Mary Martin, Ph.D.

Creating Your Own Book Intensive

The Book Intensive is my best-selling, yet most-expensive service. It's $3,000-$5,000 per day, and here's what happens:

• We start at about 9 am and end after dinner.
• We go for a walk in there somewhere or maybe do some yoga and/or meditate.
• And in between, I sit across from you and help you learn how to write your book (or article or chapter), sentence by sentence.

Now, if you don't want to do that, I can just either write your book for you or edit what you've written. But if you want to be the one to write your book, or you want to improve your writing, there's no substitute for having someone coach you in real time.

I'm in South Florida and I don't travel nearly as much as I used to. I used to have a huge carbon footprint, mostly from traveling, and I decided that was unacceptable. So there are fewer Book Intensives in my life these days. Maybe a total of 20 days over an entire year.

But who needs me?

You can create your own, do-it-yourself Book Intensive with a writing partner. If you each pick a project and swap days, you'll be providing one another with a service, cost free, that is likely to help you improve your writing.

And you don't even have to know all the rules and have perfect grammar because part of the process is looking up any questions that neither of you can answer. From usage to rules for reference notes to vocabulary (such as by enlisting the Visual Thesaurus), you learn together and become better at writing, editing and researching together. You challenge each other about your diction and syntax, and act as devil's advocate for each other.

Two heads really are better than one when you want to become a better writer.

On Quantifying and Reaching Your Market

Whether you're self-publishing or going the traditional route, you need to know who your market is. And I'm not just talking about naming the market; I'm talking about putting a number to them.

If they have some sort of national organization/association, great! Get the membership numbers. If they have a magazine, fabulous! Get the circulation numbers. Is the population studied by the Census or some other broad study? Is there a foundation that studies or serves the population?

Where exactly can you find your audience, and how do you know its size?

Once you know where to find your audience, you should also know how to market to them. Is there an e-mail list you can purchase (if that's a good idea for your population)? Are there websites or blogs your audience frequents that are popular enough to warrant paying to advertise on them? Is there a type of store they tend to hang out in that allows talks or advertising? Are there local groups or national groups that cater to your audience and might promote your work (if there are, it would behoove you to already be a member)?

You should be appearing any and everywhere your audience does and getting to know them better as soon as you have articulated who they are. You want to be promoting your work as a member of the group, not as an outsider. Insider status will help you with marketing and promoting in addition to confirming your credibility and your genuine interest in the population/issue.

All of your research regarding your target market should be summarized in your proposal. You should also be able to describe your market and how to reach it thoroughly yet succinctly.

Today's tip: Know thy audience! (And read more about knowing your audience here.)

Why on Earth Am I Blogging?

I told several clients that I started this blog and their reaction was: "You're gonna give away what I pay through the nose for?"

And my response is: Yes. In the publishing world, there is a lack of democratization of information. Those with the most money can pay experts to help them at every step of the way. To be fair, things aren't that different in any other industry.

After nearly 20 years I discovered that some basic information could help a struggling author "make it," and the only thing in their way was that information. Not their talent. Not their message. Just the information. Just the premises they were operating under.

I started to feel like charging for my knowledge about writing or about the publishing industry was dicey. Somehow, there was something less-than-pure about it. Hence the blog.

I invite you to ask questions, as this could be one of the few times you can get the advice of an expert without having to pay a penny.

Ask away, about the following topics:

• writing/editing
• ghostwriting
• publishing (traditional)
• self-publishing (including e-books)
• blogging
• marketing
• nonprofit writing (e.g., grants, proposals, marketing materials)

I have been given many gifts and have had many breaks in my career, and it's time to give back. When you reach certain goals you've set for yourself, I hope you do the same.

What's a Book Intensive?

Greetings.

Ghostwriting isn't for everyone. Collaboration isn't for everyone. My goal is to help you discover what process will work best for you so you may achieve your writing goals. As my website explains, I work in a variety of ways. But how I work isn't that important. What's important is how you work.

In my nearly 20 years of professional writing, I've discovered that the biggest obstacle most people face is the sheer terror that they won't be able to write their book or their chapter or their article. And that fear usually comes from not knowing how to get what's in their head onto paper. They're thinking:

Everyone knows how to write, right? How hard can it be to compose a 1,200 word article or a chapter on a topic I'm supposed to be an expert in?

Though ghostwriting has its perks, and collaboration is stimulating and fascinating, helping someone become a writer and embrace their writer-ness is the best part of my job. This isn't about me writing for you, it's about you finding your own style and process that leads to success for you so you have a great chance of repeating that success. If I write for you and your work succeeds, you'll need me (or someone like me) again for future success. Therefore, if you've got more than one writing project in you, it would behoove you to develop a way of working that you enjoy and that serves your goals effectively and efficiently.

During a Book Intensive, I sit next to you for an entire day, or even days at a time. We work, we eat, we take walks, we might do some yoga, we might meditate, we might get a pedicure, we might go hiking or kayaking. We might even go to the gym. We're living life, and learning how to live as a writer does--writing and editing all day long, no matter what else you're doing. I'm not talking about consciously multi-tasking, here. I'm talking about being open to ideas about your writing all day long.

This brings me to my first official freebie tip for writing:  Invite your mind to write whether or not your hands are writing.