Getting Frilly Awards

By Keith Fisher

Ain’t it pretty? It’s a tag that tells me I’ve got a good blog. Well, it’s really just another self-promotion plan. The idea, when presenting the award, is to get the receiver to link back to your blog and call attention to more bloggers of their acquaintance. Then your network is increased and refreshed.

My friend, Kimberly Job, tagged me for this one, and I’m very grateful. She mentioned the frilly nature of the award and that I was the only man on her list, but I love getting mentioned.

As you know, I’m a writer of LDS fiction. When you work in the LDS market, or any market for that matter, you notice a preponderance of women versus men who also write. I suspect the ratio is greater in the LDS market, however.

It makes things like awards significantly feminine, but I don’t mind. Being the only man on the list makes me stand out and that can be good also, but when someone checks out my list of friends on Facebook, they might notice I have more women friends than men. What they don’t see, is my sub directory of friends. I divided them up into family, Dutch Oven cooks, high school acquaintances, close friends, other friends, and writers.

The writer’s list is significantly larger than the others, because I use Facebook to promote my writing career, and I include publishers and media types in the list. Of course the number of women, versus men is indicative.

So when I get noticed, and awarded a frilly tag, I’m grateful. When I get included in the girl talk at conferences I am honored. When I become the male prospective in critique group, I am elated. It means I’m succeeding in my promotional efforts, and I might be the successful writer I want to be, someday. It also means I can help romance writers get a grip on reality when they paint a picture of the hero in their books.

I don’t know who has already been mentioned on other blogs, so I will break the rules and only list a few. Thank you, Kim, for the mention.

LDS publisher

Nichole Giles

Laura's adventure

Tristi's

See they are all women :)

With a Little Help From my Friends

By Keith Fisher

I Joined Facebook back in November in order to promote my writing career. I started making writer friends. Most of those friends were friends already, but I began to make new friends and my circle increased in size.

Now, I have 217 friends (not all writers) but I have a small army of a network. That means if I happen to be having a book signing in almost any town, I can announce it on Facebook and some of my friends will come and support me.

At the recent LDStorymakers conference, I attended a publisher’s panel discussion, and listened to Lyle Mortimer, President of Cedar Fort, suggest writers join Facebook and make friends with him. I smiled because I already had. I’d been commenting on his wall, and he’d commented on mine.

Lyle is right. Now I have a friend who is a publisher. That friendship won’t nescisarily get me published, but it will get me looked at. My manuscripts will have a better chance of being printed.

This type of networking, however, is not new to the internet. I also, belong to other groups like Author’s Incognito. It’s an online support network exclusively for those who attended an LDStorymakers conference. The membership is growing, and those friends offer support and expertise. Often times, if I have a plotting question or problem, I can post it to the group and almost always, someone, who is an expert in one way or the other, will offer professional help. I can get first hand advice from medical people, police officers, even high school English teachers.

It's like Nichole said on Thursday, "We need a support system in which we feel a special kinship, one that gives us the ability to share knowledge with, and encourage each other."

Writing, and getting published, is easier because of my increasing circles of friends. In 1967 The Beatles recorded a song on the Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album. The lyrics were, and can be, interpreted in many ways, but the relevant part for us is the first verse:

What would you think if I sang out of tune,
would you stand up and walk out on me.
Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song,
and I'll try not to sing out of key.
Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends,
I get high with a little help from my friends,
oh, I'm gonna try with a little help from my friends.

By changing the words slightly, we can relate this to writing instead of singing and then it becomes a theme song to sing when we need help with our writing. If you just launched your writing career, I suggest you start now, to build your network. Even if you never need their help, a person can always use a friend.

Good luck in your writing---see you next week.