Browsed by
Author: Angela D. Meyer

Angela D. Meyer lives in NE with her husband and two children whom they homeschool - recently graduating their son. She has taught Bible class for over 35 years and is on the leadership team of her local Christian writers group. She loves God, her family, the ocean, good stories, connecting with friends, taking pictures, quiet evenings and a good laugh. Someday she wants to ride in a hot air balloon and vacation by the sea.
We are going to spend a few weeks talking about the trees inside the forest. The small parts that often feel tedious to the creative brain. But they are necessary. The rules you must understand before you go breaking them in the glorious exhibition of your style.
If you want your medicine to be a bit sweeter, join a critique group. The fellowship and encouragement you receive will make up for the toil and sweat you must go through. And what you learn in the process of editing others’ work will grow you toward your goal by leaps and bounds.
For starters, I am going to recommend several books I have found to be helpful.
  • Contains exercises
  • Applicable to both fiction and non-fiction
  • Covers 7 grammar points
  • Used throughout your manuscript
  • Short and fun
The First Five Pages by Noah Lukeman
  • Contains exercises
  • Focused on fiction, but parts applicable to non-fiction as well
  • Focus on grammar, does include some on elements of story
  • Although applicable to entire manuscript, focuses on first few pages
  • From perspective of what an editor will see that may turn him off to your manuscript immediately
Self-Editing forFiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King
  • Contains exercises
  • Focuses on fiction
  • Elements of your story, not just grammar points
  • Easy to read and understand
The First Fifty Pages by Jeff Gerke
  • No exercises
  • Focuses on fiction
  • Covers elements of story
  • Great examples from the movies
  • Easy to read and enjoyable
All writers need to build a library of reference books. You will go back to them again and again. Consider purchasing one of these books or look around and find a different one that will suit your needs better. Do you already have a collection? If so, what is your favorite book covering some aspect of self-editing?
 

Writing can be an isolating task. In order to focus, we squirrel away in some out of the way place or corner in the house and attempt to defy the distractions.

To some degree we succeed or nothing ever would have been written. But a by-product to this isolation is often discouragement. Those around us may not understand the dance of characters in our head or the struggle to find just the right word.

Most people who don’t write don’t get that we HAVE to write. And as Christians it is our God given assignment and mission to pen the words He has placed on our hearts.

So how do we maintain equilibrium in the midst of such imbalance? How Do we keep our mind on the goal when frustrations set it?

Read good things. There are many good encouragement books and websites out there. I highly recommend Marlene Bagnull’s book,  Write His Answer, a bible study for writers. 

Hang around other writers who are writing and submitting. This holds you accountable and gives you hope that you can do it, too. 

Take a break. Enjoy life with those you love. Relationship triumphs words.

Improve your craft. Take a class. Read lots of books – about writing in general as well as fiction. Participate in a critique group. Write. Submit your work on a regular basis.

What ways have you found to  be encouraged? Do you have an idea not listed? Or a favorite website or book?

Before you tell people to come and see what you have, you better have something to show! And it better WOW them or they may move on and never come back.
For a writer, one of the best ways to ensure a dynamic product is to be part of a critique group. It is easy to make excuses not to join one. Activities demand our attention and time. But if you are serious about publication or just improving your craft for personal reasons, then consider what a critique group provides.
Support and encouragement. When you come to a table of writers you can know that everyone understands the work involved in producing your best piece. They see your work at its worst and still believe in you that you can make it better and they will push you to do that.
Everyone needs a cheering section. Someone walking beside you that is a step ahead of you on the journey allows you to see the possibilities  if you keep working at it.
Feedback/critique/edits. Another set of eyes on your writing offers an objective view of the quality. As a writer it is easy to be so enamored of the content we don’t see the work the form needs. And after reading our piece for the 100th time, we see what we expect to see and often miss things that need improvement.
Education/mentoring. A critique group is an opportunity to learn and grow as others around the table offer information and resources that they have discovered along the way. Members who are more experienced in one area of the writing craft can guide others in that area.
A grammarian can help those who excel at a plot, but have no clue what active and passive writing entails. Someone who excels at showing instead of telling can help the devotional writer bring his pieces to life.
Accountability. Knowing that others are going to ask if you wrote or submitted anything will help you to stay on the ball and be proactive about improving your writing craft.
For myself, I know without a shadow of a doubt that my critique group made the difference in my writing that was needed for me to pen a novel that a publisher would want on their book list. Without their help and encouragement, my book would still be sitting on the computer instead of awaiting publication.
My advice? Get thee to a critique group post haste!
Are you part of a critique group? I would love to hear about it.
A funny thing happened on the way to writing this blog. I could not upload a new profile picture. No matter what I tried. What did I learn? Sometimes, Facebook has glitches. And sometimes you just have to wait a couple of days. It took about 3 days of waiting and now I have a brand new picture!
Photos, Likes, Notes, videos and events come with the fan page. You have tabs for 12.
 
 Only 4 are visible unless you click on the little arrow to the right of the tabs.
 
After all the app boxes drop down, click on the little + in the upper right corner of the blank app box to see what is available. There are also some more choices under “find more apps.”
Otherwise apps are tricky to find. There is no central cataloguing system to find them. The best way I know is to look around at other pages and find one that you like. Click on that tab and somewhere on that page you should find a button to click to get the app for your own page.  Unless it was a custom app. Click and follow the directions to load it to your page.

Once your apps are loaded, you can customize the look. You can rename most of them, add your own photo for the tab cover and rearrange the order of them (except for photos-  the tab shows the last one that you uploaded).

To make changes to your tab, click on the little pencil in the upper right hand corner of the loaded apps(after you have dropped down all the tabs). If you want to change position, click on the app you want it to switch with. If you want to change the name or picture, click on edit settings.
Under edit settings, to change the name, type in what you want it called and your set. To change the picture, click on change picture. On the next screen, click on change and it will take you to another screen where you need to follow the directions to download the picture you want used as a custom tab. 
For sizing and cropping, use whatever photo editing software you have on your computer. The picture must be at least the minimum size referred to in Part 1 of this post. If it is too big, then Facebook will tell you when you try to download it. Adjust accordingly.
Please share what you have been learning in your Facebook experience so we can help each other grow in this area.

You probably don’t want the world knowing all the private details and information about your friends and family. You have two options. Create an author fan page or accept subscribers on your personal profile.

A subscriber is someone who follows you on your profile without being a friend. If you go this route, then on every post you will have to choose who sees that post. Anything you mark as public can be seen by these subscribers as well as anyone who chances by your page.
The benefit to this is not having to keep track of two pages. And it allows your fans to see the more personal you, something fans like.
For those of you who want to have an author fan page and for those still trying to figure out some of the details, here are a few tips and tidbits that you may find useful.
·         The cover photo needs to be 851 x 315 pixels. The cover photo may not have advertising in it. You cannot have a call to actions in it and it cannot be primarily text. Consider your cover photo part of your branding. It should in some way represent you and your message.
·         Your profile picture needs to be 180 x180 pixels. This will be the picture that shows up when the link to your Fan page is shared.
·         If you customize your app tabs, the picture needs to be 111 x 74 pixels. There are lots of cool things you can do with apps. We will cover these in part 2 of this post.
·         You have to have 30 fans before you can see your stats. The stats are useful in that they allow you to see which of your posts are reaching people.
·         The average engagement rate is 2%. To figure your engagement rate divide the number of people talking about your page by the number of likes. When you are checking out other Fan pages and see one that has a high engagement rate, see what they are doing.
·         If you have both a personal profile and an author fan page, then when you visit a blog and share it back to Facebook, it will share to the account you are signed in to at the time. When you leave a comment, you can usually choose which ID to use in leaving it.
Next week I will share more that I am learning about apps on your fan page as well as some ideas for sizing your photos.



Angela D. Meyer lives in Omaha, NE with her
husband and 2 kids.She is working to build her
platform and gladly shares what she is 
learning.  She is awaiting the release of her debut
novel Bruised Reed, Check out her website:

Give more than you take from your readers.
Before you flag down people cruising the internet highway and redirect them to your website, Facebook page or some other social media, make sure you do have something to give your readers once they get there. And make sure it is worth their time.
In his new book Platform, Get Noticed in a Noisy World,Michael Hyatt emphasizes the importance of the wow factor.
You get one chance to make a first impression. You want to make that impression memorable. You want them to go out and tell all their friends to come.
Have you taken the time to develop the product (whether it’s a book, blog or something else) you are offering or are you settling for “good enough”?
It’s better and less costly in the long run to make it the best now rather than to go back and try and recapture those people who passed by and said it wasn’t valuable enough for them to stay. At the same time, don’t use this as an excuse to not start.
My lesson this week:
My main product is my book, but on my website, Facebook, and other social media I need more to offer  than my book to attract an audience(especially since this is a debut novel). 
 
While at times I may feel anxious about building my platform, I can’t rush to a place I’m not ready to be. I’ll be making some noise to wave down more traffic soon enough.
I highly recommend Michael Hyatt’s book. He has the proof that he knows what he’s doing. His audience is huge and it’s loyal. Me? I can only share what I am learning and point you to those who have gone before me.

I’ve noticed a few common threads throughout the articles I’m reading while I work to build my platform. Consistency. Value. Engagement.
Consistency: Give your readers what you have promised them.
Frequency. If you tell them you will be blogging on Mondays. Then blog on Monday. If you want to blog 3 times a week and tell your readers, then do so. Better to blog once a month and be consistent than for your readers to never know what to expect. They will most likely move on.
Content. If they become followers on your blog because you write about your grandmother’s recipes, then all of the sudden you switch gears and talk about motorcycles, chances are you will lose your audience. Unless of course, you’re talking about recipes your grandmother used over the campfire while she toured the country on her motorbike.
Value: Give them something to make their lives better.
Listen. Find out what your readers want. What matters to them. Check out other blogs and see what gets people talking. Ask questions. Take a poll. Look at your stats and make adjustments according to which blogs attract the most interaction.
Make it count. Whether it is encouragement, education or entertainment, enrich your readers’ lives. I doubt they want to hear about how well you brushed your teeth. Unless you’re a dentist writing about the value of dental hygiene.
Engagement: Interact with your readers.
  
Talk WITH your audience, not to them. Invite them in by asking questions. Encourage them to comment by not filling in ALL the blanks. Make them a part of what you are doing. Give them ownership.
Call to action. Whether you ask them to like your fan page, leave a comment, retweet your message, or tell their friends, ask them to participate in some way.
There are more ideas out there than I could possibly write about. Undoubtedly you have found a few favorite tips of your own. Please feel free to jump in and share what you are learning.
Angela D. Meyer lives in Omaha, NE with her
husband and 2 kids.She is working to build her
platform while awaiting the release of her debut
novel Bruised Reed. Check out her website:
You hear it in any book you pick up on writing. Show, don’t tell.
The visual picture you want to leave with people applies to so much more that writing. How does it go? I’d rather watch a sermon than hear one any day.
Believe it or not, showing instead of telling applies to marketing as well.
More than book signings and making sure stores carry your book, marketing is about building an audience to hear what you have to say. You have to woo the people you want to reach. Show your audience (don’t just tell them) why they should listen to you.
Don’t just talk about what you’re going to do, do it. Get your message out there for them to see.
“But I don’t have a book out yet.”
If you have your sights set on publication, the wooing of your audience starts now. Wherever your NOW is in the timeline of writing to publication. There are many days I wish I had a jump start on the marketing. Before the contract.
If it feels a bit overwhelming to consider all that is involved in the wooing process, just take it one step at a time.
A good place to START is building a blog. Before you get into the thick of a book release is a great time to fine tune your voice and your focus. So jump in with both feet.
Here are 5 tips for starting a blog:
  • Be willing to learn from successful bloggers.
  • Provide quality content.
  • Post when and how often you promise your readers.
  • Keep it simple. You don’t have to write long involved posts to be effective(no term papers please).
  • Always give a takeaway.
  • And remember to show. Pictures are a great way to create interest and bring in traffic.
I could go on, but I want to hear from you. What have you learned about the wonderful world of blogging on the way to getting your voice heard? Or maybe you have a favorite link to someone you are learning from.
Feel free to jump in and help me build my list.
And have a wonderful blessed day!
I wanted to share with the group my exciting news. I have been offered a contract for my novel. I am so thankful to have been provided a way to the HACWN conference – I would not have met the acquisitions editor to pitch my book idea to (at least not at this point in time).
Make plans now to make it to a conference this year. Work on your craft and then give God a chance to open doors for you.
Blessings to each one of you. Angela Meyer

“…there’s a hormone secreted into the bloodstream of most writers that makes them hate their own work while they are doing it, or immediately after. This, coupled with the chorus of critical reaction from those privileged to take a first look, is almost enough to discourage further work entirely.” –Francis Ford Coppola, “Letter to the Reader,” Zoetrope magazine

ALMOST Such a small word, but to a writer it is the difference between giving up and persevering. In my Flip Dictionary other words suggested for perseverance are: constancy, continuance, dedication, determination, diligence, drive, endurance, grit, insistence, patience, persistence, resolution, spunk, stamina, steadfastness, tenacity. All of which are necessary in a writer’s life.
So all of you writers out there — pick up the pen and write something. No matter how much. One word, paragraph, page or chapter at a time. It all adds up and surpasses the almost for submitted. Because, as Kat will remind us, you can’t publish what you don’t submit!
To God be the glory!