BY KATHI KAMEN GOLDMARK AND SAM BARRY

The Author Enablers are here to answer your questions about writing and publishing. Together, Kathi and Sam have more than 25 years of experience in book publishing. Kathi is an author, radio producer and former publicist; Sam is a marketing manager at a major publishing company and a freelance editor. They are also proud members of the Rock Bottom Remainders, the all-author rock band founded by Kathi in 1992.

Keeping it real

Dear Author Enablers,

I have an 11-year-old son who is an extraordinary writer with a passion for fiction. His teachers are all convinced he will be a famous writer someday, he has a writing mentor at school, and he has been contacted by a few colleges based on his test and IQ scores. What action would you take with a child like this to help him on his way to fulfilling his potential?
—Christine D.

You have every reason to be a proud mom, and we applaud your desire to nurture your son's talent. That said, it seems to us that you have the academics pretty well covered. Reading wonderful books and having a good mentor are important to every writer, but writers also need to play, to work (chores count), to explore and to savor the richness of everything life has to offer, including comic books. Our best advice is to expose your son to lots of great literature while allowing him the time and space to develop the experience and street smarts that fuel and inform his creative life. No matter how good he is, he'll need stuff to write about that means something to us regular-guy readers.

Dear Author Enablers,

I read your response regarding copyright permission for song lyrics and was hoping you could clarify. I was under the impression that such usage, if brief and properly attributed, fell under the "Fair Use" standard and did not require permission. Am I mistaken?
—Robert H.

An entertainment attorney we know warns that the distinction between fair use and infringement may not always be easy to define. Fair use is a rule that governs the reasonable use of copyrighted material without the consent of the copyright holder. Reasonable use is determined on a case-by-case basis and there are no simple standards to follow—which is good for the lawyers, but not for the rest of us. Here's our two cents (to the tune of "Our Love Is Here To Stay," with apologies to George and Ira Gershwin):

The rights are dear, and we don't want to pay
Not for a year, not even for a day
The lines from movies and books and the lyrics from songs
That we cut and paste—could it be so wrong?
They're too dear, and we won't pay!

Dear Author Enablers,

I would like to know where I can send stories for someone to read and tell me what they think. Do you know of any magazine that might publish them?
—Gloria O.

Writers groups and extension classes are great ways to get your stories heard and evaluated by other writers with approximately the same level of experience and skill. Your local college may have affordable creative writing classes, and if there isn't a writers group in your area, you can start one. If you don't have access to either of these options, there are some online versions that might do the trick. One we've recently discovered is www.storywrite.com. Become a member and you can post your stories and get evaluated by your peers, like an online writers group. Once you're confident that your stories are the best they can be, the magazine Poets and Writers offers listings of publications looking for submissions.

Dear Author Enablers,

How does one get an analysis of books similar to one's own in order to submit a manuscript proposal? Obviously this is a new experience for me.
—Gloria W.

We have a top-secret trick for you. There's a little-known website, amazon.com, which functions as an online database of many of the world's books in print. Type in keywords and a list of related books will appear, along with a little information about each one. Even more reliable (and certainly more personable) is your local librarian or independent bookseller. Ask for a list of books in your category—these folks are experts. Additionally, you can look in the acknowledgements and bibliographies of similar books. Remember, these tips are our little secret.

Thanks for writing,
THE AUTHOR ENABLERS