Of Zombies and Social Media

I’m a lucky guy. Although I never received credit (I didn’t have an agent), I was fortunate enough to have done some “script-doctoring” on a few forgettable network TV series back in the 90s. Of course, as a writer, I also had aspirations of penning the next great American novel, or at least one that would be a best-seller. But then Al Gore had to go invent the Internets and I didn’t do much writing for over a decade.

Fast-forward a few years and social media, tablets, e-readers and e-books are changing everything. Indeed, there’s never been a better time to be an aspiring author. You can build an audience on your own, sell directly to your readers and pocket the cash without splitting a penny with a publisher or an agent. As a result, I’ve not only taken the dive back into writing, I’ve become fascinated with how writers are using social media to build their careers (and to sell more books).

In this post, the first in a series about how authors are using social media, I interviewed Jonathan Maberry, author of such zombie brain-feasts as Patient Zero, Rot & Ruin, Dust & Decay, Dead of Night and Wanted Undead or Alive.

Please tell our readers about yourself. Who is Jonathan Maberry?

I’m a professional writer and part-time writing teacher. I write thrillers, horror novels, post-apocalyptic adventures for teens, movie tie-ins, and short stories. And I freelance for Marvel Comics. I teach a weekly writing class for teens and run a few classes on novel writing for adults.

Before I went full time as an author I had a grab-bag of different jobs. I was a bouncer in a strip club (in my wild youth), a bodyguard in the entertainment industry, a college teacher, the executive director of a writers center, an Expert Witness for the Philadelphia D.A.’s office (for murder trials involving martial arts), and a graphic artist.

I live on Bucks County, Pennsylvania with my wife, Sara Jo.

When did you start writing? When did you start writing fiction?

I’ve always written. Before I knew how to spell I told stories with toys and drawings. I sold my first professional piece in 1978 while I was in my junior year of college. It was a magazine article on jujutsu for Black Belt Magazine. Over the years I’ve sold over 1200 feature articles, about 3000 columns, as well as two plays, greeting cards, call-floor scripts, package inserts and descriptions, over a dozen textbooks, and how-to books.

In 2005 I wrote my first novel, Ghost Road Blues. That changed the course of my writing career and I’ve gradually stepped away from nonfiction writing. Since 2005 I’ve sold fourteen novels, five nonfiction books, and a slew of comics and short stories. I keep very, very busy….and I like that kind of pace.

When, and more importantly, why did you decide to start using social media?

I got involved with message boards early on, but mostly to communicate with like-minded people on subjects that interested me; martial arts, books, film, the paranormal, folklore…things like that.

Then, while teaching a program at the Writers Room in Doylestown, PA, one of my students made a presentation on the subject of a new thing called ‘social media’. At the time the hot topic was MySpace. I wound up exploring MySpace and then becoming heavily invested in the online community.

That student was Don Lafferty, who is now a publisher, writer and a social media consultant of some note. He frequently advises a number of other successful authors on social media.

How can social media help an author?

Some folks say that it’s all about the ‘buzz’ and to a degree that’s true. But for me the most important aspect of social media is the community building. Prior to the rise of these utilities, people were becoming more and more anti-social. They were interfacing with websites rather than people, and as a result there was a down trend in genuine communication. Then with the social media platforms there was suddenly someone else at the other end of the wire. People made connections with real people. The world became smaller and more human.

Now, view this from the point of view of an author. We don’t want to be simple hucksters who try to sell, sell, sell using newsletters, email blasts, website ads, and that stuff. We want to connect with the people who might enjoy reading our books. We get interaction in something approaching a real time discussion which means that we hear what our readers have to say and we interact with them—not just their credit cards. I can’t begin to describe how much more satisfying that is. You see, for a real writer, even though we want to make a living from book sales, we write so that we can share what fascinates us with the reader. We create something meaningful; a piece of writing that speaks from our heart, or contains some of our views and insights. If we just concentrate on selling units we disconnect from the people who actually invest many hours of their lives reading our words. Social media allows for us to become a part of that connection in an entirely new way, and on a scale never previously imagined.

I have thousands of friends on my various platforms, and many of them have become actual friends. People I look forward to hearing from, and with who I want to share ideas, mine and theirs, and views, and humor, and a sense of being part of a real group of people.

What platforms are you on?

I’m all over the place, but I’m most heavily invested in Twitter, Facebook (regular page and group page), LinkedIn, and GoodReads. I rely heavily on Yahoo Groups for my classes and special projects –such as an anthology I’d editing, and we use the message board for posting info, submissions, and so on. I also have a website (www.jonathanmaberry.com), and I belong to Shelfari, LibraryThing, and a bunch of message boards –many of which are connected to writers organizations to which I belong (The Mystery Writers of America, Horror Writers Association, International Thriller Writers, Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, and the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers.

Though it’s more of a utility than a social network, I use Skype extensively to communicate with people all over the world. I use it for virtual book signings, and to visit classrooms, libraries and book groups in places where it’s not practical for me to visit.

The other thing I use is a blog. I imported a WordPress blog into my website and use it to interview other authors in my genre. That’s easier than creating original content, and creates a larger community out of our individual fan-bases.

For authors, what platforms would you recommend?

The big three are Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. That’s where the crowd hangs out, that’s where they talk, and that’s where the most useful connections are made. I also recommend that all writers join GoodReads and LibraryThing, and also build a website that draws a lot of traffic to one central point.

What platforms, if any, would you NOT recommend?

MySpace is of little or no value to writers anymore. And the Ning sites are just too cumbersome to find and use. I’m reserving my opinion on the new Google social media site. If it’s just an attempt to compete with Facebook and Twitter, then it’s probably not going to be worth the investment of time.

What’s your social media strategy?

I spend most of my time having fun. I read a lot of the posts other people make, and comment as often as I have something interesting (or funny) to say. I also post a lot of humor. These are dark times, so lightening the mood seems to work. I post links to events and publications by other writers and to items that I feel are of general interest. I’m a science and pop culture geek, so there’s a lot of that in what I post.

What I don’t do is use these forums to discuss politics or religion. And I never make a negative comment. I’d rather post nothing than use the Internet to slam someone else. There’s no real and effective way for someone to respond to a negative post (which I learned the hard way by trying to respond to negative posts directed at me), and it’s comes off as a form of bullying. It’s cowardly, and it doesn’t contribute anything positive.

So, my strategy is to post positive stuff and generally have fun on the Net. Of course, I’m also a businessman, and I publish with six or more publishers, so I do have to make promotional posts. Over the years I’ve tried to shape these so that they also have a sense of fun to them rather than being flat advertisements.

One thing that has greatly increased the traffic to my platforms and dialed up the volume of interactive posts is to include my readers in my projects. I’ll have contests online for people to name characters (including letting them win the chance to have a character named after them); or to pick the title of my next book; or win something nice like a Kindle or Nook. And, yes, giving out prizes is fun for me, too.

Has social media helped sales? If so, how are you measuring that?

Social media definitely bumps up sales. I see it in the analytics that track click-throughs from newsletters or social media posts to purchase sites like online booksellers.

And with social media I’ve been able to build an international fanbase that I might not otherwise have built. Publishing houses can’t afford to send as many writers on tour these days, and even when they do it’s usually a limited tour.

Does the tablet craze help you interact with fans?

That’s not really part of my world yet. I don’t have a tablet and haven’t yet launched into learning much about them. I am, however, deeply involved in the world of e-readers. I have one, which is packed with stuff; and I download audio books to my iPod and interact with lots of readers who do the same.

What do you think of eBooks? Are you selling them as well?

All of my works are available in print and in e-book format. It would be foolish to do it any other way. E-publishing is not a fad that’s going to burn itself out. It’s a large part of the future of publishing.

I’ve also started posting short stories to the Net using Smashwords. At the moment they’re mostly reprints of stories that were previously published in anthologies, but I’ll be definitely writing some straight for the Net. The money is good and fast, and there’s a more direct response from readers. They buy and read the stories then they hit me on Twitter or Facebook to discuss them or to buzz them to other folks. It’s fun, because there’s no lag time in gauging reader reactions to something you’ve just written.

What kinds of interactions do you see people/fans responding to?

It’s pretty clear to anyone who visits my Twitter or Facebook page that I’m having an enormous amount of fun driving my jet-ski at high speed through the social media seas. Fun is infectious; people want to play with the happy kid in the playground. Try it out. Make a negative post and count the ‘likes’ and reposts then post something fun like a link to a cartoon (I post a ton of cartoons), a fascinating bit of science trivia (zombie ants, for example), praise for someone else’s accomplishments and then see how many MORE hits there are. Positive trumps negative every time.

At the same time I believe that people respond to my integrity. I never bash, never descend to base humor, and I don’t use the Net to proselytize any political agendas. I think that also engenders within them a greater sense of trust in the quality of the products I have on the market. Integrity and good will are hard to fake in anything but the short term, so people who hang out with me online know they’re safe and that something weird or silly is going to happen. We all dig that vibe.

Do you see social media becoming part of the story telling process?

It already is. We use social media to engage interest and to share information. The Net encourages us to get to the heart of our message, and as a result we’ve learned (and continue to learn) how to do that. The 140 character limit on Twitter is brilliant, and the fact that you can post a quick message and a hot link allows people to jump right in.

From a different perspective, some folks are using social media as an actual delivery system for storytelling. The Japanese Twitter novels are an example of that, but that’s been going on for years and I don’t see it catching fire here in the States. That said, I think the door is open for some new kind of multi-platform and interactive storytelling that we haven’t seen yet. I’ll bet money that it will happen. And, yeah, once it’s there I’ll probably experiment with it.

For would-be authors, what “best practices” would you recommend for using social media?

I touched on a lot of that in some of my earlier answers, but let me recap. Staying positive is key. Using posts to uplift everyone is equally important. You don’t gain anything by dragging you and your online friends into the dirt.

Also, don’t make it all about ‘me, me, me’. It’s not. Share the playground.

I hear you’re in talks to develop one of your books into a TV series. Do you see social media/Twitter playing a role?

That’s one of those Hollywood horror stories. Sony Pictures had optioned Patient Zero for TV. They hired Emmy Award winning writer Javier Grillo-Marxuach to do the pilot script, and he nailed it. They brought it to ABC, and we got all the way down to the wire so that it was pretty much a decision between my show and a remake of Charlie’s Angels. And they went with the Angels.

As of now, the option is open again and my agent has been fielding reach-outs from various producers, so we’ll see. We’re all pretty optimistic, however.

Once something does catch fire, social media will be crucial. I’ve seen how that worked for The Walking Dead, a show based on the comics by my friend Robert Kirkman. The production company was all over the Net with that. It was everywhere, and it paid off, because the show was an instant hit as it deserved to be. But without social media buzz, it might have struggled to gain an audience and might not have done so soon enough to get the nod for a second season. Social media greatly helped that show.

What movie tie-ins have you written? What was that experience like?

I wrote the official novelization of The Wolfman, which was a New York Times bestseller. It recently won the Scribe Award for Best Adaptation, issued by the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers (announced a few weeks ago at San Diego Comic-Con).

I was contacted directly by a vice president at Universal Pictures and offered the gig. I did not get to see the movie, however, until a week after the book came out. I worked from the original script by David Self. I was asked to turn in the completed novel in eight weeks, which is pretty fast. It was the fastest I’d written a book. Of course, it was also a shorter novel than my previous books. Ghost Road Blues was my shortest previous novel, but at 140,000 words it was fifty-five thousand words longer than The Wolfman.

To write the book, I first read the script through end to end without making notes. I read it to appreciate the story, the characters, the writing, the dialogue and the pace. Then I re-read and made notes on things I needed to research and things I wanted to include. Ideas occurred to me during the first two read-throughs and made a bunch of notes on themes, character traits and motifs.

After that I pulled out a scene and did a draft to get a feel of the voice. Understand, I never got to see the film. I was working entirely off of the script, a movie trailer and a handful of early production sketches. So, I had no idea how the actors would interpret the lines or how the director would be crafting mood through camera angles, lighting, etc.

When I asked Universal how they wanted me to approach the writing, they said to make it my own. I took them at their word, and when I sat down to write I was determined to write the best novel I could. Understand, I wasn’t trying to novelize a movie script, I was writing a novel. I wrote it so that people would enjoy reading it.

One of the challenges to adapting a novel is the fact that a line of script might translate to pages and pages of story. For example, in the first draft of the script I read there was a scene of the moon rising above some ancient standing stones. The script describes a visual and that’s it. I took that and built a motif of the moon as a predatory goddess of the hunt, and echoed that through the story.

What have you been working on for Marvel Comics? Can we expect to see something soon?

I’ve done mostly mini-series for Marvel, and that’s been a lot of fun. My first works were one-shots, though. A Punisher story for their adults-only ‘Marvel MAX’ line; and a Wolverine short as a back-up piece to an anniversary issue. Since then I did a short stint as regular write on Black Panther, then spun off of that into the DoomWar mini, which pitted the Panther, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Deadpool and WarMachine against Doctor Doom. Lots of fun.

I worked on Marvel Zombies Return, which hit the New York Times bestseller list when it went to graphic novel; and more recently I did Captain America: Hail Hydra. I also created a franchise within Marvel called the ‘Marvel Universe versus’ series. It’s an apocalyptic story, and the first part was the four-issue Marvel Universe vs. The Punisher. That was so successful that they asked me to do a prequel, Marvel Universe vs. Wolverine. The third issue of that will be out on Aug 17, and I just sold another in the franchise, but details of that are under wraps. All of my mini-series are released as graphic novels a few months after their run as monthly comics.

When did you get interested in zombies?

When I was ten years old, I snuck into the Midway Theater in Kensington on October 2, 1968, the official release of Night of the Living Dead. Absolutely freaked me out and scared the bejesus out of me. So, I stayed to see it again. And snuck in again the next day. And the next. I was a devoted fan of the genre from then on.

Then in 1973 the librarian at Conwell Middle School introduced me to several world-class authors including Richard Matheson, who wrote I Am Legend, the film that inspired George Romero to create Night of the Living Dead. Matheson told me a lot about writing, and about thinking ‘across genre lines’.

Some people don’t understand the allure of zombies. What makes them so attractive (of course, provided they haven’t decomposed too much)?

Zombies are the perfect monster. You can do anything you want with them and still make a good story. That’s pure gold for a storyteller. Since the story rarely if ever depends on the personality of a zombie, then we can’t even cheapen them to parodies of themselves, which sometimes happens with monsters like Dracula, Frankenstein, and the Mummy. There’s no loss of grandeur if a zombie is in a comedy like Shaun of the Dead or Zombieland; there’s no harm to the genre if zombies talk (Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Dead), play football (Ryan Brown’s Play Dead), become vehicles for pan-dimensional demons (Brian Keene’s The Rising), become comic characters (Marvel Zombies Return and The Walking Dead), go retro (Fido), or lay siege to castles (Army of the Dead). They’re both ubiquitous and protean –you can do anything with them.

Some folks get upset when a zombie book or movie does follow the George Romero canon. They say: “Zombies can’t move fast.” Or “Zombies don’t use tools.” Or “Zombies can’t talk.”

I beg to differ, and so does the master himself. In George Romero’s first film, the landmark Night of the Living Dead, some zombies moved faster than other. One even ran (though awkwardly) to try and follow Barbara…and that same zom picked up a stone and used it to smash her car window. Then in Day of the Dead, a scientist taught a zom (the wonderful ‘Bub’) to speak; and when that scientist was killed, the zom showed remorse and sought revenge. In Land of the Dead, the zom ‘Big Daddy’ led an army of the living dead on a successful attack against the humans. So…Romero allowed his own zoms to change according to the demands of his scripts. So…adaptable, changeable zoms are canon. So there.

Thematically, zombies represent a massive threat. Once introduced, they maintain the threat but the story focuses on the human, who then must deal with that threat. The nature of the threat varies, because zoms can be metaphorical stand-ins for disease, racism, nuclear war, global unrest, xenophobia, consumerism, and just about anything.

Short answer? Why not zombies?

Do you think zombies make good tweeters?

They’re relentless and they never tire, so yeah…they’ll be tweeting 24/7 with only a short break for some fresh brains.

Can you recommend any zombie related Twitter accounts, our readers are dying to know (pun intended)?

Some of my favorites are:

Thanks to Jonathan Maberry and Don Lafferty. If you’d like to read any of Jonathan’s books, click on the links below.

Neal Wiser is the owner of Neal Wiser Consulting, a Digital Marketing consulting firm. You can follow Neal on Twitter (his handle is @NealWiser). Neal is also the Cofounder and Co-host of the Addicted to Social Media Podcast. You can also read more of Neal’s Twitip posts here or on his blog at NealWiser.com.

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