Graphic Novel Creators Kenny Porter & Zach Wilcox

Kenny Porter is a professional writer living in West Michigan. He's most known for content development, writing comics, copy, blogs, and fiction. He graduated from Grand Valley State University with a BA in Writing. The writing program at GVSU allowed him to create his own curriculum, which he used to focus on fiction, writing for the web, genre studies, and manuscript development. He started his career in writing during high school and has since gone on to publish short stories, write articles for online magazines, and has won the first Top Cow Talent Hunt for Writing.

Finding the Right Literary Agent

As an author, I often receive questions from writers and students about literary agents. Specifically, how to find a literary agent. Up until recently, I would respond by launching into a discussion about query letters and book synopses, writers forums and agent wish lists, proposals and comparison books, etc., etc.

Now, I tell them what I wish I could tell my younger self: it's not about simply finding a literary agent. It's about finding the right agent for you.

Founder, President at Experience Digital Marketing for Authors and Publishers

Michael Mejer is an established, trusted digital marketing expert in the non-fiction business book space. The culmination of years of experience in publicity, marketing, and sales in this niche has empowered him to help dozens of authors take their social media platforms to the next level to help promote and grow their books, brands, and businesses.

What Being a Writer Has Taught Me About Being an Editor (and Vice Versa!)

What I hadn’t realized until recently was that the skill sets for writing and editing, so intertwined and yet so vastly different, can inform each other. Indeed, I’ve learned much about being a writer and writing from being an editor and editing, and vice versa.

Books in Translation: Foreign Rights Generate Author Income

Here at the Trident Media Group literary agency, the advances and royalties received from foreign publications makes up about a third of our overall income. So you can imagine that for an author, foreign rights, or books in translation, might also make up about the same overall income on any given book title of theirs. Well, that's certainly nothing to scoff at! That's just one of the reasons why we make every effort we can on behalf of the authors at Trident Media Group to retain foreign rights, such that foreign rights can be properly exploited to an author's benefit. In this article I explore the benefits of working with a literary agency in the foreign publishing markets, as well as the downside of allowing American publishers to handle foreign rights for authors.

Artist, Filmmaker, Playwright & Author Jonathan Ashley

Jonathan Ashley is an author, playwright, concept artist, and filmmaker from Arizona. At fifteen, he illustrated his first book, Mathematickle, written by his grandfather. He studied filmmaking and animation at New York University. His illustrations and designs have been featured in films, commercials, comic books, and puppet shows. He lives with his wife and daughter in the shadow of the Manhattan Bridge, on the Brooklyn side. He is also the author of Lily & Kosmo in Outer Outer Space in which to join Kosmo's "Spacetronauts," an all-boy crew of child space cadets, aboard their floating tree house in the stars, a girl from Brooklyn must prove that she can hold her own among the galaxy's unruliest rascals…along the way, she and another will evade the clutches of merciless minions, find themselves marooned in The Murky Way nebula, and ultimately face the vilest villain of all, "His Meanness" The Mean-Man of Morgo.

Author Brand Developer, Passionate Advocate & Innovator Trident Media Group Chairman Robert Gottlieb

Robert Gottlieb is the Chairman of Trident Media Group, book publishing’s number one ranked literary agency for North American sales for well over a decade in consecutive years. In 2000, he founded Trident Media Group with the goal of bringing an innovative approach to book publishing. That approach includes a uniquely organized company that not only delivers the highest level author management in the industry but also provides unique marketing dynamics for an author’s career in a very competitive marketplace. Robert Gottlieb’s leading position in the literary agency business gives him access to all the decision makers in publishing at all levels including media firms around the world. He has worked with many New York Times bestselling authors and is skilled at launching authors’ careers. Robert Gottlieb focuses on maximizing and establishing his authors’ brands on a worldwide basis. When negotiating deals he seeks to retain as many rights as possible, including foreign rights, film/TV rights, and audio rights, to ensure the author’s benefits extend beyond their domestic publishing arrangements. Trident’s robust Foreign Rights departmentthen sells these titles at the London Book Fair and Frankfurt Book Fair and continues a year-round effort of constant contact with foreign publishers to ensure substantial foreign deals. Robert Gottlieb also places a high focus on marketing and works with Trident’s dedicated marketing team to ensure his authors reach the widest audience possible. He is devoted to his authors’ careers and can guarantee he will advocate for them at every stage of the publishing process.

Mark GottliebFebruary 25, 2019robertgottlieb, tridentmediagroup, literaryagency, LiteraryAgent, markgottliebliteraryagentComment

powerHouse Books Founder/Publisher & NY Photo Fest Co-Founder Daniel Power

Daniel Power is the CEO of powerHouse Books, POW! Kids Books, powerHouse Packaging & Supply. He is the proprietor of The POWERHOUSE Arena & POWERHOUSE on 8th. Daniel Power is also the director & co-founder The New York Photo Festival.

Simpsons Artist & Slothilda Author Dante Fabiero

Dante Fabiero is a Los Angeles native who has made a career working on some of TV's most popular animated shows, such as The Simpsons, Family Guy, King of The Hill, American Dad, Disenchantment and Cosmos, seen on Netflix, TBS, and Fox. Fabiero launched Slothilda in 2014 and has garnered close to half a billion views on the website Giphy. You can see Slothilda come to life and subscribe to receive future comics for free at slothilda.com.

The Best Articles Are Only Two Lines Long

Chances are you won’t reach the end of this blog. That’s a bit sad, but it’s not really my fault. Because it seems, at least according to a recent study by Microsoft, that the average human being now has an attention span of… just eight seconds.

Mark GottliebJanuary 21, 2019markgottliebliteraryagent, TridentMediaGroupComment

First Impressions Are Everything: Using Social Media Banners to Promote Books

They say not to judge a book by its cover, but people often do, and that's one of the reasons why first impressions will likely leave a lasting impression. Why else would stores such as Macy's make elaborate storefront arrangements? It's often to draw customers into the store.