A Little Reading Round-Up

 I've been doing some reading I'd like to talk about, so get ready.

Children's Books: A Middle Class Ghetto? by Elen Caldecott in The Guardian. Interesting points: Caldecott argues that when working class kids do appear in children's books, they're often portrayed negatively. The working class life is one characters should want to escape.

Not Another Critique Group by Kelsi Turner in the SCBWI Winter 2016 Bulletin. This was a list of suggested alternatives to traditional critique groups.

State Author Networks: A Model From New Jersey by Jennifer R. Hubbard in the SCBWI Winter 2016 Bulletin. You know how I am about community. This article is all about creating a writer community within a state. Our SCBWI presence in my corner of the world is New England-wide, not state-wide. We miss out on the closer community.

The Savvy Self-Publisher column in the Nov./Dec., 2015 issue of Poets & Writers. Editor Jessica Page Morrell says that a "strong cover" can be designed for less than $5,000. Publicist Jessica Glenn reports that her company provides a "traditional campaign" for $5,000. The column doesn't mention editing. The days of publishing eBooks is long gone, people.

What Did You Do This Week, Gail? Jan. 29th Edition

January is still going very well, even though most of yesterday and all last night I had kitchen appliances in my dining room.

Goal 1. Adhere to Goals and Objectives. Yes, indeed.

Goal 2. Prepping Mummy Hunters for Submission. I'm researching more submission possibilities. I'm thinking of narrowing it down to agents who have Twitter feeds I like.

Goal 3. Generate New Short Work/Programs. Nearly finished a draft of one of the writing strategies programs I'm doing the beginning of March and turned the slide material over to Computer Guy who has already worked up a set of slides.

Goal 4. Marketing Saving the Planet & Stuff.  A liiiittle bit of reading on Kindle Direct Publishing Select.

Goal 5. Community Building/General Marketing/Branding.

• The NESCBWI workshop descriptions were announced this week, and I went over them.
• I also posted the CCLC and distributed the newsletter. I marketed the calendar at CT Bloggers, the NESCBWI listserv, my Facebook page, two Facebook communities, and Twitter. 
• I did the TMT post and marketed it at Facebook, a Google+ community, and Twitter.
• I also did two blog posts on picture books and marketed them to a Google+ community and Twitter.
• I reposted an Original Content post at my Goodreads blog and reposted excerpts from those two recent picture book posts (covering four books) in reviews there.

#CTchildlit--Using Community To Promote

As part of my continuing community building obses--commitment, I have created and started using a hashtag--#CTchildlit. #CTchildlit is for discussing children's and YA author/illustrator appearances in Connecticut and publishing news for Connecticut children's and YA authors and illustrators.

Authors, illustrators, booksellers, librarians, bloggers, readers, and other people I haven't thought of can use this hashtag to help promote Connecticut children's/YA authors.

#CTchildlit could also make it possible for people in the Connecticut Children's literature community to become more aware of one another or even to get to know one another.

An Internet Idea That Hopped Out Into The Non-Internet World

Internet activities are often modeled on what you might call real-world events. Traditional book tours became blog tours. Traditional book launches became virtual book launches. Moving away from book-related issues, dating became on-line dating. On-line versions of magazines and newspapers were created. But they were still magazines and newspapers, which have existed for centuries.

You see where I'm going with this.

This summer I heard about something that originated on the Internet being copied out here in what the Trek folk used to call the carbon-based world. Here in Connecticut this month we're going to have a Quilt Shop Hop.

Blog hops involve bloggers linking together, usually connecting posts on a similar subject. But I don't recall hearing about anything on that model outside the Internet until I stumbled upon a flyer promoting the Connecticut Quilt Shop Hop at my local sewing store.

This particular hop involves a $7 registration fee, which I believes gets you a mug as well as a "passport." You can take that passport into participating stores for special items. It looks as if there will be a pattern given away. Some stores will be featuring special material or kits. They have a Connecticut Quilt Shop Hop Facebook page. The salesclerk at my local store said a good time is had by all.

Now, yes, I'm interested in this because I made a quilt top this year. And if I was going to be around this month, I'd probably take part in this hop because I need more material for the backing, and two of the participating stores are convenient for me to get to. But why am I writing about it at a writer's blog?

Because in addition to being intrigued by the movement from Internet to brick and mortar store, I see this quilt shop hop as an example of using community for marketing. I've been interested in that for a few years now. I don't know how well this community marketing effort works for these sewing stores, though they've done it five times now, so I'm guessing they must think it's worth it. Presumably they are sharing the expense of promotion. Presumably every store has promotional materials available for this event, meaning they are promoting other stores, even by just mentioning their names.

What if a group of bookstores did something similar? What if every participating bookstore offered a free book to registered hoppers instead of a free pattern? What if every bookstore offered a special event to hoppers? What if every bookstore featured a different local author with a signing, meaning the authors would get  involved with promotion? What if they started promoting the hop months ahead of time, the way the Quilt Shop Hop people did?

How much would promoting the group benefit the individual?