NEW MEXICO BOOK ASSOCIATION
  • Join / Renew
    • New Member Join
    • Our Member Directory
    • Membership FAQ
  • About
  • SHOP
  • Events
    • Events Calendar
    • 25 Summer Gala
    • In Person Monthly Networking Meetings
    • Richard Harris Awards
    • Workshops
    • Meet the Authors
    • NM Writers Dinner Book Display
  • Blog
  • SWBDA Awards
    • 2025 SWBDA Awards
    • PAST AWARD WINNERS >
      • Purchase Award Stickers
      • 2024
      • 2023
      • 2022
      • 2021
      • 2020
      • 2019
      • 2017
      • 2016
  • News
    • NMBA Virtual Book Store
    • Libro Nuevo Entry
  • Members Only Area
    • Member Directory
    • Past Workshops
    • Member Discounts
  • Contact

NEWS BLOG

NMBA News, Opinion, and Articles are powered by members.
To submit, please email your materials to [email protected]

The Southwest Book Design and Production Awards final deadline is tomorrow (April 20)!

4/19/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
We have more than 35 beautiful book submissions in our possession. Thank you to those who have already submitted. If you haven’t, now is the time to find a place for your book in our 14 categories and submit your entries. The winners will be recognized at our 25th Anniversary Annual Gala on June 8, so don’t forget to save the date! Click here to learn more and submit your books.
0 Comments

SIGN UP NOW FOR OUR APRIL WORKSHOP WITH CAROLYN ROARK: “THE WRITE STEPS: CHOOSING YOUR BEST PATH FROM IDEATION TO PUBLICATION”

4/18/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
April 24, 6 P.M., at La Montanita Co-op. Cost: $15 for NMBA members, $25 for nonmembers.
 
The explosion of service providers in the publication industry is both a blessing and a curse for many authors. You have more choices than ever before, but it can be difficult to know which will get the best results for your book. Pick the wrong path at any point on the journey, and you might not see any return on investment for your money, your time, or your energy.
In this workshop for both new and experienced authors, ghostwriter Carolyn Roark lays out the steps to making the right choices for yourself and your manuscript, including:
1. How do I get this manuscript out of my head and onto the page?
2. Should I work with a professional ghostwriter or editor? How do I find one?
3. Do I need an agent?
4. Is self-publishing right for me?
5. Should I seek a contract with a traditional press?
6. How do I avoid predatory publishers and con artists in the industry?
7. What the heck is a platform, and do I have to have one?
...and many more!
 
Carolyn’s bio: Dr. Carolyn Roark helps accomplished people build skill and confidence, create striking content, make the right publishing moves, and connect powerfully with their audiences through writing. Her clients include top Inc.com columnist Kevin Daum, Great Legal Marketing pro Ben Glass, the “professional imperfectionist” Stephen Guise, “rock star” speaker Marvelless Mark, and others. Read more of Carolyn’s bio.
REGISTER FOR THE WORKSHOP
0 Comments

HOMEGROWN AUTHORS OPEN FOR SUMMER BUSINESS

4/17/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
We are happy to announce that Homegrown Authors, under the sponsorship of NMBA, will open for business at the Santa Fe Farmers Market on Tuesday, May 7, at 7 A.M. Authors must appear at 6:30 A.M. and remain until 1:00 P.M. This is our sixth year at Farmers Market, and we have evolved into a close-knit group of authors who have learned how to greet the public with elevator speeches that don’t waste their time or ours. Tourists love us!
We are “guest vendors” at the market, which means we operate under different rules than the farmers. This year the rules have changed, requiring guest vendors to pay $150 for the privilege of sharing a guaranteed space. That presented a problem for us since the guaranteed space might be occupied by different authors each week. To solve the problem, we agreed that the four authors who shared the fee—due May 1—would be given a permanent place at the table, which each could either occupy or allow other NMBA members to take their place when they cannot be present. This allows the table to be filled by regulars who come because they are satisfied with the number of books they sell, and at the same time it allows newcomers to come when the regular member cannot be present. The permanent owners of the space may choose to recover some of their $37.50 cost by renting it at their discretion. All visitors must abide by Homegrown Author rules in addition to the Farmers Market rules for vendors.
 
Additional fees and costs due by each seller include individual parking, 5% of sales to the Farmers Market, and a $1.25 tip for table and chair set-up.
 
NMBA members who have written a book they wish to sell and would like to sign up for a table when one of the permanent members is on vacation should contact Maxine Davenport at [email protected] or call 505-474-0979.
 
All members are urged to come by the table to say hello and to see our beautiful books!
0 Comments

CALL FOR SUBMISSION: WRITING CONTESTS FOR PUBLISHED NEW MEXICAN AUTHORS IN POETRY, AND FOR PUBLISHED AND UNPUBLISHED AUTHORS IN FICTION AND NONFICTION

4/16/2019

0 Comments

 
The Albuquerque Museum Foundation has announced writing contests open to both unpublished and published authors in fiction and nonfiction, and only to published authors in poetry. Open to all New Mexico residents. Deadlines differ for each category. Winners will be announced at the Albuquerque Museum Foundation’s A Celebration of Writing, on Friday, November 8, 2019, 3:30 p.m., at the Albuquerque Museum, 2000 Mountain Road NW. Full submission guidelines and deadlines can be found at albuquerquemuseum.org/writing. For further information, call the Albuquerque Museum Foundation at 505-842-0111, or email [email protected].
0 Comments

MAY WORKSHOP WITH ALICIA INEZ GUZMÁN: “Getting Image Rights Right”

4/15/2019

0 Comments

 
May 22, 6 P.M., at La Montanita Co-op. Cost: $15 for NMBA members, $25 for nonmembers.

For anyone interested in publishing reviews, art essays, or artist books, navigating how to find and publish images from emerging and established artists can be a challenge. In this workshop, Alicia will talk about her experiences as an arts writer dealing with artists’ estates, copyright laws, and requests for images. She’ll offer a few anecdotes about the difficulties she’s met as well as a few tips for writers embarking on the process.
Register for the Workshop
Picture
Originally from Truchas, New Mexico, Alicia Inez Guzmán currently lives and works in Santa Fe. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Fine Arts from the University of New Mexico and a Master of Arts and PhD in Visual and Cultural Studies from the University of Rochester, New York. Her writing focuses on Indigenous and Chicanx art practices and histories of land use in the Southwest, and is the senior editor of New Mexico Magazine and author of Georgia O’Keeffe At Home.  She has published regionally, nationally, and internationally, and has won awards from the Susan B. Anthony Institute in Women’s and Gender Studies, the Latin American Iberian Institute, and the Georgia O’Keeffe Research Center. In 2017, Alicia received an Andy Warhol Foundation Creative Capital Arts Writers Grant for her website Tierra Firme Projects.  
0 Comments

GHOSTWRITER CAROLYN ROARK SPOKE ON “EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT GHOSTWRITERS” AT APRIL NMBA LUNCHEON

4/15/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
April kicked off with a lively luncheon where Carolyn Roark talked about what professional ghostwriters do: how they earn a living, what they have to offer, and how they make life better for many authors. She smashed all our illusions when she shared that, in fact, the Nancy Drew series was written by ghostwriters, and Carolyn Keene is a pseudonym. While all this could be learned through a simple Google search, most of us had no idea!
Here are Carolyn’s notes from her talk:
Using a ghostwriter used to be considered a dirty secret, the kind that could ruin an author’s career if it got out. Not anymore! Now we know that there are many good and practical reasons for an author to seek a ghost’s help. In fact, Madeline Morel, a respected agent for professional ghosts, estimated in a 2014 interview that 60% of the nonfiction titles on the bestseller lists of that year had been written by ghosts. There’s no reason to think that’s changed.

First, it’s important to get a few definitions straight:
  •  An AUTHOR is a person who generates and owns the ideas in a book.
  • A WRITER is a person who records and presents the ideas in a book.
Sometimes one person fills both roles. But when an author brings in a second party to shape their ideas into something readers will understand and enjoy, that second party is a GHOSTWRITER.

To understand what a ghost does, it’s important to be clear what a professional ghost is not. We are not co-authors who work collectively to develop the ideas and own them jointly. We are not author substitutes who create ideas, put them in readable form, and let someone else take the credit in exchange for cash. And we are not student or scholar stand-ins who do other people’s homework for them.

So who uses ghostwriters? Many people! The first and most obvious are VIPs—celebrities, politicians, corporate titans, and the like. They’re incredibly busy and their time is precious, so it has always been considered acceptable for them to hire professional help in writing a book. But they are no longer the only ones.

First, anyone who lacks TIME can benefit from a ghost. That can be defined a number of different ways. Busy professionals who are running an organization or managing a successful career often don’t have enough time to pen a book, but need one to get to the next professional level. Famous authors who are too busy to keep up with demand do so, too. Guys like Tom Clancy simply can’t produce enough new work per year to keep up with their fan’s appetites or their publishers’ demands, so they bring in ghosts. Some, like Clancy, have also figured out that their name is their best brand asset. So they lend it to books though they have no hand in writing, in exchange for a princely sum. And of course, when an author dies, that’s the ultimate way to run out of time. The estates of famous authors like V.C. Andrews and Robert Ludlum have brought in ghosts to complete manuscripts based on any notes, scribblings, or other materials an author leaves behind when they pass.

Second, a lack of expertise can motivate someone to seek a ghost’s help. As Madeline Morel says, “Celebrities sell books but they can’t necessarily write them.” Becoming an expert in any given subject takes enough time and effort; it may not be practical to become an expert on writing, too. A raconteur such as Alexandre Dumas may have good ideas, a popular following, and great skill at self-promotion. If he doesn’t have a way with words, he hires a shy fellow like Auguste Maquet to do the heavy lifting on manuscripts like The Count of Monte Cristo. Other professionals may struggle with writing, or simply may not like it. They can still share their wisdom and experience by telling their stories to someone who loves putting the pieces together. And I’ve worked with many people whose lack of confidence or organizational skill amounted to a paralyzing case of writer’s block. For them, working with a professional like me was the key to making their book dreams a reality.

Last, there are the “book profiteers,” those who monetize books as products to make a profit in a market niche they have identified. Remember all of those Nancy Drew mysteries that teen readers devoured for decades? Their author, Carolyn Keene, does not exist. The manuscripts were written by a whole stable of ghosts hired by a publishing company who saw the opportunity in a plucky girl detective. And, of course, there have been rumors in the publishing industry for a decade that famous Goosebumps magnate R.L. Stine brings in some hired guns (though he denies this vehemently). Maybe he really does turn out two books a month...every month...every year. Who is to say?

So how do professional ghosts make a living? Most of us find clients through word of mouth. Yes, we advertise, maintain websites and social media, and network. But because we tend to operate behind the scenes (and often cannot talk about our past projects due to NDA clauses), we rely on endorsement from happy authors. When we talk to potential clients, the first thing we do is assess whether the relationship is the right fit. After all, you’re going to be working very closely and intimately for several months. After that, the process tends to go as follows:
  1. We settle on a mutually agreeable contract that covers items such as how long the book will be, what publishing path it will take, how the information will be collected, how much outside research and fact checking will be required, and what the time frame is.
  2. We settle on payment terms, including how much the final price will be and how the payments will be split up. (Note: Rates for a professional ghost start at about $20,000 per book. That goes up if the ghostwriter has a lot of experience, has penned multiple bestsellers, and/or has had many VIP clients.)
  3. We collect data from the author, usually by a series of interviews. If there are journals, speeches, notes, or other materials, we will use those as well. Sometimes we do additional research or fact checking.
  4. We create first drafts of the content (I share these with the author chapter by chapter), and check in with the author to make sure the content and tone are on track with what the author wants. We collect their feedback.
  5. We do revisions to make sure each chapter—and the whole book—are clean and polished. This usually takes two to three drafts.
  6. We submit the finalized manuscript to the author, who then takes it on to the next step on their journey.
  7. We start over with a new client.
I have often been asked by hopeful authors whether finding a ghost is the right choice for their specific situation. I say it comes down to four straightforward things.
  1. Can you afford it?
  2. Do you know what you want a book to do for you or your career?
  3. Are you committed to making the book happen in a timely fashion?
  4. Does your gut (or your brain) tell you that it isn’t optimal/possible for you to go it alone?
If you can answer “yes” to all of them, then it’s time to go ghost hunting.  
0 Comments

POEMS AND PRINTS: PALACE PRESS POETRY BROADSIDES Exhibition dates April 5–26, 2019

4/5/2019

0 Comments

 
The Historic Santa Fe Foundation (HSFF) celebrates National Poetry Month with an exhibit of more than 50 poetry broadsides and books by well-known and not-so-well-known poets, all printed at the Press of the Palace of the Governors. The exhibition opened at HSFF’s El Zaguán, 545 Canyon Road, on Friday, April 5, and will continue through April 26, 2019. On Thursday, April 18, sit down with poets Joan Logghe, Renée Gregorio, and John Brandi, along with Palace Press director Tom Leech for your daily dose of poetry and a conversation about the joys of slow reading and fine printing. Each of the poets has published several poems in the form of poetry broadsides and limited-edition books with the press.
0 Comments

ARE YOU CELEBRATING SOMETHING OR HAVE AN AUTHORLY ANNOUNCEMENT TO MAKE? SUBMIT IT TO THE LIBRO!

4/1/2019

1 Comment

 
Picture
We want to help you celebrate and shout it from the rooftops . . . or at least include a blurb about it in the Libro newsletter. We invite all NMBA members to submit their upcoming events, book releases, awards announcements, and more. The Libro will now be published mid-month, so we can accept your submissions until the first of the month in which you’d like your news to be published. Submit your blurbs, links, and/or photos and see them in this newsletter. Not sure if it’s appropriate for the Libro? Send us an email and we can help you figure it out. We’re all here to support and promote each other, so don’t be shy!

Libro Nuevo News is the monthly newsletter of the New Mexico Book Association, the nonprofit organization serving all book professionals throughout the state since 1994. Submit your news, articles, and events to [email protected].
1 Comment

    About

    NMBA News, Opinion, and Articles are powered by members. To submit, please email your materials to [email protected]

    Archives

    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    April 2023
    January 2023
    September 2022
    March 2022
    October 2021
    September 2021
    February 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    September 2020
    July 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    January 2020
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018

    Categories

    All
    New Mexico Book Association
    NMBA
    NMLA
    Resources For Authors
    Santa Fe NM
    Summer Gala

    RSS Feed

New Mexico’s Only Nonprofit Serving All Book Professionals
Picture
MAILING ADDRESS
New Mexico Book Association
​PO Box 1285 
Santa Fe, NM 87504
EMAIL ADDRESS
[email protected]
© COPYRIGHT 2015-2024. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Join / Renew
    • New Member Join
    • Our Member Directory
    • Membership FAQ
  • About
  • SHOP
  • Events
    • Events Calendar
    • 25 Summer Gala
    • In Person Monthly Networking Meetings
    • Richard Harris Awards
    • Workshops
    • Meet the Authors
    • NM Writers Dinner Book Display
  • Blog
  • SWBDA Awards
    • 2025 SWBDA Awards
    • PAST AWARD WINNERS >
      • Purchase Award Stickers
      • 2024
      • 2023
      • 2022
      • 2021
      • 2020
      • 2019
      • 2017
      • 2016
  • News
    • NMBA Virtual Book Store
    • Libro Nuevo Entry
  • Members Only Area
    • Member Directory
    • Past Workshops
    • Member Discounts
  • Contact