Comparing and contrasting leads to great ideas and validation!

Comparing and contrasting leads to great ideas and validation!

Seems I’ve been doing a lot of confessing over these last few blog posts. Today’s is that I’ve never paid much attention to travel fiction – or books, in general. Other than the Lonely Planet books I consulted when first drafting Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World. When I began writing this novel all the way back in 2004, the Internet was barely into its tweens – and there were no sites like TripAdvisor or Orbitz – and no shared economy platforms like Airbnb or Uber. I have subsequently used these sites for research, and they’ve even made an appearance in the novel because they are so ubiquitous in the life of a world traveler today.

So travel books, not a big thing for me. In putting my big toe into the water of comparison and contrast – checking to see what might be out there that’s at all like Stan – I find loads of travel books I should probably read, and authors’ sites to visit. Though not fiction, the best known contemporary work that perhaps rivals Stan a little, at least in terms of the motivation for the travel, is Elizabeth Gilbert’s runaway hit, Eat Pray Love. (That book has been published and celebrated its 10th anniversary in the time since I started writing Stan, just as a point of reference.)

Of course, there’s the classic Around the World in 80 Days, as well as Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail.

chris-pavone

When it comes to comparing websites and marketing efforts – there’s another big toe to be dipped. I’ve recently come across Chris Pavone’s site. He’s the NYT best-selling author of the new international thriller (I got that from said website), The Travelers. One thing I like about his site is the drop-down menu with subtopics: About the Book, Excerpt, and Itinerary. I could easily incorporate that into my author website, once that next book comes to fruition. It’s a story about a Foo Fighters tribute band, so the drop-down items could be: About the Book, Excerpt, and Playlist.

Oh – and a little more searching uncovered the one that seems most like Stan. It’s a book by Francois Lelord, titled Hector and the Search for Happiness: A Novel. From the Barnes and Nobel website:

Now a major motion picture starring Simon Pegg, Rosamund Pike, Toni Collette, and Christopher Plummer. The international bestseller with more than two million copies sold.

“Once upon a time there was a young psychiatrist called Hector who was not very satisfied with himself. … And so he decided to take a trip around the world, and everywhere he went he would try to understand what made people happy or unhappy.”

Hector travels from Paris to China to Africa to the United States, and along the way he keeps a list of observations about the people he meets. Combining the winsome appeal of The Little Prince with the inspiring philosophy of The Alchemist, Hector’s journey around the world and into the human soul is entertaining, empowering, and smile-inducing—as winning in its optimism as it is wise in its simplicity.

How excited am I to hear (a) it sold more than 2 million copies and (b) it became a major motion picture. Oh – and it’s book one in a series, something I never thought I’d do. The other titles are Hector and the Secrets of Love and Hector and the Search for Lost Time.

hector-series

I think I have some reading – and website visiting – to do!

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

Coloring books, cookbooks, and apps – oh, my!

Coloring books, cookbooks, and apps – oh, my!

travel-diary

Readers want books – you know, with pages and words and stories and information. But bookstores want books and other things to accompany them. Products that will flush out a brand, not just a single title. Of course, perhaps the most famous is the Harry Potter series, which spun off so many products that there’s actually a website dedicated just to the merchandising: HarryPotterShop.com. Visit to buy everything from wax seals for your letter-writing needs to magical mugs to bedding, wands, games, and calendars. But ancillary products are not just for kids’ books. Inspirational author Sark has a whole collection of goodies for sale on her site, from blankets (I see a theme here) to books to card decks.

So how does this translate to my book, Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World? Well, lots of ways, actually.

  • One thing I had planned long before they came into vogue (have I mentioned I started writing this book in 2004?) was a coloring book with my cartoon version of Stan in scenes from the many cities he visits.
  • Another is a cookbook that offers one main dish, one drink, and one dessert from each of the same cities.
  • I’m also planning to create an app that integrates a treasure hunt of some sort (if Pokeman Go can do it, so can I!) with a tour of the places Stan visits.
  • Postcards seem a natural fit.
  • As does a travel diary.
  • And a Stan-styled postal bag, to be sure!
  • And a small gift book with the ways to say “hello” and “I love you” in all the languages of the countries passes through.
  • I’m not sure I’ll go with a plushie of Isis – although I’d never say never.

Whether or not they ever wind up in book stores or not, I can design them and sell them on my website and other travel sites that may have room for clever products.

What kind of toy or other product would entice you to jump on Stan’s travel bandwagon? Comments are encouraged and welcome below!

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

Brick-and-mortar vs online – which is the better non-bookstore venue?

Brick-and-mortar vs online – which is the better non-bookstore venue?

wide-world-of-maps

The other day, my husband and I were astonished to see that a longtime map store is still in business in Phoenix. Maps – otherwise known as an origami-styled paper-folding craft, with big pictures of streets and lakes and mountain ranges painted on the paper. What with Waze being all the rage these days, even brand name GPS companies like Garmin are suffering. And yet I know someone who recently went and bought a paper map because she finds it easier to read than pulling out a magnifying glass to see all the details on a smartphone’s tiny screen.

Would a map store, such as the one referenced above, be willing to take a chance on a book about a guy who travels around the world? Maybe. I’ll definitely drop off a copy of Stan as soon as it’s ready to go. And make a list of the other map stores still standing – maybe approach them with a postcard campaign.

Art and investment banking also play big roles in the book, but those aren’t the kinds of things that lend themselves to storefronts. Stan does travel with his dog, though, so perhaps the right high-end indie pet shoppe would take an interest. Wheels are turning there, to be sure.

noblebeast

And, of course, I keep going back to online retailers – specialty shops in the international cities Stan visits. A glass blower in Sweden. A carpet maker in Turkey. Would they bite? I won’t know until I approach them. May have to find some translation partners before I email my pitch. It’s a wide world – and the Internet makes such connections possible.

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

Travel Channel, here I come!

Travel Channel, here I come!

I have a confession. I’ve never watched the Travel Channel and never felt particularly compelled to read the Sunday travel section of any newspaper (The New York Times, The Arizona Republic, and the Arizona Daily Star are the papers I’ve been most familiar with) unless it was an article about somewhere I really wanted to visit. Now, however, as the author of a book about a guy who travels around the world, I’m looking at such vehicles as potential marketing bonanzas, in terms of people who might have an interest in my little novel.

travel-channel

The idea even occurred to me to wonder how I might pitch Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World as a cartoon TV show. After all, once upon a time, Where in the World Is Carmen San Diego? was just someone’s idea, right?

So I feel like I’ve got some catching up to do, in terms of identifying potential experts who might be good ones to approach to write blurbs for my book – or have me as a guest on their show, or as an interviewee for their travel column. The household name who comes to mind is Anthony Bourdain.

anthony-bourdain

I’ve written about approaching Mr. Bourdain before – for the last blog challenge, when I posted all of my entries on my book marketing blog because Stan’s blog hadn’t yet really come into its own. Here’s an excerpt from that post:

Strangely, it took me longer than I’d have thought to come up with the right person to ask for an endorsement of Stan, but once I arrived there, I was sure I’d hit on the perfect person: Anthony Bourdain, chef, author, and host of CNN’s popular show, “Parts Unknown.” Will he be challenging to get to? Perhaps – but maybe someone who’s just two degrees of separation from him is reading this very post! Stranger things have most certainly happened.

One person I know quipped that Bourdain isn’t the most loquacious guy to go seeking a blurb from. No worries. Regardless of how tight-lipped or busy he may be, all I need for him to do is put his name behind three little words: “Read this book!”

So if anyone reading this lives next door to the college kid who babysits Bourdain’s daughter … ahem, I’d really, really, really appreciate an introduction.

Certainly there are others … and I’ll make a short list. But I’m going to put my intention behind this one and leave the rest up to the book marketing angels.

Time to get busy hitting up LinkedIn, checking my old Phoenix Film Festival Connections, and approaching the few Hollywood types I’ve met over the years to see what kind of apples might shake loose from those trees. It can’t hurt. The worse I’ll hear is no – and that leaves me exactly where I am right now.

As for the Travel Channel, as soon as this Blog Challenge is done, I’m going to pop a big bowl of popcorn and sit down and watch for a while.

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

Would you eat a peanut butter, bacon, and banana panini?

Would you eat a peanut butter, bacon, and banana panini?

Oh, sometimes a person can be too clever for her own good. When I heard that November 3rd was National Sandwich Day, I was so excited about creating this writing prompt for the Author Blog Challenge (I am the host). Now, however, that I’ve got to actually answer my own prompt, it doesn’t seem so clever.

Sandwich. Sandwich. Sandwich. What are the ingredients of my book marketing sandwich? I guess the plan would be the bread that holds it all together – because without a plan, you really have more of a book marketing salad than a hearty sandwich you can easily hold in your hands.

bacon-peanut-butter-banana

As for the gust of my campaign, I think it’s kind of an outlandish grouping of things besides the tried and true. The great news is that a novel about a guy who travels around the world has an unending supply of potential tie-ins, from the backers of the social causes mentioned in the book (e.g., Lost Boys of Sudan, Liter of Light Project, and Art for the Homeless to name just a few) to travel Meetups to online shop owners in all the cities Stan visits. I suppose the unconventional ingredients make it most similar to a peanut butter, bacon and banana panini. You won’t catch me eating it – but somebody must, or they wouldn’t serve it at Parker and Otis.

Condiments might be honey or molasses, to sweeten the deal. That would be the social media, news releases, list building – the traditional stuff that will support and enhance the rest of my less-than-ordinary efforts.

You tell me – would you eat a peanut butter, bacon, and banana panini? Even if it were served by a dog in a chef’s hat and an apron?

dog-in-chefs-hat

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

From My Platform, I Can See…

From My Platform, I Can See…

…perhaps over the top of my laptop to the stuff on the desk behind it. That’s not a very tall platform, now is it? In publishing parlance, an author’s platform is who knows them, who follows them, who’s talking about them, and most importantly who is waiting for their book to be published. I’ve been working on Stan Finds Himself on the west-coast-tourOther Side of the World for a very long time. The good news is that virtually everybody who knows me is aware of this fact. The better news is that I keep meeting new people all the time – so I suppose you could say I am consistently growing my platform.

My social media influence isn’t rock-star status, but it’s not bad, either. And with some consistent work and a P-L-A-N, it will get better.

One new thing I’ve done this year is begin to do readings – albeit small ones – where I get to see the listeners’ reactions to my work. Overall, the response has been quite positive – as it has been from those who’ve read the whole ARC (advance reader copy). The most common refrain is: “Just finish it already!”

Since I plan to publish it early next year, I will be hitting the pavement hard, working to connect with book clubs and travel groups, which seem to be two target-rich environments for me. I plan to develop an app – more details on that to come in a few days – and a few ancillary books and other products.

I have a vision of a six-city West Coast train tour this coming summer, starting in San Diego and heading north through L.A., San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver. This will be a group tour with a handful of other authors who want to share the experience. I’ve had a travel agent friend working on the details part-time for a while now. A LOT of coordination goes into an event like this – so please keep your fingers crossed that we can pull it off. And stay tuned, because as soon as the details are in place, we’ll publish them here first!

In the meantime, if you’re new to the blog, please take a look around. Download the FIRST 5 Chapters – and if you like what you’re reading, mark your calendars for the full release in Spring 2017!

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by

Part Travelogue, Part Social Commentary, Part Fiction

Part Travelogue, Part Social Commentary, Part Fiction

As an aspiring fiction author, it is perhaps impolitic to admit that I don’t read a whole lot of fiction anymore. As a child, it was all I read when I wasn’t doing research for a school project. Hundreds and hundreds of novels, particularly during the long, hot Phoenix summers. Somewhere along the way, though, my taste morphed toward nonfiction. Memoir, spirituality, marketing, personal development, politics – I’m one of those people who finds almost everything interesting. That is, perhaps, why I majored in nonfiction writing. I took fiction and poetry classes because you had to – nonfiction is a Creative Writing degree – but I was terrible at them. Long, plodding sentences. Boring descriptions. Clunky poems with little grace or style or lyricism. I listened with admiration and envy to my peers who could craft gorgeous stories out of the same 26 characters I had to work with.

describing-stan

I kept writing, though, and my writing improved. I’d never call it outstanding, but it’s strong. And the more you do of anything, the better it gets, so I keep on writing. Over the years, I began to notice and watch people. And to listen to them. How they form sentences. The way they interrupt and talk over each other. The natural flow of dialogue is halting; The Bard may have preferred soliloquies, but people do not naturally employ them in their day-to-day speech. I watched movies with equal attention, always preferring well-developed characters to an exceptional plot – not that one is more important than the other. Both are essential for a good story, whether it be in film or print version.

So my writing continued to improve. Enough, I thought, that I could actually try my hand at a novel. Still trying, as it turns out, 12+ years later. That’s OK. It will be finished soon.

When it comes to considering how best to describe my book – to give people a sense of what it’s like – I’m at a bit of a loss because I’m not really a fiction reader. I’ve had nearly a dozen people read early versions, though, and no one has said, “Stan is like a cross between X and Y.” So maybe it is unique, in that there aren’t really things out there to compare it to.

During the last Author Blog Challenge, I also described the process of writing Stan and how I hoped to market it. Those posts are archived on my marketing blog, Marcie Brock Book Marketing Maven. One really helpful a-ha that emerged from that Challenge was the understanding of how to best tell people what the book is about: it’s part travelogue, part social commentary, and part fiction. You’ll remember I’m trained as a nonfiction writer, so I worked very hard to get the real-life details right. Having been to only a handful of the places Stan visits, I did scrupulous research because I don’t want anyone to read it and say, “Ah, she’s obviously never been there.”

The social commentary comes as Stan is exposed to many new ideas, philosophies, and experiences. He is a tightly wound, security-conscious guy – and world travel requires him to stretch and grow in unexpected ways. As I made discoveries in my research, I wove them into the story so that Stan could also discover them along his sometimes bumpy journey.

Ultimately, though, it’s a book about a guy who takes his dog with him as he travels around the world. How much disbelief must you suspend from Page 1 to allow for that to happen? And while a handful of characters are based on people I have known, the vast majority of the individuals who populate this novel are pure fabrications, straight out of my imagination.

Likewise with the incidents. Yep – I had a Jack Russell terrier who was the best traveling companion you could imagine. I lived in Jersey City and worked on Wall Street. And I had a conversation with a friend a lot like the one between Paula and Stan that gives rise to Stan’s journey in the first place. But neither of us stormed out, neither of us set off afterward on a trek around the world, and the vast majority of the things that happen in the story are 100 percent made up.

Part travelogue, part social commentary, part fiction. If that intrigues you, keep reading this blog – and look for Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World in early Spring 2017!

_______________

Read the FIRST 5 Chapters of Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World.

_______________

LAURA ORSINI is an author and self-publishing consultant who works with other authors who want to LO picchange the world. From concept to publication to the first-time author’s book launch, her expertise will help you make a better book and find more readers. Friend her on Facebook, follow her on Twitter, and check out her pins on Pinterest.

/0 Comments/by