• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Self-Publishing
  • Author Blogging
  • Sitemap
  • Fonts/Typography

The Book Designer

Practical advice to help build better books

by selfpublishing.com

COACHING


PUBLISHING


WRITING


PRODUCTION


FREELANCE


WRITING JOBS

  • Home
  • About
  • Articles
  • Contact
  • Shop
You are here: Home / Self-Publishing / Have You Tried Jucilating?

Have You Tried Jucilating?

by Judith Briles on March 5, 2020 3 Comments

By Judith Briles

You may have been overloaded with a tsunami of activities and gatherings personally and professionally as last year came to an end. Most authors I know were.

It’s another new year, and another new decade; how about a new you? Are you ready to jucilate? Okay—I made up that word. (Hey—claim yours, it’s called being creative. For me, that’s jucilating!)

jucilate verb (ju•ci•late): the art of creating new ideas that intrigue others and catch their eyes and open their ears.

For me, I want all the above—it doesn’t matter if I’m working on nonfiction or fiction. I want my ideas and the words that I use to be juicy-like chewy-like. So the reader will stop and pause as I present a concept or a key point. How about you?

Sometimes morphing a word creates one that becomes a tell all. Every year, go-to resources such as Websters and Cambridge add “new words” to their master dictionaries. Some are new-new; others have a new meaning. Recently added were:

ghost gear noun (goʊst.gɪr): fishing equipment, such as nets and lines, that is abandoned in the ocean and takes several hundred years to decompose, thus causing harm to sea life and the environment.

seacuterie noun (siːˈkuː təri): an assortment of cold fish and shellfish, cooked or prepared in different ways.

In 1987, I published my first book on the topic of women undermining women: Woman to Woman: From Sabotage to Support. At the time, I thought it would be the only book I wrote on the topic that was based on my dissertation—”Ethics: do women undermine other women?”

Little did I know that it would seed a 30+ year speaking and consulting career that took me to 50 states and to 20 countries as “the expert”. It seeded five other books, the last on the topic; Stabotage: How to Deal with the Pit Bulls, Skunks, Snakes, Scorpions, and Slugs in the Health Care Workplace.

I was dealing with conflict resolution without putting the conflict resolution label to it within a female dominated environment. The narrowing of my audience: the health care workforce came to me with book two—we need your help voiced from health care executives nationwide. Those five books sold a million copies at full retail price.

I took the old conflict resolution model and created a new model of confrontation. I jucilated! The “Briles Carefronting Model” began to buzz within hospitals and nursing associations. Bookmarks were created with the words and the “how to” use them—a laminated tool with a purple tassel. And, they weren’t freebies—I sold them for $5 each (10 for $40 wrapped in a purple ribbon)—many thousands of them.

When I spoke at events, participants would ask me to help them with their words to “carefront” a coworker, even a manager, or a manager to a staff member. And I did. Many health care professionals would ask for permission to use my model and surveys in their own research. And I always said yes.

Later, my work began to appear in other speaker presentations. For the heck of it, I did a Google search as I wrote this month’s column and several slides from other speakers popped up citing my work:

Incivility in Nursing Education: Using The Joint Commission Sentinel Event Alert #40 as a Springboard for Action – PowerPoint PPT Presentation

What concepts, ideas, word variations are floating around you that could create a buzz factor?

If I hadn’t been jucilating, chewing on how to better connect with my readers and my audiences, I wouldn’t have come up with the Briles Carefronting Model.

How about you? For nonfiction authors, what can you claim as yours, or what can you take that is known and add a unique twist to it stamping your name with it? For fiction, you can play with words and descriptions that your characters can use.

Okay, again, I may be stretching it a tad. Yes, your words need to be clear and to the point and woven with other words that will connect, intrigue, do the tell—you name it. As you write your book … as you create marketing copy.

  • Do your words connect with your reader?
     
  • Do they make the reader want to read just one more chapter before turning off their light … then one more?
     
  • Do your words deliver intrigue with a hint, reveal or even a wink of the eye to the reader?
     
  • Do your words force the reader to do a copy/paste and look up what they mean online or reach for a dictionary, scratching their head?

Words are powerful. For you. For your reader. For your book’s success. Celebrate them. Use them. Create them. Start jucilating.
 
Photo: BigStockPhoto

Filed Under: Self-Publishing, Contributing Writers Tagged With: creativity, Judith Briles

journal marketing

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Maggie Smith says

    March 5, 2020 at 9:33 am

    Love this very clear example of writing something that was important to you and over time, having it become an important concept to people you’ve never even met face to face. It’s true, writing can change things for the better. Your story is a perfect example of that. My debut novel, Truth & Other Lies, has a sub-theme about the conflict between the older generation of women baby boomers and the younger millenials who work for/with them so I’m interested in reading your non-fiction books along that same vein. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
    • Judith says

      March 9, 2020 at 10:51 am

      YOu are welcome Maggie … look forward to seing what you come up with. Judith

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Top Picks Thursday! For Writers & Readers 03-12-2020 | The Author Chronicles says:
    March 12, 2020 at 10:01 am

    […] Sometimes we need to find inspiration to keep the creative flow going. Susann Cokal lists 4 reasons to spend time with “bad” books, Eldred “Bob” Bird enjoys coloring with words, and Judith Briles suggests we try jucilating. […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Get the Advanced Publishing Kit

Topics

  • Audiobooks
  • Author Blogging 101
  • Book Construction Blueprint
  • Book Design
  • Book Printing
  • Book Production
  • Book Reviews
  • Cameras
  • Contributing Writers
  • Cover Design
  • E-Books & Readers
  • Editorial
  • Guest Posts
  • Interior Design
  • Interviews
  • Journey of a Book
  • Legal Issues
  • Marketing
  • Podcasts
  • Project Focus
  • Reports
  • Reviews
  • Samples
  • Self Publishing Basics
  • Self-Publishing
  • Social Media
  • Training
  • Video
  • Webinars
  • Writing
Self Publishing Platform
Self Publishing School

COACHING

Self Publishing

PUBLISHING

The Write Life

WRITING

The Book Designer

PRODUCTION

Make a Living Writing

FREELANCE

Freelance Writers Den

WRITING JOBS

Footer

  • Home
  • About
  • Articles
  • Contact
  • Shop
  • Self-Publishing
  • Author Blogging
  • Sitemap
  • Fonts/Typography
Terms of Service
Privacy Policy
Comment Policy
Guest Author Guidelines
Why?
"Writers change the world one reader at a time. But you can't change the world with a book that's still on your hard drive or in a box under your bed. This blog exists to help you get that book into people's hands."
—Joel Friedlander

Copyright Self Publishing School All Rights Reserved. © 2022