writing | Bertram's Blog

Do Blog Tours Live Up to The Hype?

September 20, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Daughter Am I, my latest novel, will soon to be released by Second Wind Pubishing, so I have to start planning a blog tour if I’m going to do one. I hear so much about how great they are — mostly from the major publishers who don’t want to spend the money to send their authors on an unvirtual tour — that I wonder if blog tours do anything for an unknown author. I know the most popular book blogs do help get the word out, but if one can’t get a guest spot on those blogs, is it still worth doing a tour? And is there any real difference between doing a formal tour and doing guest spots on a few blogs?

In case I decide that a blog tour is worth all the work, would you be willing to be a host?

Daughter Am I is a young woman/old gangsters coming of age tale that is being sold as mainstream, though it could just as easily be classified as a mystery.

When twenty-five-year-old Mary Stuart learns she inherited a farm from her recently murdered grandparents—grandparents her father claimed had died before she was born—she becomes obsessed with finding out who they were and why someone wanted them dead. Along the way she accumulates a crew of feisty octogenarians—former gangsters and friends of her grandfather. She meets and falls in love Tim Olson, whose grandfather shared a deadly secret with her great-grandfather. Now Mary and Tim need to stay one step ahead of the killer who is desperate to dig up that secret.

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Posted in blogging, internet, writing. Tags: blog tour, Daughter Am I, gangster story, mainstream fiction, mystery, Second Wind Publishing. 3 Comments »

How to Tell When Your Novel is Finished

September 19, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I finally turned in what might be the final proof of Daughter Am I. At least I hope it’s the final one. People often ask how you know when a book is finished — well, if you’re to the point where seeing one more word of the manuscript makes you want to throw it against the wall (or bang your head against the wall, though the first hurts less) then you’re finished. And I passed that point months ago.

I have a rocky relationship with my books — not exactly love/hate, more of an enjoy/disenjoy relationship. (I realize disenjoy is not a word, but it should be.) Sometimes I read what I’ve written and am amazed that I enjoy it so much. Other times I can’t believe how boring it is. (To be fair, any bit of writing, no matter how great, does pall after the hundredth read through.) Daughter Am I is no exception. I like the story:

I like the beginning. I’ve been told that the first sentence is too long and introduces too many characters, but it’s the only possible beginning since it states the book’s main premise and it foreshadows the end:

“Who were James Angus Stuart and Regina DeBrizzi Stuart?” Mary asked, trying to ignore the mounted heads of murdered animals staring down at her from the lawyer’s wood-paneled walls.

I also like my characters, though I do wonder about the long-windedness of a couple of them. The eighty-year-olds that I know, however, aren’t as quick with one-liners as are younger folk, and they do tend toward loquaciousness, so I hope readers are as forgiving of my octogenarians as they are of their own.

Still, after all these years of researching the Mob, of writing the book, rewriting it, editing it, copyediting it, I am a bit tired of the whole thing and will be glad to see the end of my work.

So why am I telling you this? Well, it is a painless way of doing a bit of pre-publishing publicity (painless for you, too, I hope). There is also a moral: when you decide to write a book, make sure it’s one that you can live with for a very, very, very long time.

Daughter Am I will be released by Second Wind Publishing in October, 2009.

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Posted in fiction, writing. Tags: Daughter Am I, How to tell when your book is finished, the Mob. 4 Comments »

Okay, I Admit It. I’m Jealous.

September 18, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Jealous of whom? Need you ask? I bet if they were honest, most authors would also admit they were jealous of Dan Brown. Whatever one thinks of the man himself, the man as a story steller, the man as a wordsmith, the fact is, he wrote a book that is dazzling the world.

I only read The DaVinci Code because I was curious as to what captured people’s attention when it came to books. Though his prose is supposedly the worst thing since moldy bread, what I noticed were the internal inconsistencies — if the villain was so smart as to stay one step ahead of Robert and Sophie, if he was so smart as to figure out where they were going next and kill the person they wanted to contact, why wasn’t he smart enough just to kill the two of them and put us out of our misery? I don’t like books where the body count rises just to show how smart the hero is to stay alive. Cheap thrills, but apparently they work.

The internal inconsistencies were bad enough, but what drove me nuts were the external inconsistencies — though the cathedrals in France do hide a code, the code predates the cathedrals, predates Christianity even. The cathedrals were all built on ancient mystical sites, as was the Vatican itself. If the cathedrals themselves do contain a code, it is a manifestation of the prehistoric meaning. And then there was Sophie as the direct descendent of Jesus. Puh-leeze. A family tree is exactly that — an everspreading, ever thinning genetic branching. Even if Sophie was a direct descendent, her Jesus genes would be so minuscule as to be indistinguishable from yours or mine. (Go back twenty generations, and we’re all related.) I won’t even mention the possibility that Mary Magdalene never existed as a flesh and blood woman but, together with the other two Marys, was a manifestation of the mother goddess. And then, of course, I kept hearing echoes of a previous book I’d read — Holy Blood, Holy Grail — the book that he didn’t credit for his research.

Still, with all that, he captured the world’s attention, and now with his new book, for whatever reason, he is dazzling the world again. I wonder what that would be like? Must be nice.

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Posted in books, culture, life, writing. Tags: Dan Brown, Holy Blood Holy Grail, Mary Magdalene, The DaVinci Code, The Lost Symbol. 3 Comments »

Aaaarrrgggghhhh!!!!! Now I Have to Write a Review!

September 16, 2009 — Pat Bertram

While most of the world is talking about the new Dan Brown bestseller, Second Wind Publishing, LLC has quietly released a thriller of its own — Staccato by Deborah J Ledford. You won’t find all the elements that have become Brown’s hallmarks: cartoonish characters, amateurish prose, tin-ear for dialogue, internal inconsistencies. What you will find is a well-written, well-constructed story that will keep you enthralled.

The product description on Amazon says it better than I could: Performed against the backdrop of the Great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, Staccato transports readers to a behind-the-scenes glimpse of professional musicians, the psychological twists and turns of its characters, and in the end, retribution that crashes in a crescendo of notes played at the literary pace of a maestro’s staccato. The only drawback to Staccato is that it doesn’t come with a soundtrack — each meticulously chosen piece of music enhances the mood of the scene it accompanies, and unless you are much more informed about music than I am, you will miss some of the brilliance of this composition.

Readers are in for a treat, and me? Aaaarrrggghhhh!!! I have to write another review! Well, I don’t have to, but the book deserves all the attention it can get. So, I will add it to the stack of other books I’ve promised to review, yet haven’t:

Lacey Took a Holiday by Lazarus Barnhill
The Medicine People by Lazarus Barnhill
Steel Waters by Ken Coffman
Toxic Shock Syndrome by Ken Coffman
Mazurka by Aaron Lazar
Heart of Hythea by Suzanne Francis
and now, Staccato by Deborah J Ledford

Although all these books are much more literate, readable, and enjoyable than Dan Brown’s pap, the best I can come up with as a review for each of these deserving novels right now is, “Good book. I liked it and you will, too.”

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Posted in books, fiction, life, writing. Tags: Aaron Lazar, book reviews, Dan Brown, Deborah J. Ledford, Heart of Hythea, Ken Coffman, Lacey Took a Holiday. Lazarus Barnhill, Mazurka, Second Wind Publishing, Staccato, Steel Waters, Suzanne Francis, the Medicine People, Toxic Shock Syndrome. 4 Comments »

My Wonderful Surprise!

September 15, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Among the people coming to my blog for sex with sister tips (it’s up to about 60 a day now) are those who actually pay attention to what I write. I’ve often said I blog for myself, using this space to try to get in contact with the creative within me. Whenever I am stumped at something, whether the direction of my current WIP or my struggles to learn how to become a selling and excelling writer, I come here and let the words flow. Except for that ultimate puzzler — how to promote effectively without annoying everyone to the point that said promotion becomes ineffective — I usually manage to find a way out of my difficulty. That I’ve managed to attract readers is a bonus. That they (you) actually like what I say or how I say it is beyond my ability to describe.

Today I had a wonderful surprise. Joylene Nowell Butler, author of Dead Witness, nominated me for a Kreativ Blogger Award. She said: You have only to look at Pat’s blog to realize she’s an inspiration to the world of writers. Pat questions everything. Her wide-eyed enthusiasm and her deep desire to understand the world of the real and unreal has fascinated me from day one. I think she’s covered every aspect of writing there is, only to stop by and see she’s discussing yet another subject that would have never occurred to me. Pat loves writing. Her quest to become the best possible writer she can be is contagious. She loves books. She loves authors. She’s brave, determined and the way she strings words together to form sentences is amazing. Here’s to you, Pat Bertram for venturing into the sometimes scary, but always creative world of creative fiction.

Thank you, Joylene. I appreciate all the comments you have left here on Bertram’s Blog. I also wish you every success — you are my role model.

Passing on the torch, I nominate . . .

James Rafferty has a great blog that ranges from fabulous photos of his travels to informative essays about OneNote
Malcolm Campbell combines a wonderful and poetic way of using words with intelligence and practicality.
Second Wind Publishing — this might be a bit of a cheat since I’m one of the contributors, but when you combine two dozen different authors all with different outlooks and experiences, you end up with a great blog.

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Posted in blogging, internet, writing. Tags: Dead Witness, James Rafferty, Joylene Nowell Butler, Kreativ Blogger Award, Malcolm Campbell, Second Wind Publishing. 9 Comments »

How Do You Choose the Books You Want to Read?

September 14, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I took an informal poll to find out how people discover new authors. (Hmmmm. Wonder why I’m interested in that!) I posted the following on discussion boards on both Goodreads and Facebook:

It seems as if there are as many ways of discovering books as there are readers, but I’m curious as to how you choose the books you want to read. Do you go by reviews? By recommendations from friends? Because you’re familiar with other works by the author? Do you ever read a book because of an ad you saw? Because of a blog article? Because of a mention on a website such as Goodreads? Do you cruise book stores, libraries, or online sites like Amazon? Do you find them some way I haven’t mentioned, such as gifts, perhaps?

Admittedly, the questions were loaded, but I still got an interesting and probably quite accurate overview:

Favorite authors or previously read authors: 36
Word of mouth: 26
Blog reviews/Book websites: 26
Goodreads/Shelfari: 24
Local bookstores: 21
Amazon/B&N/other online stores: 15
Library: 13
Publisher sites/newsletters: 5
Social networking sites like Facebook: 5
Book Clubs: 5
Author appearances/writing conferences: 5
NY Times bestseller list: 5
Offline reviews: 5
Yard sales/second hand bookstores: 4
Advertising: 3
Saw the movie: 3
Oprah: 1
Free downloads: 1
Gifts: 1

I’m not sure exactly what this means in terms of promotion, except that ideally you want to become everyone’s favorite author and have them recommend you.

How do you discover the books you want to read? Or rather where. (A lot of people said they found books to read by the front cover or the blurb on the back, but I’m more curious as to where they saw the cover.)

Posted in blogging, books, internet, writing. Tags: Amazon, book reviews, Facebook, favorite author, Goodreads, informal poll. 7 Comments »

“Now That My Book is Out, What is the First Thing I Should Do?”

September 13, 2009 — Pat Bertram

A newly published author asked me an interesting question today: “Now that my book is ‘out,’ what is the first thing I should do?” I ought to know the answer to that since I was in the same position not that long ago and will be again next month when Daughter Am I is released, but I’m still a bit mystified about how to promote effectively online.

So much of book promotion on the internet depends on social networking sites, which means that one’s promotion efforts have to start long before the book is ever published because you need people to promote to. That was the big lesson I learned during my first months as a published author. The internet is so vast that any message thrown casually out into cyberspace has about as much impact as a child’s balloon set free to drift on the wind. If you hand a child a balloon, however, at least one person for sure will see it, maybe even two or three. If you have “friends,” on social networking sites perhaps a few of them will see the messages you post on your profile and be glad for you. Or at least they will pretend to be glad for you since chances are they are promoting a book, too, and responding to such messages is part of their promotion campaign.

(Do I sound cynical? I don’t mean to. I am a bit disappointed that promoting on the internet hasn’t had the impact on my sales that I’d hoped, but on the other hand, I’m having a wonderful time meeting new people, discovering new books, rediscovering old friends, creating new relatives. In essence, I’m developing a whole new life, which is a thrill in itself.)

Some new authors send email messages to all their contacts, but unless you know the people personally, I don’t think it’s such a good idea. I’m hearing through the grapevine that spamming generally doesn’t have much impact on sales, and it only irritates people, which might cause a backlash. On the other hand, status updates on MySpace, Facebook, Goodreads, Twitter are good, especially if you link the update to a blog article that tells about your struggles to get published or something else of an equally personal or helpful nature.

The secret to social networking is to be social. I admit I don’t do the one-on-one thing that well. I have a huge list of people I owe blog comments to, but somehow the days pass, and the list keeps getting longer. I’ve started responding to comments on my blog, though, which is a big step in the right direction. I used to think it was better to give commenters the last word, but recently my blog readers have convinced me they like a bit of dialogue, if only to let them know I read and enjoyed their comments. And I do. Read them and enjoy them, I mean.

I’m starting to ramble a bit here.

The point is . . . heck, if I knew what the point is, I’d be sitting back and counting my millions. Still, I have learned one thing — websites, blogs, tweets and status updates all work together to create something more than the individual parts. Who knows, that something may eventually turn out to be book sales.

Daughter Am I will be released by Second Wind Publishing, LLC in October, 2009

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Posted in blogging, books, internet, writing. Tags: blogging, book promotion, cyberspace, Daughter Am I, debut novel, Facebook, MySpace, new author, online promotion, social networking, status updates, Twitter. 12 Comments »

My Brand New Cousin and My Brand New Book

September 12, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I love the internet. I never know from day to day what will happen, who I will meet, who will become part of my future. I’ve made many new friends, some I have no doubt who will be in my life for years to come, and I also made a new cousin.

Another Bertram contacted me on Facebook and wanted to know if we were related. Since I have very few Bertram relatives that I know of, I told him regrettably that we probably weren’t related, though we could be. He lives in Hamburg, and my great-grandfather came from Appen, which is nearby. Since Dirk (I hope he doesn’t mind my mentioning his name) also has few Bertram relatives that he knows of, we decided to become each other’s cousin. And who knows, we could be related. We’re both creative — I write novels, he’s a musician who produces book trailers. He says he’ll make the book trailer for my soon-to-be released novel, Daughter Am I. How cool is that!

He wanted an excerpt which shows the spirit of the book, and I finally sent him this one, though I don’t really know how he can make a trailer from it since nothing really happens, but it does show the spirit of the book, or at least the spirit of the characters.

The old man stopped bouncing and let his arms drop to his sides. Now that he was standing relatively still, Mary could see that he was even skinnier than she had first thought. A gray slouch hat was tilted toward one eye, but the jaunty effect was marred by the baggy pants cinched high above his waist and the bright flowery shirt that was several sizes too large. His hands were shaking uncontrollably. Parkinson’s disease?

“You must be Happy,” she said.

Frowning, Happy patted his torso. “Must I be happy?” His voice deepened to what Mary assumed was his normal tone. “Can I be happy? Can anyone truly be happy?”

“His name is Barry Hapworth,” Kid Rags said, flicking a bit of lint off his navy pinstriped suit jacket. “For several obvious reasons, everyone calls him Happy.”

Mary glanced from the bus to Happy. “Were you driving this thing?”

Happy puffed out his meager chest. “Sure was.”

“And did you almost run over Mrs. Werner’s cat?”

“I’ll take the fifth.” Happy paused for a fraction of a second. “A fifth of bourbon.”

“Did someone say bourbon?” Kid Rags removed his flask from his hip pocket, took a swig, and passed it around.

“Who are all these people?” Bill asked from behind Mary.

Mary turned, wondering how she was going to explain the situation, but Teach saved her the trouble and made the introductions. Arms still folded across his chest, Crunchy nodded to Bill, then stepped close to Mary. Happy punched the air, but stopped when Bill showed no inclination to fight.

Kid Rags shook Bill’s hand. “You’re a lucky man.”

“What are you all doing here?” Mary asked. “I was supposed to pick you up. And why is Happy here?”

“Happy is a friend of Kid Rags,” Teach began, but Kid Rags interrupted him, saying hastily, “Not a friend. Just a fellow I know.”

“Anyway,” Teach continued, “Happy knows someone who knows Iron Sam, and since we knew your car wasn’t big enough for all of us, we took Happy up on his offer to drive us in his bus.”

“Who’s Iron Sam?” Bill asked, sounding plaintive.

“Butcher Boy,” Kid Rags said.

Bill’s eyebrows drew together. “Butcher Boy? Mary, are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

Mary laughed, suddenly feeling lighthearted and carefree. “I haven’t a clue.”

Daughter Am I will be released in October by Second Wind Publishing.

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Posted in internet, life, writing. Tags: book trailers, Daughter Am I, Second Wind Publishing. 3 Comments »

The Themes of Our Lives

September 9, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I’ve been thinking about themes lately — the themes of our lives, the themes of our stories, the themes that permeate our relationships. (Technically, relationships fall under the category of the themes of our lives, but I like to do thing in threes, and I couldn’t think of a third theme category.)

Someone asked me recently if I ever considered writing a novelization of my life, and I just laughed. There is no story in my life — nothing noteworthy ever happened to me, and I never did anything that millions of others didn’t also do. Still, the question niggled, and a couple of days later I saw a theme: sometimes I’ve put aside my dream to try to help someone achieve theirs. Now that would make a good “three bears story.” The first time perhaps my namesake gave too little when she tried to help someone, and the other person didn’t achieve his or her dream either. The second time she might have given too much and still neither of them got their dream. The third time she gets it right, and everyone wins. In real life I haven’t yet gotten it right, but I’m working on it.

I also read a comment that “nothing changes if nothing changes,” which sounds like a good theme for a book. Perhaps an older woman is whining that nothing ever changes in her life, and someone tells her that nothing changes if nothing changes, so she decides to make a simple change — perhaps henna her hair or buy a dress that is out of character or go to a museum. And from that simple change comes a ripple of changes, so at the end, she ends up completely different.

Another comment was “intimacy is so hard and manipulation is so easy,” which kept my mind occupied for days on end. How much of intimacy is manipulation? If someone tells you they love you, is it manipulation, or is it intimacy? I suppose it depends on the intent, the motivation. Intimacy vs. manipulation would be a fun theme to explore in a novel.

Something else I read: “Every crisis creates a new normal.” Every time something happens to a person or a character, he must readjust his thinking to accept the new normal. How far out of the normal does he have to go before he becomes a saint or a monster? The original comment had to do with accepting the crises of age, but as a theme, it can mean any sort of crisis.

So, what are the themes of your stories, the themes of your lives, the themes you’ve written, the themes you’ve read, the themes you’d like to write?

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Posted in writing. Tags: intimacy vs. manipulation, story, story themes, storytelling, themes. 12 Comments »

Lisping Dialogue

September 8, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I used to read books about writing — dozens of them. Several mentioned that mispelled words and apostrophes are no longer in style to show speech defects or accents — such dialogue is difficult to read. To denote dialect, one needs to show speech patterns from the specific area, such as “It’s not far, just down the road a piece.” Tells you a bit about the character, and it’s easy to read. Another suggestion was to use the misspellings and apostrophe’s to set the character’s accent in the reader’s mind, then switch to normal spellings. I heeded this particular bit of advice in my upcoming novel, Daughter Am I. To get the full meaning of the excerpt, you need to know that the Scourge and Butcher Boy once worked for the Outfit, aka the Mob.

“Who ith it, my love?” A rotund little old man wearing plaid bermuda shorts and a pink polo shirt appeared at the door beside the woman.

“Hello, Wallace,” Happy said.

Mary bit back a giggle. This was the Scourge? This gnome of a man with twinkling eyes and a lisp?

Wallace peered through the screen at Happy. “Do I know you?”

“Don’t you remember? We used to work for the same outfit.”

The woman’s face lit up. “Oh, how nice. Won’t you come in?”

She made a move to open the door, but Wallace put out a hand to stop her.

“That won’t be necessary. These folks were just leaving.”

“Hey!” Happy protested. “What’s the big deal? All we want is some information about Butcher Boy.”

“The supermarket in town has a nice butcher,” the old woman said, “but you can’t really call him a boy. He has to be at least forty.”

Wallace patted the woman’s arm. “Let me handle this, sweetie.” He opened the door, slipped through, and closed it behind him. Motioning for Mary and her gang to follow, he headed for the road.

“This your bus?” he asked.

A couple of editors mentioned that I was inconsistent, that I should have carried the lisp throughout the scene. It was only two pages, but still, that’s a lot of th’s.

“That won’t be nethethary. Thethe fokth were jutht leaving.”

“…Thweetie.”

“Thith your buth?”

So, when you read Daughter Am I (you are going to read when it’s released, right?) and notice the inconsistency, just remember how kind I was being to your eyes.

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