Devoted to publishing, publishers and to those who craft the written word

"We regret, too, the no-children rule. Some of us feel that Children bring nothing but Joy to all occasions; others feel differently, and this is a discussion we’ve agreed to table until a later time. (Not too much later! Tick tick tick . . .) If it’s any consolation, you’ll be sparing your Little Loved Ones many painful inoculations, and then there’s the whole child-slavery thing."

That's an excerpt from Larry Doyle's insane faux-wedding evite in The New Yorker--the first hyperlinked funny story in that magazine, as far as I know.

Besides writing humor pieces for My Favorite Magazine, Doyle has written scripts for The Simpsons and HBO. He's visiting The Publishing Spot this week to talk about his debut novel, I Love You, Beth Cooper. We'll explore that book later this week. Today, Doyle discusses how he built his web community.

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality interviews with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web publishing.

Jason Boog:
You have a website, a blog, and a collection of yearbook pictures to support your new book. How did you build online community and resources for your book?  How do you communicate with readers? Any advice for a first-time novelist build an online community?

Larry Doyle:
Everything I did was by brute force. Continue reading...

 

If there's a shortcut, I don't know it. I built the sites using some combination of iWeb and Freeway Pro, along with bits and pieces of HTML I picked up along the way. Lots of trial and mostly error. I made my videos using Adobe Premiere, which is not as good as Final Cut but which I already knew how to use.

Most of my Myspace friends I invited personally, looking up their likes and dislikes. There's apparently robot programs you can get to do this for you, but I was told if myspace catches you, they will delete all your friends.

Whatever traffic that has been driven to my site has been through myspace or by blogs who have taken a liking to the book. I'm having trouble maintaining the community, however, due to all the book tour travel.

After I finish writing this sentence, I have 147 emails left to answer.