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Black Forest Wildfire Pics

by Kristin Nelson

I’m sure you’ve been dying to see a picture of Agent Kristin manning a wood chipper. Finally, your chance. My husband Brian and I spent a weekend with Dave helping him clear his property after the Black Forest Wildfire destroyed his home and everything there.

Pic 1: Dave chainsaws a tree

Pic 2: One tree down

Pic 3: That’s me picking up branches that have been cut so as to take to the wood chipper

Pic 4: I’m watching Dave cut so I can grab those branches

Pic 5: A very dirty Kristin & Brian

Pic 6: Dave & Me & a wood chipper

Pic 7: Me feeding the chipper. Fargo anyone?

Pic 8: The clean up crew. Jen, who saved the dogs, is sandwiched between me and my husband Brian. She, who had just lost everything, still came to help clean the property. Amazing gal!

Pic 9: My favorite picture! Dave had a stack of firewood for his fireplace. It was the ONLY thing that didn’t burn. LOL How ludicrous is that?

DaveChainsawsTree DaveWithFoundation Landscapeshot_me&branches KN&Dave-tree-down Brian&Kristin-dirty Dave-Kristin-Woodchipper KristinFeedsChipper TheCleanUpGang Firewood-didn'tburn

Isaac & The PediCab World Bookmobile Night

by Kristin Nelson

We had sunshine but warm it was not. I needed that down jacket you are seeing me wearing.

Best story of the night? Standing on the corner of 16th Street and Market when Isaac zipped by on his pedicab. On such a cold evening, we couldn’t help shouting out “free book to celebrate World Book Night?” He said, “no thanks” and starting riding away. He wasn’t interested in any religious material (although I didn’t realize at the time that he thought we might be giving away some religious literature). I called out, “But it’s Neil Gaiman’s Good Omens (sorry Terry I was speaking quickly) and The Phantom Tollbooth.”

Isaac whipped around so quickly on his pedicab, I felt like I had whiplash. “No kidding?” he exclaimed..

No kidding!

He thought Book Night was so cool, he insisted on being our Pedicab bookmobile and wouldn’t take no for an answer. It was darn chilly. Not a lot of people walking up and down the mall. But we loaded up on his pedicab and he zipped us up and down 16th street looking for kids and other delighted folks who couldn’t believe we were giving away free books. No strings attached.

Pictures to enjoy!  And Sara’s son Elan was our very special ambassador! Thank you Elan for braving the cold with us! And thank you Isaac! If you see this blog post, drop us a line. You made World Book Night a triumph for Nelson Literary Agency. We’d love to send you the pics.

Kristin&IsaacSara,Elan,Isaac,Kristin-withbooksMan-BabyStrollerAnita-Kristin-withRecepient CoorsField

Update on World Book Night

by Kristin Nelson

Oh it’s happening – despite the fact it’s 25 degrees out right now and we will all be bundled to the max and unrecognizable. LOL. Last year it was 82 degrees on this date. Oh fickle Mother Nature.

We’ll be celebrating World Book Night as promised but instead of being at Skyline Park and 16th street, we’ll be on Wynkoop near Coors Field. There is a Rockies game scheduled and I’m betting that if you are a diehard enough fan to sit outside in 25 degree weather to watch a game, you might be a reluctant reader. Besides, kids will be there!

With the minimal foot traffic along the mall we are likely to get because of weather tonight, we’ll hedge our bets. So come join us. Bring Hot Cocoa and say hello! Just look for the banner. And notice that I’m wearing Rockies colors.

 

KN & WorldBookNight-Poster

9 Submissions in 9 Sentences

by Kristin Nelson

What I’ve seen in the last 2 weeks and why I passed:

4 Full Manuscripts (2 with offers of rep on the table)

1 – New Adult/wm’s fic. Recommended by a former editor we know well and like. I totally enjoyed the writing but for me, the story didn’t have a foot solidly in one genre or the other. I didn’t have the vision/passion for it so I passed.

2 – Wm’s fic/erotic leaning. Probably one of the more interesting concepts for a story that I’ve seen in a long time. What was interesting is the writing was quite literary but if I were to explain the plot, it would feel like contemporary romance. I went back and forth on that one as so intriguing. I did end up passing despite how smartly it was done.

3 – Middle Grade. Great great concept. But I had reservations that the voice didn’t quite nail the middle grade age range and although cool, a lot of the story felt too sophisticated but not exactly right for YA either.

4 – Middle Grade. Multicultural main character which I love. Great MG voice. Story line needed some work and with my current work load, I was afraid I couldn’t give the author the attention deserved.

5 Sample Pages

1 – Adult literary. Too literary for what I can be successful with. But terrific writing and a wonderful multicultural story.

2 – Young adult. Previously published author with great background. Fun paranormal. Snappy writing. I liked it but didn’t love it.

3 – Adult steampunk. Author had very cool background and the writing was nice but the opening didn’t grab me.

4 – Adult literary. Same as the other above. Too literary for what I tend to have success with. Wonderful multicultural angle though.

5 – Contemporary romance. Previously published author with great backlist and background. I liked it but didn’t love it. With a full client list, it makes a difference on what I’ll take on.

Rushdie Discusses What it is to be a Writer in this World

by Kristin Nelson

Last night Anita, our intern Chris, and I went to see Salman Rushdie’s talk at Mackey Auditorium on the CU Boulder campus. Mr. Rushdie is eloquent and quotable. I was one finger typing furiously on my iPhone so as to share some kernel of ideas with my blog readers. Any inelegance in my paraphrasing of his talk last night is solely my fault.

His talk tackled what it is to be a writer in this world.

In a world where 24-hour news necessitates posting something about an event, even if it’s not entirely accurate and only later to be retracted, readers are hard-pressed to find “truthyness” in a lot of journalism these days.

The novel takes on a new form of accurate truthfulness that might be a more accurate reflection of what our world actually is. The novel becomes the depth of the lived experience and the writer is bringing to the public the socially important information that is missing from all other sources.

Rushdie mentioned that the novel, Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson, which won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for fiction just last week, is all we need to read to truly understand what is happening in North Korea.

And it is for this reason that when they come to power, tyrant and totalitarian regimes target artists and writers.

Rushdie went on to illuminate that we, as people, understand ourselves through the telling of stories. We have the right to tell story our way, through our beliefs, and about our nation. And those stories are a continuing dialogue. Unfree nations try to control the narrative. Not to have freedom to tell stories is true unfreedom.

The job of the writer, as it is for all the great arts, is to open the universe.

Tyrants close the world. A writer’s job is to open it.

Amen.

 

Come Celebrate World Book Night With NLA!

by Kristin Nelson

And incidentally, my birthday! If you haven’t got plans on Tuesday, April 23, come join the gals of NLA at Skyline Park on the 16th Street Mall of Downtown Denver. We’ll be talking to passerby’s, reluctant readers, and giving away two very cool books.

Last night my husband says to me, “I’m a reluctant reader. Can I get a copy of Good Omens?” I replied, “it’s true you are a reluctant reader but you can afford to buy a copy so no, you don’t get one.”

I know! I’m tough. No nepotism people!

 

GoodOmens PhantomTollBooth

New Adult – Perhaps the latest word for Chick Lit

by Kristin Nelson

Just recently I was doing an interview with a reporter from  Publishers Weekly and she asked if I found it surprising that the New Adult category had remained hot for so long. Here is my response: 
I don’t find it surprising at all actually. Publishing tends to run hot on trends. Sometimes to the point of saturation.
What indie self publishing authors are doing is writing and releasing a lot of content quickly. They see what works and what doesn’t and they shift course if something is not getting the desired reaction or when something is. They have that flexibility because it’s all digital.
Ten years ago, new adult was “hot” but we called it chick lit and it was less sexual relationship or romance focused. Then that became a dirty word and we had to call it contemporary romance or women’s fiction and age up the protagonists.
That left a hole in the market for a whole lot of readers who loved reading works in that genre but got tired of the same old Sex in the City type story lines.
New adult is the 20-something coming of age and the new novels hitting in this realm are emotionally intense (unlike their chick lit predecessors). Prolific indie authors figured it out pretty quickly that the audience was there and started writing for them. It hasn’t abated because the market is not yet saturated.
One thing about Jasinda Wilder is that she is creating her own niche within what people are calling New Adult. 50 Shades is a story of sexual discovery and awakening. What Jasinda is doing is more Nicholas Sparks. Her stories are about emotional healing and the relationship/romance is part of the healing process in a significant way. Now she is a little stunned at the velocity of the response/sales for Falling Into You.

Indie Author & Agent Partners – Thought 2

by Kristin Nelson

So last week when I was out in New York for the Writers Digest Conference, I gave a talk on why successful indie authors might want to partner with agents.

As I was putting together my talking points, I actually came to the conclusion that why they partner is the wrong question. The real question might be when should indie authors partner with an agent.

If  indie authors are becoming successful, an agent can accelerate their exposure in a big way. For example, I couple of weeks ago I took on self-publishing phenom Jasinda Wilder. On March 16, she released her 18th novel FALLING INTO YOU.

In less than one month, she sold 140,000 digital copies of this title.

Yes, you read that right.

That’s a crazy number of copies in a short period of time. She hit the NYT and USA Today list for several weeks in a row.

She decided to partner with me. My job is now to accelerate her exposure in any way possible. Within a week Publishers Weekly did a feature story on her and I imagine this won’t be the last coverage given her extraordinary success.

Would Jasinda get coverage without me? Sure. But there is no doubt I’m stomping on the gas. This can be incredibly beneficial in talking with publishers and for foreign deals.

Indie & Agent Partners: Thought 1

by Kristin Nelson

On Thursday I’m flying to New York City to give a presentation at the Writers Digest Conference on Friday morning. My topic is why a successful indie self-publishing author might want to partner with an agent.

If you are an indie author that doesn’t see the value in having an agent, I’m not really going to change your mind so there really is no purpose in reading my next several blog posts where I share my thoughts. However, if you are curious, I’m happy to share several reasons on why they do. Now of course I can only speak to why several indie authors have decided to partner with me. It’s going to vary depending on the author and the agent.  But I represent several and they find our relationship invaluable.

Thought 1: People are complaining about the archaic nature of publishing and why doesn’t it change.

Okey dokey. Let’s quit complaining and start having conversations to instigate change because how do you think change happens?

In May of 2012, I had Hugh Howey fly out to New York to sit-down with publishers. I thought it was important for them to meet him in-person just so they could see for themselves what a reasonable, personable, and forward-thinking author he was. He was not, and has never been, anti-traditional publisher. In fact, he’s fairly pro-publisher. But a partnership has to make sense and there is a lot of stuff from traditional publishing that doesn’t make sense.

Before Hugh got on the plane, we both knew that it was very unlikely that the meetings would result in an offer that we’d be willing to take.  Yet, WE DID IT ANYWAY. Why? And this might be kind of silly but both of us felt kind of strongly that having in-person conversations with publishers about our sticking points (ebook royalty rate, sales thresholds in out of print clauses, and non-compete clauses) was necessary in order to facilitate possible change in the future. In other words, we weren’t going to see the benefit of it but maybe a future indie publishing author would because we had started the conversation.

And these conversations could only occur via a reasonable author partnering with a reasonable agent who were meeting with affable and reasonable publishers and editors and having frank, smart, and intelligent conversations with them about current contractual sticking points.

For Hugh, it resulted in a very unexpected print-rights only offer five months later (much to our surprise). That was way sooner than either of us had ever thought to hope.

I imagine that in the not-so-distant-future other indie authors (and who might be unagented) might be thanking Hugh for having partnered with an agent (way) back in 2012 so as to have these meetings. Just as they might be thanking Bella Andre and her agent for pulling off one of the first print-rights only deals (that was publicly announced -there might be others I’m unaware of).