Fable & The Verbivore Fable & The Verbivore

Today on Fable and the Verbivore, we talk about the specific questions Fable used to help develop her own author brand.

This episode is part two of our new series on developing a distinctive brand as an author. In it, we dig into Fable’s personal author mission statement and brand and how she went about refining and building it over the last two years. Specifically, by looking at her books and asking herself what her writing is and what it isn’t.

In this conversation, we talk about a method for brainstorming and workshopping your own personal author brand by reviewing the natural tendencies within your work and asking yourself some key introspective and fill-in-the-blank questions. 

Things like:
- What is consistent across my work?
- What are my strengths? 
- What are my weaknesses?
- My voice is…
- My reader wants…
- My reader needs…
- When they read my stories, they want to feel…
- They read my books, when they want (a consistent thread or experience)...
- My reader’s pain points are…
- What gaps in the market can I fill?
- What is the kind(s) of story readers can expect from me?
- My target audience is…
- My author competitors are…
- My ideal readers are…
- What font and colors best reflect the feeling of my brand?

For instance, Fable’s brand is writing clean, crisp, exciting, fast-paced, and entertaining stories that will make you lose sleep, miss your bus stop, or burn dinner. She enjoys crafting and helping others craft stories that you can’t put down. Her books are speculative with magic, monsters, and aliens. 

Towards the end of this conversation, Fable talks about how part of this process for her was using concrete examples that encouraged readers to think of the last time they felt a certain way about a book (unable to put it down, pulled out of a reading slump, lost in a great story) and in that way tie her work to something that’s familiar by helping them to feel (not just know) what her books are like.

We hope you enjoy listening to this episode and that you find it useful wherever you are at on your writing journey!

We’ll be back next week with part three of this new series on author branding to discuss how The Verbivore answered these same questions. Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore

This week, Fable and The Verbivore discuss creating an author brand name for your writing.

This episode is part one of our new series on developing a brand for your stories. And we open, by giving a broad definition from TechTarget.com that calls a brand “a product, service or concept that is publicly distinguished from other products, services or concepts so that it can be easily communicated and usually marketed. Branding is the process of creating and disseminating the brand name, its qualities and personality.”

But also, branding is:
- What people think of or associate with you
- Defined by a persona and specific attributes
- The feel/vibe/emotion connected with your work
- An aspect of your work that makes it distinctive from the work of others

In this conversation, we cover a lot of ground about branding and reasons why we feel every author should work on developing their own. 

Things like the following:
- Step back from your work and assess what is already part of your writing
- Get specific and intentional on the story of your brand
- Tap into the vibe/emotion behind your work and express it visually — through colors, fonts, and images
- Be willing to sit with, workshop, and play with different ideas as you begin to hone in on your brand
- Find the niche or distinctive white space in the market that you naturally fall into and enfold that USP (unique selling proposition) into the story of your author brand and marketing materials
- Once you have developed a brand, find ways of being consistent through the things you create — even websites, your bio, and social media posts

Towards the end of this conversation, we talk about the importance of tying all of this back to the specific feeling you want a reader to have with your work — using a concrete example to not just tell them how you hope your work will make them feel but show them. And, also, viscerally remind you as you write what feel you’re aiming towards.

We hope you enjoy listening to this episode and that you find it useful wherever you are at on your writing journey!

We’ll be back next week with part two of this new series on author branding to discuss some specific questions to consider. Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore

This week, Fable and The Verbivore talk about the ins and outs of using pen names.

We open by discussing some of the reasons why people choose to use pen names. For instance: 
- Managing reader expectation across different genres, tones, or spice or violence levels of your stories
- Separating out your writing work from your personal life or other professional work
- Making it easier for readers to find you and your work in a search if you have a common name (like Johnson)
- Using a name that is more memorable, easier to spell/pronounce, or more directly reflects the feel of your stories

In this episode, we cover a lot of ground about both the personal side and the logistical side of working with a pen name. 

Things like the following:
- Googling the proposed name to see how easy or difficult it would be to find you and if there could be things associated with the name that you would not want to reflect on your work
- Remembering that this name will represent you and your writing for a period of time and choosing something that feels like a reflection of you or your brand and you wouldn’t mind directly being called or associated with
- Deciding whether or not setting up an LLC under the pen name is a right choice for you and some resources for how to go about it
- Copyrighting under a pen name and thinking what situations are worth defending and what ones aren’t worth the effort and financial outlay

Towards the end of this conversation, we note that there are no right answers if you decide to go this route, but that being informed of what some of the options are will help you make the most empowered decisions for you. And if you decide to use one or more pen names for your work, you’re in good company because many authors do. 

We hope you enjoy listening to this episode and that you find it useful wherever you are at on your writing journey!

Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore

Today, Fable and The Verbivore discuss a variety of books, YouTube videos, and articles that we’ve connected with on the writing craft.

As we done on previous episodes, we talk about several new writing craft books we’ve loved reading. But, we also end by talking about some fantastic free YouTube and internet article resources that are available to anyone and that we’ve personally found helpful in developing our writing.

Things like the following:
- Lisa Cron’s Wired for Story - Storytelling from a neuroscience perspective, what our brains are doing as we interact with different elements of stories and how to use that to make our stories stronger and know when it makes sense for the rules to be followed and when they should be broken
- James Scott Bell’s How to Make a Living as a Writer - Contains a great overview of the business side of writing. Includes: writing a business plan, increasing the speed at which you write, organizing yourself, marketing your book, where and how to invest in your work
- Chuck Wendig’s Gentle Writing Advice: How to Be a Writer Without Destroying Yourself - Unpacks a lot of truths about the complexities and contradictions of the writing craft, and advice for what to do when you hit a wall or push yourself to the brink
- Joanne Harris’ Ten Things About Writing: Build Your Story, One Word at a Time - Potent and consumable tweet sized information on a variety of craft related subjects. Useful at any part of your writing journey.
- “TedEd Writing Workshop” and “TedTalk on Writing” YouTube Playlists - Short , entertaining, and packed full of useful writing nuggets.
- “Diane Callahan - Quotidian Writer” YouTube Channel - Serves as an in-depth writing writing 101 class with video topics on a variety of topics from Book Titles to Under/Over writing
- “Like Stories of Old” YouTube Channel - Unpacks current cinema from a variety of storytelling lens (such as: theme, symbolism, what we as humans believe, archetypes)
- “Actors on Actors” and “Directors on Directors” YouTube Playlists by Variety - Actors unpacking the craft and emotional side of embodying characters and tell their stories authentically, Directors unpacking the elements that make up their story and the specifics behind individual scenes
- Brandilyn Collins' Getting Into Character: Seven Secrets A Novelist Can Learn From Actors - Helps writers get into your characters mindset and voice and develope their characters by using embodying techniques from actors

We end by talking about how sometimes the greatest resources we’ve come across have been in a small book with a terrible cover, a YouTube video essay, or are freely available articles on websites such as Writers Helping Writers & One Stop for Writers, MasterClass.com Articles, WritersDigest.com, Reedsy.com blog, and LitHub.

We hope you enjoy listening to this episode and that you find it encouraging wherever you are at on your writing journey!

Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore

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Today on Fable and the Verbivore, we’re sharing our latest book reads conversation — this is part 2 of 2 featuring Fable’s stories!

Over the last few months instead of doing our typical bookclub episodes, we’ve started talking about some of the things we’ve recently read and enjoyed, connected with, or learned from. It’s been a great way to share what we’re consuming and loving lately and finding new recommendations.

In this episode, Fable talks about her new second favorite writing craft book; a sweet monster romance with a cinnamon roll male lead who is recovering from a previous toxic relationship; a dark, high stakes fantasy romance with great tension and pacing and that’s first in a series where the author decided to have the plots of all three books happen at the same time; and a promising author whose in progress first book Fable fell in love with during her beta read and is currently obsessed with.

We also talk a lot about these stories from a craft perspective and what the authors did that we found interesting. Things like:
- Wired for Story - From a neuroscience perspective, this book unpacks how effective storytelling strategies tend to work in our brains and why.
- Tiger by the Tail - Turning the gender stereotype script and having a male character need to grapple with an abusive relationship and the new love interest help support him, Well-developed neurodiverse characters
- Her Soul to Take - A dark fantasy romance with believably high stakes, great drive to the story, and character motivation; Studying how the author went about plotting three stories to interweave into each other and occur simultaneously

We hope you enjoy this episode! Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore

These notes include affiliate links.

Today on Fable and the Verbivore, we’re sharing our latest book reads conversation — this is part 1 of 2 featuring the Verbivore’s stories!

Over the last few months instead of doing our typical bookclub episodes, we’ve started talking about some of the things we’ve recently read and enjoyed, connected with, or learned from. It’s been a great way to share what we’re consuming and loving lately and finding new recommendations.

In this episode, the Verbivore covers a range of books, shows, and one film - a funny and poignant coming-of-age story, three hilarious and delightful romcoms, two much anticipated books by a couple of her favorite authors, a prequel book and it’s blockbuster adaptation, and several critically well received Netflix series.

We also talk a lot about these stories from a craft perspective, what the authors, writers, or directors did that we found interesting. Things like:
- Frankly in Love - The impact choices can have on the tone of a scene; How to craft a personal story that can bring readers to laughter and tears
- Loathe at First Sight: A Novel - Generational tension adding pressure on the main character’s situation; Balancing humor, building romantic connection, and saying something about the negative aspects of toxic work environments
- The Soulmate Equation - Character precise and flavourful characters; Creating relationship dynamics that are believable and supportive, but have natural obstacles and tensions that feel organic when problems arise
- A Curse for True Love - Filling stories with larger than life characters, flavor, color, drama, and magic; Using the unique aspects of the world (a story curse) to create added details with bonus content
- Check and Mate - Changing genres from Adult to YA; Exploring scientific and psychological concepts (like Stereotype threat) in a fun and delightful story setting
- The American Roommate Experiment - Using your experience from a meta standpoint to bleed into the story; A great example of an author progressing in their craft from one book to the next; A swoonworthy male lead who cooks, is a sweet cinnamon role, and has an edge and a past
- The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (& Film adaptation) - A lesson in giving your readers things to hope for, even when they ultimately know how a story ends; How to boil down and take the imperative aspects of a story into an adaptation
- Wednesday Season 1 - Knowing the tone you’re wanting to set and leaning into the details that help make a story world feel real and grounded in reality
- The Queen’s Gambit - Sitting with a character over time and watching them grow and develop, but also have setbacks; A great example of interwoven storytelling that combine the past, present, and a clear objective
- Queen Charlotte - The first 15 to 20 minutes are brilliant in introducing the audience to the character with only a few key scenes; Taking a character we think we know and pulling back the curtain on who they are and why they are that way
- The Marvels - Creating an antagonist whose motivations we not only understand, but could see us doing under the right circumstances; Interweaving the storylines of several characters and leaning into the tensions and awkwardnesses that naturally unfold from the situations; Balancing humor and high stakes situations

We hope you enjoy this episode! Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,
Fable & The Verbivore