In My Words: Kimberly Burton Allen, Writer

From NPR Books : Whoops, My Dear Watson:  Anthony Horowitz, the man behind an  upcoming James Bond novel , has a few issues to sort out with Sherlock Holmes first.  Sarah Lyall reports in the New York Times  that advance reading copies of Horowitz's Sherlock novel  Moriarty  contain some not-so-subtle clues to his writing process. Notes to his copy editor have been mistakenly left in, littering the text in all-caps — including this frank assessment: "I'M NOT CHANGING THIS." Knowing how pusillanimously I've proofread the galley copies of each of my books en route to publication, I cringed at the idea of copyediting notes making it to the ARCs w hen I read NPR Books' recent bulletin. But  I laughed out loud at this last line. As a writer, whether you've been published traditionally, used the services of a professional editor, sent your ms to beta readers, been a member of a writer's group or all of the above, you've run up against this declaratio...

In the ongoing debate -- paper or ebook? -- a recent article caught my eye: Science has Great News for People Who Read Actual Books .  The gist of the article is that readers of "real" books engaged more fully with the text, had increased comprehension and could focus better on longer passages, and derived more relaxation while reading. That struck a chord. I am a multi-book-at-a-time, multi-medium reader. At any one time, I have an Audible book on my iPhone, a book on CD in the car, a tower of paper books on my bedside stand, magazines in the bathroom, and several books queued up on my Kindle for anywhere I might go that might require even five minutes of waiting (car wash, dentist, car dealership, someone else's errand). Before the Internet, the article says, people read in a linear fashion, using sensory details in order to remember where key information was by layout. I am definitely one of these readers who subconsciously remember page layout and relative percent...

Remember when we went back to grade school each fall and our first assignment was to write an essay titled "What I Did on My Summer Vacation?" Today is the first day of fall , and a lthough our vacation doesn't happen until winter,  I’ve finally got time to catch my breath and share what I did over the summer: For folks who don’t have a Kindle or prefer to hold a “real” book, I’m excited to announce that all of my novels are now available in print form. (Aren’t they pretty!) Click (actually, Ctrl+click) on any of the titles below to read more about each book, or to read a sample of it on Amazon. BLOOD EXPOSURE Psychological suspense Where blood ties run deep and often intertwine, some secrets are too destructive to reveal. When Merris Alcott begins pulling the family skeletons from the closet, she finds her search for the truth has become the catalyst that threatens to destroy her entire family. Order now: BLOOD EXPOSURE NET STALKER   Psycholo...

When our bed and breakfast guests discover that I am also a writer, they often ask when it is that I get any writing done. With a laugh, I tell them I rise every morning at 4 AM and write for an hour and a half, then take my hour-long walk before showering and beginning the preparations for breakfast.  Yeah, right. The truth is, I admit to them, that little outside of the jotting of ideas and the occasional blog happens while we're busy with A Butler's Manor . Pretty much all my writing gets done between Columbus Day and May Day. I've mentally beat myself up for this for years, until I realized something key the other day: The reason I don't write when it's like a racetrack around here isn't only because I'm too busy with my day job. It's because during our long season, I'm driving the wrong vehicle, the Extrovert SUV. And that is completely opposite the Introvert one-woman kayak I need to be in to write. Guest relations are at the heart of o...

True confession, from someone whose former career was in marketing and advertising: I am lousy at self-promotion. I know I am hardly alone: Most writers I read or follow find it difficult to put the sales hat on when their natural bent is to retreat into the wizard hat of creation. Of course, at a certain tipping point of sales and word of mouth, your name is all the self-promotion you need. But getting to that point involves marketing yourself. In my opinion, the contemporary author most successful at self-promotion is James Patterson, who back in the early years, personally paid the big bucks to run ads for his books in the New York Times Book Review , and later, even television commercials. Truly, how often had you -- have you even today -- seen a TV ad for a book? But it works for him, and according to his (admittedly self-promotional) website, he holds the Guiness record for the most New York Times bestsellers ever. Love his books or hate them, you gotta admit the man is a ma...

On a sultry September day in 1997 (yikes, was it THAT long ago??), UPS rat-tat-tat-tatted on our front door with a square fat box addressed to me. Tears brimmed as I pulled the books from the box. Here they were, my first published book, the first hardcover copies of A Butler's Life. For about a week, I carried a copy with me everywhere. Even if I wasn't showing it to someone (anyone! The clerks at the grocery check out! The bartender at our favorite restaurant! The pharmacist at CVS!), it sat on the passenger seat of my car while I ran errands. On my bedside stand while I slept. On the kitchen counter while I prepared meals. Had there been a Facebook back then, I would have probably annoyed all my friends with my "baby" pictures. Because my last three books have been released first on Kindle, I've forgotten the deliciousness of opening the mailbox to find the physical copy of my book. But two days ago, Choice was released in paperback , and I received the ...

A while back I wrote that I believed  the future of traditional publishing was in trouble.  The future of the printed word has much to do with distribution channels (where and how do we get our books?) and with business models that, in my not so humble opinion, can or should no longer support waste. More and more of us are enjoying the ability to read on our tablets, be it a Kindle, iPad or other e-reader, and they are changing our experience in more ways than you might expect. A classic example:  At our bed and breakfast inn , I meet a lot of guests who are fellow readers. We'll be comparing notes about something we've enjoyed and they'll say, "Oh, if you like Author A, you should try Author B!" And instead of making myself a note in my smart phone where I won't happen upon it again for months, I punch up the app on the spot and send the ebook, or a sample of it, directly to my Kindle. I have done this at bars, yoga studios, sandwich shops, cocktail partie...