Design as a Marketing Tool and Editing Essentials: From the Big Picture to the Nitty Gritty are the two workshops that will be featured at the Write to Publish conference this year. Vinnie Kinsella, a book production specialist, will be running the design workshop, while the editing workshop will be led by writer and editor Susan Defreitas. Below is a little info about Vinnie and Susan, and their explanations of what their workshops are all about.
Design as a Marketing Tool
Independent writers who want to be taken seriously rightly understand they must provide readers with well-crafted, well-edited content. They spend hundreds, maybe even thousands of hours perfecting each sentence of a manuscript in order to deliver content that doesn’t read like it’s self-published. That drive for perfection must also extend to professional publishing. Just as negligently edited text can turn off readers, so too can bad design. While it is true that readers may buy a poorly designed book based on the recommendation of a friend, they are not likely to buy that same book without the recommendation. Why? Because the book itself is a marketing tool. If the book’s construction is shoddy readers will associate the lack of craftsmanship with the writing. This can result in lost sales. But this doesn’t have to be your book’s fate. By avoiding the biggest causes of design failure, your book will not fall victim to the self-published look. This workshop examines the common reasons why a book’s design fails and what can be done to avoid that fate. In addition, it offers notes on how ebooks fit into all this.
Vinnie Kinsella is a book production specialist living in the Pacific Northwest. His varied work as a writer, editor, document designer, publication consultant, publication project manager, online journal publisher, and college instructor affords him the opportunity to help numerous book publishers, independent authors, news organizations, small businesses, and nonprofit organizations produce high quality print and online publications. He offers an array of publishing-related services through Indigo Editing & Publications including publication consultation and project management for self-published authors, editing, and document design.
Editing Essentials: From the Big Picture to the Nitty Gritty
Whether you’re interested in working with an editor or simply stepping up your own game as a writer, a basic understanding of the three stages of editing will save you both stress and time. This class will explore developmental editing, line editing, and proofreading, with pro tips for each process. The workshop will demystify the process by which a manuscript becomes a book.
Susan DeFreitas is a writer, editor, and spoken word artist. Her work has appeared in The Utne Reader, The Nervous Breakdown, Southwestern American Literature, Fourth River, Weber: The Contemporary West, and Bayou Magazine, among other publications. She is the author of the fiction chapbook Pyrophitic (ELJ Publications, 2014), and holds an MFA from Pacific University. Susan lives in Portland, Oregon, where she serves as an associate editor with Indigo Editing & Publications and a reader for Tin House Magazine.