The Little Things Community

The completion of the Harry Potter series has left a Snitch-sized hole in the hearts of his fans and publishers (as well as the film industry) are itching to fill it. An article in the Wall Street Journal suggests that the “next big thing” has already been discovered.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern is the story of two young circus magicians who fall in love. It sounds like an exciting read… but the next Harry Potter? We’re skeptical.

What’s more interesting is the WSJ’s observation that “Booksellers that have been hard hit by the recession and the digital revolution have seized on “The Night Circus” as a potential cure for lackluster sales in a post-Harry Potter world. To nurture a new fan base, bookstores across the country are planning publication-day parties that resemble big-budget film premieres. Some are bringing in magicians, jugglers and stilt walkers and serving popcorn, cider, candied apples and other carnival fare to re-create the atmosphere of the book.”

We LOVE this idea and we really try to push our publicists to work with bookstores and other venues to set up author events like those that are being planned for The Night Circus. If you have any ideas about how we can make our own book signing events and launch parties more like Hollywood film release galas, we’d love to hear them. Post in the comments, tweet us… you know what to do.

Detail from "It's a Great Day, Depending on the Outcome" by Matt Maniscalco

While reading an article in The Age, an Australian news outlet, today (what do you do in YOUR spare time?), I stumbled across this quote: “Painters and authors once worked closely to create memorable book covers and there is a push to re-establish the tradition.”

How exciting is that?! The article provides a brief history of the book jacket as a work of art.

At TLT, as usual, we are ahead of the game. We hire artists to work with our authors and our art director, Matt Maniscalco to create stunning pieces to capture the moods evoked by our novels. We value the book jackets as much as we value the words inside the books. The covers have a major influence on a reader’s decision to purchase a book, and even more importantly on his or her state-of-mind while reading the book. Not something to be taken lightly.

Fortunately, we have Matt to create a number of our covers, maintain our “artistic vision” and keep all of our other designers in line. They’re kind of an unruly bunch. Matt comes to us with an awesome portfolio of his artistic and design work. He has participated in a variety of shows in the Black Cloud Gallery in Chicago. He will travel to Michigan in a few weeks to display his painting (detail shown on the left) that depicts endangered animals. Matt has also designed logos for a number of local businesses and is currently working on a large mural at the Harty Boy’s Restaurant’s outdoor patio. In his spare time, he travels the world in a sailboat and slays wild beasts (after he paints portraits of them). And as one of the only dudes on our estrogen-charged TLT team, we’re just going to go ahead and admit it. We all have work crushes on you, Matt. You rock our socks off… in a strictly professional sense.

If you’d like to talk to Matt more about his artwork (most of it is for sale), feel free to shoot him an email at matt@tltpublishing.com.

Also, we’d love to hear your feedback on the cover work that we’ve produced thus far. You can see jackets for all of our books HERE. Which one is your favorite?

Well... not quite. But you get the idea.

Read this article in the New York Times for an uplifting look at the publishing industry. It’s not all doom and gloom, ya know.

According to the article, the ebook reader isn’t destroying the industry, in fact it may be giving it a boost. We at TLT have always been fans of the ebooks because they’re better for the environment, they’re easy to carry with you on the train (I have the Kindle reader app on my iPhone- it was FREE!) and they’re much cheaper for us to produce. This cut in price allows us to turn a bigger profit and in turn share that additional revenue with our authors and readers by offering discounts. Not to say that we don’t love good ol’ paperbacks and hardcover books, but change is a good thing…

We found this quote to be particularly nice to hear: “One of the strongest growth areas was adult fiction, which had a revenue increase of 8.8 percent over three years.”

Thanks to TLT editor Miriam Pera for the find!

Need a little afternoon pick-me-up? Check out this hilarious site that awards a prize to the most awful opening line of a (fortunately fake) novel. The 2011 winner is Sue Fondrie, who writes:

“Cheryl’s mind turned like the vanes of a wind-powered turbine, chopping her sparrow-like thoughts into bloody pieces that fell onto a growing pile of forgotten memories.”

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest originated at San Jose University in 1982. It was named after Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, the original author of such cringeworthy cliches as “it was a dark and stormy night,” “the pen is mightier than the sword” and “the almighty dollar.”

Read the opening lines of former winners of the BLFC here.

Please note: All rejected TLT manuscripts will be submitted to the 2012 contest.

(Just kidding… That would be mean.)

Watch this awesome video today during your lunch break, because we at TLT do not condone slacking off at work (hehe… yeah right)! It is written and nararrated by Stephen Fry, the voice of the Harry Potter audio books. He makes some great points about the beauty of the English language… and also uses the phrase “sod them to Hades,” which we’re going to try to work into at least one conversation today.

Thanks Stephen. You’re our new hero!

By now, you’ve probably all heard the news. Borders is going out of business. For good. All of their remaining stores will close their doors and thousands of jobs will be lost. This is a big hit for the publishing industry, but not one that was completely unforeseen. Borders was too late to jump on the ebook bandwagon and it’s ereader just couldn’t stack up to the Kindle or Barnes and Noble’s Nook. Even though they caught the trend in time, the future is still looking kinda shaky for B&N.

Here’s an article from the International Business Times about the effect that the collapse of Borders will have on the other industry giant.

The final line of the article is dismal. “Ultimately unless Barnes & Noble can find a new, innovative way to start selling hordes of books in those major stores, it would be wise to finally sell to a willing buyer.”

We at TLT like to stay positive and focus on the solution, rather than the problem. What do you think Barnes & Noble should do? When was the last time you bought a book from one of their stores? Be honest. I can’t remember the last time I did and I used to work at one!

I worked at the largest store in the Chicagoland area during the holiday season two years ago to learn more about the retail process. Now, I’m no retail expert. I can tell you what you need to know about how to set up an author event or the best way to identify your target audience, but throw last quarter’s sales numbers at me and it’s likely that my eyes will cross and I’ll start drooling. However, even I know that when the managers are walking around with grim expressions and lunchroom bulletin boards are plastered with unfulfilled sales goals at CHRISTMAS, things are pretty bad.

Fortunately, I no longer work for B&N, but my heart does go out for the thousands of people who may lose their jobs if the company is sold or, God forbid, goes under. Let’s help these folks out. They sell our books and host our events, and I think that if they keep their minds open to change, all is not lost.

What ideas do you have that may help Barnes & Noble (and brick and mortar bookstores everywhere) avoid collapse? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below!

Recently, I attended Book Expo America, one of the biggest annual publishing conventions in the US. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, so I just jumped in and went with the flow.

BEA Tip #1: Get your badge the day before BEA opens. This saved me standing in long lines the day of BEA just to get registered and to go inside. I was overwhelmed by the amount of booths that were there, but I made a point to stop by a lot of them. This included Harper Collins, Scholastic, Simon & Schuster, and many more. The size of the publishing company depended on the size of the booth. As you can imagine, the bigger publishing companies had the larger booths. I visited some of the indie publishers too, who were very warm and welcoming.

BEA Tip #2: Don’t be annoying when promoting your product. So many book sellers and publishers came up to me, harassing me and forcing me to listen to what they were saying. This was annoying and not a good way to promote your product. I usually just ended up giving their swag away if someone was forceful. However, when a seller or publisher took the time to talk to me about my interests and credentials, I was more open and receptive to their product.

BEA Tip #3: Attend as many panels as you can. In this industry, I believe you can never stop learning. I attended a few panels, including the YA Editors Panel, to learn about what the trends were and what information was currently being passed around in this industry. It’s also fun to go to author breakfasts if you can get the ticket for them. I heard about four authors speak and they were very inspirational.

BEA Tip #4: Don’t be shy! Talking and networking got me invited to a VIP event at the Scholastic store, hosted by the lovely ladies at Scholastic. Famous YA authors such as Meg Cabot, David Levithan, and Libba Bray were also there. I also had the opportunity to learn more about smaller publishing companies and see what kind of books they are putting out there right now.

BEA Tip #5: Don’t expect this to be a vacation. I was up at 5 AM almost every morning to get ready and get to the convention by 7 AM. I would eat in the morning, but there was so much going on at BEA that I never had time to each lunch or leave BEA to eat. Bring lots of granola bars and water. By the time 5 PM rolled around, I was usually too tired to do anything but eat dinner and go to sleep. It’s fun, but it’s also a crazy whirlwind!

I really did have a fun experience, especially since I had the chance to talk about TLT Publishing and promote myself as an editor. I am definitely planning on going back next year. It’s a great experience for those who are serious about publishing.

Here's Kristi from the Story Siren, Jamie from Broke and the Bookish, and me and my friend Britney waiting in the BEA lobby to attend the YA Author Breakfast

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A recent article in The Guardian discusses the new concept of ebook spammers….

“What seems to be happening is that Amazon’s platform is being overwhelmed by spammers who “scrape” content from websites or, in some cases, actually lift entire texts, and republish them as ebooks.”

Entire article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jun/26/kindle-ebooks-publish-naughton

This is yet another hurdle for the unknown or self-published author. How do you make your book stand out in all the muck and mire that will now be available through the Kindle?