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

I haven’t gotten anything back from the artist, yet even though I paid the invoice. I know I’m impatient in this regard, but I’ve been telling everyone that the book is going to be released tomorrow. What I may end up doing is using the samples she gave me to get things going and then replace them with the real ones when the art comes in. There also might be a delay in getting the stuff up, but it is going to go up on New Year’s Day…just not as early as I had hoped. The artist is someone who strikes me as professional, and to be honest – she did have to goad me once into getting her an updated word count, but I worked without sleep that one weekend to do it. I am going to not obsessively check my email every five minutes (ten minutes is really the better time period). I am just going to put this out of my mind and get back to Tyro’s novel.

Speaking of Tyro’s novel, it’s a little hard getting back into it since I was away for a while (mea culpa, ushabit.). I’m getting them to the second village, which will be far unkinder to them than the first one – not going to say how, but those that have read my material will know that something is going to happen soon. I am going to work on getting this one finished by the end of March and given that I’ve got a really good head start on it, I think this will be entirely feasible. One of the things I am working on in this book as far as mechanics go is trying to keep Tyro from being a Mary Sue. I do want her to shine sometimes (she is the main character after all), but I don’t want her to come off as some sort lame author avatar. Well, the first thing I should worry about if getting it finished and passing it to my beta readers to see if they get the Mary Sue vibe off of it.

Well, this year is now creeping down to hours remaining. I have a really good feeling for this year. I see what’s happening and I just feel warm and fuzzy…and not the ‘I am coming down with something’ sort of warm and fuzzy. I hope that this is a feeling that you are having or will have in the coming hours. I should get back to the novel, so I am going to cut this a little short. Thank you for reading and as always feel free to leave a comment below.

Happy New Year!

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

… and that feeling is opening night jitters. The novel is getting released Wednesday. I know it’s as ready as it’s going to get. I’ve checked the spelling several times, the grammar twice (in as much as Windows will let me) and had several people read it over to make sure that the plot doesn’t have any holes… well, any big ones. But as much as I want to release this novel and get to the next one…I am nervous about it to the point of unhealthy thinking. Sure, it’s not the best one I’ve written – but this one got no less attention than any of the other novels I am working on. Maybe this is just my neurosis and insecurity talking to me. Well, it’s far too late now. I’ve paid off the artist and gotten the artwork. When I get in from work on Tuesday, I am going to sit down and upload it to CreateSpace and Amazon. After that and I have confirmed that the books are up and ready for sale, I am going to try to sleep and absolutely not touch the AfterWord app on my phone until after I wake up in the morning. Trust me that is going to be the hardest part of all. J

OK – what am I going to work on next after the book’s away? I was considering working on I/O Error, but I haven’t finished the outline so I can’t really charge into it, so I am going to work on the Tyro novel (Unbound) since I’m about a third of the way through it anyways and the outline is done. I am going to continue the outline for I/O Error at work (What? What did you think I do at work? My job? Oh, you silly, silly geese…) to get it finished. I am going to hold myself to the timelines I have set up, and on the upside, I have a good head start on it – I am in the second act getting ready to ramp up the weirdness.

I had a good Christmas. Got myself some Blu-Ray movies: The A-Team and District 9 and The Portable Dante and a couple of Marvel t-shirts for casual, walking-round-the-homestead. Oh! I got an unexpected early gift from Amazon! I got the latest volume of Empowered two weeks before its official release! This is a series that I recommend highly to comic book aficionados. The artwork is amazing and the story is compelling – the latest plotline has been wrapped it and another one is starting soon. Look past the cheesecake and you’ll find a story of dedication and triumph. Really.

Well, there is little else to comment on right now. With the holiday season winding down, I can focus a little bit more on getting the work done and getting away from my job. I hope everyone else had a good holiday. As always, thank you for reading and feel free to leave a comment below.

Happy Holidays!

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

I was chatting with someone at work (because the only other thing to do there would have been my job… *snicker*) and they asked me a good question: What sort of marketing are you going to do. To be honest, I thought me running up and down the streets shouting “IT’S FINSHED! IT’S FINISHED!” would have been sufficient. Thanks to my friend (and not taking a call for at least 15 minutes) I was able to draw up some sort of plan. This is something that I going to have to start considering since I am doing all of this by myself:

1. Friends: those poor, poor people. They’re never going to hear the end of it, but I am not going to be obnoxious about it. I am going to tell them that it’s out and if they liked it, to tell others. If they didn’t, it can stay just between us (as Marcus puts it).
   
2. Goodreads: Since I will be publishing the paperback through CreateSpace, I’ll have an ISBN number, so I can put the book on Goodreads – the key is visibility.
   
3. Project Wonderful: A way of getting banner ads on a lot of sites that people who would be interested in the book, and since they run it as an auction and dirt cheap to boot, I can get more people steered to the book, and since I am a part of the Amazon’s referrer service, I can stand to get a little extra if someone clicks on the ad to buy the book.
   

    

I can certainly see the utility of having a publishing house behind me on something like this – I’m not sure where I am going to find a lot of the time and money (beyond my own wallet) to do some of this and more. However, when it comes to having a publishing house, I’m trading off accessibility and marketing to get creative freedom and more money (15% if I’m lucky versus 70%… hmm… math wasn’t my strong suit but 70 even looks bigger than 15 here). So, I am willing to do it. I am also going to follow through with the new plan for my productivity for a year:

• 1 finished outline a month
  
• New rough draft every 3 months
  
• Finished novel at least once a year
  

   

Does it sound ambitious? Yep. Especially that outline every month deal, but I can do it. I’ll write 1,700 words a day (giving me 122,400 word manuscript, a really good length for a novel). While the first novel is getting edited down, I’ll just turn around and start the next manuscript. I’ll go the writing during the day. At night is when I’ll work on the outline. An outline a month might be a bit more of a challenge, but I will just have to buck up and do it. I just gotta do this and I am hoping to carry over the inertia from the novel into next year.

Wish me luck.

Thanks for reading, please feel free to leave a comment and I hope you had a great Christmas and a better New Year.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

*only if I can convert the $7.58 into pennies and toss them into the air…

Amazon is now releasing all royalties! Their policy previously was that you’d get paid after you reached the magic threshold of $10.00, or $25.00 if you wanted a check. Given that my book Four Bits and a Dollar is only a $1.50 (cheap!), it’s going to take a while to get to the magical amount. Since they’re going to release the funds now, I’m going to get a small deposit into my bank account. Yes – it’s a small amount, but it means I am getting paid for m work, finally. This is a bigger incentive for me to get something out there now since I know that I am going to get paid for it sooner than later.

Speaking of working – I am still editing the novel down (or up as the case may be, I need to jam in another 9,000 words to get to the word count I set) and I am going to work really hard on getting it ready for the New Year’s Day release. It’s getting easier as I go along – it’s more cutting lines here and there, closing up gaps in explanations and sharpening up some of the descriptions. After that and setting through an editing program, it will be released to a small amount of fanfare and off to the next one. I’m looking forward to getting this one finished, just so I can have it done and out of the way.

Since I have a lot of eagerness to get to work, I’m going to cut this a little short with my apologies. Thank you for reading and I hope you have a good day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

Hi, everyone! I didn’t get a good night’s sleep last night, but the bed was too warm to leave and do work. It was weird in that I had no ‘drifting to sleep sensation’. I flipped (to me) in between two states: restless turning and dreaming. Really odd things, too – walking down a highway and talking to two people from work about re-coding a website. What’s odd about this is that I don’t know how to code. I have no idea how to tie together 1’s and 0’s to count to 10, much less writing a program to run credit cards. I am certain there is a lot more to it than that, but I don’t remember enough to even begin to draw any interpretations. Anyway – I have a little bit more of holiday shopping to do and then I can finally hunker down on the weekend to get the editing done and on Christmas Day sit back in enjoy the horror movie marathon. God Bless Netflix.

Editing is coming along, but it’s coming along slowly. I am in the twelfth chapter (Well Scented Rest, for those of you playing at home) and this is one of the chapters that will need a lot of work. In fact, I don’t think there was a single sentence in that whole chapter that was not spared the red pencil of doom. Yeah, this is going to be the hardest one, but it will also be the most entertaining in that I get to flex more descriptive muscles than I usually do with my work. I always feel that I don’t get in enough when I do the rough draft, so I am going to try to improve upon this with the next novel. As far as the next novel’s outline goes, I am stuck at dressing the main character. I need to get over this minor pause and get the outline finished before the end of January. Granted, I have three chapters outlined, so I can jump into writing it on the stroke of midnight, but I wanted to have the full outline finished before I set key to finger. I know what I need to do (have her examine the footage from her personal log after recovering from the surge and find that there were no people carrying her in); I just have to get myself to get to that point.

One of the themes that I am working with in the novel is the group versus the individual – the crew of The
Shepherd vs. Gail; the ghosts of the old crew vs. Eliza vs. Jenny. My theatre professor would be elated (well, as elated as he could get) over the fact that I am going back to what he called ‘universal themes’. In fact, looking at a lot of the works I’m writing – that seems to be a running theme of mine. I might have to start looking at some other things. Well…no, there are a couple of works that pit one group against the other. Well, I should work on some other themes rather than the individual versus the group.

I should also refill my coffee and get some lunch. I hope y’all have a good day and I thank you for reading. As always, feel free to leave a comment.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy