reality, where the lines between AR and VR are blended.  The Metaverse Neal Stephenson first came up with this term in his 1992 novel, Snow Crash, and it encompasses both physical and digital worlds. It won’t be a single place run by one specific company. It’s more like ‘the internet,’ a term that encompasses so much. It will be accessed and experienced through AR and VR devices, rather than just 2D screens. Venture capitalist Matthew Ball describes the metaverse not as a virtual world or a space, but as “a sort of successor state to the mobile internet” — a framework for an extremely connected life. There “will be no clean ‘Before Metaverse’ and ‘After Metaverse.' Instead, it will slowly emerge over time as different products, services and capabilities integrate and meld together.” Web 3.0 Web 1.0 (around 1991 – 2005) consisted of mainly static websites on desktops and laptops. It was expensive to create a site and so only big companies had them and they were mainly for pushing information or as replacing things like the Yellow Pages for finding things.  Web 2.0 is social and mobile and characterised by an explosion of digital creation though blogging, podcasting, social media, video, comments, digital publishing and digital commerce. The cost of creation basically went to zero and everyone with a mobile device and/or access to the internet could have an online presence. Facebook launched in 2004 and Twitter in 2006. The iPhone and the Kindle were both launched in 2007, which is when web 2.0 really took off.  Web 3.0 is the next stage and we are in the early stages now, kind of like the years 2004-2006 when early adopters began blogging, way before it went mainstream. Web 3.0 is about exponential con

Taking the long-term view plus taking advantage of new marketing tactics can help you sell more books, as Karen Inglis talks about in this interview. In the intro, Pearson launches a subscription app [The Bookseller]; A+ content could help you sell more books [The Hotsheet]; Takeaways from Podcast Movement 2021 around the audio eco-system and Facebook for Podcasts. Plus, new free video series on book marketing from Nick Stephenson, and Ask an Adventurer by Alastair Humphreys. Today's show is sponsored by IngramSpark, which I use to print and distribute my print-on-demand books to 39,000 retailers including independent bookstores, schools and universities, libraries and more. It's your content–do more with it through IngramSpark.com. Karen Inglis is the best-selling author of books for children, including The Secret Lake, Eeek! The Runaway Alien and The Tell-Me Tree. Her book for authors, How to Self-Publish and Market a Children's Book has recently been released as a second edition. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Writing children's books across different age groupsSales split between print and ebookQuality of picture books from POD suppliers and when it's worth doing a print runSelling local. Schools, bookstores, and librariesHow marketing children’s books has changedWhy experimenting with ads is keyLicensing foreign rightsThe long-term view of success You can find Karen Inglis at SelfPublishingAdventures.com and on Twitter @kareninglis Transcript of Interview with Karen Inglis Joanna: Karen Inglis is the best-selling author of books for children, including The Secret Lake, Eeek! The Runaway Alien and The Tell-Me Tree. Her book for authors, How to Self-Publish and Market a Children's Book has recently been released as a second edition. Welcome back to the show, Karen. Karen: Oh, thank you for having me again, Joanna. It's lovely to be here. Joanna: Now, you were last on the show in 2018. And since then, of course, you've written more books. Give us an overview as to what books you have now and also what age groups because I know that's always important for the children's market. Karen: In terms of new books beyond those I have already, of course, I've got my picture books, the original ones, Ferdinand Fox picture books. But I now have two new picture books since we last spoke. I have The Christmas Tree Wish, which is for ages three to six, three to five, and The Tell-Me Tree. The Christmas Tree Wish came out in 2019, so probably a year or so after we spoke. And then The Tell-Me Tree came out last summer. Beyond that, I have brought out German versions of The Secret Lake, French and German versions of The Christmas Tree Wish and The Tell-Me Tree. And then, of course, my big nonfiction book. And then beyond that, of course, I've still got my chapter book, Eeek! The Runaway Alien for ages 7 to 10. I've got Henry Haynes and The Great Escape for ages six to eight, and The Secret Lake and Walter Brown. This is of ages 8 to 11. Joanna: It's a really interesting spread. Karen: I know. I can say it's by accident rather than design. Joanna: It's good you're taking them through from 3 till 11. There are lots of options as the kids grow. Karen: Exactly. And I always say that just comes because my stories come to me rather than me deciding I'm going to write a book for a certain age. It's always something I hear or see that then triggers the book. The Christmas Tree Wish, the one that came out the year after you last interviewed me, the idea, I'd seen a tree on valance green several years earlier and I knew I wanted to write a story about it, but I was waiting. And then suddenly I overheard a conversation that suddenly made me realize what the story would be. And likewise with The Tell-Me Tree a very similar story. So, I never know what's coming next. Joanna: What has changed for children's authors in terms of publishing options since the last edition of your nonfiction book? So, for example, is digital any bigger or is still print as dominant? And anything on audio as well because I think that might be something that might have changed. Karen: I would say that in terms of publishing options, and what sells, print is still dominant. It still makes up 95% of my sales and of most middle-grade authors I know, but there's one or two exceptions. And there was a slight increase in digital during the pandemic particularly the early part. I certainly saw that, and again, other authors I know saw that, but it has dropped back again to the usual split, for the most part. I'd say the only exception to that might be if somebody is writing for sort of somewhere that's middle grade, but slightly touching on young adult. So, maybe you might sell a little bit more digitally then. Audio uptake, I think, it's the same for children's books as it is across the board. It is on the i

What has changed in publishing over the last decade? How can a reputable author services company help you achieve your publishing goals? In this interview with John Bond from White Fox, we discuss aspects of the publishing journey. If you are considering working with an author services company or publishing partner, check whether they are a Partner Member of the Alliance of Independent Authors and whether the ALLi Watchdog service rates them well. You can also check for scams and bad companies at Writer Beware. John Bond is the CEO of White Fox, a premium publishing and book marketing partner for industry leaders, writers, and brands based in the UK and U.S. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes What’s changed in the decade since John started White Fox How the pandemic has accelerated changes in publishing How attitudes toward independent creatives have changed in the last decade Crowdfunding for special limited edition book projects How to find a quality publishing partner and avoid getting scammed You can find John Bond at wearewhitefox.com — or if you want to support the podcast, please use TheCreativePenn.com/whitefox or tell him I sent you! You can also find him on Twitter @wearewhitefox Transcript of interview with John Bond Joanna Penn: John Bond is the CEO of whitefox, a premium publishing and book marketing partner for industry leaders, writers, and brands based in the UK and U.S. Welcome, John. John Bond: Hello, Joanna, how are you? Joanna Penn: I'm excited to talk to you today. So let's start. Tell us a bit more about you and your publishing journey. John Bond: I started, I guess in a bookshop. That was the beginning, a bookshop in North London. I ended up applying for and getting a job as you did in those days as a marketing manager at Penguin, as it was then, now Penguin Random House, in the early 1990s. I had three interviews for that job. The last one of which was two questions. What are you reading? And do you play golf? So I think that probably says more about that period of publishing. Joanna Penn: Publishing history, indeed! John Bond: I ended up being marketing director there and then I went to HarperCollins in the UK and ran sales and marketing there. I ended up running their literary fiction and non-fiction division, including Fourth Estate. I left HarperCollins in the UK in 2011 and set up White Fox early in 2012 with one of my colleagues from HarperCollins, Annabel Wright. We started working in a cafe in East London with two laptops and trying to organize a diaspora of freelancers around the world. That was the beginning. Joanna Penn: Obviously, a lot has changed since 2012. That actually seems pretty prescient when you started because it really was the beginning of a lot of technological changes that enabled digital publishing. What are the major changes that you've seen in the industry since you started almost a decade ago? And what might've accelerated in the last 18 months due to the pandemic? John Bond: I think that's exactly right. I think everything that was changing has just sped up in the last 18 months. We definitely, started really primarily providing project management services for traditional publishers. What's happened is we've gradually developed much more of a business working with individuals and companies and brands who want to do their own thing. They want to have more creative control over their publishing. They want to make something happen in 3 to 6 months rather than a year to 18 months. All those things have really accelerated during the pandemic; the migration to online sales versus bricks and mortar retailers, people really wanting to understand what moves the dial on marketing that they can do themselves. And the pandemic we found, at a time when so much was out of people's control in terms of their life, writing something, publishing something, starting something, finishing something, finding readers was something that people could do. And we could work remotely with those people. We weren't in an office, we were all in our homes. And seeing people developing their writing and their businesses around their writing was amazing and inspiring, actually. Joanna Penn: You mentioned the diaspora of freelancers and I wondered, you mentioned Penguin before PRH, you mentioned HarperCollins, obviously, there's the Simon & Schuster acquisition which is happening. Have you seen a lot more freelancers coming out of traditional publishing and moving into servicing the independent community? John Bond: Yes. And I think that's also happened in the last 18 months. People who have decided that they quite like their lifestyle, a portfolio lifestyle at home working with people like us who can represent a pipeline of work, but that work actually ends up being quite varied. I think for many people, it's more interesting. And I think there's

How can you rediscover your creative free spirit if you're feeling burned out? How can you combine creativity, spirituality and money to experience more in your author life? Peleg Top talks about these things and more in today's interview. In the intro, adding A+ content to your Amazon book pages; Audible launches Premium Plus in the UK [The Bookseller]; and Audiblegate goes on. Shopify introduces NFTs [TechCrunch], Jeanette Winterson's 12 Bytes; and A Mid-Life Journey through US National Parks. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, where you can get free ebook formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Get your free Author Marketing Guide at www.draft2digital.com/penn Peleg Top is an artist and a coach, living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He serves the accomplished creative community with workshops and retreats, as well as his transformational course, 100 Days of Creative High Growth. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Pivoting to a new type of creative work after burnoutSearching for our creative free spiritThe importance of expanding, moving forward, and taking risksFacing fear when making a big changeAdvice for those creatives who feel stagnantThe importance of creating just for the joy of itBringing creativity to the flow of money You can find Peleg Top at PelegTop.com and on Twitter @pelegtop Transcript of interview with Peleg Top Joanna: Peleg Top is an artist and a coach, living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He serves the accomplished creative community with workshops and retreats, as well as his transformational course, ‘100 Days of Creative High Growth.' Welcome to the show, Peleg. Peleg: Thank you. Good to be here. Joanna: I'm so excited to talk to you, and several of my close creative friends are your clients, and so I'm very excited about today. Peleg: Me too. Thanks for having me. Joanna: We're going back in time a bit. You had this incredibly successful career building one of LA's leading creative agencies, and you served clients in the music and entertainment industry; pretty sexy stuff, to be honest. What made you pivot from what many would consider the height of creative business success? Peleg: It's an interesting story because it wasn't anything that actually made me pivot, but it was really an organic process that came about. I was a creative professional from, gosh, right out of high school, and I became an in-house designer, and then a freelancer, and then opened my own agency, and did that for 20 years. In the beginning, it was just amazing, because design was such a passion of mine, and I loved doing the work. I was one of those odd creatives that had a passion for the business side and the marketing side as well. To me, that was a big part of the creative process as well, so it helped grow the business, to the point of becoming really successful. But somewhere along the line, after about 15 or so years of working as a creative, I started getting burnt out. I started feeling like it's the same thing over and over again. And I didn't really feel as challenged anymore. Over time, I started caring less about the work. And I found myself in this place that, now, looking back, it was a bit of a spiritual crisis, because my whole identity was so wrapped up around being a designer and running an agency that, when that all of a sudden didn't satisfy me, satisfy my soul, my reason for waking up in the morning, I felt lost. The pivot really began when I started noticing that this isn't working for me anymore. I'm not really excited about this work anymore. And it became a process of shifting into something new. But it wasn't something that was so clear in the beginning as far as what I wanted to do. So, to answer your question, the pivot was a process that started with a lot of fear and anxiety, and lack of clarity, but became more of a new path to walk on after I took the time to actually do the inner work that I needed to do to get back in touch with something inside of me that I'm excited about. Joanna: That resonates with me a lot. And I think a lot of writers are burned out from doing the same thing over and over again. We see this in the writing community, with this need to create ever more product, books, and what might start out as the book of your heart or the thing you really want to write, and then once you've written that, or once, as you did, you've created that design, and then it becomes more like work. And work is great. We love work. You mentioned the process of discovery and not really knowing where to go. How did you find where to go? I feel like a lot of people would love to pivot, but the process of doing that, does it take years? I know you enrolled in chef school. You did some practical things. Does it take all this deeper, meaningful work in order to pivot? Peleg: That was part of the journ

How do you know when the seed of an idea is enough for a novel? What makes literary fiction different from other genres? Roz Morris shares her writing process from idea to the publication of Ever Rest. In the intro, my experience of COVID, my interview on Story of a Storyteller, and A Mouthful of Air poetry podcast. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with Scrivener, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 25% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna. Roz Morris is a best-selling author as a ghost writer and an award nominated author with her own literary novels. She writes writing craft books for authors under the Nail Your Novel brand, and is also an editor, speaker, and writing coach. Today, we're talking about writing literary fiction and Roz's latest novel, Ever Rest. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes The difference between literary fiction and genre fictionHow to know when an idea is right for exploring in literary fictionHow Roz incorporates music into her writing processResearch and preparation before the writing beginsRevising a book the way music is mixedGiving a novel space to breathe while it is evolvingHow do you design a book cover that doesn’t fit into a genre? You can find Roz Morris at RozMorris.org and on Twitter @Roz_Morris Transcription of interview with Roz Morris Joanna: Roz Morris is a best-selling author as a ghost writer and an award nominated author with her own literary novels. She writes writing craft books for authors under the Nail Your Novel brand, and is also an editor, speaker, and writing coach. Today, we're talking about writing literary fiction and Roz's latest novel, Ever Rest. Welcome back to the show, Roz. Roz: Hi, Jo. It's great to be back again. I love these shows. Joanna: We've literally been doing these on and off for over a decade now. You're one of the regulars on the show. I'm excited to talk about this. So, as I said, you've been on the show a lot. People can go back and listen to your history, so we're just going to dive into the topic. I wanted to start with a definition. What is literary fiction as compared to genre fiction? And why is it such an emotional question? Roz: Usually literary fiction is bigger than just the story and the characters. There's usually a sense of universality. The writing is often more nuanced than…maybe sometimes poetic than genre fiction, if we're comparing with the genre fiction. And if we are comparing it with genre fiction, it might not conform to genre tropes. So if you've got a murder in your book, for instance, in certain kinds of genres it's very clear what must happen about that murder. In a cozy mystery, it's got to go a certain way. It's all got to be solved and it's got to be put right. In something much darker, it might end with a much darker, more uncertain note. But usually, it would be very clear for each genre what has to happen about that murder. In literary fiction, almost anything goes. The murder might not be solved at all. And solving murder won't necessarily be the point. It will be something else. So literary fiction doesn't really conform to many genre tropes. However, this is where it gets quite fuzzy, genre novels might have certain literary qualities. And I think it has a continuum. Each writer might be very genre or very literary or somewhere along the whole rainbow that goes through the middle. I suppose you could say literary tends to be bigger, deeper, perhaps more mining for individual truths, more enigmatic than just being about the plot and the characters. And it's an emotional question, as you say, and I think that's because there are all sorts of issues that people might have with literary fiction or non-literary fiction. There's a sense of superiority sometimes one over the other that literature is worthwhile and other kinds of books are ‘entertainment.' You can hear the air quotes in my voice there. And indeed, you have to think about what entertainment is. These ideas changed drastically over the years anyway. In certain academic circles, Charles Dickens was not taught as literature because he was an entertainer. So tastes change all the time. It really depends what you like.. Another example is that, again, if you talk to literary people about plot, they think that's an absolutely filthy word. And, in fact, some very literary writing courses, I was talking to somebody I'm helping with her novel. She said she's never taught about structure and pace, and she's been on numerous writing courses. There is just very different values, I think, between certain factions of the writing world. But really, as f