Time for a little mid-summer ramble.
Sometimes, when you’re a writer among a group of writers, it seems like you have the most fantastic community of like minds to draw upon. Other times, it seems like everyone is totally ignoring you. The oddest part is that, on the average, both of these extremes are true. We are writers, so we are a community of like minds. We support each other. We will promote each other’s projects. We’ll give up our blog space to guest posts and promotional opportunities. We’ll give advice, and share techniques and resources. We’ll challenge each other to friendly competition. We’ll even buy each other’s books, or pledge funds to each other’s Kickstarters. But do you know what is the single most difficult thing to get another writer to do in support of your project? The single thing they are least likely to do? [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Novels,
Obscurity,
Rambling,
Reputation,
Short Stories,
Writing
On Wednesday I hinted that there was likely to be another update on my writing this week, and I was right! Last Sunday I was looking at milestones for my progress, and realized that based on the rate of progress I had made on the second draft of The Perils of Prague, I was right on track to complete the draft this week. Then I had several days in a row when I had to spend my daily writing time working on other projects. I got my daily writing in, I just didn’t make any progress on editing Perils. At the time I published Wednesday’s update, I figured I should still be able to finish by the end of the day on Sunday, provided I could edit at least 3000 words a day… [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Crackle & Bang,
Novels,
The Perils of Prauge,
WIP,
Writing
This is a late #WriterWednesday post, and it is also going to be a short one. Hopefully I’ll be able to add in a longer post later in the week. As you can tell from the title of this little missive, work has dominated my life of late. I had a good, long Fourth of July weekend, in which I was able to go to a couple of parties at friend’s houses, see some fantastic fireworks, play some Cards Against Humanity, and watch the cook consistently give my burger to someone else. It was a good time, but it came to an end all too soon. And then, the dayjob attacked! [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Crackle & Bang,
Friends,
Novels,
Steampunk,
The Perils of Prauge,
WIP,
Writing
Wow. Will you look at that. It’s July now. July. 2013 is half over. Halfway done. I’ve set some ambitious goals for the latter half of the year. Perhaps I should also take some time to take stock of what I’ve done so far. Let’s see how it breaks down… [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
ACX,
Balticon 46,
Balticon 47,
MoPO,
Novels,
Panels,
Parsec Awards,
Short Stories,
Steampunk,
Swimming Cat Studios,
The Bright Lands,
The Cross of Columba,
The Perils of Prauge,
The Way of the Gun,
Voice Work,
Writing
[Today, we have something special for you. And by “we” I don’t mean just my wife, the cats, and myself. Today we have a guest post from Author Starla Huchton, as part of her Blog Tour to promote her newly released book Maven. Starla has been all over the place with this blog tour, doing interviews, giving character interviews, sharing pre-release blurbs and talking a lot about the book. Well, I had to be different. I didn’t want to bring my readers the same kind of material that you could find at other blogs. So I asked Starla to write a guest post about what it took to bring Maven to print. All too often in the writing world, people focus on that first draft. Well, that’s just the tip of the iceberg As you’ll see below, Starla put a lot of work in just to get her story ready to publish, and then she had to do all the publishing parts, too. It’s a little longer than your typical blog post, but I think Starla paints a fascinating picture of the process of self-publishing. Enjoy! – Doc] [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Books,
Novels,
Pimp Your Friends,
publishing,
Starla Huchton,
Writing
After only a week, I’d like to thank everyone who has offered their help towards getting The Perils of Prague ready for publication, especially considering the contact form I used last week didn’t work as expected. I’ve been contacted by eight different people so far who have voiced their willingness lend my project a hand. Some are fellow authors, who are willing to Beta read for me in exchange for having me Beta read their work. A couple are editors who are willing to offer their services if we can come to a compensation agreement that fits their available time and needs. This is exciting for me, but I still have to realize that things can fall through, and I still need a lot of help. I’ve been trying to organize the responses I’ve gotten, and get in contact with each of them. If you’d like to help out, it still isn’t too late! Just drop me an e-mail, and let me know how you’re willing to help, and what kind of compensation you’d like to have for your services. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Books,
Novels,
Reading,
Steampunk,
The Perils of Prauge,
WIP,
Writing
When I started Swimming Cat Studios, I named it because I was having to do a lot on my own, teaching myself as I went. I had some resources to steer me in the right direction, and a few friends who could give me suggestions, but I pretty much had to do it on my own. It is the only way to learn new skills. Over the years I’ve tried a lot of new things, had some success, and some failures, and learned a few things.
One of the things I’ve learned is that there are some things you can’t do for yourself.
And that is why I’m asking you if you’d be willing to help me out. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Crackle & Bang,
Novels,
Steampunk,
The Perils of Prauge,
Voice Work,
WIP,
Writing
In the previous installment, I talked about the wonderful people who filled my Balticon Weekend. I wasn’t able to mention everyone who made the weekend a memorable event, but I tried to address as many as I could. I probably should address some of the folks I left out, but instead, I want to move on to some of the more memorable events of the weekend that made it the incredibly special experience that it was. I won’t mention every panel we attended, but I would like to point out that there will be a Balticon 47 Wrap-up, and this year’s Wrap-up should feature about 20 episodes of content. I still have to get permission to make sure I can release some of the audio, and work out some deals on the release of some content. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Balticon 47,
Crackle & Bang,
Novels,
Panels,
Reading,
Steampunk,
The Perils of Prauge,
The Shrinking Man Project
Today, I have the opportunity to do a very special post in the Pimpin’ Your Friends category. The friend in question is the lovely and talented Starla Huchton. Starla is not only a friend, she’s my cover artist. She did the cover for the e-book of my short story “Welcome to Paradox” and she will be doing the cover for my steampunk novel The Perils of Prague. She’s got a very nice business as a freelance graphic designer over at Designed by Starla, doing book covers for independent authors and publishers. Today, Starla is releasing a very special cover, and I have the privilege of bringing that cover to you. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Books,
Novels,
Pimp Your Friends,
Starla Huchton,
The Perils of Prauge,
Welcome to Paradox
They say that brevity is the soul of wit. Well, after last week’s post, perhaps I should try to be witty. Who knows, it might work.
Last week I also promised that I would speak of more writerly things, and that is a promise that I can keep. I have kept with the habit of writing every day and have leveled up to writing 300 words a day. This past week I’ve actually been more likely to write over 500 words a day, which is a little surprising… [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Novels,
The Bright Lands,
The Perils of Prauge,
WIP,
Writing
