New Year, Fresh Beginings, and Resolutions by Diana Flegal

January first is just a day on the calendar, but it offers us a chance to examine where we are and project our goals to where we want to be, spiritually, mentally, and career wise.

I like fresh starts, a change to begin anew and to make a new list of goals. My personality lends its way to lists. I get such a sense of accomplishment when I cross a task off; it gives me the incentive to tackle the next one. One of my clients, David Stearman, recently said in an FB post, "For my first job of the day, I try doing something I know will be successful; a sure thing. An early victory sets a nice tone for the coming day."

I do that with my lists. I write it according to difficulty, with the easiest one listed first.

A favorite movie of mine is, "What About Bob." I think many Christian counselors could use that movie as a tool in their sessions. The takeaway for me was: Get things done by taking baby steps.

Books are the source of much direction I receive from God. I read his word, yes. But maybe I have to have someone predigest it for me. When I read Max Lucado's, Cure for the Common Life I took notes, and took something away from it that I could apply to my life. I am better for it.

When I read Erwin McManus's Seizing Your Divine Moment, I was so excited to give myself permission to think outside the box. Love that about Erwin.

So when I enter a new year I gather books about me that I feel are going to make me a better person. Better at my job, better in my relationships, and mostly, a better daughter of God.

This January I am reading, Your 100 Day Prayer, Actively Waiting on God by John Snyder alongside of Simple Abundance by Sarah Ban Breathnach. I just finished the novel The Wildwater Walking Club by Claire Cook. And for my continual quest to learn more about the writing process, I am just about done reading Cec Murphey's, Unleashing the Writer Within.

In my stack are two books with bookmarks in them that I will complete as I finish these others. Life Lessons by Elisabeth Kubler Ross & David Kessler (authors of Death & Dying) and When you Don't See His Plan by Nadine Hennesey with Rebecca Baker. Other stacks wait patiently for me beside my nightstand and on my bookcase.

I am curious what titles you are reading as you enter this new year. What books have bookmarks in them on your night stand? I pray your list of goals are realistic and that you have great success in fulfilling them.

Let's Hear It for Heroes by Andy Scheer

I'm old-fashioned. I desperately miss hymns in church. I don't own a smart phone (let alone an “app” for one). I still listen to LPs, and I even read books printed on paper.

And I like to read books with heroes. Not just protagonists, but the kind of POV characters that as a kid we called “good guys.” (Remember them?)

Maybe that's why my shelves are filled with various genres of action-packed novels. I love to experience adventure vicariously: on deck with Dudley Pope's Nicholas Ramage of the British Navy, in the saddle with Stephen Bly's Stuart Brannon, racing a 1904 Locomobile with Clive Cussler's Isaac Bell, or exploring an underground river with his Dirk Pitt.

And not just experience these heroes' adventures, but also their virtues. Yes, in the best of these stories, the heroes are human. They face doubts and setbacks. But with integrity, they persevere.

And because they do, more than just their fictional settings and associates come out ahead. I believe their readers do too. In a world splashed with bad news and scandals, we need heroes—people we can respect and from whom we can draw inspiration as we face our own mundane battles.

Are we too sophisticated for heroes today? I don't think so. Though I'm not much of a sports fan, I remained fixed to the screen for several hours this past Sunday as I watched the latest installment of “The Adventures of Tim Tebow—Football Hero.” In a sport plagued by stars who've succumbed to the world, the flesh, and the devil, here's a genuine hero who by the grace of God has stayed true to those values that remain long after the players leave the field.

The amount of ink and airtime devoted on Monday to the storylines behind the game show me that sportscasters—and the public—still know the power of a gripping story. Especially a story with a hero. Maybe some are cynics hoping to see him fall. But whether in real life or in fiction, I believe many of us still long to see a good guy win.

FEEDING THE WRITING ADDICTION by Linda S. Glaz

Well, that gets right to the point, doesn’t it? After reading four books over the last couple days, my daughter asked me, “Mom, where do you find the time?”
I told her, “Are you kidding? Look around my house?" Do I care that there are dust bunnies procreating in every corner? Does the fact that we’re eating leftovers for the nth time push me to make a pot roast? Am I bothered by the spots I have to look through to see outside? In other words, has the health department shut me down yet? No…so I’m still good to go.

Seriously (for those who don’t want to believe the truth above) I am willing to read, edit, write, and read some more to the exclusion of almost anything else, with the exception of family and an occasional load of wash.

I waited until my kids were pretty much grown to pursue my writing. I allowed stories to toss around in gray matter while scrubbing the toilet bowl, fill my mind day to day as I dashed about the soccer field, awaken me at night in all their wonderful glory. And then, one day, I sat down with a legal pad and put some of those tales to paper.

I have never regretted my decision to allow writing to take over my life. There were so many characters living in my head that sooner or later some of them had to come out willingly or I had to pursue serious medication to force them to leave. And now, I have the added pleasure of sharing other folks’ works, helping them push the squatters from their minds to the page. I don't find writing to be what some describe as a lonely or singular endeavor. There are so many wonderful characters to meet and mold. (or do they mold me? Hmmmmmm…)

At any rate, the pleasure is all mine. Even if none of them grace a cover from Zondervan, Multnomah, or Abingdon, my characters live. They have told their stories to a readership of one. They crawled from my head to my fingertips with love, and I’ll continue to tell their stories, even if only to this readership of one.

January & Marketing Plans by Jennifer Hudson Taylor

Regardless of whether you're pre-published or published, January is the perfect time to create a marketing plan for the year. A plan helps you evaluate where you are and prompts you to think about where you want to be at the end of next year. Otherwise, you're just floating along and hoping to make progress without really being deliberate, consistent, or strategic.

If you have new books coming out, you probably have a book launch campaign and you could incorporate that into your overall plan, but don't let your campaign be your only plan. There are some basic steps you can incorporate into your daily routine that will build your platform while you write the next book. If you're pre-published and you aren't yet doing any speaking engagements, radio talk shows or book signings, I'll be you're online and could benefit from a marketing plan that would increase your social media platform.

It isn't necessary to hire a professional publicist to create your marketing plan unless you're published and at the stage where you need to take your platform to the next level. If you've never written a Marketing Plan, you can start out with something basic, depending on how much time, money and effort you want to put into your marketing plan. No boiler-plate marketing plan is going to work for everyone. We are all different, our schedules vary, our talents unique, and our books are in various niches. The marketing plan you create for 2012 may not be the best one for you in 2013.

Below are some basic categories I would suggest to start. 

• Book Launch Campaigns - If you have any new books coming out this year.
• Internet Presence - This is your home place on the web. It's usually your domain location whether it be a static website or a daily/weekly blog. 
• Traditional Media - TV and radio shows, newspapers and magazines, and places to distribute media releases.
• Social Media - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube, as well as online forums.
• Digital Media - Blog interviews, e-zines, podcasts, videos, and video book trailers.
• Speaking Engagements - Conferences, workshops, webinars, video conferencing, Skype and Google+ presentations.
• Book Signings & Readings - Some of these are just signings and others allow authors to provide a reading, offer Q & A, or give brief presentations.
• Print Publications - Graphic Design and printing of bookmarks, flyers, business cards, postcards, signs, banners, magnets, and memorabilia.

If you noticed, I've absorbed Public Relations into Traditional, Social and Digital Media. It's started taking on different forms these days, but should be utilized in all three mediums as needed. Have you created your marketing plan for 2012?

2011 was a good year by Terry Burns

I’ve been with Hartline for ten years in February (2/13/02), have been an agent there for five years of that time (10/18/2006), and have been involved in writing and publishing (primarily business oriented) for some twenty years before that time, before I turned to writing fiction and recognized the need for an agent. . Starting a new year seems like a good time to look back over the past year and see how it shook out.

Photo is me with Bonnie Calhoun at ACFW as she received the "Mentor of the Year" Award.

The numbers tell a lot of the story. I ended the year with 61 clients and have done 119 book contracts for them, 23 of them multi-book contracts. That means that 71% of my clients have published since signing with me. That is certainly no record, but it’s not a bad average. I went through over 3400 submissions to select these clients, again surely not a record, but it feels like a lot.

But the numbers don’t tell the entire story. I do work with a large number of new writers and I’m usually in the number one spot on the list of agents placing debut authors on the Publishers Marketplace website. That also means I work with more small publishers than some in helping these debut authors get their start. I get a lot of pleasure out of helping new writers get started.

I do an occasional contract with a client for a single book, but most Hartline clients sign for “all book length work.” That means we are more interested in helping them develop their career, not just sell a book. I helped Jennifer Hudson Taylor get her first book in print and now she has eight books in print or under contract. Max Elliot Anderson had a number of books in print but his publisher went out of business. We were able to find a publisher that would reissue those books and he has gone on to have 17 ‘books for (reluctant reader) boys’ in print or under contract and is still going strong. While with me Jill Williamson won a Christy with her “By Darkness Hid” and though she no longer uses an agent has gone on to win a second Christy.

I require that my clients all be in an online group that gives me an opportunity to contact all of them at once. They do have the option of being in the side of the group that can talk to one another or the side that only receives priority messages from me. The full access side have become very close to one another and have also turned out to be a group of prayer warriors that support one another, celebrate each other’s successes and support each other when projects don’t get picked up. It’s an amazing group.

Just as Joyce got me started in the business I have worked with a number of assistants and some have gone on to an expanded role in the publishing industry. Two have formed small publishing houses that are growing by leaps and bounds. Kristine Pratt founded Written World Communications, and Randall Mooney Crossover Publications. Linda Glaz went from being an assistant to becoming a Hartline agent in her own right, and two, Tammy Barley and Normandie Fischer became editors at Written World. Jennifer Hudson Taylor is now the in-house publicist at Hartline and is getting her own publicist company established as well. I have some new assistants working with me now.

What does the future hold? We have several hundred submissions out for clients and spend a huge amount of time trying to identify that editor that we feel is a good potential fit for a project. The economy may have a lot to do with the amount of success we can expect to see. Changes in the industry have a lot to do with it as well and we work hard to keep our clients positioned on the cutting edges of changes that are occurring, particularly with digital books. Change has always been the hallmark of the publishing industry, but I don’t remember a time when it was as pronounced or as fast moving as it is now.

Verbal Fitness by Andy Scheer

If the ads in your newspapers this weekend were anything like the ones in mine, you couldn't miss the message. It's a new year—time to get in shape. You've indulged yourself too long. Now buy this gadget (like the kind you see everywhere at garage sales) and you'll become slim and happy.

If only it were that easy. Our lifestyle (with the physique it produces) consists of countless tiny habits. Try to change them all at once and we're doomed to fail. But focus on one or two little things, and maybe there's hope.

The same goes for our writing. Extra words can easily creep into our prose—then go unnoticed as we edit. What's the harm? But sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, chapter by chapter, they add up. Those extra, superfluous, unnecessary, redundant words—that duplicate a point you've already made—act like verbal flab.

So in case your New Year's fitness resolution includes more vigorous writing, let me highlight two habits that often bloat our prose:

● Subtle redundancies. He blinked his eyes. (What else would he blink?) She paced back and forth. (Not up and down?) Sometimes we even write triples: He unlocked the door with the key in his hand. Unless your character is a burglar or a spy, why add obvious details?

● Double dialogue attributions. If the context doesn't already tell your readers who is speaking, then supplement the spoken words with either a dialogue tag (Melanie said) or a “beat”/action tag (Melanie put on her coat). But don't make a habit of using both: “Let's take a walk,” Melanie said, putting on her coat.

Two little writing habits—easy to catch as you edit your drafts.

Try looking for just one in your writing this week. Then next week. And even the week after. It might become a new habit. Then instead of having to wear baggy sweats, your prose just might look good in Spandex.

Discusson of Blogs by Linda Glaz

There's been a lot of discussion lately on the importance or lack thereof of blogs. How do you all feel about blogging? Do you see promotion of your work, your sites, your ability to reach out or is blogging simply another obstacle to your writing?

Obviously, you want others to go to your blog, comment, help you draw their readers from their blogs to yours. Do you go to the other blogs or do you get "blogged down" with all the sites you need to visit?

Does blogging distract you from the immediate issue at hand? Your writing time...

Have you done a professional blog site? Are the results worth the time? Are you concerned with numbers, or the level of bloggers who follow you? In other words, are you a blog "snob" crunching numbers and name dropping?

Just thought I'd throw this out there and see whether you do or don't put much emphasis on blogs. Be part of the discussion. Care to share any thoughts?