Now in its fifth edition, this book has been a staple for aspiring authors for over twenty years. Judith Appelbaum is well-known in the publishing business and has put together an excellent book on how to write a publishable book, how to get your manuscript accepted by a publishing house, and how to work with the publisher once you accomplish that. This newest edition also has the latest on self-publishing options - pros and cons.

List Price $14.00. Buy it here for only $11.20

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There are a lot of books on writing out there. Many carry the same messages. But this one is different. It talks about those points that are TRULY salient. Using it, side by side with your latest project, is like having a friendly instructor standing by, saying. "Wait, you might want to . . . " or, "It would be better if you . . . " Especially good sections are on showing versus telling, point of view, and characterization. We at Mapletree highly recommend this book, especially for writers who are serious about taking their writing over the greatest of mountains. Buy the book. Read it thoroughly, taking notes. Go back to your writing and write some more. Then go back to this book and read it again. If you apply yourself, you can dramatically raise the level of your writing, but it will take you reading this book many times to thoroughly absorb all it teaches.

The book is also a great help for editors who want to help their authors get more power into their writing.

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You may want to visit the author's web site: www.davekingedits.com. Click the link there that says "writing advice" for several articles on writing that are very helpful. Dave King also offers online one-on-one sessions with writers. 

While Self-Editing for Fiction Writers (above) is a comprehensive course in the principles that distinguish professional writing from hack writing, Orson Scott Card here gets into principles that will help you create a great story:
*The factors that make a good character
*How to come up with ideas for your characters
*How different types of stories relate to the characters
*How to give emotion to the characters
*The different types of characters
*Transformations in the lives of characters
*The pros and cons of each point-of-view

This is the classic text on writing. Many acclaim it the best book on writing ever written.

While the content is most helpful for fiction writers, he addresses both fiction and nonfiction writing. He shows how to plan your characters, your plot, your pace and your point of view. He explains what makes both fiction and nonfiction writing interesting. He doesn't believe that great writers are usually gifted in creating great writing with a first draft. Rather, he believes that great writing is created by the author being able to take criticism and to be critical of himself or herself so that the first draft can be revised and tuned so that it becomes great.

This book, we feel, is very valuable for editors, also. Stein goes through a comprehensive and extremely helpful editing strategy that he calls the "triage" method—to revise your own manuscript or to edit another's.

An eye-opening explanation of what makes good writing and how to create it. While this book addresses nonfiction writing, it is highly instructive for writers of fiction also. Franklin advocates starting with an outline, writing the climax first, and engaging in other grueling tasks that seem like hard work because they are.

"This wonderful book changed my writing life. I wish that I could say that I have lived up to Jon Franklin's writing advice, but at best I have aspired to live up to the advice Jon Franklin shares in WRITING FOR STORY. I first read this in 1988 and have periodically re-read it since then. For nonfiction feature writers, this book is on a par with Strunk & White. Highly recommended."  —Robert Beattie, New York Times bestselling author of Nightmare in Wichita.

"On Writing Well" is possibly the best-written, most-accessible coverage of effective nonfiction writing. It is a classic that was first published in 1976 and is now in its seventh edition.

In 300 pages Zinsser tackles a broad range of subjects such as style, tone, word usage, structure, and unity, and applies these principles to various forms of nonfiction writing: the interview, the travel article, the memoir, etc. It will lead you through the mire of poor writing, a mire littered with the sins of clutter, fuzzy thinking, poor usage, passive verbs, you name it. One author, after reading this book proclaimed: "So I repented, and now I'm a disciple."

This book is a series of some three dozen essays written by prominent editors on various aspects of editing. Their reflections range from the thoughtful to the lighthearted—comments on what makes a successful editor, the history of editing in America, the ethical and moral dimensions of editing, how books are chosen, how editors schedule their work, the editor as negotiator, copy editing, line editing, etc. There are also a number of essays about editing various genres of writing: Christian literature, crime fiction, children's books, mass-market paperbacks, fantasy, reference, romance, and so forth.

While the title of the book indicates that it is written for writers, it is every bit as useful, if not more so, for aspiring editors. In fact, at Mapletree, we have asked all of our editors to read this book. It will provide an excellent education in the craft from dozens of the most successful editors of our day.

Harper Collins publishes 1,200 books a year, according to the authors of Guerrilla Marketing for Writers. Is there a snowball's chance in the Sahara that their publicity department can adequately promote all of them? Of course not. Don't let someone else's publicity department drop the ball when it comes to your book. Guerrilla Marketing's 100 weapons for selling your work range from creating media kits and promotional calendars to appearing at book-group discussions and fundraisers.

List Price $14.99. Buy it here for only $10.49

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Jacqueline Deval explains here how publishers simply don't have the resources to fully promote every title and remain profitable. Nor are they as effective in many areas of publicity as the author herself or himself beating the bushes for their book. Learn here how to do those things that will make your book a success.

List Price $15.95. Buy it here for only $10.85

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Price $27.95 - sorry, no discounts available on this excellent book.
The definitive book on marketing books—700 pages packed full of ideas for authors and publishers. The book also contains keywords for connecting to John Kremer's online book marketing helps. While written primarily for publishers, the book is loaded with tips for authors—when you need to coordinate your efforts, the things you need to do on your own, and when you should get out of the way and let the publisher do it.

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This book belongs on every author's bookshelf. The nuts and bolts of book promotion are covered for fiction, nonfiction, hardcover trade, mass market, and trade paperbacks. Readers are told how to tailor campaigns to reach differing consumer, trade, and special-interest audiences; how to pitch the media and arrange author tours with print, television, and radio interviews; and how to produce headline-grabbing promotional events.
Jodee Blanco has spearheaded campaigns for more than a dozen New York Times best-sellers. President of Blanco & Peace, a Chicago-based public relations firm with offices in New York and Los Angeles, and a faculty member of New York University's Center for Publishing, she splits her time among all three cities.--This text refers to the Paperback edition.
 

Recommended by Publishers Weekly. In their review, they remind authors that your work doesn't end when a book is written. Lissa Warren has learned this over the course of a career publicizing well-known and unknown authors, and she shares her wisdom in this practical, information-packed volume. Authors who aren't already in the publishing industry should read this just for the crash course in jargon it provides, but there's so much more. Warren covers all the topics authors might be wondering about, from publicity basics to working well with your publicist and creating buzz in the media, plus plenty of areas many authors might not consider, such as doing a "big-mouth" mailing of a book and what to wear for a TV interview. Simply reading this won't guarantee publicity for a book, but it will give authors an understanding of just how hard they have to work to accomplish that key element to a book's success: "Get the customer to go to the store and buy it."

This book is the product of experience and extensive research. The author lists numerous resources available to authors (many of them online), publicity protocol advice that'll make you feel like an instant insider, and creative techniques to publicize your work. She tells you how to evaluate the success of your efforts. She teaches you about branding, how it works and how it is different from publicizing one book at a time. She shows you what belongs in a media kit, where to submit articles, what to bring to a writers' conference, how to use promotional gifts and where to get them inexpensively, and how to do a TV interview.

Other recommended books:

More a book for publishers than for writers, Peter has done both and tells you how to do both jobs well. From business decisions such as how many books to order for your first printing and the advantages and disadvantages of print-on-demand, to mundane details like putting a piece of plywood over the pallet before you stack your book cartons on it, this book is packed with helpful information.

Price $18.95. (Sorry, no discounts available on this excellent book.)

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List Price $19.95. Buy it here for only $13.97
Tom and Marilyn Ross are experts in book publishing and marketing. They founded the Small Publishers Association of North America, and are loaded with ideas for selling books.

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