w r i t e r s     h e l p i n g     w r i t e r s

    Spotlight on... Theresa Meyers

    by
    LaTessa
    Published: 07-26-2010 12:14 PM
    0 Comments Comments
    Savvy Authors is proud to turn the spotlight on...

    Name:     Theresa Meyers
    Occupation:     Book Publicist, Blue Moon Communications by day / Fiction writer by night

     First off, Theresa thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to chat with the Savvy Authors Community.

    Do you mind telling us a bit about your and your background?
     I was the oldest child raised by a bibliophile. Instead of a dining room, my mother lined the walls with bookshelves on all types of subjects and all genres of fiction. Even though I had dyslexia and it took me intensive work over several years to learn how to read, I absolutely loved books and telling stories.

    In my teen years I knew I wanted to write. I wrote for the newspaper in jr. high, high school and college. I sent out queries to Seventeen Magazine and got rejected. I started my first novel, a historical romance, in high school as part of a specially designed elective with three other classmates. Eventually I enrolled in a Writer's Digest course during college, but ended up putting the book under the bed until I joined Romance Writers of America in 1993 after graduation with a degree in Mass Communications.

    Professionally I was a writer, first for newspapers, then as a freelancer for national magazines and spent a number of years working as a public relations account executive for multi-million dollar corporations and the largest public relations agency in Arizona. The whole time I kept writing fiction. In 2005 I was selected as one of eleven finalists in the nation for the American Title II contest, which is the American Idol of books, for my Scottish historical, The Spellbound Bride, which is now available through Diversion Books.

    Currently I live in the Seattle area on a mini-farm of a few acres in a Victorian style house. My office is in the turret and I have a view of the horse pasture where our old Arab gelding nibbles on the apple trees. I have a fairly set schedule between working the day job and writing. I've been married over 20 years to my high-school sweetheart. Our first date was his junior prom, and my parents drove us to the dance with my little brother between us in the back seat. I knew then and there if he could put up with that, he was hero material. To help me balance out my writing life, I try to get together once a week to have tea with my other mom friends – who aren't writers - and volunteer at the school. I love to talk to readers and other writers. People can find me online at www.theresameyers.com, on Twitter @Theresa_Meyers or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/TheresaMeyersAuthor.

    What are some of your favorite authors, genres, and/or books?
     I’m partial to romance because I love the happy ending. I figure if I’m going to invest several hours of my life I want it to be a pleasant experience in the end and feel like it was worth it. I also enjoy Action/Adventure/Thrillers with a scientific bent and read some YA fiction for fun. The first romance author I read when I was in my early teens was Victoria Holt. OMG, I devoured her books. Right now my keeper shelf is somewhat varied. I’ve got a full collection of Julia Quinn’s books and many by Yasmin Galenorn. I adore James Rollins, read Gail Carriger, Jessica Andersen, Cherry Adair, P.C. and Kristen Cast’s Night series, the entire Harry Potter series and enjoy Janet Evanovich.

    I feel the same way about romance novels, sometimes I just need a happy ending J


    What do you do for fun and relaxation?
     I have young children so I spend a lot of time with them whenever I can, which means going to sports practices, lessons, school events and band concerts. One horse-back rides, the other is into running on the dunes on four-wheelers, so I do both. I like to sew on my steampunk costumes when I can and usually can be found having tea with my friends at least once a week. I’m a bit of a tea nut and enjoy cooking too. I also like canning and painting. Of course I also like to read a lot and watch action adventure and romantic comedy movies. It’s all fodder for an active imagination.

    So, what is a standard day like for you?
    Because I'm still working a day job and writing at the same time I have to be fairly structured. Usually I'm up by 5 am and I'll sit down at my desk with a cup of tea as soon as hubby leaves for work at 6 am. I'll work, check on emails, make calls for East Coast clients and such until about 7:30, when I get everyone up and ready for school. I'm back at the desk most days by 9 am and will work on business until about noon. Then I turn on the soundtrack for the book I'm working on, get another cup of tea and switch over to writing until about 3 pm when everybody gets home from school. If I haven't gotten my page count in for the day and I'm on deadline for a book, I'll start in again on the writing at about 8pm until the pages are finished before I go to sleep.

    Wow, that’s a pretty full day. You have the type of self-discipline I’m striving to obtain myself.


    How do you come up with your story ideas?
     For me ideas are a constant. I'm always reading something, listening to music or finding inane little facts that spark ideas for me. For instance, once I was sitting in a college botany class and there was an aphid on one of the plant samples I was supposed to be examining. The professor made an off the cuff comment about how aphids are born pregnant and my writer's imagination took off. What if they cross-bred humans with aphid DNA for a strain of workers that reproduced for an expendable workforce? What would that society be like? How would they have gotten to that point? See, that's what I mean. For me story ideas are kind of like blinking. They just happen, even when I don't expect it.

    A lot of authors, myself included, have specific routines/settings they are most creative in. Do you have any special things you do when you write?
     I have a couple of things I do rather regularly. First, I usually have a soundtrack that I create for each book that I play while I'm writing on that book. Often it'll be a fairly eclectic mix of heavy metal, rock, country, pop, classical, whatever makes me think of those characters and that setting as soon as I hear the music. Sometimes I'll also light a special scented candle and only use that scent while writing on that book.

    What's the hardest and easiest parts of writing for you?
     Good question. I think the hardest part is actually sitting your butt in a chair and typing away day after day until the book is done. That's the part that takes dedication. We all have the same 24 hours in a day to work with. You have to make your writing a priority over watching television or washing the car and take your work seriously if you want to make it a profession. The easiest part is coming up with the story ideas and letting my imagination run wild.

    You are so correct. Some days, putting my butt in the chair is the hardest thing for me to do.


    Do you have any advice for aspiring authors trying to break into the industry?
     First, no one can write the book for you. That means you need to finish the book. Sit down, put in the time and make it happen. Second, remember that writing the book is only half the battle. The other half is getting it out into the market. While e-publishing is becoming a bigger segment of the market, you still have to be aware of the marketing and promotions involved in getting it out to your readers. It's not going to happen all on its own just because you've written a great book. If you are looking to break in to print with one of the houses in New York, keep at it, be persistent. Sometimes it can take decades and multiple books before you hit that right combination of timing, market and product. I keep a fortune cookie scrap taped to my monitor in my office that reads “You are never given a dream without the ability to make it come true.”

    I love that quote. I have a similar saying that I repeat to myself whenever I am feeling down about my writing.


    Now, a little bit about Blue Moon. What inspired you to start Blue Moon Communications?
     Actually, I tried very hard not to! Originally I began working in public relations because I went to college for a degree in Mass Communications and knew I wanted to write. I tried journalism and found working at a daily didn’t suit me. I worked for a number of years in corporate and agency PR and wrote my fiction novels on the side trying to keep the two worlds separate. It wasn’t until my critique partner, Cherry Adair, asked me to help her promote her book Hide and Seek that I brought the two together.

    If you’ve ever met Cherry, she’s a force of nature. Within a few months I had several clients and formed Blue Moon Communications, dedicating myself to working with fiction authors by taking what I knew about consumer product publicity and blending it with what I knew about fiction authors and the publishing industry to form something very different from what I saw presented by other publicity firms.

    Do published authors really need their own publicists? Even though they will get some PR through their publisher?
    These days, I’d say yes. Most publishers are understaffed and their publicists are working on 20-40 books a month. If you’ve ever done any of your own promotion you can see where they simply don’t have the time or budget to fully dedicate themselves to each and every book. The second part of this is that publishers usually only publicize the book, rather than the author brand. Media don’t care about fiction books for the most part, until they become a cultural phenomenon of their own in which case they’ve become news. If they are spending more than 30% of their productive writing time working on promotion and marketing, then they should be getting some help. No one else can write the book, but the author. You can always pay other people to do promotions and marketing for you, and they’ll likely do it faster with better results.

    What about unpublished authors? How important is for the unpublished authors to establish a presence? Do you have recommendations for low to no cost PR opportunities for the unpublished authors out there?
     Unpublished authors do need to be working on the basics. They need a website. They need to be networking on social media and within their communities with writers groups, librarians and booksellers so that when they do sell they’ve already got a core group of supporters and a defined presence. If you want to become a professional, then behave like a professional. Giving back by giving workshops to schools or to libraries in your area on writing, can go a long way in helping you create a reader base for the future. By volunteering in writers groups, you’ll also get your name known and out there as well. You can write articles for writer’s publications about other aspects of your life (day job or hobbies) that writers might be curious about for research. In publicity you are ultimately working to increase the total number of impressions and networking and volunteering are a great way to make that happen.

    What’s next for you? Do you have any upcoming releases or projects you are working on?
     Several, actually. I'm working on projects for clients, mainly setting up speaking engagements and plans for 2011. On the writing side, I have three books out: two vampire novellas with Harlequin Nocturne Salvation of the Damned and A Vampire’s Mistress , and my Scottish historical.

    I’ll have three print books out in 2011, two vampire romances with Harlequin Nocturne The Truth About Vampires in March 2011and The Vampire Who Loved Me in June 2011, as well a new western-set steampunk romance trilogy out from Kensington slated to come out in Nov. 2011 starting with The Hunter.

    Theresa thanks for sharing a bit of your expertise with us. Before we wrap up, do you have any events coming up?
    I blog every Tuesday as one of the STEAMED! Lolitas at www.ageofsteam.wordpress.com and teach a number of classes online for writers. You can find details about what’s coming up next at www.theresameyers.com

    Also, I’ll be attending the Emerald City Writers Conference Oct. 1-3 and Steamcon II in Nov, both events are in the Seattle area. My schedule for 2011 is already filling up and I plan to attend the RT BookReviews conference, the national conference for Romance Writers of America, the Emerald City Writers Conference, the Pacific Northwest Writers Conference and Steamcon III.

    And how can your authors get in touch with you if they want to inquire about your services?
    I’d suggest first going to the website www.bluemooncommunications.com because there are a lot of questions/answers there that can help. The easiest way to reach me is by email at bluemooncomm@aol.com.


    Categories:
    1. Interviews
    Comments Leave Comment

    Click here to log in

    Please enter the six letters or digits that appear in the image opposite.