Fast Chat Friday: Liz Nakazawa

I'm happy to kick off the first edition of Fast Chat Friday, a series of informal end-of-week interviews with writers, publishers, editors and other creatives. This week, you can win a free consultation with book marketing coach Liz Nakazawa. Simply enjoy the chat, then add your name and a comment to be entered in the drawing.


Portland writer and editor Liz Nakazawa is the owner/founder of Market My Books, a firm offering book marketing strategies and coaching. A freelance writer since 1984, Liz has published numerous articles on a variety of subjects. Her work has appeared in Oregon Business Magazine, Christian Science Monitor, Psychology Today, Fitness Magazine, and Northwest Travel. In addition, for ten years she was freelance writing instructor at Portland Sate University.

Liz’s book publishing and promoting career began by publishing of her own work, Deer Drink the Moon: Poems of Oregon, which was named one of the 150 books for the Oregon Sesquicentennial.

Let’s talk first about book marketing. What can you offer authors that they can’t do themselves?

I help authors think outside the "bookstore box" and help them discover different approaches to marketing. For instance, one of my clients wrote a book about the importance of fathers in our lives and he markets mainly to Rotary Clubs all over Oregon. That is his target market as those clubs are very family oriented.

What’s the best thing authors can do to get readers to their book?

The best approach for authors is to do one thing every day to market their book, their gift to the world. There isn't one best approach. Marketing needs to be done on many levels. It is great to market to bookstores but there are 144,000 libraries in the U.S. and that is a huge market. In my classes I discuss the best way to approach libraries. In addition to public libraries there are also academic libraries, prison libraries and many other kinds of libraries.

I like your idea of a strategic plan. In terms of marketing, is there a common miss or mistake you see authors make? Conversely, is there a brilliant move you'd like to see more?

There are two marketing mistakes authors make. One is thinking that you have to spend a lot of money marketing. Many authors spend hundreds of dollars sending slick, multi-page marketing materials to libraries and bookstores by snail mail, a costly decision. A one-page book sheet done as a PDF suffices. This can be then be sent to any prospective buyer. The other mistake is underestimating how interested libraries and bookstores will be in your book. Many libraries, for instance, love local authors and are eager to purchase your book. Do not give it away for free!

As a book editor, you created Deer Drink the Moon, a wonderful collection of work by 33 Oregon poets that “celebrates the state (and state of mind) of Oregon.” How did you come to this project, and to poetry?

I attended a poetry reading honoring our state's late poet laureate, William Stafford. Someone read a very wet-sounding poem, an ocean poem, and then someone read a very dry sounding poem, one set in eastern Oregon. At that moment I thought, "Why not gather poems that reflect the geography, flora and fauna of our diverse state" These poets in the book are finest in the state.

What’s your next project?

My next project is to write a one-act play about a family dealing with Alzheimer's. I know, that is a very different sort of project!


Win a free consultation with book marketing coach Liz Nakazawa. To enter the drawing, simply add your name and a comment below. Or, send a quick email to dcm@drewmyron.com. The winner will be randomly selected and announced next week— on Friday, January 15.

Forecast: Paintings & Poems



Forecast has come home!


Thanks to you, the word-art collaboration created by Tracy Weil & Drew Myron has had a great run:


• The exhibition traveled from Denver's Weilworks Gallery to Boulder's National Center for Atmospheric Research.


• Poems were read at mountain-top weddings and performed in seaside coffeehouses.


• The Special Edition Exhibition Book is featured in libraries and student classrooms nationwide.


Since its debut in Autumn 2008, you've oohed and ahhhed and asked to purchase and now we are happy to announce:


The Forecast paintings/poems are for sale!

Details here: http://weilworks.com/forecast/works.html


Many thanks for your support and appreciation. Tracy and I thrive on on creative collaboration, and your encouragement and enthusiasm fuels our art. Thank you!

Gratitude looks best in cursive

I love January, so full of fresh starts and determination. And I get giddy with the thank you notes this season requires. I love the excuse to write messages — and even full letters! — in a long, careful hand that demands pause and consideration. Because I was three steps behind this entire holiday, I'm using thank you notes as a replacement for the Christmas cards I intended to, but never did, send. Now I get to take my time and pick a card to match each recipient. Funky? Formal? Lined and structured, or scrappy and handmade?


My latest favorite card artist is Kristin Loganbill at Moontea Artwork. From her farm-studio near the Oregon Coast, she creates handsome and homey blockprints. Her art prints now adorn our walls, and her notecards are the ideal instrument to deliver gratitude and glee.


At this end

Burning the Old Year

Letters swallow themselves in seconds.
Notes friends tied to the doorknob,
transparent scarlet paper,
sizzle like moth wings,
marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,
lists of vegetables, partial poems.
Orange swirling flame of days,
so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,
an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.
I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,
only the things I didn’t do
crackle after the blazing dies.

From Words Under The Words: Selected Poems

Sent with love

to december

this is a letter
to december
its chills and surprises
its hurry
its wait

to the longest month
the shortest days
to mittens and chocolate
cookies and nog

to long lines and tired feet
pine, fir
elves, angels
and fa la la la la

this is a story
a memory
a manger
a message
a blessing
a wish

wrapped in hope
tied with peace
sent with love


- drew myron
with thanks and a nod to This is a Letter by Rebecca Dunham

Wordful creation

The best thing about Christmas may be the mindfulness it brings.

Last week the Young Writers, a group of high school-age writers and adult mentors, exchanged gifts. The rules were simple: We each drew a name, and had one week to create a word gift for that person. We could create original poems, songs, letters . . . or share published pieces, or any other wordful creation that reminded us of the name we had drawn.

When we gathered to share our gifts, gratitude and pride circled the room. One student received a love poem, another a letter. One teen was given an inspirational message printed on fancy paper and presented as a scroll. Another a handmade card. A young woman gave me an artful acrostic of my name.

It is a powerful experience to receive a gift that someone had made purposefully for you. Both the giving and receiving require thoughtful consideration and contemplation. And that, really, is the best gift of all.

For the exchange, I drew the director of Seashore Family Literacy, who started the Young Writers Group many years ago. Here's the poem I gave to her:

Lost and Found
for Senitila, who knows

This morning
the young girl
wears a face
wounded by

words

with my arms
around her
I am wounded too
Tonight you call

say

I am lost
I want to tell you
I am lost too
all of us stumbling

hurt and bruised

I want to say
pack for a long trip
plot your way
but instead

we share

a map
worn from
distance and
drift

together

we study the
roads to find
our way
home


— Drew Myron


More Wishes

Earlier this week I called on my favorite writers: What books, I asked, do you hope to find under the tree? The wish lists rushed in. Books for everyone!

Judyth Hill — author of six books of poetry, and author-in-residence at Simple Choice Farm in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico — is bursting with books, wishes and wants:
• The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver (she and Hill are featured at the San Miguel Writers' Conference in February)
• Divisadero by Michael Ondaatje
• Leaping Poetry by Robert Bly ("for the 100th time," jokes Judyth)
• Posthumous Diary by Eugenio Montale
And, she adds, "the usual James Patterson, Patricia Cornwell, Stephen King bonbons!"

Bill Siverly — author of several poetry collections including the recently released Clearwater Way, and editor of Windfall: A Journal of Poetry of Place — says he has "way too many books already" but he'll make have room for Raymond Carver's short stories. "I've never read Carver, whose role in Pacific Northwest writing is considerable." Keeping with the Northwest theme, Siverly recommends three books by Robert Bringhurst who "brings a deep understanding and appreciation of Native American literature and literature in general, especially ancient literatures. A joy to read":

Gail Waldstein, poet and author of To Quit This Calling: Firsthand Tales of a Pediatric Pathologist, offers her book list, along with a wish for more time to read:
• Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro

• Ford County: Stories by John Grisham
• and "any new Carl Hiaasen books!"

Sage Cohen, author of Writing the Life Poetic: A Guide to Reading and Writing Poetry, is all business with her suggestions:
• Get Known Before the Book Deal by Christina Katz

What's on your wish list? Anything to add, expand, highlight, rewrite or delight? Please share your comments, suggestions and reviews here.


Wish List of Books

In this season of giving, the air is filled with urgent ads: Make it a sparkle Christmas, they say. But I say skip the baubles and hand me the books!

I'm not alone. I grilled a few of my favorite writers to see what books they hope to find under the tree. The responses arrived fast and fevered:

Rick Campbell calls himself an "accidental reader." As a professor at Florida A&M University, the director of Anhinga Press, and the author of three poetry books including Dixmont, he's got a full life and a robust reading list. He's reading a dozen books now, including Land of Amnesia by poet Joseph Bathanti; Impetuous Sleeper by poet Donald Morrill; and Chronicles by Bob Dylan. "I've been reading these books for about two years," he says, "except for The Travels of William Bartram, which I've been reading for 30." Despite the ambitious pile, he has his eye on two more:
• Stealing Fatima, a novel by poet/novelist Frank X. Gaspar
• News of the World, Philip Levine's latest book of poems

Kate Maloy, author of Every Last Cuckoo, has holiday hopes pinned on:
• Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, a book about Henry VIII's consuming need for a male heir.
• True Confections by Katharine Weber, though it won't be released until January.
"And," she adds, "if I didn't already have it, I would want Karen Armstrong's The Case for God, which traces wildly varying philosophies and theologies form prehistoric times, including the shifting relationships between science and religion. Erudite and dense with scholarship but mesmerizing."

Liz Nakazawa, whose book Deer Drink the Moon: Poems of Oregon was chosen as one of 150 best books for the Oregon Sesquicentennial, has a few 2009 favorites that would make great gifts:
• Lit, a memoir by Mary Karr
• The Adaptable Man, a novel by Janet Frame

Mark Thalman, author of Catching the Limit, hopes to find five poetry books under the tree:
• In Search of Small Gods, by Jim Harrison
• Another World Instead: The Early Poems of William Stafford, 1937-1947 by William Stafford, edited by Fred Marchant.
• Queen of a Rainy Country: Poems, by Linda Pastan

With so many books, this list is just a start. Check back later this week for more wish lists from authors Sage Cohen, Bill Siverly, Rick Schultze, Gail Waldstein, and more.

Give me the words

I can't shake this song.


In a Manner of Speaking was originally written and recorded in the early 1980s by the experimental postpunk band Tuxedomoon. In 2004, Nouvelle Vague, a French band creating bossa nova covers of punk and new wave classics, reinterpreted the song with haunting vocals by Camille Dalmais.

Described as "moving poetry," the video is an artful blend of words, music and revision. You can also experience the original Tuxedomoon song here.


Book haze, laze, craze

Am I alone in my shopping haze? As in laze. As in behind the curve and calendar. As in Christmas is 2 weeks away and I have not one gift in hand.

It's not enthusiasm I lack, or even ideas. While I was hovered over my coffee cup in a feeble reach for heat, I lost track of days and deadlines and decisions.

My favorite gifts to give and get are books but this year even that path has come up short. Over the years, I've given all my faves: Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott; Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams; Comfort me with Apples by Ruth Reichl; Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner. (Forgive me, friends and family, for sending the same book to you again and again. My tracking has a faulty system — my memory). Last year, in a dreadful display of self-promotion, I even gifted my own book: Forecast: A Word-Art Collaboration.

I need new titles. Won't you help a harried shopper? What books are you giving this year? What books do you hope to receive?


More gifts

You know the saying: You can never be too rich, too thin . . . or have too many journals.


But it's gotta be one that fits just right. None of that precious, museum-quality leather for me. Or delicate pages that can't stand up to a rugged rant.

My favorite journals are the functional works of art found at Ex Libris Anonymous. For several years I've sung the praises of Jacob Deatherage and his knack for salvaging vintage toss-aways and turning them into blank books that inspire and amuse. He's got a brilliant blend of practicality and quirk. I can't get enough of these one-of-a-kind journals! (And mine take a beating, squeezed into luggage and exposed to weather, as you can see.)

These book journals make great gifts, and great keepers, too.

Gifts to give (and keep)

Susan Miller, astrology master of the universe, has strongly advised that I (well, not just me but Pisces worldwide) wrap up holiday shopping by December 9. That's just two days!

Given that Halloween seems like it was just last week, and that Thanksgiving came in a rush of gravy, I've really gotta get on the stick. In my consumer panic, I've gone keyboard crazy. In the last few days I've discovered some great treasures, and strangely they each have a writer/artist theme, making them great gifts to give — and keep!

Today's treasure combines my favorite things — words and art:

Portland, Oregon artist Trish Grantham paints directly on the pages of old books (a page from a 1935 Webster's Dictionary, for example, pictured here), to create layered pieces rich with history, texture and playfulness.

Using acrylic and watercolor paint, Grantham creates a cast of doe-eyed, anime-like people, animals and anthropomorphized objects (like a charming slice of bread).

Grantham's works are wonderfully original and affordable (paintings from $42; cards at $1.20) See her paintings here, and notecards here.





I've been to this party


At the Office Holiday Party

I can now confirm that I am not just fatter
than everyone I work with, but I'm also fatter
than all their spouses. Even the heavily bearded
bear in accounting has a lithe otter-like boyfriend.

When my co-workers brightly introduce me
as the "the funny one in the office," their spouses
give them a look which translates to, Well, duh,
then they both wait for me to say something funny.

A gaggle of models comes shrieking into the bar
to further punctuate why I sometimes hate living
in this city. They glitter, a shiny gang of scissors.
I don't know how to look like I'm not struggling.

Sometimes on the subway back to Queens,
I can tell who's staying on past the Lexington stop
because I have bought their shoes at Payless.
They are shoes that fool absolutely no one.

Everyone wore their special holiday party outfits.
It wasn't until I arrive at the bar that I realized
my special holiday party outfit was exactly the same
as the outfits worn by the restaurant's busboys.

While I'm standing in line for the bathroom,
another patron asks if I'm there to clean it.

— Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz


I am trimming my financial fat — otherwise known as slashing "unnecessary" luxuries from my life — when I find this poem. This gem is in the Winter edition of Rattle, the last issue in my subscription. I wasn't going to renew. Times are lean and I need to cut back, stand tall, carry on and every other recession-era platitude that eliminates fun and replaces it with function.

But then I read this poem. And turn the page and read another great poem. And another. I am glued to the journal, racing and retracing every word and absorbing poets I did not know and now want to (namely Alice Fulton, Molly Peacock and Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz).

Even the bio notes in the back feel insightful. Erik Campbell, author of a startling poignant poem about his father, writes:
"I read and write poetry to remind myself that I have a soul that needs a periodic tuneup."
That seals it. I am renewing my subscription. With balm like this, literary journals are elevated from really-want to must-have.


Events

Write On!

Writing is always in season, and the spring session for youth writing fun begins March 31. Activities are led by Drew Myron, with adult mentors/volunteers, and take place at the Waldport Community Learning Center, in Waldport, Oregon.

• Happy Hour for Young Readers & Writers
3rd, 4th, 5th grade
Wednesdays, 4:30 to 5:30pm

A fun hour of structured reading & writing games and one-on-one reading time. This group is offered through the 21st Century After School Program. Register by calling Melaia Kilduff, Center coordinator, 541.563.3476.

• The Writing Club — for middle school students
6th, 7th, 8th grade
Thursdays, 4:30 to 5:30pm

A fun and engaging way for students to explore creative writing through word games, crafts, poetry and prose. This group is offered through the 21st Century After School Program. Register by calling Melaia Kilduff, Center coordinator, 541.563.3476.

• Writers Group – for high school students
9th, 10th, 11th, 12th grade
Thursdays, 6 to 8pm (includes dinner)

Students generate fresh poetry and prose during this free, weekly session of revved-up writing practice. In this supportive setting, young writers share their work with the group, and enjoy feedback from adult mentors and peers. This activity is free and offered by Seashore Family Literacy. Register by calling Drew Myron, instructor, 541.547.3757. Group is limited to 12 students.

For more information, contact:
Drew Myron, instructor, dcm@drewmyron.com



• • •


Starting Here: A Stafford Celebration takes place on Saturday, January 23 at the Green Salmon Tea & Coffeehouse in Yachats, Oregon. Doors open and music starts at 6:30pm. The reading performance begins at 7pm. Admission is free and open to all ages.

Oregon writers will read a Stafford poem, as well as one of their own pieces written in the spirit of Stafford's works. In addition, members of the audience are invited to read a favorite Stafford poem or to tell a personal anecdote about the late Oregon poet laureate.

Featured writers include: Ingrid Wendt and Ralph Salisbury of Eugene, Flip Garrison of Lincoln City, Ron Brean of Yachats, Khlo Brateng of South Beach, and Drew Myron. Richard Sharpless, of Yachats, will provide music.

This free event is in conjunction with The Friends of William Stafford, a nonprofit organization providing education in literature, particularly in poetry, in a way that will encourage readers, writers and those who aspire to find their own voice. In 2009, there were 60 Stafford celebrations held in Oregon, Washington, California, Kansas, New Jersey, Texas — and Malaysia, Scottland, Mexico and Japan! This event marks the first Yachats celebration.

About William Stafford

William Stafford was one of America's most prolific poets, authoring 67 volumes in his 79 years.

His first book of poetry was published in 1960 when he was 46 years old. Just three years later, in 1963, he won the National Book Award, and later won the Shelley Award from the Poetry Society of America, served as the Poetry Consultant for the Library of Congress, and was appointed Oregon Poet Laureate in 1975.

Stafford had a quiet daily ritual of writing. His poems, typically short, have a “steady quiet,” focusing on the earthy, accessible details. He kept a daily journal for 50 years, and composed nearly 22,000 poems, of which roughly 3,000 were published.

A pacifist, Stafford was a conscientious objector during World War II. He was confined in Civilian Public Service work camps in Arkansas and California, where he did work for the U.S. Forest Service. For the following fifty years, Stafford included poems of pacifism and reconciliation in his readings.

He taught at Lewis and Clark College, and traveled thousands of miles each year to give readings and to encourage aspiring poets throughout the United States, Egypt, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Iran, Germany, Austria, Poland and many other countries.

Stafford was always "listening for the next sound," and "rubbing words together until something sparked." About his work, he once said, "I have woven a parachute out of everything broken."

Stafford died of a heart attack at his home in Lake Oswego on August 28, 1993. He was 79.

You Reading This, Be Ready

William Stafford

Starting here, what do you want to remember?
How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?
What scent of old wood hovers, what softened
sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world
than the breathing respect that you carry
wherever you go right now? Are you waiting
for time to show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this
new glimpse that you found; carry into evening
all that you want from this day. This interval you spent
reading or hearing this, keep it for life—

What can anyone give you greater than now,
starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?


• • •




A free reading event
Saturday, September 19 at 3pm

Looking Glass Bookstore
7983 SE 13th Avenue
Portland, Oregon
503.227.4760

Featuring:
Tess Gallagher — author of the foreword
Holly Hughes — editor
& contributing writers:
Alice Derry
Joseph Green
Kake Huck
Judith Montgomery
Drew Myron
Paulann Petersen
Mark Thalman

Read about the book and event here.

• • •


Book binge

I haven't written a thing. For the last two weeks with the exception of a short grocery list and a quick thank you, I have not crafted a single sentence of meaning or merit. I have been on a book binge instead.


I've been reading nearly a book a day, along with a few magazines, restaurant menus and travel guides. It's been bliss (and much healthier than my typical binge of peanuts and Diet Coke) and without a bit of writer's guilt -- well, maybe a bit of angst the first few days.

Here's a few of my recent favorites:

A bright, lively and evocative collection of essays by women who understand that food and hunger are powerfully wrapped in fear and shame. Editor Harriet Brown gathers a great group of writers, including Caroline Leavitt, Lisa Romeo and Ann Hood.

What took me so long to find author Francine Prose? The author of 15 novels, the aptly-named Prose writes fiction that floats. In this haunting novel, 13-year-old Nico traverses the rocky aftermath of her sister's death.

While many writers get bogged in their own familiar story, author T.C. Boyle reaches wide and deep, with characters and plots that ring page-turning true. From Inner Circle (a fictional account of sex researcher Dr. Alfred Kinsey) to Tortilla Curtain (a tragic tale of Mexican immigrants), Boyle draws me in to seemingly obscure topics. In Drop City, the subject is a 1970s-era commune replete with hippie sex, drugs and a compelling story.

I can't get enough of these electric poems by Rhett Iseman Trull. Real Warnings (winner of the 2008 Anhinga Prize for Poetry) is hot off the presses and sizzling with, as poet Sheryl St. Germain says, "the brutal paradoxes of love and of loving damaged things." Stay tuned for my interview with Rhett to be posted here soon.

I sense my book binge coming to an end. Boosted by the words of others, I will again pick up my pen and carve my way through a forest of ideas. How about you? What are you writing, reading or creating today?


To live the question

A young friend and I exchange letters.


Who are you today? we ask ourselves and each other. Our answers come in fits and starts. Long pauses. Weeks of delay and churning uncertainty.

I am grateful for the examination. Appreciating the lack of a fixed reply, I applaud her search. Answers do arrive, I tell her (and myself), in letters, books, in shifts of illumination when we are not looking. Last night, for example, I landed on this passage:

Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They can not now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.

— Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet


November light


Something about November makes me sad in a not-so-awful way. It's the long-goodbye light that casts everything— from water to mood — in a tender, ending sad.

The garden is forgotten

in November’s thin light. Shadows yawn

sad and I am surrounded by things we

covet, yet forget:


sunflowers, a tomato’s full curve, the snap

of carrots — wilted from a rigored season.

Now tomatoes lie bruised, sunflowers quiet


and leggy. Even the crabgrass is worn with

effort. Something inside me swells in

this frail autumn glow. I don’t know if


it is fatigue or forever.



— From Forecast, a word-art collaboration featuring poems by Drew Myron and interpretive paintings by Tracy Weil. Special Edition Exhibition Book and prints are available at www.weilworks.com/forecast.