Sunday, 16 June 2019
News
Friday, 31 March 2017
Free and discount ebook giveaway
The promotion started at midnight (PDT) on March 31st (so that was 6pm AEST, or 7am UTC). It ends on April 2nd.
I've made Wild Thing free for all three days (actually, a bit more: both before and after). Unfortunately, because Harsh Lessons's Kindle Select Term ends (rolls over) on March 31st, the best I can manage is to make it free on the 1st and 3rd days: Amazon have no way of pre-allocating free days in the next term, nor can they set the price to free on the current day, even if you do it at the start of that day.
The purpose of the promotion very much aligns with what I think is the key issue for authors working outside the traditional publishing environment: being discovered by readers. It also helps readers discover books they've never heard of. And who knows, some of those writers in the promotion might become your next favourite author! So I'd encourage you to have a browse of the titles available over there at the Support for Indie Authors event.
Various writers there have been working hard creating promotional images for the event and sharing them for all the participants to use. C.B. organised a Thunderclap; Christina McMullen organised the event and put together the event site, and all the authors helped with promoting and discounting their books. One member, Missy Sheldrake, even made a couple of promo videos you might like to check out, and uploaded them to Youtube here and here!
I'll be back at work on Shadow Hunt from April 1st, having received an interim critique of the 1st 200 pages from Dave at ThEditors.com on Friday night. (He said it's looking pretty good so far.)
(I'll post this same article over on my other blog.)
Monday, 27 March 2017
March 2017 news
This is a very brief update on what I'm up to.
I've teamed up with a bunch of other authors from Support for Indie Authors (not the talented Aussie singer/songwriter, Sia!) of Goodreads) who will be running a large free-or-discount book promotion event from March 31st - April 2nd. The site will go live on midnight of Mar 31st at VM's Spring Attack, when a big bunch of books will appear.
In other news, on Sunday March 26th I uploaded a draft of Shadow Hunt to Amazon, to make it available for pre-order on April 30th. Dave is still working through his final critique, but felt that April 30th sounded a reasonably manageable date for me. But I will be busy between now and then!
Right now, I'm basically doing some marketing type stuff, as well as doing what I can to get Shadow Hunt ready for publication, while waiting for Dave's final critique. Jon Marshall has kindly acted as a Beta reader (x2), and said the book is noticeably better after my revisions following Dave's critique of Jan 11th. But Jon had some notes/comments, which I'll be working through this week.
I will also be attending Swancon 42, April 13th—17th, the speculative fiction convention in Perth (Western Australia). It'll be my first visit there. I think the flight is over four hours — it's a big country!
In the meantime, I've made myself a little list of all the things I need to do between now and the end of April. My dream is that I'll have the ebook ready before that, and will be able to publish earlier. And that I'll be able to use the last week or two of April to prepare and get the printed books ready, once again via IngramSpark.
I also have several blog articles that I plan to write (both here and on A Toe in the Ocean of Books): including a Q&A article from some good questions from my first fan.
Excelsior!
Wednesday, 15 February 2017
Shadow Hunt blurb
I've received lots of useful feedback for this and my other blurbs. As a result, I feel I'm slowly learning how to write a blurb. Below are some of the comments I've had, that highlight problems to keep an eye out for. Mostly these comments have been for different versions of a blurb — although sometimes the comments have been for the same version, but from different people! (The highlighted item is the critical point.)
- It wasn't until the end of the blurb that I discovered the MC was a young woman.
- This blurb won't make much sense to someone who hasn't read the previous books.
- This blurb says too much about what has gone before, and not enough about this story.
- I don't get a sense of what the story is.
- The final paragraph implies there's some choice the MC has to make — but you've given us no information regarding what that choice is about.
- There's not much of the personality of the MC coming through.
- You're using too many hedging constructions like "this, but that" or "although one thing, also another".
- You're trying to say too much; what's the heart of the story?
- You're giving away too much: just give us hints about what happens. Show us enough to make us ask questions. Intrigue us.
- It's too long.
- It's too short.
So it's definitely an art. I've also heard it said that a blurb typically goes through hundreds (or even a thousand) revisions, in traditional publishing. I think mine go through about a hundred or two. The blurb for Shadow Hunt has probably been reviewed about fifty times by others, and about seventy times by me, so far. This time I really think I have something that's good: close to good enough for the back cover, at last? Then again, I also thought that three times before.
One worthwhile thing I did recently was posting the blurb on facebook, and asking people what they thought of it. From that, I received lots of critically valuable feedback. (I'd received similar feedback on Friday night from some friends, but I didn't understand the why behind it, then.)
The key realisation for me was that when I read a blurb, I want to know only the bare minimum to decide if I want to read the story or not. The only blurbs I read in their entirety are those by authors I don't love. For authors I know I enjoy reading, I read only enough of the blurb to get a general sense of the story and the MC; and for a series I love, I read the blurb after the book, not before.
This means that for series, I think it's important for the blurb to say as little as you can: most readers will have read the earlier books. Other readers will probably sample bits inside the book to decide if they want to read it, or read reviews to get a better idea of what to expect.
Anyway, here is my new version of the blurb. Is it good enough?
Blurb for vol 3 of The Leeth Dossier, Shadow Hunt. (The tag-line is: "She thought she was hunting it"). It's 108 words long. (2017/2/28.)
Threat to all humanity.
2062, 26 years after magic unexpectedly returned to our world. In the Dumps outside New Francisco, eighteen-year-old Leeth is on the run. She doesn’t regret sacrificing her future to save her friend, but both the ruthless covert agency she worked for and her controlling uncle want her back.
Despite the loneliness and hardships, Leeth is relishing her freedom, and is still determined to honor the promises she’s made.
But thanks to an insane mage’s tampering with meta-magical Archetypes, a uniquely altered killer is hunting her. And in this case, what she doesn’t know can doom her — then everyone else.
Progress
I should give a brief status report. I've spent most of Monday and Tuesday working on the blurb, in preparation for Wednesday night's meet-up by the Marrickville Writers Corner, and following the feedback I received (thanks to everyone who reviewed it). On Monday I basically had a day off; much of Tuesday was devoted to family stuff; and Wednesday included the next step in the Solar Panel and Malfunctioning Battery saga. So my progress through Dave's extremely valuable critique has slowed: I don't think I'll complete it until E/Feb at the earliest; more likely, March 7th.
As of Wednesday evening I was on p35 of 142pp of the 2nd half of the MS with Dave's annotations, which puts me on p238 of 491pp of the full, revised MS. I'm in the 100pp Fist Fest arc of the story, trying to cut the 30pp or so that Dave recommends, to fix the pacing. I also have a few new chapters to write. And then I need to polish all the new bits, then need to find a slot with Dave for him to re-review it, and then work through that critique (hopefully, much easier). So trying publish it E/March sounds impossible. But I'm still going to try!
I tweet my progress each day, if anyone wants to closely track where I'm up to. Sharing that information also helps spur on. So I'm sorry if this revised schedule will disappoint people, but on the other hand, I'm confident you'd all want me to produce the best book I can.
Now: back to the 'writing board'!
Older versions of the blurb.
2017/2/25, 110 words long.
Threat to all humanity.
2062, 26 years after magic unexpectedly returned to our world. In the Dumps outside New Francisco, eighteen-year-old Leeth is on the run. She doesn’t regret sacrificing her future to save her friend, but both the ruthless covert agency she worked for, and her controlling uncle, want her back.
Despite the loneliness and hardships, Leeth is relishing her freedom, and is still determined to honor the promises she’s made.
But thanks to an insane mage’s tampering with meta-magical Archetypes, a uniquely altered killer is hunting her. And in this case, what she doesn’t know can doom her — and after her, everyone else.
2017/2/19, 91 words long.
Threat to all humanity.
2061, 25 years after magic unexpectedly returned to our world. In the Dumps outside New Francisco, eighteen-year-old Leeth is on the run. She doesn't regret sacrificing her future to save her friend, but the ruthless covert agency she worked for, and her controlling uncle, want her back.
Despite the loneliness and hardships, Leeth is relishing her freedom. She is also determined to honor all the promises she's made.
But what she doesn't know, may do something much worse than kill her.
2017/2/18, 163 words long.
Threat to all humanity.
It's 2061, 25 years after magic unexpectedly returned to our world. In the Dumps that fringe New Francisco, Leeth is on the run. She doesn't regret sacrificing her future to save her friend, but the covert government agency that's been training her as their assassin wants her back.
As does her uncle, who still believes he owns her.
Despite the loneliness and hardships, Leeth is relishing her freedom. She is also working out how to honor her promise to release Godsson from the Institute for Paranormal Dysfunction — unaware the insane mage sees her as the key component needed to 'correct' human nature. His meta-magical construct, a shadow bonded to a ruthless killer, continues to hunt her. And is closing in.
Unless
one girl's spirit can prove strong enough to forge her own Path.
And the feedback on the above was pretty consistent and uniform: although several people liked it, several others commented that it was still saying much too much, and greatly chopped back everything at the point where it starts talking seriously about this book. And also shortening the contextual paragraph ("2061..."). Sandra Wigzell noted "Those that have read book 1 and 2 will know the premise of where you are going.. less words more mystery" and "in another analogy... stop being a stripper and now dress like a Nun...".
I had trouble with these shortened descriptions, in that none of them indicated the major plot arc. A few people commented that I had revealed too much (plot twists), until I realised they could not have meant plot twists (because I hadn't; and because every blurb in every series I sampled — about 10 — did indicate the major arc). But I myself don't read blurbs of series I like and authors I trust, because they give away too much. They don't give away plot twists, they give away the plot arcs. And I trust the author enough to assume they'll follow the plot arcs they've laid down previously, and I prefer to be surprised.
That said, the blurbs I sampled all varied in how much of the arc they revealed: some were very vague (and I would not mind reading them before reading the book, if I had taken the chance), but some were pretty clear (and I'm glad I read the blurb only after I finished reading the book).
So I think what everyone was really saying was that they want to know the bare minimum about what's happening in the book: just hints and clues, if that.
My brother Matthew wrote: "I like Zen paintings. I love minimalism. People who distil a perfect moment with their media to its essence leave me in awe of their ability" and "giving advice is not easy. I just tell you what's in my heart and what I like."
2017/2/17, 199 words long:
Threat to all humanity.
Sacrificing her future to save her friend is a decision Leeth refuses to regret. Now eighteen, she has escaped the covert government agency training her as their assassin. Hunted by her former colleagues, yet still desperate to belong, she is learning to survive in the society of outcasts bordering New Francisco. Hardship and loneliness bring freedom — and Leeth is relishing it. But darker agendas are at work.
The manipulative Doctor Harmon still believes he owns her: Leeth must best him if she's to take control of her life. Deciding to involve her friend Marcie, however, may have unexpected consequences.
Leeth also needs to learn to trust more wisely. Bound by her promise to release Godsson from the Institute for Paranormal Dysfunction, she remains unaware the insane mage sees her as the key component needed to ‘correct' human nature. His meta-magical construct, a shadow bonded to a ruthless killer, continues to hunt her. And is closing in.
Unless
one girl's spirit can prove strong enough to forge her own Path.
Monday, 6 February 2017
Shadow Hunt cover designed!
Today I finalised (I hope!) the blurb, and Mirella de Santana finished her cover design, being very patient as usual with my fussiness. I love her work, and I hope you will too. Here’s the new cover:
Blurb writing is tricky – it’s been through numerous revisions, including input from friends, other writers at the very supportive Marrickville Writers Group, and my editor Dave at TheEditors.com. Here it is:
Leeth: Experimental subject. Government assassin.
Humanity's doom?
Desperate to belong, but hunted by her former colleagues, Leeth is now learning to survive in the society of outcasts bordering New Francisco. And despite hardship and loneliness, she is relishing her new-found freedom. But other agendas remain at work.
The manipulative Doctor Harmon still believes he can control her; still believes she belongs to him. Only by dealing with him can she take control of her life.
But Leeth has greater, hidden enemies who wish to use her. Godsson, the insane mage, sees her as the key ingredient in his plan to ‘correct’ human nature. His meta-magical construct, bonded to a ruthless killer, continues to hunt her. And it is closing in.
The stage has been set – for an ending worse than anyone knows.
Unless an eighteen-year-old girl’s spirit can prove strong enough to forge her own Path, instead.
Following Dave’s detailed critique of the 1st half of the MS, and feedback from my beta reader (Jon Marshall – thanks for spotting some significant problems!) right now I’m working on polishing my changes while waiting for the detailed crit of the 2nd half. Then it will be full steam ahead. I’m also in the process of booking things to visit Swancon 42 in Perth, April 2017.
I’ll need to decide the publication date for the ebook version, soon, and upload the draft MS to Amazon. I’m thinking March 15 – if I manage to complete it before then, I’m sure people won’t complain! It’s funny how each book seems to bring its own challenges and new things to learn. Or maybe Leeth is just intrinsically challenging! And Harmon, too, in his own way. I think my next post here will be from a Q&A session with an interested reader from overseas (my first fan contact!). He said he was happy to share our discussion (that largely focused in on the relationship between Leeth and Harmon), so after the book is ready, I’ll condense that into a post. Unless I find I need a break to preserve my sanity, and manage to make time before then.
Friday, 23 September 2016
Professional editing (my experience in working with thEditors.com)
Of all the advice given to independent authors, the top two things are probably "Get a professional cover design", and "Pay for a professional editor". Of these, the latter is I think the more important, though it's also the more expensive. A good cover is needed for someone to pause and consider your book, but in the end it's what's inside that really counts.
So it begs questions like:
- How do you find an editor?
- How much does an edit cost?
- How do you find a good editor?"
What is editing? There are different kinds of editing, and therefore different kinds of editors, with varying costs that depend on two things: the type of editing, and the amount of work involved. A short answer is possible, though, by being suitably vague: and that's to say "thousands of Australian dollars". The difference between a professional's work, and that of a skilled amateur, is exactly what you would expect from any other field. It's better. A professional editor working in their area of expertise will not just see problems in your writing clearly, but they'll be able to explain why it's a problem. An amateur may be able to sense that there is some problem, but very likely to be less sure of why. An amateur might say "I liked this chapter" (or not) — which is all well and good, but gives you little help to tackle the issue. A professional should give you much more: the whys, the hows, possible solutions, and so on.
Let's talk about cost first, since it's perhaps the easiest to deal with, and high on the list of authors' concerns. Especially true for indie authors, since the cost of the editing is not hidden inside the package of a deal with a traditional publisher.
Is it worth the money? Definitely, yes. From my own experience, I can state a personal and unqualified "Yes". And sensitised to the topic by my own experience, I then started picking up strong confirmation from successful authors in general. Read between the lines of the "Acknowledgements" section that prefaces most books, for the thanks given by the author to their editor. (Often, you don't need to read between the lines.) Or attend talks by writers: often, they'll very clearly state just how much credit they owe to their editors. I seem to recall one saying something along the lines "It's almost a dirty little secret: just how much your editor helps you to write the best book you can." I suspect that if you've read a book from an author you loved, and been underwhelmed by them with another of their books, to the point of wondering "How could that author have written that book?", the answer may be "Different editor."
Anyway, back to the topic of cost, you should think of it this way: you're going to be paying a professional to read your work, and to spend time thinking about what can be improved, what isn't working, what to do about it, and to write all that down so you can address all the issues (and perhaps, opportunities). If you're lucky, the editor may include some ideas that you'll kick yourself for not having spotted yourself. Or which simply make you go "Wow, great idea, yes!" and make you want to dive back to the keyboard, or pencil and paper. Another positive thing to consider, when weighing the cost, is that a lot of this is under your control: the clearer your writing, the more things you get right, the less work the editor will have.
Length. Obviously, the length of the work will affect the cost. A moderate length book is something like 80,000 — 100,000 words. A long book is something like 120k — 150k words. A very long book is 160k — 200k words. And so on. The more words you've written the more time it takes to read them and critique them. I'd also say, the more chance there is for things to go off the rails, and require large portions to be cut. So bear that in mind when thinking about the cost of an editor, and the time you will need to spend on writing the best book you can.
Polishing. Another point worth making about the cost, is polishing. The more time you can spend improving your work:
- the better it will be,
- the less work will be required from the editor,
- and the lower the cost will be.
So, regarding the cost: think of how many hours and weeks of work you're buying, and then divide the total cost to get a rough idea of how much you're paying the editor per hour. That should help you get a perspective on how much you're "really" paying for.
Finding an editor. So let's consider the question "How do you find a good editor (for your book)?"
As this article is already probably too long, I'll be lazy and just focus on my own experience, rather than trying to give a complete answer. But here's a token effort:
There's a little survey of how different writers approach editing, at: http://www.lexirad.com/income-covers-and-editing-more-fascinating-data-about-indie-authors/, and Ellis Shuman writes about how he found his editor here: Ellis Shuman: How I Found My Editor, while Emily Suess added a Self-Publishing Services Directory to her blog (though that has since become private <shrug>). An internet search will probably turn up the Editorial Freelancers Association website (www.the-efa.org/). It's also worth a Google search of Editors and Predators: you'll find some informative stuff.
My own experience? I found thEditors through Twitter. Early in my learning about self-publishing, I learned of the importance of authors being involved in social media (to the right degree), and joined Twitter, while trying to work out what it was and what I was supposed to do with it. I still think it's a good way to "curate the internet" — i.e. to learn of useful stuff for you. By Following other authors and people involved in publishing I encountered an ad for thEditors. Their offer was great: you sent them the first few thousand words of your novel, and they'd critique it for free, and indicate whether your manuscript would be a good fit for them.
Now, (don't laugh!), at this point I was just in what I thought was the final stages for self-publishing my novel. I'd put a lot of work into it over the years since its first draft, and it had even been a finalist in a contest. Since then, I'd found some big flaws, and made major improvements, and I'd just spent two more months (since being made redundant at the end of March, 2015), working intensely to learn about self-publishing and to improve the MS ready for publication on Amazon. I thought it was good to go, and that getting an opinion would be something along the lines of (I said, don't laugh!), "This is fine, you don't need our help — go for it."
(Of course, I also read the testimonials on their web site. To me, they seemed genuine: not faked-up or paid-for.)
What I got back, within two weeks!, was a lengthy email, basically encouraging but also with some suggestions for several big issues that needed addressing, and which was full of insightful comments. To me, it was a reality check: I had to agree with at least 95% of what he'd written; he definitely seemed to "get" my book, and even if I did nothing else, I definitely needed to go away and address all the issues he'd pointed out. He was also interested in working with me further on it, and asked a few questions (like: how long was it?)
What to do?
So, we started discussing it, by email.
Now, a good friend, who'd been patiently encouraging and prodding me over a twenty year period (I kid you not) to finish the book and publish it somehow — including reading it and critiquing it in detail — reacted at first with an "Are you sure this isn't just a lure? Do they just want your money? I think you could publish it as-is. You've been polishing it for years."
But my answer was that, 1) all the points they'd made seemed both correct and insightful, to me, and 2) I felt, from all our emails as we'd discussed it, that they were honest, and were not just stringing me along. So I showed my friend a print out of a couple of the emails, and remember Jon reading it and then looking up to me and saying "You're right. He knows what he's talking about. This is good advice. I hadn't seen these things."
And so I decided to go ahead, and spend the money. And then, I thought back to a comment in one of Dave's emails, that said something like "You'll see what I mean from the in-line comments in the document," which I had assumed at the time meant "… after you pay me the money and we get seriously to work." And thinking about it again, I mused, "You know, that really doesn't match my feelings about how thEditors operate. I don't suppose by any chance I overlooked an attachment, in one of the emails…?"
Uh.
Why, yes. Yes, I had. In that very first lengthy email from Dave, so full of good advice, in fact! There was a Word document attached, and just as he'd said, it had much more detail, including line-by-line comments. And the advice there — well, like his email, only more so. So, by this point it was blindingly clear that I'd have to be stupid to decide to go it on my own.
Kinds of editors.
I'm speaking of my experience with thEditors, who provided me with a line by line structural edit and also numerous developmental suggestions (while also pointing out typos spotted along the way). Their critique identified plenty of sentences that needed attention, and suggested fixes. Much of this focussed on my wordiness, some about over-use of adjectives and adverbs, some was to point out repetition; often it was just advice to shorten: pointing out that if you boil it down and concentrate your writing, the passage will usually have more impact. (I suppose the extreme example of this is poetry.) In my mind, it's what I think of as "the Cameron Edwards principle": if something can be said with fewer words, that's probably the right way to say it. (Based on an insight from a very smart young engineer I worked with, while our team was reviewing an important but lengthy patent we were drafting.) A pity I don't follow Cameron's (and Dave's) advice more, I hear you say! But I'm working on it.
Other kinds of editing range from this level, down to the level of detail of copy editing (proofreading?): identifying typos, grammatical errors, punctuation errors, and simple continuity errors. Have a look at, e.g., http://www.editors.ca/hire/definitions.html or wordcafeblog: Editing workshop 2: what are the different types of editing/ for some definitions.
Rough diamonds. Anyway, what Dave provided was, metaphorically, taking an uncut gemstone, and cutting and polishing it. Or, perhaps more accurately, advising me where to cut and polish. That included cutting off some lumps of gemstone, removing clumps of clay, and also turning it to present a different angle. All with the purpose of producing something that was already there, but in some sense covered. I don't think the metaphor stretches as far as a sculptor cutting away the stone to reveal the Venus de Milo — or in my case, maybe some kind of fish, is it? — hidden inside (that's probably more the work of a ghost-writer). I'm sure the boundary between what the editor does and what the author does varies, across people, across time, and even across the pages within a single book.
Note though that I qualified that by saying, "working in their area of expertise". If you search on the internet, you can read some tales — from traditionally published authors — of bad experiences with editors. You'll find lots of horror stories of awful and even wrong advice from professional editors who, basically, just didn't "get" what the author was doing. My impression is that it mostly happens when the book the editor has been assigned to is one they wouldn't choose to read themselves, and they're trying to change the book into something they would want to read, even if that means it's no longer the book the author is trying to write. Or it happens when the personalities of the author and editor clash horribly.
In TP (traditional publishing), the balance of power lies with the publishing company and editor: unless the author agrees to make the changes the editor requires, the book will not be published. That, I'm sure, can be anguishing — and sometimes destructive and wrong, for the book. On the other hand, in SP (self-publishing or indie publishing), the balance of power lies with the author. "Terrific!" you exclaim — until you realise that the author is typically blind to the problems in their own work, which means there will be some awful works published because the SP author ignored the advice of their editor….
Working with an editor
So, what was it like, working with thEditors? The short answer is "great!", but a longer answer is probably helpful.
At this point, my MS was 150k words: after a lot of effort, I'd managed to cut it from 169k to 150k. And, mind you, this was ten years after realising that in the version of the MS that had been one of ten finalists in the inaugural George Turner contest, I'd realised that the whole second half of the novel had plenty of story and action — but not much in the way of plot. So I'd chopped it in half, and then added a grand new plot element and carefully wove that through the 1st half. Which grew the MS back past it's original length.
Why do I mention that? Well, along with the thousands of in-line comments, there were a three big issues that Dave identified (opening his email with "So don't have a heart attack ... but"):
- Too much POV shifting. Far too much.
- One long arc needed a major rewrite
- The book probably needed splitting into three; or maybe just two.
I should also add that Dave gave me some feedback (points 1 and 3, above) that I could think about while he was completing his critique. That was really helpful.
Anyway, we discussed, at length, the pros and cons of splitting the MS into two, or three, books: what would have to be done, including ideas for new plot elements and various structural changes. In the end we came to agree that splitting it in two was the way to go.
So I tackled the big issues first, but while working through the line-by-line comments, addressing each in turn. For those where I thought a question remained, I'd add a comment to reply to Dave's; for those where I thought no questions remained, I'd delete Dave's comments.
And then, when I'd addressed all the comments, and all the issues, and after some more discussion with Dave by email, I now had a new MS that had been 1) chopped in half to 70k words, and 2) grown back to 115k words (from memory). It seemed obvious to me that there was enough new material, that a 2nd round of editing would be sensible. I discussed it with Dave, we discussed the cost, considering that he was already familiar with much of it, and we agreed on a cost and I sent it back.
Once again, Dave critiqued it thoroughly, and had more good suggestions, mainly for the new material. So once again I worked through the critique, in the same way as before, and at the end the MS had grown back to about 130k words. So, again we discussed the idea of a final, 3rd critique, and I sent it off.
I had set myself a publication date of 11th December, as that would be the anniversary of my wife's death, to whom the book was dedicated, but the date was looming very close. I got Dave's critique back close to that date, but there were still some issues that he'd identified, and so on the last day, we started working across a 10-hour timezone gap, with me saying "Well, as long as I publish on 11th Dec US time, I can tell myself I published on that date." Alas, Dave and I both came to the conclusion at about the same late hour, that I was dreaming, and could not meet my self-imposed deadline.
So we both collapsed, in separate countries, and I worked through the remaining issues, publishing in Amazon's KDP program on I think Dec 17th. Reassuring myself that Stella would have wanted it done right, more than on time. Especially having watched me working on it for over twenty years!
Schedules. This is probably a good point to comment on schedules.
Having worked for decades for a company that was owned by the Japanese, I've learned that meeting high quality standards is not enough: you also have to meet deadlines; and perhaps more especially, it important to avoid giving unwelcome surprises to the people you're working with.
I was careful to let Dave know my plans, and to work as hard as needed to me the deadlines I'd set. Most of these were optimistic (I think Dave may have thought me crazy), but I had all my time available to spend on this, so I worked as hard as I could, and managed to meet my deadlines, more or less. I also sent him a concise progress report as the deadlines approached, so he could see for himself how I was tracking, and use his own expertise to sense whether I was getting into difficulties or not. I think this was helpful to him.
We were also both pretty flexible to changes, and discussed and re-planned things a few times, especially for the 2nd and 3rd critiques.
Now, if anyone takes a look at the revision history for Wild Thing, or the (too?) detailed lists of changes that I've made available on the website here, you will no doubt think I was stupid to say that I would handle the proof-reading myself. I think I'm very good at that, but it's hard to get it right, yourself. Dave could have provided that service too, but I felt that I could handle it myself. Admittedly, more than two thirds of those changes are me retroactively polishing the text at the sentence level, but fully a third are either typos, grammatical, continuity or other errors. I'm indebted to Louise Harris for picking up the largest slab of problems after several rounds of my own self-correction, and getting it to a professional level of quality. No doubt a few more typos still lurk, waiting to be corrected as the years pass.
Book 2. I won't go into details for Book 2, other than to say it was eerily similar to what happened for Book 1 — even down to the advice to split it in half again! The big problem which Dave had identified, at the very start of my work on book 2 (working from Dave's original critique of the MS before I'd split it), was that it was going to be too long. We had discussed a pacing problem in what would be book 2, and I had proposed that instead of cutting some chapters, I add a chapter or two (a "Mean Girls" story arc), to break up the slow patch and fix the pacing. Unfortunately, this grew into a rather major story arc of 50-60 pages, and suddenly the book was heading towards 600 pages long. In addition, when Dave saw the revised MS for Book 2, he pointed out that I had missed an opportunity for a very satisfying denouement and natural ending, at about the mid-point.
So, yeah: split again! And I have to credit Dave with the idea for Marcie, Superman, and the message of hope. And for making things go badly for Marcie, at the end. Which I saw the sense of, and tried to produce. At which point, Leeth refused to co-operate, or perhaps I should say, refused to give up, and the rather more dramatic and shocking ending came about.
So, right now I'm quietly working to piece things back together now that Leeth threw a major spanner in the works, and I'm in discussion with Dave about the re-planning for Book 3, and scheduling the critique of it when I'm ready.
Working with, and disagreeing with, your editor.
When I talked to other writers, about my experience in working with thEditors, one thing I observed is that I agree with somewhere between 90%-95% of Dave's comments and suggestions. This is, apparently, highly unusual. One would expect more disagreement than that. I attribute this to two things. The biggest one being that Dave and I are on the same wavelength — he "gets" what I'm doing, and understands the characters, despite their oddities (indeed, I hope, their uniqueness). Sci fi and fantasy is one of the genres he understands and enjoys. (Other members of their team have other areas of special expertise.)
The second thing I suppose is that I'm quite open to criticism and feedback. Again, decades of working with groups of people as smart as and smarter than me, reviewing and critiquing each other's work to improve it, provided me with a deep appreciation for the whole review and critiquing process. I respect Dave's opinion; and he respects mine.
Going back to an earlier point, about the author being the boss, that's something Dave always highlights. Basic grammar aside, he never says "you must do this", but rather "I think", or "how about?". (Well, perhaps with one exception. I have a mental image of Dave tearing his hair out after the 24th POV shift between four characters interleaving through one particular chapter. At that point Dave had some frank observations for me. :-)
I learned that I'm unusually comfortable with POV shifts. If you don't believe me, here's what the POV situation looked like, in the MS which will soon have evolved into three books. It looks a mess, eh? And yes: that graph is saying there were 24 POV shifts (orange diamonds) in the 21-page-long Chapter 44 (blue squares):
You'll be pleased to learn that Chapters 44-46 (an upcoming arc in Shadow Hunt), has had the POV shifts removed. I've learned my lesson: POV continuity trumps temporal continuity.
Okay, but, what do you do when you can't agree? This didn't happen much, largely because I followed advice from other writers, and a dash of common sense, and didn't just "agree to disagree", but instead kept discussing until we each understood what the other person's point of view was. Mostly, that meant that we did in the end reach agreement.
Who's queen? Incidentally, I think the "power relationship" between an indie author and an editor can be far healthier — if you let it — than is often the case in traditional publishing. The tricky part is knowing when to go with your heart, your gut instinct, over the advice of your editor — the expert you're paying for their insights. Dave and I always talked things through (by email, or in-comments), until we both understood the other's perspective. For my part, I tried to err on the side of taking Dave's advice. (Though, yes, I know: I still need to learn to cut more.)
In a handful of instances, I simply did what Dave recommended. And in another handful of instances, where I cared strongly, I went ahead and did what I thought was right. One of the errors this lead to, was that some sections of Wild Thing are too slow: more should have been cut to improve the pace in some sections. And Dave always thought I was taking a huge risk on the sexual and abuse side of things: which I have to agree with; but I think they're such a key element for what's unfolding, that I couldn't soften those as far as he would have liked. And indeed, I think it's why some reviewers have found this aspect of the book(s) repellent. But I think that's a fair point of view, too: what happens is disturbing, and even horrifying. But it's an integral part of my vision, and of Leeth's journey. Probably if I had followed his advice to the letter in this area I'd have fewer reviewers complaining, but I think the story wouldn't have been what I wanted. It would not be as raw and visceral. Certainly the upward climb, for Leeth, would have been shorter and simpler. But sometimes you have to take risks. And the result, I hope, is a book that the reader will either love or hate. And I'm okay with that.
So with all that said (at too great length, no doubt!), Dave was happy for me to ask him a few questions….
A quick interview with Dave Taylor, Editor-in-chief of www.thEditors.com:
What was your background — how did you develop your skills and understanding, to become an editor? Was it a straight path, or a convoluted one?
Dave: As an author myself I used to do a lot of beta reading for people. What I was saying seemed to strike a chord. When I no longer had time for it, one of the authors offered to pay me to read and comment on their book. That got me thinking.
I attended a few courses and along with another editor (who has since moved on) I began offering my services part-time. It gathered momentum over time, mainly through recommendations, until I was able to do it full-time.
What types of writing, or perhaps genres, do thEditors prefer to focus on?
Dave: We're willing to look at all genres, but our favourites are probably science fiction and fantasy.
How do you decide whether to work with someone on their manuscript?
Dave:
- Do I like it?
- Do I think I can help make it better?
- Is the author friendly and easy to work with?
When you and an author disagree, how do you try to resolve the disagreement? What kinds of things do you feel get in the way of getting to the bottom of differences of opinion?
Dave: I always like to say the author is the boss. I will state my case and discuss it with you as much as you wish, but I won't fight you over it. Nobody knows your book as well as you, and if you disagree the last word is yours.
What advice do you have for indie authors?
Dave:
1. Pay for a good cover designer.
2. Pay for a good editor (I would say that, but it's true).
3. Produce many books or a series of books.
What advice do you have for indie authors who can't afford the services of a professional editor?
Dave: I think one of the most important things you can do is read. Read as much as you can, especially in your genre. You can't expect to write good books if you don't read any. Also, no matter what, you will really have to get somebody competent to proofread it.
What things can authors do, to make your job easier?
Dave: Keep in regular contact and stick to agreed schedules. Oh, and write great books!
What's been the most difficult thing for you, working with me — what should I myself aim to improve? :-)
Dave: Occasionally setting very tight deadlines!!
Sunday, 11 September 2016
The Creative Process and the Unconscious
I'm fascinated by the creative process, and I've had a few pieces of luck, perhaps, in getting some insights into it.
I'm right now in the middle of watching a TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert (author of Eat, Pray, Love) which I found on Shannon Ellison's absorbing blog at Nearly Eloquent (more specially in Four Tips on Writing Well), about the creative process.
(image courtesy of Pexels)Elizabeth's talk is great (as so many TED talks are!), and I think would resonate with most creative people. She speaks of the pressures that the creative writing career (and creative careers in general) place upon the creator: two of the big ones being "My work is crap; what if I never achieve success?" and if you're lucky enough to have a big success: "What if for the whole rest of my career, I never produce anything anywhere near as good as that first big success?"
She goes on to say that only in the last 500 years or so did the notion that all the creativity came from within the individual arise — the idea that that person, and that person alone, was owed all the (narcissism-inducing) glory of the success, and all the (soul-destroying) acid for all the failures. She said that the ancient Romans idea of genius was a spirit that lived literally in the walls of your home, and which came out and assisted the creator invent. So, the burden of both success and failure was a shared one. She told fascinating stories of interviewing the great American poet Ruth Stone when she was in her 90s who spoke of being able to sense when a poem was on its way: to her it was like a thunderous wind barrelling toward her across the plains, like a great storm. And unless she could get inside, get to a pencil and paper, by the time this might storm train of a poem crashed through her, she would lose it. So she'd run for the house: and if she got there in time, she could capture the poem and copy it down to the paper, but if she was too late, it would surge through her and past, and be lost. But if she could grab a pencil before it had passed completely through her, she could kind of reach out and spear it with the pencil tip, and drag it back inside her body, gripping it until she could find a piece of paper, in which case she would then haul it back inside her, word by word, transcribing it onto the paper. And most fascinating of all, it would be in reverse: word for word, backwards.
She also spoke of also interviewing the musician Tom Waits, who had similar experiences, until in middle life he did something novel one day which changed his whole process. She tells how he was driving on the freeway in Los Angeles, unable to stop, and suddenly heard in his head a most delightful melody, and he knew he needed to capture it at once, or it would be lost. So all the usual stress and tension started building up. And so, she said, instead of panicking, he looked up into the sky and said out loud "Excuse me, do you not see that I'm driving? Does it look like I can do anything for you right now? So, either you come back later, when I can give you the care and attention you need, or go and bother someone else; go and bother Leonard Cohen."
And she told the story of one of the depressing times while working on Eat, Pray, Love, when she became convinced that what she was writing was not just going to be the worst book she'd ever written, but the worst book ever written. And she remembered what Tom Waits had said to her, and leaned back in her chair and spoke to an empty corner of the room, and said, "Look, you and I both know that this isn't all just on me: I'm doing the best I can; I'm putting everything I have into this; but it needs the both of us. So if you're not going to do your part… well, I'm going to sit here and keep working. But I'd like the record to show that I showed up for my part of the job."
Elizabeth's thought was that by putting all the credit for success and failure on the shoulders of a single person, we're putting incredible pressure on each creative individual, and it's this awful pressure that leads to the so well known stories of writers and other artists literally dying: if not through conscious suicide, then often through disabling addictions or disastrous life choices. That by acknowledging a spiritual dimension to the process, that huge burden can be shared.
Now, from what I've read on the web and from seen in interviews and heard in conversation from other writers, most would agree, and welcome that. I think I'm an oddity: I don't seem to be assailed by self-doubt, but nor do I feel overweening pride in my abilities. I think I have a talent, but I think I'm far, far from the best, and still far from the best that I can be. But I'm learning and improving, and I don't need to be the best: it's not a competition, and anyway, what strikes one reader as genius will quite likely leave other readers cold and unimpressed. There are two parts to creating and appreciating artistic works — there's creativity on both sides, not just the artist's. As much, perhaps, goes on inside the reader as it does in the writer, as words or pictures resonate with the receiver's own life experiences and they add their own layer of meaning to the picture. So there is no "best writer", there are only "the writers who best resonate with some set of readers". My guess is that it would be hard to even find two readers who agreed completely on which set of writers they'd collect in their "best writers" bag.
So all this is just by way of saying, I think I'm a realist when it comes to evaluating my own work. I generally like it, and often even love it; I can see flaws in it — undoubtedly, not all the flaws — but when I do, I work to fix them. But I rarely (never?) look at something I've written and say "That's crap." Maybe because I tend to write from the heart, and I try to always write with honesty. And if I don't have anything that I feel driven to write, well, I either don't write, or don't put it in the same box as I do with the stuff I care about. If it's just a cooking recipe, or a note about how to fix some problem on my computer, or an email about some practical matter, then that's all it is. I know that not everyone will like what I write. I know I can't please everyone, and that I shouldn't try. I've set my bar for success, with just a little thought, as "If my writing generates more hours of reading pleasure than hours of writing effort, I'll consider myself successful." So for me, I don't think I place a huge burden on my shoulders: I write the best I can, and try to learn and improve, and if that's not good enough to please some people — that's okay. And if I'm one day lucky enough to have a best-seller — well, I know that there is luck involved, and that there are many other writers equally worthy of such success. Writing is not a rare talent, there are hundreds of thousands of good writers around the world, all working away to create literary wealth for the human race. I'm just a drop in that ocean. So I think that knowledge is enough to ward off the narcissism which success could all too easily induce.
One of the lucky events I experienced was a talk from a successful self-publishing writer and illustrator, where I was fortunate enough to be able to ask the question "How do you avoid the danger of becoming self-indulgent, and stay open to criticism?" And instead of taking the question in the spirit in which it was intended, he took offence and said that he knew better than anyone what he wanted to create, and had learned to ignore criticism. I'd been thinking of the astonishing and unfortunate level of misogyny that his work had developed following a bitter split up with his girlfriend; and he proceeded to demonstrate that, yes, the danger of becoming self-indulgent was all too real. (I think it's an even bigger risk for self-publishers, since they really can choose to have complete creative control.)
And my viewing of Elizabeth Gilbert's talk came just days after watching a TV documentary on Philip K Dick. I hadn't known that he was troubled by visions, that he dabbled in counter-culture stuff — maybe including drugs — and maybe even had some mental problems. But there's no question that he had enormous creativity, and genius, and has been hugely and deservedly influential in Western culture. Many people credit him (through Bladerunner, initially), as being the person who made sci-fi palatable and even desirable to Hollywood, and through it, to mainstream culture. Today, it's mainly only the literary crowd who really look down on and turn their nose up at all genre fiction, especially sci-fi and romance. But until Bladerunner, and probably Star Wars, sci-fi was commercially uninteresting to Hollywood.
Anyway, the thing was, that many of Dick's ideas for short stories or novels came to him from a place that seemed outside himself. He spoke of being hit by a beam of pinkish-red light from the crystal piece of jewellery around the neck of a young female Christian visitor one day, that knocked him into an altered state of consciousness. He spoke of being hit by a beam of ultra-bright pink light on later occasions too, that seemed to pour cosmic knowledge into him. He "intuited" a medical problem in he and his wife's young boy, and urgently insisted on taking his son to a doctor, and tests showed that he was perfectly correct, and the appropriate treatment was applied. It was around that time, and IIRC while stalled while trying to write "The Man in the High Castle", that he started using the I-Ching to solve his plot problems. When faced with a problem, he'd cast the sticks, read the appropriate entry from the I-Ching, and then apply that to his novel. Apparently he used that technique from then on, since he found it worked so well.
In a similar vein, I'd read advice about creating plots for role-playing adventures in which you used a deck of Tarot cards to lay out pieces that would be used to create the characters and the threats for a session or a whole campaign, kind of in a similar way to using them to read someone's fortune.
Now, all these stories sound very much like spiritual interventions, or tapping into some mystical well of creativity or knowledge, right? After all, such stories are part and parcel of human history through the ages. And it could be what's happening: I can't disprove it. And it would be a very comforting thing to be true.
But I think there is an alternative explanation, and it's simply rooted in possibly the most amazing thing in the universe: the brain, and its ongoing process, the mind. Another piece of serendipity was receiving a day of training on creativity, on innovation in the workplace, at the R&D company I worked at for many years (hi, CiSRA!). This training was unusual in being science-based, drawing on research into how the mind worked, and what influenced creativity. It was run with a mixture of lectures and workshop exercises in small groups, and all of it was fascinating — from the theory to the practice to watching how the group dynamics affected all this. One of the key pieces of the theory was about the unconscious or sub-conscious, as opposed to the conscious rational part of the mind.
(Just as an aside, my understanding of things is that brain is the hardware for our thinking, affected of course by our proprioceptive senses, hormones, chemistry and health — as well as external influences like very strong magnetic fields, flashing lights, or pounding beats and heart-swelling chords — and the mind is what emerges from processes running on that astonishing hardware.)
The rational mind is basically a single process (in the computer sense: if you're not into computers, you could think of it as a connected series of mental tasks, a series of logical steps in some chain of reasoning). Rational thought is pretty logical, and proceeds step by step in a line that can be straight or meandering and even looping. Unconscious thought, in contrast, uses huge amounts of parallelism. I don't think we yet understand how much cross-connectivity and echoing and rebounding resonances operate to simultaneously evoke memories and form new connections; but we do know that in addition to that complex process, there are somewhere around fifty different processes at work, or available to work, on certain kinds of problems. Some of these, I assume, are tied to sensory input, but not all. All this complexity and richness is I think why the myth of people only using ten percent of their brain developed: it's because we have areas in the brain specialised to deal with certain problems. Just as parts of the visual system break sight down into pieces, some recognising horizontal and vertical lines, other recognising movement, some (I'm sure!) evolved to detect an eye pointed in our direction, and so on. All layered together in a hierarchy or network of networks. All able to cross-communicate. So using all parts of the brain would only happen if we were being flooded with all sorts of sensory inputs, as well as facing challenging problems.
But the rational mind, being serial in nature, and tending to be logical, is the only part that can handle certain problems: like counting and working out sums, and purely logical reasoning. Whereas the unconscious is great at making connections between ideas, weighing up pros and cons, relating one memory to another, matching patterns, and so on. There are some fascinating research papers about this, which you can find by Googling "Unconscious thought theory." One way of applying the theory to solve problems, especially creative problems, is basically this:
1) Learn or revise as much as you can that is related to the problem at hand.
2) Consciously pose yourself the question you want to answer or the problem you need to solve.
3) Distract your conscious/rational mind for at least ten minutes, doing something like a crossword puzzle.
4) Return to the question, and then, as quickly as you can, pick from the available options, or jot down an answer to the problem, without trying to analyse or reason it out.
I have confidence that this works, since it worked on the day of our training to solve a good range of problems, and I've used it often since then when I faced creative problems in my writing. On numerous occasions I had plot problems, or needed some creative idea that satisfied a whole web of logical and emotional issues. Often, they were daunting, and I wondered if there even was any solution at all. But I simply set aside the fear and self doubts (thank you, ratbag cops from Perisher Valley back in about 1983, for forcing me to learn that lesson), and let my subconscious churn away at it; sometimes for hours, sometimes for days. And then, when I felt the time was right, I'd sit or lie down with pencil and paper and start writing: sometimes with a brief note explaining what needed to happen, sometimes then picturing in my head various options, sometimes just writing down bits and pieces that might help, sometimes a mix of all those things — and in short order, suddenly the plot and/or story would flow, with the actors and action unfolding as I wrote.
So, all I'm really saying here, is that we each carry around inside a fount of creativity that we can tap into quite easily. It's sensitive to our moods, it's sensitive to and absorbing facts and impressions, sights and sounds and smells, from the world around us; it's synthesising ideas and joining facts together, juggling things together and looking for patterns, and best of all, if something is important to us and we consciously pose a problem, that mighty unconscious array of mental powers can be put to work at solving the problem.
Go and watch Elizabeth's TED talk (Elizabeth Gilbert on Genius): even though she comes to a quite different conclusion to me, I think her idea would work as well or better than mine, for many people. Her idea is more romantic than mine, and I think more appealing for many people. But for me, the idea that this creative genius can be inside all of us is just as exciting.
And now, back to work on book 3...
Monday, 25 April 2016
Harsh Lessons progress (Vol 2)
Harsh Lessons now has the cover designed, once again by Mirella de Santana:
You can find Wild Thing as an ebook (on Amazon) or as a paperback. Use this search to find it via Google from a local bookseller, and avoid having to pay for it to be shipped from Amazon in the US.
I'm pleased to say that the MS for volume 2, Harsh Lessons (it was going to be Shadow Hunt, but that will be Vol 3), is now with my editor (ThEditors). He's already warned me that at 156k wds it's almost certainly too long; and I'm at a loss at present for what would cuts would improve it, so I'll just wait and see. Maybe a small adjustment to the margins might reduce the paper consumption? I can't drop the point size for volume 2: that would be horrible for people who like to buy series. So, we'll see. There is, after all, a chance that the pacing and everything may be okay!
It still seems a bit surreal to me: that the MS which I'd already split in two to become volume 1, and which was 160k wds, I think, got split in two again to make a 143k wd Wild Thing and the (currently) 153k wd Shadow Hunt Harsh Lessons. And I still haven't revisited the 2nd half of the MS from its original split: I'm not even sure that will make it into volume 3 4 (Lost Girl)!
After reading a note from my editor about a pacing problem, I was worried about that; and discussed a couple of fixes. He quite liked my idea of a short "mean girls" episode. Which I think came out very well, but which did grow to be something longer than either of us expected, I'm sure. So, did I fix the pacing problem? I don't know! But I was quite worried about it, and of course the overall length, and that ended up with my invention of what I call the "oomph analysis". Here's what it looks like for the original Vol 2 MS:
The idea is that the author works out the categories that best capture what he or she feels are most important for his or her book, and then, reading it chapter by chapter, gives each chapter a score from 0 to 5 in each of those categories (in a spreadsheet). It takes a few minutes thought at the end of each chapter, so it's not that hard to do. I also added a one-line summary of each chapter. Then out pops a colour-coded graph. I've written about it a bit over on my other blog, A Toe in the Ocean of Books, but I'll summarise what I said there: for my book, the categories I decided on were: Pace (action), World building, Character development, Plot development, Emotion (moving), Humour, and Tension. It's partly objective, despite being subjectively-based. I basically gave myself a 5 for humour if I had several laugh-out-loud moments in the chapter, or on where I really cracked up; similarly, if I cried a fair bit, I gave that chapter a 5 for emotion; and so on. I hope the fact that I think it varies means there is some variation there to be seen! The formula I invented to show the patterns balances chapter length (longer chapters reduce oomph, but very short ones don't overly boost it; and high scores are exaggerated, because high scores have much more impact and are harder to get). I plan to write more about this; and also to do the same analysis for Wild Thing.
Anyway, I'm now updating and working my way through my list of (currently) 33 things to do for publication and book launch. And praying that my editor won't have more than a month of work I'll need to do, when I receive his critique!
Thursday, 17 December 2015
And we're off and running...
In the book, I promised that the 1st ten readers to spot typos or other errors would receive a free electronic copy of the sequel as soon as it's prepared. Well, the first eagle-eyed reader was Nikos Andronikos, who noticed that I'd not used the American/modern spelling of "medieval" in the Bio section on the back cover image. Now, I think I'd prefer to leave that "error" there for sentimental reasons, since my wife always insisted on the old English spelling of the word (just check out the Sydney Mediaeval and Renaissance Group web site - for which she was President for a good number of years - if you don't believe me). Anyway, I think that still earns Nikos a free copy, but I still want to leave the way open for 10 other people to spot errors, so I've put him in at the top of the table as a nice computer scientist-y zeroth entry.
The idea behind this, is to find and fix errors in the book, of course. I've done my best, and I dream that perhaps the list will not reach ten, :-), but telling me of errors means I can fix them, so any reader who enables auto-update will get a corrected copy. And because the printed editions will be all POD (Print on Demand), I plan to fix such errors in the print editions, too, by uploading a corrected PDF to the printer every now and then as needed. Of course, I can't fix errors retroactively in already-printed copies, but at least later buyers of the paperbacks will benefit from the keen eyes of earlier readers. I do hate typos in books.
I've also added a list to keep track of and thank the first twenty reviewers of Wild Thing. By "review", I mean a "substantive" review: at least 100 words. These don't have to be good reviews, just honest ones. Though if the review makes no sense to me, or I truly can't see how it relates to my book (I see that Wild Thing is a popular title for a book!), then in those cases I'll withhold the "award", which again earns a free electronic copy of the sequel when it's ready.
And yes, I plan to do this for all my books. As a writer, I depend on reviews and word of mouth to gain readers, and I think honest reviews are a critical piece in the new publishing model. So reviewers help both authors and other readers.
Today I prepared the cover PDF for IngramSpark for the 5"x8" paperback edition. But (cough, cough), I realised at 1am this morning I hadn't sent in my Cataloguing-in-Print application for any of the paperback editions. So I can't actually finalise the text for the CIP entry in the print editions. And they may not get to it by 22nd December, when they take a break, so I'm sitting here mildly tense, wondering if I'll get the print editions underway before the end of the year. [Later note: the Australian CIP people came through, so all was well!]
I may also mention that I'm seriously planning to offer to virtually attend (via Skype or Facebook Messenger of Google chats) book club discussion groups for people who have read the book. I made a little video where I talk for a few minutes about Emily Craven's idea, and as I say there, I think I'm not taking much of a risk by making the offer. Because I'm an unknown writer, I'm not going to be swamped with requests to do that. (More likely than not, no one will ever take me up on the offer!)
In the unlikely event that some group is interested in inviting me around via video hook-up, and if you'd like a list of possibly-interesting questions for discussion, I've made a little list, and if you'd like me to send them to you, just ask. I could just post them here, but that seems to me just a little presumptuous, somehow.
These "ten winner" lists are over on the right of the blog, just above the Follow by Email widget.
Future posts here will be more about the book(s), and writing in general. This blog is focused on the creative writing side of things, and the books themselves. My other blog is really focused on self-publishing, and covers the less creative but equally-important side of the new publishing model that's sprung into being.
Anyway, I think I've rabbited on long enough, so that should do for now. I think the top thing on my to-do list however, has become Christmas shopping and cards. I've been very slack on that front, and concentrated 99% of my time and energy into getting the book ready. I will take a little break over the festive season, too, but I'm very keen to get Shadow Hunt finished and published, too. And even more keen to get back into writing the 3rd book, Lost Girl.
Merry Christmas!
Friday, 10 July 2015
Welcome
If you're reading this, then either your Google-fu is strong, or it's December 2015 and Wild Thing has launched.
If you found this blog via the link at the end of the book, then first I'd like to thank you for reading Wild Thing, and I hope you'll find some content here of interest.
My plan for this blog is that it should be a place where I can interact with people who are interested in my books, in the ambitious hope that there will eventually be one or more people on the planet who fit that description. So my idea is that this is the place to come if you have questions about the book, or if you have spotted errors and want to be the first person to tell me about them (and earn yourself a free copy of the next book), or if you've had some cool idea that you want to share with me.
I suppose for this first post, it makes a kind of sense to talk about the creation of the book...
I started writing it, in pencil on paper, in 1991, and completed that first draft in 1993. (It occurs to me that it might be vaguely interesting to include a photo of the very first page and the "lucky pencil" I used for pretty much the whole book...)
I continued working on it, improving my writing skills (tip: using a full-length novel makes for a lot of work fixing stylistic problems!), even putting it aside for something like eight years (appeasing my conscience with “Well, I'm just waiting for Baen to reply”), but last year I kind of looked up and around and noticed that the publishing landscape had changed substantially. So I decided to self-publish it. (I've been recording what I learn at my blog, A Toe in the Ocean of Books.)
Anyway, I think that's enough for the initial post, especially since I'm trying to get the print editions ready.