Writers can be shy and retiring types of people, who humbly sit at home, tapping or writing out the words that express whatever it is they feel compelled to express. The writing is the point of who they feel themselves to be, they are writers, they write.
But when you have words that have come together to form a book, and that book is published, then comes a completely other stage of the process, the marketing stage … These days, the writers who sell their books are those who can also to at least a reasonable job of selling themselves.
This may be simple talking about their books, to interested people, whether individually, or in group situations. Or in might be on the radio, or even television. These things can be more than the writer first thought they’d have to do …
The good writer needs to be a good presenter to, to give their words the best boost possible, and attract the interest of possible book buyers … It is a learning curve I’m doing my best to get my focus on, and tomorrow, I’m going to be getting the word out about one of my books.
That book is the memoir I wrote after I was diagnosed in 2010 with Multiple Sclerosis “Mick Jane and Me – Living Will With MS”. Tomorrow, at the Gawler Poets at the Pub Poetry reading event (2-4pm Prince Albert Hotel Gawler South Australia). I will have a time when I can do my stuff and read from that book, in the best way I can, and also talk about my life with MS.
My Book, cover photo by Martin Christmas
This event will also be a fundraising event for the MS Society SA and NT, as well as an awareness raising event. MS is a widely varied disease, with different people have a variety of different symptoms. Some with MS have a lot of pain, most have numb, and/or tingling hands and legs. Some have blindness of various levels, continence problems can occur for some, balance problems leading to falls are common, muscle weakness can be common as well.
Find out more about it the fundraising event here.
Some of those things are part of what I have, or have had, or possible may have in the future, I don’t know … But apart from my most recent fall, (OUCH) I’m doing well. I went for a walk with my husband and our dog this morning, and was able to easily keep up with them both.
Anyway, tomorrow I will be dressed up, wearing red for a reason (raising awareness of Multiple Sclerosis), reading from my book, and I hope, helping to raise money, and getting new orders for a copy of this book!
I’ll have copies of my other books there too, so who knows whether I will get any sales? Doing my part in this fundraising and talking about Multiple Sclerosis, these are the main things for the afternoon for me. Book sales are always nice though!
Writing left in a drawer, or a laptop or computer, and never shared is fine, if a person is happy enough with that. But for me, sharing my words is one of the main reasons why I write.
This is why I am enjoying my newly joined writing platform, Medium.com, where I have been able to share new things I’ve written, but also found a place for some of my much older pieces of writing.
The piece in the link about, is one such thing, and I am glad to have found this new option for my words. The knowledge about this site came from one of my writing group friends, and I’ve certainly seen the good things that can come from sharing ideas with others!
A few years ago I had what I considered to be a great idea. I was going to write a book titled ‘Wise Words’ filled with my own words, ones I considered to be particularly wise ones. I kept that little book in a file on my laptop, and it stayed there, doing absolutely nothing …
I’d pretty well written off the idea of doing anything more with those words, but then, oh glorious time, then I came up with the idea of breaking that small book into a serious of articles, and began posting these articles to a new (for me) writing platform, Medium.com. So at the moment, I’m about halfway through posting these, not rushing it, and doing other things, both writing related, and other things.
This new platform is a global one, and even though at the moment, I’ve only been here for a week or so, I’m enjoying learning more about what it is, and how it works. I’m not expecting to make huge amounts of money there, but that file on my laptop, doing nothing, was never going to make any money at all. And of course, the sharing of my words is more important to me than making any money.
So even though this will not be a huge money-making thing, in fact it will be lucky if I make more than a single dollar in April, my first month of placing my work here, at least I can see how many people are reading my work, and that’s a good thing!
above is a link to that most recent piece from ‘Wise Words’ – why not take a look, and explore the platform, It may appeal to you as well! Leave a comment there, and one here too if you want to, I’d love to know how you feel about my ‘wise words’ and about that writing platform too!
Words shared with others will always be better than words rotting away on a laptop, never looked at again …
What is a writer? A writer is a person who writes, right? Yes it is that simple, as far as I’m concerned. Whether or not you are a person who shares their words, if you write, then you could legitimately be called a writer, whether or not you accept the title.
What does that mean? Does a writer have to do anything in particular, if they are a writer? Some writers use their words to simply make themselves happier, or calmer – more healed perhaps. Other people write with groups of others with the some interest in writing. Some writers prefer poetry, others prose, but most writers have a love for the written word, even though the writing can be frustrating at times.
So poetry and prose, are two options to think on, and further to those two are the questions of print or online, spoken or in a book, for money or for the love of the word. Some writers never ever share their written words with another person, and may die, leaving many unshared words to be discovered later, or perhaps never found, and who knows what treasures may be lost to humanity though not non-sharing …
But the main point of this post is to look at my own options, because of course they are the ones I know the best. I am a writer, who writes prose and poetry, and have books published in both of these genres. I love poetry, but prose is has a great interest to me in my life, particularly in my role as the editor of the Mallala Crossroad Chronicle, a monthly newsletter for the town on Mallala and beyond, that is available as a hard copy, and online, here.
photo by author – a recent issue of the newsletter I edit.
I enjoy putting this newsletter out every month, and am glad to have a small team of others who either provide me with words they have written themselves, or with material from other sources for me to use. It leads to a lovely range of different and interesting reading material.
I also have some published books, eight so far, with several in various stages of ‘being worked on’. There is a possible chapbook of poems and a little prose perhaps, based on my recent sprained forearm. And there is the long-suffering Cosy Murder Mystery I tell myself I should be writing, constantly, and usually ignore my nagging, although I do write tiny new pieces for that, every now and then.
photo by author – some of my published books
I also have a poetry collection I have just submitted to a publisher, and I’m waiting to hear whether or not they wish to publish it. I hope they do, obviously, but if they don’t want to, there are other options for publication. More importantly is an exciting book I’ve been working on, an anthology of writing, I called for submissions on last year. The submission process has closed now, and I have put it at all together into an anthology, that will be printed soon, and launched in late July, during the Gawler and Adelaide Plains Festival of Words (Recovery).
This will be the biggest most important piece of work I’ve edited I think, with some of the people involved in this project calling it a historically important book. I’m definitely looking forward to sharing the wonderful words I’ve received, and sharing the book with all of the contributors and then others who wish to purchase their own copy.
Of course, I have other writing related things I do as well. I’m involved in the Gawler Poets at the Pub monthly event, which involves a writing related workshop first (sometimes) and then a poetry reading with poets from around coming to the Prince Albert Hotel on the last Sunday of the month, to share their poetry, by reading it to the audience. Fun times there, for sure!
I’m also getting more into the idea of being a public speaker, talking about my writing, reading from my works and doing writing workshops with groups of people. My most recent event was attending an aged care facility, where I read some of my poetry to the group present, and then we all worked hard at it, and produced two brand new poems, which will be published in the newsletter the facility regular puts out for residents.
I am also the President of a writing group, which meets once a week, at the same Hotel as the Gawler Poets at the Pub event. Much writing is done at our meetings, and for the homework to be read the following week. I am also the Competition Secretary for the same group, and we have a poetry competition going at the moment, on the theme of Recovery, with the details available here, if you are interested in taking part.
I’m going to be speaking soon with someone I know who works at a nearby school, one I already have a good working relationship with, and I’m hoping to be working with both teachers and students at that school. It will be great if some of the students get inspired to writing poetry after hearing me speak and present some of my own poems!
I’m blogger, and have recently become involved in an online platform Medium.com and am enjoying myself there, posting small articles about a wide variety of things. It is a site that pays for the contributions received, in certain circumstances, and even though money is far from being the reason why I write, or not the main reason anyway, a little bit of money never goes astray. And given I haven’t even made a dollar there yet, it is certainly not going to make me rich, I don’t think. But the sharing of words is always my main reason for writing, that that is fine.
So this is a bit of news about me, as a writer, how about telling me a bit of your story?
I’ve used a few painful writing prompts in the past that resulted in fine books being written, and published. Pain is a subject that gets to the gut wrenching honest to goodness truth in life. So just because something is painful, don’t tuck it away in a drawer, if you want to write words that resonate with others, Drag that stuff out, and use it!
My first successful example of this was my first poetry collection, “damaged children, Precious Gems” that was about child sex abuse, rape, and other child abuse issues. The collection did have a narrative arc of sorts, beginning with the worst stuff, and ending in a much happier way.
My next relevant book on this subject would have been my first memoir, I suppose, a book of prose mostly, but some poetry. It looks at my life after Multiple Sclerosis came into my life. Some of the material there is painful in some ways for sure, the changes it makes to a person’s life, when they are suddenly labelled as disabled.
And then came the most recent published book, “Angles on Ankles”, that has poems I wrote in the time after I fell over and broke my right ankle. Not a good time, that one, that’s for sure. This was a slim little poetry collection named a ‘chap book’, which have become quite popular these days.
So what to do when I fall over, and think I may have broken a bone in my forearm, what do I do? Well apart from going to the hospital to get treatment of some kind, I write a poem about it, of course! That happened last Saturday, 10 April 2021, a date I won’t forget, because it was the day after my 58th birthday.
So, less than a week later, with a painful, but not broken forearm, keeping quiet, and carefully resting my arm as much as I can, I find I’ve written four poems on the theme of my sore arm, and I’m wondering whether it may end up being a prompt that brings to life enough poems for another little chap book. I have one in my head, wanting to be released, and I’m going to be talking about it, and other poetry prompt related things tomorrow, and who knows what else I may write.
When life gives me things to write about, no matter how painful, of course I’m going to use them, I’m a writer!
Carolyn Cordon - Creative 