BAIPA members Betsy Graziani Fasbinder, John Byrne Barry, and Becky Parker Geist will be leading local workshops this month and next.
Betsy Graziani Fasbinder, who presented “From Page to Stage” at BAIPA in October 2017, will be at Book Passage on May 26, presenting “Public Speaking Skills for Today’s Writers — Pitfalls to Avoid, Practices that Pay Off” at the California Writers Club Marin meeting.
Every author, or author-to-be—whether they write literary fiction, memoir, sci-fi, romance, poetry, or how-to—has heard about how valuable it is to build their “writer’s platform.” They spend tons of time, money, and energy gathering names for their email lists, beefing up their social media presence, and hiring publicists to help them secure interviews to promote their books.
But many authors forget that once they build that platform, somebody is going to have to stand on it…and speak…to people.
Betsy will help prepare writers to engage audiences of any size. She is the author of Page to Stage: Inspiration, Tools, and Public Speaking Tips for Writers, a novel, Fire & Water, and a memoir, Filling Her Shoes.
On June 23, Becky Parker Geist will lead “Bring Your Book to Life in Audio” at Book Passage, also for the California Writers Club Marin.
Audiobooks are hot—but can also be costly to produce. Find out what you need to know to make good decisions about audio and how to leverage an audiobook to achieve your goals. You’ll learn:
- Key considerations in audiobook decision-making
- Production: how to, how long, how much
- Distribution—options, royalties
- Marketing your audiobook
Becky Parker Geist is an audiobook producer and narrator with 37+ years of experience in the audiobook industry. She is the owner of Pro Audio Voices, and has narrated and/or produced well over 200 titles to date. She is also president of BAIPA.
BAIPA board member and author John Byrne Barry will be leading a workshop in Oakland on Wednesday, June 5, on Setting That Works: How Memorable Setting Can Advance Plot, Reveal Character, Echo Theme, and More. The event, hosted by the California Writers Club Berkeley, will be at WeWork in downtown Oakland, 1111 Broadway, at 6 p.m.
The primary job of setting — in fiction, memoir, and narrative nonfiction — is to immerse readers in the scene. So they can visualize it, feel it, smell it. But the most memorable and effective setting is more than a pretty, or gritty description. It’s working multiple “jobs” — advancing your plot, unifying various elements of your story, defining and revealing character.
This hands-on workshop will also include several writing exercises where you’ll get a chance to put what you’ve learned into action.
John is author of two novels — Bones in the Wash: Politics is Tough. Family is Tougher, set during the 2008 presidential campaign in New Mexico, and Wasted, a “green noir” mystery set in the Berkeley recycling world. His third novel, due later this year, is an assisted suicide family thriller called Why I Killed My Father.
[Note: This event was rescheduled from April 3 in Berkeley to June 5 in Oakland.]
great programs!!! what time do the Book Passages ones start?