–John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us

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Recommended inspirations for beginning:

• The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
• Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury
• Why We Write edited by Meredith Maran
• The Art of Fiction by John Gardner
• Wreck this Journal by Keri Smith
• The Getaway Car by Ann Patchett
• On Writing by Stephen King
• Why I Write by George Orwell
• 12 Rules of Creativity by Michael Atavar
• This Time I Dance! by Tama Kieves
• Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
• Steal Like an Artist by Austin Kleon
• f**k it by John C. Parkin
• A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson

Love in the DMZ by Julia Cameron

In LOVE IN THE DMZ: and Other Novellas, renowned author, playwright and poet Julia Cameron explores three passionate love affairs in three masterful epistolary novellas, each ripe with longing, exile, and the love that endures time, distance, and the dark forces of a modern world.

“Love in the DMZ: A Play in Letters”
A stirring exchange of letters between an American soldier stationed in Vietnam and his wife, who eagerly awaits his homecoming, Love in the DMZ is about the battles fought on multiple fronts: of a nonsensical and savage war, a lonely wife’s efforts to raise her sons, and a couple’s struggle to remain true while distance brings temptations.

“Hell”
Set in Nazi Germany, a young spy posing as concubine to a high-ranking officer reveals the depth of her deceptions, and her affections—her body claimed by an evil brute, her love promised to a hero as deep in covert operations as she, fueled by infrequent secret trysts between them. Her letters anxiously contemplate their ability to return to a “normal life” after bearing witness to so many demoralizing practices—and engaging in some of their own.

“Paradise”
In a series of letters between a young woman and her lifelong friend—a priest who has embarked on a religious mission in Africa—love at once forbidden and innocent blooms. Each friend endeavors to guide the other in their spiritual journeys, offering the warmth and encouragement by which a true connection, and friendship, is made.

LOVE IN THE DMZ: and Other Novellas is a study in human nature, a poignant mixture of love, despair and compassion—even in its darkest moments.

Click here to purchase on Kindle. 

Starred Publishers Weekly review:

Collins’s improbable and utterly charming tale of assuming iconic status as a popular music star from the early 1960s’ onward also proves a tremendously valuable chronicle of the early folk music scene. Collins was there, rather accidentally: she was a classical pianist who had largely grown up in Denver, Colo., to a blind, hard-drinking father who read Dylan Thomas in Braille and hosted a radio literary program; she was married and with a young child when her husband suggested that she get a job at Michael’s Pub in Boulder singing the folk songs she loved. Steeped in the work of Jo Stafford and Elton Hayes, later songs by Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, Collins was a natural troubadour of traditional ballads like “The Gypsy Rover” and “Maid of Constant Sorrow” and gradually made a name for herself on the circuit, like the Gate of Horn in Chicago and Gerde’s Folk City in Greenwich Village; she secured a long-running record deal with Elektra by 1961, when she was 22. Her memoir portrays the now legendary talent she rubbed shoulders with, especially songwriters like Joni Mitchell, Stephen Stills, and Leonard Cohen, and captures a time in the musical scene replete with experimental drugs and sex, while her encroaching alcoholism stalks her story darkly. By 1978, when she concludes in this forthright, radiant work, she had made scores of records—and quit drinking to save her life. (Oct.)

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Starred Booklist:

To the casual observer, Judy Collins projects a particular image: a sweet-tempered, crystal-clear warbler who earned her fame by singing other people’s songs (Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now”) and, improbably, had a huge international hit with an old hymn written by the captain of a slave ship (“Amazing Grace”). In this candid yet tastefully restrained memoir, Collins reveals her problems with alcohol, her marital woes, and her struggles with depression, anxiety attacks, and migraine headaches. But there are also plenty of music anecdotes. She recalls the first time she heard folk music, as a teenager in Colorado, a traditional ballad called “The Gypsy Rover” (“I knew at once it was meant for me”); being a part of the Greenwich Village folk scene; and the heady days in 1968, when she met and fell in love with musician Stephen Stills in Los Angeles (“Everything about L.A. in those days was romantic. It was the rocking place to be”). It was Stills, of course, who, as part of Crosby, Stills & Nash, would immortalize her in the song “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.”

— June Sawyers

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Kirkus

Famed folk singer’s candid memoir about her survival in the music business despite a 20-year battle with booze.

Although classically trained folkie Collins (Singing Lessons, 1998, etc.) may exude an angelic veneer of ivory-snow purity and Midwestern conservatism, this memoir should dispel any remaining air of innocence surrounding the woman who made Stephen Sondheim’s saccharine “Send In the Clowns” a top-10 hit. Collins was raised in a middle-class family in Colorado at the beginning of World War II. Her father was a blind radio personality with some modicum of notoriety. However, he was also a depression-prone alcoholic whose addictive personality got passed down to his musician daughter with full potency. Although this is as booze-soaked a memoir as any rock star could hope to write, Collins provides a panoramic view of a politically turbulent but creatively explosive bygone era. Along with telling the story of her own rise to prominence in the mid-’60s New York City folk scene, the author also places her life in its broader historical context. Readers will get a keen sense of the tenor of the times as Collins repopulates the Greenwich Village streets with all the vibrant characters and long-vanished performance venues that helped make that neighborhood famous. Though she married young, Collins soon became something of a notorious serial monogamist, zipping from one partner to another with striking frequency, even for the free-love generation: Collins shared a bed with everyone from an English professor to rock star Stephen Stills. Although the author is refreshingly forthcoming about her promiscuity, she never spends much time second-guessing her frequent and sometimes overlapping relationships with men. Up through her popular mainstream success in the ’70s, Collins continued her struggle with alcohol addiction and fragmented relationships until around 1978, when she finally found some grounding in her life.

Despite Collins’ tendency to lapse into high-toned idealism and compulsive name-dropping, this is a fascinating and even harrowing musical and personal reflection.

Grow the Tree You Got by Tom Sturges

When Tom Sturges became a father, he decided that he wanted to be one of the greatest father that ever walked the earth. But things became a bit more complicated when his older son turned ten, and the chatty kid he’d known suddenly started locking his bedroom door. Tom realized he needed to find a way to stay on track-he needed crib notes…

Click here to buy this book on Amazon

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Susan Raihofer/ David Black Literary Agency/www.susanraihofer.com/ twitter @sraihofer

After nearly two decades as an agent, I’ve heard thousands of pitches (and have survived). I do believe anything is possible. But in today’s challenging publishing economy, you need heavy doses of talent and determination, along with some basic tools, to find representation and a book deal. Whether it’s a health/science proposal or a celebrity memoir or a practical sex book, my advice is the same.

What I am looking in a non-fiction pitch:

1. PLATFORM:
Are you an expert in the field?
Cross promotional marketing opportunities?
Contacts for advance praise/blurbs?
Contacts throughout the media?
Successful blog, twitter following, facebook, etc.?
Do you give talks/lectures regularly?

2. AN EXCELLENT IDEA–a high concept, excellent writing, something that can hook a major mainstream audience and has tie-in promotion

3. TRACK RECORD:
Have you published a book before? If so, what’s the sales track record–everyone in the business has access to this info through Bookscan; it’s the first thing an editor looks at when considering a book proposal. Track record needs to be overcome creatively when pitching why this book is a departure from previous book (and its track record).

OTHER tips from agent to writer:

TITLE/SUBTITLE: please…you need a spectacular title and subtitle (I have taken on projects based on phenomenal, succinct titles that also had a strong platform connected to them.) A BAD TITLE can also kill it. (I think: can I hear myself saying this to an editor and hear his/her instant enthusiasm??) The title should hook reader and tell us about content/audience/narrative arc of the book.

CATEGORY: The book needs to specifically fit into a particular, SUCCESSFUL mainstream genre (ie, don’t pitch me a chick-lit novel; look up NYT article on the death of chick-lit). You should know exactly who your book buyer is–you must clearly envision this person and know what category it belongs in.

WRITING: can no longer be just ‘good’ to find an agent and publisher. GOOD and GREAT will not suffice. It needs to be elevated (think U2!), impressive, extraordinary. You know it when you see it. Think: when several agents read this they will ALL want to represent. (I always wonder: do I HAVE TO represent this? A ‘maybe’ is a ‘no.’)

DO YOUR HOMEWORK: research agent, publisher. Know the kinds of books they work on. Don’t pitch me a kids book or a graphic novel, for instance. That will irritate me and make me lose my trust in you and instantly delete.

SUBSCRIBE/follow Publisher’s Lunch/publishersmarketplace.com, PW, various agents/editors on Twitter, blogs; study the bestseller lists, see what’s working, etc.

ADVANCE PRAISE/advance blurbs from authors of note are a big selling tool; if possible you should have advance blurbs ready at the time of selling a book to publishers. Through contacts, can you have commitments from magazines, tv, radio–to do a story or have you on show at time of book release?

PROPOSAL: boiled down in one line, should include: Introduction, Outline, First two chapters, Overview, Books In Market/comp titles, Marketing (including all fabulous social media stuff you’re doing), Bio

WRITE 1 paragraph pitch, ie, flap copy to summarize book idea–can include in proposal or just have to help focus idea.

IS YOUR BOOK worthy of a book length narrative? Would someone pay $25 (or even $12 in paperback…or $7.99 as an e-book?) for this…or is it just a magazine article?

IT’S EASIER for a prospective agent (or prospective editor) to SAY NO.

EDITORS will not buy a book because a proposal is well-written or a great idea. That’s not enough. They want a sure thing and NO RISK.

IN A QUERY letter, I don’t need a lot of background, just a succinct description of the idea. But MAINLY I want to hear about your major platform and cross-promotional selling points along with the high concept.

**As for query letters: unless you have been REFERRED by someone (in which case, put that in the SUBJECT LINE of your email), I do not respond to queries. I look at everything that gets emailed to me, and we have readers reviewing what’s mailed in, but time does not exist for me to have a one-on-one dialogue with every query letter that’s submitted. Highlight your REFERRAL and your platform in the query. That will get my attention and then I’ll look at your idea.

Closer than Blood by Gregg Olsen

The first time was easy. No one ever suspected the victim had been murdered. The crime long buried, the dark passions guiding the killer’s hand are still alive. But the need for revenge cannot be denied. Only one person can stop the killing. Only one person can identify the killer. Only one person knows the face of death – is as close as the face in the mirror…

Click here to buy this book on Amazon.

Click here to find out more about Gregg Olsen

When I think President’s Day, my mind skips over slashed prices at the mall or even the day off… I always think of my first day working at the agency. It was probably snowing.  There were probably train delays, especially taking the N or R trains (the “Never” and the “Rarely” as they truly were decades ago). It was a national holiday, a Monday, a great day to get introduced to the office and get settled “without the phones ringing so much.”  That was 18 years ago–we didn’t have the internet.   We had a 386 computer with a sickly yellow font that took 20 minutes to warm up. Worrying about the phone ringing seems so…quaint.  The day was dense with activity but the pace wasn’t agitated or worried….no worrying about the hundreds of daily emails, or the information we weren’t staying on top of in dozens of blogs/articles/newspapers one must read, or the proposals and mss. virtually landing.

I spent that first day leisurely going through the deal memo book with David, hearing the stories behind the deals, about the relationships with clients and how they’ve come about.  I got a mini-history of our little world within the publishing world in one day. I loved the tangible proof of our purpose and clear role in this mission to publish. It was 1993 and writers needed agents to get published. Manuscripts in boxes and bound by rubberbands were everywhere. The supplies closet had a  tower of manuscripts that nearly reached the ceiling.  All queries.  How the hell so many writers could even locate us back then, I don’t know. The mandate: we were to read through all of them (usually on what we called “query night.” Also quaint.) We owed that to writers, this was our duty, we believed.  OK, so we also had a rule that anything at least a year old must simply be thrown away (no such thing as recycling either back then!) It was just cruel to keep a manuscript that long and twice reject the writer…a long drawn out assumed rejection, and THEN a formal rejection.  We actually had several different form letter rejection letters that were tailored to the rejection’s theme (“sorry, we don’t handle children’s books” or “we’re not taking on new clients” if we felt that suited.) So we didn’t have the internet. We didn’t have information to jam into our brains at every moment of the day.  We had the task at hand.   Talking to writers….talking to each other…actually talking and brainstorming about ideas.  Newspapers and magazines stacked up for us to read and find writing we loved, writers we wanted to represent.  Letters to type up and mail.  Manuscripts to read.  Publishing stories to share to one another, face to face, over morning coffee on a (probably) snowy holiday in February.

Subscribe to my feed from me, Susan Raihofer for more industry news and views. Contact me today.

Subscribe to my feed from me, Susan Raihofer for more industry news and views. Contact me today.

Winter of our Disconnect by Susan Maushart

Click here to buy this book on Amazon.