Top Picks Thursday 06-14-2012

Our Anniversary Giveaway is going strong—still 3 weeks of great prizes. Congrats to Shani Bush, Bryan Prince & Rosa Cruz! We have a signed copy of Jonathan Maberry’s ROT & RUIN, DEAD OF NIGHT, and ASSASSIN’S CODE. Each of our winners will receive one of his books.

Ray Bradbury tributes abound this week: A group of science fiction writers share what Bradbury meant to them; Neil Gaiman comments; and Scott Myers compiles a wonderful link roundup of Bradbury’s video interviews and other information.

CONFERENCE ROUNDUP

Many conferences happened over the last weekend, and we want to shout out to all of them.

Lucas Mangum recounts his first-ever conference experience at the Philadelphia Writers’ Conference. (If you’re in the Doylestown, PA area June 16, don’t miss his Awesome Reading Fest VII.)

We’ve got Book Expo America info from YALSA’s Jessica Miller at the Children’s Author Breakfast; YA Highway’s Sarah Enni shares her BEA experience; the Writer Beware team reports with a BEA overview; and Torsten Adiar lists BEA’s Hottest Graphic Novels of 2012.

Marcy Collier recaps the New Jersey regional SCBWI conference, and the nostalgia brought on by conference season makes Fae Rowan recount her first Romance Writers’ national conference memories.

CRAFT

Jim Worrad delves into the brain of a reader—literally. He explores what neuroscience tells us about the art of fiction, how our brains interpret the imagined as real, and how reading makes us increases morality.

Austin Kleon urges us to steal like a writer; Christopher Jackson says writing is a war and your story is a Trojan horse; and Joshua Henkin advises embracing the glint of danger in your writing—the fear of going too far often leads to not going far enough.

In a number-filled advice section, Amy Deardon talks about the 4 story pillars; Steven James points out 5 story mistakes even good writers make; Mark Nichol lists 50 problem words and phrases; and Stephen L. Duncan reveals Pixar’s 22 rules of storytelling.

Jami Gold tells us how to make the most of a scene; Karen Schravemade explores the four types of dramatic tension; and Mary Kole explains that while worrying may be tense, worrying is not action.

Every writer strives to write a story with depth. Julie Eshbaugh shows how to add depth to your story with motifs, while Mary Kole returns to talk about layers of emotion and how they bring characters depth.

Gina Carey knows you can’t get much deeper than the heart of your story. And you had better know what the heart of your story is while writing your correctly-formatted synopsis (from Dear Editor).

So many things keep us from our writing—and a big issue is fatigue. After all, most of us are not writing full time, but juggling it with other responsibilities. Krissy Brady shares the secret to making your writing sessions more productive.

Janice Hardy helps you avoid time sinks and improve your writing efficiency, while Colleen Patrick shows how multitasking helps you make twice the mistakes in half the time. And Chris Anderson tackles the email monster by writing an Email Charter to help ease the email burden on you and your correspondents.

In a writers’ lovefest, Jami Gold shares her top 3 reasons she loves the writing community (and asks you to share yours), while Chuck Wendig lists his 25 reasons this is the best time to be a storyteller.

BUSINESS

Writer Beware’s Victoria Strauss reports that a class action suit has been filed against PublishAmerica, a company with a long history of fraudulently parting authors from their money.

And in a followup to an article first posted on Writer Beware regarding who owned the content of the books created with Apple’s iBook software, Rue Liu reports that Apple has updated their end user agreement to address content ownership concerns.

Concerns of conflict of interest have plagued literary agency-owned self-publishing operations. Now comes Argo Navis, an independent ebook publisher designed to work only with AGENTED professional authors who have the rights to their books.

Brian A. Klems talks about the pros & cons of self-publishing and traditional publishing (via J. A. Konrath). Meanwhile, self-pubbed author Ashley Barron faces a self-publisher’s pricing dilemma.

Anyone trying for traditional publishing has faced those rites of passage: cover and query letters. Jacqueline K. Ogburn explains the difference between them, and provides samples of good and bad cover and query letters. Janice Hardy dissects the query letter that got her an agent, and provides some general tips. Finally, Jane Friedman lets us in on how to influence editors and agents in a way most writers don’t.

Julie Anne Lindsey explains what you should look for in an agent, while agent Wendy Lawson answers the question: how many clients does an agent represent? The answer may surprise you.

Jane Friedman talks marketing, author platform, and making your novel break out. Melissa Foster explores placing a value on marketing a free book and the various avenues available to authors. Ben Arogundade dissected the successful ebook authors, and found 10 steps to ebook success that they all had in common. And no matter what you do, Nathan Bransford reminds us of the befuddling randomness of bestsellers.

In social media and technology, Roni Loren examines investment vs. payoff: Is blogging worth the time? and Summer Hayes introduces YALSA’s new teen book finder app.

THE UNIQUE SHELF

Veronica Sicoe has a great take on something we all share: writer’s neurosis.

One of the big fears is speaking to a crowd. This humorous post by Perry Block lays out tips to combat your fear of public speaking.

Ever wondered where famous authors grew up? Flavorwire brings us the childhood homes of 20 famous writers. (Better make sure your childhood home looks good for when you make this list!)

The University of Cambridge is going wild with the digitizing of their collections! They have already digitized Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, and are planning to digitize the faith and science collections.

That’s it for this week!