Blogger: Kathleen Y’Barbo, Publicist
Location: The Woodlands, Texas PR Office
Weather: STILL HOT!
The past two weeks we’ve been talking about author bios. First came the one-line summary, and then, last week, I challenged authors to answer questions I called “The Four Ws of You.” If you’ve done your homework, you can answer these four questions:
1. Who are you?
2. What have you written?
3. Why do you write?
4. What else do you want them to know?
If you’ve not yet stopped to consider the responses you’d give to these, do that before going any further. You’ll be glad for the exercise in creating a bio that will not only catch the attention of professionals, but will also showcase your voice. Now that you’ve practiced, prepared, and reviewed, let’s see what we can do to enhance your work.
First, you’ll need an opening line to hook your reader. To find that, go back and review your one-line bio. This should be your opening hook. Polish it if you’re not happy with the impact of the sentence, and make it shine. This sentence will also answer the first question of who you are.
Now move on to the second question and look at the list of books, articles, or other pieces of writing you’ve done. Which of these are most fitting to use? I suggest choosing a few key items that best represent the type of writing you wish to continue doing. If you have a few nonfiction pieces that support the novel, list those too. Or perhaps you’ve written a novel then published articles from your research. All of this fits well in the middle section of your bio.
Next, consider why you write. This is a section that may or may not be appropriate to your bio depending on whether you are writing for the Christian or general markets. If you choose to include this, try to go beyond “because God says so” to craft a statement of purpose. Again, keep this brief and use words that reflect your voice.
Finally, look over your bio and do a quick word count. The entire paragraph should add up to no more than 300 words. Why, you ask? Because when publishers put together sales packets for their sales force, a 300-word bio is almost always included. So, do the work now and rest easy later.
In most bios, an obligatory ending thought is included to allow the reader to know where to find you. Thus, I suggest the bio end with this: Read more about Amanda Author on her website at (web address here) or connect with her on Twitter at (twitter name). If you use other social networking sites, consider a mention of them in a prominent place on your website so as not to clog up your final sentence with a string of web addresses and Facebook page listings.
And what of those who like to end with this stunner: Norman Novelist lives in Name City with his wife Nancy and their dog?
Yawn. How many times have we read this? My challenge for this week is for you to come up with a fabulous ending to your 300-word bio. Yes, you can certainly use the cozy ending, but if you do, please, please, please make it interesting. How? Well…that’s up to you. Show me what you come up with. I can’t wait!
Deb Salisbury is a Californian living in Texas. She has written a dictionary of color in history, Elephant’s Breath & London Smoke, and is the creator of the Mantua-Maker historical sewing patterns. Her lifelong love of fantasy – from J.R.R. Tolkien to Mercedes Lackey – inspired her to create a world of her own. She hopes you enjoy the journey. You can visit her at http://www.DebSalisbury.com.
(Oh, dear, well short of 300 words. And my website points to Mantua-Maker. Sigh. Another thing for the To-Do list.)
Bethany Neal describes herself as “the stenographer for the alternate reality that is her mind”. Her passion for film inspired her to evolve into a reader at the ripe age of twenty-five (finally). However, the side effect of all this reading are all the plots whirling in her head. They never go away. In an effort to maintain sanity she writes them down. She wrote her first manuscript out of necessity. It was rattling in its cage. It had to be freed.
Her first work, Immortal: Eternity Begins is about an adventurous immortal young woman who meets her soul mate after almost a century on Earth. Although their match is blissful they are faced with life altering and threatening decisions she could never have predicted. Eternity Begins is the first in a series of Immortal adventures penned by the young author.
She is currently working on a project tentatively titled Self-made Tabloid about a girl who fabricates an autobiographical gossip blog documenting her faux celebrity life. Thanks to the exposure of the internet her online charade morphs into a mainstream hit- skyrocketing her into her fifteen minutes of fame. Now she has to fabricate a way to deal with real fame.
Being an author is an essential part of what she calls her “Zen”. It’s a freeing experience where she lets your mind take over and stops thinking about how to control everything. The characters take her by the hand and she’s there to share the journey with her readers.
Connect with her on Twitter @BethDazzled and at http://www.GiddyGirlEntertainment.blogspot.com.
Teri Dawn Smith lives in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and tries to keep up with the holidays, quirks, and loyalties of her international family including her Canadian husband and three adopted Bolivian children.
For ten years, she taught essay writing to homeschoolers and wrote non-fiction including over fifty stories for Sunday school handouts, articles in The Teaching Home magazine, and three young adult short biographies. Her passion is to tell others of God’s grace so she wrote A Hint of Heaven, her first novel, with a desire to present the truth of God for women who love a story.
You can find her on facebook at http://www.facebook.com/teridawnsmith.
She took her first ride on a Harley to research this story and wonders what she should research for her next novel…skydiving or maybe scuba diving.
These bios are fabulous!! Keep ’em coming. I can’t wait to see what you’re doing with 300 words.
My 257 words … thanks again for this wonderful series! 🙂
A romantic at heart, southern transplant Aimee Laine, writes of challenges, choices and introspection – inspired by her work as a parent, photographer, writer and dreamer.
Madly in love with her husband since she was fourteen, they married six years after surviving a prolonged, long-distance relationship. Since then, she’s produced three native North Carolinians and one photography studio. Each has necessitated a significant amount of writing, some more pleasurable than others.
Her true interest in writing began, years before, at age twelve, when she wrote, illustrated and bound six hand-made books for a school assignment — and its extra credit. At least one still exists — carefully archived by the story’s main characters.
Today, Aimee writes all her studio’s content and creative flash fiction pieces which have been described more like viewing within the mind’s eye than simply reading. Her storytelling articles, The Making of the Vagina Monologues and It’s All in the Details, were published respectively by Wake Living Magazine and her town’s newspaper, The Apex Herald, in early 2009.
Aimee delights in her admirers, family, friends and clients, on which she bounces her ideas and from which she draws inspiration. MIRAGE, her debut novel, and LITTLE WHITE LIES, a work in progress, are the direct result of these influences.
To Aimee writing is like a couple’s first kiss. It’s desired, sometimes unbearably. Anticipation and excitement rule the moment. Once the memory is created, it can’t be duplicated rather opens one’s eye to new adventures.
Read more about Aimee Laine on her website at http://www.aimeelaine.com.
Aimee we sound very much alike. I’m a hopeless romantic like you wouldn’t believe and I’m a photographer too!