Minutes from June’s meeting with thanks to our speaker Beth Jusino, Lynne for obtaining the grant for her to join us, LaVonna for leading the meeting, Jean for taking minutes, and Judy for ensuring the minutes got sent out in a timely manner. With thanks to everyone else too — I’m still jetlagged; I’m sure I’ve forgotten someone!
Writers’ Mill Minutes, June 17, 2018
Cedar Mill Library, Beaverton, OR
About seventeen people attended the meeting, including new attendees and Kimberly Ogadhoh, a special guest from the Cultural Coalition of Washington County, the organization that provided the grant for today’s workshop.
LaVonna Sydow opened the meeting and introduced Writers’ Mill to new attendees. Judy Beaston announced prize winners for the June “If I’d Only Known” contest hosted by Karin Krafft. Since Karin was absent, prizes will be distributed next month. Winners are 1st place: Richard David Bach for his poem “If I Knew Then What I Know Now,” 2nd place: Jessie Collins for her essay “Memories,” and 3rd place: Sheila Deeth for her poem “Saving Amy.”
Next month’s contest “Summer Solstice” will be hosted by Richard. Deadline for the contest is Sunday, July 1. August contest theme is “Victim vs Survivor,” hosted by Joanne DeHaan. September contest theme is “Growing Old,” hosted by Jessie Collins.
LaVonna next introduced Lynne Erlandson, our library partner, who wrote the grant request to fund three publishing workshops this year by Beth Jusino, a publishing consultant from Seattle, who presented to us last year. Lynne explained the work of the Cultural Coalition of Washington County and how it distributes funds from Oregon’s Cultural Trust to non-profit organizations. Lynne introduced Kimberly Ogadhoh and today’s workshop presenter Beth Jusino.
Beth has been in the publishing field for 20 years as a writer, teacher, editor, and literary agent. She is the author of The Author’s Guide to Marketing and her most recent work, Walking Together to the End of the World: One Couple’s Thousand Mile Hike on the Camino de Santiago.
(Refreshments were provided by Mary Jane Erickson, Barbara Cleary, and the Library. Jean Harkin took Minutes while Sheila is visiting Jessie in England.)
Beth began her presentation with setting parameters for questions and stated that she will be happy to discuss individual projects in person following the two-hour session. With a slide presentation to highlight her talk, Beth presented “Pitch Your Book so That Publishers Pay Attention.” She showed us how to master the synopsis, the hook, and the verbal pitch to publishers and agents.
The first step is to be able to answer the daunting question in a succinct few sentences, “What is my book about?” An author must be able to describe the essence of their book in a few sentences that will draw in the listener/publisher/agent/
Step two is to determine where to pitch your book: There are over 1200 publishers. Beth described what publishers offer; the BIG SIX publishers as contrasted with small, independent publishers. She noted that the big publishers almost always contract through agents; the smaller publishers deal with authors on a more personal basis. All are concerned with the bottom line—how many copies they can sell, and all move relatively slowly. Therefore, it is advisable to contact more than one agent/publisher simultaneously. Beth advises familiarizing yourself with what types of books are published by various houses, know your audience, and where you want to sell your books.
Further steps involve finding agents and publishers, how to network, and finding online reports about marketing trends. The last three steps for pitching your book covered making the pitch, the query letter, and the more formal proposal. The following building blocks are needed: 1) Know your genre, 2) the hook—what makes your book unique, 3) what is the inciting incident that starts the action, 4) who will read this book, and 5) something about you, your background, and qualifications.
Beth provided us with a sample of a successful query letter (one page maximum!). Her slide show is available at https://www.slideshare.net/