Speechifying

sharon — Wed, 27 Jul 2016 18:45:41 +0000

This week is the Democratic National Convention, and last week was the Republican National Convention. Don’t worry, this isn’t turning into a politics blog! There’s actually a lot you can learn about effective writing from paying attention to the conventions, regardless of which party you gravitate towards. Because conventions are all about speeches, and speeches are all about writing persuasively. Sure, it’s partly in the delivery, but a well-written speech can elevate a decent speaker to a great one, while a poorly written one can waste the most charming candidate’s time with the mic. So pay attention to which speeches keep your interest—and which speeches people are talking about, sharing links to, quoting from the next day—and then spend some time reading and thinking about how the writers put the speech together.

DGLM client Roy Peter Clark did this with Michelle Obama’s speech at the opening night of the DNC. Clark identifies eight lessons from the First Lady’s speech that writers of any kind can benefit from. Strategies like “Use first person, second person and third person to create specific effects” and “Express your best thought in a short sentence.” These are especially useful if you’re working on a piece of writing meant to prove a point or win someone’s allegiance…for example, a query letter!

So next time you tune into a political speech, pay attention to not just what the speaker says, but how they say it! Find some inspiration for your own work (just be careful you take inspiration only, no fair hacking the actual words of the poor hard-working caffeine-addicted speechwriters!). And don’t forget to VOTE!

What tip in Roy Peter Clark’s list do you find most useful? Let us know in the comments if you’ve seen anything else in the presidential conventions that you want to apply to your query letter!

I VOTED

sharon — Tue, 04 Nov 2014 21:08:52 +0000

It’s Election Day today! Kudos to those of you already proudly sporting an I VOTED sticker, and to those of you who will make it to the polls by the end of the day. But don’t let the voting fun end there! Another election is taking place right now, one even more exciting and important than the one which determines our nation’s government – and you don’t even have to wait in line in a school gymnasium to vote in this one: The 2014 Goodreads Choice Awards.

Okay, so maybe this is a little more for fun and a little less for the fate of the future (unless you’re an author with a book in the running, that is!). But it’s still fun to think about your favorite books of the year. There are 15 books presented in each category –Goodreads picked their initial nominees based on the stats from their site, so it’s TRULY democratic. But don’t worry, you can write in your own picks as well! And if you’re like me, and second-guess every award short list that’s announced, this is the perfect chance to actually have a say in picking winners!

New to Goodreads? It’s a fun way to catalog the books you own, the books you’ve read, or to simply check out what passionate readers thought of a book you’ve been planning to pick up – I’m planning to check out The Romanov Sisters and The Museum of Extraordinary Things. So click through the categories and cast your vote. Bonus points if you just so happen to vote for some DGLM authors’ books, like these Jim suggested on Twitter for starters.

Did you any books that didn’t appear on the list as nominees? Add any new titles to your To Read list? What’s your favorite way to use Goodreads?

Dystel, Goderich & Bourret » Voting

Speechifying

I VOTED