The Christian Writer’s Manual of Style

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Do you need a style guide but can’t afford the Chicago Manual of Style and/or The Associated Press Stylebook? This handy soft-cover manual is a great substitute, and it’s much cheaper than Chicago and more comprehensive for the Christian writer than AP. In fact, I think every writer for the Christian market should own a copy. The full title is The Christian Writer’s Manual of Style: Updated and Expanded Edition (2004), and the author is Robert Hudson.

The manual contains a myriad of spelling, capitalization, punctuation, and usage guidelines in a convenient alphabetical format. Specific to the Christian market are the portions dealing with style issues unique to Christian publications, like Is it Psalms 95 or Psalm 95? Is “biblical” supposed to be capitalized? ? Do you capitalize pronouns like “he” and “his” when they refer to God or Jesus? It’s amazing how much information is included in this book. For a preview, go to the listing on Amazon and take a look at the Table of Contents using Amazon’s “See Inside” feature.

Published writers know that, these days, editors have little time for repairing manuscripts with grammar and usage errors. If you’re an unpublished writer, you may think it’s the editor’s job to clean up your manuscript. However, it’s just not that way any more. Your chances of getting published are much better if you submit manuscripts that are free of errors in grammar and style. And, it’s a big mistake to think, because you made good grades in English in school, that you don’t have anything to learn about grammar and style. Published or unpublished writers, this book will help you present a quality product in a crowded market.

EzineArticles.com: Marketing Tool, Information Source

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Writers need to get their work out on the Web, and you can do that with a Web site or a blog. However, if you don’t have any traffic, your work is not being seen. So, what other options do you have?

Take a look at EzineArticles.com. This site is just loaded with information. Anyone can submit articles for this service which matches Ezine publishers with writers. The first time you submit, you have to send ten articles. If those articles are approved, you will not be limited in the number of articles you can submit. There is no pay. See the Terms of Service here.

Now, you might think, “Why should I submit ten articles in order to get approved to submit more articles if I’m not paid for any of them?” Well, honestly I don’t think I would go too far with it, but, if your work has never been published, the fact that you are accepted for EzineArticles.com gives you some credibility. If your articles are used in one of their ezines, you get an enormous amount of exposure. You are allowed to include a link to your Web site, provided you own the domain name. This means, if I understand correctly, that a free site or blog would not qualify.

OK, so you don’t think you want to submit that many articles for no pay. You can use the EzineArticles.com site as an information source. I searched “marketing for writers” and got what looks to me like an infinite number of articles on that subject. I got similar results for a search on “writing fiction.” Check it out here.

Surf the site for a while, and see how it works. You can get new ideas for marketing, for improving your writing, or for information on a number of other subjects. Sign up for one of the ezines that they offer on site (http://ezinearticles.com/subscribe/). If you prefer RSS feeds, they offer that, too, here.

Writers are no longer limited to print publications. If you can get your work published online, you can build your credibility for paying markets, either print or online.

Disclaimer: I have not submitted the 10 articles myself. It’s one of those things I’ve been meaning to do…..

Little Handbook of Perfecting the Art of Christian Writing

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Subtitle is Getting Your Foot in The Publisher’s Door

Leonard Goss has years of publishing experience with major companies like Broadman & Holman. Co-author, Don M Aycock, is an author, seminar leader, and pastor. Their team effort on this handbook has produced an excellent resource for Christian writers seeking to get their work published.

Sharing experiences of famous authors like Max Lucado and Jan Karon, the authors start by pointing out that writing for publication is work—hard work. But, they go on to show that, if you are willing to work for it, you can “commit publishing.”

The book contains chapters on book proposals, contracts, the writer-editor relationship, and much more. The last portion is an excerpt from Goss’s A Little Style Guide for Great Christian Writing and Publishing (reviewed in this blog here). Although a chapter from the style guide is included in the handbook, I would recommend that writers new to the publication process acquire both the style guide and the handbook.

Just Write! by Susan Titus Osborn

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Full title is Just Write! An Essential Guide for Launching Your Writing Career. Susan Titus Osborn has provided an invaluable tool for beginning writers in this book. Because it was published in 2000, you might be tempted to pass it by. Big mistake! It’s just chock-full of valuable information especially for beginning writers.

Osborn covers everything from getting your creative juices flowing to finding markets for you work once it’s done. It’s amazing how much ground she covers in this one book. Learn how to organize you work, find time to write, improve your craft, keep records, avoid copyright problems, and much more. Especially valuable to me are the chapters on article writing. I review them once in a while to keep from getting sloppy in my own article-writing.

A few portions of the book are dated, like the portion giving instructions on how to submit by mail. Many publishers today require that you submit work electronically. However, there are still some who take initial queries and proposals by mail. All in all, it’s worth the cover price.

Osborn, a writer and teacher, offers a manuscript critique service through The Christian Communicator. See her Web site: www.christiancommunicator.com. She and her staff of editors have helped many beginning writers kick off their careers.

The Little Style Guide to Great Christian Writing and Publishing

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Notice the title of this book is not A Little Style Guide. It’s The Little Style Guide. That’s because this little book is the best, most affordable style guide and reference for any writer aspiring to have his or her work published.

Written by Leonard and Carolyn Stanford Goss, this book will educate you about book production. Then you’ll be guided through the grammar and style conventions common to the Christian publishing industry. You’ll find helps with publishing technology and electronic media, proofreading and editor’s marks, and a listing of recommended books for authors and editors. Top the content of with a detailed index, and you’ve got the handiest, most economical single reference book a Christian writer could own.

Need to know how to spell website, Web site, Website? Look on page 156, and you’ll find that the publishing industry prefers Web site. Or, maybe you are confused about spelling an capitalization of religious terms, there’s an extensive list on pages 39-60.

If you think grammar and style is not important as you write your book, think again. Publishing houses prefer books and/or proposals that need very little editing for grammar and style these days. It’s true that publishers often have their own style guides, but many of them adhere to the industry standard Chicago Manual of Style. This little style book gives you the Cliff’s Notes version of Chicago at a very reasonable price.

Both Leonard (Len) and Carolyn Goss have extensive experience in the publishing industry. Leonard has been with Broadman & Holman Publishers for a number of years. Carolyn has worked in marketing and sales for publishers and is an author and a teacher of composition and literature. They’ve been involved in the production of numerous books, either as author or as editor.

If publishing a book is your dream, you need to read this little book and keep it hand on your desk

WordPress Web Presence: It’s Free

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Most blogging tools are free, but WordPress gives you more than just a blogging tool. If you haven’t experimented with WordPress, I suggest that you give it a try.

I was slow to hop on the blogging train, but now that I have, I am enjoying it immensely. Last year, in Blogger vs. WordPress post, I shared my research about the pros and cons of the two blogging tools. If you’re new to this blog, review that post before continuing.

I decided then to go with Blogger, mainly because I found it easier to use, especially for beginners. Later, I decided to work with WordPress more and to see what the differences were. I now use WordPress for most of my blogs. On the Blogger version of Wired to Write, I explained why I decided to change here.

Paste from Word: Now that I’m using WordPress regularly, I am discovering some really great features. For example, you can compose your posts in Word and paste into WordPress using the “Paste from Word” tool. All the formatting comes with it, including hyperlinks and text formatting like boldface and italic. This is a big time-saver, because, f you compose your posts online, it takes longer to do all that formatting. If you just copy and paste from Word without using the tool, you lose the formatting entirely.

Static Pages: One of the primary reasons I changed back to WordPress is that you can have a static page on WordPress, and you can’t have that on Blogger. See my book review blog as an example. Notice the menu bar across the top. There’s an About-Guidelines page and a Reading and Resources List for Writers page. Those pages are always there no matter how many blog posts I enter.

Use as Web Site: Some writers use WordPress as their primary Web site rather than having a main site and a separate blog. See Brandy Brow’s site here as an example. Using one of the standard WordPress designs, she has the welcome message on the home/blog page. Her other pages are static pages ( not available on Blogger). This makes a great free Web site, and Brandy can use it as a blog later if she chooses. I’ve tried some of the free Web site offerings out there, and I think WordPress is much easier to use than most of the ones I’ve tried.

Generally, WordPress offers a lot for the low price of FREE. If you get into it and find you need more sophisticated features, you can always upgrade to the paid version which is described at WordPress.org.

Blogging: E-mail Subscriptions

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Image courtesy of Master isolated images / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Recently, people have asked me in person and online about subscribing to blogs, so I have done a couple of posts about blogs an RSS feeds and about FeedDemon. I follow several blogs myself, and I think the feed reader is the most efficient way to follow a large number of blogs.

Subscribing by E-mail
However, some people, especially those new to the blog-following scene, prefer e-mail subscriptions. All of my blogs offer e-mail subscriptions in addition to RSS feed. If you want to subscribe, here’s how:

  • Click on the link that says something like “subscribe by e-mail,”
  • You’re taken to a page where you type in your e-mail address and do the word verification thing.
  • Then you’re given instructions on what to do next.
  • You’ll get a confirmation e-mail. If you don’t get the confirmation right away, check your spam folder and be sure to add the e-mail address of the confirmation e-mail to your address book to keep your subscription from going into spam in the future.

See the e-mail subscription option for this blog on the upper right corner. And, I invite you to subscribe while you’re looking. You can always unsubscribe if you want.

Adding E-mail Subscription Option to Your Own Blog
If you are a newbie blogger, you may know that the RSS feed is automatic for Blogger and WordPress. These are the most popular free blogging sites and the only ones I have used. If you want to offer e-mail subscriptions, it’s a little bit of work but it’s worth it. You can track your subscribers better if you use the e-mail option. Not only will you have a subscriber count, but you’ll also have the e-mail addresses of your subscribers.

I used Feedblitz.com as my e-mail newsletter service until recently. They have changed their navigation structure, and I have become frustrated at not being able to find what I need when I need it. Also, it seems to be that it works more slowly than other sites.

Now, I use Feedburner, now a Google service. If you already have a Google username, just go to www.feedburner.com and log in. If you don’t have a Google account, you need to set one up to use Feedburner. The Create an Account button is just below the log-in on the Feedburner home page. Once you’re logged in, you’ll see a box where you type in your feed information for your Feedburner e-mail subscription.

In WordPress, your feed will be http://yourblogname.wordpress.com/feed, and that’s what you put in the box to start the process. Complete instructions for setting up Feedburner e-mail subscription on WordPress are here. These instructions are good for Feedburner, but they are out of date for WordPress.

Here’s my attempt at the updated instructions. You’ll copy the html code for your subscription from Feedburner and paste into WordPress Text widget. Go to Appearance, the Widgets. Drag TEXT widget over to the sidebar that you want your subscription note to appear in. When you release it, box will show up, and that’s where you paste your code. Once that’s done, it automatically refreshes the site and your subscription form is done. Test your subscription link by subscribing yourself.

For Blogger, you can use a form (which is forbidden on WordPress) or the text link like the one on this blog. Instructions are here. See my blog for the form-type e-mail subscription.

As you work on setting up your subscription, remember that you can always access Feedburner, WordPress or Blogger help at any point. Also, if you really mess up the first time around, you can delete the subscription and start over. It just takes some time, but it’s worth it because you will have more information about your readers.

 

Magazine Article Writing: Two Options

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When I go to writers’ conferences, I meet people who have a story to tell and think that they need to write a book. However, a writer whose work has never been published will have a difficult time finding a publisher. It’s preferable to work on getting some work in print to prove that you can produce publishable work and that someone was willing to pay for it. Magazine articles are a perfect way to break into print.

Writers who can’t go back to school or attend conferences can learn how to write for magazines on their own. I recommend two paperback books that give you just about everything you need to teach yourself how to write for magazines.

Writing for Magazines by Cheryl Sloan Wray

My first magazine writing workshop was taught by Cheryl Sloan Wray, a freelance writer and journalism teacher. Her book first came out in 1996, but it has since been published by McGraw Hill Higher Education and is used as a textbook at the college level. Don’t let that scare you off, though. Her writing style is easily understood and well-organized. If you work your way through this book and follow the guidelines, you’ll be ready to submit articles to magazines in no time. If you’re on a budget, keep in mind that the educational edition is more expensive that the early edition simply because it is considered a textbook. Although some of the contact information in the old edition may be out of date, much of the content is still valid.

Effective Magazine Writing: Let Your Words Reach the World

by Roger C. Palms

Palms is a former editor of Decision magazine. He also walks you through the entire process of writing a magazine article. I don’t know how many times I’ve picked up this book when I just couldn’t get going on a work in progress. For example, I needed a better lead for an article, but I just wasn’t happening. I went to Palms’ book and read the chapter about the different types of leads. Soon I was creating an effective lead and on my way to finishing that article. The book is out of print, but you may be able to find it on www.half.com, Amazon, or other used book sites.

Which One?

Buy one or both and keep them near your writing desk. They are both written by professionals who have “been there and done that” numerous times with excellent results.

Book Proposals That Sell by W. Terry Whalin

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Subtitle: 21 Secrets to Speed Your Success

Do you have a great book idea? Are you ready to look for a publisher for a book you’ve already written? Regardless of where you are in your quest for publication, you need the information contained in this book. Plenty of writers have had great book ideas that didn’t come to fruition because the writer didn’t know how to market his or her work to publishers. Terry Whalin tells you exactly how to prepare your proposal and lay the foundation for a successful sale.

Whalin knows what he’s talking about. He has written more than 60 nonfiction books himself, and he’s been an editor, a literary agent, and now a publisher at Intermedia Publishing Group. The book is endorsed by publishing giants like Michael S. Hyatt of Thomas Nelson Publishers, Leonard Goss of Broadman & Holman, Sally E. Stuart (publisher of the Christian Writers’ Market Guide), and literary agent Steve Laube.

You can find information online about how to write a book proposal, but Whalin’s book goes the extra mile, giving you insider secrets that you won’t find anywhere else. For more information on Whalin, visit his site, http://terrywhalin.com/. To buy the book, go to http://www.right-writing.com/ways.html.

Words to Write By: Author Devotionals Compiled by Robin Bayne

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When you are discouraged as a writer, wouldn’t you like to sit down with somebody like Cecil Murphey, Robin Lee Hatcher, or Sally Stuart? Wouldn’t it be a comfort to know that these big names in the Christian publishing industry have had their share of discouragement, too? Maybe you’d like to know how they managed to overcome their difficulties? Well, Robin Bayne has compiled this book of devotionals by published writers who share scripture and/or quotations which have inspired them on their writing journey.

Each chapter deals with issues all writers deal with, like motivation, rejection, and networking. You can keep it handy in your writing space so that you can get help on the spot when you need it. The final chapter, Write for Him, we are reminded that we are writing for God and that we will do well to partner with God as we write.

Order the book from Robin’s Web site.