I’m back from a whirlwind trip to Buffalo for Dyngus Day, a post-Lenten holiday that involves pussy willows and polka. But really, it’s about drinking and eating lots of pierogies and kielbasa. Much as I enjoy spending all my free time with my fictional characters, I find it’s good to get out of the house and interact with actual human beings. But I’m back and ready to dive into deadlines, novel research, and revision.
On to this week’s links!
- “How often do agents take on an author, but fail to sell their book?” Literary agent Jennifer Laughran answers this burning question.
- “My sales are awful, and I’ve done everything. I give up.” It takes more than a few tweets and a Facebook ad. This is Why Your Books Aren’t Selling: 4 Ways To Improve Now.
- Kate Sullivan, Senior Editor at Delacorte Press, discusses some of the blind spots and ways to break the system that inhibits diverse authors in her post, I Just Don’t Identify with the Character.
- How Do You Write About “Diversity” When the Word Has Become Hollow? Three writers—Daniel José Older, Ashley Cassandra Ford, and Tanwi Nandini Islam—examine a word that’s lost its meaning.
- There are Seven Deadly Sins of public readings, and every single one of them is avoidable.