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Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Thank You

I took a moment to visit Shelfari and noticed someone had taken time to list out all the characaters in my book 'Touched by The Devilish One".  Now all I need is for someone(s) to fill in the descriptions. That'd be cool.

Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you to that person. It made me feel like my book was good, and came at a perfect time becasue a few people slaughtered it at good reads. Although one user gave a long, well thought out review, which I am also thankful for.

Monday, August 27, 2012

Smashwords Only Free Coupon Code for Aunt Hellen:

- Good through September 27th CODE: PD63P
- People either love it or hate it.
- Just remember it's from the POV of a disturbed person.
- Would love honest, helpful reviews.

Calling all critics:

- I just updated Touched By The Devilish One from free to paid.
- Anyone who has an interest in reading it can ask me for a free coupon.
- I would love some feedback.

Kindle Lending:

- Amazon has made this sound so good.
- I beg to differ on that point. After all, if I were a prime member and could read a book for free, I'd  
  be going for the best sellers.
- That said, since I really love Exterium, I enrolled it into the lending program.
- Again, any feedback would be terrific.
- I have received several requests for a sequel and would like to know what others would like to read.

What's Ahead:

- I am working on an erotica novel.
- This is not a subject I typically write about, but I am really enjoying the book.
- I will be publishing around the holidays under a pen name (certainly don't want to mix the kiddie 
  books up with the adult books!)
- Anyone who is interested should drop me a note.



Saturday, August 25, 2012

Book Reviews

How I would love any well thought out - constructive book review for any of my stories. It really irks me when people make comments like "Bleh - mostly a waste of time." How is that helpful? And reviews that are just plain BS...Like someone stating Aunt Hellen was a 190 page book. It was only 22K words (or there abouts).

I did some searching on Amazon and discovered there is a group of hate mongers that run around trashing other peoples books, just becuase they think they are competition. That's just plain silly to me because chances are most indie authors are not going to get rich off their books. In fact, only a few traditionally published authors get wealthy.

I'm not looking to become wealthy. Writing keeps me sane and gives me purpose outside of work and family. Some people paint, some people play an instrument...I write.

I challenge anyone critical of my work to produce a detailed, informative review of why. Likewise, if someone likes my book, what was it that made it exciting to read? I'm always looking to improve, which is diffuclt when I am giving useless feedback.

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Typos

I noticed some typos in my blog posts...good thing I'm the only one who reads them.

How Annoying

The beautiful thing about my job is not only that I'm good at it, but I also get all kinds of magazines. Funny how I pull publishers' data together to create reports, but no one will publish me. Ah....the irony...At least they like my reports, even if they don't know me, the person behind them!

Anyway, I picked out Writers Digest and was sorely disappointed...again. Their advice is obvious and redundant. Then they have pages of agents/publishers. Some of the recommendations are of entities I have found on writers beware. Yikes! Do they do any research or are they simply in churning out enough pages to qualify as a sellable magazine?

Something else I noticed is the agents they recommend are no longer employed at the agencies they are listed as representing. I don’t know, maybe they are dead? Maybe there is a big revolving door at these places? It all seems very unstable to me.

I have read so much advice of querying and book writing that it’s near pathetic on my part to keep on doing it. Okay, I’m not saying my work is worthy of publication, although Exterium is doing very well on authonomy.com. That’s beside the point. Am I a little bitter? Yeah, but at least I’m realistic and hold a full time job that not only pays well, but is also enjoyable.

This is some of the conflicting advice I have read:

1.      Add a lot of supporting detail to paint the scene.
2.      Limit detail to the bare minimum, allowing the reader to paint their own picture.
3.      Don’t start a book with dialog, it seems like an attempt to jump right into action and misses a proper beginning.
4.      Enough with the detail. Get straight to the action, otherwise you bore the reader.


Wow, which is it? Oh I think I’ve got it. We pathetic unpublished writers (we cannot call ourselves authors), are so desperate the find the answer to what’s missing in our novels that we waste our time, sometimes money, to find the answers.

Well, I have to admit I have also read there are no set rules. This is so true. How many of us have read “best sellers” only to be disappointed? For example, Hunger Games was the worst piece of crap I have ever read. Then there is the obscure book with little sales on Amazon, and even fewer rating that are awesome. For example, Battle Royale.

I have read a lot of struggling writer’s works and some are terrible and others pretty darn good. So what aren’t the good ones published? Well, I think it depends on the taste of the agent/editor. Of course that makes perfect sense. Also, luck…lots and lots of luck. Talent, in my opinion, is a minor point. A lot of people can write well…and well is enough.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Long Time

It has been quite a while since my last post. I guess this is a great way to 'release' because I'm certain only a few people stumble onto this blog by accident. Ha! Good news is that Exterium has been a hit on authonomy and youwriteon. Charlie's Haunting: Of Death and Romance, is slow to catch, which surprises me. My daughter was so into it! Anyway, my next book is on it's way. This one is non-fiction. I guess I'm dipping my feet in all genres to see which one gets the most votes. Funny, in college, I was told I should write children's books because I wrote simple. It was a bit insulting at the time, but maybe she was right.