Kobo Writing Life Podcast

Heather Tucker, author of The Clay Girl , had an entire career as a nurse, teacher, bereavement counselor, and professional writer, before she discovered that "playing with words is more fun than working with them." What is it like to publish a debut novel at age 62? She kept an emotional journal from a young age to age 50. She was going on a big trip to Asia and taped a note on the boxes that sai...

Episode 93 includes a series of short interviews that KWL Director, Mark Lefebvre conducted at the 2017 When Words Collide conference in Calgary, Alberta. Mark speaks with authors Robert J. Sawyer and C.C. Humphreys as well as marketing consultant Mickey Mikkelson about digital publishing, global eBook pricing, author promotion strategies and successful author readings.   Robert J. Sawyer Robert J...

In Episode 92, Mark Lefebvre interviews Charles de Lint, who is the author of more than seventy books. Renowned as one of the trailblazers of the modern fantasy genre, Charles is the recipient of the World Fantasy, Aurora, Sunburst, and White Pine awards, among others. De Lint is a poet, folklorist, artist, songwriter and performer. He has written critical essays, music reviews, opinion columns an...

KWL Episode 90 is a special episode featuring the announcement of the launch of Kobo Audiobooks, narrated by Jim Dale. Let me tell you a story. Do you remember when you first fell in love with reading? Well you weren't really reading, were you? No, your passion for books began quite another way. It was listening, wasn't it? To a story. Yes; your love of reading got started when you were being read...

Episode 90 of the Kobo Writing Life Podcast features an interview with Dennis Weichman, (AKA, Mr. W.), a retired math teacher who has brought his passion for teaching and tutoring into the digital realm with YouTube channel and study guides published to Kobo . Mr W. is interviewed by KWL Director Mark Lefebvre. In the interview, they discuss: How, after he retired in 1998, Dennis began tutoring st...

Episode 89 of the KWL Podcast includes on location interviews with 7 different authors conducted by Mark Lefebvre, Director of Author Relations at Kobo during the 2017 Romance Writers of America (RWA) Annual conference. Barbara Freethy Sharing the enjoyment she gets connecting with fellow writers at RWA, Barbara also shares info about a new romantic suspense series (a spin-off of her Storm trilogy...

Episode 88 of the Kobo Writing Life Podcast isn't the more typical interview, but rather, KWL's Director, Mark Lefebvre, outlining five strategies that successful authors use to build their sales, raise their author profile and get readers to sign up their author mailing lists with Free eBooks. First, Mark talks about the updates to FREE tracking. If you've been paying attention to the updates in...

  Episode 87 of the Kobo Writing Life podcast features a keynote address from When Words Collide's 2016 Guest of Honour, Eve Silver . She is a national bestselling author of books for adults and teens, has won the Ontario Library Association's "Forest of Reading White Pine Award" and has been praised for her "edgy, steamy, action-packed" books, darkly sexy heroes and take-charge heroines. Eve is i...

Episode 86 features an interview with international bestselling author Catherine Coulter, about one of her most recent titles, Insidious .   In the interview, Mark and Catherine talk about: The question Catherine's sister asked her at a family reunion back in the 1990's that inspired the her first romantic suspense novel, The Cove (which became the first book in her FBI series) The devious nature...

Episode 85 of the KWL Podcast contains an interview with Scacchi Koul conducted by Johanna Schneller about Scacchi's new book One Day We'll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter . Please note that this interview contains adult language which might not be appropriate for all listening audiences. In the interview, Johanna and Scaachi talk about: The story behind Scacchi's Twitter profile picture...

Episode 84 contains the third and final installment of interviews that took place at RT (Romantic Times) Booklovers Convention in Atlanta this year. This time the interviews are from Sinead McElhinney, PR Coordinator for Kobo, who was interacting with dozens of authors and romance readers at the conference. Featured interviews include chats with the two authors who write under the name Christina L...

This episode continues from where episode 82 left off with KWL's recent live interviews with attendees from RT Booklovers Convention in Atlanta, Georgia in early May 2017. RT (Romantic Times) Booklovers brings more than 3,500 fans and between 600 to 800 authors together for a celebration of romance novels. Mark Lefebvre, Director of Kobo Writing Life, interviewed authors and industry folks about v...

KWL was recently in Atlanta, Georgia attending RT Booklovers Convention. Considered the Book Lover Event of the year, RT (Romantic Times) Booklovers brings more than 3,500 fans and between 600 to 800 authors together for a celebration of romance novels. Mark Lefebvre, Director of Kobo Writing Life, was on site interviewing authors and industry folks about various topics on writing, reading and pro...

KWL Director Mark Lefebvre speaks with former college professor Gilian Baker about her new novel Blogging is Murder . In the discussion, the two explore: The transition from teaching academic writing and literature for twenty years to the challenge of writing; first approached through blogging and ghost-writing Her original blogging experience, which was created for college students who were reluc...

Kobo was delighted to recently host Emily Schultz in a "Kobo in Conversation" chat in the Kobo Café a few weeks ago while she was coming through Toronto on a book tour. Kobo Merchandiser Nora Parker interviewed Emily. In the interview, Emily and Nora talk about: The fact that Emily had started working on this novel before her previously released novel The Blondes The rum-runner history in Emily's...

Julie Czerneda , an international bestselling science fiction and fantasy author from Canada, was one of the Author Guests of Honour at the 2016 When Words Collide conference which takes place in Calgary each year in late summer.   When Words Collide is an annual non-profit festival designed to bring readers and writers together in a celebration of the written word. Up to 10 tracks of programming,...

Mark Lefebvre, Director of Kobo Writing Life, interviews Young Adult Fantasy and Chicklit author, Katie Cross as she shares strategies about how she was able to keep writing, with even more productivity, in her transition from full time author to full time Mom. In the chat, Katie and Mark discuss: Her lifelong passion of writing and her recent passion of becoming a mother (which happened about a y...

From his role as a guest faculty member at Superstars Writing Seminars, Kobo Writing Life director Mark Lefebvre interviewed professional photographer Lauren Lang who was on site to help attending authors get a professional author photo. In the interview Mark and Lauren discuss: Lauren's start in the industry in journalism and her desire to use a visual medium as her preferred method of telling an...

On site at Superstars Writing Seminars, Kobo Writing Life Director Mark Lefebvre interviews Joshua Essoe , freelance editor. In their discussion Mark and Joshua discuss: What led him to writing (the author's notes at the end of a Piers Anthony novel he had picked up at an early age) and then, more specifically, what led him into editing The role that Brandon Sanderson played, at the very first Sup...

Instead of the regular interview with an author or industry person, episode 75 of the podcast features Kobo Writing Life Director Mark Lefebvre pausing to look at some of the most successful Kobo Writing Life authors on Kobo for 2016. He compiles a list of the top 5 things that the most successful authors in terms of both unit sales and net sales all have in common, and tries to break them down in...

Mark Lefebvre, Director of Self-Publishing and Author Relations for Kobo is the host for this episode, and introduces a memorable clip from Episode 279 of The Creative Penn Podcast where Joanna Penn talks compares walking the 100KM " Race to the Stones " with writing. In her talk, Joanna goes into the details regarding 9 Lessons Learned About Writing from Walking 100K in a Weekend: Deadlines and s...

Colson Whitehead, is the author of Zone One ; Sag Harbor ; The Intuitionist , a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway award; John Henry Days , which won the Young Lions Fiction Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; and Apex Hides the Hurt , winner of the PEN Oakland Award. Colson is interviewed by Kobo's Nora Parker about his latest book, The Underground Railroad , which is an Oprah's Book Clu...

Described as "One of the most harrowing, powerful, and imaginative books of the year" Affinity Konar 's MISCHLING is a novel about twin sisters fighting to survive the evils of World War II. As part of the experimental population of twins known as Mengele's Zoo, the girls experience privileges and horrors unknown to others, and they find themselves changed, stripped of the personalities they once...

Executive Vice President of Publisher Relations and Content at Kobo , Pieter Swinkels introduces a live on stage at Kobo "Kobo in Conversation" interview of Robert Harris about his latest book, Conclave. (As an interesting aside, Pieter was, at one time, Robert's publisher in the Netherlands). Robert is interviewed by Toronto pop culture columnist, film journalist and television personality, Johan...

In episode 70, Christine Munroe interviews bestselling romance author Melissa Foster. Over 7 years of self-publishing, Melissa has tons of insightful advice to offer, including why authors should stick to their passion instead of chasing trends, and why she will always manage her own social media and all public-facing marketing efforts. Tune in to hear them discuss: Melissa published her first boo...