Tag Archives: publishing

General, Life, Patreon, Publishing, Writing, Imagination, Inspiration, Method, Career

New Book Published!

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

Super excited to finally have my second book, Transformation, published and on sale!  It was a long time coming but it finally came together. This time was definitely easier as far as the actual publishing process goes. Just a few minor issues with things I’d managed to forget between my first book and this one. As usual the Smashwords edition is giving me the most problems but I’ll have time today to sit down and fix them.

Once that is done I can focus exclusively on Avatars & Identity and getting it done. I have a couple of people reading it as I go along and so far it’s my most exciting story yet. I find that funny since it’s the book I’ve struggled with the most. Not to mention the majority of it was written very quickly in the first half of November 2014. It’s been nice taking a break from Stephen’s story to try something different. Lately though I’ve been missing the old gang so I’m also looking forward to getting back to them and finishing off my first trilogy.

On the school front I’m looking into the various writing opportunities available here. I’ve discovered we have an excellent fellowship program for graduates, though I don’t hold out much hope of getting a slot. There are apparently well over 600 applicants for the 6 spots each year. Still won’t hurt to try. I’m also talking with the English department about putting together some kind of information packet or workshop on self-publishing since that is a very new and valid option for budding authors (or even long time authors for that matter).

All in all it’s been very busy but very productive and I’m feeling much better about my situation in general. No idea yet if this whole writing full-time thing will pan out but I’m making progress building up my body of work. I’m also discovering that I enjoy writing poetry a whole lot more these days than I did waaaaay back in high school so that is yet another avenue I will be exploring.

Onward and upward!

 

 

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Uncategorized, General, Life, Publishing, Writing, Live Writing, Method

The Novel Continues

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

Another week of class just about done with another two live writing sessions complete. Finished up chapter 15 of my NaNoWriMo 2014 novel Avatars & Identity today. The past three days have seen more writing on my part on the book than I’ve managed to do in the last month. I’ve muddled past another difficult story section and I only have a few major plot points left to hit. I’m not holding myself to the 50k word target for NaNoWriMo for this story though. It will be how ever long it ends up being.

The physical proofs for Transformation came in today. I’ll finish reviewing tomorrow, a last check to make sure everything is good before approving the book to go live. Very excited to finally have the second book done!

Publishing, Reading, Writing, Method

Re-reading (Re-watching, Re-playing, etc.)

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

I’ve only spoken to a couple of friends and acquaintances about re-reading books but the majority have said that they don’t re-read books. The exception seems to be when they’ve stopped reading a series and feel the need to refresh their memory. I’ve always that was strange because I love re-reading books. My favorite is when it’s been long enough (many years usually) that I don’t remember what happens anymore. Or I’ve forgotten some of the bigger plot points. It makes the book an even newer experience. Even if I do remember a book well that won’t stop me from re-reading and re-enjoying it. 🙂

I think one of the reasons I do enjoy re-reading so much is because though the book doesn’t change, my perspective does. As a teenager I had a voracious appetite for book and read a whole bunch. I started on Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time epic when I was 12 or so and there were only a couple of books in the series. Admittedly they were a tough read for a kid my age but I muddled through and really loved the books. Other favorite authors of my youth are David Eddings, Laurell K. Hamilton, and Mercedes Lackey. I’ve added plenty of other favorite authors but sometimes I just want to read something I loved reading previously. And the amazing thing is that I get something new out of them every time. Every time I re-read one of those books I’m at a different point in my life with different things influencing how I read and process the books.

Probably the biggest differences looking back are my shift into real maturity (something I’ve only managed to just barely snag in the past decade) and now that I’m writing for a living. As an adult my tastes have changed somewhat and I find I have no patience for situations and things that I may have sympathized with as a teenager. (A big example here would be angst. Having been through my fair share I don’t have a lot of patience for it.) And now as an author I find myself with a split view of everything I read: one as the laid-back reader I’ve always been and one as an author examining word choices, formatting, publishing quirks, etc. It makes for an engaging experience even when I’ve read the book many times before.

Anywho, just some food for thought.

General, Life, Publishing, Writing

When Bad News Strikes

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

I’ve been out of the game for some time now but I’m finally getting back into the swing of things. I know I don’t have many readers but for those who were wondering my long silence was due to finding out my sister has cancer. It was more than a bit of a shock to us all especially considering just how fast it developed. We have all been dealing with the fallout from that diagnosis for the past month or so. The silver lining here is that it could have been much worse and they caught it early enough the doctors are talking about fully curing her, not just remission.

The funny thing about news like this is how it alters how you think of things. This was the first time someone close to me was diagnosed with something as serious as cancer. My family has its fair share of ailments but cancer really wasn’t one of them. I suppose that made me feel like we’d dodged the bullet. After all we grew up just a block away from a park that harbored a dangerous carcinogen just under the surface but we seemed to be fine. Not to much now. Still, things are not nearly as bad as they could be and we are very hopeful at this point that she will make a fully recovery.

As for my writing the whole cancer thing definitely derailed that for a time. This week was the first time I managed to concentrate enough to finalize the formatting for Induction. As of today the print proofs have shipped and I am very excited to hold my first book in my hands. In a case of interesting timing I finished my second book on the same day I found out about my sister. I haven’t done much with that beyond a quick first edit but I do have it out for a more thorough round of editing and I hope to get it back shortly. Funny enough thanks to all of these delays I was able to include a sample of book 2 in the print and updated digital copies of book 1.

In other news I am working on my application to attend the university here. I am very eager to have access to their Creative Writing curriculum. The community here in town is also very artist, and writer, friendly. All in all college this time around should be a much more rewarding experience.

Life, Publishing, Writing, Method, Career, General

Fun with (Re) Editing

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

Managed to finish up the formatting for POD with Induction. It was looking damn sexy. I’d always thought the font used in most print fiction was Times New Roman but it turns out to be Garamond. At least that’s what the templates I’ve received from various sites use and it looks very nice indeed. Had some fun (not really) setting up my Table of Contents in Word. The best part of that is that it’s tied to the chapter headings so even if future edits cause page numbers to change I can just update the TOC and it will automatically fix the numbers. This was my first time setting that up but it was pretty easy. Much like computer programming it takes more work up front but the end result is greatly increased efficiency and accuracy. Things I’ve always appreciated.

So I’m done right? Ready to upload the file and get on with the printing process! Woot! I did one last quick look over the whole thing and realized something was missing. A lot of somethings. It turns out that at some point my Google Docs master copy of the book lost ALL of its italics formatting. This is a huge deal for the book since I used italics to denote thoughts for the main character and a few others. Just re-reading the prologue was confusing because the thoughts are written like dialog but are placed within the paragraphs at the exact point the character is thinking them. Without the italics formatting they are horribly out of place and confusing. The worst part is this is the version currently on sale in electronic format. Yikes! So my main focus now is to re-apply all of the missing formatting in the print version and then make a copy to re-format back to ebook. Le sigh.

I looked at the revision history hoping to find a recent copy with the italics but nope, it’s been this way for months and I just didn’t notice. That’ll teach me to have just one master copy. I’ll check some of the downloaded ones before I get too far with the re-formatting to make sure I don’t have a local backup, but I’m not holding my breath. Ah well. Live and learn.

In the meantime I’m taking a break from the editing spree to slap on the last two coats of whiteboard paint on my office wall. Super excited about that. The first two coats are already on and it looks very promising. Once these last two are done it’s a three day wait for the stuff to cure. Then I get to see if the time and money I’ve put into this was even worth it. This paint has very mixed reviews after all. Here’s hoping!

Publishing, Writing, Inspiration

Writing Log: Day 5 – Month 1

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This entry is part [part not set] of 73 in the series The Writing Life Blog

Only five real days of solid writing for this month. Not what I really hoped to make, but not bad either as I ease back into the swing of the writing process. Today was dominated by publishing concerns. I’m finally working on the print format for my first book. I’m looking forward to getting that done since my first book won’t be finished until the print and audio versions are done. Well, print is done and audio is in the works. For the print version I’m giving CreateSpace a shot. I’m also learning InDesign CS6. I went with a so-called “legacy” copy instead of the stupid subscription model so many companies are pushing now. It costs more up front but after the first year I’ll have saved a good chunk of change. At this point I’m just learning the ropes as far as formatting goes.

One thing that became evident immediately was that I should have worked out the print cover before doing the electronic. In the future I’ll simply clip the front print cover to be used for the electronic. Makes things much easier. As it is the electronic cover of my book will be changing a little to match the print version. It’s not really a big deal though since changing the electronic cover is as easy as uploading the new file. Welcome to the brave “new” world of self-publishing! This is definitely one of those things that has become infinitely more accessible thanks to technological advances. While a part of me wishes I’d been writing non-stop since high school (since I’d probably be sitting on a veritable mountain of stuff that I could now publish), I might have been horribly discouraged by the publishing system of yore.

I’m planning on putting a full guide together capturing all of my experiences with self publishing along with a quick reference guide. There are a lot of good sources of information out there, but they’re pretty widespread. Also, the specifics (like how to estimate your page count for print purposes) are buried in a mountain of more general information. A quick reference or cheat sheet would be incredibly helpful until I really get used to this. Once it’s all old hat I shouldn’t need the hours I’ve sunk into the publishing side so far for future books and projects. Still, I don’t begrudge the time. The journey itself is definitely worth the effort.

Well, today wraps up the month of March. I may have only put in 5 real days of work on my book, but I’m pretty pleased with the results. Today was particularly productive. I think I’ve found my flow again for the story which is very heartening. I’m looking forward to seeing just how much I can get done in April!

 

Writing Log – Day 5 Month 1 (Monthly Wrap-up)

Transformation (Second Shroud Novel) –  11,050 words to date (2,269 today)

Other Fiction – 0

Blog Entries – 495

Emails – 0

Total Fiction This Month: 12,144

Total Words This Month: 14,920