WordServe Literary

WordServe Books Pubbed in 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 08:00:00 +0000

We apologize for the length of this post but we wanted to give a little plug to all the WordServe authors who published books in 2009. So here is the list, divided by fiction & non-fiction, and listed in reverse chronological order (Dec. to Jan.). Wish we could have included book covers but there are just too many. Each one has a link to Amazon.

Congrats to all of WordServe's fantastic clients!

FICTION

The Appomattox Saga Omnibus 3 by Gilbert Morris

Honor in the Dust: A Winslow Breed Novel by Gilbert Morris

Christmas In My Heart, Book 18 by Joe L. Wheeler

Look to the East by Maureen Lang

Blind Sight by James H. Pence

The Blue Enchantress by Marylu Tyndall

Lost Mission: A Novel by Athol Dickson

The Sacred Cipher: A Novel by Terry Brennan

Snow Melts in Spring (Seasons of the Tallgrass) by Deborah Vogts

Sonnet to a Dead Contessa by Gilbert Morris

What the Bayou Saw: A Novel by Patti Lacy

Angel Train by Gilbert Morris

Shepherd's Fall (The Prodigal Recovery Series, Book 1) by Wanda Dyson

Appomattox Saga Collection 2 by Gilbert Morris

The Red Siren: Charles Towne Belle Series, Book 1 by Marylu Tyndall

NON-FICTION

The Marriage Project: 21 Days to More Love and Laughter by Kathi Lipp

50 Ways to Feel Great Today: Keys to Beating Stress, Worry, and the Blues by David Biebel, James MD Dill, and Bobbie Dill

The Eden Diet: You Can Eat Treats, Enjoy Your Food, and Lose Weight by Rita Hancock

Fat Chance: Losing the Weight, Gaining My Worth by Julie Hadden

Closer: Devotions to Draw Couples Together by Jim Burns and Cathy Burns

Regret-Free Living: Hope for Past Mistakes and Freedom From Unhealthy Patterns by Stephen Arterburn and John Shore.

Mansions of the Heart: Exploring the Seven Stages of Spiritual Growth by R. Thomas Ashbrook

Ask the Animals: A Vet's-Eye View of Pets and the People They Love by Bruce R. Coston

Battle Ready: Prepare to Be Used by God (Bold Man Of God) by Steve Farrar

Terror by Night: The True Story of the Brutal Texas Murder That Destroyed a Family, Restored One Man's Faith, and . . by Terry Caffey and James H. Pence

Fresh Start: God's Invitation to a Great Life by Doug Fields

Jesus: Why the World Is Still Fascinated by Him by Tim LaHaye

A Woman's Heart That Dances: Keeping in Step with God's Design for You by Catherine Martin

Raising a Spiritually Strong Daughter: Guiding Her Toward a Faith That Lasts by Susie Shellenberger

Religions of the Stars: What Hollywood Believes and How It Affects You by Richard Abanes

How God Makes Babies (Pure Foundations) by Jim Burns

God Made Your Body (Pure Foundations) by Jim Burns

What's He Really Thinking?: How to Be a Relational Genius with the Man in Your Life by Paula Rinehart

The Girl in the Orange Dress: Searching for a Father Who Does Not Fail by Margot Starbuck

We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories from the Band of Brothers by Marcus Brotherton

It's A Wonderful Imperfect Life: Daily Encouragement for Women Who Strive Too Hard to Make It Just Right by Joan C. Webb

The Secret Holocaust Diaries: The Untold Story of Nonna Bannister by Nonna Bannister, Denise George, and Carolyn Tomlin

Being Christian Group Leader's Kit: Exploring Where You, God, and Life Connect by John Shore, Stephen Arterburn, and Eric Stanford

Mom Needs Chocolate: Hugs, Humor and Hope for Surviving Motherhood by Debora Coty

God Has Not Forgotten About You: ...and He Cares More Than You Can Imagine by Leslie Haskin

Paperdoll: What Happens When an Ordinary Girl Meets an Extraordinary God by Natalie Lloyd

God Is with Me through the Night by Julie Cantrell

God Is with Me through the Day by Julie Cantrell

Leading on Empty: Refilling Your Tank and Renewing Your Passion by Wayne Cordeiro

Working Mom's 411: How To Manage Kids, Career and Home by Michelle LaRowe

Reading Your Male: An Invitation to Understand and Influence Your Man's Sexuality by Mary Farrar

What Pastors Wish Church Members Knew: Helping People Understand and Appreciate Their Leaders by Denise George

Passionate Prayer: Discovering the Power of Talking with God by Catherine Martin

Passionate Prayer--A Quiet Time Experience: Eight Weeks of Guided Devotions by Catherine Martin

The Husband Project: 21 Days of Loving Your Man--on Purpose and with a Plan by Kathi Lipp

Midlife Manual for Men: Finding Significance in the Second Half (Life Transitions) by John Shore and Stephen Arterburn

Refuel: An Uncomplicated Guide to Connecting with God by Doug Fields

Godology: Because Knowing God Changes Everything by Christian George

This Is Your Brain on Joy by Dr. Earl Henslin and Dr. Daniel Amen

Power of a Man, The: Using Your Influence as a Man of Character by Rick Johnson

Thank you to all WordServe clients. We appreciate you!

Happy New Year,
Greg, Rachelle and Caleb

New York, New York

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 19:41:00 +0000

I recently returned from my fifth trip to Manhattan, the publishing Mecca—a trip I always look forward to. Meeting new editors and seeing old friends is something I just plain love. If an editor has made it at a Big-Six House (Harper, S&S, Penguin, Hachette, St. Martins, and Random House), they are book-lovers supreme. But, naturally, there are more houses than just the Big Six, with good editors, too. I was able to meet with many of them on this trip.

In 15 years as an agent, probably less than 10 percent of my sales have been to the general market (I've sold mostly in CBA). For a number of reasons, WordServe is deliberately going to be upping that percentage significantly over the next five years (hopefully 50/50). Why? There are authors with great projects that simply don’t fit in the increasingly narrow niche of CBA, including current WordServe authors: Marcus Brotherton has made five non-CBA sales (Penguin, S&S, Kaplan), Bruce Coston to St. Martins, Beth Lueders to Penguin, Bob Welch to St. Martins, and we have several authors at Guideposts, located just a block from the Empire State Building.

So with several proposals in my briefcase, I hit the subways, taxis and busy streets.

“I read a magazine article once,” an editor told me in one of my first meetings, “that the death of publishing was foretold; that books would soon be a thing of the past.”

“When was that?” I asked.

“They were talking about when movies/talkies started to take root. Then it happened again at the advent of TV. ‘Books will go the way of the Dodo,’ they all commentated. And when audio books came out, the bound book was again thought to be on the way out.”

“And now the e-book,” I said, knowing where she was going.

“Exactly. The truth is a bound book is the perfect product. It’s completely self-contained; packaged well, fits in the hands, affordable…it’s not a product that will ever go away.”

Okay, that was a good start. Looks like there is a bit of job security after all in this crazy publishing world.

I then met with a VP/Publisher at St. Martins. He gave me the lowdown on all of the trends he was seeing, including:

→ E-books are still only 1-2% of sales;
→ Mass market books are going down in sales;
→ Non fiction isn’t quite as strong as it used to be;
→ Marriage and parenting books are a tough sell because people are getting a lot of their content off the internet;
→ Mid-list male thrillers are down;
→ We’re doing more trade papers originals than we used to because the consumer doesn’t have the money for hard cover.
→ Diet and self-help is strong;
→ Current affairs and issue books can do well with the right author;

And the not-so-big news (but I’m sure glad to hear it from a NY pro) was, “TV producers are watching blogs for their stories. The more noise there is on the Internet (so to speak), the more the TV sharks start to circle.” He mentioned this in the same breath as saying “print media jobs (magazines/newspapers) are down by half.”

It’s (nearly) all gone to the Internet: reviews, promotion, ideas, and a lot of the great writing. Video on Amazon and You Tube is also getting noticed.

The upshot of this—and many other discussions—was that if authors are not VERY active themselves on the Internet, there’s a good chance no one will find out about their book.

My Monday consisted of meetings with four editors from Steeple Hill/Harlequin (fiction and non-fiction), Berkley, Penguin, Viking and Scholastic. The last one was very educational, since breaking into the non-CBA children’s market has always been a struggle.

Tuesday was four editors at St. Martins, lunch with the Guideposts publisher and Senior Editor, and a very profitable meeting with two editors from Sterling…a publisher wholly owned by Barnes and Noble. Sharp people doing gorgeous books.

Wednesday rounded out my trip with a breakfast meeting with a young editor from Holt, another two from Fireside and Atria (S&S), two more at Kensington (mostly a quality fiction house), and then I finished with a meeting with new VP Becky Nesbitt at Howard (S&S) who happened to be in NY for sales meetings (my wife, Becky, joining us for drinks).

Overall, a great trip and one I will make again. I was able to present a few current and many more “upcoming proposals” to various editors (including a couple from Rachelle and Caleb). And I was able to sort through my backlist of proposals that have so far not sold to see what they might interested in…and found a couple of projects they wanted to see.

To serve our authors better as the years go on, WordServe will have a broader stroke in the publishing world. And that means knowing more editors and what they’re passionate about acquiring. While most are not very interested in strictly Christian books (“That’s why our company bought/created an imprint”), we’ve got our toe in the general market waters a little deeper. Maybe an ankle next year.

Merry Christmas!

Greg

.

Are You on Twitter Yet?

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 13:43:00 +0000

If you're on Twitter, please email Rachelle with your Twitter name, so we can start following each other. We'll post everyone's Twitter name on this blog eventually.

Also include your Facebook name if you want other WordServe clients to friend you, and your blog/website URL if you'd like it to appear in a sidebar blogroll on this blog.

Rachelle AT Wordserveliterary.com

Thanks!

Are You Going to ACFW?

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:50:00 +0000

If you are planning to be at ACFW, please email Rachelle (rachelle@wordserveliterary.com) so we can get a final WordServe count. We'd like to plan some kind of agency get-together.

Thanks!

Want to Be a Guest Blogger?

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:15:00 +0000

I'm sure most of you have seen Rachelle's blog (click here if you haven't). She's planning to use guest bloggers every Thursday this fall, so she is now looking for guest posts. Do you have something you'd like to say? Anything to help other writers along on their journey? Something you've learned along the way that you want to pass along?

This is a great opportunity to get exposure for your own blog and your books, since a couple thousand people read the blog regularly. Links to your URL and your Amazon page will be included in your mini-bio after the post.

Posts should be about 500-700 words. If you're interested, please email Rachelle (rachelle@wordserveliterary.com).

Finally, another post!

noreply@blogger.com (Cathy York) — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:45:00 +0000

While no one (that I know of) has complained about not getting our WordServe client blog updates, it’s been awhile since we’ve updated agency and industry news. So, my apologies.

Google Update
We continue to get news and reviews from every source imaginable about Google’s plans to make ALL books available to anyone, anytime. They have already scanned and uploaded hundreds of thousands of out-of-print or public domain books, as well as books still in print. The settlement to authors for this privilege will be finalized (as of today) by September. As a former author with about 20 out of print books, I’m personally going to approve of the settlement. There will be small cash payments, but not enough to buy a round at Starbucks for your and your friends. More to come soon (I promise) as to the details and our recommendations. But I want to urge EVERY author to check out the site and do some research yourself on what you should be doing to protect your intellectual property. Click here for the official Google Settlement website.

An old friend and colleague in the industry, Chip MacGregor, blogged about this issue and I thought it was great stuff. Go to Chip's blog, click on "May 2009" in the sidebar, and read the May 26 post. It's worth it!

New Agent at WordServe!

While the industry is shrinking, WordServe is expanding. We’re very honored to have Caleb Seeling on board as a new agent who has joined the team. That means we will continue to search out new voices and great writers. Caleb will be a generalist, like all of us must be, but he will be looking for authors who speak to the 18- to 35-year-old crowd, as well as general market properties.

Caleb has a very broad range of work experience including community organizing Black churches in inner-city Detroit, teaching sociology, providing family and individual therapy, running a permanent housing program for chronically homeless people, and developing a communications package for the prevention department of an HMO. While these jobs paid the bills, his concurrent unpaid experience includes organizing artist gatherings, recruiting and publishing writers for community arts projects, initiating and facilitating film screenings, and most recently, founding a local branch of the International Arts Movement.

Immediately prior to joining WordServe, Caleb was an acquisitions and developmental editor for NavPress. He originated, developed, and launched the NavPress Deliberate line, initiated the partnership between NavPress and the Via Affirmativa artist group, and held the company’s first authors’ forum at Glen Eyrie which included Leonard Sweet, Spencer Burke, Makoto Fujimura, Margaret Feinberg, Scott Cairns, and John Armstrong. Immediately after leaving NavPress, Caleb founded Samizdat Creative Services which provides editing, writing, and consulting for self-publishing writers. He also writes for the online arts magazine The Curator and is a regular columnist for Examiner.com as Denver’s Faith and Family Examiner.

Caleb is a native Coloradan and lives with his wife—a doula and midwife-in-training—and four children in Littleton. He does not have a dog.

Click to visit Caleb’s blog.
Click to visit Caleb's Examiner column.

New York Times Bestseller?
Congratulations to Marcus Brotherton for hitting the New York Times extended bestseller list for his book that debuted in May, We Who Are Alive and Remain. On the Hardcover Non Fiction list, it was #34 the week of June 28th, #28 the week of July 5th, and #32 the week of July 12th. That doesn’t “officially” make it a New York Times bestseller, but it’s still darn good.

ICRS (formerly CBA)
As many authors are aware, the yearly International Christian Retailing Show (ICRS) happens in Denver next week. Rachelle and I will be our usual busy selves meeting with editors, but you will also hear how terrible the attendance will have been. We were told that as of two weeks ago, they had less than 1,000 attendees from retailers coming. While that number will most likely rise, it’s truly a harbinger for things to come in the Christian book selling industry. With retail down to less than 2,000 stores, and most sales happening through publisher/chain meetings months before, the need for ICRS as we’ve always known it is seriously doubted. Thomas Nelson and Waterbrook both are not even coming to the event, and next year in St. Louis, our guess is quite a few other publishers will stay home.

The face of CBA is changing rapidly as the economy hurts the book buying habits of everyone, but also as publishers and retailers struggle to find buyers of what has typically been a brisk industry. With fewer retailers to sell their books too, and those retailers stocking fewer books in less quantity, it remains to be seen how it will affect new and even established Christian authors.
In the months ahead, we will continue to report to you what is happening and why, but just know that the CBA book industry as we knew it over. It’s morphing, evolving…hopefully for the better. More to come.

Clients in the News
The tragic yet triumphant story of WordServe client Terry Caffey appeared in People Magazine the week of June 18th. His book, Terror by Night (written with James Pence) will come out from Tyndale in October. Hopefully with accompanying major media.

You Thought It Couldn't Happen But...
I have actually started a blog! It's only "sort of" related to the industry. I'll promote client books, as appropriate, but mostly I'll be posting thoughts about encouraging, comforting, and caring for others. My theme verse is, "Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works" (Hebrews 10:24) and the name of the blog is Touch Another Life. Stop by and say hi!

Summer Vacations
Greg will be traveling July 16th - 30th on the Oregon Coast, but will be connected by Blackberry, as always. Rachelle will be taking two mini-vacations, July 20-22 and July 27-29. She'll have her Blackberry, but can’t guarantee any responses while she’s gone since she’ll be camping in the wilds of Colorado.

And don't forget, we'll be harder to reach next week (July 13-15) while we're attending ICRS.

New Publishing Contracts!

Quiet Time Ministries president Catherine Martin continues her publishing career with another book, this time a women’s devotional, to Harvest House.

Lisa Velthouse, communications guru and writer at Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids, writes a memoir called Craving, her story of a six-month period of time where she fasted from sweets and learned about her life and relationship to God in extraordinary ways, to InterVarsity.

James Bell, a whiz at collecting contemporary stories, was selected to be the compiler of an 8-book (what could be 12-book) series of books that Guideposts will publish in a “God Answers Prayer” continuity series.

Dale Black signed with Bethany in a book called My Flight to Heaven that details the story of his small plane crash, his near death and coma, and his remembrance of a trip to heaven. This event happened 40 years ago when he was 19, and Dale is just now telling his story to the world.

Pastors and church planting consultants Hugh Halter and Matt Smay signed with Zondervan for The Genius of the AND, a book for leaders on how any church can continue on in their normal Sunday gatherings AND start forming missional communities to reach out to sojourners; they don’t have to quit one to start another (a Leadership Network book).

Musician and speaker Bob Kilpatrick will write with his son and author Joel Kirkpatrick for Zondervan a book titled The Art of Being You, making the case that God is an “art” God and not as much a “math” God of details, debits and credits.

Receiving a bronze star in Iraq as a nurse, Army Reserve Lt. Colonel Susan Luz (with Marcus Brotherton) signed with general market publisher Kaplan Publishers for a memoir of her life and her time in the Middle East. The book is titled The Nightingale of Mosul and will be published in May of 2010.

New Releases!

April:

9-11 survivor Leslie Haskin published God Has Not Forgotten About You…and He Cares More Than You Can Imagine, with Bethany House Publishers.

Prolific and beloved novelist Gilbert Morris release Angel Train, the fourth and final book in an 1800s historical romance with Broadman & Holman.

May:

Paula Rinehart released What’s He Really Thinking? How to be a Relational Genius with the Man in Your Life with Thomas Nelson.

Joan Webb released It’s a Wonderful (Imperfect) Life: Devotional Readings for the Women Who Strive Too Hard to Make It Just Right with Regal Books.

Gilbert Morris released Sonnet to a Dead Contessa, the final book in “The Lady Trent Mystery” trilogy, with Thomas Nelson.

Patti Lacy released her second novel with Kregel called What the Bayou Saw.

June:
New novelist Deborah Vogts debuts her first novel with Zondervan called Snow Melts in Spring, first in the Seasons of the Tallgrass trilogy.

Margot Starbuck released her first book, a memoir called The Girl in the Orange Dress: Searching for a Father Who Does Not Fail with IVP.

Richard Abanes released Religions of the Stars: What Hollywood Believes and How It Affects You with Bethany.

That's the news for now. Have a great summer!

Recent Releases by WordServe Authors

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 15:00:00 +0000

The Holocaust Diaries
by Nonna Bannister with Denise George and Carolyn Tomlin

Born into an aristocratic Russian family, Nonna Lisowskaja fully expected to enjoy a cultured, privileged life. Her family had many advantages at a time when other Russians struggled to buy food. By her sixth birthday, Nonna spoke four languages. She had a good life.

But then her life fell apart. The Nazis invaded Russia. And though her family was not Jewish, she lost everything…except a few family photos and scraps of a journal hidden from the Nazis in a small pillow.

This is her story. Published by Tyndale, and co-authored by Denise George and Carolyn Tomlin

God is With Me Through the Day
and
God is With Me Through the Night
by Julie Cantrell

For a child, so many things can happen in one day. Sometimes the world outside is a scary place. There is so much to be discovered and understood and at times the adventure is simply overwhelming. This story reminds kids that God is always present. He is a protector who never stops caring for all children, each day. With an engaging message and comforting pictures of lovable critters that seem to have similar feelings, these books assure children that God is always near. Julie Cantrell authored both of these books, and ZonderKidz published.

Shepherd's Fall
by Wanda Dyson

Bounty hunter Nick Shepherd is fearless when it comes to chasing down criminals. It’s his difficult ex-wife, rebellious teenage daughter, and dysfunctional siblings that keep him awake at night. In charge of the family business, the Prodigal Recovery Agency, he thinks of himself as a shepherd of sorts. When his “flock” is out of his control, Nick’s well-ordered universe falls into chaos. A new novel by Wanda Dyson and published by WaterBrook Press.

Paperdoll
by Natalie Lloyd
Foreword by Shannon Etheridge

What happens when an ordinary girl finds the extraordinary love of God? Near a well in Samaria, one girl found out when she came face to face with Jesus. Today’s young women may be in a different culture, but they have something in common with that girl by the well: Sometimes they go looking for love in all the wrong places. Just as the Samaritan woman carried an empty jar to the well, they carry their empty, two-dimensional hearts, looking for one person, one more award, one glowing accolade, to fill it up and make it whole. True love is waiting at the well. In the eyes of the One, the woman at the well had infinite worth, meaning and purpose, and there’s a secret waiting for girls who take the time to listen to what Jesus had to say to her that day: When an extraordinary girl fills up on the love of an extraordinary God, unforgettable things happen. Written by former Brio columnist Natalie Lloyd and published by Regal Books.

* * *

On another topic... here's an interesting New York Times article about book advances in the general market: "About that Book Advance..."

What Happened to March?

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:50:00 +0000

I was all set to write my March update when I looked up and suddenly it was April. How did that happen?

Here are some of the things that have been happening in the last month.

Christian Book Expo in Dallas

As you may have heard, the consumer event in Dallas didn’t come off as planned. Organizers hoped for 15,000 people, but ended up with 1,500. Time of year (Spring break in Dallas), venue (downtown convention center), cost ($20 a day to come hear authors and buy books!)… all combined for an event that was, well, embarrassing for many. WordServe, however, was well represented by having many authors in attendance to either speak or sign books (or both):

• Calvin Miller
• Steve Farrar
• Jill Hubbard (a finalist for book of the year in the youth category for The Secrets Young Women Keep, co-authored with Ginny McCabe, who was also in Dallas)
• Jim Burns
• Joan Webb
• Kathy Lipp
• Catherine Martin
• Marylu Tyndall
• Richard Mabry
• Julie Ieron
• Cheryl Scruggs

Also around were Texas WordServe authors Jane Jarrell, David Murrow, James Pence and Anna Clark.

Christy Award Finalist!

For the third year in a row, novelist Athol Dickson is a finalist in the suspense category, which he has won the last two years. His latest is a Bethany title, Winter Haven.

Writers Needed …

Author James Bell needs contributors for a new 8-book series of stories on God answering prayer in incredible ways. Guideposts is publishing the series for their continuity line. Please contact James directly at incredibleprayers@earthlink.net for the full scoop. He’s paying for published contributions. Please pass this info along to any writer you know in need of some paying gigs. He’s got hundreds of stories to find, so he needs your help.

New Submission Guidelines

This does not affect you much as a WordServe author, but we have changed our guidelines for submissions to the agency. We can no longer guarantee a response to queries if we are not interested (and we say yes to about 1 in every 200 queries). If people are asking you how to get an agent or how to submit their project, just send them to the website so they can read our guidelines. However, if you are referring a friend or someone that we ought to give a careful look, have them put “Referred by... [your name]” in the subject line, otherwise it goes to Cathy for a first look.

Google Mess

You may have heard that Google is scanning and copying all public domain or out-of-print books. All... as in, ALL. Naturally, this is causing no small amount of ruffled feathers by authors and their estates. There was a class-action suit and some sort of monetary figure was awarded, but the ruling and rules are more complicated than we can tell you. We’re compiling a file full of articles on the issue, so if you have concerns or want more info, email Cathy (admin@wordserveliterary.com) and she’ll forward what we have so far.

Books Recently Signed to Publishers

Terror by Night, a book by Terry Caffey, with James Pence writing, will be published by Tyndale in September. A fast track book due to the high level of media attention (Greg has personally talked with producers from Oprah, Dateline, Inside Edition, 20/20 and many others), it’s a modern-day real-life story of Job.

A week after his father died, Terry, his wife, and two sons were sound asleep when gunshots and screams filled the night. Intruders had broken into his home and killed his wife, his two sons and filled him with a dozen bullet holes. As the house was burning down, he crawled out a bathroom window and made it 400 yards to a neighbor, so he could tell them who the murderers were: his teenage daughter, her boyfriend and another teen couple. Months later, after his physical wounds had healed, Terry returned alone to his now empty property. Everything that he had known in life was gone. In one of the trees, however, Terry noticed a piece of paper. He pulled it off the tree only to discover it was one page of a novel.

The torn page spoke right to the heart of his situation. The first completely visible paragraph says: "I couldn't understand why You would take my family and leave me behind to struggle along without them. And I guess I still don't understand that part. But I do believe that You're soveriegn; You're in control."

Instead of giving up on life, Terry took this as an (obvious) sign from God that his life wasn’t over. He started speaking at churches, holding up this framed parchment. He didn’t know the book or the author, but in one small Texas church, someone did. It was a page from a James Pence novel called Blind Sight. Terry and James met, and surprisingly had another connection. Terry’s daughter Erin, one of the killers, had been in James’ home as a friend to his own daughter.

Those who witnessed the sentencing at the end of the trial say it is the only time anyone can remember the victim and the felon holding hands as the judge passed down (a 42-year) sentence. Terry has forgiven his daughter and the other killers. Now James is writing Terry’s story! A story that has a Job-like ending: Terry has remarried and his two new sons are now about the same age as those who were killed. (And yes, we have some movie interest.) We should be seeing his story in People magazine in the next couple of weeks.

* * *
Signing with Berkley/Caliber (Penguin) was Marcus Brotherton’s Gone But Not Forgotten. It’s a remembrance from 20-40 family members of the original men from the “Band of Brothers,” featuring untold stories of the time during and after WWII, how they fought and how they finished their lives. Publication will be May 2010.

* * *
Signing with Kaplan Publishers is Col. Susan Luz for a memoir A War to Care (with Marcus Brotherton). Susan earned a Bronze Star from the Army in Iraq for her efforts in a MASH unit during her long tour of duty; but more than that, she has lived a life of service amidst great personal sacrifice; a lifetime of caring for her fellow man has been her constant theme. Publication will be in the Spring of 2010.

* * *
Tim LaHaye and Craig Parshall are teaming for the Endgame series that Zondervan will publish. The storyline starts with non-stop action about the use of a sophisticated military defense technology that is capable of returning nuclear missiles to their place of origin. This causes a series of events to unfold that eventually leads to the prophesied Rapture of the Church and the Last Days of mankind. The first book will be published in the Fall of 2010. WordServe co-agented this series with Joel Gotler at Intellectual Property Group.

* * *Debut novelist Karen Witemeyer signed a three-book contract for a historical romance series with Bethany House. Her first title is The Dressmaker's Proposal, and you can read Karen's story about her road to publication here on Rachelle's blog.

NEXT POST: WordServe Authors' Recent Releases

Special Announcement: PR 4 U

noreply@blogger.com (Cathy York) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:54:00 +0000

As promised, we have partnered with not one but two PR companies to help our authors with their projects. Here is what will go on our website soon, but what you can consider right now….

The face of publishing is changing. The economy, new technologies, and new ways to market books make it clear that now—more than ever—authors must be more involved in the marketing and PR of their works. While publishers will always carry on initial marketing campaigns for most titles, those campaigns are getting shorter and less complete. What’s an author to do?

At WordServe Literary, we are convinced that with many projects, our authors would benefit greatly by investing in a secondary campaign using trusted marketing and PR reps. Two independent PR professionals we’ve come to trust are Blythe Daniel and Danielle Douglas. They have offered WordServe authors a 20 percent discount on secondary campaigns (those started after the publisher’s initial marketing push is over). WordServe is not receiving any type of cut or commission for the work they do; we are simply hoping that volume for Blythe and Danielle will help make up for the discount they are giving.

While these two professionals are certainly capable of handling PR campaigns from the first release of a book (and we will be recommending them to publishers along the way to do just that), they know how to structure a campaign to maximize your dollars and their time to provide that added push to get decision-makers to promote your work to their constituents.

As a WordServe Author, here is the procedure to get the ball rolling:

√ Email Blythe and/or Danielle and inform them of your desire to hear more about their services; letting them know you are a WordServe Author (copy your agent);

√ Blythe and Danielle are working together on WordServe clients, so they will decide which one will contact you back to set up a time to talk about your book and your PR goals;

√ After talking through your book and goals (sending them a manuscript to review), you will receive back a detailed plan that will include a quote on what they will charge. Fees are paid directly to them.

√ A discussion with your agent once you receive a plan and quote is certainly fine.

FAQs:

When is the best time to contact Blythe or Danielle?

Ideally, the best time is about 3 to 6 months before your book releases. That way you can coordinate when your publisher’s campaign will end and when theirs can begin. Significant follow-up can be accomplished after the publisher has discontinued their initial campaign.

What if your book has been on the shelf for several months and the publisher’s campaign ended months (or years) ago?

Secondary campaigns can be effective as long as your publisher is ready to get books back on the shelf. Oftentimes, after the book has been released, the shelf life is only 4-6 months (sometimes less, if a retailer’s cash flow or market conditions warrant it—returns happen). So it’s important to notify your publisher that they should let chain bookstores know the author will do another PR campaign. This will usually get retailers stocking your books again (at least this is what publishers have told us). Your agent will be happy to step in at this point to help insure (to the best of our ability) your publisher gets books back on the shelf!

Approximately what will the costs be?

For a two- to three-month campaign, you will generally be looking at between $1,500 and $2,000 per month, depending on the depth of service you want. This is the price WITH the 20 percent WordServe discount.

Blythe Daniel’s contact information:
Her website: http://www.theblythedanielagency.com/

Her email is: blythe@theblythedanielagency.com

Danielle Douglas’s contact information:
Her website: http://www.danielledouglaspublicrelations.com/
Her email is: danielledouglas@q.com

And, of course, if you have any specific questions before you get into this process, please contact your agent.

Talk to Us!

noreply@blogger.com (Cathy York) — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 21:36:00 +0000

We're so impressed with how many of our clients are active in social networking! Of course, it can be a bit mind-boggling to keep track of you all. So in the interest of strengthening our network, we'd love for you to send us (admin@wordserveliterary) an e-mail that contains the following information:

aYour blog's URL, so we can include a link to it on this blog's sidebar

aYour Facebook link

aYour Twitter link

aYour plans to attend writer's conferences, so we can get together with you if we're there, too

Thanks for helping us keep tabs on you!

#####

And for your reading pleasure, here's a great article from Paula Friedrichsen, one of Rachelle's clients:

Same Book, Different Hook:
Taking another Turn around the Publicity Track

About three years ago I had the thrill of writing my first book. Although I had been writing newspaper and magazine articles for quite some time, it took a few years for me to get the nerve up and try to get a book published. To make a very long story very short, four years ago I found myself sitting across the table from a literary agent at a writer’s conference pitching him my book idea. He signed me, he got me a book contract, and I wrote the book.

When the publisher finally released my book, they assigned me a publicist. “Melissa” was everything I could hope for, and I credit her with being the major reason I was able to learn so much about publicity so quickly. But since all good things must come to an end, about four months after my book was released my publicist moved on to her next set of soon-to-be-released books.

Can I Do This?

It was at this point that I decided to take over my book’s publicity. It was either that or let it languish on store shelves—or worse, at the Random House warehouse. I was surprised and delighted to find out how much I actually enjoyed publicizing my own book. I also discovered I was good at it!

Using what I’ve since come to refer to as “The Six Pronged Publicity Plan” I actually ended up booking more media opportunities then my very talented, yet very busy publicist did for me. While she was forced to work on 10 or 20 books at a time, I could devote all of my creative energy to just one book—mine!

Today’s article will focus on just one aspect of my “Six Pronged Plan”: how to develop an interesting “hook” for your book. Rather than trying to come up with hypothetical situations, I’ll use my own book as an example.

What in the World is a “Hook”?

To promote your book you must first figure out what your “hook” is. This should be the most interesting

astory

afact

astatistic

aholiday tie-in

acurrent event tie-in that relates to your book. For example, the title of my book is, The Man You Always Wanted Is the One You Already Have (Multnomah, 2007). The opening story (as told in chapter one) was the hook for my book because it was interesting and a bit provocative.

The hook of The Man You Always Wanted is: Fifteen years ago I became romantically, although not sexually, involved with the pastor of my church. This affair devastated the church and did great harm to both of our marriages. But God used the difficult lessons that I learned during that arduous time to reshape my thinking about marriage, and to plainly show me that the man I always wanted was the one I already had!

With that hook my publicist was able to book me on popular Christian TV shows and dozens of radio shows—as well as having articles excerpted from my book published in print and online magazines. She also submitted my book for possible review at Christian women’s magazines. All that publicity greatly enhanced my Amazon ranking (meaning the book was selling well), and it would have been easy to stop right there. But I was so impassioned to get my message out, and to possibly help failing marriages, I was compelled to continue! And quite honestly, I also wanted to sell books. I wanted to succeed.

Same Book, Different Hook

When my beloved and esteemed publicist finally turned her attention away from my book, I decided to see if I could take another turn around the publicity track. Because my first hook had been pitched to all the major media outlets, I decided to put my thinking cap on and come up with a new hook. This wasn’t as easy as it sounds. It needed to be interesting…had to be creative…it needed to offer the listener, viewer, or reader helpful information and “take away” points. What could I pull from The Man You Always Wanted Is the One You Already Have that would fulfill those requirements? I decided that since the focus of my book was marriage, Valentine’s Day would be a perfect tie-in. Tying your hook into a holiday is a win-win proposition. Media outlets need content for upcoming holidays, and you need to publicize your book. You can accomplish both of those things by creating your hook around a holiday if possible.

Okay, now that I had my tie-in holiday picked out, I wanted to find a cute or creative way to word my hook. By using an online rhyming dictionary I found something that rhymed with Valentine’s (not as easy as you’d think). And so was born my February 2008 publicity campaign (drum roll, please!) Lifelines for Valentine’s. The pitch consisted of four of my book’s major points formatted into “take away” points for the listener/viewer/reader:

aThe three symptoms of unforgiveness and practical solutions to bring a spirit of unity back into your marriage

aValidating and appreciating opposites

aTa-da! Look who you married (i.e. taking notice of your mate’s unique and praiseworthy strengths)

aHow to stop letting your emotions rule your marriage

I carefully prepared press materials, possible interview questions, talking points, and graphics to go with my hook, and pitched it like crazy. I ended up with numerous TV interviews, radio interviews, print magazine articles, online magazine articles (one which had over 3200 February viewings alone!), newspaper articles, and online book reviews. My Amazon sales were great, and the email feedback from those reading my book increased. Suffice it to say Lifelines for Valentine’s was successful beyond my wildest dreams. And if I can do it, you can do it! With a bit of creativity, a sprinkle of ingenuity, and a whole lot of hard work you can promote your own book.

Paula Friedrichsen is a published author and conference speaker living in Central California. http://www.pfministries.com/

Fresh Ideas…

noreply@blogger.com (Cathy York) — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 19:35:00 +0000

One thing I’m learning in this new era of book writing/publishing/selling is that we either all hang together or we’ll hang separately (to quote a famous founding father). As the middle men, um, people, for WordServe clients, Rachelle and I often hear great ideas from clients that we want to pass along. Marcus Brotherton has done a fabulous job of promoting his books on the web “on a dime.” He’s figured out some things that he was happy to share with the WordServe family of authors.

Here’s a nice piece from Marcus that you may want to print out and work through…

Happy on-line marketing,

Greg

Website Design for Books—
the George Costanza Way

by Marcus Brotherton

When it comes to designing websites for my books, every decision I’ve ever made in my entire life has been wrong.

My only success has come when I took a lesson from Seinfeld sidekick George Costanza, who came to the epiphany one day that if every instinct he had ever had was wrong, then doing the opposite of that would have to be right.

In George’s case, instead of ordering tuna and toast at the diner like he always did, he started by ordering chicken salad on rye, untoasted, with a side of potato salad. Then instead of trying to get dates by lying and saying he was an architect, his opening line became, “Hi I’m George. I’m bald, unemployed and live with my parents.”

And—that worked!

With website design, I began the process several years ago with all the bells and whistles. A production company designed my first book website which had a flash opening with all the gewgaws. Things looked impressive. But production companies don’t come cheap, and changing the site was so complicated code-wise that I couldn’t figure out how to update it on my own. For me, this wasn’t a long term solution.

My second attempt wasn’t any better. A few years back I wrote a house-backed series for teens called FlipSwitch (Multnomah Books). Everything in that project needed to be huge. By contract, I’m not allowed to disclose how much the website’s URL purchase price was, (Multnomah picked up the tab for that) but let’s just say that I once bought a Honda CRX for the exact same amount.

Then, halfway through the project, everything busted loose. Random House bought Multnomah, FlipSwitch fell through the cracks, and I was out on my ear. I still needed a huge website to promote the books, so I coerced a web-savvy friend to design my site for free, but in exchange I had to sit on a board for a non-profit organization he was championing. Three years later the FlipSwitch book project had garnered impressive awards and sold a total of eleven copies. Random House closed my website (because they owned the URL), and I’m still sitting on my friend’s board.

Thankfully, book projects continued for me, and I still needed to create websites for them. What was I to do? I wanted to inform my readers about the books. I also wanted to be able to update the sites anytime I wanted. I also (as I was a full-time collaborative writer by then and broke) didn’t want to spend much cash. Nothing else I had tried had worked so far.

Enter the book website crafted from a blog. Not only are these sites easy to create, but two of them have actually turned a profit (and the third is newly up and running, soon expected to generate some cash). These sites haven’t made millions, mind you, but the Amazon click-throughs on them have paid for whatever I’ve previously spent on the websites that made nothing. My conclusion is that if you want to create an informative, easy, and cheap website, this is the way to go.

If you can see what these look like, I’ve currently got three of these Costanza-styled websites up and running.

→ A bio site at http://www.marcusbrotherton.com/. This is mostly for publishers and authors needing collaborators. It’s basically a résumé on-line.

→ A book site for a collaborative military non-fiction project I worked on at http://www.callofdutythebook.blogspot.com/.

→ And a site for an upcoming book at: http://www.bandofbrothersbooks.com/.

If your main criteria for creating a website is for it to be informative, simple to update, and inexpensive, you can build the same thing for your book.

Here’s how:

1. Go to http://www.blogger.com/ and create your free blog. It’s easy and it only takes a few minutes to set up your site, name your blog, and select your URL.

With blogger, all URLs end with “blogspot.com” and my recommendation with the first part of your URL is to be as simple, direct, and memorable as you can. My mistake with Lt. Buck Compton’s book was to go informative and name it “Call of Duty the Book at blogspot dot com,” which is quite a mouthful if you say it out loud. If I had to do that one over again, I’d name it something more direct such as “Buck’s book at blogspot dot com,” or even simply “Buck at blogspot dot com.”

2. Once your blogger site is set up, you’ll need to create a template from the ones that blogger provides. If you want to host Amazon links on the side, you’ll need a template that has side columns. I chose the template called “Rounders.3” for all of my sites, and then went and changed the colors later on so each site would look different. (If you want to later be able to customize your blog with free backgrounds you can download from the Internet, use the Minima template.)

That’s about all it takes to get your website up and running. You can now add your information to it as posts and customize how your site looks. The best advice here is just get on it and start to play around, experimenting with how things look and how your wording sounds.

If you want a URL different than “blogspot,” that can be done, too, but it will cost you a small bit of money and it’s a bit more complicated. There are a variety of ways it can be done, but the easiest way I’ve found is to go to a domain purchasing site like www.GoDaddy.com and buy your URL.

I own two of my URLS: http://www.marcusbrotherton.com/ and http://www.bandofbrothersbooks.com/. Since nobody owned either of these beforehand, I was able to get them both very cheaply. They each cost me about $10 a year. Just follow the steps on the GoDaddy site to purchase a new URL.

Then, to have my new URL show up on the blogspot site, I had GoDaddy “forward” the new URL over to the blogspot site and then mask the blogspot URL.

To do this yourself, go to the “Domain” button, select your domain name and you’ll see the function that guides you through it set up there. It might look straightforward, but I couldn’t figure it out, so I just phoned up GoDaddy and explained to them what I wanted to do. They were very helpful in walking me through it. When you don’t know something, just call and ask—that’s become my motto.

To place a link on your site to your book’s listing on Amazon, you’ll need to join the Amazon Associates program. Go to www.affiliate-program.amazon.com and sign up for your account there. This step takes a while to do as you need to follow a number of steps including telling them how you want to get paid. I get paid by direct deposit, which means you need to know your bank’s routing number. All that took was a simple phone call to my bank and they were happy to tell me all I needed to know.

The Amazon Associates program website is quite straightforward, and will walk you through everything you need to know about placing a click-through link on your site. Once you get the code information for your book from Amazon Associates, go back to your blogger site, go to the “Layout” button, and look to the right where it says “Add a Gadget.” Click on that button and scroll down to where it says “HTML/Java Script.” That’s where you’ll paste the code you got from the Amazon Associates site.

You can also create “widgets” from the Amazon Associates site, everything from video links to revolving displays of several books, which is what I have on the www.bandofbrothersbooks.com site. Again, just go to the Amazon Associates site, play around and experiment.

It never hurts to submit your URL to Google so search engines find it. Go to http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl and follow the directions there.

So that’s it. Website for your book, done. Start to finish, maybe two days tops. Maybe less.

How do you publicize your book blogsite? That’s always the big question, and new ideas emerge all the time. I’m not a blogger, per se, even though my sites are on blogs, so I don’t post new information with any amount of regularity other than quarterly. I probably should, but then again, I’m doing this the Costanza way.

What I have done is gone to existing online forums around subjects near to whatever book I’m working on, and posted comments there, with links back to my sites. That’s worked pretty well, and word seems to get out around.

I’ve also had a few URLs printed in the back of books I’ve worked on. This seems counter-intuitive—to have people buy your book and then go to your website—but, in practice, things seem to flow both ways there. People read your book and then want to find out who you are, that type of thing. It’s also handy if you’re offering several books for sale on your site.

This is the end. Happy website creation, and enjoy the chicken salad on rye.

Marcus Brotherton is a collaborative writer, the author or co-author of 19 books.

Greg here:

We’d welcome the chance to hear YOUR good ideas, as well.

Are you downloading out of print books on Kindle? Can you send us a step by step guide?

How do you get higher Google rankings so your book/website comes up on page one?

How do you promote your books locally? Newspaper, radio, bookstores…what have you done that has been successful?

These types of ideas, and more, will be golden as we all try to weather the economy with a business and writing career intact. Share them with Rachelle or me and we will edit and post on future blog updates.

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 16:00:00 +0000

Hello to all WordServe clients! Here's the latest news...

WordServe will be represented at the Gold Medallion Awards this July in Denver. Dr. Jill Hubbard and Ginny McCabe’s book The Secrets Young Women Keep (Thomas Nelson) was named a finalist in the Children’s and Youth category. This is a nice honor. Way to go!

Special Announcement

Susie Shellenberger, a name that is known to hundreds of thousands of young ladies around the world, is starting a brand new venture. As a longtime Greg Johnson client (nearly 15 years) and friend (we wrote nine books together in the '90s), it was a sad day when we learned Focus on the Family had decided to ax its teen ministry, including Brio Magazine which Susie founded (and Breakaway, the magazine Greg founded).

But from the ashes has come a wonderful thing.

Susie has decided to launch a brand-new magazine that's more relevant, more splashy, and more determined to meet girls where they are today.

Tentative plans are that SUSIE mag will debut its premiere print issue this May. As an international speaker and an author who has sold more than 1.3 million books, Susie is excited about continuing ministry to girls on a new level.

For subscription details and to pitch articles, please contact Susie directly at: susieshell@comcast.net. Or visit the new SUSIE blog.

NEW RELEASES…

SHAMELESS PROMOTION ALERT!!!!

My wife Becky collaborated with Neurotherapist Dr. Earl Henslin for This is Your Brain on Joy (Thomas Nelson Publishers). It comes with a Foreword by Dr. Daniel Amen (of the PBS special “Change Your Brain, Change Your Life”).

Dr. Henslin is one of the only Christian therapists to daily integrate SPECT brain imaging with traditional therapy. The results have been phenomenal. His clients reach faster, lasting, significant change much more thoroughly than ever before. The book is written in a fun, easy-to-comprehend, warm and engaging style, offering help for the Five Mood Issues every human being will face in themselves or someone they love. Earl says, “I think it will broaden our compassion and understanding of ourselves, our families and the people in the pews who struggle with mood issues and the guilt that accompanies our internal anguish.”

Using everything from prayers, thoughts, movies (cinema-therapy), nutrition, exercise, supplements, aromatherapy, and suggestions for medications that could be helpful—this book is reader-friendly, a reference book that every pastor, counselor and lay person will want to have on their shelf.

Honolulu pastor Wayne Cordeiro wrote about his experiences with “leadership burnout” in Leading on Empty (Bethany House Publishers). It’s a self-revealing work that helps any leader (or anyone who loves a stressed-out leader) regain balance and a renewed sense of calling to the work of the ministry.

Quiet Time Ministries President Catherine Martin has written two more great resources for women called Passionate Prayer: Discovering the Power of Talking with God and Passionate Prayer—A Quiet Time Experience (both from Harvest House Publishers). Perfect for small groups of women, these resources will take any reader deeper into the heart and purpose of prayer. A timely resource for today!

Reading Your Male by Mary Farrar (David C. Cook) gives any female reader a greater understanding and appreciation for the male species. It’s billed as “An invitation to understand and influence your man’s sexuality.” The goal is to help women go beyond reading a man’s mind to connecting with the way man needs connection.

Author and speaker Denise George follows up her book What Women Wish Pastors Knew with a new book called What Pastors Wish Church Members Knew (Zondervan). Diligently researched, this book promises to help anyone understand and appreciate their leader in greater ways. It paints a very intimate portrait of the pastor’s life and absolutely will give anyone a deeper appreciation for those who have devoted their lives to the work of the ministry.

The “2004 International Nanny of the Year” has done it again. Michelle LaRowe penned her third with Regal Books, this time to help working moms. Working Mom’s 411 is an idea-rich book that will assist any mom in getting more organized so they can spend more quality time with those they love. Few authors come to the table with as much practical help as Michelle.

PR Partnership Update

We are VERY close to making an announcement about our PR partner of choice. Hopefully you’ll be hearing something more definite in the next 10 days.

Rights. Rights. And more Rights!

Publishers are in the rights business. They license your words in as many ways as we allow them and attempt to sell them wherever they can. Some rights have good potential value (foreign, audio, large print), and some have little value (brail, quotes, anthologies).

Did you know that your agents monitor ALL of the rights sold? But we need your help!

When you get a notice from your publisher of a foreign license sold, an audio license, even a new print run, PLEASE inform your agent. Agents do not often get these announcements direct from publishers (especially from CBA houses) and yet we need to know what you know so we can cross check the royalty reports when they come in to make sure all rights are properly credited (and paid). We keep track of nearly every statistic on your book: sales, rights sold, formats, print runs…all of it. So help us do our job even better by forwarding to us any announcements you get from your publisher.

Some interesting online reading...

From the New York Times:
The Greatest Mystery: Making a Best Seller

From Time Magazine about the future of publishing:
Books Gone Wild

From Mike Hyatt:
Why Every Author Needs a Powerful Online Presence

That's it for today! Moving forward, I think we will update this blog about twice a month. We'll keep notifying you by email when our updates have gone up for the next couple of months, but you may want to sign up to "follow" this blog either through your Blogger Dashboard or FeedBlitz. (Look to the right on the sidebar and enter your name in the box where it says "Get this blog in your email." Then you will automatically receive the updates in your email box.)

Have a terrific weekend from all of us at WordServe.

Greg Johnson
President, WordServe Literary

Happy New Year!

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 20:10:00 +0000

We hope everyone is getting settled in to 2009, excited about the possibilities our country’s new President brings, and avoiding despair over the economy. Right now I’m thankful that God is in control and that none of this has taken Him by surprise.

We have lots of great news about WordServe and our clients… (click on the book covers for Amazon links).

TV ALERT!

Tomorrow in the fourth hour of “The Today Show,” WordServe authors Jeff and Cheryl Scruggs will be talking about their new book just released by Waterbrook, I Do Again: How We Found a Second Chance at Our Marriage—and You Can Too. Married for ten years, divorced for seven and then remarried, they have a fabulous story of redemption and love. Set the DVR!

CURRENT RELEASES:

Following are releases from the past couple of months as well as from January. As you know, January is a time when new book releases are legion, and WordServe authors have done their share. Normally, there won’t be this many new books in our updates.

Gone in a Heartbeat: Our Daughters Died…Our Faith Endures by David and Marie Works, with Dean Merrill (Focus/Tyndale), is the moving yet hopeful story of the New Life church killings in December of 2007. While tragic in the earthly consequences for this strong family of faith, God always shows the redemptive path to those who look for it. This book illustrates that God never loses the file of those He loves.

Doug Fields, pastor at Saddleback, releases Refuel: An Uncomplicated Guide to Connecting with God (Thomas Nelson). A practical “message book” that helps any reader to consider the simplicity of reconnecting or connecting with God.

Alaska author Leslie Fields comes out with Parenting Is Your Highest Calling: And 8 Other Myths That Trap Us in Worry and Guilt (WaterBrook). As the mother of six children, she knows how kids can overwhelm and life and marriage. And while we should, of course, “focus on our family,” it’s not the highest mission a Christian parent has. Good stuff.

Rick Johnson, President of Better Dads (http://www.betterdads.com/), and author of The Man Whisperer, comes out with a new book The Power of a Man: Using Your Influence as a Man of Character (Revell). A timely, balanced resource for men.

Novelist Marylu Tyndall has come out with The Red Siren: Charles Towne Belles (book 1, from Barbour). A Christy Award finalist, this historical novel set in the South is a page-turner.

Dave Biebel has penned 70 Ways to Beat 70: Keys to a Longer, Healthier Life (Revell). Well researched, practical, the perfect book for anyone over 60 (or younger). First of the 3-book series on a variety of felt need issues.

Christian George releases Godology: Because Knowing God Changes Everything (Moody). A story-driven book on the attributes God, perfect for the under 30 set.

Kathi Lipp comes out with her first book, The Husband Project: 21 Days of Loving Your Man, on Purpose and With a Plan. This is a three-week plan for wives to put the spice back in marriage by paying better attention to their husbands on a daily basis. Rachelle is especially excited about this one… Kathi was her first client and this was the first book she sold.

Gilbert Morris has The Appomattox Saga: Book 2 (Barbour), a Three Books in One reprint of an older 10 book series on the Civil War. As a value priced hard cover, it makes for a great extended beach read for anyone interested in that time period.

PR UPDATE

I wish I had some final news on our new partnerships, but I do not. I am meeting Friday with two experienced publicists to talk through partnering for WordServe authors. Please lob up a prayer for this, if you could.

Also, it won’t be long until I have something firm on an internet marketing PR company (a new one), whose goal it is to be THE expert in PR’ing women’s non fiction to the internet world. Again, WordServe discounts.

More on both of these opportunities with the next update in a couple of weeks.

NEW ASSISTANT

Many of you know that we’ve hired a new administrative assistant to help with client details. Cathy York has been with us for a couple of months now and has picked up the book industry quite well. Her email is admin@wordserveliterary.com. So if you can’t get through to Rachelle or me, email Cathy and she can handle it. She’s still only part-time, working 3 to 5 hours three to four days a week, so if something is urgent, it’s still always best to go to your point person agent.

BLOG UPDATES

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Leave a comment if you like. We always love to hear from you. (Click # comments, below.)

Have a great week!

Greg Johnson
President
WordServe Literary Group

Warm Christmas Greetings!

noreply@blogger.com (Rachelle) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 21:00:00 +0000

I hope you are all set in your holiday plans and that they include wonderful times with family, some time off, and a continuing and deep appreciation for Jesus, the reason we live and breathe; the one who gives meaning to our lives.

The whole holiday rush got away from me in the midst of navigating all the rapid changes in the publishing industry this fall. I couldn’t put together normal “mailed” cards—or send gifts, sorry to say. But what I thought I’d do instead is to combine my Christmas greetings with news of the industry and how we're responding to these changes. People ask me all the time how business is going and lately my answer is always, “Not as good as last year, but not bad.”

Here are a few of the 2008 highlights:

→ WordServe's newest agent, Rachelle Gardner—even amidst a down book market—is really doing well. She closed ten deals over the course of the year (including a recent six-figure New York publisher auction deal), and continues to find great authors and great books. Her blog, if you haven’t seen it, is fantastic. In June, Writer’s Digest named it one of the top 100 blogs/websites for authors, and it was the only one on their list by a Christian agent. (Click here for the blog.)

→ We had more than 60 books come out by WordServe authors in 2008.

→ We negotiated 50 publishing contracts.

→ We will have at least 50 new titles debuting in 2009.

→ While many publishers are cutting staff, several others are not (as of yet).

So, amidst the gloom and doom we're constantly hearing about, many WordServe authors continue to thrive.

Now for the bah-humbug (in case you haven’t heard). I would say the changes happening in the book industry are unprecedented.

→ October, November and now December have shown that book sales could be the worst…ever (or at least in recent memory)! Naturally, it’s all a function of the economy. Books are seen as optional to food and mortgage payments, so that’s why the downturn. (And upturn in library patronage!)

→ Publishers (Thomas Nelson, Simon & Schuster, Random House and others) are downsizing to save money, so long-time editors and other veterans are leaving the industry.

→ Publishers are delaying contracted books to subsequent years since the crystal ball for 2009 is another slow year in book sales. They’re also lowering advances, making fewer buys, taking longer to make decisions, cutting marketing budgets…Oh boy, Happy New Year to authors and agents!

→ E-book editions (Kindle, Sony Reader) continue to improve, though only a few are predicting the (eventual) end to hard copy books as we know it. There are still lots of kinks to be worked out before these take off.

→ Retail is struggling, while on-line stores are doing well. It wouldn’t surprise me if Borders goes into Chapter 11 after the first of the year. That would be a huge blow to the industry, as you can imagine.

All this to say, the New Year will bring challenge…AND…opportunity. One of Becky's favorite quotes is “Crisis is an invitation to cross a threshold.” (Sue Monk Kidd)

Authors will have to work harder than ever to build an audience and readership. They will have to become a fuller partner with their publisher to make their books succeed. Even more than in the past, authors are going to have to be as much marketer as writer. Publishers will be looking hard at each author to see how much they are participating—with the publisher and on their own—in selling their works.

What this means for us here at WordServe is instead of entrenching and cutting back, we've made the decision to increase our level of service to our authors. In the weeks ahead, you will be hearing of new initiatives from us that will:

→ Better inform you of changes in the publishing industry; and

→ Better equip you to be the primary marketer of your book through a strong internet presence and PR initiatives after the publisher’s initial marketing plan has been fulfilled.

In this arena specifically, we are seeking to partner with an established PR firm to give authors a discount on continuing PR campaigns.

Now is the time to continue to get better at what we do, and help our authors be better at what they should be doing. So while there are challenges ahead, we intend to meet all of them head on.

The key word for 2009 is “PARTNERSHIP.”

Let's not fret about the future. Nothing has taken God by surprise. It’s comforting to note that so many angel's messages around Christ’s incarnation began with “Do not be afraid” or “Fear not!” and followed by good and encouraging news, “good tidings of great joy.”

The message of Christmas contains all we need to know to experience peace on earth and joy to the world, no matter the state of the economy or the unease in the (publishing) world around us.

May Christ, who IS our peace, enfold and infuse you with hope and good cheer; erasing all fear and replacing it with serenity beyond human logic and reasoning and energy for the work ahead. We stand on a solid rock in a shaking world. That is always cause for celebration.

Christmas blessings to you and those you love,

Greg Johnson
President
WordServe Literary Group