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Why Didn't I Write That? - How To Make $100,000 Writing Nonfiction Books

How Ordinary People Are Raking In As Much As $100,000 A Year, Making Money Writing Books From Home

Writing Nonfiction: Turning Thoughts Into Books

• Contents
  • Chapter 1 - What Your Book Will Do For You 11
  • Chapter 2 - The New Book Model 25
  • Chapter 3 - What To Write, Selecting Your Subject 39
  • Chapter 4 - Researching Your Topic and Checking for Competition 47
  • Chapter 5 - Your Book's Title and Subtitle 55
  • Chapter 6 - Your Book's Covers 63
  • Chapter 7 - Getting Organized, Setting Up Your Binder 79
  • Chapter 8 - Your Writing System 91
  • Chapter 9 - If You Can Speak It, You Just Wrote It. 109
  • Chapter 10 - Your Publishing Choices, Selling to a Publisher or Publishing Yourself 115
  • Chapter 11 - Finding a Publisher, Finding an Agent 127
  • Afterword 136'
  • Appendix
    • Resources 137
    • Colophon 154
  • Index 155

Back Cover

You will discover how to:

• Build books rather than just write them
• Find free research materials, quotations, art and stories on the Web
• Repurpose your core content into downloadable books, CDs, eBooks, audiobooks, reports, articles, seminars and consulting
• Find an editor and other help
• Handle interviews, autographings & the throng of fans

Your years of experience provide all the ingredients you need to be a successful, published author. Dan Poynter supplies the recipe. What are you waiting for?

"For nonfiction, Dan Poynter is the top coach for writing, publishing and, most important, promoting" - John Tullius, Directory, Maui Writers Conference

"One essential ingredient to our Chicken Soup success was consulting with Dan Poynter in the early stages." - Jack Canfield, coauthor, Chicken Soup for the Soul series

"Dan Poynter has generously guided thousands to authorship. Their books make this a better world." - Dr. Robert Muller, Past Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations and author 2000 Ideas & Dreams for a Better World

About The Author

Dan Poynter has turned thousnads of writers into authors; his shelves are overflowing with their books. He has authored more than 80 books and hundreds of other information products. The media come to Dan because he is the leading authority on how to write, publish and promote books.

First Chapter Notes

The cost of publishing books is then covered. 3000 copies of a 144 page, 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" softcover with a few photographs and black ink on white paper with four color cover will cost about $1.55 each for a bill of $4650. Direct-to-image electrostatic can cost $2.20 in 500 quantity, or $5.17 for 100 copies, giving a printing bill of $517. Complete budget for a book, including typesetting, printing, book cover design, and promotion used to be about $10,000, but now it cn be just $1,000 to $3,000 using the techniques in this book. Harcover adds $1 to $1.60 per book, but can double the asking price of the book. As an introduction for a writer, a hard cover book may give added prestige and credibility.

The chapter continues on with encouragement to have a personal mission and write with feeling from personal experience to help others.

Six principles of success are then listed:

• 1. Make more money selling products than hours.
  • Brian Tracy, despite earning $15,000 per presentation, is trying to achieve a 20:1 ratio of sales of products to speeches. He has developed audiotapes, videotapes, and books that are sold through multiple channels.
• 2. More money in selling informatin about a product than selling the actual product or service. Often consultants and book authors make more money than business owners.
• 3. Books can be sold to more people. They are a time effective way to multiple efforts and help millions.
• 4. Books are an ideal product. Easy and inexpensive to produce, with good markup.
• 5. Books you write are a "sole source" product. You control the market and the price. Don't forget to buy the copyright so that you have full monopoly over your work.
• 6. Invest time. Using your time to write a book is an investment in the future.

Books have many forms such as hardbound, softbound, audiotapes, CD's, eBooks, serialized, condensed, or excerpted, or translated into other languages.

There are many benefits to bein gan author such as living almost anywhere that there is a telephone line and postal service. It's schedule can be flexible, but it also makes great demands in terms of organization and discipline. Any expenses an author incurs while writing a book is a deductible expense.

Being an author is a great stepping stone to being a guest on radio and TV talk shows. Everyday, more than 10,200 guests are needed across the U.S. Interviews are very effective ways for an author to sell a book, and are more effective than buying advertising.

Authors have book signings, and are in demand at bookstores to do seminars to draw more people into the bookstore. Seminars are a bigger benefit than simple autographings.

20

Quotations From The Book

• "The author is the author-ity" - Joe Vitale, CyberWriting?Create
• "Recognition is everything you write for; it's much more than money. You want your books to be valued. It's the basic aspiration of the serious writer." - William Kennedy, novelist and Pulitzer Prize winner
• "Writing ranks among the top 10 percent of professions in terms of prestige" - Jean Strouse, Newsweek
• "Your Book is your best business card. People do not throw out books, they put them on their shelf."
• "Books are a form of immortality. The wors of men whose bodies are dust still live in their books." - Wilfred A. Peterson, The Art of Living by Day
• "Write out of love, write out of instinct, write out of reason ... But always for money." -- Louis Untermeyer, poet, in ''The New York Times, September 30, 1975.
• "Certain books have exerted a profound influence on history, culture, civilization and scientific though throughout recorded time." - Robert B. Downs, Books that Changed the World
• "We are all wounded. Our wounds are the single greatest source of material. Bad experiences make us experts on the subject. Talk about what worked for you. You have been there." - Dr. Susan Forward, author, Emotional Blackmail
• "Words still offer the most complete kind of understanding, and they last." - Bob Woodward, journalist/author
• "Chase the passion, not the profit." - Terri Lonier, Working Solo
• "I do not think that most writers write for money alone. Good ones write mainly to please themselves and hope at the same to please as many other people as possible." - Merle Miller
• "If you're creating and selling information, you'll never go out of business." - Michael LeBoeuf?Create, Ph.D.
• "Books are the carriers of civilization." - Barbara Tuchman, historian. Author's League Bulletin, November 1, 1979
• "Never do an autographing; always offer a mini seminar. Attract buyers to your autograph parties." - Teri Lonier, Author, Working Solo
• "Books through the ages have earned humanity's high regard as semi-sacred objects." - Richard Kluger, author/editor

This chapter then goes on to estimate the time needed to complete a book. It quotes the Brenner Information Group as saying fiction books take an average of 475 hours to write, and a nonfiction book takes 725 hours. Some authors can create books like 50 Tips to Speak Like a Pro!, Terry Paulson, Crisp Publications, in just a couple o flong airline flights. This book was 50 pages and he already had many of the quotations and material already on his hard drive. Another example was an 87 page The Christmas Box in six weeks. It was a bestseller, was translated into 13 languages, and eventually sold to Simon & Schuster for 4.2 million. Computer Selection Guide was 168 pages and took 21 days of work. One author produced 402 page book, "Communicate with Confidence" in 22 days. Would You Put That In Writing (Facts on File) took four days. http://www.booherconsultants.com

According to the book a beginner might take longer to organize their first book. First drafts might be done in a coupel of weeks, but a second draft requires more research, and the book describes a process of peer review that involves others looking at the book, and it might take 3 weeks. The book even suggests a fourth draft to go to a "wordsmith".

Why Didn't I Write That?

• Leadership secrets of Attila The Hun
• The Rules - Small Time Operator
• The Grits
• Who Moved My Cheese
• Random Acts of Kindness
• The Duct Tape Book
• Is There Life After Housework by Don Aslet
• Roget's Super Thesaurus (written by the author of this book). It was voted among the "Top Ten Reference Books"
• How To Keep Your Volkswagen Alive - A Manual of Step By Step Procedures For The Compleat Idiot
• Unbelievably Good Deals and Great Adventures That You Can't Get Unless You're Over 50
• Don't Sweat The Small Stuff... and it's all small stuff

• Why Didnt I Write That - Table Of Contents

• Why Didnt I Write That - Chapter 1 Bestselling Nonfiction Books You Could Write

• Chapter 3 - What Kind of Nonfiction Book Should You Write? pg 41-58
  • Work only for publishers who pay royalties and advances
  • Gives advice on which markets niches to pursue

Pg 53

• Childrens - Mostly fiction books, nonfiction is difficult unless linked to a movie show or TV. Popular nonfiction topics include dinosaurs, space, sharks, and nature. Advantages: Short and can be written quickly. Disadvantage: Intense competition, glut on market

Pg 55

• Books that support what people want to believe - books that support psychic phenomenon, conspiracy theories often sell well.
• Crime books - Lots of research needed: heavy interviewing, and reviewing huge numebrs of court transcripts

Pg 66

• Advice to download shareware word processor - NOTE: In Garnet's opinion, it's better to bite the bullet and invest in something like Microsoft Office. Many more training programs are available, and files produced will easily transfer to most of the rest of the universe that has standardized on Microsoft Office.

• Review the leading competitors

• Chapter 6 - Do You Need An Agent? Pg 92-110
  • Instead of letting the publisher do it, and author should consider doing his own sales to these alternative channels:
    • Electronic book publishers
    • Movie and TV
    • Foreign

• Chapter 9 - The Proposal Pg. 133-151
  • Be sure to tell the publisher about your qualifications as an author
    • List any of your books that have been selected for special honors liek Book-of-the-Month Club
    • Best seller list placement
    • TV or movie sales
    • Best reviews you've received
    • Unpublished authors: Don't invent qualifications

• Chapter 10 - Negotiating The Book Contract Pg 152-175
  • Covers are often chosen by the publisher, and the author may not agree with the choice. To get a better cover, the author might ask the editor to use the advance towards producing a cover.

• [Why Didnt I Write That - Chapter 12 Secrets To Fulltime Writing Success]?Create
• Chapter 13 - Grab Bag of Tricks
  • The first question answered by this chapter is the five causes of writers block:
    • Exhaustion
    • Lack of adequate research material (encouraging the writer to invent filler)
    • lack of belief in writing ability and ability to sell the writing
    • unrealistically demanding perfection on first drafts.
    • lack of passion
  • Cures to the blocks
    • General cure: momentum is great, just getting something written makes it easier to write the rest.
    • exhaustion - Cure: rest
    • lack of passion - cure: write about your interests.
    • lack of research material
      • Cure: Get plenty of material including expert quotes, anecdotes, descriptions, studies, statistics, etc.
    • Lack of belief
      • Cure: Build confidence through cycle of effort, failure, and working to overcome failure. Regular feedback from a professional such as editor, agent, or another nationally published author, can be very helpful.
      • Writing small articles can help build confidence. The American Directory of Writer's Guidelines and the Writer's Market can tell you what to write and who to send it to. These articles will look good on your resume. Article writing teaches research skills, and how to write concisely, and skills at interviewing experts.
  • Use a thesaurus

• Cooling off periods where you spend at least a couple of weeks away from a piece of writing so that you can do a better job of revising it.
• Always carry a notepad for ideas
• Find a good book doctor. Reliable ones can be found in ads in Writer's Digest Magazine.
• Rewrite and edit. Helpful books:
  • Elements of style' by Strunk and White
  • Getting the Words Right: How to Rewrite, Edit and Revise by Theodore Cheney
• Work hard on titles. Titles should intrigue or captivate.
  • Some titling tricks include: "Top Secret", "The 100 Top", "The Complete Guide To...", "World's Best". Drama, exeggeration, and hype are helpful.
  • Spend weeks on titles and subtitles.
    • Rejected: A Dictionary of Descriptive Terms Accepted: Descriptionary
    • Rejected: Human Being Accepted: The Compass In Your Nose and Other Astonishing Facts About Humans
    • Rejected: The Birds and the Bees Accepted: Everything You Wanted To Know About Sex But Were Afraid To Ask.
• Use specific verbs and nouns. Don't use general verbs. Some examples:
  • Bad: The man went through the mud. Better: The man slogged through the mud.
  • Bad: The car came to a quick stop. Better: The corvette squealed to a stop.
• Use imaginative descriptive terms (think Thesaurus). However use common words instead of pompous words that are not more precise. Think "Audience". Also use research to be sure terms are proper, and to find the most precise words.
• Avoid cliches. Be unexpected.
• Cut away non-essential words. "Cutting Sharpens". Try to use as few words as possible to describe ideas. For example: She didn't pay the slightest attention to him. Better: She ignored him. Dump adverbs and adjectives and qualifiers.
• Get the reader interested right away: Start in the middle of a crisis. Done have a boring beginning.
• Use different sentence lengths and rhythms
• Use positive statements rather than "Not"
• Break up bland blocks of description with narratives of actions
• Avoid exclamation points that may be comedic rather than dramatic.
• Dialogue qualifiers should be avoid repeating the dialog.
• No weak sentence beginings: "There is", "There are", "it is" are frequently wasted.
• "The best sermon is example" - Benjamin Franklin
• Use sensory language.
• Be careful of homonyms like then/than their/there. then is often useless.
• If you must use abbreviations, only use ones commonly known by the audience.

228

• Why Didnt I Write That - More Tips From The Book

• Why Didnt I Write That - Quotations
  • "The greatest block to any writer is self-doubt. This inner demon nags, criticizes, calls us names, and undermines our faith by focusing on our weaknesses instead of building our strengths. Self-doubt drains our creative energy, sends us into self-perpetuating negative spirals that can plunge us into depression. The best defense against it is recognition and deflection. At the first sign of this pest, do something constructive. Say a prayer, invoke the muse, repeat an affirmation, seek support from other writers... The best way to grow as a writer is to write." -- Diane Dreher, The Tao of Womanhood
  • "The First draft of anything is shit." - Earnest Hemingway
  • "Coming up with a good title, one that intrigues or captivates the reader, is much like writing poetry. The essence of the adventure that is in the book has to be summed up in as few words as possible. It can sometimes take me months to come up with the right title, but whenit's right, it grows on me." - Vicki Cobb, Science Experiments You Can Eat, Squirts and Spurts, and many others.
  • "A title should just grab you and concisely summarize what's inside." - Jerry McTigue?Create, who changed the title Don't You Just Hate It When to ''Life's Little Frustration Book" to take advantage of the success of another series of books.
  • "Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader - not the fact that it's raining, but the feel of being rained upon." - E. L. Doctorow

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