Y o u r W r i t e r s G r o u p

Happy 4th!

2009-07-03T22:04:30-06:00

We're up at the lake with the family for a few days, and I'm thinking about going into the other room to play Wii with everyone else, watch some baseball maybe, have a little more apple pie...

But a competing desire has me thinking about all the writing I haven't been getting done while I'm bounced out of my schedule and I'm wondering how to keep writing when I'm away, on vacation, just thrown off my regular game. Sure, there needs to be time to take a break from production and get away for a while, clear the head. But I don't want to break momentum in the middle of a chapter--I'm too far along to stop now and I'm wondering what happens next. You know when you're at a place where it's time to stop or time to keep going--and they just never seem to fall at the right times.

Is it a matter of planning better? If anyone has a thought about how I can manage this better, I'd love to hear it. I'm trying to stay close to my characters and how they're developing right now and I know I can't make life stop for it, so I suppose it's a matter of being as efficient as possible with the little time I do have. Capture what thoughts and developments I can and come back to it as I'm able.

Of course, being fully present and enjoying family time is necessary too. There's definitely a balance to consider here. You don't get these moments back.

What I'm thinking is probably best is to enjoy both writing and family time as I'm able and make the most of every bit I can. I can accept that I can't do it all, and I know that I'll get to finish that chapter eventually. I certainly don't want to miss the time to enjoy and make memories and get inspired by the hanging-out and just enjoying together....

Anyone else think about this? And if so, what do you think?

Happy 4th, everyone. Hope it's a fun and fruitful one.

Christian Products' Industry Future is "Bleak"

2009-06-22T16:13:24-06:00

Demonstrating once again the failure to distinguish between Christian products and Christian books, Christian Retailing reports that former marketing exec for Nelson and Zondervan, Greg Stielstra, foresees a bleak future for the Christian "products industry" (CR):

"Brick-and-mortar operations haven't lost all their business, but they've lost the business that will allow them to stay in business, whether they know it or not," says Stielstra.

Interviewed for World Magazine’s annual books issue (ironically releasing Independence Day, and just one week before the International Christian Retail Show), Stielstra says: "There's a lot of lip service to online retailing and to e-books, but there's still too much allegiance to old ways of doing business. Surges in Christian fiction, or in sub-niches, are just disguising the fundamental problems."

Stielstra adds that the music industry showed the way ahead for the book business. "It's no accident that it took a computer company--Apple--to figure out the new music model. They had nothing invested in the old model, nothing to protect."

(Incidentally, in the same upcoming issue, a World report highlights self-publishing as "the bright spot in a gloomy book-selling environment.")

Many thoughts ricocheting around my head over this, but one question stands out: Could it be that some Christians don't consider books just another product among the "miscellaneous retail" taking over Christian stores? Okay, another: Could it be that the Christian retail channel has focused too narrowly on certain segments of their potential market?Or maybe it's just that Wal-Mart or Amazon is cheaper.

The International Christian Retail Show changed its name from the Christian Bookseller's Convention recently after many years of books losing floor space to other products. Now books are also losing to a retail industry that sees no connection between their recent downturn and the surge in popularity of the "spiritual-but-not-religious" description of faith.

We can ignore or decry the situation all we want. But I wonder,

Is there a connection between current rejection of establishment restrictions (about which the established powers--religious, corporate, and governing--are typically very concerned), and these entities' declining health?

Because whether YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter are creating or following this social revolution, it doesn't seem many in the established powers (save Obama, maybe) are really paying much attention.

Well, I haven't read the article yet. Maybe that's part of what Stielstra is saying about Christian retail. His coauthored book, Faith-Based Marketing probably deserves a fair read.

Free the Christian Book!

2009-06-15T17:21:34-06:00

In a guest editorial for Christian Retailing, Mark Kuyper, President & CEO of the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association, shares how according to the 2008 American Religious Identification Survey, 76% of Americans identify as Christian (50.9% claim to be Protestant). Another study shows 75% of the population reads books. Two-thirds say they read the Bible and "other religious works." Yet, according to Pubtrack Consumer, Christian books are only 4.7% of the market. Kuyper says, "the potential for ... growth is staggering...."

His conclusion?

"Going through difficult times encourages us to innovate. Publishers and retailers all over our industry are rethinking how to do their work. Now is the time to actively and creatively develop new ideas and strategies to reach beyond our current customer base..."

Amen. A standing ovation for the thought. So what might these "new ideas and strategies" be?

This week, I'd like to honor Mark's wonderful suggestion and ask for your ideas and strategies. The ECPA, the Christian Booksellers Association, even Christian Retailing, which according to their slogan, "serves the $4.6 billion Christian products industry" is eager to hear what we think we should do to grow the market for Christian books. So far, these new ideas are pretty scarce (one new suggestion comes from the CBA chairman: downsizing stores). And to be clear, Kuyper's article isn't necessarily agreeing with the original assumption that the Christian book is only intended for Christians. Yet though he does believe that The Purpose-Driven Life sold to more than just Christians, there's no denying that this simplistic Bible study broke out of CBA--the association of Christian book stores--to reach those who didn't need a safe shopping experience or assurance that their values were shared by the store-owner. Those who bought it at warehouse stores or online could have been nonChristians, but according to the data, if one in four American Christians bought the book, all copies would be accounted for. And given the number of churches who ran 40-Days-of-Purpose campaigns, I think that may be pretty close to accurate (Barna says over half the US population attends church at least once a month).

I'm happy Mark's joined me in what I've been saying for a while now: we need a new strategy. The Christian book industry has taken up the challenge too, so where should we start? I'd like to suggest we start at the beginning--at our guiding principles. I believe our problem comes down to this: not enough of us really believe what we say we do. And that's nothing new. How many of us really practice the Great Commission every day? How many of us break the first and second commandment often? But what about the Golden Rule? Most of us at least do to others what we'd like done to us, right?

Not when it comes to Christian book buyers (I mean buyers of Christian books). Would you like others to treat you as an outsider and say what kind of books you should be allowed to read and where you can get them? No! That's why CBA was initially formed in the 50s, when Christian books were being denied shelf space at secular bookstores. But what about today--with the largest segment of the Christian book industry owned by secular houses and Amazon carrying everything as cheap as it can get? Now the tables are turned and some Christian book buyers find their "seeker" books banned in Christian stores, and by association, themselves untolerated. The challenge to think up new ideas and strategies for expanding the customer base is all well and good when we're talking about reaching Christian buyers of Christian books. But everyone else? They're just not who we serve.

Of course, I'm not necessarily saying there's a problem with this. I suppose it might fly: "Sorry, Lord. I tried to do what you asked, as long as it didn't offend my existing customer base. Christian books just don't reach anyone but Christians."

Guilt-trips aside, since tough times are ripe times, I'd like to offer up the first admittedly-simple-minded suggestion for one of these new strategies: stop thinking of books or stores or customers as Christian vs. non. After all, we're all just reaching out of the same gutter. And in place of those categories, think of how your next act will share love and reach someone God misses. Sure it might not be as nice and neatly compartmentalized, and make it harder to thin-slice the market into subcategories. But if we really have a higher organizing principle, let's apply it to deconstructing this idea of insiders and outsiders and replace it with the idea of all of us looking to get out of the same old dirty box.

And maybe, when we're all unworthy-yet-adored, and O-thank-you-God reachable, we'll just happen to find that transcendent books can in fact sell, for the very reason that they also transcend bariers.

Free Yourself

2009-06-12T17:02:57-06:00

It's strange blogging. I've said before it's like taking your shirt off in front of the class. It feels sort of wrong to do it. Which is probably why so many people like it.

But other people do it for traffic. I've done that before, but I don't really care about that anymore. I actually like not being anyone special. Can you believe that? What's wrong with me? The whole WORLD wants to be famous and special and they kill themselves for 15 minutes of fame. But I've had a little taste of popularity and while it's fun in a way, it comes with a lot of responsibility. And I'm not necessarily against responsibility--it's just when it's really heavy and for things you'd rather not be responsible for. Like the responsibility not to offend all the other people trying to get famous.

When I was young, it was being the pastor's kid and performing at piano recitals that brought unwanted attention. Now it's the almighty book deal people seek at writers conferences. And I don't enjoy that part. It makes me feel weird and I get worn out by it and afterwards I have to go be with normal people for a while and talk about normal things.

But there's a trick here you can learn whether you're popular or not: how to be yourself. I've written articles and stories about this--being who God made you, how to find it and how to hold on to it--and I believe it's what we all really want. And yet for some people it's so ellusive. It's what most editors are looking for when they sit down to be pitched to, and it's what we look for in our favorite actors and actresses who are basically the same people no matter what role they're in. It's the annoyingly trite answer to the unanswerable question of how to "break out." We love people who are authentically themselves, and those who talk with understanding about this truth--people like Holden Caufield, the poster boy for this sacred principle of youth, against all the phonies and the subscribers to artifice and duplicity.

But the thing is, everything is artificial. And this is what drives Holden crazy in the end of The Catcher in the Rye (Oh, there I just spoiled it for all you 8th graders. Sorry). Culture is artifice. Most relationships involve some form of artifice. A novel is the height of artifice, no matter what kind you're talking about. Which doesn't seem a positive sign for novelists. These are constructs built by human ingenuity. Industry, publishing included, is a culture of artifice. Writers are pressured to adopt certain identities and assimilate them, to be contributors to this "society." "I'm sorry," they say to all you Holdens out there, "you must assimilate." So what is the chief difference between publishing and say, a cult? I'm sure there's a good punchline to that, but actually, there's very little difference. So maybe we should take a lesson from our inner teens and not become phonies just to belong to the club. Don't fit your culture, don't impress people. Tell them to blow their book contract out their butt.

I'm being deliberately antagonistic here and I know it. But for me, not wanting to be famous, it can be difficult to see how many people do. I consider many of these people as hopelessly searching for an identity to latch on to. Why can't they be authentically themselves and just write what they want rather than what they think others want them to? What are they afraid of? Rejection? Why can't more wanna-be authors just write about crazy things happening to crazy people and if that happens to reveal some theological truths, great! But no. Even if there's one in a hundred doing that, the 99 will say he's being duplicitous and artificial trying to deceive everyone that what he does is simple, that he's actually striving very hard to come off the right way and fit just the right niche.

Well I don't think so. I've seen people break out and it isn't because they're trying to. Sooner or later, the act slips (see Bakker, Swaggart, Haggard, et al). There's no art to real.

And I can't accept the rules to breaking out because I'm this person. And you're that person! So don't try to fit what you think someone's looking for. Just being YOU is what people are looking for. And even if they aren't looking for you currently, being you will make them beat down your door. It sucks, but it's true! Believe it or don't. Think it's too simple or naive or whatever. Maybe it's childish to place such a high premium on being yourself. But remember Jesus with the children and think about what kind of artifice a kid knows about. Nothing. And why must the kingdom have no business with anything other than innocence and genuineness?

Childlikeness is actually a spiritual value. And actually one of the bigger ones.

I'll promptly take back this claim if someone can produce an author who "broke out" who was trying to fit a mold. There could be a special author attitude that works like a magic contract-printing machine. But if it did, it wouldn't be worth the effort to figure it out.

In the end, those who are their true selves without apology continue to make us smile and scury to read their genius. And all you publishing gurus with your nine steps to fame and fortune can put that in your pipes and smoke it.