Here are some writing & publishing resources I found helpful. I hope they will help you as well!
The Submission Grinder
The Submission Grinder is a terrific, easy to use, searchable database of short story & poetry markets as well as a submission tracker for your own submissions. Lots of useful information, like stats about market response rates and times, pay rate, recent acceptances and rejections, etc. And it's absolutely free to use (although consider supporting them if you can, to keep the good thing going).
Writing Excuses Podcast
Writing Excuses is a fantastic, long-running podcast run by professional writers and focused on the art and craft of writing fiction, with occasional forays into publishing, marketing, and the business of fiction as well. Each episode is about 15-20 minutes long and packed with information, and you can search the extensive archives for any topic you wish. Topics include story structure, characters, plot, outlining, discovery writing, genres, worldbuilding, pacing, research, revising, and many more.
Six Figure Authors Podcast
Run by three full-time indie authors, Six Figure Authors is a great weekly podcast that "helps you take your writing career to the next level" by offering thoughtful, honest, up-to-date advice on writing, publishing, and marketing your books. New episodes drop on Thursdays, and you can peruse the archive to learn about additional topics. Two of my favorite recent episodes include: Book Marketing for Introverts; and Mistakes That Newer Authors Make.
Reading Aloud Tutorials
Mary Robinette Kowal, who is an award-winning speculative fiction writer as well as a professional puppeteer and audiobook narator, has an excellent series of blog posts called Reading Aloud with advice on doing readings and audio recordings of your fiction. Well worth the time!
Artbreeder
Artbreeder is a creative tool for generating and manipulating images, including portraits, landscapes, album covers. It uses machine learning (specifically Generative Adversarial Networks) to allow almost endless manipulations to the images that users upload to the platform and combinations of these images. You have to open a free account to start playing with the images, and there's a paid subscription option with additional functionality. Why would a writer use Artbreeder? Inspiration for settings and characters (e.g., you can create a character and progressively change their age).
The Creative Penn Podcast
The Creative Penn Podcast is a long-running, super informative and fun to listen podcast for writers created and run by an indie thriller writer and creative entrepreneur, Joanna Penn. Most episodes include an in-depth interview with a writer, editor, publishing or marketing professional, or subject expert, and there's also a segment on publishing news and a segment on technology of interest to creatives. New episodes drop on Mondays, and there is a huge, searchable archive. For instance, here is a collection of episodes on dictation.
Copyright Resources
To be blunt, if you're a fiction writer, you are in the intellectual property (specifically copyright) business. The more you know about the copyright law in your country, the more you can protect yourself and your work. How to start learning?
U.S. Copyright Registration
In the U.S. and many other countries, you automatically hold copyright in all your creative work providing the work meets the criteria for copyright. But there are still benefits to registering your work with the U.S. Copyright Office, especially since they allow Group Registration of Unpublished Works (up to 10 literary works) for a reasonable fee (right now $85). Here is a step-by-step video tutorial. By the way, you can register your work even if you write under a pen name or pseudonym.
Online Barcode Generator
This might be more of interest to indie published authors... If you use your own ISBNs, maybe because you want your company name to appear as the publisher rather than AMZ, you would purchase those from Bowker. But - good news! - you do not have to buy the barcodes that are also required on print books. There is a wonderful online tool that will generate a barcode for your ISBN absolutely free - the Free Online Barcode Generator! Use responsibly.
Publishing Contracts
Contracts and Dealbreakers is a series of articles on all aspects of publishing contracts and related intellectual property (IP) licensing topics, written by a long-time speculative fiction writer, editor, and publisher Kristin Kathryn Rusch. A required reading for all writers, whether you aim to publish indie, with a small press, or with a traditional publishing house!
Publishing a book involves signing publishing contracts. As the title suggests, Book Publishing Contracts: Checklist of Deal Terms offers a handy "checklist and guide to the issues typically covered, and the terms publishers typically offer, so you can identify issues to consider and possibly address and thereby make the time spent with your lawyer or other advisor more efficient."
3D Book Cover Mockups
Ready to create some promo materials for your book? Here is one free and easy tool: The 3D Book Cover Creator from DIY Book Design. Enjoy!
I'll be adding more writing & publishing resources here as the Write-A-Thon 2021 unfolds, so please check back.
