Penn

Sample audiobook chapter for The Relaxed Author: Take The Pressure Off Your Art and Enjoy The Creative Journey written and narrated by Joanna Penn and Mark Leslie Lefebvre. 

Do you want to be a more relaxed author?

There are plenty of books and tips on writing faster, learning more marketing tactics and strategies, trying to maximize your ranking, hitting the top of the charts, juicing the algorithms, and hacking different ad platforms. While these are all important things — which the authors themselves regularly write and talk about — it's also important to recognize that your author journey is a marathon, and not a sprint.

Joanna Penn and Mark Leslie Lefebvre have been in the business long enough to see authors burning out and leaving the writing life because they turned what they love into a hamster wheel of ever more production and marketing tasks they hate. It doesn't have to be this way.

This book is a collection of tips on how to be a more relaxed author — and return to the love that brought you to writing in the first place. 
You will discover:
Why the 'relaxed' author?
You are not alone. Why authors are not relaxed.

Part 1: Relaxed Writing

Write what you love
Write at your own pace
Write in a series (if you want to)
Schedule time to fill the creative well and for rest and relaxation
Improve your writing process — but only if it fits with your lifestyle

Part 2: Relaxed Publishing

Make empowered publishing choices
Understand persistence, patience, and partnership
Value your work. You create intellectual property assets.
Publish at your own pace
Publish wide (or don't)
Sell direct to your audience
Don't let piracy and plagiarism derail you
Deal with cancel culture, bad reviews, and haters
Find a community who support your publishing choices

Part 3: Relaxed Marketing

Focus on the basics first
Simplify your author brand and website
Simplify and automate your email
Find one form of marketing you enjoy and can sustain for the long term
Put book 1 in a series free or permafree
Choose social media that suits you — or don't use it at all
Advertise in campaigns
Outsource when you can
Embrace who you are. Double down on being human.
Think global, digital, long-term marketing

Part 4: Relaxed Business

Do you really want to run an author business?
Create multiple streams of income
Eliminate tasks. Say 'no' more.
Organize and improve your processes
Use tools
Find voices you trust and tune out the rest
Learn about money
Look after your physical and mental health
Keep a long-term mindset

The Relaxed Author

The Relaxed Author Sample Chapter

Introduction chapter from Your Author Business Plan. 
Digitally narrated by the voice of Mia (US, female) from Google Play Books. 
Available as a full digitally-narrated audiobook and as a separate version, narrated by the author.

Buy on Google Play

Your Author Business Plan — Introduction. Digitally narrated by Mia from Google Play Books

Introduction to How to Write a Novel, written and narrated by Joanna Penn.

Writing a novel will change your life.
It might not be in the way that you expect, but when you hold your book in your hand and say, “I made this,” something will shift. 

The process of getting to that point will light a spark in your creative soul and help you discover unexpected aspects of yourself. It will be one of the things you are most proud of in your life. This book will help you get there.

I’m Joanna (J.F.) Penn, award-nominated, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 18 novels and novellas with nearly a million books sold in over one hundred countries.

This book will help you write your first novel, or improve your creative process so you can write more books and reach more readers. It covers mindset, ideas and research, aspects of craft, how to write a first draft, and work through an editing process to a finished book.

How To Write a Novel. Introduction. Written and Narrated by Joanna Penn

Introduction of Writing the Shadow: Turn Your Inner Darkness Into Words, written and narrated by Joanna Penn
www.TheCreativePenn.com/shadowbook

We all long to write boldly, without filters or fear.
To spin stories that capture the messy beauty of what it means to be human. Tales that lay bare the truth of living — darkness and all.  
But something holds us back. 
Whispers of “Who do you think you are?” and “You don’t have permission to write that.” Our own self-censorship and the judgment of others keep us from writing freely — and sometimes, from living fully.
 But all great art taps into darkness, and your most compelling work emerges when you embrace your full humanity—both light and Shadow.

In Writing the Shadow, I’ll guide you on an intimate journey to explore the darkness and discover the gold lying hidden in its depths. Gold that may be the source of your best creative work in the years ahead.
The Shadow is calling. It’s time to turn your inner darkness into words.

Part 1 goes into the various ways you can tap into your Shadow. Since it lies in the unconscious, you cannot approach it directly. You need tools to help reveal it in different ways. 
You will find ideas here — ranging from personality assessments and identifying Shadow personas to mining your own writing and exploring your true curiosity — as well as ways to protect yourself so you don’t get lost in the dark. 

Part 2 explores how the Shadow manifests in various aspects of our lives. I discuss the creative wound and how it may still be holding you back in your writing life, as well as aspects of traditional and self-publishing, then expand into work and money, family and relationships, religion and culture, the physical body and aging, death and dying. 

Part 3 explores ways that you can find the gold in your Shadow, and turn your inner darkness into words through self-acceptance, letting go of self-censorship, deepening character and theme in your work, and opening the doors to new parts of yourself.

Learn more

Writing The Shadow: Turn Your Inner Darkness Into Words Introduction

What was drowned will be drowned again… 

Marine archaeologist Dr. Evelyn Price has spent her life uncovering the mysteries of the deep ocean. But when a violent storm uncovers an ancient timber circle off the coast of England, she faces a discovery that will challenge everything she knows.

As the tide rises and storm clouds gather, Evelyn and her team race against time to decipher the strange symbols on the wooden pillars, before the sea comes to claim its own once more.

Seahenge is a gripping archaeological short story that blends cutting-edge science with ancient myth. It will leave you questioning what really lies beneath the waves…
https://jfpennbooks.com/collections/seahenge/

Seahenge. A Short Story by J.F. Penn

I’m a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, podcaster and creative entrepreneur. I write thrillers and dark fantasy as J.F.Penn as well as non-fiction for writers under Joanna Penn.

My thriller site: http://www.JFPenn.com 
My site for writers and The Creative Penn podcast: http://www.TheCreativePenn.com
Books and Travel Podcast and Blog: https://www.booksandtravel.page