The bestselling author of Take Off Your Pants!, the popular outlining guide for writers, is back with another how-to manual for those seeking to start a career in historical fiction. There’s no doubt that historical fiction is popular with readers. In fact, the genre is expanding all the time, gaining market share and influencing other media at a rapid pace. But the HF market has some peculiar quirks that can challenge any writer. In Making It in Historical Fiction, Libbie Hawker shares her knowledge and experience in the world of commercial HF. Hawker’s strategy for success begins long before you write your book. You’ll learn how to spot key opportunities in the modern publishing market, how to create an advance plan for your books that will maximize reader loyalty and build excitement, how to make the genre’s tropes work for you, and more. From understanding the average HF reader to branding your books; from choosing subjects with commercial appeal to fine-tuning dialogue and narrative voice, this book contains everything modern historical novelists need to tap into the commercial potential of the genre.
Author
Libbie was born in Rexburg, Idaho and divided her childhood between Eastern Idaho's rural environs and the greater Seattle area. She presently lives in Seattle, but has also been a resident of Salt Lake City, Utah; Bellingham, Washington; and Tacoma, Washington. She loves to write about character and place, and is inspired by the bleak natural beauty of the Rocky Mountain region and by the fascinating history of the Puget Sound. After three years of trying to break into the publishing industry with her various books under two different pen names, Libbie finally turned her back on the mainstream publishing industry and embraced independent publishing. She now writes her self-published fiction full-time, and enjoys the fact that the writing career she always dreamed of having is fully under her own control. Libbie's writerly influences are varied, and include Vladimir Nabokov, Hilary Mantel, Annie Dillard, George R. R. Martin, songwriter Neko Case, and mixed-media storyteller Chris Onstad, to name but a few. She previously wrote under the pen name L.M. Ironside (historical fiction).
