I am submitting a short story to a couple of places. and they have a tendency to ask for a short third person bio. can anyone tell me what should be in this, how long it should? Maybe even show me an example. Be grateful for any tips Best F
You mean your own bio but written in the third person? Like, tell us about yourself but don't use the word "I?"
Hmm. I would assume that should you be published they want to copy and paste a blurb about yourself into the publication. "When he's not curing cancer or slaying dragons, Francis likes to write etc etc etc...."
Advice I have received several times, from different sources, is to include 3 bios in my press kit. * Short Bio: 40 words / think: what's your brand / uses: "by" section of blog post or printed article, profile on social media * Medium Bio: 40-250 words / think: job application / uses: marketing material, meet the staff, query letter, podcast guest introduction * Extended Bio: 250+ words / think: mini bio of writing life / uses: "About" section on author's own website
And not to self plug, but it's a propos: my WritingForums 'about' (*) page uses an adaptation of my 'short bio'. But it's not my official short bio, because WF has a really tiny character limit. (Not a complaint - just a good real world example) Which brings up another benefit of preparing a set of bios with varying word count, is that it takes a lot of work out of composing these ubiquitous 'about' profiles in social media, many of which have character count limits. So I started with something that's, say, 200 characters max, but one time I had to scrunch it down more into 100 characters, and as soon I had it right, I wrote down where it was and saved that for another one. At this point, I'm actually curious about how much I can shave off and still be useful, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it. Anyway, the benefit is consistent branding. (*) (hah! get it? about page? a propos? eh... I digress, sorry...)
So this is what I have come up with so far. Francis de Aguilar, has been an antique dealer, car dealer, drug addict, parent and, having found recovery, became an addiction therapist. He was born and grew up in London U.K. Now retired he lives in rural Devon. He focuses on writing fiction, including three novels, several short stories and a number of poems. Francis’s unpretentious writing is lean, conversational and accessible. His list of writing heroes is a long one, but at the top are; Elmore Leonard, John Le Carré, Jo Nesbo, Val McDermid, Khaled Hosseini, Philip K Dick, Elif Shafak, and Heathcote Williams. I generally have no issue with self disclosure of myself as a recovering addict. I wonder if it is a good idea from a marketing perspective?
