It's been a rather quiet month around here writing-wise. I've made progress on a number of fronts, but haven't really had much in the way of exciting news to report. There's nothing wrong with that -- in fact, it's rather typical. The last couple of months certainly spoiled me a bit, though, with all the story sales and other exciting news that I got to share. But I absolutely can't complain about the progress I've made with getting various stories written and revised, which is equally important, if less exciting to talk about.
Below are this week's writing-related links that I wanted to share with my readers. Also, if you're so inclined, C. Bryan Brown has a guest post up today on my Write Every Day blog where he talks about how he's developed his writing rituals.
Showing posts with label self-publishing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self-publishing. Show all posts
Sunday, July 22, 2012
Thursday, May 17, 2012
DIY: Creating My Own eBook, Part Three - Lessons Learned
Late last month, after publishing my first eBook ("Gravity's Pull"), I wrote two posts about the process. The first was a general post on what I did and the second was specific to creating the cover art.
I promised a third post, discussing things I had learned and what I might decide to differently in future eBook publications. With a few weeks having passed, now felt like a good time to do that. I'll caveat all of this that I'm going off a single "experiment" here and that I'm generalizing from it. If you've experienced something dramatically different from what I've described, I'd be very interested to hear about it.
The first thing I've learned is that my supposition about what sales would be like was correct. In my first post, I said: "I wouldn't be surprised to see a couple more sales trickle in through these channels over the next couple of weeks, but unless I put more effort into getting eyeballs to the eBook it's probably going to have very, very few sales from month to month."
I promised a third post, discussing things I had learned and what I might decide to differently in future eBook publications. With a few weeks having passed, now felt like a good time to do that. I'll caveat all of this that I'm going off a single "experiment" here and that I'm generalizing from it. If you've experienced something dramatically different from what I've described, I'd be very interested to hear about it.
The first thing I've learned is that my supposition about what sales would be like was correct. In my first post, I said: "I wouldn't be surprised to see a couple more sales trickle in through these channels over the next couple of weeks, but unless I put more effort into getting eyeballs to the eBook it's probably going to have very, very few sales from month to month."
Monday, April 30, 2012
DIY: Cover Art - Creating My Own eBook, Part Two
Last Monday, I gave an overview of the process I used when creating my first eBook. One of the things that I said I'd go into more detail about at a later date was the creation of the cover art.
Everything I've read about the publication and marketing of eBooks over the last several months has suggested that one of the most important aspects of the whole process is having appropriate cover art. You want cover art that fits the genre/feel you intend for your book to have and you want to produce that cover art on a budget which fits your overall sales expectations for your book. There's obviously a quality factor, too, but that is both somewhat subjective and is dependent to a certain extent on the budget. Another important thing is for it to look good when seen in a thumbnail view.
Everything I've read about the publication and marketing of eBooks over the last several months has suggested that one of the most important aspects of the whole process is having appropriate cover art. You want cover art that fits the genre/feel you intend for your book to have and you want to produce that cover art on a budget which fits your overall sales expectations for your book. There's obviously a quality factor, too, but that is both somewhat subjective and is dependent to a certain extent on the budget. Another important thing is for it to look good when seen in a thumbnail view.
Monday, April 23, 2012
DIY: Creating My Own eBook, Part One
One of the major things that has changed between the first time I explored the world of fiction publication (early 1990s) and today is the nature of self-publishing. Back then, it typically involved laying out hundreds or thousands of dollars upfront and was very much considered the last refuge of a writer who had failed to find a market. There was the occasional self-published item that went on to have some certain degree of success, particularly in niche markets, but most self-publishing left authors with boxes of unsold books in their garage or basement.
To say there has been a sea change would be an understatement. The growing acceptance of eBooks by readers has led to a whole new marketplace for digital titles. Turnaround times are miniscule, overhead is small to nonexistent. It's literally possible to take an existing work and turn it into an eBook ready for sale in an evening. In fact, that's exactly what I did one night last week with my science fiction story "Gravity's Pull" and my experience is what I'll be discussing in this series of posts.
Here are the steps I followed:
To say there has been a sea change would be an understatement. The growing acceptance of eBooks by readers has led to a whole new marketplace for digital titles. Turnaround times are miniscule, overhead is small to nonexistent. It's literally possible to take an existing work and turn it into an eBook ready for sale in an evening. In fact, that's exactly what I did one night last week with my science fiction story "Gravity's Pull" and my experience is what I'll be discussing in this series of posts.
Here are the steps I followed:
Friday, April 20, 2012
"Gravity's Pull" eBook Live on Amazon
I have been thinking for months about starting to do some self-published eBooks through Amazon and/or other sites. Recently, I decided to go ahead and take the plunge.
"Gravity's Pull" is one of the first short stories I wrote last summer. It's a hard science fiction "problem" story of the kind that I associate with Analog. The blurb I wrote for it on Amazon reads as follows:
"Gravity's Pull" is one of the first short stories I wrote last summer. It's a hard science fiction "problem" story of the kind that I associate with Analog. The blurb I wrote for it on Amazon reads as follows:
Camilla is beginning her first tour of duty as a crew leader and is expecting a routine three months on the GT Donald Ademu, a gravity tractor ship assigned to change the trajectory of an asteroid. An unexpected development jeopardizes the lives of her and her crew as well as many other people. Camilla and the two others on-board race to find a solution in "Gravity's Pull."I plan to post several blog entries in upcoming weeks talking in more detail about the ePublishing process. For now, I just wanted to share the news that the story is out there to be read and also share the cover art that I developed for the book.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Sunday Links & The Week in #storyeachnight: March 25, 2012 Edition
The last two days saw (among quite a few rejection emails) a pair of very exciting emails. The first, on Friday, was one from Nature indicating that they were interested in buying one of my stories for their "Futures" feature. This was exciting for any number of reasons, three of the chief ones being that this will easily be the largest readership any of my writing has ever been exposed to, it will be my first print publication in my return to writing, and it will be my first sale to a Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) qualifying market, making me eligible to join as an Associate member. Needless to say, I'm happy.
Saturday, I received an email from a semi-pro market indicating that they were interested in buying one of my stories as well. I've been asked to make some minor revisions, which I have agreed in principal to do and will be working on later today. This one is exciting to me because it's my first non-flash sale in my return to writing and it represents the sale of a story which I am particularly fond of -- it's easily my favorite of the stories I wrote towards the tail end of last summer. I'm not naming the market yet since the revisions still need to be made and accepted. I've no reason to expect this will pose difficulty, but since it would be awkward for both parties if it did pose difficulty, I'll wait to share any more details on this until the revisions are accepted and the contract signed.
It's certainly nice to have some good news to share here!
Here are the stories I read for #storyeachnight this week; I did get a nice string of four nights in a row, though it's been far from "each" night recently:
3/18 - None
3/19 - "Ride-Along" by Brendan Dubois from THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. I was a bit underwhelmed by this one. Lots of it felt too heavily telegraphed. Writing was good enough that it was still decent but I wasn't wowed.
3/20 - "Memories of My Mother" by Ken Liu from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. Well-told story of relativistic travel and one family. That said, I've read several relativistic travel stories recently & am not in a rush to read another. No fault of the author. (* My favorite of the week.)
3/21 - "I Am Nano" by Sean Monaghan from ASIM #52. A story of nanobots gaining sentience.
3/22 - "Who Killed Skippy?" by Paul D Brazill from NOIR NATION #1. Entertaining story about a family business & a dead kangaroo.
3/23 - None
3/24 - None
And now, here are this week's links:
Saturday, I received an email from a semi-pro market indicating that they were interested in buying one of my stories as well. I've been asked to make some minor revisions, which I have agreed in principal to do and will be working on later today. This one is exciting to me because it's my first non-flash sale in my return to writing and it represents the sale of a story which I am particularly fond of -- it's easily my favorite of the stories I wrote towards the tail end of last summer. I'm not naming the market yet since the revisions still need to be made and accepted. I've no reason to expect this will pose difficulty, but since it would be awkward for both parties if it did pose difficulty, I'll wait to share any more details on this until the revisions are accepted and the contract signed.
It's certainly nice to have some good news to share here!
Here are the stories I read for #storyeachnight this week; I did get a nice string of four nights in a row, though it's been far from "each" night recently:
3/18 - None
3/19 - "Ride-Along" by Brendan Dubois from THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. I was a bit underwhelmed by this one. Lots of it felt too heavily telegraphed. Writing was good enough that it was still decent but I wasn't wowed.
3/20 - "Memories of My Mother" by Ken Liu from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. Well-told story of relativistic travel and one family. That said, I've read several relativistic travel stories recently & am not in a rush to read another. No fault of the author. (* My favorite of the week.)
3/21 - "I Am Nano" by Sean Monaghan from ASIM #52. A story of nanobots gaining sentience.
3/22 - "Who Killed Skippy?" by Paul D Brazill from NOIR NATION #1. Entertaining story about a family business & a dead kangaroo.
3/23 - None
3/24 - None
And now, here are this week's links:
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Sunday Links & The Week in #storyeachnight: March 11, 2012 Edition
First off, a quick update relating to Dissecting the Short Story. As some of you may know from comments I've made on Twitter or other places, things have been incredibly crazy in my life recently. In the span of two weeks my father was injured in an accident which has drastically (and, thankfully, presumably temporarily) restricted his ability to get around and my mother-in-law had a stroke. Between taking on extra tasks to help family members and a lot of driving (750 miles in one 36 hour period) I've been both short on time and energy to do anything writing related. My writing time has been spent almost totally on things that either have a deadline or where I have time-based commitments (such as my Seinfeld/Daily Writing Chain and blog schedule).
How this relates to Dissecting the Short Story is that some of the benchmarks in my original timeline (as discussed in Monday's post about the future of the feature) are likely to slip a bit, though hopefully not by too awfully much.
So, with that out of the way, let's move on to the usual Sunday business of my #storyeachnight recap for the week and links to blog posts, etc. which I read in the last week and found worth sharing. First, the week's nightly short stories:
3/4 - "The Stars Are Falling" by Joe Lansdale from THE YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY AND HORROR 2011. A man returns to his wife, son, & East Texas home after experiencing the horrors of World War I but everything is different.
3/5 - "Accident Report" by Ed McBain from LEARNING TO KILL. Seemed very much a predecessor to the 87th Precinct stories
3/6 - "Something Real" by Rick Wilber from the 4-5/12 ASIMOV'S. A story of alternate timelines, WWII and Moe Berg.
3/7 - "Hurt Me" by M.L.N. Hanover from YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY & HORROR 2011. An interesting ghost story, nicely atmospheric, with a resolution I didn't expect.
3/8 - "Chinese Puzzle" by Ed McBain from LEARNING TO KILL. Another pre-87th Precinct procedural, this one 1st person.
3/9 - Ironically when I couldn't sleep I read "Insomnia" by A. G. Carpenter from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. I mostly liked "Insomnia" (the story) though the ending left me a bit underwhelmed. Good voice & main character.
3/10 - "Electrica" by Sean McMullen in the Mar/Apr 2012 F&SF. Wow! If you have this mag, make time to read it! "Electrica" had some steampunk elements & setting (though not tone) put me in mind of the Flashman novels. I thoroughly enjoyed "Electrica." Didn't want to put it down. McMullen apparently is working on a novel in this universe. (* My favorite this week, though many weeks "The Stars Are Falling" or "Hurt Me" could have been my favorite. An especially good batch of stories this week.)
And now, here are this week's links:
How this relates to Dissecting the Short Story is that some of the benchmarks in my original timeline (as discussed in Monday's post about the future of the feature) are likely to slip a bit, though hopefully not by too awfully much.
So, with that out of the way, let's move on to the usual Sunday business of my #storyeachnight recap for the week and links to blog posts, etc. which I read in the last week and found worth sharing. First, the week's nightly short stories:
3/4 - "The Stars Are Falling" by Joe Lansdale from THE YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY AND HORROR 2011. A man returns to his wife, son, & East Texas home after experiencing the horrors of World War I but everything is different.
3/5 - "Accident Report" by Ed McBain from LEARNING TO KILL. Seemed very much a predecessor to the 87th Precinct stories
3/6 - "Something Real" by Rick Wilber from the 4-5/12 ASIMOV'S. A story of alternate timelines, WWII and Moe Berg.
3/7 - "Hurt Me" by M.L.N. Hanover from YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY & HORROR 2011. An interesting ghost story, nicely atmospheric, with a resolution I didn't expect.
3/8 - "Chinese Puzzle" by Ed McBain from LEARNING TO KILL. Another pre-87th Precinct procedural, this one 1st person.
3/9 - Ironically when I couldn't sleep I read "Insomnia" by A. G. Carpenter from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. I mostly liked "Insomnia" (the story) though the ending left me a bit underwhelmed. Good voice & main character.
3/10 - "Electrica" by Sean McMullen in the Mar/Apr 2012 F&SF. Wow! If you have this mag, make time to read it! "Electrica" had some steampunk elements & setting (though not tone) put me in mind of the Flashman novels. I thoroughly enjoyed "Electrica." Didn't want to put it down. McMullen apparently is working on a novel in this universe. (* My favorite this week, though many weeks "The Stars Are Falling" or "Hurt Me" could have been my favorite. An especially good batch of stories this week.)
And now, here are this week's links:
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Sunday Links & The Week in #storyeachnight: March 4, 2012 Edition
It's Sunday again! Time for me to go back and look over the short stories I read as part of my #storyeachnight reading and also highlight some writing-related links that I found particularly useful from this past week. First, here are this week's stories along with my comments on them from my #storyeachnight tweets.
2/26 - "Last Cottage" by Christopher Merkner from BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. An interesting first person plural story of greed in a small town. (* My favorite of the week.)
2/27 - "Bus Ride to Mars" by Cat Rambo from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. I enjoyed reading it, lots of great details. If there was much plot, I missed it. That said, it's a credit to the story that I was unsure of the "point" and still liked the story.
2/28 - "The Procedure" by L. E. Elder from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. A singularity-ish story with one of last non-AllTechs facing her future. Maybe I've just read too many similar stories, but that one really didn't grab me.
2/29 - "Frumpy Little Beat Girl" by Peter Atkins from YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY AND HORROR 2011. A Robert Rankin/Douglas Adams-esque fantasy about a used bookseller co-opted into trying to save the world. Fun. I've really enjoyed this anthology, almost every story I've read from it so far has been excellent.
3/1 - "Top of the World" by Bill Crider from FAVORITE KILLS.
3/2 - "Jack Webb's Star" by Lee Goldberg from FAVORITE KILLS. From a traffic ticket to theft and murder...
3/3 - "More Than a Scam" by Dave Zeltserman from 21 TALES. Most everyone gets more than they bargained for in it.
And now, here are this week's writing-related links that I found interesting and worth sharing...
2/26 - "Last Cottage" by Christopher Merkner from BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. An interesting first person plural story of greed in a small town. (* My favorite of the week.)
2/27 - "Bus Ride to Mars" by Cat Rambo from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. I enjoyed reading it, lots of great details. If there was much plot, I missed it. That said, it's a credit to the story that I was unsure of the "point" and still liked the story.
2/28 - "The Procedure" by L. E. Elder from DAILY SCIENCE FICTION. A singularity-ish story with one of last non-AllTechs facing her future. Maybe I've just read too many similar stories, but that one really didn't grab me.
2/29 - "Frumpy Little Beat Girl" by Peter Atkins from YEAR'S BEST DARK FANTASY AND HORROR 2011. A Robert Rankin/Douglas Adams-esque fantasy about a used bookseller co-opted into trying to save the world. Fun. I've really enjoyed this anthology, almost every story I've read from it so far has been excellent.
3/1 - "Top of the World" by Bill Crider from FAVORITE KILLS.
3/2 - "Jack Webb's Star" by Lee Goldberg from FAVORITE KILLS. From a traffic ticket to theft and murder...
3/3 - "More Than a Scam" by Dave Zeltserman from 21 TALES. Most everyone gets more than they bargained for in it.
And now, here are this week's writing-related links that I found interesting and worth sharing...
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Sunday Links & The Week in #storyeachnight: February 12, 2012 Edition
I'm still working on adjusting to my new blogging schedule of Monday, Thursday, Sunday after having done Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday for several months. It sort of feels weird only writing up one mid-week blog post. I'm going to give it a while, though, and see how I feel about it after a couple of months.
One routine I've picked up recently is reading a short story every day/night and tweeting about it. Nicole Cushing has been doing this on the #storyeachnight hashtag for quite a few months. Here are the stories I read this week along with the comments I made on them.
2/5 - "Exit Interview" by Lynne Heitman from BOSTON NOIR: Office/gender politics & a hostage situation.
2/6 - "Cellmate" by Theodore Sturgeon from an old paperback of E PLURIBUS UNICORN
2/7 - "Fever Dream" from THE VINTAGE BRADBURY: Child realizes a danger no one else sees. Some chilling aspects. But it also felt a bit dated and not just because it had a doctor making house calls. "Fever Dream" & last night's "Cellmate" were both late-40s Weird Tales stories. I felt that Sturgeon's held up better.
2/8 - "Night Nurse" by Harry Shannon from FAVORITE KILLS: A nightmarish trip to a hospital for the MC in this story.
2/9 - "Mrs. Hatcher's Evaluation" by James Van Pelt from 3/12 Asimov's. Fun story,very critical of modern education theory
2/10 - "The Secret of the City of Gold" by Ron Goulart from the 1-2/12 issue of F&SF. It featured series character Harry Challenge, seems to have been intended to evoke the feel of old (old) school pulp fiction. I think I tend to be more forgiving of originals than pastiches & this didn't strike me as a terribly amusing pastiche.
2/11 - "Scrap Dragon" by Naomi Kritzer from the 1-2/12 F&SF. A fairy tale or bedtime story with LOTS of..."editorial" suggestions by the "listener." Quite enjoyable; it put a smile on my face.
As I do every Sunday, I've gathered together links I've liked/gotten something out of from things I've read this week. Here are this week's links...
One routine I've picked up recently is reading a short story every day/night and tweeting about it. Nicole Cushing has been doing this on the #storyeachnight hashtag for quite a few months. Here are the stories I read this week along with the comments I made on them.
2/5 - "Exit Interview" by Lynne Heitman from BOSTON NOIR: Office/gender politics & a hostage situation.
2/6 - "Cellmate" by Theodore Sturgeon from an old paperback of E PLURIBUS UNICORN
2/7 - "Fever Dream" from THE VINTAGE BRADBURY: Child realizes a danger no one else sees. Some chilling aspects. But it also felt a bit dated and not just because it had a doctor making house calls. "Fever Dream" & last night's "Cellmate" were both late-40s Weird Tales stories. I felt that Sturgeon's held up better.
2/8 - "Night Nurse" by Harry Shannon from FAVORITE KILLS: A nightmarish trip to a hospital for the MC in this story.
2/9 - "Mrs. Hatcher's Evaluation" by James Van Pelt from 3/12 Asimov's. Fun story,very critical of modern education theory
2/10 - "The Secret of the City of Gold" by Ron Goulart from the 1-2/12 issue of F&SF. It featured series character Harry Challenge, seems to have been intended to evoke the feel of old (old) school pulp fiction. I think I tend to be more forgiving of originals than pastiches & this didn't strike me as a terribly amusing pastiche.
2/11 - "Scrap Dragon" by Naomi Kritzer from the 1-2/12 F&SF. A fairy tale or bedtime story with LOTS of..."editorial" suggestions by the "listener." Quite enjoyable; it put a smile on my face.
As I do every Sunday, I've gathered together links I've liked/gotten something out of from things I've read this week. Here are this week's links...
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Sunday Links: January 22, 2012 Edition
Most of Sunday has passed already, but there are still links to be shared.
First off, if you're looking for an opportunity to experience the editorial side of short fiction, Shimmer is looking for new slush readers. Everyone I've talked to who has done slush reading has said that they have learned a lot from it. I was tempted to apply for this myself, but I think I'm going to pass for now because I'm already struggling to meet my current writing goals. The editor estimated this would take about five hours a week of a person's time. So, if this is something you're interested in, I'd urge you to check out the details at the link above.
Without any further ado, here are the other writing-related links which I've come across this week that I wanted to share with you all...
First off, if you're looking for an opportunity to experience the editorial side of short fiction, Shimmer is looking for new slush readers. Everyone I've talked to who has done slush reading has said that they have learned a lot from it. I was tempted to apply for this myself, but I think I'm going to pass for now because I'm already struggling to meet my current writing goals. The editor estimated this would take about five hours a week of a person's time. So, if this is something you're interested in, I'd urge you to check out the details at the link above.
Without any further ado, here are the other writing-related links which I've come across this week that I wanted to share with you all...
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Sunday Links: October 16th, 2011 Edition
Hmmm... Didn't October just start? The post title claims that we're more than halfway through the month, but I'm finding that hard to believe. *double-checks calendar* Nope, that's right. Well, how about that. They do say that time flies.
Speaking of time... There are still a few days left to enter the first Kazka Press monthly flash fiction contest. One of the things mentioned in my poll was an interest in knowing about new contests and markets. Since I like flash fiction, this one definitely was of interest to me. The people running it were also very responsive when I asked for some details about rights, etc. while they were still in their "pre-announcement" mode last month. This is going to be a monthly contest, so keep an eye on their site if you like writing flash fiction.
Among everything else this week I've been doing tech support work for my wife who got to be one of the first Sprint customers with an iPhone. I must say it's a pretty slick device. I should be able to get a new phone once November rolls around, and I'll likely get one for myself. So it's not really "tech support" it's just "reading ahead" for my own iPhone usage. :)
But enough about my technophilia. It's just a bit over two weeks until NaNoWriMo time (and I'm not, I repeat, not panicking despite being a bit behind where I'd like to be with planning). One thing I am pleased about is having coming up with my one-sentence description for my planned novel: "A young woman who has just lost her parents to a car accident would give anything to be able to change that aspect of her past, but finds herself in a position where she must protect a different element of the past to save what remains of her family."
Now for this week's links!
Speaking of time... There are still a few days left to enter the first Kazka Press monthly flash fiction contest. One of the things mentioned in my poll was an interest in knowing about new contests and markets. Since I like flash fiction, this one definitely was of interest to me. The people running it were also very responsive when I asked for some details about rights, etc. while they were still in their "pre-announcement" mode last month. This is going to be a monthly contest, so keep an eye on their site if you like writing flash fiction.
Among everything else this week I've been doing tech support work for my wife who got to be one of the first Sprint customers with an iPhone. I must say it's a pretty slick device. I should be able to get a new phone once November rolls around, and I'll likely get one for myself. So it's not really "tech support" it's just "reading ahead" for my own iPhone usage. :)
But enough about my technophilia. It's just a bit over two weeks until NaNoWriMo time (and I'm not, I repeat, not panicking despite being a bit behind where I'd like to be with planning). One thing I am pleased about is having coming up with my one-sentence description for my planned novel: "A young woman who has just lost her parents to a car accident would give anything to be able to change that aspect of her past, but finds herself in a position where she must protect a different element of the past to save what remains of her family."
Now for this week's links!
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Sunday Links: October 2nd, 2011 Edition
As promised last Sunday, this week's links post comes with a bright shiny new month attached to it. Welcome, October!
Earlier this weekend I went to my first Tae Kwon Do tournament in over twenty years. I wish I could say that I had achieved better results, but I can honestly say that it was a good learning experience. Like writing, martial arts training isn't something that most people can just pick up and excel at without hard work and a number of failures along the way. So, just like I am working to not let writing rejections get me down, I intend to not get overly disappointed about the less-than-I-hoped-for performance I turned in and work to do better next time!
Voting for the 2nd challenge in Rachael Harrie's Platform-Building Writers' Campaign remains open throughthe 11:59 EDT on Monday 10/3 Friday October 14th. (The 10/3 deadline is for entering the contest, not voting. Thanks to @I_Am_LadyJai for setting me straight on this.) The judging for this challenge is strictly based on popular vote. So, if you read mine ("My Name is Imago Montoya...") and enjoyed it, I'd truly appreciate you voting for it by clicking here and "liking" entry #42.
And now, the links!
Earlier this weekend I went to my first Tae Kwon Do tournament in over twenty years. I wish I could say that I had achieved better results, but I can honestly say that it was a good learning experience. Like writing, martial arts training isn't something that most people can just pick up and excel at without hard work and a number of failures along the way. So, just like I am working to not let writing rejections get me down, I intend to not get overly disappointed about the less-than-I-hoped-for performance I turned in and work to do better next time!
Voting for the 2nd challenge in Rachael Harrie's Platform-Building Writers' Campaign remains open through
And now, the links!
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Sunday Links: September 18, 2011 Edition
Time to revisit the past week. It's seen me dive into writing a novel in addition to continuing work on my short fiction. The upcoming week has me a bit concerned. I'm on a good roll with my Seinfeld Chain (up to 17 days as of last night) but the next five days I'm going to be in training for my day job nearly 12 hours a day when you include transit time. Will I end up using a Mulligan? I hope not.
I came across some great blog posts around the internet this week, and I'm happy to present them past the jump. I hope everyone had a good week and has a great week this coming week.
I came across some great blog posts around the internet this week, and I'm happy to present them past the jump. I hope everyone had a good week and has a great week this coming week.
Friday, September 9, 2011
Stretching Out
In the last six weeks I've written first drafts of 16 stories ranging in length from 200 words to about 5500 words. Many of these have gone through revisions and/or Beta and are out to markets. I'm thrilled with the volume of writing I've gotten done, but I'm also running into a situation where I'm starting to feel like I'm doing some serious juggling. Several of my stories have sat in first draft now for 1-2 weeks without me revisiting them for a second draft. This is due to a combination of factors. One is that I'm spending time doing revisions of slightly older stories based on feedback from Beta crit partners. The other is that with my goal of having 500 news words every day and with the fact that my average story length is about 2000 words, I'm producing at least two new stories a week. Finally, just the process of submitting all these stories is taking a non-trivial chunk of time.
The longest story I've ever written is just under 10,000 words. When I first started investigating being published -- around 1990 -- the common wisdom was that novelettes and novellas were next-to-impossible to sell for non-established writers. That might be a bit less true today if you consider self-publishing options. But, for now, I'm still primarily interested in following the "traditional" publishing route. I'm interested in learning about self-publishing, but not ready to jump into those waters yet.
I've already planned to do NaNoWriMo in November. But I've got two novel ideas and I'm feeling the itch to try to start diving in to one of them sooner than that. Starting on one of these would let me keep working on writing every day while not adding to my backlog of short stories. I could still write a short if the mood struck me. In fact, I'll probably try to do that to make sure I don't let the short story muscles I've been building up recently get flabby. Looking at themed issues and anthologies seems like a possible way to keep myself using those skills.
On the one hand, it's an exciting thought, tackling something new. On the other hand, it's scary. A novel is a big project representing a lot of time commitment. The thought of spending all that time on something that possibly no one but my Betas would ever read is unsettling. But I think I'm going to take the plunge.
I'd love any advice from people who have gone through that shift of writing shorts to writing novels. Naturally, I'll keep everyone posted on my progress. My plan at the moment is to do some preliminary work over the next few days (while getting my 500 words in on other tasks) and start Chapter 1 by the middle of next week.
OK, I've said it. Now I just have to trust in myself and let peer pressure help keep me "honest" to what I've decided I want to do.
The longest story I've ever written is just under 10,000 words. When I first started investigating being published -- around 1990 -- the common wisdom was that novelettes and novellas were next-to-impossible to sell for non-established writers. That might be a bit less true today if you consider self-publishing options. But, for now, I'm still primarily interested in following the "traditional" publishing route. I'm interested in learning about self-publishing, but not ready to jump into those waters yet.
I've already planned to do NaNoWriMo in November. But I've got two novel ideas and I'm feeling the itch to try to start diving in to one of them sooner than that. Starting on one of these would let me keep working on writing every day while not adding to my backlog of short stories. I could still write a short if the mood struck me. In fact, I'll probably try to do that to make sure I don't let the short story muscles I've been building up recently get flabby. Looking at themed issues and anthologies seems like a possible way to keep myself using those skills.
On the one hand, it's an exciting thought, tackling something new. On the other hand, it's scary. A novel is a big project representing a lot of time commitment. The thought of spending all that time on something that possibly no one but my Betas would ever read is unsettling. But I think I'm going to take the plunge.
I'd love any advice from people who have gone through that shift of writing shorts to writing novels. Naturally, I'll keep everyone posted on my progress. My plan at the moment is to do some preliminary work over the next few days (while getting my 500 words in on other tasks) and start Chapter 1 by the middle of next week.
OK, I've said it. Now I just have to trust in myself and let peer pressure help keep me "honest" to what I've decided I want to do.
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Thoughts on Publishing
The publishing world has changed dramatically in the twenty years since I first took any serious interest in it. That shouldn't be surprising; lots of "worlds" have changed dramatically in that time but I've had reason to think some about those changes recently.
That first period of taking writing seriously would have been in the very early '90s. Most of what I tried to write then (as now) was genre fiction, almost entirely SF/F/H. I was also working completely in the short fiction world. There were a handful of "big" magazines (Analog, Asimov's, F&SF being the biggest) and a lot of small press magazines which paid anywhere from a few cents a word to not a cent. Those small press magazines also tended to come and go with some regularity. There were occasional themed original anthologies which took unsolicited submissions.
Though I didn't attempt anything novel-length at that time, I was aware of the fact that there were Publishers (big and small) and Vanity Presses/self-publishing. The general impression I got was that no one who seriously considered being a potential professional Writer would be going the self-published/Vanity Press route.
Fast-forward to 2011 and some things look the same, others look a lot different. In the short-fiction world, most of the "big" magazines of 1991 are still around, though circulation numbers continue to drop and F&SF switched to bi-monthly larger-size issues a while back. Small press magazines still exist, but a large percentage of them are electronic.
In terms of electronic publication, the huge change has been the rise of the e-reader and eBooks. No longer does self-publishing necessarily mean throwing a bunch of money at someone to print copies of your books and then hope you can sell them so you aren't losing money on the deal. Sites like Smashwords and Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing have been game-changers; you upload your "book" (which could be non-fiction, a novel, or even a single short story) in the proper format and its made available in their marketplace. When people buy it, you get a (typically hefty) percentage of the sale price.
Now, the trick of course is that people have to buy it. Otherwise, you've burned your first publication rights and haven't gotten paid for it. Still, I suspect in the Twitter/Facebook/Google+ world, it's a lot easier to drum up interest in a book by someone nobody has ever heard of than it was 20 years ago if you were driving around on a tour of independent bookstores with a couple crates of books in the back of a van. John Locke has sold over a million books that way, and even with the reduced percentage of the sale price he's received by pricing his books at 99 cents, that still represents a lot more money than many authors ever make. Obviously one example doesn't mean "Oh my gosh, everyone should be self publishing novels at 99 cents -- it's a gold rush!"
For me at least, there's still something ephemeral-feeling about eBooks. If you publish an eBook, even one that sells well, you can't give signed copies to your friends and your grandchildren won't one day run across a copy in a used bookstore or library.
But it does give one reason to think, especially since we're still clearly in the dawn of the eBook age. Being flexible and keeping your eyes open for changes will be valuable skills for writers new and old.
That first period of taking writing seriously would have been in the very early '90s. Most of what I tried to write then (as now) was genre fiction, almost entirely SF/F/H. I was also working completely in the short fiction world. There were a handful of "big" magazines (Analog, Asimov's, F&SF being the biggest) and a lot of small press magazines which paid anywhere from a few cents a word to not a cent. Those small press magazines also tended to come and go with some regularity. There were occasional themed original anthologies which took unsolicited submissions.
Though I didn't attempt anything novel-length at that time, I was aware of the fact that there were Publishers (big and small) and Vanity Presses/self-publishing. The general impression I got was that no one who seriously considered being a potential professional Writer would be going the self-published/Vanity Press route.
Fast-forward to 2011 and some things look the same, others look a lot different. In the short-fiction world, most of the "big" magazines of 1991 are still around, though circulation numbers continue to drop and F&SF switched to bi-monthly larger-size issues a while back. Small press magazines still exist, but a large percentage of them are electronic.
In terms of electronic publication, the huge change has been the rise of the e-reader and eBooks. No longer does self-publishing necessarily mean throwing a bunch of money at someone to print copies of your books and then hope you can sell them so you aren't losing money on the deal. Sites like Smashwords and Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing have been game-changers; you upload your "book" (which could be non-fiction, a novel, or even a single short story) in the proper format and its made available in their marketplace. When people buy it, you get a (typically hefty) percentage of the sale price.
Now, the trick of course is that people have to buy it. Otherwise, you've burned your first publication rights and haven't gotten paid for it. Still, I suspect in the Twitter/Facebook/Google+ world, it's a lot easier to drum up interest in a book by someone nobody has ever heard of than it was 20 years ago if you were driving around on a tour of independent bookstores with a couple crates of books in the back of a van. John Locke has sold over a million books that way, and even with the reduced percentage of the sale price he's received by pricing his books at 99 cents, that still represents a lot more money than many authors ever make. Obviously one example doesn't mean "Oh my gosh, everyone should be self publishing novels at 99 cents -- it's a gold rush!"
For me at least, there's still something ephemeral-feeling about eBooks. If you publish an eBook, even one that sells well, you can't give signed copies to your friends and your grandchildren won't one day run across a copy in a used bookstore or library.
But it does give one reason to think, especially since we're still clearly in the dawn of the eBook age. Being flexible and keeping your eyes open for changes will be valuable skills for writers new and old.
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