Note: My computer's screen resolution is set at 1920 X 1080. Your screen's resolution may require you to resize or place your images at different markings than the ones I have listed here.
Gimp is a free image creating/editing program. My version is 2.8.2, so if you have a different version of Gimp, your commands may be slightly different from mine.
First, I created a new image background. Its size is 2560 x 1600. For my Twitter page, I made a simple starry background with a single nova focal point following a simple Gimp planet design tutorial.
Next, you need to choose which images you want to display on your background. My book covers were created using Gimp and were exported in jpg format. You can open many different image types in Gimp and use them in other projects as long as you either have permission to use them or created them yourself and own the copyrights to them. Go up to the menu and select Edit, then Copy. If you only wish to use part of your image, use the rectangle selection tool to outline the area of the image you wish to use in your background before going up to Edit, then Copy. Once the image is on your clipboard, go back to the page with the background image you've created. Go up to Edit, Paste As, and select New Layer. This pastes the image into the project page, while allowing you to move it around and manipulate it as a separate entity from the rest of your project. If you do a simple paste, the image will merge with your background, and you won't be able to resize or move it after you click outside the image's borders.
If your image does not appear on your background as anything other than a dotted outline, go up to menu, and click Layer, Stack, and Layer To Top. You should now see your image on top of your background.
Next, you need to resize your image. Go up to the menu and select Tools, Transform Tools, and Scale. Click on your image. A dialog box should appear. One of my gripes about this feature is that you can't just click in the size boxes, type the size you want, and then hit Scale. You must use the arrow keys on the sides of the numbers to enlarge or decrease your image size manually. For my book covers, I use a width of 193 and height of 265.
Note that this will make your images appear rather small on the background, but rest assured it will look plenty large on your Twitter page once it's uploaded.
Next, you will move your image to the position you want on the page. With the image size I selected, I can display 6 book covers to the left of Twitter's feed and 6 more covers to the right, so if you're a prolific writer like me, you have plenty of space to display your book covers.
Go to Tools, Transform Tools, Move. Your cursor should change to a cross image. Now, before you do anything else, you need to check that you will be moving the active image instead of the background! On the right hand side of Gimp's working page, I have a menu tab that was a default setting on the working view. There are tabs at the top of the menu tab, and the fourth one from the left in that window is labeled Tool Options, which changes with each tool you select, so you have to have the Move tool active in order to see the correct options for it. Click on the tab, and in the box underneath, you should see Pick a layer or guide and under that Move the active layer. Click on Move the active layer. Move your first image to the top left of your background, leaving only a little clear space showing background color to the top and left of it.
Repeat your actions to add one additional book cover to the right of your first image and up to two more rows of book cover images underneath that first row, lining the images up as best you can and leaving only a little space between the rows. This fills up the space to the left of your Twitter feed.
Now, to utilize the space to the right of your Twitter feed, you will repeat the actions above, but when positioning the images on the background, look above your project, and you'll see a ruler. Align your first right hand side image at the 1275 or 1280 mark on the ruler.
Note that you will have a lot of empty space on your background to the right of your right hand images and beneath all of your images when done. I'm not sure why, but I've found it necessary to have all this wasted space in my background in order for it to appear the correct size and in the correct position on Twitter.
Once you have all of your images sized and placed on the background, save it as a Gimp xcf file with the name of your background--I use the name Twitterbackground. Next, you will export the project as a jpg to your desktop. Go up to File, Export. A dialog box should open. In the Places column, select Desktop to export the image to your desktop. On the bottom of the dialog box, click on Select File Type (By Extension), and scroll down until you see JPEG image. Select that. Click the Export button. A second dialog box should pop up. Click the Export button. The image should now be available on your desktop.
To upload your new background to Twitter, go up to the round Settings And Help button on your Twitter page. Click Settings, and a menu pops up on the left hand side. Click on Design, and you will see Customize Your Own. The top item is Background image. Click on Change Background, and Choose Existing Image. When the dialog box pops up, scroll through until you find Desktop on the left hand side. Click on that, and then on the right hand side, click on your image's name, then hit open. Note that your background may or may not immediately update. Wait a few moments for the upload to complete, then on your Twitter page, scroll down to the bottom and click Save Changes. If your image didn't immediately update after uploading, it should update now.
Sunday, August 31, 2014
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
A few words about writing action
After reading a few other self-published books and professionally published books put out by women, I can see why there's such a stigma against women writing in certain genres--most of the women whose work I've read lately are awful at writing action. I would like a female crime writer's work a lot more if she had more action in her books, but she seems to be completely against it. I would have better liked a pornographic "romance" novella if the action in that (and I'm not talking about the sex) had been better written. Instead, both of these women, pro and self-published, really dropped the ball IMO, giving women writers another black eye when it comes to writing action. A third self-published writer wrote action sequences, but she was repetitive and completely wooden in her depictions of action, describing some martial arts moves in one word "sentences". "Grab. Twist. Neutralize." That got old really quickly.
Since I like to write sci-fi, one thing I knew at the outset was that I could not shy away from action. Since my favorite characters to write are strong females, I need to keep in mind that not every five foot one hundred pound woman is going to be able to kick everyone's butt without getting a scratch every single time. In fact, I also tend to shy away from the "she's tiny, she's beautiful, and she kicks ass" stereotype altogether. I'd rather write about realistic women facing realistic challenges who don't always come out on top at first. I think it makes for more interesting reading.
So to any female who reads this and wants to try her hand at genres that expect action, in particular crime or sci-fi, I ask you to please learn how to write action and hire test readers if you need to so you can get honest feedback on how you are doing.
One of my favorite reviews of The Tourney is from a man who said he thought my action sequences were very well-written. I personally think there's a fine line between describing action too little or too much, and that's where practice comes into play as does listening carefully to honest feedback from your test readers.
If that doesn't convince you, consider which of the following action sequences you would rather see in a book:
1. "He knocked her to the floor and stood over her, gloating."
2. "Wham. His fist hit her in the stomach. 'Oof.' Her breath whooshed out of her. Pain lanced through her. Thump. She landed on the floor."
3. "His fist slammed into her stomach, driving her breath from her. She doubled over in pain, crumpling slowly to the floor. She peered up at him as he stood over her, gloating."
Personally, I think number three is the best. I think number one is too brief, cheating the reader out of more completely described action. I think number two is tedious, going into so much detail it reads like it's not happening in real time. I think number three walks the fine line between too little and too much. To me, it's a more graphic description of the action without being too detailed. I.e., it's the kind of action I like to read.
Since I like to write sci-fi, one thing I knew at the outset was that I could not shy away from action. Since my favorite characters to write are strong females, I need to keep in mind that not every five foot one hundred pound woman is going to be able to kick everyone's butt without getting a scratch every single time. In fact, I also tend to shy away from the "she's tiny, she's beautiful, and she kicks ass" stereotype altogether. I'd rather write about realistic women facing realistic challenges who don't always come out on top at first. I think it makes for more interesting reading.
So to any female who reads this and wants to try her hand at genres that expect action, in particular crime or sci-fi, I ask you to please learn how to write action and hire test readers if you need to so you can get honest feedback on how you are doing.
One of my favorite reviews of The Tourney is from a man who said he thought my action sequences were very well-written. I personally think there's a fine line between describing action too little or too much, and that's where practice comes into play as does listening carefully to honest feedback from your test readers.
If that doesn't convince you, consider which of the following action sequences you would rather see in a book:
1. "He knocked her to the floor and stood over her, gloating."
2. "Wham. His fist hit her in the stomach. 'Oof.' Her breath whooshed out of her. Pain lanced through her. Thump. She landed on the floor."
3. "His fist slammed into her stomach, driving her breath from her. She doubled over in pain, crumpling slowly to the floor. She peered up at him as he stood over her, gloating."
Personally, I think number three is the best. I think number one is too brief, cheating the reader out of more completely described action. I think number two is tedious, going into so much detail it reads like it's not happening in real time. I think number three walks the fine line between too little and too much. To me, it's a more graphic description of the action without being too detailed. I.e., it's the kind of action I like to read.
Tuesday, December 17, 2013
How to easily change the orientation of your writing
Since I found a way to create fonts for my fictional writing systems, I've been busy the past few weeks getting them done. Along the way, I've learned a few things. Most fictional alphabets are written left to right, because that's how it's done in the Western world. There are other ways of writing around the world, including right to left, and top to bottom, which usually is read from right to left. There is at least one writing system that switched between being read left to right and right to left--the direction switched every line. There are also rare occurrences of natural writing that proceeds from top to bottom and reading left to right, but so few that word processing programs are not set up to handle them with just a few clicks of the mouse. There is also no good way to make the word processors I work with write right to left without making a lot of changes to your computer, including an OS change to a language that requires one to write right to left, i.e. Hebrew. However, I found a way to force your word processor to write top to bottom with the lines moving from left to right, and I also figured out which programs to use and what to do to write right to left without changing your OS language to Hebrew or another language written right to left.
To write top to bottom and left to right, you first need a custom font because all your letters must be the same width. I was designing a vertical cursive font, so I automatically made all my letters the same width and kept track of the alignment of each because they needed to seamlessly run from one letter into the next. Next, you need Open Office Org's writer to create the document you will use. More recent versions of MS Word may work correctly now, but the version I'm required to use for work, while it says it can handle up to 45 columns on a page, will not allow me to create a page with that many columns on it! However, using OOO's writer you can create a document for Word that has that many columns on it, and Word can open and use it. I chose numerous narrow columns, because my goal was to make each column narrow enough that it forced the word processor to display a single character per line before moving down to the next line. Since columns are ordered left to right, this resulted in a document that writes from top to bottom and left to right. OOO will allow you to save your document in Word's format, so you can open and use it in Word.
My next challenge was to write from right to left without doing an OS language change. I found that simply activating Asian language support in OOO didn't work, for while it allowed me to specify writing right to left, it actually displayed the words from left to right and only moved everything from beginning each line at the left side of the page to the right.
However, I have experience with numerous other programs, including drawing programs that allow you to create what's called a text box. Since a text box is a drawing object, it can be manipulated to face any direction you want, and that coupled with another custom font provided my solution. First, you need to create a font with all the letters facing backwards. This is so your letters will face the correct direction so you can read them properly when the image is reversed. Once that's done, you can use either Windows Paint or OOO's drawing feature to write your message. In Paint, create a text box. Switch to your backwards facing font and write what you want to say in the correct order--if you want to say "correct", you will type "correct" and not "tcerroc". It will display every letter backwards because it's writing from left to right. Once your text is done being written, BEFORE YOU EXIT YOUR TEXT BOX, go to your Home tab, and to the left of your tools you will see orientation controls. Choose Rotate, and Flip Horizontal. Your text box will reverse itself, and since you used your backwards facing font, all your letters will now be facing the right direction, all without doing a global language change on your computer. To do the same thing in OOO's drawing, you will create your text box, write what you want it to say using your backwards facing font, and exit the text box. Select the text box (if it's the only thing on the page, press CTRL and A to select all), then find Modify on the top menu. Go to Convert, and convert your text box to a bitmap. Go to Modify on the top menu again, and choose Flip, Flip Horizontal, and your text box will reverse. In either program, if you are writing in several different fonts and orientations, you will create a separate text box for each.
To write top to bottom and left to right, you first need a custom font because all your letters must be the same width. I was designing a vertical cursive font, so I automatically made all my letters the same width and kept track of the alignment of each because they needed to seamlessly run from one letter into the next. Next, you need Open Office Org's writer to create the document you will use. More recent versions of MS Word may work correctly now, but the version I'm required to use for work, while it says it can handle up to 45 columns on a page, will not allow me to create a page with that many columns on it! However, using OOO's writer you can create a document for Word that has that many columns on it, and Word can open and use it. I chose numerous narrow columns, because my goal was to make each column narrow enough that it forced the word processor to display a single character per line before moving down to the next line. Since columns are ordered left to right, this resulted in a document that writes from top to bottom and left to right. OOO will allow you to save your document in Word's format, so you can open and use it in Word.
My next challenge was to write from right to left without doing an OS language change. I found that simply activating Asian language support in OOO didn't work, for while it allowed me to specify writing right to left, it actually displayed the words from left to right and only moved everything from beginning each line at the left side of the page to the right.
However, I have experience with numerous other programs, including drawing programs that allow you to create what's called a text box. Since a text box is a drawing object, it can be manipulated to face any direction you want, and that coupled with another custom font provided my solution. First, you need to create a font with all the letters facing backwards. This is so your letters will face the correct direction so you can read them properly when the image is reversed. Once that's done, you can use either Windows Paint or OOO's drawing feature to write your message. In Paint, create a text box. Switch to your backwards facing font and write what you want to say in the correct order--if you want to say "correct", you will type "correct" and not "tcerroc". It will display every letter backwards because it's writing from left to right. Once your text is done being written, BEFORE YOU EXIT YOUR TEXT BOX, go to your Home tab, and to the left of your tools you will see orientation controls. Choose Rotate, and Flip Horizontal. Your text box will reverse itself, and since you used your backwards facing font, all your letters will now be facing the right direction, all without doing a global language change on your computer. To do the same thing in OOO's drawing, you will create your text box, write what you want it to say using your backwards facing font, and exit the text box. Select the text box (if it's the only thing on the page, press CTRL and A to select all), then find Modify on the top menu. Go to Convert, and convert your text box to a bitmap. Go to Modify on the top menu again, and choose Flip, Flip Horizontal, and your text box will reverse. In either program, if you are writing in several different fonts and orientations, you will create a separate text box for each.
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Creating a true type font for your fictional writing system
You've put a lot of time and effort into your universe, and now are concentrating on the finer details, like providing a font for the writing system your characters use. Fans eat this stuff up, so for me, it was a must have.
There are a number of free and paid programs out there that can help you do it. The fastest way is to find a free "handwriting" font site, print their template, fill in your letters, numbers, and other symbols, and upload it. However, the downfall of using a free website is that while you end up with a useable font, any problems with the scan can end up showing in your letters, and your letters will be irregular in size, shape, and spacing. I found this out when using Paintfont.com. I also had a problem with uploading. My printed page wasn't dark enough, so I had to use my image handling software to darken the picture so that Paintfont could read it. I also tried the free online site Fontstruct.com. It has a simple grid based design platform you use in your browser, and while it has a number of different shapes and allows you to adjust the spacing of your font, it can be challenging to use to make a rounded font. I did design a font using Fontstruct.com, which for a free website gave me quite satisfying results. I then looked at free and paid font programs. I'm not a total computer geek, but I have studied computer science, and I don't find most font programs to be user friendly. I found the price on FontCreator had gone up considerably, and therefore tried two free programs, FontForge, and Birdfont. FontForge is no longer being updated, and it didn't work properly on my computer, though I had the most recent release that was supposed to work with my version of Windows. I then looked at Birdfont, which has very little documentation in English so far (it's a newer program and says on the web page that is seeking help translating to different languages, including English), and the tutorials I saw didn't show the info I needed.
Since I really wanted to program a cursive font, I realized I needed to use a free website that would convert my handwritten images into a font and after that a font program to modify it. I used Birdfont to modify the handwritten font so that it looked more cursive. All the tools in Birdfont are labeled, but instructions on how to perform simple actions are sparse as of my writing this. Here's what I figured out through trial and error: The first thing you need to do is save your file under a different name, so if you screw up, the original scanned font file is available for you to try again. You should hit save after every letter is edited, so if you mess up, you don't have to redo a lot of your work. You can move the baseline and top line around the letter, but you can't save the moves (bug report sent on this). To move your letter onto the bottom line, you need to use menu commands. First, you need to see what you're doing. On the right hand side are a bunch of buttons. About two thirds of the way down on the right, you'll see an F. Directly above that is a button that when highlighted says "show grid". Click on it. You should now see a grid in addition to the basic top, bottom, and side margin lines. Under Tools, select Move, then under Edit choose Select All. Once the entire letter is selected, you need to use the arrow keys to move the letter around. You can't go diagonally (unless you use the mouse, but I found moving letters with the mouse gave me unsatisfactory results) but I found movements with the arrow controls fine enough that I could move the letters around where I wanted them. You can adjust the width on both sides of the letters and save that, which is important because a cursive font needs its letters to be right against each other with no space between them. To get rid of unwanted marks generated by the scan, you need to left click on them, and when they are highlighted, press the delete button. Note that if there is a mark in an open area on the letter that it sits behind the open spot, trying to click on it to delete it won't work, and since I didn't want to move the letter and open space independently so that they weren't centered on each other to get to those tiny marks, and the marks aren't visible in the font at font size, I left those in place. If the mark is close to the letter, you also need to be careful--if the entire letter gets highlighted when trying to select a small mark to delete, you can accidentally delete the entire letter, and you can only use undo ONE time to change an edit and the letter back. All is not lost if you've been working carefully and saving regularly, so if you screw up and can't undo your changes, you need to exit the program without saving and restart it to bring your letter back. If your letters are too small and you want to resize them, on the upper right of the screen is a button that reads "resize and rotate paths". If you click on that button and then on your letter, an arrow will appear, and if you left click and hold down on the button and move it away from your letter it will enlarge, but it will NOT enlarge the entire letter--any open spaces in your letters, cursive or print, are considered separate pieces, and if not selected before you click on the arrow, they will stay the same size. To enlarge an entire letter, you need to click the "resize and rotate paths" button, click on the letter, then go to the menu on the top left, and under Edit, click Select All. A second arrow should appear in the middle of the letter. Once it is showing, put your mouse's pointer over the first arrow that appeared and drag it up and to the right to enlarge your letter. If your letter is too large, drag it towards the letter to make it smaller. Once all your editing is done, if you're not sure if you got all of the extra marks deleted, look on the right hand side, and about two thirds of the way down is an F. When highlighted, it says "show full glyph". Clicking on this will make the entire letter show up in your view. If there are any marks that got scanned in that didn't show up in the view when you displayed the letter to edit, they will now, and you can delete them. Once your font is edited to your satisfaction, go to the menu on the top left, hit File, and click on Name And Description. In the window that pops up, rename your font to the same as the saved file's name so that when it's exported in its edited form you can easily find it. Save that change, and then in the same menu area, under File, hit export. Find your new font and install it on your computer. Note that while I can use the true type fonts generated online with any program on my system, those edited with Birdfont only work in newer programs--so my cursive font doesn't work with my older version of Word (bug report sent on this as well). However, I only use Word to work, which is why I haven't upgraded my version, so it's an acceptable loss to me, and hopefully one that will be fixed in future versions of Birdfont.
See a screen shot of my fonts in use below.
There are a number of free and paid programs out there that can help you do it. The fastest way is to find a free "handwriting" font site, print their template, fill in your letters, numbers, and other symbols, and upload it. However, the downfall of using a free website is that while you end up with a useable font, any problems with the scan can end up showing in your letters, and your letters will be irregular in size, shape, and spacing. I found this out when using Paintfont.com. I also had a problem with uploading. My printed page wasn't dark enough, so I had to use my image handling software to darken the picture so that Paintfont could read it. I also tried the free online site Fontstruct.com. It has a simple grid based design platform you use in your browser, and while it has a number of different shapes and allows you to adjust the spacing of your font, it can be challenging to use to make a rounded font. I did design a font using Fontstruct.com, which for a free website gave me quite satisfying results. I then looked at free and paid font programs. I'm not a total computer geek, but I have studied computer science, and I don't find most font programs to be user friendly. I found the price on FontCreator had gone up considerably, and therefore tried two free programs, FontForge, and Birdfont. FontForge is no longer being updated, and it didn't work properly on my computer, though I had the most recent release that was supposed to work with my version of Windows. I then looked at Birdfont, which has very little documentation in English so far (it's a newer program and says on the web page that is seeking help translating to different languages, including English), and the tutorials I saw didn't show the info I needed.
Since I really wanted to program a cursive font, I realized I needed to use a free website that would convert my handwritten images into a font and after that a font program to modify it. I used Birdfont to modify the handwritten font so that it looked more cursive. All the tools in Birdfont are labeled, but instructions on how to perform simple actions are sparse as of my writing this. Here's what I figured out through trial and error: The first thing you need to do is save your file under a different name, so if you screw up, the original scanned font file is available for you to try again. You should hit save after every letter is edited, so if you mess up, you don't have to redo a lot of your work. You can move the baseline and top line around the letter, but you can't save the moves (bug report sent on this). To move your letter onto the bottom line, you need to use menu commands. First, you need to see what you're doing. On the right hand side are a bunch of buttons. About two thirds of the way down on the right, you'll see an F. Directly above that is a button that when highlighted says "show grid". Click on it. You should now see a grid in addition to the basic top, bottom, and side margin lines. Under Tools, select Move, then under Edit choose Select All. Once the entire letter is selected, you need to use the arrow keys to move the letter around. You can't go diagonally (unless you use the mouse, but I found moving letters with the mouse gave me unsatisfactory results) but I found movements with the arrow controls fine enough that I could move the letters around where I wanted them. You can adjust the width on both sides of the letters and save that, which is important because a cursive font needs its letters to be right against each other with no space between them. To get rid of unwanted marks generated by the scan, you need to left click on them, and when they are highlighted, press the delete button. Note that if there is a mark in an open area on the letter that it sits behind the open spot, trying to click on it to delete it won't work, and since I didn't want to move the letter and open space independently so that they weren't centered on each other to get to those tiny marks, and the marks aren't visible in the font at font size, I left those in place. If the mark is close to the letter, you also need to be careful--if the entire letter gets highlighted when trying to select a small mark to delete, you can accidentally delete the entire letter, and you can only use undo ONE time to change an edit and the letter back. All is not lost if you've been working carefully and saving regularly, so if you screw up and can't undo your changes, you need to exit the program without saving and restart it to bring your letter back. If your letters are too small and you want to resize them, on the upper right of the screen is a button that reads "resize and rotate paths". If you click on that button and then on your letter, an arrow will appear, and if you left click and hold down on the button and move it away from your letter it will enlarge, but it will NOT enlarge the entire letter--any open spaces in your letters, cursive or print, are considered separate pieces, and if not selected before you click on the arrow, they will stay the same size. To enlarge an entire letter, you need to click the "resize and rotate paths" button, click on the letter, then go to the menu on the top left, and under Edit, click Select All. A second arrow should appear in the middle of the letter. Once it is showing, put your mouse's pointer over the first arrow that appeared and drag it up and to the right to enlarge your letter. If your letter is too large, drag it towards the letter to make it smaller. Once all your editing is done, if you're not sure if you got all of the extra marks deleted, look on the right hand side, and about two thirds of the way down is an F. When highlighted, it says "show full glyph". Clicking on this will make the entire letter show up in your view. If there are any marks that got scanned in that didn't show up in the view when you displayed the letter to edit, they will now, and you can delete them. Once your font is edited to your satisfaction, go to the menu on the top left, hit File, and click on Name And Description. In the window that pops up, rename your font to the same as the saved file's name so that when it's exported in its edited form you can easily find it. Save that change, and then in the same menu area, under File, hit export. Find your new font and install it on your computer. Note that while I can use the true type fonts generated online with any program on my system, those edited with Birdfont only work in newer programs--so my cursive font doesn't work with my older version of Word (bug report sent on this as well). However, I only use Word to work, which is why I haven't upgraded my version, so it's an acceptable loss to me, and hopefully one that will be fixed in future versions of Birdfont.
See a screen shot of my fonts in use below.
Thursday, September 5, 2013
The Tourney is now available in paperback.
The Tourney will be printed in 6 x 9 format, a larger book, as it costs less to print, allowing me to keep the price reasonable. It's a full novel, and when printed in 6 x 9 format, is 255 pages.
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Reader beware of these ripoffs.
I've discovered to my dismay lately that many writers are
not interested in telling a good story for the sake of telling it, they feel to
me like they are interested in telling a story in installment or
neverendingstory formats, both of which seem like nothing more than a
money-making proposition to me.
The first example is the installment story. You pay for your "book" and
download it to your reader, only to find it's not even novella length, and that
what should constitute a single book has been broken up into a
"series" of three or more installments, wherein the author wants you
to pay as much as you would for a single novel for every tiny segment of their
book. I've abandoned some good
storylines and left negative reviews for authors who use this ploy on me. I'm not cheap, but I do expect value for my
money spent, and if I'm paying for a book, I want a book, not something I can
read in less than an hour and which leaves many major plot points
unresolved. I've got nothing against
cliff-hanger stories, but I prefer that a writer is up front that they want to
tell you their story only a little bit at a time.
The opposite end of the spectrum is the neverendingstory. I've seen some series that are beyond epic
and into the realm of ridiculously long, where a single storyline that can and
should be told in one to three books is drawn out over nine books or more with
never a coherent stopping point seen.
IMO, it's nothing more than another rip-off, designed to get the reader
to continually shell out more money in hopes of getting a resolution to plot
points somewhere along the line. I feel
if your series is set in a coherent universe that ends up being popular with
readers, then you can tell more stories in the same setting rather than
dragging out a single plot line over multiple novels that have a lot of useless
filler in them. Granted, I can be wordy
(The Tourney is a whopping 125,860 words long as of the latest version), but I
can't see telling the same story over nine or more books.
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Some random crafting thoughts
I've been invited to join a group of volunteer docents at a
local museum who dress up in historical outfits and perform tasks appropriate
to the people they would have been around the time of the Civil War.
Most people don't know the history of textiles, but I've got
a good understanding of the history of spinning, weaving, natural dyeing, and
sewing of textiles. I also have a good
understanding of both knitting and crocheting.
The friend who works at the museum wants me to demonstrate spindle
spinning, which was a common skill that everyone, male and female, learned from
an early age. "No idle hands"
was a phrase I've heard was often told.
That being said, while I don't have the time to volunteer, I
can contribute for the sake of my friend--small handmade purses have been
popular for centuries, but there are certain restrictions for the period of
time I'm looking at. Purses of the
Civil War era were called "reticules", and were not nearly as
substantial as they are today. They
were made of plain cotton or linen fabric, silk, satin, or velvet, and they
could be plain, embellished with intricate embroidery, crocheted Irish lace, or
even an all over beaded pattern that may have only randomly placed beads, regularly
placed loops of beads, or an all over pattern that makes a picture--there are
many surviving patterns and samples from that time.
However, if you want a piece that's historically accurate,
you need to know a few things. Most
patterns called for "bunches of beads", "purse twist", and
if a needle or hook size was indicated, it's nothing like the needles we have
today. Most crochet patterns only say
to use an appropriate size hook, which is no problem. I'm experienced enough and have enough hooks that I can look at
thread or yarn and make a fairly educated guess as to which size I'll
need. However, obtaining "purse
twist" and "bunches of beads" and figuring out knitting needle
size is needed took more research.
Purse twist was made of silk.
Some people are selling old stock of "purse twist" online, and
in order to find the right size of silk thread, you have to know that
"purse twist", a tightly spun and plied thread, was made of three plies
and came 150 yards to a half-ounce spool.
Gudebrod sold silk beading thread for many years, but they stopped making
it in recent years, though some spools are still available at some sellers, but
there is at least one other supplier who sells silk thread on spools. Theirs also comes in different sizes, and I
picked the one that most closely matched my need, 140 yards to a half-ounce
spool. I also found a bead seller
selling old stock of "bunches of beads" that listed one bunch of
beads as containing 1200 beads. I found
an old conversion chart for knitting needles and found that size 20 steel
needles are 0.875 mm in diameter, which is smaller than today's 5-0/1.0 mm
steel needles and larger than the 6-0/0.75 mm and 8-0/0.5 mm. However, since the thread I'm planning on
using is slightly thicker than what was historically available, I figure 5-0
needles should work fine for a knitted project. Knowing all this, I can now make a fairly accurate reproduction
from an old pattern.
Meanwhile, until I find the time to start such an ambitious
project as an all over beaded purse, I'm working on a much simpler Irish lace
pattern using a 0.75 mm hook and very fine thread.
Thursday, February 7, 2013
The cost of self-publishing
A friend recently asked me if it cost a lot of money to
publish my first three books. I said it
wasn't much at all, but I didn't tell her exactly how much I spent.
There are a number of sites that offer a lot of help to self-publishers. Many also offer peripheral services for an
extra cost. However, by doing most of
the work yourself, you can save a lot of money.
For instance, for the original artwork I wanted for my first
book's cover, I contracted with an artist friend to do an exchange of materials
and work. I'd make her dog a sweater
with custom designed elements using materials I had on hand in exchange for the
cover work I had in mind. We did the
exchange and I was thrilled with the art work, but unfortunately when it came
time to publish, the art work would not work for the cover design no matter how
hard I tried. I ended up downloading
the free program Gimp and put images together from NASA and the ESA for the
background and used Gimp's tools to add the text. However, I needed another design element to give more of a hint
at what the material inside the book was all about. I ended up looking at several sites and signing up for
Dreamstime. For $15.00, I purchased
enough credits to download multiple royalty-free images for four books. I could have stretched it further if I
hadn't radically changed one book's cover after working on it for some
time.
Another program I used was the Paint program that comes with
Windows. I used it to modify a free
image of the SR-71 stealth plane so that I could use it as a spaceship on
several of my books' covers and more easily created several elements I wanted
to use in Gimp than I could have had I used Gimp to make them.
Note that images from NASA and the ESA as well as many other
agencies are considered in the public domain and as long as you properly credit
where you got the image from, you don't have to pay to use them. This makes it easy for a sci-fi author to
download images of planets, moons, and starry backgrounds galore. Using Gimp to crop and custom rotate the
images makes it really easy to vary the images, and of course you can resize
them as well.
As for everything else, I didn't pay for editing, but I did
pay a test reader by providing her with a Kindle so she could more easily read
my book, but I consider the Kindle more of a gift than a payment. That and more of my time is
all I have invested in my first four books.
I will need to buy more credits for Dreamstime in the future, but for
now, the combination of pictures I've taken, free-to-use pictures others have
taken, and free programs to work with them have kept my publishing costs to a
bare minimum.
Monday, January 21, 2013
Still editing
So while I'm taking a hiatus from writing while still editing a finished book, I thought I'd share a few random things:
I designed a 4-piece Enterprise Christmas tree ornament for a friend's birthday since she's a fan, and her birthday is close to Christmas, and she was as excited to see it as I'd hoped she'd be. It's a nice feeling to surprise someone who is super nice by doing something unexpected for them. Try it, and you'll see :-).
When I posted pics of the party, including the Enterprise ornament, another friend requested one and that I also make him Millennium Falcon and X-Wing ornaments. Since there is only one pattern for a plushie Falcon and it's huge, I designed a smaller one from scratch, and since there are no plushie X-Wing patterns that I found that I thought looked like an X-Wing, I designed one. He requested them too close to Christmas for them to arrive in time for 2012, but in 2013, he should have a Merrier Geekmas with those to put on the tree or hang around the house. I know other Star Wars and Star Trek fans, and I plan on making more ornaments for them as I find the time, hopefully well before next Christmas.
For writing-related fun, I checked out several name generators, some for fantasy and other role playing games, and some create names related to a specific franchise (like Tolkien's elves and Star Wars' Jedi Knights), and I got some good results from several of them. I also found a fantasy race generator, which randomly creates a description of elf, dwarf, and other races. While the available societal details are limited, running the generator can make a good starting point for a fantasy race or even a sci-fi one. You just have to ignore all the magic related suggestions, unless your sci-fi universe allows interaction with the magical world.
Hopefully, I'll have another book ready to publish soon. I'm about halfway through with what I call the intense edit, where I read each line keeping not only the story in mind, but is the sentence necessary, and is it in active voice rather than passive? I know that's an issue with my writing sometimes, and I work to correct everything I can before sending the books on to the publisher. On a positive note, the cover is finished, and I really like it.
I hope anyone who reads this had a great holiday season.
I designed a 4-piece Enterprise Christmas tree ornament for a friend's birthday since she's a fan, and her birthday is close to Christmas, and she was as excited to see it as I'd hoped she'd be. It's a nice feeling to surprise someone who is super nice by doing something unexpected for them. Try it, and you'll see :-).
When I posted pics of the party, including the Enterprise ornament, another friend requested one and that I also make him Millennium Falcon and X-Wing ornaments. Since there is only one pattern for a plushie Falcon and it's huge, I designed a smaller one from scratch, and since there are no plushie X-Wing patterns that I found that I thought looked like an X-Wing, I designed one. He requested them too close to Christmas for them to arrive in time for 2012, but in 2013, he should have a Merrier Geekmas with those to put on the tree or hang around the house. I know other Star Wars and Star Trek fans, and I plan on making more ornaments for them as I find the time, hopefully well before next Christmas.
For writing-related fun, I checked out several name generators, some for fantasy and other role playing games, and some create names related to a specific franchise (like Tolkien's elves and Star Wars' Jedi Knights), and I got some good results from several of them. I also found a fantasy race generator, which randomly creates a description of elf, dwarf, and other races. While the available societal details are limited, running the generator can make a good starting point for a fantasy race or even a sci-fi one. You just have to ignore all the magic related suggestions, unless your sci-fi universe allows interaction with the magical world.
Hopefully, I'll have another book ready to publish soon. I'm about halfway through with what I call the intense edit, where I read each line keeping not only the story in mind, but is the sentence necessary, and is it in active voice rather than passive? I know that's an issue with my writing sometimes, and I work to correct everything I can before sending the books on to the publisher. On a positive note, the cover is finished, and I really like it.
I hope anyone who reads this had a great holiday season.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Contested Crown has been published.
Contested Crown has been published on Smashwords. For only $3.99, you can read the conclusion to the Crown Princess Keestu Ranell trilogy. I'm currently outlining the fourth book in the Union series, but Keestu will not be the protagonist.
Here's an excerpt from Contested Crown:
General Pelka turned to back to Keestu suddenly, and the look in his eyes made her back up several steps, her chains rattling.
Stunned, Keestu went cross-eyed and didn't react to
the unexpected attack. Something was
terribly wrong.
Here's an excerpt from Contested Crown:
General Pelka turned to back to Keestu suddenly, and the look in his eyes made her back up several steps, her chains rattling.
"Time for you to die, sudi," he hissed at
her, pulling out an energy pistol.
"What are you doing, General?"
General Pelka darted forward, grabbing the chain dangling
from her manacles, yanking it down and forcing Keestu to her knees. He stomped his foot on it to keep her
kneeling as he stood over her, planting the muzzle of the pistol against her
forehead.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Slowly but surely getting out there!
You can now find my first 2 books on Kobo and Barnes & Noble, though the front cover image for Crisis isn't available on B&N just yet--the issue has already been addressed and should be remedied soon thanks to the wonderful folks at Smashwords.
The Tourney on Kobo
The Tourney On Barnes & Noble
Crisis On Sandar on Kobo
Crisis On Sandar On Barnes & Noble
Meanwhile, I didn't participate in NaNoWriMo because I have 2 books written that I'm preparing to publish, and given the other things that have happened this month, it's a good thing I didn't take the challenge this year. Maybe next year, though there are numerous books I'm eager to write, and I will probably end up concentrating on publishing one or more of them rather than writing something that may not be suitable to share.
The Tourney on Kobo
The Tourney On Barnes & Noble
Crisis On Sandar on Kobo
Crisis On Sandar On Barnes & Noble
Meanwhile, I didn't participate in NaNoWriMo because I have 2 books written that I'm preparing to publish, and given the other things that have happened this month, it's a good thing I didn't take the challenge this year. Maybe next year, though there are numerous books I'm eager to write, and I will probably end up concentrating on publishing one or more of them rather than writing something that may not be suitable to share.
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Crisis On Sandar has been published
Now available at Smashwords for only $3.99, Crisis On Sandar, the second book in the Keestu Ranell trilogy, part of the Union novel series.
Here's an excerpt:
Hemda's voice broke the shocked silence that followed these
revelations. "Esplosion confirmed
high o'er the middle of Eastique!"
She had stayed at her post to monitor the incoming reports while Ismer
addressed the extended family.
"'Nother o'er Southern.
"Westique military reports tree military flitters
chasin' a spacecraft inland!" A
moment later, she blanched, her voice trembling with reaction. "Westique military flitters have gone
off air in mid transmission."
She took several breaths to steady herself while listening
to more reports on the military channel before continuing. "Eastern ground control reports
esplosion o'er the Midrange Mountains, with the military flitters crash landin'
'fore inerception.
"Westique capital ground control is on! Esplosion high o'er that continent as
well."
"Are there any damage reports yet, Hemda?" Ismer was tense.
She answered after looking over the updates scrolling across
her console. "Not yet." She
pressed a hand over one ear so she could concentrate on what was being
reported. "CeCe reports a
spacecraft incomin' high o'er the border between the seventh and fifth
baronies! Military fighters have been
scrambled from Enforcer but are still out of range, so our local military
flitters are to fire on it in four, tree, two, one, fire!"
Friday, November 2, 2012
The Tourney Excerpt
Here's an excerpt from my book, The Tourney, available at Smashwords for only 99 cents:
They were getting the receipt for their meal when two male
nobles entered, laughing loudly. One of them called out to the restaurant, and
Keestu looked at her cuff. "The Prató's get," was all that it
understood and translated. She wondered if Pulon had been sent to find them?
"He just said something about the Prató's child,"
Keestu informed her table.
"We better check it out," Gontu said, wobbling
momentarily as he stood.
Vahin nodded in jovial agreement, and they approached the
nobles, one of them very drunk. He put his finger to his lips with exaggerated
care as he grinned at them, hushing them as he motioned for them to follow. He
staggered into the night and took them around to the back of the building.
Keestu's eyes darted around before she went around the corner, alert for a
trap. She saw that Tenget and Gontu, while feeling their drinks, also scanned
their surroundings before moving into the alley.
Keestu was completely unprepared for what she saw there:
Shariel, her back to them, had her hands in the trash barrel, and was pulling
out leftovers and eating them with the same single-minded intensity as she had
the food on her plate at home.
Disgust warred with pity in Keestu. She understood that
Shariel's mother was a horrible cook, but Shariel herself appeared to either
lack the discipline needed to keep her eating under control or she suffered
from a serious medical disorder of some sort. She was eating as fast as she
could, and Keestu realized she must do this every time she was locked into her
room for the night, for it gave her many hours in which to get to the city and
return unnoticed.
The drunk noble sniggered loudly next to them, and Shariel
whirled, her cheek and chin smeared with stew from the garbage. Keestu saw
horror, shame, and anger on her face before she shouted something at them in
Phaet, which was muffled by the mouthful of food that she had just crammed in.
Keestu saw that their erstwhile guides had vanished, no doubt
fleeing the wrath of the Prató's daughter.
She grabbed at Tenget's arm, pulling on it while
emphatically nodding her head back towards the light. However, shouts sounded
from that quarter as well.
"Down the alley," Gontu decided, urging them past
Shariel, who was still shouting at them in Phaet. Keestu didn't bother to try
and read the translation on her cuff in the darkness.
They were almost to the end of the alley, when their way was
blocked by a group of six Vuloan nobles armed with stun staves, spears, and
short swords. "So," one of the guards growled at them menacingly in
Unity, "You're digging in the trash with the Prató's glutton
offspring!"
Before any of them could respond, the guards were rushing at
them. "Spread out," Gontu shouted. "Find a weapon if you
can!"
Keestu looked frantically around the alley, but saw nothing
she could immediately use. She looked back to see Gontu planting his feet in
front of Rue, who he'd shoved back towards Keestu. Tenget sprang forward, to
face the closer immediate threat with Gontu, while Vahin checked behind them
for anything useful to use to fight. Finding nothing, he moved forward and
resolutely formed a second line between Keestu and the closest onrushing Vuloan
nobles. Keestu checked behind her again, though she heard no more pursuit from
that direction. In fact, Shariel had vanished, as had the nobles who had come
out of the restaurant to see what the others found so funny.
The first of the men were on them, and Gontu sidestepped the
first stun staff thrust at him, grabbing it with one hand as he delivered a
backhanded punch to the man carrying it with the other. There was an audible
crunch as the man's nose broke, and he fell to the ground, yelling what Keestu
assumed were curses in his own language. Gontu kicked him soundly in the
stomach after he landed, and the man curled quietly into a ball, unable to cry
out with the breath knocked out of him.
Meanwhile, Tenget had met his first assailant and was
grappling with him over his stun staff. Neither had punched each other, and
Keestu watched in horror as the short sword of another man came down on
Tenget's left arm, severing it just above the elbow. Tenget screamed,
reflexively kicking out at the man who'd maimed him as he fell to the ground,
blood spurting from the wound.
Gontu, seeing Tenget gravely injured and knowing they were
now greatly outnumbered, turned to Keestu and Rue, yelling the one word she
never thought she'd hear from him. "Run!"
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Asking blogs to review your book
I'm relatively new to blogging and am finding lots of advice on how to do so. First off, if you want a blog to review your
book, you must read their review request form over carefully and follow their
special instructions if they have any.
I think this is to keep people from sending the same boilerplate request
to any and every blog they see (using what I call the shotgun method) in the
hopes that a few will agree to read and review their book. I tend to shy away from form letters that
are sent to me, and I try to not send out a form letter to anyone.
Lastly, you need to be patient. Most of your first copies are going to be bought and/or given to family and friends. For me, this is not an issue. I began writing as a hobby to amuse my friends with daydreams I made up while bored in school. Yes, I am paid as a medical writer in my job every day, but being a paid book author is a new experience for me. However, I'm still at my day job and have no delusions of becoming an overnight literary success. Heck, I'll consider myself a success when someone I don't know reads my book and says they like it, since I think family and friends are sometimes just being polite when they gush about something I've written, and an independent opinion or three will tell me whether I've got true potential as an author or not.
Keep in mind that you should only ask blogs that
deal with your type of book (trad or indie) and your genre. It would be frustrating for me if I
started reviewing books and stated that I didn't review a certain genre and got
requests from a person asking me to review a book in that very genre
anyway. So read the blog over to make
certain they are: 1. Currently accepting requests. 2.
They are interested in your book's genre. 3. If they have any detailed instructions on how to query them.
It should go without saying that if you want someone
to invest their valuable time in reading and reviewing your book, you shouldn't
ask them to pay to do so. I can't
imagine having to tell someone this, but I suppose some people figure they've
invested a lot of time in their book and therefore everyone should fork out
some money in order to read it.
However, if you are serious about marketing your book, think of it as
you would any other product and think of new products you see in the
stores--most stores around here have dedicated kiosks that are handing out free
samples of new products. So, if you're
a new writer in search of a market, you've got to be willing to give out a few
samples to let people try it before they buy it. If they like it and tell others who trust their opinion, you'll
more than make up the "loss"!
Next, you should be persistent but not annoying when
marketing your book. If you aren't on
social media sites, you should be, and when your book is launched, you should
make your pages reflect that fact and make an announcement about it every so
often, especially if you are having a special on your book. By special, I mean coupons, contests to give
away free copies, and the like, all of which will bring more attention and interest
to your book. But, there's a fine
line between being enthusiastic and being annoying. Try and network with others in your new field, watch what they
do, and learn by example.
Lastly, you need to be patient. Most of your first copies are going to be bought and/or given to family and friends. For me, this is not an issue. I began writing as a hobby to amuse my friends with daydreams I made up while bored in school. Yes, I am paid as a medical writer in my job every day, but being a paid book author is a new experience for me. However, I'm still at my day job and have no delusions of becoming an overnight literary success. Heck, I'll consider myself a success when someone I don't know reads my book and says they like it, since I think family and friends are sometimes just being polite when they gush about something I've written, and an independent opinion or three will tell me whether I've got true potential as an author or not.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
The Tourney has been published
After a major revision, much editing, and a new title, my sci-fi book The Tourney has been published. You can find it at Smashwords for only 99 cents. Smashwords supports most, if not all, ebook formats, so you are bound to find my book in a format your reader can display.
I hope everyone who reads my book enjoys it. If you do, I ask that you please leave a review. If you don't like it and leave a negative review, please be constructive in your criticism.
For those who do like it, the sequel has been written and is currently undergoing what I hope is its final edit, and I hope to have it out by Christmas.
The final book in the Keestu Ranell trilogy has been written and will soon undergo its first edit. I hope to have it out early next year.
However, more books are planned for this series.
In addition, the novel made from a series of urban fantasy short stories I wrote about 20 years ago is undergoing editing, and I hope to have it published early next year as well.
Until then, please check out The Tourney!
I hope everyone who reads my book enjoys it. If you do, I ask that you please leave a review. If you don't like it and leave a negative review, please be constructive in your criticism.
For those who do like it, the sequel has been written and is currently undergoing what I hope is its final edit, and I hope to have it out by Christmas.
The final book in the Keestu Ranell trilogy has been written and will soon undergo its first edit. I hope to have it out early next year.
However, more books are planned for this series.
In addition, the novel made from a series of urban fantasy short stories I wrote about 20 years ago is undergoing editing, and I hope to have it published early next year as well.
Until then, please check out The Tourney!
Friday, October 26, 2012
Preparing to market your book
There are several options for self-publishing your book, and
each taps into a little different market.
Ebooks are one of the fastest growing markets, as readers
are compact and can access many books at once, so different members of the same
family sharing a single reader can each read a different book at the same
time. Many Ebooks are offered for free
or at discounted prices. A publisher
such as Smashwords will convert your book to as many Ebook formats as are
supported in order to reach the most consumers, making Ebooks very attractive
to self-published authors.
Print on demand.
There are a number of companies offering POD services, and it's up to
the writer to select which one best fits their needs. Many offer copies at a discount so the author can have several
copies of their books on hand, which are great for promotional giveaways--have
a contest on any social media, including Facebook, Twitter, and your blog, and
give away a few autographed copies. You
can also loan out your book to family and friends who want to read your book in
the traditional form.
Audio books. This option is often overlooked by self-published authors. I'm currently gearing up to record my first book, which will be first published as an Ebook, then offered in POD, and finally as an audio book. One thing that most authors don't understand is that unless you record your audio book yourself, it can make the audio book cost prohibitive to produce, requiring a higher price than either Ebook or POD formats. However, I think I'm in the majority to say that I'm not overly fond of hearing my own voice, especially when I started recording it using my Windows 7 indwelling sound recorder. A simpler version than what was offered on Vista or XP machines, this one records only and doesn't offer any editing features as were found on older versions. However, if you get into the control panel, hardware and sound, and manage audio devices, you'll see a tab labeled "recording". You select your microphone and go into "enhancements". DC offset cancellation is the default choice. I found that it made my voice sound incredibly nasal. I recorded each of the filters separately and in groups and wasn't happy with any of them. I either sounded extremely nasal, really processed or tinny, or all three. Further research into recording audio turned up a simple device you can make at home that will filter your voice but not make it sound overly processed. You see it in images of singers and voice actors in recording studios. It's called a "pop filter". The pop filter can be made using items found in most households where women are present. All you need is a frame of some sort (which can be made by cutting rounds out of an oatmeal box), and a pair of pantyhose. I used a knee-high stretched over a hand-held weaving loom since I also work with yarn. An embroidery hoop or an empty picture fame would work as well. You simply stretch the hose over the frame and place it between your mouth and the microphone. My mic is part of an old Labtec headset/mic get-up I used to try speaking my work rather than typing it out by hand, but last I knew VR still hated women's voices and all the technical medical jargon I use in my day job as a medical language specialist. There's also a technique called "de-essing", which reduces the hissing of sibilant sounds when a recording is remixed in a pro studio, but a way you can reduce the hissing without having to record in a studio is to position the mic so it's not in a direct line with your mouth so the hissing air isn't picked up. A few practice sessions of recording your reading are the only other things necessary to get started making an audio book, since most people need to learn to speak more slowly when reading in order to obtain the best results.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Self-publishing
It's been a while since I updated my blog because I've been
busy pursuing the traditional publishing route. I think it's more difficult than it should be to get an agent to
look at your work. However, with the
steep rise in population comes a steep rise in the number of people competing
for the same thing I want, which is to get my written work out there.
Next up is the cover art.
I looked at Smashwords' recommended cover artist list and browsed most
of their pages. Unfortunately, it sounds
like most of the listed cover artists use stock photos to create a book cover. As I'm certain there are no stock photos
that come close to portraying how I envision the cover art for my books, I have
begun contacting artists who make the kind of images I have in mind for the
covers of my books.
After having numerous agents reject me after my sending them
requested pages for my first book after they responded positively to my query,
I've decided to publish my book myself since self-publishing doesn't have the
stigma attached to it that it used to.
Vanity publishers whose only goal is to make as much money off you as
they can still exist, but there are now several options for writers who can't
seem to get their foot in the door of an agent and don't want to submit their
book to a single publisher's slush pile and then wait for a year or more to
find out if the publisher wants to take on their book.
There are a few things that you need to do when you
self-publish. First off, you have to
make sure you polish your manuscript, which means edit, re-edit, and re-edit
again, which I have done. Have test
readers go through your work and critique it, which I have done. After the initial test reading, I made a
major revision of the book I'm nearly ready to publish and had test readers
read it again, which resulted in completely positive feedback over the plot and
characters and no complaints regarding anything in the book.
After the polishing is done, you need to format your work
for the publisher. I've decided to go
with Smashwords, and so I downloaded their free formatting guide, and I've gone
through my book and made the necessary formatting changes. Find/replace is a powerful tool, and with
the detailed information given in Smashwords' formatting guide, I was able to
quickly make the changes required for a manuscript that will be made available
in numerous formats.
Once the cover art is done, my first book will be ready to
launch! That means I have to find time
to hammer out the details I'm going to share on my web site and begin building
it, since I already own my domain name, so there's no excuse to slack off on
getting it up and running around the same time I publish my book.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Test readers and editing
I've heard a lot about test readers and editors lately and
thought I'd weigh in on it.
When you ask your friends for feedback, be aware that they won't want to hurt your feelings, so they'll probably be vague in their critique, and you'll have to analyze their comments in order to interpret what they are saying. For instance, two friends said the same thing about one of my novels "the second half of the book was a much faster read than the first half". This told me that the first half of the book needed a serious revision. I added more action and ruthlessly cut fourteen pages using rewording and deletions in order to try and balance out how fast it read and was told that it greatly improved the book.
Some people think a single edit of their finished novel is sufficient. However, the writer is too close to the story and will not notice that they've repeated information two or three times that they wanted to make sure was included in the novel. I suggest after the first edit that you read the book aloud to yourself or someone else, because it will bring to your attention things that you've already covered in your story, and in addition will highlight awkward passages that you need to edit so they are easier to read.
There is no substitute for a spell checker, but it's not an absolute. There are many sound alike words that people misuse, including simple words such as "there", "they're", and "their", and if you have trouble remembering which is which, you should expect to pay a premium for editing services.
Keep in mind that even if you have professional editors working on your novel, they're human and will miss things. One writer blogged about how many people he has editing his work and test reading it, and yet I found mistakes in the first chapters of both of his novels that I read (both wrong words), so you have to keep in mind a spell checker won't tell you you've used the wrong word if it's spelled correctly, and having multiple people edit your work won't catch all the errors. You just have to decide how many times someone examines your work with a critical eye before you declare it finished and be ready for the comments of others when they find things that everyone else missed.
If you have your friends test read or edit a book for you,
it's best to not give them a deadline on finishing it. Most people have
extremely busy lives, so if you want quick feedback on your story or a fast
editing job, you're better off hiring someone for the task.
When you ask your friends for feedback, be aware that they won't want to hurt your feelings, so they'll probably be vague in their critique, and you'll have to analyze their comments in order to interpret what they are saying. For instance, two friends said the same thing about one of my novels "the second half of the book was a much faster read than the first half". This told me that the first half of the book needed a serious revision. I added more action and ruthlessly cut fourteen pages using rewording and deletions in order to try and balance out how fast it read and was told that it greatly improved the book.
Some people think a single edit of their finished novel is sufficient. However, the writer is too close to the story and will not notice that they've repeated information two or three times that they wanted to make sure was included in the novel. I suggest after the first edit that you read the book aloud to yourself or someone else, because it will bring to your attention things that you've already covered in your story, and in addition will highlight awkward passages that you need to edit so they are easier to read.
There is no substitute for a spell checker, but it's not an absolute. There are many sound alike words that people misuse, including simple words such as "there", "they're", and "their", and if you have trouble remembering which is which, you should expect to pay a premium for editing services.
Keep in mind that even if you have professional editors working on your novel, they're human and will miss things. One writer blogged about how many people he has editing his work and test reading it, and yet I found mistakes in the first chapters of both of his novels that I read (both wrong words), so you have to keep in mind a spell checker won't tell you you've used the wrong word if it's spelled correctly, and having multiple people edit your work won't catch all the errors. You just have to decide how many times someone examines your work with a critical eye before you declare it finished and be ready for the comments of others when they find things that everyone else missed.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Something different--a derivative constructed language
For my Urban Fantasy short story series to book conversion,
I decided to make up a Native American tribe rather than offend any tribes by
taking liberties with their histories and cultures.
I figured they would need a language, and rather than try and make up a native-sounding language, I found info on an ancient form of a language still spoken in the Americas today, though the modern form is very different from classical. I decided to use the classical form and have it influenced by English rather than Spanish, the language that influenced many of the real modern dialects of the language.
I also found info on several related languages and started comparing where they diverged. Interestingly, I found two languages spread further apart in modern times that were more closely associated before whites took over the US, so they often have similarities to each other for words that are completely different from the dead classical form of what I consider their mother language to the point that I have no idea how they got from the mother tongue to the modern ones.
However, it gave me a starting point to see how changes took place. I had derived a few words based on the mother tongue, and on comparing them with the real languages, I saw similarities in what I had derived with the real langs, but at the same time, the words were different, which is exactly what I was looking for; all three language groups should find many of the words familiar, while others will not be instantly recognized.
The writing system was actually much less of a challenge than I anticipated. Glyphs for the mother language are listed on ancientscripts.com, and taking a cue from the scribes of ancient Egypt, who came up with two faster ways to write their hieroglyphs, I studied the shapes of the language's known glyphs to come up with simpler forms to quickly print the derived language. Taking it one step further to a cursive form was much easier than I had anticipated, but I had had practice in taking an angular printed constructed script to a cursive form for a sci-fi book series.
It may sound like it took a long time to do all this for a couple of names, phrases, and descriptions in a book, but it only took a couple of lunch hours to accomplish, and as studying languages is a hobby of mine, they were pleasant hours.
I figured they would need a language, and rather than try and make up a native-sounding language, I found info on an ancient form of a language still spoken in the Americas today, though the modern form is very different from classical. I decided to use the classical form and have it influenced by English rather than Spanish, the language that influenced many of the real modern dialects of the language.
I also found info on several related languages and started comparing where they diverged. Interestingly, I found two languages spread further apart in modern times that were more closely associated before whites took over the US, so they often have similarities to each other for words that are completely different from the dead classical form of what I consider their mother language to the point that I have no idea how they got from the mother tongue to the modern ones.
However, it gave me a starting point to see how changes took place. I had derived a few words based on the mother tongue, and on comparing them with the real languages, I saw similarities in what I had derived with the real langs, but at the same time, the words were different, which is exactly what I was looking for; all three language groups should find many of the words familiar, while others will not be instantly recognized.
The writing system was actually much less of a challenge than I anticipated. Glyphs for the mother language are listed on ancientscripts.com, and taking a cue from the scribes of ancient Egypt, who came up with two faster ways to write their hieroglyphs, I studied the shapes of the language's known glyphs to come up with simpler forms to quickly print the derived language. Taking it one step further to a cursive form was much easier than I had anticipated, but I had had practice in taking an angular printed constructed script to a cursive form for a sci-fi book series.
It may sound like it took a long time to do all this for a couple of names, phrases, and descriptions in a book, but it only took a couple of lunch hours to accomplish, and as studying languages is a hobby of mine, they were pleasant hours.
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Plot points—Luck of the draw
If you are working on a complex plot sequence like a fight,
and the outcome for some minor characters is no consequence, it can be
difficult to match characters against each other. I don’t know if anyone else does this, but when I’m faced with
this situation, I leave the results up to chance.
In another book, I had to choose who would be afflicted with a genetic defect. Again, I chose to draw names from a hat for characters other than the two main people I already knew were going to be afflicted. That particular draw turned out so that more women were afflicted than men, but I worked it into the plot the way I drew it, and if anyone asks, I will tell them that for that particular corner of the universe, that’s just how the luck of the draw turned out.
When I had a complex fight to choreograph, I had an uneven
number of characters who would be fighting in pairs, while one character would
sit the first round out. I had no clue
how to match the minor characters up, so I wrote all the names of the minor
characters on slips of paper and put them into a hat, drawing two at a time in
order to pair them up for the fight.
When it came time to write each fight sequence, I cast a die to
determine who won the match. That left
me free to concentrate on planning the fights of the main characters who would
eventually face off.
In another book, I had to choose who would be afflicted with a genetic defect. Again, I chose to draw names from a hat for characters other than the two main people I already knew were going to be afflicted. That particular draw turned out so that more women were afflicted than men, but I worked it into the plot the way I drew it, and if anyone asks, I will tell them that for that particular corner of the universe, that’s just how the luck of the draw turned out.
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