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Stephanie Leary

Writer, WordPress consultant, recent MLIS grad

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Writing and Publishing 101

  • Agents

    • A little-known way of identifying successful agents
    • Agent first, then sale? Other way ’round?
    • Career planning: before you look for an agent…
    • Do you need an agent?
    • Everything you wanted to know about literary agents…
    • Five Writers Explain How They Got, Kept and Fired Agents
    • How to Get Published: a Flow Chart
    • On agents as publishers
    • On agents' self publishing services
    • On the getting of agents
    • Preditors & Editors
    • Questions to ask an agent who has offered you representation
    • Sales reported in Locus since July 2004
    • The 20 Worst Literary Agencies
    • The Association of Authors’ Representatives
    • Why fee-charging agents suck
    • Writer Beware
    • Writing a simple query letter
    • You should never submit unagented to publishing companies
  • Book Publishing

    • A Book Publishing Glossary
    • A Publishing Dictionary
    • Book Publishing Accounting: Some Basic Concepts
    • Debut author lessons
    • How Acquisitions Work
    • How publishing works from the bookselling side
    • How publishing works from the publishing side
    • How to Get Published (a brief overview)
    • How to Get Published: a Flow Chart
    • How to Write a Query Letter in Five Easy Steps
    • Publishing in the Twenty-First Century, part 1
    • Publishing in the Twenty-First Century, part 2
    • Publishing in the Twenty-First Century, part 3
    • Publishing primer, part 1
    • Publishing primer, part 2
    • Sell-Throughs
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, corrections
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, part 1
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, part 2
    • The Rise and Fall of the Mass Market Paperback
    • Things the author does not get to control
    • Tracking Sales with Affiliate IDs
    • Under the Author’s Control For the Most Part/Not Under the Author’s Control For the Most Part
    • Who are all these people?
    • Word count for novels and children’s books
    • Word counts and novel length
  • Copyright

    • Copyright FAQ
  • Critique Groups

    • Critters
    • How To Start A Writing Group
    • Online Writing Workshop
    • Seven essential questions of critiquing
    • Steven Brust's Ultimate Iron-Clad Final Rules on Critique Groups
  • Ebooks

    • Business Rusch
    • Cover Designs for Digital Publishing
    • ebook formatting guide
    • On ebook piracy
    • Pricing strategy, back matter, and discoverability (half the good stuff is in the comments!)
    • Tracking Sales with Affiliate IDs
  • Jargon

    • A Book Publishing Glossary
    • A Publishing Dictionary
    • Romance Writer Jargon
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, corrections
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, part 1
    • The Devil’s Dictionary of Publishing, part 2
  • Magazines

    • Locus
    • SFWA Bulletin
  • Markets

    • Submission Grinder
  • Money and Contracts

    • Anatomy of a three-book deal
    • Annotated first novel contract
    • Bestseller list primer
    • Business Realities for the Beginning Writer
    • How much money you’ll actually see from a six-figure book deal
    • Laura Anne Gilman’s Basic [and Updated] Rules for Going Freelance, specific to novelists
    • More on money and the writing life
    • Negotiating novel contracts
    • P&Ls and how books make (or don’t) money: part the first: the mass market original complete failure
    • P&Ls and how books make (or don’t) money: part the second: the hardcover to mass
    • Real World Book Deals
    • Real World Book Deals — follow-up #1
    • Real World Book Deals — follow-up #2
    • Royalty calculations explained
    • Royalty periods, payments, and making a living
    • Sell-Throughs
    • Simple book revenue breakdown
    • Survey of first novel advances
    • The Big Misunderstanding About Money
    • The Importance of Reversion Clauses in Publishing Contracts
    • Unasked-For Advice to New Writers About Money
  • News, Rumors, and Daily Reads

    • GalleyCat
    • John Scalzi
    • Making Light
    • Publishers Lunch
    • PW Daily
    • The Awl’s Publishing School column
    • Top Ten Blogs About Writing and Publishing
  • Organizations

    • Broad Universe
    • Horror Writers of America
    • Mystery Writers of America
    • Romance Writers of America
    • SF Writers of America
    • Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators
    • Speculative Literature Foundation
  • Publishing

    • Industry Statisics: Men vs. Women
  • Responding to Reviews

    • Do: Carla Cassidy
    • Don’t: Alice Hoffman
    • Don’t: Anne Rice
    • Don’t: Jacqueline Howett
  • Scams and other bad ideas

    • Arguments against self-publishing
    • How to spot the scammers
    • Preditors and Editors
    • Publish America: Everything you need to know
    • Publish America: further reading
    • Publish America: the never-ending thread at Absolute Write
    • Variants of publishing scams
  • Self Publishing

    • “Indie First?” What Is Best In Publishing?
    • A tale of two royalty statements
    • Charlie Stross: Why I don't self-publish
    • Cover design secrets
    • Elisabeth Naughton on leaving her publisher
    • How Tobias Buckell used Kickstarter to continue a slow-selling series
    • Hugh Howey: Self-publishing is the future — and great for writers
    • On agents as publishers
    • On agents' self publishing services
    • Pricing strategy, back matter, and discoverability (half the good stuff is in the comments!)
    • Self-publishing income/sales survey
    • The Importance of Backmatter
    • Tracking Sales with Affiliate IDs
  • SF Writing Workshops

    • Clarion
    • Clarion South
    • Clarion West
    • Odyssey
    • Taos Toolbox
    • University of Kansas Center for the Study of Science Fiction
    • Viable Paradise
  • Short Stories

    • Jay Lake on short story length
  • Slush

    • Common slush mistakes
    • Confessions of a Slush Pile Reader
    • How NOT to write a cover letter for novels
    • How NOT to write a cover letter for short stories
    • Myrtle the Manuscript
    • Slushkiller
  • Working with editors

    • Five Writers Talk About Their Book Editors
    • How to be the perfect author
    • What a copyeditor’s style sheet looks like
  • Working with other authors

    • On The Asking of Favors From Established Writers
  • Writing

    • Avoid these clichés
    • Billy Wilder’s ten tips
    • Dan Harmon on story structure
    • Dos and Don’ts of Setting
    • Elmore Leonard: Ten Rules of Writing
    • Holly Lisle’s articles
    • How to Write a Novel
    • How to Write a Sentence
    • Jennifer Crusie: Plot Diagrams
    • Jennifer Crusie: Revising Scene
    • Jennifer Crusie: Turning Points, part 1
    • Jennifer Crusie: Turning Points, part 2
    • John Scalzi: 10 Things Teenage Writers Should Know About Writing
    • John Scalzi: Ten Writing Tips
    • John Scalzi: Utterly Useless Writing Advice
    • Learn Writing with Uncle Jim
    • Michael Hauge’s six-stage plot structure
    • Orson Scott Card’s articles
    • SFWA’s articles
    • Stephen King: Everything You Need to Know About Writing Successfully in Ten Minutes
    • Steven Brust's writing advice
    • The Guardian collects ten rules of writing from various authors (part 1)
    • The Guardian collects ten rules of writing from various authors (part 2)
    • The secret menu of writing advice
    • The Well-Tempered Plot Device
    • Trouble vs. Conflict
    • Write a Novel
  • Writing Life

    • 12 things about authors
    • A day in the life of John Scalzi
    • A week in the life of Nick Mamatas
    • Beware Of Writer II: Revenge Of The Teenage Penmonkey From Mars
    • How to behave at conventions: hotels & going out to dinner
    • How to keep writing as a new parent
    • The Dictator of Writing Announces His Decrees, Part I
    • The Penmonkey’s Paean
  • [Note as of June 2022: This page is nearly ten years old and may contain outdated information.]

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    This is an excerpt from Content Strategy for WordPress.My latest books are Content Strategy for WordPress (2015) and WordPress for Web Developers (2013). Sign up to be notified when I have a new book for you.

    I’m a front end developer at Equinox OLI, working on open source library software. I was previously a freelance WordPress developer in higher education. You can get in touch here or on LinkedIn.

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