Roy Miller's Blog, page 316

Keepsakes

I’ve posted a quick short story over at Medium called Keepsakes. Check it out here.

Spotify #YearInMusic 2015

Spotify has come out with a pretty awesome little tool to give you information on the music you’ve streamed throughout the year. If anyone is curious about what I listen to a lot of the time, you can check out a little collage I made of my results right here.

New Project

I’m going to be working on a new screenplay with my cousin over the next 6 months or so. Details will be pretty much kept under wraps for the time being, but I wanted to let you all know that there is something new in the works. This will be my first attempt at something of this nature, so I’m excited to learn some new terminology and formatting specifications. Hopefully, if we have any luck on our side, you’ll see our finished product on the big screen someday. Stay tuned.

Book Distribution

The new title, Sunburnt Farmlands of the Midwest, has been distributed to a few more vendors. For those of you that haven’t picked it up yet, you can check out the following store links:

Barnes & Noble for print or ebook, and iTunes, Kobo, Inktera and Scribd for ebook only.

Thanks for your continued support!

Sunburnt Farmlands of the Midwest

For those that have been waiting, my next title is available now. Marketing doesn’t start until Cyber Monday, but I figured I’d give a heads-up post here today.

Sunburnt Farmlands of the Midwest contains 223 pages broken down into 23 separate stories, ranging from 2 and a half pages at the shortest to 30 at the longest. To get more information on the title and to find out where you can buy, check out the post for the title. (Protip: Amazon has a HOLIDAY30 promo code you can use for 30% off for a limited time.)

Special thanks to my family and everyone who helped me out in some way. I wouldn’t be a mediocre “artist” with a slave labor job making sub-poverty wages if it wasn’t for you. Or, well, you know what I mean.

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Down in the Dirt July-December 2015

Down in the Dirt Magazine has released an anthology of the second half of 2015 titled The Intersection, which includes my piece, Nimble, that was published in the hello goodbye goodbye hello issue (October.) This anthology is 420 pages long and includes over 150 stories and poems from almost as many authors. Support the indie writing scene and potentially even find a new favorite author.

You can view the listing here and pick up a copy over here.

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Getting Started With eBooks – Part II – Planning & Outlining

If you checked out Part I of the series, you’ll have everything you need to get started on this section. If so, let’s do it!

Once you’ve cleaned your area and got it all nice and comfortable, the next task in starting your book is, well, starting your book. I’m sure by this point you at least have a rough idea of what your story is about, and this is where the world and character building begin. Of course, there are probably hundreds of different articles out there on how to build and flesh out amazing characters, from physical traits to deep-rooted emotional baggage, but the most important thing to remember in this stage is that it’s your character. People can guide you through the process in so many different ways, but it’s imperative that you allow yourself to create things the way you want to, instead of just following an article step by step. (Including this one.)

We’ll break this down into two sections: Planning and Outlining.

Planning

Most of this stage can be done in your off-time, which is helpful if you’re busy with a normal day job or a family. When you have a few spare minutes, write down some small things you think of. The name of a city, what kind of climate it has or what the population is. One tip I can give here is to think of character backgrounds first, that way you can search for specific names or surnames that match. I know that for me personally, characters that are not only deep, but consistent, are much more alluring and rope me into a story better. Let’s break it down:

Names – Cities, countries/territories, people, destinations, objects, spells. Create your own local lexicon to keep your story straight.
Relationships – Map out families, factions or anything else that has a hierarchy. Not doing this can lead to unnecessary plot holes.
Plot Arcs – Different small stories that help to move the main story along. Use a wide range of characters and give background when you can.
Plot Twists – It’s very important that you keep twists and any other type of complicated bits straight. Having a visual aid really helps in this area.
The Ending – Starting off a story with no idea how it’ll end is tricky, and some say even ill-advised. It doesn’t have to be exact, but at least have a rough idea.

The most time-consuming part of this process is building characters and worlds, and these are the most important parts of your story. If your characters aren’t deep enough and your world is too small or poorly described, you risk not hooking your reader and having them put down your book. One thing to remember is that the way the story is told is just as important as the story itself. I’ll separate these into their own categories.

Character Building

Physical Traits – Plan out not only full physical descriptions of what your characters look like, but also things that they do. Bite their nails, spit, laugh a certain way, etc. Each character’s uniqueness is decided by their traits.
Emotional Traits – As above, uniqueness also includes the emotional part of a person. Are they vengeful? Jealous? Prone to fits of laughter? Do they prefer inside or outside? Shy? Extroverted? There are a lot of things to choose from here, which you can find on lists like this.
Alignment/Morality – A lot of times people want the bad guy to be romanced by the pretty female protagonist and be the bad-boy-turned-soft fantasy. While this is possible, your character needs to be written that way from the beginning. It’s not uncommon for people to change their allegiance or way of thinking, but who/what it changes to and why is heavily dependent on your character’s traits.
Look for help – Don’t be afraid to search the web for some guides or examples of good characters. No good writers did it all by themselves, and it’s okay to borrow a little bit, as long as you keep your own voice. Check out some of the resources listed here to start.

World Building

Consistency – Consistency is a huge part of your world. If your city is located near the equator, it’s not going to snow. Ever. (Well, aside from nuclear winter.) Make sure you plan out not only where the location of your story takes place, but the weather patterns, surrounding areas and possibilities of extreme weather. You might not need it all depending on the type of story you’re writing, but it never hurts to have a really in-depth look at your world.
Layers – When creating a fantasy world, there’s a ridiculous amount of things to take into consideration. If you’re unfolding your story in a completely fictional world, you have to not only create the world itself, but everything that goes inside of it. Government, laws, races, jobs and currency are only a few of those things, and those are all very complicated in themselves. Anyone that has ever viewed the Harry Potter Lexicon can tell you the herculean effort J.K. Rowling put into her world. If you plan to go that route, make sure you know what you’re in for.
Look for help – Same as in the Character Building section, there are tons of guides out there to help you out in this area. Some people have spent countless hard hours putting together masterlists of all of the best information on the internet. Do yourself a favor and make their work count for something, while making your work easier on yourself.


Outlining

A lot of the outlining section has to do with taking everything you did in the planning section and putting it into an easy to read arrangement. This section depends on you and how you work best. Some people are more visual than others, and other prefer audio. You have a variety of choices to carry this out, of which the following can be considered:

Physical – Get a piece of posterboard from the Dollar Store and do a family tree-style listing of all of your ideas. Tack it up on the wall by your writing station for easy viewing.
Digital – There is quite a bit of software out there that can make this task frightfully easy. Of course, if you go this route you should be prepared to shell out a little bit of money, depending on the program you intend to buy. I haven’t used any personally, but I’ve heard good things about Scrivener. You can even use some free tools like Trello that, while intended for different uses, actually work quite well for this.
Keep on track – The purpose of even doing an outline is to keep your organized and on track with your novel. If you go through the trouble of making the outline and then neglect to keep it updated with changes and milestones passed, you can even more easily get tripped up and have difficulty regaining your bearings.

I’m personally more hands-on, so if I have a story that’s somewhat complicated and I need to keep track of arcs or certain character interactions, I just use a plain old notebook and pen. It’s easier for me to cross things out, switch them around (by drawing arrows) and figure out where I’m going next. The trick is finding a solution that works best for your type of environment and workflow.

That’s it for Part II, stay tuned in the next few days for Part III – Problems & Solutions. Thanks for reading, and if this guide has helped you at all, consider sharing it with someone else to help spread the knowledge.

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Article Marketing: What To Watch Out For

One of the biggest things new writers are faced with is the decision of whether or not to just continue writing novels, or to branch off into the world of professional writing. We’ve all seen the big sells. “You can earn $100,000 your first year as a copywriter!” “It only takes a few minutes to find out how to build your client list and making thousands per week!” “Get started for free!” If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

There’s a sort of backwards marketing technique that’s been popular for years, and while most people don’t think much of it, the ones that find a way to get their hooks in it can make a fine living. The ‘experts’ of a field will offer information to those just starting out, but at a price. Sounds reasonable, but it’s a little dirty if you look at it from another angle. It’s someone saying, “I’m already successful, and I want you to be as well, but my advice isn’t free, so you need to line my pockets a little more before I can point you in the right direction.” It’s their way of offering you a little advice, but making sure that their foothold in the market isn’t in jeopardy. No one does anything for free these days, but if you’re really looking out for the interest of newcomers in your field, at least be forthcoming in your intentions. A lot of places aren’t, and that’s why I’m writing this for you today.

If you ask me, I’m a half-way decent writer, which means I should be able to take an idea and flesh it out with a little bit of research and time, right? So who’s to say that I couldn’t launch a money-making campaign on how to get free money from the government? Sound familiar? I thought so. Take an idea, do the research, then write up a program that is “quick and easy” and sell it for profit. It happens all the time, since the initial information is free, and so many people want an immediate solution without putting much work into it. Free money for the taking.

“But if it’s so easy, why doesn’t everyone do it?”

Honestly, most people don’t even think about doing it. They see the infomercials on TV on how to get rich quick and just think it’s some kind of scam, when in reality the information is there, you just have to pay for it if you want to get it easily. It’s what we call paying for convenience. The host will say, “I can show you how I got rich, and if you follow my steps you can be rich, too.” Did the host actually get rich through their practices? Maybe, maybe not. But they will get rich off the well-written buzz surrounding their product. The idea is only the first part of the process; building it up and making it flashy and easily accessible is what really takes the project from an idea to a salary machine.

The purpose of this article is to expose the hierarchy of information gathering in a specific market. Most people that are just starting out don’t have the money to blow on all of these get rich quick programs, but they may check a few of them out at face value and then decide to take a chance on one of them. One of these, for example, may be AWAI, or American Writers and Artists, Inc. I just saw earlier they were having a huge special, $9 for a year’s worth of their subscription magazine, The Barefoot Writer, instead of its normal $49. I figured, what the hell, might as well give it a look. So I ordered it and took a look around. Here are some examples of the thing’s you’ll see there:

How to Cash in by Providing a Turn-key Solution for Info-marketing Clients
Save $150 on Financial Copywriting Program
FREE Webinar: Writing for the Business-to-Business Market

These are pretty hook-y headlines, aren’t they? That’s because they’re written by writers like us. The only problem is, once you get into the meat of the article, a lot of times you find out there really isn’t anything there. When you save $150 on the program, you find out at the end of the article that the program was originally $500, so you still have to pay $350. In the webinar, they tell you how much money you can make, how great it is working for yourself on your own time and what qualifications you need, but when it comes to actually finding real clients or getting access to lists of prospects, you gotta cough up some kind of membership fee or one-time payment.

Of course, I’m not saying every place is bad, and I’m also not saying that AWAI doesn’t have legit articles with good information. What I am saying is that the majority of what you will run into is fluff, and you need to be wary of who you pull your debit card out for. Do your research. When you visit a site, don’t just feast on the clickbait articles and catchy headlines. Do some digging and see if there’s any real information there. If a company really wants to share something with you instead of putting their profit first, they’ll have some meaty bits even in their open areas that you can run with.

Be wary of catchy headlines and do your research before you shell out money.

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Getting Started With eBooks – Part I – Gathering Materials

Sadly enough, the majority of guides you’ll see when searching for how to get set up in, well, any activity, are written very specifically, but not for the reason you think. It’s not as much about the content and getting the reader what they need, as it is about the way the article is set up and the keywords it has to increase gains for the writer, whether it be in backlinks or notable content for writing jobs. Instead of seeing real step-by-step instructions, you see numbered lists with short paragraphs using buzzwords that really don’t go anywhere. “10 Ways to Increase Your Focus” or “The Top 20 Mistakes New Authors Make” are good examples of this. Instead, I’m going to begin a series of posts that will give some insight on my personal process of getting started, written not for profit, but for information’s sake.

As a side note, this guide is aimed at writing your book in an eBook capacity, but these practices lead to the possibility of a print version as well. In my own process, I write my material directly in eBook creation software so it can be distributed when I’m ready, but once you’re done you can easily transfer the content to another program suitable for print production.

Preparing to Start – Gathering Materials

While this part isn’t really crucial for everyone, it’s better for a lot of people that feel comfortable with solidarity. Some of us can be doing something completely unrelated and get stricken with an idea, then immediately stop what we’re doing and write it down for later, while others work better when they sit down, get comfortable and concentrate on the task at hand. This is split into two parts-the physical materials, and the digital materials, which I’ll cover separately.

Physical

Clear your schedule – Use a calendar tool or an actual calendar to visualize your days and find openings where you’ll be able to comfortably sit down and invest some focus and energy into your writing. You won’t get far if you remember ten minutes in that you have a doctor’s appointment and have to leave. Write down actual times where you’re meant to put effort into just writing, and nothing else.
Clean up your space – Make sure that not only your writing desk, but the room its in, is in good standing order before you start. Clutter and dust and the like can make for an irritating energy in the room, which in turn can influence your mood-and writing-in a bad way. If you’re outside with a laptop or in a public place, make sure you bring headphones, bug spray or whatever else you think you might need to create a comfortable environment.
Grab something to eat and drink – Getting sidetracked by thirst or a rumbling stomach is something that happens to everyone, but how you set up for it makes a difference. Instead of having to leave your space and break concentration to go into the kitchen, fill up a water bottle, grab a cup of coffee and some finger food like chex mix or fruit that’s easily accessible and keep it on your desk.
Turn on your ‘do not disturb’s – This is a hybrid area between physical and digital, but making sure you can concentrate is key. Set your Skype and any other digital programs to Busy, and put your phone on vibrate or silent. Just make sure you don’t forget if you have children or someone else that may need to get a hold of you.

Digital

Find useful pages online – Create a new bookmark folder and drop some useful links into it. Websites that have writing prompts, background noise like rain or other ambiance, similar books to what you’re writing for ideas on structure and pacing, and resources on the topic you’re writing about are all good to have handy.
Download your tools – I use Sigil to write my eBooks, but you may find that something else works better for you. Here is a list of eBook creation software you can look through to see what suits you best. If you find that you don’t like the setup of Sigil or one of the other tools, you can always use Microsoft Word, or better yet, OpenOffice. OpenOffice is free, constantly updated and includes plugins from the community to help streamline your process.
Keep contacts handy – We’ve all met some people through writer’s groups on social media or other places. Keep the emails or websites of people you mesh well with near so you can reach out if you need help. A beta reader, someone that’s good with formatting or someone you can ask about world building are some examples of good people to have around.

Once you have everything you need together, you’re ready to dive into your project. It never hurts to make a checklist of these things for future use in other titles, or just something to look over each time you sit down to write. I’ve created one based on this article that you can print off and post on the wall near your writing area.

Part II will cover a few topics such as brainstorming, outlining, and what to do in various situations when you’ve hit a wall. Stay tuned!

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Tragedy in Paris

In the wake of so many people being senselessly killed tonight, I think it’s a good idea to reach out to a loved one and get reacquainted with who we are as human beings. Connect with someone, share a meal or a drink or just good conversation and help spread the word of these people who lost their lives for no reason. If we let things like this tear into the fabric of humanity any more than it already has, we’re only going to be worse off in the future.

Love each other.

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