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Publish Smart with Amy M Le · WriterCon

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This week on the writer Con podcast, I.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Would say start yesterday. Everybody always says, you know, I'll
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: start win or I will start promoting when I have
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: my book published, you know, and them. Yeah, as soon
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: as you have that idea and you're going to commit
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: to writing it, that's when you start.
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  Speaker 1: Welcome to writer Con, the gathering place for writers to
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  Speaker 1: share their knowledge about writing and the writing world. Your
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  Speaker 1: hosts are William Bernhardt, best selling novelist and author of
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  Speaker 1: the Red Sneaker books on writing, and Laura Bernhardt, Award
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  Speaker 1: winning author of the want Ln Files book series.
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  Speaker 3: Thank you, Jesse ul Rich. Hey, they're writers. Thanks for
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: joining us today. We're going to take you back to
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: grade school because today Jesse brought some.
• 0:49
  Speaker 4: Show and tell. It's a huge book.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: I assume it's a James Patterson novel.
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  Speaker 4: Am I right?
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  Speaker 1: How dare you look at this baby?
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  Speaker 4: Look at the sweet What is it like?
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  Speaker 3: Four thousand pages?
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  Speaker 4: It is thirteen hundred pages.
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  Speaker 3: That's longer than War in Peace?
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  Speaker 4: Ten days?
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  Speaker 1: It is ten days breaking up the chapters?
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  Speaker 4: Are the days?
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  Speaker 3: Do you portion it out? So you say, okay, I've
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  Speaker 3: read one hundred and thirty pages. I can quit now.
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  Speaker 1: No, I just I did not get last sleep between
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  Speaker 1: December sixth and when I finished.
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  Speaker 3: So, uh you now he's younger than I am, because
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  Speaker 3: that's not how it worked for me. I would fall
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  Speaker 3: asleep on the second page and it wouldn't.
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  Speaker 4: Matter what I'm planning to do.
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  Speaker 1: I fight through it.
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  Speaker 3: Very impressive. Well, Laura, what are you reading these days?
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  Speaker 4: Something? Anything?
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  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, d it was something on that iPad last night.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, several books. I'm actually finishing up a Discovery of Witches,
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  Speaker 5: and I have ice Breaker waiting to go, and I'm
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  Speaker 5: also reading Crying an Aged Mark.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: Sounds good books. I'm reading American Comics, A History by
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: Oh gosh, I didn't know we were going to do this.
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  Speaker 3: I can't think of his name, Jeremy Dauber. I so
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  Speaker 3: apologize if I've forgotten your name. But your book is terrific.
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  Speaker 3: It's sort of a global history of the comic book,
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  Speaker 3: which I know now everybody's You had this classy science
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  Speaker 3: fiction novel, Lara had classy stuff, and I've got the history.
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  Speaker 4: Of comic books. But whatever, they're all good books, right, yes.
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  Speaker 3: Our interview today is with Amy M.
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  Speaker 4: Lee.
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  Speaker 3: She is the award winning author of The Snow trilogy
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  Speaker 3: and several other books as well, and a longtime friend
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  Speaker 3: of writer Common. She's also the founder of quill Hawk,
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  Speaker 3: a female owned Asian American company that helps writers indye
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  Speaker 3: publish their books. We're going to talk to her about
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  Speaker 3: all that and much more, but first the news news
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  Speaker 3: story number one. I think this is going to delight you, Laura.
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  Speaker 3: I'm kidding. I remember on the last episode when we
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  Speaker 3: were making predictions, you said you were worried about AI,
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  Speaker 3: and with good reason, because somewhere at the end of
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  Speaker 3: last year, after we did our last podcast, one of
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  Speaker 3: the Big five publishers, HarperCollins, signed a formal agreement with
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  Speaker 3: Microsoft to allow them to use the publisher's nonfiction works.
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  Speaker 3: This is Harper Collins. Can you imagine the number of
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  Speaker 3: nonfiction books they have in print?
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  Speaker 4: It would be huge.
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  Speaker 3: Anyway, it's no longer a question of whether publishers are
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  Speaker 3: going to allow AI to scrape the books. They are
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  Speaker 3: and this three year agreement says they're going to pay
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  Speaker 3: HarperCollins five thousand per book, and HarperCollins says they will
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  Speaker 3: share that evenly, which would suggest that an author is
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  Speaker 3: going to get twenty five hundred bucks for allowing their
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  Speaker 3: books to be screat But listen to this part. First thing,
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  Speaker 3: nobody even knows what exactly it is Microsoft is doing
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  Speaker 3: with this. They've got some kind of new model, but
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  Speaker 3: they haven't told anyone what it is. They say it
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  Speaker 3: won't be to generate new AI books, I promise.
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  Speaker 4: Well what then?
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  Speaker 3: Anyway, So they can't do it without the author's permission,
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  Speaker 3: they say, and the AI model will be limited. To
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  Speaker 3: listen to this, their product will be quote no more
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  Speaker 3: than two hundred consecutive words, or five percent of a
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  Speaker 3: book's text in it's output. That's and or so does
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  Speaker 3: that mean one or the other? Well, yeah, exactly five
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  Speaker 3: percent of that would be thirteen hundred you say a
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  Speaker 3: quick math, that's like sixties five pages. Holy smokes, I mean,
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  Speaker 3: that's enormous. According to Poles, less than half forty seven
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  Speaker 3: percent of US adults trust companies to responsibly prevent their
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  Speaker 3: AI models from creating work that's derivative of other work.
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  Speaker 3: In other words, the people who are working with this
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  Speaker 3: aren't sure they can control AI. And now you know,
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  Speaker 3: HarperCollins is just going to be the first. The others
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  Speaker 3: will follow suit. And now they're having permission to generate
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  Speaker 3: pages and pages that is, word for word taken from
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  Speaker 3: somebody else's books. You know what humans are going to
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  Speaker 3: do with regard to these future publications is hard to understand. Laura,
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  Speaker 3: would you take this deal? It's twenty five hundred bucks.
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  Speaker 5: The money is good, All many is good.
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  Speaker 3: Many it is good.
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  Speaker 5: I know, So I couldn't. I couldn't fault somebody for
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  Speaker 5: taking that deal. Let's say I wrote nonfiction and I
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  Speaker 5: was asked about this, boy. I mean, it's less it's
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  Speaker 5: less dubious, I suppose, than just data scraping and taking it.
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  Speaker 5: It seems like a baby step in the right direction
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  Speaker 5: that they're at least asking for permission to use it.
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  Speaker 5: But I still don't love it. I just still don't
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  Speaker 5: love it. AI to me equals right now plagiarism over
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  Speaker 5: and over again. It's just taking somebody else's words and
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  Speaker 5: creating something new and not letting anyone know where it
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  Speaker 5: came from. I kind of feel right now about AI
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  Speaker 5: at this point in my life, I think the way
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  Speaker 5: Jesse feels about James Patterson. I just just could.
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  Speaker 4: Do without that.
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Jesse, what do you? I mean? Clearly, Lara's right,
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  Speaker 3: some people are going to do it. Are they going
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: to regret it later?
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: I just wish people who are working on AI would
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  Speaker 1: focus on the ad AI parts that will make our
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  Speaker 1: lives easier and not the creative parts that make things
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  Speaker 1: that we don't need, Like help me manage my schedule,
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: help remind me of the things they need to do,
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  Speaker 1: like stop trying to create art.
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  Speaker 3: But don't you think that's in part where it's going,
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  Speaker 3: Because yeah, we can write something ourselves, but not everyone can,
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  Speaker 3: and that's how this is how they're going to generate
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  Speaker 3: a short story or a song or whatever.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's a crutch because at some point an
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  Speaker 1: author can't pretend to write things if they're using AI
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  Speaker 1: to do it. Eventually they're gonna get caught, or they're
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: eventually someone's good to know, or eventually they're gonna be
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  Speaker 1: asked for something that AI can't produce for them. So again, like,
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  Speaker 1: help me make my minutes for the board I'm on
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  Speaker 1: for this nonprofit and help me go through my emails.
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  Speaker 1: Stop trying to write a novel?
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  Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, good, Hey, Internet.
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  Speaker 5: Stop it stop it just stop it?
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  Speaker 3: Is that going to be your next after James Patterson?
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  Speaker 3: Is you can't take down the whole internet.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, listen, you can when James, Like when James Patterson
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  Speaker 1: starts using AI to write write his novel so he
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  Speaker 1: doesn't have to pay ghost writers, Like, then you will
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: have a fiel day on this podcast.
• 8:39
  Speaker 5: Yeah, we'll both furious. Yeah, you'll have the wrath of
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  Speaker 5: both of us going.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, are you ready for that?
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  Speaker 4: James? Are you ready for Are you ready for that?
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  Speaker 4: All right?
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  Speaker 3: News story number two. And let me warn you in
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  Speaker 3: advance that this involves some unpleasant discussion of inappropriate relationships Withers,
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: So trigger warning. If that's going to bother you, skip
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: ahead to craft corner.
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  Speaker 4: Okay.
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  Speaker 3: Unfortunately, this scandal involves Carmack McCarthy, the very successful, prominent
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  Speaker 3: literary writer who passed not very long ago, but just
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  Speaker 3: a few I think it was the last issue Vanity
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  Speaker 3: Fair published a bombshell article informing everyone that Carmack McCarthy,
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  Speaker 3: this is the author of All the Pretty Horses and
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: when a Pulletzer for the Road and whatnot. Anyway, one
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  Speaker 3: of our most celebrated novelists had a relationship with a
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  Speaker 3: girl and am using that word advisedly. A girl he
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  Speaker 3: met when he was forty two, and she was sixteen.
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  Speaker 3: She was a foster child, an abused child, and a
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  Speaker 3: runaway who reportedly felt so unsafe at home she often
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: carried a gun and used the pool area and the
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: motel to shower. And it just sounds horrible. She says,
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  Speaker 3: she didn't know that McCarthy was married when the relationship began,
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  Speaker 3: or that he had a son almost exactly her age.
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  Speaker 3: She did a few years later in the sexual relationship,
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  Speaker 3: but they continued to stay in touch. They exchanged letters,
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  Speaker 3: talked on the phone, visited each other. It doesn't seem
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  Speaker 3: to have been any acrimony. And apparently most of his
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  Speaker 3: friends and a lot of scholars and critics who wrote
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: about him were already aware of this, but keeping it
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  Speaker 3: to themselves. What I found interesting is that, I mean,
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  Speaker 3: nobody's approving obviously, but then again, nobody's calling to ban
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  Speaker 3: his books or anything.
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  Speaker 4: But most of the.
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  Speaker 3: Chatter has been about Vanity Fair's assertion that this woman,
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  Speaker 3: miss Britt, was the key inspiration for some of his
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  Speaker 3: most memorable female characters. And if you're like me and
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: you've read him, you start thinking female character, female character,
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  Speaker 3: there are many, and they're mostly like you know, victims
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  Speaker 3: or people bad things happen too, and that opens a
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  Speaker 3: whole new kettle of fish. But anyway, you know, they're
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  Speaker 3: recurring themes, his obsession with horses, guns, vulnerable young women
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  Speaker 3: who suffer advice suffer violence rather and heartbreak, and at
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: least occurding this article that's all attributable back to this
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  Speaker 3: young woman Wanda in Harrogate and Sutry Karla Jean and
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: No Country for Old Men Alejandra and All the Pretty Horses, which,
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  Speaker 3: by the way, is a terrific book, even though I
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  Speaker 3: may never endorse a Cormack McCarthy a book again, but
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: it is what can you do? And also in the article,
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  Speaker 3: she said that this romantic relationship was consensual. Of course,
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  Speaker 3: many people are going to say that's not even possible
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  Speaker 3: when somebody's sixteen. Oh here's a detail I left out
• 12:15
  Speaker 3: just to give you this. She also said McCarthy doctored
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  Speaker 3: her birth certificate so he could get her into Mexico. Okay, Laura,
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  Speaker 3: will you be reading any Carmack McCarthy books anytime soon?
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  Speaker 3: Or is it fair for us to judge me? I mean, yeah,
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  Speaker 3: it's disturbing, but what writer did live up perfectly? Or
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  Speaker 3: what anybody I haven't let it perfectly. I haven't done this.
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  Speaker 1: But be careful, Bill, be careful laws.
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  Speaker 4: This is what I'm trying to say. Uh so what
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  Speaker 4: do you, I don't know.
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  Speaker 3: You think you could still read one of his books?
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  Speaker 5: Well, you just gave a pretty darned amazing endorsem meant
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  Speaker 5: for one of them.
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  Speaker 4: People love that trilogy.
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  Speaker 5: I probably could. Is this absolutely disgusted me? Yes, I
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  Speaker 5: don't understand. I don't understand this type of behavior from
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  Speaker 5: either a male or a female. I don't feel very
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  Speaker 5: much to me like they're preying upon a child. But yeah,
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  Speaker 5: of course I can also remember when I was sixteen,
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  Speaker 5: I thought I was full grown and knew everything, but
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  Speaker 5: but I didn't. I don't know, especially when you have
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  Speaker 5: a child that age, I would be seeing my child
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  Speaker 5: in that child like I can't. I just can't imagine.
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  Speaker 5: But it's none of us is perfect Throwstones.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, I can tell you I'm forty three now
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  Speaker 1: and I could not date a seventeen now. That would
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  Speaker 1: be gross.
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  Speaker 5: But this was a sixty year old. It's gross, gross,
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  Speaker 5: and it does feel very predatory to me.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know how it came about, except that
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  Speaker 3: I know she was a foster child.
• 14:12
  Speaker 4: So yeah, more ick, yeah.
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: Is it possible to enjoy somebody's literature when you're in
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: the back of your mind you're thinking, oh, well, world goal,
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: anchi semitic and you know, Kip playing racist.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Listen, if I didn't, if I didn't read people who
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: you know, I discovered later anti semites that have very
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: few books to read. So you know, you just you
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: find a way to separate the art from the arts.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: It helps that he's dead now, yeah, because like you
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: don't want them to profit off these horrible behaviors.
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  Speaker 3: How did they ever keep this secret when he's so
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  Speaker 3: prominent and so many people apparently knew about it.
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: If it happened early enough, if it happened early enough
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: in the age of the internet, like it just stayed there.
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  Speaker 1: And you know, had it happened had he been doing
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: it now, we would people would have found out, and
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: it would and someone would have posted it that just
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: like what would happened with Neil Gaman, Like it would
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: have come out and in a way that you know,
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: uh not not through like a normal channel.
• 15:18
  Speaker 4: So yeah, yeah, I think you're right all right.
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: Today in Craft Corner we have back with us again.
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: John Myers and Emily Brooks, the authors of Right Better Together,
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: and they've got a podcast themselves this week. They're tackling
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: something different, something geared toward writers preparing for conferences and
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: speaking and writers' groups and all that. I think it's
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: a change of pace, but I think it's a very
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: interesting one. Take it away, John and Emily.
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: Craft Corner.
• 15:56
  Speaker 6: Welcome everybody to Writer con Craft Corner. John Myers from
• 16:00
  Speaker 6: Write Better Together. Hey, look, everybody, as family Brooks.
• 16:03
  Speaker 7: We're talking about the three elements authors should include when
• 16:06
  Speaker 7: building a masterclasses, and we're specifically going to be talking
• 16:10
  Speaker 7: about how to include your attendees. So the very first
• 16:14
  Speaker 7: thing is you want to establish their personal learning objectives
• 16:18
  Speaker 7: from the beginning. Every classroom is different. You have to
• 16:21
  Speaker 7: adjust sometimes based on your class's experience levels or what
• 16:25
  Speaker 7: they really came in for. It's good to ask those
• 16:28
  Speaker 7: questions of who are you, why are you here? If
• 16:31
  Speaker 7: you have a larger class, maybe you can do a survey.
• 16:33
  Speaker 6: If you put your agenda aside and spend the first
• 16:36
  Speaker 6: thirty minutes of those attendees sharing why they're there with you,
• 16:41
  Speaker 6: it will totally change the remaining two and a half
• 16:44
  Speaker 6: hours because they will have clarified what they were trying
• 16:49
  Speaker 6: to get out of the thing, and they will have
• 16:50
  Speaker 6: bonded as a community, and your job is done.
• 16:54
  Speaker 7: The second thing that we do is include interactive exercises
• 16:58
  Speaker 7: that introduce or utilize your main learning objectives. So you
• 17:02
  Speaker 7: could give them any kind of exercise really that is
• 17:04
  Speaker 7: going to help you get that conversation going.
• 17:07
  Speaker 6: It also gets rid of some preconceived notions. You can
• 17:10
  Speaker 6: establish upfront what they thought it was going to be
• 17:13
  Speaker 6: than what it really is.
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: Period.
• 17:15
  Speaker 7: It also makes it more memorable by allowing them to
• 17:18
  Speaker 7: actually practice what you're talking about and they can take
• 17:21
  Speaker 7: that home with them. The last one is to structure
• 17:25
  Speaker 7: time or a strategy for answering questions.
• 17:29
  Speaker 6: So you want to resolve their questions, but you don't
• 17:32
  Speaker 6: have time for a twenty minute soliloquy, and that's not
• 17:34
  Speaker 6: what the other attendees paid for. If you have small
• 17:37
  Speaker 6: moments of time carved out after each segment, and you
• 17:40
  Speaker 6: tell them that upfront, then they'll know, oh, here's my
• 17:43
  Speaker 6: opportunity to ask questions. If it's a longer or more
• 17:47
  Speaker 6: complicated question, you can take that out to the hallway
• 17:50
  Speaker 6: after the session.
• 17:51
  Speaker 7: Or here's my email you can send me questions.
• 17:53
  Speaker 6: Thank you, William, Laura and Jesse for having us on.
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: Thank you John and Emily. All right, Jesse, let's talk
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: to Amy em Lee. Amy em Lee, welcome to the podcast.
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure. You know
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: you've made it when you've been invited to Writer podcast?
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: Is that it? I kind of have that in a quote.
• 18:21
  Speaker 4: We'll put that on the website.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: You got it, all right?
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: Traditional first question, Amy, if you could offer writers one
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: piece of advice.
• 18:31
  Speaker 4: What would it be.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I would say, start yesterday. Everybody always says, you know,
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: I'll start when or I will start promoting when I
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: have my book published. You know, Yeah, as soon as
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: you have that idea and you're going to commit to
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: writing it, that's when you start.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I think you're right.
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: Tell me how did you get started writing? Because I
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: know you've done other things in your life. Where did
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: the writing come from?
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Twenty seventeen, my mom passed away and that's what started
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: my journey to healing. You know, I worked in the
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: corporate space for over twenty years, and when mom passed,
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: I just quit, took two years off, and God told
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: me to write my mom's story, and that's how I
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: started to unearth my heritage, understand my boat refugee experience
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: as you know, a survivor of the Vietnam War, and
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: how we came to the United States. And that just
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: started my journey. And before you know, I had a
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: trilogy with Snow Trilogy and then now it's like nine
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: books later. It's just yeah, it's crazy, how sure we
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: get back.
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: To that though I knew you were from Vietnam boat refugee,
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: tell us about that.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: So the boat people are the refugees who left Vietnam
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: via boat, you know, after the war ended in April
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: nineteen seventy five, which the fiftieth anniversary is coming up
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: this year in April.
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  Speaker 5: Oh wow.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: So hundreds of thousands of people fled the country seeking freedom,
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: and many of them went by boat. In the middle
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: of the night. They were out in the South China Sea.
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: They were hit by pirates, starvation, you know, just sold
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: many things, and a lot of us made it to
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: a refugee camp and then ultimately got sponsored. Some of
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: them got deflected back, some of them never made it
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: and just perished at sea. So but yeah, we were many.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: We were one of the lucky boat people who survived.
• 20:34
  Speaker 5: Can you remember that journey?
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: Is that?
• 20:36
  Speaker 5: How old were you when that happened?
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I was five, and you know, the main
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: reason for us leaving. There were several reasons, but one
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: of us is because I was born with a congenital
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: heart defect and if I didn't get medical care, I
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: would have died before the age of five. So we
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: literally had enough money to scrape it together when I
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: was five to escape the country. We were hit by it,
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: like I said, a lot of storms and irate from
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: that kind of thing. But I came to the United
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: States right when I turned six. I had open heart
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: surgery at Seattle Children's and here I am fifty fifty
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: years old. I'm still kicking.
• 21:17
  Speaker 5: Terrifying to me, it is terrifying.
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: I remember parts of our journey. I remember the boat burning,
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: you know, the beautiful sunsets and sunrises and just a lot,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: and you know it's all in my book.
• 21:28
  Speaker 5: So which, like you said, this is what you captured
• 21:34
  Speaker 5: in your snow trilogy. Can you tell us some more
• 21:37
  Speaker 5: about those books?
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: Absolutely so. Actually, because it's the fiftieth anniversary of the
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: Fall of Saigon this year, which we call it Black April,
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: I released all three books in one volume and it's
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: called the Snow Trilogy Anniversary Edition. But the first book
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: really talks about my mom's journey, how she was betrayed
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: by my dad, what life was like in Vietnam under
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: communist rule, you know, having to survive that, and then
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: the refugee camp and all that stuff. But the second book,
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: Snow in Seattle, is about how we got resettled in America,
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: what life was like for not only us, but for
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: the war veterans to return to the US, finding you know,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: their space and healing. And then the Snow's Kitchen, which
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: is the third book. It's the novella and a cookbook,
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: and it's you know, throughout the three books that we
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: talk about food quite a bit, and so the cookbook
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: kind of ties it all in with some of my
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: favorite recipes, my mom's recipes. But the third book is
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: really about my life as a teenager, trying to figure
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: out my role between the Vietnamese culture and the American culture.
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, wow, I think you mentioned before nine books.
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: Did I hear that correctly?
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: One Snow books and then what okay.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: So I have so Vietnam Snow in Seattle, Snow's Kitchen.
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: I have the Snow Trilogy at a collect edition, but
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: also with Listener Trilogy. It's an anniversary edition. But I
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: at the Copper Phoenix, which I ghost wrote, but the
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: author passed away, so I took full control of that book,
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: so my name's on there. I have Bustop Buddies, which
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: I wrote under my pen name with a collaboration with
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: my son about bullying. It's the middle grade, middle grade
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: fix excuse me fiction. And then I have Immigrants of
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: Immigrant Voices in the Pandemic, which is a collapse in
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: anthology basically that was picked up by Solid Press in
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: the UK. And I have Asian Women Crailblazers who Boss Up,
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: also an anthology of sixteen women who Asian women who
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: are unapologetic about what they do in life. So those
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: are the nine books, and then four coloring books that
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: really don't count, but you know it was fun to do, fantastic.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: Well everything, okay, it counts. And you also started a
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: company quill Hall tell us about that.
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: So quill Hawks started two and a half years ago,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: in August of twenty twenty two, and the name quill
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: Hawk comes from obviously quill for the writing instrument. But
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: the hawk comes from the Seattle Seahawks. I'm originally in Seattle.
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: I thought hawk in the Oklahoma Sky, but no, no.
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: And I'm a Seahawks fan of one of the twelves.
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: And if you're a super fan, you get a hawk
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: name that goes into this list of this book basically,
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: and quill hawk is my name. So that's where that
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: name came from. But I started at two and a
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: half years ago because somebody reached out to me on
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: social media and said, Amy, I've been seeing you hustling
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: your book and doing all these things, but you're doing
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: it wrong and yeah, and then I and he said,
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: I want to show you what you can do to
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: elevate your brand. I really think you need to show
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: authors or you know, educate authors on the process and
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: teach them. And I was very hesitant because I was like,
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: I don't know what I'm doing. I'm just kind of
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: doing and she's like, oh, you know more than you
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: think you know. And that's how that started. And he
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: built me a website and we spent months on getting
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: the seos, the keywords and you know, all that fun stuff.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: And that's how that launched.
• 25:21
  Speaker 5: Go ahead, Laura, I just think that's fascinating. And then
• 25:26
  Speaker 5: is cool Hawk publishing the books or are you helping
• 25:29
  Speaker 5: indie authors to publish their books themselves.
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: So cool Hat Publishing is a hybrid publishing company. We
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: do help authors indie publish their books. And as you know,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: hybrid is kind of a new thing right now. I
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: mean it's been around, but it's kind of new, and
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: it really is debtailing the best traditional publishing and self publishing,
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: you know. And with Quilhawks where we're a little bit
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: different in that we instead of sharing the profits and
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: the royalties with the we actually give the authors full
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: on other royalties and full control of their work, so
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: they have they have full control. And how we make
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: our money is really because of an author subsidized model.
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: We share the costs in publishing and they will, you
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: know less, they provide me five copies of their books,
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: so it's more of a consignment situation. You know, I'll
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: put their books on my bookshelf if they want me
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: to do that. I'll take their books to like a conference,
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: and if I sell it, they get sixty percent. But
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: the shared cost comes from you know, charging them less.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: For example, for editing. You know, editors can charge two
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: to precents let's say per words, and we're more in
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: the one to two cents space, So we really try
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: to make it affordable and accessible for our authors.
• 26:51
  Speaker 5: Okay, what kind of editing do you provide to those authors?
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: I do line editing, but I have three other authors
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: who do editing. One is really good about content editing,
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: the other one loves copy editing. I have a poetry editor,
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: which is a unique space. And so but you know,
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: between us, we kind of rotate the work depending on
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: what the needs are, and we give you know, samples,
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: and sometimes the author will say I like the way
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: Amy works or you know Malia works, and wiggle with that.
• 27:24
  Speaker 5: Nice and and.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: Of course you are talking about marketing a minute ago
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: and somebody telling you you were doing it wrong. Does
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: quill Hack provide that too?
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: So I helped with promos and marketing is not necessarily
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: my strong point, but I do have Media Vines Corporation,
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: Media Vine Corporation and that Digital Rush. Those are my
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: two marketing partners, and so I punch it over to
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: them to manage, and it really depends on what the
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: author wants for marketing. Also, you know what their budget is.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: And sometimes I'll even refer them to like black Chattaux,
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: depending on, you know, what I think is best for
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: the author in terms of their goals.
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: Black Chateau meaning desire. Daffy who's been on the podcast
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: a time or two and also contributed a craft corner
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: like I was trying to get you to do this morning.
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: It's all right, We're good for now.
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I'm happy to do another one, or do one.
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: Please, please do?
• 28:30
  Speaker 5: Are you still doing your own writing, Amy? I'm curious
• 28:33
  Speaker 5: if you intend to do some more writing or if
• 28:36
  Speaker 5: you've just switched to helping other authors now? Was that?
• 28:40
  Speaker 5: Have you kind of.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Working on two projects right now? One is my memoir
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: and the memoir is called From Broken to Brave Memoir
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: of a Heart Warrior, and it's about all the times
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: that my heart was either broken or not functioning in life.
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: Right The only thing that's stopping me from finishing that
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: one is really talking to my roommate from college. We
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: just reconnected after you know, decades, and she has a
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: big piece of my life puzzle that I don't remember
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: I was. I blacked out on that one, and so
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: she's she's got that piece and I need to go
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: fly to Seattle and talk to her. But the other
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: piece I'm working on is my dad's story, and it
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: is you know, he lived a really crazy, horrific life.
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: I would say, way worse than what my mom went through.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: And he's eighty eight. He just flew back to Vietnam
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: and plans I'm living there. So I've got some audio
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: of you know, his story, but my goal, hopefully is
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: to go back to Vietnam and continue that journey with
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: him before he passes.
• 29:48
  Speaker 5: Wow, that's fabulous, that's yeah, this is the time to
• 29:53
  Speaker 5: capture that for sure.
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 29:56
  Speaker 5: Would you consider yourself a panther or a planner? I
• 30:00
  Speaker 5: would think that you need to plan when you're writing
• 30:03
  Speaker 5: something that all encompassing, But how does it work best
• 30:07
  Speaker 5: for you?
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: So I tried to be a plotter when I first
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: wrote Snow in Vietnam, and that just went out the door.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: Like my husband when I, yeah, I committed to writing,
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: he built this whole office like Florida, ceiling of whiteboard
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: and then after five minutes, I was like, I can't
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: do this. In my corporate life, I was very much
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: a planner, you know, But yeah, creative writing I just
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: let the character speak to me and tell me if
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: they want to, you know, die, if they want to
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: eat cereals, breakfasts, I mean they leave the charge.
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: White boards. Was that so you could draw your like,
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: do your outline right on the wall?
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Like all the whole room is a whiteboard,
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: and I tried to map it all out.
• 30:53
  Speaker 3: And few years before that was Faulkner's home and he
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: did this same thing, but he just wrote on the wall.
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: There was nothing fancy there. You could still see the outline.
• 31:06
  Speaker 3: Do a fable right there on the wall.
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: Anyway, I'm sorry, go.
• 31:10
  Speaker 5: Ahead, no problem. I was just gonna say. Philip Margalin
• 31:14
  Speaker 5: in a talk he was giving it specifically said if
• 31:18
  Speaker 5: the outline stops you from writing, to throw it out.
• 31:22
  Speaker 5: So you absolutely did the right thing. So in that light,
• 31:27
  Speaker 5: what does a typical writing day look like for you?
• 31:30
  Speaker 5: When you're writing? What does your process look like?
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: So I usually wake up. I'm an early bird and
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: I'll wake up at you.
• 31:37
  Speaker 5: Know, jealous, I have to be up at like six ish.
• 31:42
  Speaker 5: I get that. But yeah, I'm I'm by nature and
• 31:45
  Speaker 5: night owl.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I get up, I get a little bit
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: of work done, I take my son to school, come back,
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: do my pilates, have my coffee, and then I pound away.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Usually check the mail email first, although I do get
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: easily distracted with social media, so I'm trying to get better.
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: That's my twenty twenty five goal. But and then I'll
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: sit there, you know, I'm usually working until about one
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: or two o'clock, and then I'll break my fast and
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: have a little snack, and then by four o'clock I'm
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: in the kitchen with me something up and get my
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: friend from school, and then we have dinner and yeah, decompressed,
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: and then all over again.
• 32:27
  Speaker 5: That's great, and get a full day and that's awesome.
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, I got a hustle. Yeah, I feel like
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: I started late, you know, with this whole thing and.
• 32:40
  Speaker 5: You and every other rid. Yes, I constantly feel like
• 32:45
  Speaker 5: I'm not getting enough done and not getting done quickly enough.
• 32:48
  Speaker 5: I get it.
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I got a way though. Writer Con was amazing
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: because I moved here in Oklahoma in twenty eighteen and
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty. With my first conference at twenty twenty one,
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: I was invited to the speaker. I was scared because
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: that was my first real big speaking engagement and I
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: spoke about author branding. So if you two, I feel
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: a little bit more comfortable, you know, day by day,
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: conference by conference, but more speaking.
• 33:15
  Speaker 4: Oh good, well, you were terrific. I was.
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: I remember the first time I spoke at a conference
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: it was not terrific. But we're not going to go
• 33:23
  Speaker 3: into that. Lara asked some nice questions.
• 33:27
  Speaker 5: Well, and these conferences that you're attending now speaking at,
• 33:31
  Speaker 5: I mean, what are some of the crafts tips or
• 33:34
  Speaker 5: maybe skill tips, something you've learned along the way you
• 33:39
  Speaker 5: know that you maybe you wish you knew earlier, or
• 33:41
  Speaker 5: that you feel good about sharing with others.
• 33:44
  Speaker 8: Now.
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: I talked to Bill about, you know, the whost show
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: don't tell kind of thing, and one of the biggest
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: tips I got was in everyday life, just have a
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: note pad and look at a door, look at a window,
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: look at a car, whatever, and just jot down some
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: of the things that you notice. What does it feel like,
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: what's the texture, what does it smell like? And it
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: reminds you of you know, those kind of things. And
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: then when you start writing and a door pops up
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: and there's an opportunity to describe the door, You've got
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: your little note already. So I think that's the hardest
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: part for writers, is not telling right.
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: Well, yeah, it's it's your natural, extinct instinct.
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: Let's get there, you know.
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: All right, Amy, one last question, what are you working
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: on now or what can we expect to see from
• 34:35
  Speaker 3: you next?
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: I definitely want to continue promoting Snow Vietnam, you know,
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: my trilogy basically for the anniversary edition, and continue growing
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: Quill Hawk. We've got in two and a half years,
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: fifty four authors under the umbrella, so that is fifty
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: I hear that right, No, I said that wrong. It's
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: two and a half years, fifty four authors.
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: Okay, it's still a good number.
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: Yes, so they keep me busy. But I would like
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: to do some more traveling and speaking engagements. That's my
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: cold for twenty twenty five anyway, and then continue to
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: write my memoir. So Rina, if you're out there, I
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: want to talk to you about my college years.
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: Amy, thanks so much for being on the podcast. We
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: really appreciate it.
• 35:26
  Speaker 8: Take care, toxic, bye bye.
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: Just a few parting words. I got to mention writer
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: con Cruise again. Maybe I should give it a resk,
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: but I just feel like it's January and the cruises
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: in May.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: We're cold now, you could be cold in May.
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: Right, and we're going to Alaska, so you can be yeah, yeah,
• 36:00
  Speaker 3: Do you like this feeling that you're feeling right now?
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: You can have more of it.
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: It may plan now to be freezing cold once again,
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: that's exactly right.
• 36:09
  Speaker 5: It's really the first week of June. It could be
• 36:12
  Speaker 5: getting very warm here. You could welcome yeah, cooler weather
• 36:17
  Speaker 5: of an Alaska cruise.
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: A brisk wind might be just the thing and some
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: winter wonderland.
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: But it'll be cold.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: It will be warmer than seven degrees so right, which
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: is what it is.
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: Right now, and even better over twenty hours of riding
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: instruction large.
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: Warm riding instruction.
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes warm, Yes, well you bring the blankets and no,
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: I'm sure it'll be fine on the boat. Large groups,
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: small group, could treat groups people you can talk to
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: one on one. Plus we have a really good time.
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: So if that sounds like something that might help you
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: get to the next step in your writing, like go
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: take a look at the website which is writer con
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: dot com slash cruise if you want to see the cruise.
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: If you just go to writer Con and you read
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: about everything, the cruise and the retreat and the annual conference.
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: But I'm sure I'll be whacking on about those soon anyway,
• 37:21
  Speaker 3: so I'll leave it for and now. But if you're
• 37:25
  Speaker 3: worried about missing out, you know Fomo and all that,
• 37:29
  Speaker 3: join the writer Con Facebook group and like do it now.
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: Just go to Facebook, search for writer Con, get the group,
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: not the event page, and join. It costs nothing, and
• 37:40
  Speaker 3: I think you have to be approved, and I will
• 37:43
  Speaker 3: I promise next time I get there, you'll be on there.
• 37:46
  Speaker 3: And then you cannot only read what everybody else is posting,
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: but kind of keep on what's going on in the
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: book world and the writer con world in between podcasts.
• 37:56
  Speaker 3: All right, until next time, keep writing and remember you cannot.
• 38:03
  Speaker 4: Fail if you refuse to quit. See you next time,