Sure, we all want that magic moment when the words pour from our fingertips, gracing the page with our brilliance, but you have to wait for that. Plan first, party later.

This is the method that I use to write my own books. Yes, they are fiction, but the principles apply to nonfiction, so I teach them to my authors as well.

The post The Process I Use to Write Books appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

The beginning can be hard to pinpoint. And the real point of the book is to take people on a transformational journey. So how do you start?

Let’s back up. Before you start writing the actual book, there are a few questions you need to ask yourself, things you need to identify that will help dictate your direction. Check out the video to learn more.

The post What to Ask Yourself Before Writing a Book for Your Biz appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

There are several things to consider before signing the contract and ponying up that cash, but often, potential authors just don’t know WHAT to think about to help them decide. This month’s blog features the top 3 things I recommend that you look into to help you weigh your decision.

The post How to Decide if a Group Book is Right for You appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

One morning, I awoke with a sense of urgency. It was almost like being awakened by an alarm. I felt like I should rush to my desk and write.

I had a really strange dream that was like a movie. And not like the normal dream that’s like a movie. I saw the title come up on the screen. I saw the camera angles change. I met the characters. I followed them. I was even one of the characters, not actually myself in the dream.

It was a rom com where I met some of my ex-boyfriends and found out that they were successful. The exes were played by my actual exes, but they had different names too. One of my exes was the owner of the beergarden that my friends and I were meeting at, and he was moving boxes in a corner. I had to walk past him on my way to the bathroom.

There was an entire plot from start to finish, as well as a title for it. I thought I had dreamed a book I needed to write that I could eventually pitch as a movie.

Once I came back down to reality, I looked at the plot and wondered if I was the right person to write that. I’ve never written a romance novel, only vaguely relationship-oriented chick lit. I’m pretty good with humor, but I don’t know how funny I could make the story. I already have five novels that are fiction that I was planning on rewriting so they were up to my current standards. AND I primarily work with nonfiction writers.

I didn’t see an opening for this type of book in my repertoire. It just didn’t make sense to add on another genre and work on that. Why?

The book wasn’t aligned with my business.

Should I write it? Probably not right now. I didn’t say “never,” though, because I believe that anything could be useful in the future. I took notes and put them in my story vault.

Has this happened to you? Do you feel like writing about a struggle or something you’ve overcome that has nothing to do with your current business? As much as we may like to just sit down and write on that book because the urge has seized us, we need to slow it down and answer a few questions first.

1. Can this book somehow work with my business? There is always a chance it will. If you want to speak to a certain segment of your audience, then it might work. Maybe you are focusing on teens or on the advanced crowd members. If you’re excited about a topic, think about how you can spin it so you can absolutely address the same audience (or part of that audience) that you’ve worked so hard to build!
2. If this book doesn’t work for my current business, should I start another business with it? This is a question that you will likely have to sit with for a while. Starting a new business can be hard work, but if you are passionate about a topic, then maybe you’ve got it in you to have two businesses. 
3. Is this the start of a nonprofit? Sometimes that passion to help people who have a certain challenge should be channeled into a nonprofit. If this feels like the better way to go, then look at the nonprofit as a potential arm of your business or a nice way for you to give back. That book could be a way to help generate money for a cause you want to help with.

Do you have questions about that book that’s been on your mind? Send me a message to see if we should set up a chat!

The post Is Your Book Aligned with Your Business? appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

The problem is usually that we pull a lot more than “a few” when we sit down to plan that outline.

The nice thing is that you should have plenty of ideas to populate that outline. When you do your brain dump, you can get all those thoughts on paper and discover exactly what was floating around in there.

I recommend starting with all those ideas instead of trying to stem the flow. Get everything out. Even stuff that you don’t think you will use. Put it all on paper. The more you have, the better you can narrow down and eliminate the pieces that aren’t necessary. Plus, some of it may end up being subtopics in your chapters.

Now, the trick is to know what is important and what isn’t .

When you’re going through the ideas that you wrote down, you have to determine what will actually help your audience. What do they need to know? What is their biggest problem? How can you help them solve it?

Eliminate things that don’t fit that equation. What’s left should be much more focused.

Next, you have to consider if you have too much information for one book. If you think you do, then you may want to do something that covers a broad set of information very shallowly. This type of book would give only the basics, but it would be enough to get someone through a process on their own if they really wanted to.

Another option is to break it into sections that would be able to stand alone. Narrowing your focus for this book allows you to more thoroughly explain a step in the process.

Consider what would be best for your ideal clients to learn about first. Use that to shape what information you pull for that book. And don’t scrap the rest of it! You can use it for a follow-up book or books.

When you narrow down your ideas, start by looking at the problem you want to solve. Break it into steps that you can address or segments that would make sense as standalones. Then consider whether you can present one of these ideas as a gateway to your world of genius.

The post How to Narrow the Focus When Planning Your Book appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

Though it seems like they would be doing the same thing, the jobs are very different. For starters, the writing coach’s job is to help you get the book out of your head and on paper, while the editor’s job is to clean up the text and make it publishable.

For this post, I’m going to cover what a writing coach does. For the book editor portion, please check back in two weeks (or read the next post, if it’s past January 2019).

A writing coach can solve a lot of the problems you may have for completing your manuscript. If you’ve never written a book before, and you want the process to be fast and simple, then a writing coach is a great option. From figuring out your outline to fleshing out the book to bashing through writer’s block, if anything is an issue, a writing coach is the person to talk to.

Writing coaches can take a variety of approaches and offer different programs to help you write your book. On the low-touch end of the range, a writing coach can provide accountability. They might help you set goals and meet them by checking in weekly or biweekly. They may also provide periodic phone call or email access to ask questions or bounce ideas around.

On the high-touch end of the spectrum, a writing coach could delve into the book alongside you. They may review the book chapter by chapter and do calls (phone or video) to discuss the chapters. This is how I handle my one-on-one coaching with clients who purchase a package (rather than a one-off session). When I do these calls, I like to review the notes I’ve taken while reading the chapter, including changes that would tighten or redirect the book and additions that would make the book more complete. A lot of my notes tend to be questions I have while reading the text. For example: “How can I do this part myself?” “Should I invest in software, or do you do something simple?” “Is this story important to the narrative? I feel like it’s detracting from what you were explaining.” And so on.

The biggest benefits of having a writing coach include having someone work alongside you who has been through the book process before and having an outsider look at your book. The toughest part of writing a book, even if it isn’t your first, is that you know what you mean to say. But the reader may not. When you work with a writing coach, you have someone looking for holes in your explanation. You have someone looking for ways you can be more thorough, direct, and impactful.

And, if you need a cheerleader, you have that too. A writing coach gets you to the finish line and celebrates every win along the way, especially the big publishing one!

When I coach a client, I also provide them with assistance on every part of the book process: publishing advice (self or traditional), book cover, editing, starting marketing, and anything else they have questions about. I provide handouts on these topics so we don’t spend valuable coaching time on them unless the client has specific questions, doesn’t know how to set up their Ingram account, etc.

Is a coach right for you? Consider these questions to help you decide:

Do you struggle with working steadily to meet deadlines?

Do you have a great book idea but don’t really know what all the chapters should or shouldn’t cover (you may need a single session for this)?

Do you want reassurance before you finish your book that you are heading in the right direction, making sense, and staying focused on the goal for your book? If you answered “yes” to these, then contact a writing coach (like me!) to discuss your needs. You will be so happy you did it before you sent your book to an editor who returned it with mostly red ink.

The post What is a Writing Coach? appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

Writing can be the same way.

So many people who have a personal story to tell find it therapeutic to write down snippets of their story as they think of them. Writing is a beautiful way to heal, and I recommend trying this approach.

The problem they run into, though, is that they end up with a pile of puzzle pieces with no idea what the final image should be. Is it the butterfly with the basket and flowers and a rainbow? Or is it the monster racing through the city for a bite to eat?

All those puzzle pieces can end up frustrating the writer. They may leave them as is, stuck in the journal, on the shelf, gathering dust. But if you want to share the story as part of your business, I doubt you’ll invite potential clients over and expect them to sift through to make sense of it all.

Think of the writing as a mosaic. You have all the pieces for a picture. YOU get to decide what the picture is.

It may seem circuitous, but once you have a significant amount of writing to work with, you really can jump back to square one and start planning.

1. Decide who you want to read the final book. That will dictate what stories are appropriate for that audience. If you have stories written that aren’t for that audience, put them aside. Your time wasn’t wasted. It was therapeutic. You needed to get that writing out. Plus, you might use it for another book later.
2. Determine what you want them to get out of the book. Look at the remaining stories, and see if they can be arranged to lead a reader to that goal. If they don’t work with the goal, set those aside, too. Remember, therapeutic, potential for another book later. No time lost.
3. Start arranging the stories into chapters so you can lead a reader through a process, to meet checkpoints on a journey, to understand the road they have to travel, or whatever you have set up as the method for organization.
4. Though it’s great to have a book full of stories for your potential clients, you still have to explain and analyze. The reader needs to be guided on the journey. They need to know what lessons they should learn from your stories or what you are demonstrating to them. They need to know what the stories taught you and how it will impact their lives or their businesses. You can’t just throw stories at them without giving some context.
5. Frame it. Include a chapter at the beginning about why you wanted to compile those stories and what is driving you to work with people just like your ideal client. This makes for a great way to show the reader that you totally get them. For the final chapter, include a call to action. Make sure the reader knows what the next steps are and how they can work with you (because now they know that you can really solve all their problems easier than if they attempt to struggle through all the steps on their own).

Piecing the puzzle together will help you create a beautiful mosaic that you can be proud of AND that you can use as a great marketing tool for your business.

The post Mosaic Writing: Working Backwards from Writing to Planning and Beyond appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

I like to tell my clients that it’s more about the reader than about you or the topic. You want to start out letting them know that this book is definitely for them. Think about what would make you want to read the book that you are writing. Are you guiding someone through a difficult time? Do you want them to know that there is light at the end of the tunnel? Maybe you want to make sure that they know you understand the journey by pointing out exactly where they are now and what drove them to seek help.

Whatever that need is, identify it, and use it to guide you through that first chapter. It will help you connect with your reader better if you know what they are thinking.

Here are a few ways that you can handle your first page to do just that.

• Backstory – Talk about why you are the best person to tell this story or guide them on this journey. Be humble, of course, but let the reader know your expertise in the topic in a gentle way. (Bullet points with your credentials are frowned upon, by the way.) Usually, this part is a story about how you got to where you are today and how what you learned along the way can be helpful to your reader.
• The Why – Let the reader in on what motivated you to write this book. More than likely, you experienced something that you wish you had more guidance on, and that inspired you to pen your thoughts and guidance. For example, I started coaching writers because I don’t want anyone to spend years working on a manuscript, wondering if it’s good enough. I want writers to have the confidence that their book is the best they could possibly do.
• Reflection – Tell the reader where you are today and look back on the journey that got you here. This is typically when you have come out on top or seen some sort of success after overcoming an obstacle. Show the reader where you stand. Let them feel how good it is on the other side of the struggle. You give them hope when they see that it can be done!
• Summary – Give the reader a basic overview of the book so they understand the layout and what they are supposed to do with it. Even if you have a fairly straightforward layout, you may want to address what the reader can expect from your book. Are they prompted with lots of questions to address in their personal journals? Are there sections in each chapter devoted to tools and references that supplement what you wrote? Does your book break into a story portion and a workbook portion? Let the reader know right away so they can easily follow what’s going on.
• Pain Points – Talk about why the reader is there to begin with. Commiserating with the reader will definitely let the reader know that you know where they’ve been. You know the journey they are on. You know the struggle. And you have definitely come through to a better place. Let them know that you’ve been there.

You can combine these ideas to make for a strong first chapter and help the reader feel like they chose the best guide possible to help them out. Whatever you do, speaking directly to the reader is a great way to build that connection.

The post What Happens on Page One of Nonfiction appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

Sometimes, they eat normal kid food like hot dogs or PB&J. Other days, they will eat chicken chili or shrimp with broccoli and rice. And sometimes, they ask for foods like mac n cheese or “Wendy’s burgers” and then refuse to eat them.

As it turned out, the older one enjoyed helping me make the pancakes and also liked the smell, but she didn’t like the taste. The younger one liked the first two bites and then refused to eat them (coincidentally after the older one refused to eat hers). She then proceeded to ask for an orange and a hot dog that she refused to eat as well.

Clearly, I have no idea what my children will eat, but to be fair, I don’t think they do either. But when you’re writing a book, knowing what your audience wants is vital to keeping readers engaged and selling books.

So how do you do that?

Asking everyone what they want to read about or learn isn’t a great way to go about it. So start by looking at what other books in your genre cover.

Go to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Goodreads and read what reviewers are saying about similar books. Look at the five-star and the one-star reviews. People tend to rate items when they are passionate about loving or hating them, so take note of what they are saying.

Then make a list. Write down what the books do well. What do people like about how they cover the topic? What did people learn about the most? What was most important that people learned? Next, write down what they didn’t do well. Why did it earn a one-star rating? What did the book lack? What did people want to know more about? Where did they fall short?

Looking at your list, determine where you intersect with the list. What parts of it do you want to talk about? What is your forte? Do you know enough to cover what the books didn’t do well?

If your audience loves it or longs for it, chances are, it will be important to what you are writing.

As you lay out your outline, determine how you can work those topics in and focus on what your audience really wants to know.

Remember that you have a different experience from other writers and will bring a different point-of-view and solutions to the topic. As long as you aren’t copying their chapter structure or their ideas, you are fine!

Also, if you are in a field where information changes every few years (medicine and technology are good examples), then your ideas will be fresh and new, as well as needed.

You may also be looking at a subset of the audience for some of the books you examine, so take that into consideration. If you are writing for elementary teachers, you may be reviewing general texts or texts for secondary teachers to do your comparison. Think about how that will impact what the audience is looking for.

If you do your research, you will have much more luck with writing for your specific audience than I do with cooking for preschoolers. On that topic alone, I could write a book!

The post Focusing on Your Audience for Nonfiction appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.

If you haven’t done a Rorschach test, then you’ve probably gazed at a cloud and seen a lion, a baked potato, or a car. And I know you’ve heard of someone somewhere who saw the image of the Virgin Mary or Jesus on a piece of burnt toast or a tater tot.

Our brains want to make sense of everything, even if it really is just a blob of ink, a cloud, or burn marks, and we also feel more comfortable with sense and patterns. Ask anyone with OCD if they are happier in a messy playroom or a neat, organized room, and I’m sure they will explain it to you!

This is why setting up a non-fiction book with a pattern for each chapter is a great method for planning and writing! When people know what to expect, then they fall into the pattern and feel very connected with your book. It feels familiar to them by the second chapter.

Shevelle McPherson’s SOAR: Beyond the Heels of Adversity is a spectacular example of setting up a pattern in each chapter. Here is the pattern she uses:

• Each chapter title is a character trait that must be ignited and developed to overcome the incident in that chapter
• The page with the chapter title features a couple sentences about what the chapter talks about. She does a great job of enticing the reader to keep reading.
• The first part of the chapter is a short story about something that happened in her life and how she overcame it.
• This is followed by the “Ignite Your Power” section, which talks about situations that are similar where you would need the character trait she talks about in that chapter to keep going after the incident.

Not only is this great for potential readers; it’s also great for writers. Why? Because it gives you something to follow when you are writing your chapters. And, you don’t have to figure out what you’re doing for each chapter. It’s the same pattern each time. It’s brilliant!

Another good example is from Melanie Colusci’s From Start-Up to Success: Navigating the Journey to Becoming (and Staying) a Successful Entrepreneur. Her book is for someone who is starting a business, so the order is somewhat chronological, beginning with some of the things you would do initially and then moving on to things you would need to know as your business progresses.

This is how she set her chapters up:

• The chapter title is a concept she plans to discuss in the chapter.
• The body of the chapter discusses the concept and how a business owner would be able to successfully use it for their business.
• The body is always followed by Key Chapter Takeaways, which is a bulleted list of what the reader learned in that chapter so they have a quick reference.
• Each chapter ends with Resources. These are key books or software suggestions that the reader may want to invest in for a more in-depth look at the concept or to assist with the concept (like billing software).

This predictable format makes Melanie’s book a fabulous reference. She also includes all the lists of Key Chapter Takeaways and Resources at the end of the book for easy access.

You can use any number of patterns to build familiarity in your book and ease your writing process, but the key is to pick the one that makes most sense for you and your readers. When you’re planning your book, consider what chapter topics you want to discuss. Then look at what you will talk about under each topic and see if anything can be put under the same category. When you spot the pattern, use it! Break up the chapters with matching subheadings to guide your readers. And if you don’t see that pattern for each chapter, mess with the topics or the discussion until you do see a pattern.

Remember that the goal is always to connect with your readers and keep them engaged. Engaged, happy readers write great reviews and encourage others to buy your book.

Now here’s a bonus tip: if you plan on doing talks about your book, you can use the patterned headings to help you organize your notes and keep you on track!

The post A Pattern for Nonfiction Chapter Structure appeared first on Aurora Corialis Publishing.