Writers of nonfiction books know that writing about something in the media or about to be in the media is a good way to sell books on topics of current interest. However, the problem is predicting what people will be interested in-you can't always foresee a war, a tragic event, a new trend in society until it happens, and by the time you write a book about it, the trend has passed and your book is out too late.
How do you as an author overcome this problem? By figuring out what will interest people in the near future from looking at what interested them in the past. In other words, pick a significant future anniversary of an event-fifty years, one hundred years, etc.-and write a book about it. Then when the anniversary celebrations of that event take place, making people curious to learn more about it, your book will be there to fulfill that interest.
Since we don't have a crystal ball, we can use a pseudo-time machine to go back to the past and resurrect what previously interested people (or just Google past events). It may or may not always be easy to guess what past events will make headlines with their anniversaries, but here are some guidelines for choosing an event to write about, depending upon your and your audience's interests:
- What are you interested in? If you love history, there should be no absence of anniversary events to write about, but you don't have to be a lover of history to write a book on an event or topic celebrating a major anniversary.
For example, maybe you are a stand-up comedian who also wants to write a book. August 6, 2011 was Lucille Ball's 100th birthday. Had you thought about it a couple of years earlier, you could have written a book about Lucille Ball which would be ready to sell when her legions of fans had their interest in her piqued again by her birthday. In the process, as a stand-up comic, Ball might be a fascinating person to write about because it would give you insight into one of history's all-time greatest comedians and inspire your own comedy routines. When I looked at Amazon, I found eleven books on Lucille Ball printed in 2010 and 2011-a sign that several people thought to take advantage of her upcoming birthday.
What if you're interested in recovery issues? How about a book on the 100th anniversary of prohibition (coming in 2019)? If you're interested in literature, find a major author or book celebrating its 100th birthday, and if you like movies, find a significant film celebrating its 50th birthday. Just find an event you can adapt to your interests and you're ready to go.
- What will readers be interested in? The answer to that question is easy. Any anniversary event is going to interest people. Of course, you want to choose what will interest the most people. A book on the Battle of New Orleans may not be as interesting to as many people as a book encompassing the entire War of 1812. Writing the biography of a fairly obscure American author who may have been popular in his day won't work as well as a biography about an author who is still a household name. Look at how well Mark Twain's autobiography, recently published on the 100th anniversary of his death in 2010, sold-the first print run sold out within a few weeks.
- Who are your readers? In writing anniversary books, your readers will probably not be the younger generation, people under twenty-five who are too young to have experienced a famous event that is old enough to have a significant anniversary. That said, it depends on the anniversary you are talking about. In a few weeks, the ten-year anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks will occur. The event was so significant that I imagine many books about it will sell well and even readers who were children of maybe eight or nine, just barely old enough to understand the events and who are in college now, could have interest in such a topic. While one hundred year anniversary events may seem like a sure thing, they do not reflect your readers' life experiences, but a fifty year anniversary event could be something senior citizens flock to read because they lived through that event and love to reminisce, while their children and grandchildren might be interested to read more about the world in which their parents or grandparents grew up.
- How much research will you have to do? A serious biography of an American president or a history book on a battle might take a lot of work. But what if you wanted to write a book celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of your favorite childhood cartoon-you could do a lot of research, but you also could have a lot of fun with the topic by finding people to interview who want to talk about what Bugs Bunny (turns 75 in 2015) or Bart Simpson (turns 25 in 2014) meant to them as children so your readers come away with understanding the event or subject's cultural significance. At the same time, nostalgia and reminiscing is always fun.
- How much time do you have to write the book? You want to find a topic you have time to write about before the anniversary occurs. For example, it's too late to write about anything having an anniversary in 2011-even the fastest writers will have a hard time writing and printing a book before the end of the year. Even 2012 is pushing it in some ways, and it won't help your sales if your book comes out a year or even just a few months after the anniversary, so look at events whose anniversaries are a couple of years down the road to give you time to do the work needed.
Here are a few suggestions for events that will soon celebrate anniversaries. Some of them may be coming up too soon, but they might still give you ideas for possible topics:
2012
- The War of 1812 - 200th anniversary
- Charles Dickens - 200th birthday
- Sinking of the Titanic - 100th anniversary
- Girl Scouts - 100th anniversary
- Tiger Stadium and Fenway Park open - 100th anniversary
- Perry Como, Studs Terkel, Danny Thomas - 100th birthday
2013
- President Kennedy's assassination - 50th anniversary
- Stravinsky ballet "The Rite of Spring" premieres - 100th anniversary
- The zipper is invented - 100th anniversary (Does that sound silly? How about a book on how the zipper revolutionized clothing and fashion?)
- Camel cigarettes are introduced - 100th anniversary
- Willa Cather's classic novel "O Pioneers" is published - 100th anniversary
- Richard Nixon, Rosa Parks, and Lloyd Bridges - 100th birthday
2014
- World War I - 100th anniversary
- Fall of the Berlin Wall - 25th anniversary
- Civil Rights Act - 50th anniversary
- U.S. Coinage - 50th anniversary of no longer using silver in coins (coin collecting is a huge hobby)
- Charlie Chaplin makes his film debut - 100th anniversary
- Mother's Day - 100th anniversary
- Babe Ruth makes his major league debut - 100th anniversary
2015
- The Battle of New Orleans - 200th anniversary
- Novelist Anthony Trollope - 200th birthday
- The U.S. Civil War ends - 150th anniversary
- The Lusitania sinks - 100th anniversary
- Zero Mostel, Billie Holiday, Orson Welles, Ingrid Bergmann - 100th birthday
With a little research and searching online, you can easily find lists of famous events, inventions, and people that will give you plenty of fodder to write an "anniversary" book that will be ready to sell when people are ready to commemorate a historic event or celebrate a historic birthday. History is waiting for you to preserve it for the future, and you'll be ready to give your readers what they don't even know they want yet.