Platform-Building / Career Coach
Manuscript Consultant
Editor / Book Doctor
Writing Coach Teresa LeYung-Ryan

My motto: "Reach out, not stress out, when building your platform!"  Please click here to see/hear me define platform:

Teresa LeYung-Ryan has helped over 1,000 writers.

• As author of Build Your Writer’s Platform & Fanbase In 22 Days: Attract Agents, Editors, Publishers, Readers, and Media Attention NOW, she coaches authors before and after publication. "I love helping writers make their names synonymous with the themes/subject matters/issues they write about."
• As editor/story consultant, Coach Teresa helps her clients polish their manuscripts by identifying themes and archetypes. 
• Her novel Love Made of Heart is used in college composition classes. 

http://writingcoachteresa.com  Read her blog. 

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Also, I can show you how to: 

• edit email settings; crop photos and add captions;  insert relevant descriptions and tags to your website 
• create a cyberspace "home / press room /forum" aka "blog" so that your fans can find you (before publication); the bigger your platform, the more readers you'll line up and the bigger the contract a publisher will offer you. 
  Definition of a blog:  Click here to read Coach Teresa's advice   

• set up a facebook account (to broadcast your blog posts; to help grow fanbase) 

• set up a YouTube account so that viewers can see and hear you talk about the themes and archetypes in your literary work.  
• (if you're already published and your book is distributed through Amazon) set up/updating your profile in Author Central to improve ranking (the lower the number the better;  #1 = #1 best-selling) 

Click here to see Coach Teresa's blog

Your blog will be especially gorgeous since you can use your own photos and choose color & themes for the banner.

I look forward to showing you how empowering and fun cyberspace-marketing is. 

Sincerely, 

Coach Teresa LeYung-Ryan 

Build Your Writer’s Platform & Fanbase In 22 Days: Attract Agents, Editors, Publishers, Readers, and Media Attention NOW

$9.81 for ebook; $12.96 for print edition

Editor / Book Doctor / Manuscript Consultant / Writing Coach Teresa

  Ask Coach Teresa LeYung-Ryan to edit the whole book or 50pages at a time! 

Gain tools from Teresa with each installment of your manuscript.

Coach Teresa edits mainstream fiction, women's fiction, thrillers, narrative non-fiction, memoirs, children's novels, and short stories. She loves feisty protagonists, quirky characters, and powerful messages.

 As a manuscript consultant, Teresa LeYung-Ryan loves helping writers identify their themes and archetypes.  Coach Teresa will read and provide editorial memo (to include recommendations on plotline and sub-plotlines, character development, pace, thematic connections; copy editing)

"Yes, Teresa LeYung-Ryan is one of the best writing and career coaches around today. She's a whirlwind of activity and is clear and precise in her help. Wonderful woman." Leigh Anne Lindsey (of SeaStorm Press--epublisher & emarketer)

"Coach Teresa, I love your editing skills. You not only correct and teach, but also you give me more ideas on the story line. Because of you, the story has grown. You make me dig deeper and it brings more life to the story. Thank you so very much!"   E. H. (children's book author and ventriloquist) 

"Teresa is committed to her clients and does a remarkable job of coaching and encouraging while wielding an insightful red pen. Thanks Coach, for pushing my reporting skills !" D.H. (thriller)

"Coach Teresa, thanks for cheering me on!" J.O.A. (novel/women's studies)

"Coach Teresa,  everything you suggested to me has all been right on! You're very insightful and inspiring." J.L., (memoir/cultural; short stories)

"WOW! Coach Teresa, you are good. I have just printed out your editorial memo and your notes on my story.  You have made some great suggestions. Thank you!" M.F. (children's books)

"Teresa,  Thank you again.  You are super!" L.A.H. (published author needing "Chinese-ism" for a short story) 

Teresa using her novel Love Made of Heart (to inspire adult children of mentally ill parents to speak openly about the stigmas and find resources for their families) demonstrates the power of making one’s name synonymous with the themes/subject matters/issues one writes about. Students in colleges and universities study Love Made of Heart for story-structure.

How to Make Your Manuscript Compelling?

 Look at Your Own Manuscript with an Editor’s Lens

By Teresa LeYung-Ryan

Author, Manuscript Consultant and Writing Career Coach

Since writing a story with the intent to engage the reader is so much like meeting a stranger and wanting him/her to be interested in you, I will focus on how to make the first quarter of your story a compelling read.

I love working with diligent writers who want to transform their manuscripts into page-turners. However, there are things you can do before you give your work to an editor. Let me show you how you can help yourself.

As an editor, the four biggest mistakes I encounter are manuscripts that are weak in these elements:

• Planting hook(s) or story-question(s); 
• Grounding the reader with the three Ws (Who? When? Where?); 
• Showing (not telling) what the protagonist wants; 
• Paying attention to language and rules 

Let’s learn from the pros.

Planting Hook or Story-Question:

In The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts, Maxine Hong Kingston hooks us with the first line: “You must not tell anyone,” my mother said, “what I am about to tell you…” Then, Ms. Kingston transitions into her story with: “Whenever she had to warn us about life, my mother told stories that ran like this one . . .”

Grounding the Reader with the Three Ws:

In Woven of Water, while the story timeline spans from 1957 to 2005, Californian author Luisa Adams brilliantly shows us who she was as a girl (not with a year-by-year narrative, but with a single exquisite chapter). Because she grounded us with “who, when, where,” we eagerly follow as she takes us into her enchanted world of a “cottage in the forest.”

Showing What the Protagonist Wants:

In The Other Mother, young Carol Schaefer wants to ask questions: “Was there any way to keep my baby? Was there anyone who would help me find a way to do that?”

Paying Attention to Language and Rules:

Read the first five pages of Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt and you will see how this wordsmith plays with language and rules. (You can “bend” the rules to create flow, but you must not ignore them.)

Sentences Deserve Your Attention:

Nina Amir’s post on her blog http://writenonfictioninnovember.wordpress.com/2007/11/ is a must-read.

Remember Groucho Marx’s line “One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas…”? That sentence got a lot of laughs. But, what if you didn’t want to be funny (ambiguous in this case)?

How would you rewrite these poorly constructed sentences?

• He likes to fish near the Farallon Islands and they jump when they’re hungry at dawn or dusk. 
• She insists on knowing when I come home and leave, not to be nosy, but for safety reasons. 
• Being cautious as not to step on the dog’s tail, the children tip-toed away from him while sleeping. 
• My husband still in bed snoring, I have always enjoyed rising before dawn and I eat my toast and drink my green tea on the terrace. 

To improve your sentence structure and other skills, I recommend these books:

• The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White 
• Woe is I: Grammarphobe’s Guide to Better English in Plain English by Patricia T. O’Conner 

More Advice:

• In all four stories (The Woman Warrior, Woven of Water, The Other Mother, Angela’s Ashes), the authors present memorable experiences by employing authentic details, unusual story-worlds though real, and poetic language. You want to do the same for your story. 
• Also, these stories have another vital component-all four plotlines have what Martha Alderson, author of Blockbuster Plots, Pure and Simple, calls “Cause and Effect” linked scenes. Another must-read blog: Plot Whisperer 
• When you’re writing non-fiction and do not have the luxury of rearranging the sequence of events to create a page-turning plotline, you can engage the reader by using concise expositions to leap over blocks of time in order to focus on the core themes and fast-forward the story. A helpful website: http://www.memoriesandmemoirs.com 
• You the author must show the reader what the protagonist wants, even if the protagonist doesn’t know at first. 
• We don’t have to “like” a protagonist, but, we do need to connect with him/her on an emotional level. 

In the fiercely competitive arena of the publishing world, how does one stand out in a crowd? Building relationships is one key to success in this business. Another key is to know how to translate the themes from your life to your writing and articulate those themes as community concerns. I want to see all hardworking writers realize their dreams.

My best wishes to you!

Coach Teresa LeYung-Ryan

Coach Teresa says: “Reach out, not stress out, when pursuing your dreams!”

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Teresa's videos  http://www.youtube.com/teresaleyung