I didn’t post last week. Bad blogger! But there were reasons for it. Things were actually quite busy, and what time I didn’t have taken up by work had to be dedicated to sleep. And I still didn’t get enough sleep.
So, a lot of work last week, but a lot to show from it, too. I finally had to end the Alpha Read, as my last Alpha Reader wasn’t able to give feedback on the last few chapters of the book due to the distractions of moving to a new house, caring for a family, holding down gainful employment, and other unimportant things like that. ;D Heh. Actually, I don’t blame him for where he placed his priorities, I just regret not getting his reaction on the last chapters of The Perils of Prague. I did get some feedback from my weapons consultant and made a few changes on how firearms are handled in the book. With these final edits, the Third Draft of Perils has finally drawn to a close!
And I did one other thing last week.
I hired an editor. [click to continue…]
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This post may seem like a bit of a reversal from the last one, but the Perils in Peril post was a bit of a cry for help. And I did get the help I needed, although it wasn’t exactly the help I thought I wanted when I wrote the post. Not making much sense yet, am I? Let’s just say that the cry for help was less about helping me meet a goal, and was more about getting me to face facts I had subconsciously realized, but hadn’t admitted to myself.
It was a wake up call… [click to continue…]
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Last summer, I asked for help from you, the readers of this blog. I had reached the state where I needed readers to further polish by novel and get it ready for publication. A number of people volunteered to Alpha Read, and to Beta Read. Well, things went slow with the Alpha Read. I had to scramble to get some replacement readers in December. Now, the Alpha Read is about to complete, and I’ve sent word out to the Beta readers that their part is about to begin.
And I’ve heard back from exactly two of them… [click to continue…]
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The world of publishing is changing, and a lot of the old measures of success are going away. Oh, those measures are still there, but more and more authors are finding new ways to be successful in different ways. Still, there is some draw to some of the old landmarks: getting an agent, signing a deal with a large publisher, seeing your book in bookstores. And yet, having your book in bookstores may not be the road to success most people think it is. You see, they aren’t what you think they are. The fact is, bookstores are not in the business of selling books. [click to continue…]
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A while ago I posted about forming a local writing group, the Germantown Writer’s Guild. The GWG has been doing pretty well thus far. We’ve had over 30 people join on Meetup, and there have been a couple of meetings where we have had twelve or thirteen folks show up. There is certainly an interest for some kind of support for writers in the Germantown area. We’ve already started a weekly writer’s workshop run by one of our members and based on an MFA course she once took. Another member is running a Page One meeting for beginning writers. I am doing a monthly Writer’s Support meeting, and I’ve been asked by the other members of the Guild to host another meeting… [click to continue…]
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In the full court press to get The Perils of Prague ready for publication, I’ve had to deal with a number of new experiences. One of which is figuring out the cover. I’ve done covers for a couple of my short stories in the past, but those were only e-books. For Perils, I’m planning on also having dead tree copies available. This brings up an entirely new dimension. You see, physical books have back covers. And since they have them, I have to figure out what to put back there. [click to continue…]
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A number of authors have talked about their fears on their blogs, but this has never been a topic where I’ve had a lot to say on the subject. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that I’m perfect and everyone else is flawed. Quite the contrary. We all have the same doubts. We all look at our writing at one time or another and say “This is crap!” For some, this becomes a paralyzing fear. They can’t move on and many consider quitting writing altogether. They figure that if the writing is crap now, it will always be crap, so why bother? I take a different view. To me, crap is a necessary stage. Everything has to start as crap. The difference is if you leave it as crap, or if you make it into something better. So, I pretty much haven’t been bothered by writing fears.
Until now. [click to continue…]
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If you’ve visited the site in the past couple days, you might have noticed that the progress bar at the top of the sidebar has updated! That’s right, the third draft of Perils has started! I’ve got all my Alpha Readers past the halfway mark. In fact, I’ve got all of them, except one, past the 70% mark and we seem to be on track to finish the Alpha Read by Valentine’s Day. I know I’ve had great fun transcribing the comments into Scrivener. My readers have helped me find a bunch of typos that managed to make it through the second draft, pointed out some of their favorite moments in the story, and shown me the places where I need to provide more information. Even better… [click to continue…]
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Things have been progressing well with the Alpha Read of The Perils of Prague. Of the five readers that have kept with it, three of them have sent me feedback for at least four of the seven review sections, and one of the other two has sent me comments on enough of the middle section to put him past the halfway point. I’ve encouraged everyone to keep with it, and with a little luck I will be able to close out the Alpha read around Valentine’s day. The better news here is that since I’ve got comments for more than half of the book, I’m getting ready to start the third draft this week! [click to continue…]
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