Teens! Here’s an Art Contest for You

Teen artists ages 11 to 18! Enter this contest to win a copy of my new novel, 6 Dates to Disaster (Bird Face series book three). Visit my website www.cynthiattoney.com, subscribe to my newsletter there, and email me (see Contact, under About Me tab on the website) a sketch of your fave character(s) in a scene from one of my first two books.

In the email, tell me which book and which chapter you got your idea from. Contest ends at midnight CST, January 1, 2017. Winner will be notified by 1/31/17 at the email address you use to subscribe to my newsletter. Winner must provide a valid U.S. or Canadian mailing address in a return email.

I can’t wait to see what you draw!

Cynthia

Cover Reveal! Book three of the Bird Face series

Coordinates well with the previous two, don’t you think? If the image appears pixilated, it also does to me. I’ve requested a higher-resolution image from my publisher. All part of the process of getting a new book ready for publication! The anticipated release date is December 6.

    

A Special Summer Read at a Special Price!

For girls 11 to 14—well, women of all ages!

Don’t miss it this time!

Cynthia

Creating My First Book Trailer

When it comes to marketing my books, I’m not typically a procrastinator. But until a week ago, I did not have a single book trailer video for any of my three published books (including the one out of print).

I’d written some copy for one.

I’d thought about the tone I wanted.

I’d searched for images.

I’d talked to my husband about producing one together.

I even had a YouTube channel set up and waiting.

But still, no trailer.

What lit a fire under me to move forward was the offer of a fellow author to post our author group’s video trailers on Instagram.

Excited by that prospect, I inquired from other authors which program they used. (Is program the correct word? I’m not sure.) I also researched a bit online.

I soon learned that many used Animoto or Vimeo to produce their own videos. However, my husband and I have Macs, and iMovies was already available to us.

We selected a pre-fab theme from among many free themes with built-in music. We weren’t quite happy with our first try, because not enough time was built in for the text frames unless we used only a handful of words. And the built-in background and text color made it harder to read. My husband could find no way to change the colors.

After I cut back on the text somewhat and my husband figured out how to add a second or so to those frames without the music ending too soon, we were pleased.

Until you produce your own book trailer video, you can’t imagine the planning and coordination it involves. We learned a lot that we’ll apply to our next production–a trailer for book two.

So, ladies and gentlemen, here’s my trailer for 8 Notes to a Nobody. I hope you enjoy it.

Do you have an experience to share about producing a book trailer ?

 

 

Celebrate Your Success and Enter to Win an E-book

Image courtesy of Morguefile.com free photos

In the early months of the new year, good things have happened to me as an author.

The second book of the Bird Face series, 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status, is a semi-finalist in a book contest and a finalist in another. A Florida book fair company has acquired copies of both books of the series to sell to schools. I have sorted out some of the problems with my third manuscript and gotten back to writing it.

And I’m celebrating!

Don’t you think the small steps accomplished on any entrepreneurial journey should be celebrated? If you do, I invite you to celebrate yours–with me.

To expand the positive atmosphere I’m breathing, I’m offering a chance for a commenter on this blog post to win an electronic copy of either 8 Notes to a Nobody or 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status.

All you need to do to enter for a chance to win:

1. Share in the comments about an accomplishment in your particular endeavor (writing or other) that you celebrated or want to celebrate, and how (in a wholesome way–remember that young teens also read this blog).
2. Subscribe to my monthly newsletter at cynthiattoney.com.

The names of all approved commenters who subscribe to the newsletter will be placed in a hat, and a winning name will be drawn. The prize will be a mobi file of your choice of either of my books, to be read on a Kindle or other device where you have a Kindle app.

After the end of March, I’ll notify the winner at the email address used to subscribe to the newsletter.

So, how about your entrepreneurial successes–in writing (prose, poetry, fiction, nonfiction) or an  altogether different endeavor? Was your poem or short story accepted for publication? Did you open a new online business? Sell your first painting? I’d love to hear about it.

Let’s celebrate those successes together!

 

 

 

 

Introducing Mattie, Teen Reader

Mattie at home with her dog, Bessie

If you’ve read 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status, you’ll recognize the name “Mattie” as one of the characters. This is where I got the name!

Meet Mattie, a young lady around 15 years old, who was the first reader to contact me back when the original Bird Face was published. She wrote the sweetest letter and raised my spirits as an author when I needed it most. So naturally I wanted to name a character after her. 🙂

Although the real Mattie is not all that similar to my fictional character Mattie, she is amazing and worth writing about! She kindly agreed to allow me to interview her.

Cynthia: Welcome to the blog, Mattie. Tell us a little about yourself—what combination of personality, interests, and abilities makes Mattie who Mattie is?

Mattie: I’m a creative, quirky girl, who loves to read, write, and paint. I also spend a lot of time performing. I enjoy acting because I get to pretend to be someone else. It reminds me of when I was little, and I would run around screaming, “I’m a FAIRY!”

Cynthia: You’re very talented! I can understand how you would relate to the characters in my books. You have a combination of their talents.

Which kinds of books do you like to read, and would you like to write a book similar to any of those someday?

Mattie: I like to read books that have a little mystery and romance. Books about actors are also very interesting to me, since they help me improve my craft. If I ever write a book in the future, it will probably be about life experiences I’ve had and how God has helped me get through them.

Cynthia: Terrific. The good thing for writers is that we can turn our experiences–good or bad–into a book.  And we can honor our friends by naming characters after them.

Do you have a lot of friends you hang out with or one or two close ones?

Mattie: I have a few close friends.

Cynthia: What makes a good friend for you?

Mattie: A person who loves to laugh always makes a great friend for me! It is so fun to joke around with my close friends. Especially when we get it on video, and we can laugh about it again later.

Cynthia: I wish my friends and I had been able to record ourselves!

What is the best thing about friendship with a boy? What is the worst?

Mattie: Hanging out with a guy is fun because we can play a sport or a video game which I wouldn’t normally do with my girly friends. However, the worst thing about having guy friends is that they are harder to relate to.

Cynthia: Yeah, having at least one guy friend is great for getting a male perspective on a situation, seeing the world through his eyes, but for some things you need your gal pals.

Because you have both male and female friends, I must ask you: which character in the series do you like the most?

Mattie: My favorite character is Sam. He would be a great friend to have because he knows just what to say or do when someone is upset. He is very caring.

Cynthia: Aww. Sam is one of my favorites too, even though he and Wendy have a couple of arguments, or at least misunderstandings.

Have you ever had a bad argument with the person who was your best friend, and what was it about?

Mattie: One time, I was aggravated with my best friend, and I made fun of her most hated flaw. She was super offended, and she wouldn’t talk to me for the whole day. Fortunately, she forgave me for saying something so inconsiderate, and we are still besties!

Cynthia: Wow, you two are good friends. I always feel bad if I make a comment to someone I like and she gets that hurt look on her face. Sometimes I’m kinda like Wendy was in the first book, lacking in social skills.

In your opinion, what is your best quality or social skill? Which quality or skill would you like to develop?

Mattie: My best quality is that I’m not afraid to be myself. I am comfortable in my own skin. I would like to develop the skill of small talk. When I am first meeting someone, it can be hard for me to make conversation since I hardly know them.

Cynthia: It’s great that you’re comfortable being yourself. Some teens don’t feel that way.

If you worry, what do you worry about the most? What kind of action do you take to solve the problem or get your mind off worrying about it?

Mattie: I usually worry about silly things like what I’m going to wear to an event or how I’m going to decorate my room. I will read, do some homework, or watch T.V. to clear my head.

Cynthia: Are you public, private, religious or home-school educated? What is the worst thing about school? What is the best thing?

Mattie: I go to a public school. About 50% of the stuff I learn in school will probably go to waste. I doubt I’ll remember the elements of the Periodic Table by the time I’m 30. I still like school because I get to see my friends all the time, and I eat yummy pizza for lunch everyday!

Cynthia: Thanks for visiting, Mattie. I hope this semester of the school year goes as well as the first!

If you enjoyed meeting Mattie as much as I did and would like to see her in action, she’d love for you to follow her Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC94_Sy-pS_Rct9ZNEMyOM4Q

 

 

 

Seeking My Niche

This post was first published on The Scriblerians blog, October 6, 2015.

Image courtesy of Morguefile free photos

I have one of those in my house—a niche. It’s carved out of the wall at the end of a short hallway. Not much fits there, but I placed a tall pottery vase that is flattened from front to back so it nestles in the space just right.

And boy, is it showcased.

Isn’t that what we authors are supposed to do? Find a niche for our work? An audience where it’s showcased rather than one of many similar, cluttered objects where none stand out.

I suppose those are extreme examples, but books can’t yell for attention like humans can. How do I find the audience(s) where my novels might catch fire, so to speak?

I’m thinking out loud now. Thanks for sticking with me.

My YA novels in the Bird Face series use humor and hope to address serious issues facing teens today. Each novel addresses at least a few. It’s the way I like to write stories, with my protagonist facing multiple issues and crises that are intertwined.

So, how do I find a niche for those books?

Right now, I’m looking for teens with particular challenges or areas in teens’ lives where certain types of stories or characters are lacking. Stories featuring a teen that is hearing-impaired are hard to find, for example. So are those with Catholic teen characters.

I wrote my first book because I care about kids who are shy or bullied. It’s fiction that contains elements of Christian faith, and the half-Cajun Wendy naturally became Catholic because all the Cajuns I knew were Catholic.

I wrote my deaf teen character Sam in my second book because I care about hearing-impaired teens. A good friend in my twenties taught at a school for the deaf, and she shared her experiences.  I grew up not understanding much about the hearing-impaired children I met, but I later worked around hearing-impaired adults, who referred to themselves as deaf and who became my friends.

Like an ethnic group, both hearing-impaired and Catholic teens like to see characters similar to themselves occasionally depicted in the fiction they read.

I’ve decided to try target-marketing to both Catholic teens and hearing-impaired teens (as I continue to market to all teens, Christian and non-Christian). I know, I’ve selected two niches, but I’m still figuring this out.

Anyway, that’s my plan for today.

Are you an author struggling to find your niche? As a reader, are you attracted to specific religious aspects of story or social issues in story lines?

Enter to Win a Copy of 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status on Goodreads

  If you’ve wanted to read the second novel of the Bird Face series, 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status, a giveaway of a signed print copy is going on right now on Goodreads.com. This giveaway is open to addresses in the U.S. and Canada.

You don’t necessarily have to read the first novel, 8 Notes to a Nobody, to understand the second. If you’d prefer to read the books in order, look for an announcement soon about how to acquire a free Kindle version of 8 Notes to a Nobody.

If you are not a member of Goodreads, here are some reasons to join–and these are only a few!

• It doesn’t cost a thing.
• It’s a great place to find out about books with topics or themes you’re interested in.
• It’s a great place to meet authors, writers like yourself, and readers with similar interests.
• You can keep track of books you’ve read and want to read.
• You can rate or review books and see other members’ ratings and reviews.
• You can recommend books to friends and receive recommendations if you wish.
• You can be notified of giveaways for books on your to-read list.
• You can search for giveaways and enter them.

So, what are you waiting for? Someone will win, and it could be you!

Goodreads Giveaway of 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status

Turn Up the Music in Young Adult Fiction

Image courtesy of Morguefile free photos

Name one non-living thing that teenagers everywhere love: music.

It may be Christian rock, country western, hip-hop, or the traditional music of an exotic culture—but I haven’t known a young person from any background who didn’t enjoy some type of music.

Featuring music, or a love of it, is a great way to make a story and its characters more relatable to a teen audience.

Sometimes music is fundamental to the story and the main character. Sometimes it plays a supporting role, with the love of a certain type of music appearing as one facet of a secondary character’s personality. The plot or main character arc may depend on music to motivate a character to act and change, or a character’s involvement with music may influence another character’s feelings for him.

Examples of contemporary YA fiction employing music in the storylines are Sarah Dessen’s This Lullaby and Just Listen, Michelle Buckman’s My Beautiful Disaster, and Judy Blume’s Here’s to You, Rachel Robinson. A friend and fellow author also suggested a YA fantasy novel, Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonsong. In my novels, 8 Notes to a Nobody and 10 Steps to Girlfriend Status, one of the main characters plays the clarinet, and her music is an important part of her life.

Before you search your favorite music to incorporate it into your fiction, a word of caution about including any part of a song’s lyrics: you might get into trouble! Lyrics are copyrighted, and it’s difficult (or expensive) to gain permission to use them unless you know the artist personally. However, in the U.S. any song or musical work published in 1922 or earlier is in the public domain.*

Society tends to associate particular musical instruments with certain looks and personality types, but if you think outside the (music) box, they needn’t be stereotypical combinations.

When you imagine a male teenager who plays electric guitar or bass, how do you picture him? Is he a bad-boy rebel with long hair and a sketchy reputation, or a modern-day Buddy Holly with close-cropped hair and glasses? If that musician is a girl, is she a Shania Twain or a Cindy Lauper?

How about a female flutist (a.k.a. flautist)? Do you imagine someone outgoing and a member of the marching band or a lover of the classics who is quiet and shy? She may be a serious student, or perhaps she uses her music to escape her troubles at school or at home. If your male character plays the flute, does he date a girl in the student orchestra, or is he an introvert? Does he play classical music but listen to hard rock? Does he study the martial arts?

If you employ irony by pairing a musician’s love of a particular instrument with that of a hobby that seems to contradict it, you can make a character even more memorable. Is the cello player also a skydiver? Does the drummer rescue cats?

Playing music can be a diversion, a forced extra-curricular activity creating conflict with a parent, or perhaps a young person’s primary focus and anticipated career. Your teen character may play the organ at church, compose guitar music for a band, write lyrics in secret, or work in a recording studio—for fun, for profit, or to gain experience.

Bonuses in incorporating music into a story come not only in more relatable, three-dimensional characters, but also in creating believable settings and scenes with easy-to-use sensory details.

In addition to the obvious instrumental sounds, consider other sounds as well as the marvelous sights and smells surrounding the playing of music. Think of the aromas of wood or a leather case—from an acoustic guitar or a cello, antique or brand new. Light plays with musical instruments, bouncing from metal horns and showing off a violin’s luster. Back to sounds, some of the most interesting are those that occur before and after the music plays. Sheet music rustling, discordant tuning, cases rattling or scraping the floor, locks snapping shut. Use them to show joy, frustration, or anger.

Remember that teens all over the globe can identify with other teens who love music or are involved with it in some way. Your story will truly resonate with them when the music one of your characters loves happens to be the music they love too.

Which YA novels have you read that feature music?

*http://www.pdinfo.com/public-domain-music-list.php

10 Things I Learned From My Facebook Party

Image courtesy of Morguefile free photos

… that might help with yours!

Last week I hosted a virtual event celebrating the release of the first two novels of my Bird Face series. The party was great fun, but as one author friend recognized, a lot of work.

There’s nothing like attending a few Facebook parties to get a feel for their dynamics before you make the decision whether or not to host one. I popped into several as I geared up to create my own. I recommend you visit a few—to participate in or simply “lurk”—and pay attention to the following.

1. If you’ve selected a location city in your true time zone for the Facebook account that is associated with your event, the time zone for your party will be correct. I didn’t have a city designated beforehand, and my first party notification showed up with the wrong zone. If you don’t want to give your exact location on Facebook, choose another one in your time zone. You will see a time zone indicated on any Facebook event page you visit.
2. Choose the day and time period for your party carefully. I had to consider a number of things. School had started, so teens and teachers were busy during the middle of the day. Football season had kicked in (no pun intended), and high school or college games might be scheduled on Thursday, Friday, or Saturday evenings. The Friday of the week I chose happened to be 9/11, so I didn’t want to use that day. I chose Thursday and decided to start the party right before lunch (mine), which would be morning on the U.S. west coast and lunchtime on the east. I hoped that would catch interested stay-at-home parents, home educators, and people on their lunch breaks. (Someone dropped in for a while before heading to work.) The party hours extended until 7 p.m. to include people after school and after some day jobs in most time zones.
3. Choose the length of the event to suit yourself and anyone helping you. There’s nothing wrong with a short party of two hours. Mine was long for more reasons than I mentioned above. One reason was that I recently moved and didn’t know when I’d make the acquaintance of enough people to invite to an actual party. Another was that I no longer work a day job, so I figured I might as well make the most of a virtual party.
4. As discussed in Behind the Scenes—12 tasks for book authors before the release, have at least one giveaway. In addition to your books and books from other authors, consider some unusual items that relate to your story. Either hint about the connection or come right out and say it. The most popular giveaway at my party was an art print donated by a book illustrator that related to my character’s love for animals. If your party is short, you may have time for only one or two giveaways. I had twelve. Remember—for any giveaway that you are responsible for shipping or mailing, the cost for that might be more than the value of the giveaway. But for me, having fun with my party’s attendees was more important.
5. Make the criteria for entering each giveaway you planned interesting but not too exclusive. I scared myself during two of them. One novel being given away was about twins, and I asked for comments to be about twins the person commenting knew. I wanted the comments to be entertaining, but it took so long for anyone to comment, I wondered if perhaps not many people knew or remembered twins. Another novel was about angels. I’d heard a lot of guardian-angel stories in my life and thought that sharing a true-life guardian angel story would be a good criterion for commenting and entering the giveaway. Again, participation was minimal. Sometimes the criterion for a giveaway was simply to express a desire for it. Sometimes including a photo gave the commenter an additional entry.
6. How do you schedule the giveaways? I struggled with this the most. In the initial planning, I thought I’d have each giveaway run two hours but overlap. Then reality set in. I was afraid I would lose track. I was glad I decided to have one contest (with me as judge) that ran most of the party but have the other giveaways last one hour each (except for a special one that extended to two hours). I did run two one-hour giveaways simultaneously when it seemed appropriate. For example, during a giveaway for boys, I also ran one for girls. However, I made all giveaways start and stop exactly at any given hour. So a giveaway might read like this—2:00 – 3:00 p.m.
   GIVEAWAY blah-blah-blah, and state how to enter.
7. There may be lulls in participation activity, but there may be times when you need someone to fix you a snack because you’re afraid to tear your eyes away from the screen. I experienced a 30-minute period of no activity during my lunchtime (contrary to what I believed would happen), so I made sure to stretch and take care of personal matters.
8. I cannot stress how important having prepared posts ready and waiting on a Word document was. It allowed me to play with the timing and wording of giveaways in advance. And I was able to copy from the document and paste each new giveaway onto the Facebook event page in a second as an old one was ending. I was able to easily repeat later in the day a giveaway that had no activity earlier. It happened to be the one for the art print, which became wildly popular by evening.
9. Obviously, you must picture your giveaways so people know exactly what they’d receive if they won. I had a folder on my desktop containing all the book covers and other images I needed for my posts. So … copy and past the necessary text, attach the correct image(s), and voila!
10. On everything but the contest, the names of the entrants were written on squares of paper, folded up, and placed in a “hat,” which was actually a bowl. I used two bowls at once because of the way I structured my party, but you might do something different. The winning name for each giveaway was drawn from the hat/bowl. This worked fine. I announced the winner immediately in a comment on that giveaway’s post and asked the person to message me with the needed e-mail or physical address, as the case may have been. For winners who did not contact me by the end of the party, I messaged them. If a winner was a friend of a friend, I also messaged her for help.

In the end, my party was worth the effort. Not only did I attract new readers to my books but also to the other authors’ that donated theirs as giveaways.

If you’ve hosted a Facebook event, how did it go? What can you share that you learned? If it was a book launch party, I’d love to hear if you experienced anything very different from mine.

Cynthia