Success in Writing and Publishing: A Mixture of Hard Work, Networking and Luck

I had been asked to write a summary of Kemble Scott's talk for my writers club, and thought I might share those efforts with my blog readers as well. Think of it as revising and extending my remarks from earlier when I posted about him and his book.

Kemble Scott was the guest speaker at the second annual Marin-Redwood Writers Joint Meeting. He is a San Francisco Chronicle Best Selling author of SoMa, a novel about the South of Market Street neighborhood in San Francisco.

Scott is a journalist, an alumnus of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, and has won three Emmys for his work in television news. He moved to San Francisco and wanted to live in an "urban" setting and decided against the tonier neighborhoods with Victorians and instead chose the SoMa neighborhood. He moved there without really knowing about the area's longstanding reputation. Some of the streets there were named after prostitutes from the Gold Rush era when the neighborhood first developed its own distinctive character.

After living in SoMa for awhile, Scott started becoming aware of unorthodox activities surrounding him and some of the dirtier secrets of San Francisco. Due to the sensitive nature of these human interest stories, he decided rather than use his reporting skills -- which might potentially embarrass people -- that he would take the events and situations and fictionalize them.

He also wanted to separate his fiction writing from his journalism writing and adopted the nom de plume Kemble Scott.

He couldn't find a proper venue for his stories, so he created one: the SoMa Literary Review. He was new to the literary scene in San Francisco and decided to take a leap of faith by launching how own online literary magazine and hope it would find an audience. The first issue featured ten of his stories and he used ten different pen names. Word quickly spread about his online literary journal and he soon received submissions from real writers meaning that he no longer had to hide behind multiple personas.

Scott also created the San Francisco Bay Area Literary Arts which sends out email blasts every Friday to publicize literary events and book signings. This effort has helped him generate many contacts within the literary community which came in handy when he sought venues for book signings.

He joined the Sanchez Annex Writers Grotto as well as the San Francisco Writers Workshop where he has connected with many authors such as Erika Mailman, Tamim Ansary, and Khaled Hosseini.

At one point, Scott was approached by an editor and suggested he turn the SoMa Literary Review into a book. He took the man at his word and printed out his favorites and stapled them together and sent it off. However, the editor did not want a collection of short stories, he wanted a novel with an overarching theme that wove those stories together in a compelling narrative. Scott had never written a novel before and it took him a while to figure out how to do it.

By the time he had something to show, the editor was no longer at that publisher. Scott "lucked out" and one of his manuscripts at the house of a trusted reader happened to be spotted by an agent who picked it up, started reading and liked it. The young agent contacted Scott and offered to represent him. Scott thought it was the break he needed. As it turned out, the agent was unable to sell the book and after a year, Scott fired him.

He decided to strike out on his own and identified an editor at Kensington Press who had published several offbeat travel books and thought it might be a good fit. Not only did he send off a manuscript, but he included blurbs from his writing friends and even one from the notorious JT LeRoy. Then Luck played a part. The editor was on vacation at the time SoMa arrived in the slush pile. The editor's assistant read the manuscript and fell in love it. The day the editor returned from vacation, his assistant sprang at him and passionately insisted that he buy this book.

Getting published was one hurdle, but spreading the word about his book was going to be an even greater hurdle since getting reviews for his book would be a difficult proposition. Newspapers have been cutting back on their book reviews and his novel's subject matter deals with kinky sex making it less likely to be reviewed.

One of his neighbors worked for YouTube and suggested he make a video about the book and post it online. Scott decided to make a series of short promos showing some of the locations mentioned in his book. Along with showing the places, he uses suggestive language to reference some of the unusual behavior in those places which are represented in his book. The video clips preceded the publication of his book and his novel appeared on the San Francisco Chronicle's best seller list the first week it was released, and according to Google he was the first author to publicize a novel on YouTube.

His video promos were panned on an online Silicon Valley gossip site named ValleyWag, but they spelled his name right and they included weblinks to help promote his book.

Because SoMa was listed as a best seller by a nationally recognized newspaper, even though it was not a New York Times best seller, his book has been purchased by libraries and has been sold in venues such his local Costco and even airports in Singapore that otherwise would never have carried his book.

Overall Scott's advice is to become part of your local writing community, network with other writers, create your own opportunities when you need to, be persistent and hope for a little luck.

YouTube and Book Trailers: a Success Story

Yesterday, agent Lucienne Diver made a guest appearance on my friend Lee Lofland’s blog. Her topic was how writers can create buzz for their work and she brings up a lot of great ideas.

On the comment trail there was a question posed about book trailers and whether or not they were a valuable marketing tool for authors.

I replied to him, but thought this was a topic I could expand upon and make my own blog entry.

This past Sunday my writers club meeting had Kemble Scott as our guest speaker. He has the distinction of being the first author to use YouTube to launch a novel.

His novel SoMa is about the South of Market neighborhood in San Francisco and it has subject matter that is sexually explicit in nature. He knew that it was going to be near impossible for his book to be reviewed in mainstream publications and so he was casting about for ideas as to how to publicize his book. One of his neighbors worked for YouTube and suggested that he make some short films.

Scott has had a career as a television journalist for years, but he was initially stumped at the suggestion. She then challenged him that with all his TV experience, he should be able to come up with something.

He decided on a series of short promos showing some of the locations mentioned in his book. Along with showing the locales, he uses suggestive language to reference some of the unusual behavior in those places which are represented in his book.

At first he had a professional help him with the filming, but when he viewed it he thought it looked too slick for YouTube. So he bought a $600 video camera and handed it to someone with no experience. He also changed it to black and white to give those short videos a grittier feel to match the tone of the book.

The video clips preceded the publication of his book and his novel appeared on the San Francisco Chronicle’s best seller list the first week it was released.

You can see him talking at Google’s corporate headquarters in the Authors@Google series. This video is about 42 minutes in total length, but he credits YouTube for the successful launch of his book at about 29:40 and he includes one of his videos as part of a demonstration.

Those video clips didn’t generate a million hits like the Drama Squirrel video, but they did help generate word of mouth which translated into sales. And because he made a major newspaper’s best seller list, his book has been sold in places he would never have expected including an airport in Singapore.

I finished reading his book, it is laugh out loud funny in parts, but it is blue. Very blue. It is not for those who are easily offended.

Please tell me if you know of other authors who have successfully used video clips to promote their books. I would love to see more of them to get ideas for my own future reference.

2008 San Francisco Writers Conference

Last year I wrote a post about why anyone should go to a writers conference as well as my experiences having volunteered at the 2007 San Francisco Writers Conference.

I volunteered again this year, and had an even better time than before.

I carpooled down to The City (which is what San Francisco is called by people in the Bay Area - NOT Frisco or San Fran) with my friend Cindy Pavlinac. I have known Cindy for several years and she holds the same position on the board of directors for the Marin branch of the California Writers Club as I do on the Redwood Writers branch.

Cindy and I arrived early Friday morning wanting to hear Kemble Scott speak at the opening session. That was important because we wanted to introduce ourselves to him since he will be our guest speaker at a joint meeting for our two clubs in April. He had been a speaker at Litquake last fall with my friend Erika Mailman talking about their experiences as newly published authors.



His session was great and he gave several anecdotes demonstrating his business savvy. His book is entitled SoMa which is a nickname for the gritty South of Market Street neighborhood of San Francisco. He made Youtube videos of the areas in his novel helping to publicize his book.

One thing he did not plan on was being attacked by a local online critic who hates everyone. At first Scott was taken aback, but then he realized that it was great publicity. People were learning about his new book and it increased sales.

His book has gone on to become a San Francisco Chronicle bestseller. Not bad. Not bad at all.

He has many reviews listed on his website, but this one seems the most intriguing to me:

"I read the first page of SoMa and never put it down until I read the last page. Then my housemate took it from me and read it in a day. It flows through your hands like water, yet it shocks, awes, repulses, exposes trade secrets, and illuminates the deep motives for extreme behavior. I know people who are less real than these characters. I laughed out loud. Kemble Scott is one sick bastard."

— Joe Quirk, best-selling author of The Ultimate Rush and Sperm are from Men, Eggs are from Women.

I had a great time meeting and schmoozing with Kemble Scott. I think he's a great guy, even if Joe Quirk thinks he's "one sick bastard" from his novel. It was nice that Scott hung around the conference all three days, and not just there simply for his session and leaving afterward. I even was fortunate enough to go out to dinner with him, Yanina Gotsulsky and Ransom Stephens on Friday night. We had a great time laughing, telling tales, and enjoying each others company.

I haven't read Scott's book yet, but I shall make a point of doing so before his talk at our joint meeting.




At our arrival I ran into Bryce Holt and his brother Kyle. I had met Bryce the previous year and had corresponded with him a few times over the past year. It was nice to see him again and to hear about his progress to publication in the intervening time.

I was surprised when I looked up and saw someone who had been a member of my writers club, but had moved to Oregon. I was happy when I was able to immediately come up with his name. As it turns out it was his first writers conference and being greeted by an old friend at its onset helped set his mind at ease.

Here's a picture of me with J.S. McDaniel as well as the glamorous Yanina Gotsulsky.


On Saturday morning as I was on my way to the first session of the day I crossed paths with J.S. He was on his way downstairs to the lower conference rooms. I asked where he was going, and he told me the name of the session he was planning on attending. I shook my head and said, "No. You need to go hear about Pitchcraft. Trust me." Then I redirected him to attend the session by Katharine Sands of the Sarah Jane Freyman Agency. J.S. had paid to participate in the Speed Dating for Agents on Sunday morning, so I knew he needed to hear what Sands had to say.

He did thank me, by the way.

I knew J.S. from the Redwood Writers meetings, and for some reason he always reminded me of Ransom Stephens. Here's a picture of Ransom and I mugging for the camera.



Yes, Ransom and J.S. are both white guys with black hair, about the same height and around the same age, and are both writers. However, Ransom has a dry, acerbic wit which is far different than J.S.'s style of humor.

I wanted to introduce them to each other because if for no other reason than they are both friends of mine. I had forgotten that both used spirituality in their novels. (Then again, I have only talked with them about their writing and without reading their stories, so I have an excuse for not recognizing that commonality.)

They hit it off with each other and I am hoping they will develop a correspondence and their own friendship.

That leads me to what I feel is most important aspect of the conferences. It is not the workshops, but it is interacting with the people there: the speakers, the organizers, and the attendees. It is in exchanging of ideas and expertise about various aspects of the craft of writing and the business of publishing that allows you to expand your circle of literary friends.

One of the best summaries I have ever read of how best to schmooze with others at a writers conference was written by Beth Proudfoot the past chair of the East of Eden Writers Conference.

She urges everyone to embrace any and all lines at conferences as opportunities to speak with people, exchange business cards, and establish friendships with people who share your interest in writing.

In my volunteer duties I saw myself as a roving ambassador to help answer questions about what to expect at the conference as well as offering tips for blogs, websites, etc.

I worked the Editors Roundtable session on Saturday afternoon. There were about ten editors participating and each sat at their own table with nine seats for participants to ask them questions. Each person had two minutes.

The volunteers had two minute egg timers to enforce the two minute rule.

Two minutes is not a lot of time to pitch your book and have an editor form an informed opinion about your book that you have spent years agonizing over each fine detail. We did not want individuals to try and monopolize time with the editors and cause others at their table to be given the short shrift. Overall, I think it ran pretty smooth.

The volunteers were allowed to choose which table they preferred working at and I picked Ten Speed Press. That is because of my time spent as a bookseller at Barnes and Noble and my being impressed with not only their titles but their organization as a whole. They are one of the largest independent publishers which produces about 150 titles each year. (That tidbit is from their website.)

I was impressed with the writers who pitched to the editor from Ten Speed because I think for the most part, they understood what that house published. The pitches were succinct and well received. I was surprised when Jo Ann Deck actually took sample pages, book proposals, etc., from writers. In the past I have seen most agents or editors refrain from taking anything, but instead handing out their business card to those people whose projects interested them.

She left that night with an armload of information and had made connections with a lot of writers who had promising sounding books.

And they did it in under two minutes. Incredible.

I was given another task which was to serve as a greeter at breakfast. Basically I was there with another woman to assure that those walking in for the coffee and pastries were paid conference attendees and not just people staying at the hotel who wandered downstairs and thought, "hey, free food!"

We greeted the bleary-eyed writers who were in desperate need of caffeine. I tried reading the badges for the home towns of the attendees as they walked by and saw that they were from all over the country. I remember seeing Florida, Virginia, New York, Nevada, Michigan and Hawaii. The one that surprised me the most was Zita Weber, a writer from Australia. She crossed seventeen time zones (!) to attend that conference.

Now that is commitment to your career.

On Sunday morning I not only worked as a breakfast greeter, but I worked the Speed Dating for Agents session. I was stationed outside in the hallway and did my best to answer questions of those who standing in line waiting to go inside.

Here I am trying to calm their jittery nerves.


If you squint you can see the logo for the California Writers Club on my tote bag. Yes, I was a walking advertisement for my writers club.

The one piece of advice that I tried to impart most often was to not immediately launch into a pitch upon sitting down in front of the agent, but instead to take a moment and make eye contact and smile. Make a human connection first before you start talking.

I also warned about complaining about anything, especially about not getting the full amount of time (three minutes) should the person in front of you not get out of the chair when they were supposed to.

You do not want to be perceived as a Client From Hell.

Agents are looking for professionals whose writing excites them and are a pleasure to work with. They do not want temperamental primadonnas.

I had read an agent's blog a year ago where an anecdote was related about two different writers at a Speed Dating session. The first writer grumbled and complained that they only got two and a half minutes and not the full three minutes (meanwhile wasting valuable seconds while whining.) The second writer sat down, cast a knowing glance behind them at their predecessor and then said something like, "wow, that must have been fun."

The agent was so grateful that s/he was far more likely to ask for a partial from the second writer even if it was not a subject s/he is normally interested in. Because the second writer treated him/her as a human being and not a magical gatekeeper lacking feelings.

After the conference I saw a post on Nathan Bransford's blog and contacted Joe Ramelo who mentioned he had attended the conference in his reply. I wrote to him, and as it turns out, Joe was one of many people I spoke with while waiting in line. He felt that I was an "encouraging presence" who dispensed good advice.

Yay. It is nice to know that my objectives were achieved.

One of the high points of the conference was having the opportunity to meet and talk with Tess Gerritsen. She is an amazing author as well as a warm, engaging and witty person. She gave a fabulous key note address on Sunday afternoon in which she talked about the idea of storytelling as an organic process that is difficult to define or predict.

She has given lectures to physicians who want to become novelists and she says that many of them are astounded when for the first time in their life they are not successful. They all want to know the secret. As if there was a mathematical equation which can be described and used to allow them to simply plug variables into an algorithm and get the desired result.

It is not that easy.

She gave as an example two people who might have had the same experience. "Uncle Harry" who when he begins a story causes everyone to yawn and check their watches and "Aunt Maude" who can tell the same story and have people hang on her every word.

It is not necessarily the events that are important, but it is the telling of the tale.

I was also blessed by chatting with Tess on Saturday night about medicine, wine, archaeology, and California along with my friend Cindy Pavlinac. At one point Tess looked at the two of us and remarked with a little surprise about how open we were about expressing our opinions. She now lives in Maine and people there are reserved.

We kind of shrugged at that. Cindy and I are both Midwestern gals who now live in Northern California and we do not hesitate in speaking our minds. It is part of who we are.

Here I am standing next to the lovely and talented Tess Gerritsen. I think she must have leaned down a little, because she is statuesque, whereas I am decidedly not.



I want to thank my good friend Cindy Pavlinac for taking these pictures and allowing me to share them on my blog. (My camera was being used in Yosemite while I was in San Francisco.)

All in all, I had a wonderful time at the San Francisco Writers Conference. It was some of the best weather I have ever experienced in The City, and I got the chance to schmooze with a lot of people.

For those who are interested in hearing any of the sessions from the conference, they are available on CD as well as downloadable MP3 at VW tapes. You can also find sessions from other writers conferences including the famous Maui Writers Conference at the same site.




By the way, after I returned home from the conference I was checking my overstuffed email box. I opened my spam folder and quickly scanned the contents seeing multiple notices for my winning overseas lotteries that I never entered, confidential communiques from people requesting my assistance in transferring large amounts of money from Nigeria, offers to lengthen anatomical body parts that I lack, and advertisements for horribly spelled pharmaceuticals. It was after I hit "delete all messages" that I noticed the letters SFWC in one of the message lines.

Too late. I did not notice the name of the sender and it was gone. Forever.

So if anyone reading this post tried sending me an email after meeting me at conference, and I did not respond to you -- I apologize and request that you write to me again.

Thanks and I hope everyone muse is treating them well!

Linda