Advice for New Bloggers 101

Skiing at the Brunswick Naval Air Station

My third anniversary seems the right time to share my experience of blogging, especially since my friend Maria Padian asked for advice as a newbie blogger. Do comment with more tips. As I said to Maria, the best part of blogging is the community.

My blog started as a place to gather material for my novels and to stay in touch with friends and family while living abroad. In 2007 my family was moving to England for a year. At lunch with my literary agent in NYC, she encouraged me to start blogging right away. She thought I’d enjoy it. I did, but it took months to build a following.

Back in 2007 the blogging community was barely connected. People were always asking, “What’s a blog?” This was in a time before “followers” and hyperlinked Blogger profiles. RSS feeds were brand new. Dial-up modems were common. Photos slow to load. WiFi rare. System crashes common. I typed in a shoebox in the middle of the road….

Nonetheless, my blog proved to be an invaluable writing tool and a storefront for my artwork. In England I was still working on my American novel S.A.D., and the Maine posts provided inspiration and material, like my lobstering jaunt. Now I revisit the Oxford posts to work on my English novel A MATCH FOR EVE (working title). I’ve sold paintings and photos as well, but the commercial side of blogging is secondary. I don’t sponsor advertisements, and I avoid commercial sites.

Most of all, it’s the community that makes blogging worthwhile. Writing and art are solitary occupations; you are my connection to the world. I look forward all week to my Wednesday blog days. There are true friendships in cyberspace. If you don’t believe that, then you aren’t a seasoned blogger.

 Now that I've broken the ice, let me share some blogging tips:

READ other blogs before you start to get ideas. Start commenting.

BLOGGER PROFILE: anyone can create a profile for free, even if your blog is hosted outside Google Blogger or you haven’t started. List all your interests; these are hyperlinks. Use them to find other bloggers who share your interests. Be sure to include an email so people can contact you. Enable share profile; it defaults to hide it.

BE YOURSELF: blogs are personal so get ready to share. Pick suitable content. Assume the last person you want to read it will. Be honest but don’t be snarky or mean. People may still identify you under a fake name.

DON’T SELL: a sales pitch is a big turn off. Many author blogs are boring because all they post are signings, fan mail, sales figures and reviews of their books. If you post good content, people will be interested in your books.

LENGTH: too short is better than too long. People read lots of blogs. Long paragraphs are hard to read, so are colorful fonts and backgrounds. Don’t post every photo from your vacation. Occasional longer posts, like an author interview, are fine. Revise and condense. I know; I’m guilty of long posts like this one!

FREQUENCY: post regularly or you’ll lose your following. An occasional vacation is fine, but let us know when you’ll be back. You can program your blog to publish while you are away in EDIT POSTS under POST OPTIONS. Pick a rhythm that works with your lifestyle, be it weekly or daily. The social side of blogging is time consuming (but rewarding.)

COMMENTING: respond to comments promptly either on your blog or on the commenter’s. Delete ads and abusive comments; don’t respond to them. Visit other blogs and leave comments about that post, but don’t push your blog. If you write thoughtful comments, they’ll come visit you too via your profile. Don't post the same comment every time and everywhere.  This is NOT a good comment: I love your blog, come visit mine - link.

FOLLOW: click on “follow this blog” in the sidebar, which will create an RSS feed in your blogger dashboard. Add a follow widget to your blog from LAYOUT. You can also add “blogs I follow” to your sidebar or reveal it on your profile. Don't wait for followers to find you; go find them.

LINK LOVE: to create a community, link to other blogs in your posts and sidebar. If you read a cool post, share it. Personally, I find awards that require the recipient to post and to pass them as irritating as chain letters. I have my own feature, “blog watch,” where I link to posts of interest with no strings attached. Feel free to use that meme but credit me. If you borrow a meme, always credit the source with a link.

ROUND UPS: to broaden your circle, join a regular blog round up. Visit and comment on all posts. I’m a regular contributor to the monthly Book Review Club hosted by Barrie Summy. You can even host your own.

PROTECT MINORS: do not post photos of children with their names and location. There are sick people out there. Also your kids, as they get older, will value privacy. If you swear or post unsuitable content, Google Blogger will ban you.

RESPECT COPYRIGHT: quote and cite written material.  Add a link if it came from another blog.  Get permission to repost from another blog.  Do not reproduce artwork or photos without permission from the artist or at very least cite the source with a link. Better yet, post your own photos. Add a watermark to discourage copyright infringement.

BOOK BLOGGERS: explain your review criteria and post it in your sidebar along with your contact email. FTC rules in the USA require that you state if you received a free product, like an ARC. Reveal personal connections. Don’t expect publishers to send you ARCs until you have a large following and stats to prove it. Visit your library or join online book swaps if you are short on cash.  Everyone knows that Jane Austen is good; review new authors, who need help getting their name out there. You don't need permission to post book jackets, short quotations (but check with publisher if an ARC), book trailers or links to authors. Story Siren posts helpful blogging advice and excellent YA reviews. She has become a hub of the YA blogging community by facilitating connections. Dovegreyreader scribbles blends personal life (Devon, England) with quality reading; I love her blog.

TRACKING STATISTICS: anyone with a Google account can use Google Analytics for free. There is a link to "Analytics" on your "My Account" page. Follow instructions to install the html code on your blog. Don't worry about low stats. It can take 6 months for search engines to find a new site.

HAVE FUN: blogging should not feel like a chore. If it does, take a vacation or stop. Forced posts or whiny ones are not fun to read. If you have nothing to say, you are spending too much time online. Get out there. Enjoy!

If you have more blogging tips, please add a comment.  So ends Blogger 101.

Note: shoebox line adapted from Monty Python.  I shot the photos at the Brunswick Naval Air Station last weekend.  My son took the photos of me and Stella in the fields.  Dogs aren't allowed on the groomed ski trails.  Maria Padian is a young adult author; check out her new blog, Teens, Writing and Randomness, and say hello.

10X10 Art Show in Brunswick, Maine

Can you believe that tomorrow is October? It’s almost time for the10X10 Art Exhibit and Sale to benefit Arts Are Elementary. AAE  is a non-profit organization that brings artists to Brunswick public elementary schools. The show opens on Friday October 9th at 5pm and will be up until the end of the month. Poster art "Circles" embroidered by Kimberly Christensen at Spindleworks.

When my daughter was in 4th grade, visiting artists helped the kids create unique claymation movies.  My friend Charlotte Agell, an author-illustrator, works with first graders to make picture books and also contributes to the AAE show. There are many other artists participating. It’s a wonderful supplement to the curriculum.

I blogged about the first annual 10X10 Art Show last year. Despite opening in the wake of the stock market crash,  the townspeople showed strong support.  I sold a painting last year and have a new one in this year’s exhibit. All works are 10 by 10 inches, come framed and priced at $200.

Artists include a statement with their work. Here's mine for this year:

“Lookout Point, Harpswell” watercolor by Sarah Laurence

Rain made this a challenging summer to paint "en plein air." One evening in late August, the light was perfect. I drove to Harpswell because it was close to my home. I’d visited Lookout Point three years ago while researching lobstering for my novel S.A.D.. 

It was indeed a perfect spot to paint. The goldenrod was blooming and lobster pots were bobbing as the high tide reversed. I had to work quickly in the fading light. As the setting sun shot rays under thick clouds, my palette shifted to pinks, golds and purples. The colors truly were that amazing.  

A painting on location captures a protracted moment in time (eg. the full sunset) whereas a photo would only capture an instant. This is why I work from life.  

Above is my photo of the same island (to right) at a different angle and time of day. The camera sees differently than the eye.  The wide angle lens flattens out the coastal landscape. The water appears more stagnant. The light is flat.  Some images are better captured with watercolor, some with the camera. I prefer to keep them separate, as opposed to painting from a photograph.

Every artist has a unique vision, and the 10X10 captures this diversity so well. The aquatic theme on my blog is a coincidence - Brunswick is a coastal town. Here's a sneak preview from 2 more artists:

"Red Reflection" gouache on wood pannel by Will Wilkoff

"Red Drum" textile art by Catherine Worthington

10X10
Benefit Art Exhibit and Sale
Friday Oct. 9, 5pm-8pm
and Saturday Oct. 10, 10am-4pm
Brunswick, Maine
3 venues: 


1. Morrell Meeting Room at Curtis Memorial Library, 23 Pleasant St.
2. Points of View Gallery in Brunswick Business Center, 18 Pleasant St.
3. Gallery Framing, 12 Pleasant St

All artwork priced $200 and ready to hang to benefit AAE

There are 300 pieces by 130 Maine artists.  My art is in venue #1.

Press: 10X10 Art Show in the Times Record newspaper.
My painting is there too!

Blog Watch:

• Dreams can come true. Congratulations to Steph Bowe @ Hey! Teenager of the Year for landing a literary agent. Fifteen-year-old Steph is being home-schooled in Australia. She has a fun Young Adult book blog (in my sidebar) that is definitely worth checking out. Her novel is YA fiction too. Good luck, Steph!

• If you are a Google blogger, check out the updated post editor.  From your dashboard, select “settings” and then the “basics” tab.  Down at the bottom is “Global Settings.” If you have  “old editor,” try “updated editor.” It makes adding multiple photos to your blog much easier.  From the preview box, you can place the photo exactly where you want in the text, resize and change alignment easily.  It also gives a post preview that looks exactly like it will when published. Finally!

Note: images reproduced by permission of the artists and under copyright.

Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature by Robin Brande

Speaking of freaks of nature, check out my dog. Stella stuck her head in a garbage bin and couldn’t get out. Not all dog behavior is adaptive. Humans breed them for certain characteristics (like staying cute and puppyish) that wouldn't help them to survive in the wild.

Retrievers are like grown puppies. Their ears remain floppy (instead of perking up like a wolf's ears in adulthood) as this secondary trait accompanies domesticity. If you selectively breed foxes to be friendly to humans, their ears droop too. In Robin Brande's young adult novel, Evolution, Me and Other Freaks of Nature, two teenagers test the theory of evolution on a litter of puppies.

The book opens with a living nightmare: Mena Reece has been expelled from her church for doing what she believed to be the right thing. Even Mena’s parents are disappointed in her. The Reeces have lost social standing and their family business is threatened. Everyone blames Mena. She starts high school with all of her friends hating her.

Then Mena makes a new friend in Biology class. Casey is a boy genius with a sense of humor and a house full of puppies (smarter than mine.) Plus he’s cute. Life is good until Ms. Shepherd begins the unit on evolution. In protest, all of Mena’s old church buddies physically turn their backs on the teacher. They demand that Ms. Shepherd teach intelligent design, not evolution. Mena is in a quandary: can she believe in evolution and in God? Mena opens her Bible and searches for a resolution. She blogs as Bible Grrrl.

Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature is a sweet, innocent story which I think would appeal most to girls aged 11-14. The science is explained and simplified for young readers and put in a real-life context. I would have loved having Ms. Shepherd as a teacher. She really brings the subject to life and makes it fun without sounding too didactic.

Mena narrates the story day-by-day with lots of detail, just like my middle school children when they come home from school. As a result, the voice sounds authentic, but the story doesn’t really take off until we finally hear what it was that Mena did that turned her church against her. Keep reading, it’s worth it. Curiosity and good writing kept me going.

It was an excellent choice to have an evangelical teenager who likes science as the protagonist. Mena is a very sympathetic and likable character. I wish Brande had fleshed out the other evangelical characters because it was hard to see why Mena was once friends with them. All we hear about is how mean and unreasonable they are to Mena and to others.

Nonetheless, this isn’t an anti-religion book but an exploration of how one might reconcile faith and science. Brande was once a Sunday School teacher. It’s a book with a message and won an American Library Association Notable Book Award for 2007.

Additional Reading:

My friend Maria Padian, a YA author, recommended Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature to me because my novel, S.A.D. (not yet published,) deals with a similar topic. My story is about school board politics and how the issue of intelligent vs. evolution divides a small town. I use adult and teenaged characters of several faiths to give multiple perspectives. It was interesting to see this material interpreted for a younger audience. Brande did a great job with it.

I’d recommend Born Again by Kelly Kerney to all ages. It’s a young adult crossover novel about a teenaged girl discovering evolution and questioning her evangelical beliefs. The author was raised in a Pentecostal Church and graduated from Bowdoin College. It's very good.

To learn more about the philosophical debate on intelligent design, read Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics, edited by Robert T. Pennock. It includes essays on both sides, although the editor is a critic of I.D. The thick book is an excellent resource geared toward a college audience.

For anyone looking for a guide to the American legal history, I’d recommend In the Light of Evolution: Science on Trial by Randy Moore published by the National Association of Biology Teachers. It was designed as a classrom supplement for high school teachers.

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@Barrie Summy

Congratulations to my daughter! She has a poem, “American in England,” in the summer issue of KidSpirit Magazine.

Have a Happy Fourth of July! I’m taking a blog vacation to hang out at the beach with the kids and my paint brushes. I’ll be back in two weeks to show you around North London where I collected material for NOT CRICKET (my work in progress.)

Next post: Wednesday July 15th.

Skiing at the Brunswick Naval Air Station

Help! I’m feeling a bit snowed under. I think our barbecue is under that pile to the left, but I haven’t seen it in months. It is snowing right now. Welcome to Maine in March. While the rest of you are admiring your daffodils, Maine gets the most snow all winter this month. This year and last year were unusually snowy. During the day, the drifts shrink under the warm sun. At night it falls below freezing, and un-groomed snow becomes a treacherous sheet of ice.

What is a Mainer to do? Head to the Brunswick Naval Air Station to ski. The sailors have kindly groomed a double track through the woods and a single track around the golf course. There’s a sign on Rt. 123 across from Mere Point Road, welcoming visitors. Drive in the open gates and park in the golf course lot to your left. You can ski from either side of the road, but most of the trails are directly across the road from the parking lot.
Start off skiing into the woods. It is a flat, easy trail leading to the water in under a mile. That’s my son who is on his school’s Nordic Ski team. He competes in classic (ie regular cross-country) skiing too. These trails are groomed for classic, not for Nordic/skate skiing. I taught my son how to ski, and now I get a work out trying to keep up with him. He goes “slow” for me.

After you reach the coast, reverse back through the woods. Halfway back, take a right to the golf course. There are a couple of fun hills, a treat in flat Brunswick.

The marsh is beautifully peaceful if you don’t mind the roar of jets on the nearby runway.

You’ll ski by the water once again. The whole loop takes under an hour. I’ve seen wild turkeys and other birds. There are moose in these woods too. The base is in the process of closing by 2011, and hopefully this land will revert back to town commons.

Here’s my friend Barb (middle) skiing with our friends Alida and Jean. She’s a Special Ed. teacher and a ski instructor. You might remember Barb from my post Mixed Religions & Mud Season. Her husband is a commercial pilot who used to be in the air force.   There are also commercial pilots in Brunswick who used to fly for the navy.

In addition to being a college town, Brunswick has been a naval town since World War II. For decades the base has brought naval families into our community. Their children used to comprise 20% of our school population. Despite their short stay of 2-3 years, parents and others frequently volunteer in our community and in our schools. My daughter’s soccer coach trained bomb dogs.

MA2 Shaun Hogan with MWD Paco, bomb dog 2006
(U.S. Navy photo)

I’ve been to the base a couple of times for research. My yet to be published novel, S.A.D., tells the story of a navy wife making the transition to civilian life in Brunswick. It’s an end of an era, seeing the base shut and the land opening to the public. Bitter sweet.

Blog Watch: Congratulations! Jane Green got married and is just finishing the final edits on her latest novel, Dune Road/Girl Friday, which will be out in June 2009. Donna@The Doll Sweet Journal is pregnant. Jamie and Randy@Creating our Eden posted a heart-warming story about bloggers helping a garden in need after a tornado. It’s especially nice to hear some good news these days.

Water Dogs by Lewis Robinson

Harpswell Sound by Sarah Laurence (watercolor)

Water Dogs by Lewis Robinson is set in my part of coastal Maine. If Meadow Island were real, it might be in Harpswell. Visitors drive up from Portland and down from Brunswick, crossing a bridge to the island. The Meadow Island kids, called “water dogs,” go to Brunswick High.


Lewis Robinson lives in Portland and teaches writing at USM. He’s a graduate of the prestigious Iowa Writers’ Workshop and was John Irving’s assistant for two years. You can see the touch of the master in his work, but his voice is original. Robinson wrote a fabulous collection of short stories, Officer Friendly, which I reviewed two years ago. I had been eagerly awaiting his debut novel in January. I was not disappointed.

Robinson writes exquisitely about Maine and its inhabitants. This is not “Vacationland” (as it says on the license plate) but a cold, wintry place of bleak beauty. So many novels set in Maine are about summer people “from away.” Robinson’s character are locals. These are “real men” who shoot birdhouses for target practice while drinking heavily. They puke, defecate and swear, but they also try to do the best by their loved ones, often failing miserably. You might get exasperated with these characters, but you can’t help loving them.

When we first meet the twenty-something protagonist, Bennie is woken by baby raccoons nesting in the walls of his home. He frees them by hacking a hole in the wall and then catches the mother in a have-a-heart trap. The hole in the wall remains un-repaired, but the raccoons are released into a ravine. Bennie lives with his taciturn brother in a dilapidated seaside mansion called “the Manse.” The main décor would be rows of empty beer bottles. After losing their father as teenagers, these young men are drifting.

The high point of the week is playing paintball, a war game where teams fire paint pellets from their guns in the woods. The Littlefield bothers’ arch rivals are the urchin fishermen. Playing in a snow storm, Bennie falls into a quarry and one of the urchin fishermen goes missing. Bennie’s brother becomes a suspect. Now playing detective, Bennie hobbles on crutches in search of the lost player.

Unfortunately, the central plot sometimes limps as much as Bennie. We don’t get to know anything about the missing man until the final chapters, and we never learn enough to care. It’s an odd omission because the other characters are so well developed. I think the story would have worked better if the missing person had been Bennie’s twin sister, visiting from NYC.

It doesn’t matter. The writing is so good and the characters so real, that you won’t mind that the mystery plot doesn’t totally work. What do work are the relationships. Bennie starts out insecure and lost, but in looking for the missing man, he instead finds himself. Perhaps that was really what he was searching for all along. To uncover Bennie, Robinson digs deep into family relationships with so much emotional honesty that you’ll cry with the guys into a pint of Harpoon Ale.

Robinson can be wickedly funny, skewering my hometown:

The Maine he knew was getting overhauled, burdened by interlopers and nostalgia-addled white-collar suburbs in the middle of the woods – Cumberland, Falmouth, Yarmouth, Brunswick, old towns with brand-new health stores and woodstove dealerships. Many of the cars he passed had vanity license plates – EX-BRIT, KAYAKR, SOCERDAD, DRMOM….

Robinson notes crass ugliness, but he also finds poetic beauty in the ordinary:

The ice crystals on the window beside Bennie were curved white ferns, and through them he caught glimpses of the tundra; everything in the world was dead or sleeping.

What I loved best of all was the winter island setting:

There were thin wisps of sea smoke on the water and a layer of mist just above the dark blue expanse, but otherwise the view was as sharp as it usually was in winter – no islands on the horizon.

Snow and the sea surround the characters and create the mood, enhancing the tension. The best chapter was a story unto itself in which Bennie’s father, “Coach,” dives naked into the frigid ocean, trying to save their water-logged retriever.

The flashbacks are actually better than the main story, but that works in the narrative. Bennie has to deal with his past before he can step into his future and walk again.

There was a real sense of coming home, reading Robinson’s words. Not only does he inhabit my world, he shares my vision to a certain extent.

My novel S.A.D. seems to be the next chapter in these characters’ lives, once they’ve reached middle age and sent their own kids to Brunswick High. My coastal Maine is not so bleak and isolated, but it’s volatile. Brunswick is more than a gentrified college town, it’s a naval town of diverse characters with inter-connected lives. Robinson’s young men live on an island all to themselves. I’d like to invite them in from the cold.

Blog watch: As you can see, I’ve been reading more than ever on these cold days. I noticed that some of you bloggers are doing so as well. Alyson@New England Living disconnected for a week to read books. Rose@Prairie Rose’s Garden has abandoned her frozen garden to read and to review three novels. A Cuban in London reviewed a French novel set in Tel-Aviv. For more book reviews, visit Barrie Summy's Book Review Club today. Who says bloggers aren’t readers?

Reminder: my talk on blogging and using the internet to market art is on Monday Feb 9th. Details at the bottom of last week’s post.

Maine Street

We’ve heard “Main Street” bandied about by politicians this election season. It’s shorthand for small town U.S.A. My town has a Maine Street. No, that’s not a typo. Brunswick is in Maine.

A pillared bank graces the brick sidewalks. The wide street was designed for horse drawn carriages. There were once cobblestones and Elm trees. It’s still tree lined.

I began my first novel, Moose Crossing, with a scene on Maine Street. My second novel, S.A.D, is also set in Brunswick and on the islands of Harpswell. Grand City Variety captures the old time feel of my town. Our daily paper, The Times Record, reported that this retro five-and-ten will shut at the end of this year.

There are other small businesses that are still thriving. I’m pleased to say we have an independent bookstore, the Gulf of Maine. It's a good place to find books by local authors and lots of novels.

Need steel-toed boots and Carhartt work clothes? Try Pennell’s, established 1889. That bright orange clothing is all the rage this time of year. Maine Street fashion keeps you safe. November marks the start of deer hunting season.

Brunswick pulls out all stops for Halloween. School children paint the windows.

My daughter’s team didn’t win a prize for “Horrorscope,” but I award them a blog star for originality.

That’s an underwater Halloween in a crystal ball. Global warming is scary! They painted the Little Dog Café, a great place to settle into a comfy chair with a cup of coffee.

On Halloween Brunswick children gather at the village green and then march down Maine Street accompanied by the junior high school band.

When you cross the bridge to Topsham, the street apparently loses its sense of humor and becomes Main Street. Keep driving and town gives way to farms on Rural Rt. 201.

Stop at Rocky Ridge Orchard in Bowdoin to pick apples or to buy your pumpkin. My teenaged son chose the biggest pumpkin: 56 pounds! He carried and carved it himself. My daughter is a fan of the barn swing.

We got cider and Cote’s ice cream at the farm shop. Their cider press dates from 1935.

The flag in the opening photo hangs from the rafters. Rocky Ridge is stocked full of Americana, country antiques and the best baked goods.

We brought home a mixed dozen of pumpkin, cider and chocolate doughnuts and an apple pie that was still warm.

Another good place for “donuts” is Frosty’s back in Brunswick, but you’d better go quickly. Rumor has it that Frosty’s may also be going out of business after more than 3 decades. Like Grand City Variety, they may not be able to renew their five year lease on Maine Street.

I met fellow blogger Tina Ramsey from In the Garden for pumpkin donuts at Frosty’s. I realized I had a problem once I walked in the door. I was looking for a big yellow dog (Tina’s profile image) and had no idea what Tina looked like. Luckily Tina and her mother, Jean, (another regular commenter on my blog) recognized me immediately. Not too many folks in Maine have long, black, curly hair.

Photo of Tina and me by Tina's husband

Tina and I met through our blogs when I was living in England last year. Tina grew up in Brunswick and attended the same elementary school as my children did. Now she lives in Tennessee after retiring from the army and is doing a degree in horticulture paid for by Uncle Sam. She and her husband are veterans of the Iraq War.

Reading In The Garden’s chatty comments is just like stopping by a front porch in Maine. Tina posted last week about our meeting. I’m suffering from blog lag – too many good things going on in life to keep up. Tina gave me a marker stone for my home, a gift she hand-makes for the bloggers that she meets. Thanks, Tina!

I’ve also connected with Brunswick School Board district 7 candidate Michele Joyce. Her friend from the Peace Corps in Africa is Shauna of Thinks Monthly in California, another commenter on my blog. Michele’s claim was that good people will find each other. I’m happy that a good person like Michele is running for School Board in my town. Isn’t it amazing that two blogging connections could lead back to Maine Street?

While on the topic of Brunswick politics, I'm endorsing Nick Livesay for Town Council At-Large. Nick grew up in Brunswick, graduated from Bowdoin College and has returned to raise his family. His work experience as an environmental consultant will be especially helpful for land use planning after the Naval Air Station closure.

Can you believe that Election Day is less than a week away?