I can’t believe that I got February 7-11 off – that’s the Opening Ceremony for the Olympics and a few days of the actual games. I love the Olympics and I haven’t missed an Opening Ceremony since the Summer Games in LA. I wouldn’t have been in a funk if I had to be at work, but I am often surprised that I get days off. Then again, most of my other places of employment treated asking for a day off was like trying to untie the Gordian
Knot. I don’t plan on getting another vacation until my birthday where I am going to take two weeks off. Yeah – that’s a while away, but with the reduced schedule this will be a lot better, and I think this time I am going to get paid for it. I remembered to put down to get paid on my schedule.

I am still working on the outline for Cat, Rabbit and Clover and I think I can get it finished on Saturday if I push hard enough. Once that’s finished (and a week ahead of schedule, yay me!) I’ll set it aside until April when I can get to work on the manuscript. I am also going to try to do this on the Chromebook in a remote location to try to cut down on the interruptions here at home, just to test. Tyro continues on and I am going to get back to it when I am done here. I’m in another rest period, but the natural way the scene is playing out, she’s going to be out into the fire again. I don’t know if I am still falling into the whole ‘peril-breather-peril-breather’ pattern and that needs to be stopped, or this is good advancement of a story. I’ll just forge ahead and let my editor hammer it out. I still have a lot of enthusiasm for both projects, so I am confident that I can meet the deadlines for both books – and I am going to make the cover for Cat, Rabbit and Clover. I have an idea for a local model to use – I just need to check around to see if he’s available.

Sales have been slow for the book – especially for the paperback – but they have been a lot faster than 4 Bits and a Dollar. I did include links for the books here, and they are also on the right hand side if you’re reading the blog directly. I am thinking about when it’s available to lower the price of the novel (quite drastically) for the Kindle, or even trying other e-book vendors to get it out there even more, but I have no idea where to go. I’ll have to hunt around, I guess. While I want to be successful, the first novel is just a test to see how much is involved in getting a book out there. The next one is going to have a lot more spit and polish to it. I have been looking into putting up a website, and I am going to talk to the people who host this blog and see if I can expand upon it – have better link, or a second page to hawk my wares…or even a tip jar. Who knows?

Well, thanks for reading – I always look forward to comments and I hope you have a good day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

OK – it’s snowing where I’m at. While it’s not ‘Alaskan snow-drift’ deep…

Shown: The South

I am thinking whether or not I should head into work. I’ve driven in worse, but let’s face it – I don’t want to risk any more than I can afford to lose. I’ll take a look at the roads as the day wears on. One of the benefits of working in the evening is that everyone else gets to navigate the bad roads and I can just follow their trails (until they plow into a telephone pole). Hopefully, I can get through everything with minimum fuss.

Speaking of minimum fuss…I am still working on the outline for Cat, Rabbit and Clover. It’s getting a little close to me and I am finding myself falling back on where I got the idea for the story with my personal experiences involving the company that I was working for at that point – which I have to say while it was one of the better jobs I had and I loved everyone dearly, I was happy to see it go. As I am writing the outline and putting together the characters, I am finding myself putting in people that I know and just making the necessary cosmetic changes to make sure that I don’t get visited by the Process Servers of Days Gone By. I would have to go back and just change that for something that I can make up out of whole-cloth. It’s nothing big – just amazed on how the subconscious works at times. I am still on track to finish by the end of the month, so no big deal. Tyro is moving along quite nicely – she’s in the town and is about to stay the night after picking a pickpocket and getting him tossed in jail for it. I don’t know if that scene is going to stay in the final book (it does seem to be a little clichéd for me), but it is interesting to see her use her wits rather than brawn. I always liked those types of heroes anyways. I am aiming for a completion for Unbound‘s rough draft by the end of March, but since I am running the rough draft by the writer’s group it’s not going to see the light of day for at least a year. It’s projecting to be at least 150,000 words and I can only submit 2,000 words a month. I am thinking of looking for an editor who will take this apart with a hatred unseen since the dawn of man and make it better to try to speed up the process. There are some books that I’m not going to put through the group, but rather let some trusted friends read it and fix the biggest problems – the quicker I can get that done, the sooner I can get it to press as it were. Remember – quantity has a quality all its own.

Well, I should get to the manuscript and see if letting Tyro get free room and board for a night moves the story along. Thanks for reading, feel free to leave a comment and look to the right: there are some really good books and stuff for sale. Have a good day, y’all.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

At my current pace, I can finish the outline for Cat, Rabbit and Clover by the end of next week, which means I would have finished one outline on time (shocked, I know) and ready to start on the text by the beginning of April. I am excited on this because one: Hey! I kept to a resolution! And two: Hey! A new novel is coming! With any luck, I’ll have this done by end of June and out maybe by September. Hopefully, I can get this out and maybe use it to buoy the other two books. I am not ditching Unbound, I am trying to get that finished by the end of March (fingers crossed), but if I can’t get to that point, I am prepared to set it aside for Cat, Rabbit and Clover, just because it is shorter and actually looks to be a little more paying. No slight against Tyro of course, but I have to look this as a business. I want Tyro to be the best product, so I’m willing to bench her for a while.

Speaking of Tyro, I’m at another breather scene – now they’ve made it to the town and they can stay there for a length of time before having to escape the hunter. I’m starting to wonder if I am falling into the pattern of wham-breather-wham-breather and should try to do something to shake it up a little bit. Maybe I should try with the newer novel, since the outline for Tyro is pretty set in stone. Just as long as I finish these two novels at least and finish the outline for I/O Error and get to work on horror and try to find that one genre I’m good at, or at least the one I am successful.

I haven’t watched much TV lately, I watched an episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and I still like it. I don’t know if it’s the fact that I have Hulu Plus and Netflix, so I don’t have to worry about having something recorded over. I’m going to play hooky for the Olympics if I don’t get those days off, but other than that I just don’t watch TV. Sure, I’ll catch football games on Sunday and the aforementioned Olympics, but other than that, it’s really just me and the PC. I’ve got a bunch of series that people I should watch, but…meh. Maybe I’ll get a chance after the football season. Unless I get caught up in MLS, which I have been considering, or get back into baseball (Go Nats!). I’ll just have to carve out a time for TV. Wow – that makes me sound old.

I have gotten a couple of books on photography. I am looking into that as a hobby and a way of making covers for my books on the cheap. It’s not that hard, but wow – it’s costly, so I am going to get the basics down with my meager point and click camera first (composition, lighting, etc.). I’ve always had an interest in the visual arts, but I never thought I would be good at it just because I suck at drawing. This is just going to be a test and maybe it’ll be a hobby – I seriously doubt I’m going to be hanging in someone’s gallery anytime soon. Lurking? Yes. Hanging? No.

Well, I’ve got to get to the novel, so I bid you all adieu and I hope to hear from you soon, either through the comments section or drop me a direct line. Thanks for reading and I hope you have a good rest of the day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

…”write like a meth-addled badger.” Yeah – that’s going give you a good image to reflect on. The idea is that I have to constantly put out material. I didn’t do much yesterday – but I did do something, more on that later. The sales continue on and I am continuing the outline for Cat, Rabbit and Clover at work. I have to admit, I am getting more headway at work than I am at home. I might end up setting up an ‘office’ in a Starbucks or a Panera so I can use my Chromebook effectively. I doubt that my place of work would be happy to have me open up my laptop and just start typing away. In fact, I think they fired someone for that. Well, there have been a lot of firings and quittings where I work. Hopefully, I will be one of the latter soon.

The outline continues on, and since today is Thursday I should get through the third act. If I can maintain this rate I should be able to get the outline finished before the end of the month (and maintaining my resolution!). I think I’ve come to the end of the chapter in Tyro’s novel, so I might just end it there and start the next one – Chapter 10 where we find the medium sized city and we’ll get another good break from the pace. Perhaps we’ll get treated to another flashback? Who knows? I am starting to diverge a little from the outline I have set-up here, but not enough to have to re-write something. I am delaying the appearance of one of the minor villains to keep the surprise intact. With any luck, I will be able to keep this pace up.

Tomorrow, I need to run out and pick up a printer. One of the things I am going to do is make some cards with the link to the Kindle version and the paperback version of the novel on one side. I am not sure if I want to put a QR code linking to the blog. Yes, I have the links to the books here on the left, but a lot of the earlier blog posts here are somewhat personal (this was put up before I thought to use this as a vehicle to sell stuff) and I am unsure if I want to leave them up for the public, or maybe seal them off somehow. I’ll have to make a decision soon, since I am going to set up a website and have it running (we hope) by the end of the third quarter. That also reminds me, I need to look at web hosting and getting some prices. Any suggestions?

Oh – I have to share this. I found this in my inbox. Check out the first book offered:

I can’t blame them for not selling my book.

Well, I should go wrap up the chapter and get started on the next one. I hope y’all have a good day and always feel free to leave a comment (and buy a book from the finely crafted links to the right).

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

Well, I have sold my first book overseas (…and I know who did it – thanks, Bindi!), so I can now claim the title of Internationally Known Author. On the down side: Art Bell Always is no longer, which means I have to find a new station for my morning alarm. The last thing that was played that I was listening to before the pull down was the first Dark Matter episode – coincidence? Yeah, more than likely that’s the best explanation. So, I am off to find another Internet radio station broadcasting old Art Bell shows. Wish me luck.

The outline for Cat, Rabbit and Clover is coming along, and I am trying to find a decent small sort of company working with tech that could be scooped up by a larger company. I was considering using a company that I worked with (the first company that I transitioned from temp to perm and the only company that I was let go from but not fired – they moved to another state and I didn’t want to go through the hassle of moving), and unless I think of something else, I might end up using that. I know that I said earlier I was going to work on I/O Error, but Tyro’s novel is really, really heavy at times and I think that being seized by Cat, Rabbit and Clover is my mind’s way of trying to recharge the batteries for other, more weighty work like I/O Error. Hey – as long as I keep to my resolutions, I’m good.

Actually, I am running a little behind because I was busy jumping up and down for joy in selling both a Kindle version and a paperback. So, I will bid you all adieu and thank you for reading.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

Ok – I am putting out the word on various platforms about the novel. I got it listed in Goodreads and I have used Project Wonderful, Facebook ads and I’ve finally gotten the paperback sold through Amazon. Let me tell you the up and downsides of these various things, if only so that other people thinking about using these services will be able to go into it with an idea as to what to expect. If you also look to the left, I finally figured out how to put pictures to links on the blog. It now looks at least a little better. I even get to show off the picture I took for the cover art for 4 Bits and a Dollar. I am actually considering taking up photography as a hobby. I mean… that’s a darn good picture.

The secret was to take it in between the caffeine jitters.

Harder than it sounds.

Here’s the rundown:

• CreateSpace, Amazon and Goodreads: You’re written the book and want to get it on paperback so that you can get it into the hands of more readers. So, you look at CreateSpace. Good news, most of it is free – nice considering that buying a single ISBN is $125.00. Yes, as you buy them in bulk they get cheaper, but it’s still a prohibitive cost if you’re starting out. I went the ‘gimmie the ISBN number’ route and hired someone to do the cover art (and she’s good. Check her out.). I went through the steps as a preliminary before I had everything lined up. I used a formula to determine the page count (yes, that’s whipped around and bit me in the rear). The initial price I had for it was around $8.50 – not a bad price for a paperback. Using that number, I figured the price for the Kindle version so it would be a little cheaper since I am going to be heading to a point where I am going to sell most of my stuff through Kindle and bypassing paper completely. So far, so good, so what? Right?
  

   

  The time came around for the uploading. I started plugging everything into the CreateSpace formula, confident that I could get everything done in a few hours. No. The first problem was the format. They said that the opening page of text was to be on the left side. Fine, so I moved a couple of pages over so that the first page of the text was on the right. Did the rest of the setup for the book, and I got to the point where I could plug in the price. I plugged in the amount of $8.50 and clicked on continue. CreateSpace said no — $8.50 was below the minimum cost… which was $11.35. Apparently the formula I used to figure out the number of pages was completely wrong. I made a copy of the novel and changed the size of the paper to 8″x5″ – the format size I wanted to use. The page count jumped up to the current 300+ pages, which pushed the cost up. I wasn’t happy with this, but I had to take it if I wanted to get it to print. So, I pushed on and sent the file to be proofed. 12 hours later, I got the final proof and they still said that I needed to have the text set up so that it started on the right page – which I did. The text of the story begins on the right, but the dedications and copyright page are on the left page. The automated process doesn’t understand that, so I ended up just putting in a blank page…and adding another dollar to the cost. At this point, it has been three days since it was to be put out – I was aiming for a January 1^st release date. I finally got everything put together and sent. One of the things that they put in their checklist was ‘Format your book for Kindle!’ Umm…no, thank you. I did that on my own for good reason (click on the link to get the software I used to format it), and I think I was justified. I don’t think they would have set the price to an acceptable level. All of this I can wave away on using CreateSpace for the first time. Since I know better, I’ll get it out faster and get the price right the first time.
  

   

  Here are some things that I found out about CreateSpace – they tell you you’ll get a good royalty for the book (I’m getting $5.22 for a $13.50 book), but you only get that royalty rate through their store. If you go through Amazon as well… they get their cut and Amazon gets their cut you get what’s left… which for me is about two dollars. You can’t opt out of it, because who owns CreateSpace? Yep. Amazon. They’re double-dipping and double-dipping hard. If you go to the link for the paperback novel, you’ll see that I send people to the CreateSpace link. I’m sure some of you are saying ‘dude, you should be doing this for love… not money, man!’ I’ll point you to this fine man and (an unwitting) personal mentor and what he has to say about it. Now, Amazon is listing the book on their site at a reduced price. Whether I am going to get the two dollars from Amazon or a further reduction based on the sale price. This sums up how I am feeling about this thus far.
  

   

  On to Goodreads! Since I have an ISBN number, I can put my book up there to get a little more exposure (I don’t know how that’s going to work, but hey – better than nothing). Now, with the book on Goodreads, it links to Amazon. Let me say this again… it links to Amazon. That’s right, if people looking for the book through Goodreads want to buy it, they’re going to get it through Amazon… fine for the Kindle, not fine for the paperback. Don’t get me wrong, I am happy for the exposure, and I know that having a paperback is getting it into more hands than just the Kindle version; but this seems to be the case of getting less and less returns on my investments and having to do a lot of the legwork on my own. As much as I am a maven for the free market – this is ridiculous.
  

   

• Facebook Ads! This is a good and bad thing. The good thing is that you can track how many people click on the link and you can target a group for better results. I went for as a wide group as I could – 11 million people. If you had a Facebook page and were breathing, I aimed my ad at you. I got 61 clicks. Not bad, but none of those clicks ended up being sales unfortunately. Sure, I got some exposure and it was a lot more than the next one. I might end up sticking with Facebook ads and just link the CreateSpace site to the ad. This is better than the next person…
  

   

• Project Wonderful! Let’s take eBay bidding and apply it to ads. Let’s flood your inbox with “you’ve been outbid!” I don’t really like this particular service because while it’s very selective in its targeting, but you put in a set bid amount and fight other people about it. I’ve got a limited budget ($40.00 a month) and I don’t want to blow all of it on a single webpage just because someone is willing to get to $40.50. I would much rather know that I have set down my money and have an ad placed. If I continue with Project Wonderful, I am going to really, really fine tune the ad to maybe a couple of sites. The exact opposite of what I think I should be doing. I need to be big and hard to notice. Maybe skywriting.
  

   

Wow… that’s a lot of stuff I put down and I hope it helps people who are looking into this. I know that I am a little wiser for it. My next book will definitely be put together a lot better and hopefully a lot cheaper. I am still on the fence with Amazon/CreateSpace/Goodreads – especially with Goodreads, but I will have to see how it shapes up in the coming months. Right now, I need to make lunch and get ready for work. Thanks for sticking with me on this, and as always, feel free to leave a comment on the site.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

OK – the novel is done and I now have to work on ads. Here’s the thing, and I hope you all will keep this a secret. Lean in, because I am going to whisper this.

I don’t like this.

One job I had a while back was selling cars, and as you can guess – I wasn’t very good at it. Sales has a lot to do with convincing someone to want something. Here’s how I do it: here are the facts concerning this object/issue. You don’t like it? [Censored] off and stop wasting my time. I’m not a very social person. I talk to a few friends online and tend to only go outside the house if I have to get something. As a writer, this is a perfect build: don’t go anywhere and don’t spend a lot of money, so you’ll stay home and write and can live off of a smaller paycheck. As someone who has to sell things? Not really. I’m just not a social person.

Thank God for Facebook. I am working on using their ad system right now for the Kindle version through this week and next week when I get paid, I am going to use it for the paperback version next week. I want to give this a test and see if there are any more blips. I don’t really know what else to do as far as getting the word out unless I want to start using leaflet bombs. I’ve told friends (and you, Dear Reader) and I am putting out ads through Facebook and Project Wonderful. We’ll see what’s going on later on. Hopefully, by the end of the week, I can see some sort of improvement in sales. 3 sales on Kindle is good – 30 would be a lot better.

I have a new idea for a novel, so what I am going to do is split time between this one and Tyro’s novel. I am also going to work on the outline for the luck novel: the title is Cat, Rabbit and Clover. It’s a good movie idea, and I might write the screenplay as a lark as well. I am trying to write something a little lighter since Tyro’s novel has so many dark parts to it and Cat, Rabbit and Clover is meant to be a little lighter.

There is a long gap in the blogs, and I apologize. The pipes in the house burst, so I had to spend a few days in a hotel while work was done in the house. I grabbed my Chromebook (which doesn’t have any set up for the blog) and abandoned house. Not really happy, but at least the pipes are insulated now. Now, I can go back to saving some money up the get the floor of the bathroom re-done – it’s a sagging down in a couple of places… not really good.

I’ve got to head out for coffee and get to work on both of the novels. Thank you for reading and as always – feel free to leave a comment.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

This link from io9 is not really what I wanted to see on my newsfeed. I’m not really one of those ‘one or the other’ people. I like X-Men and Captain America, but I also like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. I don’t read them as much as I would like to, but I try to at least follow the movies as often as I can. On some switching over to movies or TV, I can understand some things need to be changed just for the format. There are something that really don’t need to be changed – or should be changed at all. In Wonder Woman – there is no need to change anything. Yeah – Marvel copped out with Thor and said they’re not gods, but really, really, really advanced aliens. Why is DC doing the same thing with Wonder Woman? If DC really wanted to stand out – leave the Olympians in. Is DC afraid to offend the Christian Right? Guys – the fans are going to go see the movie regardless of politics, and the far right Christians aren’t going to go see it anyways. Is DC afraid of the unspoken implications of Olympians versus Jesus? OK. There is no need to explain it away unless it comes up in the script – and you don’t need to bring it up anyways. I’m not happy with the whole watering down of her abilities as well. Seriously? She stands toe-to-toe with Superman on a regular basis. There is no need to explain it away as a having a many-generations removed Kryptonian ancestor. Remember – Wonder Woman is basically fueled by the magic of the Olympians, which is also one of Superman’s weaknesses. Also I hope that DC remembers what Diana is ultimately: an ambassador to the World of Man.

Yeah – this calls for another ‘I Would Have Done It Differently’.

OK – I am going to workshop an idea for a novel I had that’s a sequel to my first novel (and no, I am never going to get tired of saying that! 😀 ). I am going to use Skein’s Glow and Wandersfar as mentor-like characters in the second one, giving them a little more visibility and expanding on their history together. The main story is one that I had worked on a time before this – no title, yet. The main plot is this: There is a kingdom (or a merchant house, since this will be on the Western coast of the land – either way, it’s someone with some influence) and in this kingdom/merchant house there are three children. The eldest (early 20’s) is a little flighty and a party animal – this one knows what’s going to happen when their father kicks off, so it’s time to live it up now before it gets real. The middle (late teens) is far more serious and studious – more of the Type A personality. The youngest (early teens) is friendly, happy-go-lucky and generally liked by everyone. Now – I’m thinking that the eldest and the middle should be daughters and the youngest would be a son. I’m just trying to feel out the expectations of the audience and subvert them. Maybe the eldest should be a son? Are we going to be impressed by a party animal son ‘getting serious’ about the death of the youngest, or would be more impressed by a young lady? I’m kinda thinking the eldest should be a daughter – expected to marry well and pop out kids (I know, I am such a romantic…), but the what about the middle? We’re telegraphing that this is the murderer, but the story isn’t who the killer is, but the unwilling transformation of the main character from overgrown teen to adult. If you think I’m worrying about the sex of the characters now, wait until I get to the names.

Here’s the breakdown so far: Eldest is female, next is male and the youngest is female, but I am open to changes in the middle. I want the middle one to at least have at first look as someone who is serious, but would never descend so far as to commit murder – especially murder of one’s family member. This is what I am hammering out right now. Feel free to leave a comment – it might even get used! Thanks for reading.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

If you would please look to the right of the blog (unless you’re reading this from your email, then please go to the blog site and look to the right), you will notice that there are two new entries under ‘Stuff I have written’. Yes – the novel is finished and in print. If you’re reading this through the e-mail, here are the links for you:

The Quietest Heart link for Amazon (Kindle): http://amzn.to/1hhq2cw

The Quietest Heart link for Quietest Heart (CreateSpace): http://bit.ly/1axoaEN

4 Bits and a Dollar link for Amazon (Kindle): http://amzn.to/19svZOL

I included 4 Bits and a Dollar
in this list merely because I finally did the cover art for it…and I am mildly surprised about who well the picture came out. Not bad for a point-n-click, if you ask me. I know I haven’t blogged for a while but I have been working getting the last of this down and ready. I am so happy, you have no idea. No, I take that back. You do have an idea, Dear Reader. You’ve been with me in the beginning and with me to the end. Thank you for your support.

Since I am done with that novel, I am moving on to outlining I/O Error and still working in Unbound and I had an idea for a sequel for The Quietest Heart involving two of the main characters (only because my beta reader liked them more than the main character) involving a royal family, murder and lines of succession – y’know, kids’ stuff. I might babble about this one here on the blog as I want to make this one as original as possible. So, brace yourself for time in the Maximum Fun Zone!

Wow – I seriously can’t believe the idea that the novel is done. I’ve been working on it for years and at several points, I didn’t think I was going to finish it. What’s better, I am getting some sales, so I know that this isn’t a fluke like I thought the first one was. This has also given me a lift as far as getting Tyro’s novel done. I am definitely going to have it finished by the end of March – especially since I am about halfway through it. I am getting ready to take out another member of the group and hopefully get them back moving to the next major city. I’m not sure if I want them in one of the major cities like Solvig (think of Chicago) or another smaller town? I’ll think about that, since it’s going to be the last time we see them in any sort of peril. I should also get the outline for I/O Error finished. I’m stuck in the third act and trying to get them to the next big scene. It’s just something I am going to have to work out in my head at work.

So – I’ve had a good few weeks and a great start to the New Year. I hope y’all have a better start than I did. Thanks for reading and as always, feel free to leave a comment.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy