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Posts Tagged ‘e-publishing’

Learning Process

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , , on July 22, 2012| Leave a Comment »

A discussion on one of my onling writers’ groups this week prompted me to think about this.

Sometimes, if you stack up all the rejections–and you will get rejections in this buisiness, even the pros do–it’s easy to think that it signifies failure.

Maybe I’m a cockeyed optimist, but I prefer to think of it as steps along the learning process. There’s a lot to learn and not just about the craft of writing well and telling a great story. That’s a great start, but then you’ve got to brace yourself and send your work out into the world. That means learning to write query letters and synopses–a whole other kind of writng craft. It may mean learning how to e-publish some of your work. It means learning how to market your stories. No matter how far you go, there will always be more to learn. That’s actually a good thing. This will never get boring.

So, yes, if i just look at the rejections, I might get depressed. I prefer to look at it another way. From each project that has fallen short of my hopes, I’ve learned something. And each project takes me a little closer to my goal. If I just keep on doing what I’m doing and learning with each step along the way, I will get there eventually.

My motto has always been, “Never give up. Never surrender.”

Apart from improving my craft, things that I’ve learned so far on this journey:

  1. Don’t send out a story too soon. This is a big one for me and I’ve sabotaged myself more than once this way. The old saying is true for stories as well as people: you never get a second chance to make a first impression. I just get so excited about my stories that I want to share them. I’ve instituted a new rule. After I finish the “final” revision, I allow a story to sit for about six months before I send it anywhere. At least, that’s what I’m trying to do.
  2. This applies to query letters, too. When I think it’s perfect, it’s probably about three months away from good enough. That means I’m going to have to start working on them earlier.
  3. Some stories may just not fit the mold of traditional publication, by the nature of the story or its length. But we’re very fortunate to live in a time in which we have the option of e-publication for those stories.

There are plenty of things I still have to work on. Marketing is a big one. I’ve done a little more work on book trailers. Here’s the trailer for BLOOD WILL TELL. The audio is not quite perfect yet.

Never stop learning.

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Point of View and Tense Choices

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

First, another little announcement. I’ve been playing around with creating a book trailer. This is my effort so far.

Now, I’ve been thinking about point of view and tense lately, largely because of my reading. First person present tense is really big right now, especially in young adult books. Mostly, I think this is because of THE HUNGER GAMES, where it actually works very well. In fact, THE HUNGER GAMES is the only book I can think of in which first person present tense didn’t bother me.  

The book I’m currently reading is written this way. Actually, I think it always was in first person, but I suspect the present tense was a later revision. I say this because I’ve caught a couple of places where the verbs are still past tense, like they got missed in the revision. Sadly, it’s not the only place where the text could have used a thorough copy editor.

I have actually written a couple of short stories in first person: “Heart of Oak” and “Becoming Lioness”. The first because the story really did demand to be that intimate and the second because I just started “hearing” the voice of the story that way.

I think the key to successful use of first person is a closeness to a single character. It has to be intimate, because you’re asking the reader to be the character. It’s much more than just changing pronouns and verb conjugations.

Not every story can or should be told in first person. For one thing, it can get downright confusing if you have two or more point of view characters, all written in first person. I’ve read a couple of stories like that. If the chapter headings hadn’t told me who “I” was at any given moment, I’d have been completely lost.

Another reason to avoid first person is because it is–or should be–impossible to withhold information known to the character from the reader. Conversely, it’s also impossible to let the reader know anything that the first person character doesn’t know. Sometimes, you want to do this so the reader can (silently) shout “Don’t open that door!” or something similar. And it can be darn tricky to make a heroic first-person character not come off as arrogant or a braggart. Also, in those cases where a protagonist is indecisive or not proactive (which I hate anyway), first person isn’t going to make the reader feel any more motivated to continue the story than the main character is. Sometimes, too, you just do need a little more narrative distance from the main character.

Present tense is a trickier question for me. I confess, I just don’t really like it. The only time it hasn’t bothered me, even a little, was in THE HUNGER GAMES. Part of that, of course, is that it was handled truly skilfully there. Skill and mastery of the craft will always make a difference. (Something I think debut authors do well to bear in mind.)

But that’s not all of it. Present tense worked so well in THE HUNGER GAMES, I think, because Katniss was rarely thinking very far ahead or, after the first couple of chapters, very much about the past. She was living in and just trying to survive the moment. And so present tense worked.

This particular young adult novel that I’m reading now almost fits into that same mold, at least in large sections. Just not quite enough to really pull it off. Or maybe it’s the difference between a veteran and a debut author.

Decisions of point of view and tense shouldn’t be taken lightly or leaped into just because it’s the latest thing. Those choices should only be made because they serve the story best, in my opinion.

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Ideas

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , , on July 1, 2012| Leave a Comment »

First an announcement: For the month of July, BLOOD WILL TELL and “The Music Box” are both half-price at Smashwords as part of their Summer/Winter Sale. (Clicking on one of those pretty pictures of the covers over to the side there will take you straight to them.) “Heart of Oak” is technically part of the sale, too, but it’s still free. Half of zero is still zero. At Smashwords, you can get a version for any e-reader or any computer. Just about everybody has some way to read a .PDF. So what are you waiting for, BLOOD WILL TELL is only $1.50 and “The Music Box” is only $0.99.

Now that that’s out of the way, I’m going to talk about ideas, because I had what I think is going to turn out to be a pretty good one last night, right before I went to sleep. That means I had to bounce out of bed, jot it down, and go back to sleep, but I don’t mind. Just going to sleep or waking up, walking the dogs, and in the shower seem to be the best times for brainstorms.

This idea is for my current wip, THE BARD’S GIFT. That’s fine. I’m about three-quarters of a discovery writer, so there’s no outline I have to revise to fit this in. In fact, the idea came at just about the perfect time. I’m just about to finish up act one, which has to stay fairly close to accurate history, and move my characters to someplace new and exciting.

This is the alternate part of alternate history. Since none of this ever really happened, I get to let world building take the place of at least some of the research. Obviously, not all. My characters are going to carry with them the same beliefs and social norms they had before. They’re going to build the same kind of houses and try, at least, to maintain the same way of life. But, they’re going to be faced with a new world (literally, the New World) with new experiences in store.

I’d always known there were going to be dragons in this new world. (There often seem to be dragons in my stories.) I’ve had a few new ideas about how the characters will choose to deal with that. My great new idea, though, is to sort of mash up the two mythologies–Old World and New.

I haven’t got it all worked out yet, but I will say this: look for thunderbirds as well as dragons. And don’t be surprised if the thunderbirds ARE the dragons.

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Progress Is What You Make of It

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on June 27, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Seriously, sometimes in this business you just feel like you’re beating your head against a brick wall. It’s so hard to break in. But I’m nothing if not stubborn. I’ll keep banging on that wall just as long as I have to.

I’ve been querying FIRE AND EARTH–a story I love maybe more than any other I’ve written so far–since April. I’ve had three requests for partial, two of which are still out. But that represents only about a 10% request rate. Not bad, but hardly great. I’ve recently overhauled the query. Too soon to tell how well that’s going to turn out. On the other hand, if I choose to look at the glass as half-full, I had three requests on MAGE STORM in a little over a year and more than twice as many queries sent out. So, my current request rate is actually progress. (And nothing says that I can’t requery some of those agents with the revised query in four or five months. What’s the worst they could do? Reject me again? Been there, done that, survived.)

Recently, my mind has been going back to MAGE STORM. I still really, really like this one. I keep hearing that agents and editors are crying for middle grade boy adventures. Well, that’s what MAGE STORM is, darn it. I just may have to take another pass through this one, revamp the query, and send out some more queries. I’m half inclined to use this one for the Christmas in July contest. Hmm. I wonder if it’s allowed to submit more than one book to that contest. I might have to ask.

I did get “The Music Box” e-published, but it’s going to languish just the same as “Heart of Oak” and BLOOD WILL TELL unless I start figuring out this marketing thing. It’s out of my comfort zone, but that’s part of the whole point. I need to learn how. Skin in the game was supposed to force me to do that. That hasn’t been too successful so far. I may just have to force myself to schedule in some time for that exclusively in order to make this work.

I don’t really write enough short stories to make much progress on that front. I’ve only written one and an abandoned partial so far this year. I should try to write more, but novels are just so much more satisfying. On the short story front, I’ve got two out on submission. One has been out for 147 days and a response on the other should come back any day now, assuming the publication keeps to their stated response time.

I’m making good progress (not roller-coaster, nanowrimo type progress, but good steady headway) on THE BARD’S GIFT again. That actually feels great. I’ve got my two characters close enough to begin depending on each other. Now it’s time to drop the axe and separate them for awhile. Have to make your characters suffer. And I think the opening of this one is the very best first page I’ve ever written.

So, even though sometimes it feels like standing still, I really am making progress. Sometimes, you just have to stop and remind yourself of that. It makes banging on the wall a little easier.

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The Music Box

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , on June 24, 2012| Leave a Comment »

 “The Music Box” a romantic fantasy novella has now been e-published. It’s available on Smashwords, so far. Amazon and GoodReads to follow in a few days. The other sites, like Barnes and Noble will take a little longer as it works its way through Smashwords distribution process.

 

This is the third story I’ve e-published and I think I’m getting better at the formatting process. And possibly at cover art, too.

What’s next up? Well, that depends. I have another novelette, “Becoming Lioness”, that’s still out on submission–for 144 days now. If that comes back, it’s next up. Otherwise, I’m going to have to get back to work on the sequel to BLOOD WILL TELL. Probably after I finish the first draft of THE BARD’S GIFT.

I’m happily back at work on my YA alternate history, THE BARD’S GIFT. I had been stuck on how to get from Point A to Point B. A little time working on other things and bouncing a few ideas around with writer friends did the trick.

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Cover Art

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , on June 10, 2012| Leave a Comment »

As I work my way toward completing the revisions to “The Music Box”, I have to start thinking about the next step: a cover. I’m not in a position to pay for a cover designer–at least not yet–so this is something else I have to do for myself. Hopefully, I’m getting better at it.

The cover is critically important. It’s the first impression a reader has of the book. A poor cover understandably makes them question the quality of the work inside. You can see my first two covers over in the sidebar.

The cover for “Heart of Oak” is based on a photo of mine. No issues about copyright, there. But it’s not a great cover. It’s busy and, besides that, it just looks like a blob in gray scale. Most e-readers are black and white. I hadn’t learned to take that into consideration when I did that cover. At some point, I’m going to have to redo it.

The cover for BLOOD WILL TELL is better. It’s based off of a couple of very old engravings. It works well in gray scale, but there’s still something about it. Maybe it’s the background. At some point, I’ll have to redo it, too.

So, now I’m working on the cover for “The Music Box”. Actually, I’ve been working on this for a while, but none of my ideas have worked out. Let’s face it, a picture of a music box is pretty boring.

I think, however, that I may have finally hit on something that will work. This is still very much a work in process. The color is less than half done–and may change without warning. There’s a lot of clean up needed. Unfinished Cover for "The Music Box"This will give you an idea what it might look like.

 

 

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Adding Material to a Completed Story

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , on June 6, 2012| 4 Comments »

Wow. Got right to work writing and almost forgot to blog. Oops.

Well, I’m still in the middle (almost exactly) of my revisions to “The Music Box”. Some of that is fixing problems with the story, but a lot of it is adding back in world building details that I’d either deleted or left out trying to make it fit into a more publishable length.

I think I’ve managed to spread out that info dump problem I mentioned in my last post. Let’s see what you think. Here’s the first page or so:

Liri paced across her darkened room. Everyone else was sensibly napping during the hottest part of the day, but there wasn’t anything Liri wanted less than to fall asleep. She didn’t even dare lie down for fear she’d doze off and have the same nightmare again.

As his sister, Liri had been the one to help prepare Eralan’s body for burial. She’d wanted to spare his widow and she was very glad she had. Jenae didn’t need to see that. Liri had seen all of his wounds and the other marks, enough to know the truth. Eralan’s had not been a clean warrior’s death on the battlefield. He’d been tortured to death. And now, scenes of what Eralan must have endured haunted Liri’s dreams.

She needed movement, more than she could get in this confined space. Sometimes when she danced, she could lose herself in the music and shut out everything else. She couldn’t dance here, though. She’d be sure to waken someone. There was a quiet spot out in the garden where she wouldn’t disturb anyone.

Liri picked up her music box and padded silently down the corridor. The box had been her brother’s last gift to her, less than a sevenday before his death. Odd that it should be her greatest comfort now. For a moment, she stroked the smooth, inlaid wood, feeling its texture. It must have been an expensive gift, because it undeniably had a touch of magic bound within it. One side of Liri’s mouth quirked up. Eralan had joked that the music box was supposed to help her find her true love and she’d laughed at him for his naïveté.

Falling in love was not something to be desired for a princess. Liri wouldn’t be allowed to choose her husband, after all. Her marriage would be used to formalize some alliance for her father. When that day came, even falling in love with her own husband would be a risk. Their mother’s fate proved that. Love was a weakness that other players of the Game could exploit.

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Front Loading World Building Details

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , on June 3, 2012| 2 Comments »

This subject comes up because it’s something I’m dealing with right now. I’m in the middle of revisions to “The Music Box” in preparation to e-publish it. One of the major changes I’m making is to put back and actually expand certain aspects of the world-building that I had purged (not quite completely, as the critiques proved) when trying to cut this story down to a (traditionally) publishable length. There just aren’t a lot of markets out there for novellas.

So, now that I’m going to e-publish it instead, I’m working those details back in. Right now, a big lump of this kind of detail is located in the first scene. That’s okay for this stage of the process. Just like in a first draft, sometimes it’s necessary to just get it out on paper–or at least on the computer screen. The important thing is to make sure it doesn’t stay there. Too much world building up front keeps the reader from really connecting with the characters and slows the story down too much.

My goal for feeding in world building is “learn as you go”. In other words, the reader should find out about these details when they become relevant. Of course, for some things that are going to be really important in the story, it’s sometimes also necessary to foreshadow a bit.

My standard for this is Lois McMaster Bujold’s THE CURSE OF CHALLION. (I love this book, by the way.) In the first six paragraphs, the reader discovers that Caz has or has held a rank higher than his apparent current status, that there are something like the knightly orders in this world, that the world is likely to be medieval-esque, and a little bit about the religious system. All from Caz’s interaction with a group of riders. And with that, the reader has enough information to go on with. By the end of that first scene, the reader will also be introduced to the concept of death magic, which seems almost like an interesting aside at this point, but will turn out to be very important later in the story. But all of it just flows naturally from Caz’s actions, reactions, and thoughts.

That’s what I’m striving for in this and every story. So, as I go through the revisions, I’m on the look out for places where I can feed that info dump from the beginning into the story in smaller bites right where it fits naturally. I’ve already found a place to show a bit of the political game that is the basis for a lot of one character’s motivations rather than just tell about it.

In the end, the goal is to leave only that bit of information that is really needed in that first scene and to make it look seamless. Not quite as easy as it sounds.

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Recording Stories

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , , on May 9, 2012| 2 Comments »

In my last post I wrote about recording some of my e-published stories. Here’s my progress and what I think I’ve learned.

I got the microphone and set it up (which really just meant making sure that plug-and-play had the right settings). I downloaded the recording software. (Audacity). I purchased the e-book of a fellow Smashwords author on how to go about recording something.

As recommended in the e-book, I tried a test.

Heart of Oak Test

Now, this clearly isn’t ready to go, yet. I need to work on my technique a bit. I probably want to find some music or, well, for this story I’m considering bird songs for occasional background and markers between scenes. I think it’d be appropriate.

But this recording gave me some new ideas, too. I’ve tried reading my stories out loud before, which is often recommended. All I got was a sore throat. You see, I hear my stories in my head when I’m writing them, so reading it out loud didn’t really add anything to me.

Until I listened to this recording. I hear things in the recording that I didn’t hear just reading it out loud and my fingers itched to make a couple of revisions. Now that I’ve got everything set up, I think this is definitely something I’ll be trying with my writing.

Gotta love serendipity.

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E-Publishing Goals

Posted in writing, tagged , , , , , , on May 6, 2012| 2 Comments »

My initial steps into self e-publishing haven’t exactly set the world on fire. Not that I expected them to. It would be nice, of course, but so would winning the lottery and they’re both about equally likely. Fortunately, I had more than one goal in e-publishing these stories (and a couple more to come over the next few months).

One of the things self e-publishing is going to force me to do is learn to market. This is a good thing. Someday, when I have an agent and a publishing contract, I’m going to need to know this.

I’m not doing it very well, yet, which would surprise absolutely no one who knows me. As a Girl Scout, I was the little girl who knocked on doors (yes, we used to sell door-to-door back then) and ask “You don’t want to buy Girl Scout cookies, do you?” My marketing technique has improved some since then. But then, it had so very far to go to start with. It could hardly have gotten worse, now could it?

It’s not something I really can work on effectively, or have any way to discern whether I’m doing it well or not, without something to market. So, I’m feeling my way, a little at a time, into marketing my ebooks, experience that I hope will serve me well later on. Over the next weeks and probably months, I’ll be stretching slowly–and sometimes probably painfully–out of my comfort zone.

Things that I expect to be trying out soon.

  1. Twitter: I’ll have to break down my resistance to anything that resembles a chat. I’ve always hated chat rooms. (I was only ever in a couple for classes that I was taking.)
  2. Pinterest: I’m a little worried about finding still another way to waste some of my writing time, but SFWA had a recent guest blog on how this can help an author.
  3. Audio books: I just bought a microphone so I can record my e-pubbed works, starting with “Heart of Oak” (it’s much shorter). I’ve got the microphone installed. Now I have to learn how to use the recording software. Maybe I’ll put some of my early efforts up here.  
  4. I also want to put my books up for sale on GoodReads. It’s another outlet. But to do that, I’ll have to get my own e-pub compiler, because that’s the only format GoodReads will accept.
  5. And I’m still working my way through Smashwords Marketing Guide.
  6. I don’t think I’m up to running contests on my blog, yet. Maybe a little one later on. Last week I got a taste of what I definitely don’t want to do, though. You don’t want to leave your readers feeling cheated. I think that may be a subject for another blog post.

Any other marketing suggestions? I need all the help I can get.

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