Sarah Monette's Blog, page 46
January 26, 2011
beware, beware, his floating eyes, his flashing hair
Word believes that "although" is hyphenated "alt-hough." And due to the UTTER IDIOCY of their quote-unquote "manual" hyphenation feature, you cannot correct it.
Although (ha), even that isn't as bad as what it did to Coleridge. There will be one change in the text of "White Charles," as the only way to prevent Word from hyphenating it "Co-leridge"--drawing a discreet curtain over the interim carnage--was to add in "Samuel Taylor," to get "Coleridge" away from the end of the line.
Although (ha), even that isn't as bad as what it did to Coleridge. There will be one change in the text of "White Charles," as the only way to prevent Word from hyphenating it "Co-leridge"--drawing a discreet curtain over the interim carnage--was to add in "Samuel Taylor," to get "Coleridge" away from the end of the line.
Project Valkyrie: waterlog
60 minutes, 42 laps.
293 miles, 31 laps.
Being at the pool at the same time as the kids' intramural swim team gives me horrible junior high school flashbacks. Not the kids' fault. Still, it makes me tense.
293 miles, 31 laps.
Being at the pool at the same time as the kids' intramural swim team gives me horrible junior high school flashbacks. Not the kids' fault. Still, it makes me tense.
January 25, 2011
lessons learned
What I have learned from fighting with Lulu, MS Word, OpenOffice, and Adobe:
1. Lulu would really prefer that you use (and pay for) their formatting service.
2. You have to choose a page size from Lulu that you can convince your word processor to agree on. 6"x9" may be lovely, but Word has no idea what you're talking about. Go with A5 instead.
3. Although you can technically use any font you like for the interior of your book, the fonts Lulu offers for covers are quite limited, and some of them are very very ugly. Garamond is your best bet for harmony.
4. I hate Adobe.
5. Making a .pdf is not as easy as you think, because Lulu requires you to embed the fonts. Which you cannot do from Word. You can from OpenOffice, but in going from Word to OpenOffice, you must be careful. This is the thing I learned tonight with much raging in the streets: OpenOffice will quietly bork your .rtf formatting that you have slaved over like a dog, and you will not be able to unbork it, no matter how much you swear. On the other hand, the same formatting in .doc, it's nice as pie about.
So, get everything right in Word: page size, tabs, page numbers, fonts, hyphenation, justification. Then save as a .doc, and move over to OpenOffice to export as a .pdf, remembering to tick the PDF/A-1a ticky box. (Iä! Iä!)
6. And ... oh crap. If you have to change your page size after you've turned on the automatic hyphenation, you'd better go back and double-check it. Because, O Word, library is not hyphenated after the b.
If you'll excuse me, I have to go beat my head against this wall some more.
1. Lulu would really prefer that you use (and pay for) their formatting service.
2. You have to choose a page size from Lulu that you can convince your word processor to agree on. 6"x9" may be lovely, but Word has no idea what you're talking about. Go with A5 instead.
3. Although you can technically use any font you like for the interior of your book, the fonts Lulu offers for covers are quite limited, and some of them are very very ugly. Garamond is your best bet for harmony.
4. I hate Adobe.
5. Making a .pdf is not as easy as you think, because Lulu requires you to embed the fonts. Which you cannot do from Word. You can from OpenOffice, but in going from Word to OpenOffice, you must be careful. This is the thing I learned tonight with much raging in the streets: OpenOffice will quietly bork your .rtf formatting that you have slaved over like a dog, and you will not be able to unbork it, no matter how much you swear. On the other hand, the same formatting in .doc, it's nice as pie about.
So, get everything right in Word: page size, tabs, page numbers, fonts, hyphenation, justification. Then save as a .doc, and move over to OpenOffice to export as a .pdf, remembering to tick the PDF/A-1a ticky box. (Iä! Iä!)
6. And ... oh crap. If you have to change your page size after you've turned on the automatic hyphenation, you'd better go back and double-check it. Because, O Word, library is not hyphenated after the b.
If you'll excuse me, I have to go beat my head against this wall some more.
January 24, 2011
Three clarifications
1. The Ben Jonson Memorial Sale will take place Wednesday, February 2. Nobody is in danger of missing out yet.
2. The BJMS will take place here, on this LiveJournal. I will have PayPal buttons and everything.
3. As long as you can pay me via PayPal, you can buy books. I will ship anywhere in the world, and the shipping costs are my problem, not yours.
Thank you, everybody, for your enthusiasm!
2. The BJMS will take place here, on this LiveJournal. I will have PayPal buttons and everything.
3. As long as you can pay me via PayPal, you can buy books. I will ship anywhere in the world, and the shipping costs are my problem, not yours.
Thank you, everybody, for your enthusiasm!
Project Valkyrie: waterlog
60 minutes, 38 laps.
292 miles, 25 laps.
Swimming doesn't give me the charge that my dressage lessons do, but I certainly do feel better afterwards. And my aching ankle tells me it's good PT.
292 miles, 25 laps.
Swimming doesn't give me the charge that my dressage lessons do, but I certainly do feel better afterwards. And my aching ankle tells me it's good PT.
More red panda pictures. Because I needed them.
Remember those baby red pandas I blogged about?
Aside from Mozilla's FireFoxLive site, for all your red!panda!cam needs, ZooBorns has some absolutely stunning photographs of Spark and Ember. (The photographer's website also looks like an awesome timesink--just, you know, in case anybody needed that.)
Also from ZooBorns, while I'm at it, this astoundingly surreal video of zookeepers in Spain milking an orca. No, really. (Context here.)
And one more video, just because: a lion being swarmed by all seven of his children (from this ZooBorns post).
Aside from Mozilla's FireFoxLive site, for all your red!panda!cam needs, ZooBorns has some absolutely stunning photographs of Spark and Ember. (The photographer's website also looks like an awesome timesink--just, you know, in case anybody needed that.)
Also from ZooBorns, while I'm at it, this astoundingly surreal video of zookeepers in Spain milking an orca. No, really. (Context here.)
And one more video, just because: a lion being swarmed by all seven of his children (from this ZooBorns post).
Unnatural Creatures
Thus far, 75 77 people have expressed interest (if my math is to be trusted), which means that
Unnatural Creatures
is definitely a go.
I think what I'm going to do is wait until after the sale on February 2 to have them actually printed, so I can get the exact number needed (plus two, one for me and one for the archive), and then I don't have to worry about either (a.) extras or (b.) someone who wants one not being able to get it. And the beauty of POD is that I can do that.
This means that, like the auction, the sale of Unnatural Creatures will have a time limit.
Unnatural Creatures will be on sale from 02/02 2:00 P.M. CST to 02/03 2:00 P.M. CST. This will be a "speak now or forever hold your peace" kind of deal.
It will be US Trade size (6"x9"), perfect-bound, around 120 pages. Currently, the cover looks like this:
The price will be $20. Production costs are about $7, so that means $13 of every sale goes to the Companion Animal Fund. I'm cool with that.
Please, if you are interested and haven't said so yet, leave a comment here or here or even here. Just for the sake of my curiosity.
I think what I'm going to do is wait until after the sale on February 2 to have them actually printed, so I can get the exact number needed (plus two, one for me and one for the archive), and then I don't have to worry about either (a.) extras or (b.) someone who wants one not being able to get it. And the beauty of POD is that I can do that.
This means that, like the auction, the sale of Unnatural Creatures will have a time limit.
Unnatural Creatures will be on sale from 02/02 2:00 P.M. CST to 02/03 2:00 P.M. CST. This will be a "speak now or forever hold your peace" kind of deal.
It will be US Trade size (6"x9"), perfect-bound, around 120 pages. Currently, the cover looks like this:
The price will be $20. Production costs are about $7, so that means $13 of every sale goes to the Companion Animal Fund. I'm cool with that.
Please, if you are interested and haven't said so yet, leave a comment here or here or even here. Just for the sake of my curiosity.
January 23, 2011
PSA: Unnatural Creatures
[For anyone whose eyes glaze over at long lists.]
As part of the Ben Jonson Memorial Fundraiser, I would like to do a limited edition chapbook of the four uncollected Booth stories: "The Replacement," "The World Without Sleep," "White Charles," and "The Yellow Dressing Gown." Price would be $20; after production costs, all money will be donated to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital's Companion Animal Fund.
By "limited edition," I mean a print run of 50.
If you would be interested in this chapbook, please leave a comment either here or here. A comment is not a commitment, but I would like to get an idea whether this is worth doing or not. And if more than 50 people indicate interest, I will consider making it a print run of 100 instead.
Thank you!
As part of the Ben Jonson Memorial Fundraiser, I would like to do a limited edition chapbook of the four uncollected Booth stories: "The Replacement," "The World Without Sleep," "White Charles," and "The Yellow Dressing Gown." Price would be $20; after production costs, all money will be donated to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital's Companion Animal Fund.
By "limited edition," I mean a print run of 50.
If you would be interested in this chapbook, please leave a comment either here or here. A comment is not a commitment, but I would like to get an idea whether this is worth doing or not. And if more than 50 people indicate interest, I will consider making it a print run of 100 instead.
Thank you!
The Ben Jonson Memorial Fundraiser: details
THIS IS NOT THE SALE POST. YOU CANNOT BUY THINGS FROM HERE.
The Ben Jonson Memorial Fundraiser will take place on February 2, 2011 (Ben's birthday). All proceeds will go to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital's Companion Animal Fund.
Please spread the word!
I will be selling:
MISCELLANEOUS
1 copy of Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 42.1 (Winter 2002), which contains my sole academic article, "Speaking and Silent Women in Upon Appleton House: $5
1 copy of Concussed, from Concussion (Eastercon 2006), which includes stuff from a whole bunch of cool people--M. John Harrison, Hal Duncan, Elizabeth Hand, Jay Lake, Jo Walton, Elizabeth Wein, etc.--and "Toward a Praxis of World-Building," which is a reprint of a couple blog posts of mine: $5
1 copy of Paradox: The Magazine of Historical and Speculative Fiction 10 (Winter 2006-2007), containing my novelette "Amante Dorée," about a transsexual prostitute/spy in an AU New Orleans: $5
1 copy of The Queen in Winter (New York: Berkley Books, 2006)--fantasy/romance anthology with stories from Claire Delacroix, Lynn Kurland, Sharon Shinn, and me (my story, A Gift of Wings, is set in Meduse*, although it has no other connection with the Doctrine of Labyrinths): $20
KYLE MURCHISON BOOTH
1 copy of Lovecraft's Weird Mysteries #7 (first publication of "The Inheritance of Barnabas Wilcox"): $5
1 copy of All Hallows 35 (February 2004) (first publication of "Bringing Helena Back"): $10
1 copy of All Hallows 41 (February 2006) (first publication of "Drowning Palmer"): $10
10 copies of the first edition of The Bone Key (you should know, if you're thinking of buying it, that The Bone Key is going to be rereleased later this year, with story notes, a new introduction, and a new cover): $15 per copy
I also want to do a limited edition chapbook of the four uncollected Booth stories: "The Replacement," "The World Without Sleep," "White Charles," "The Yellow Dressing Gown." Working title is Unnatural Creatures. Price will be $20, although in this one instance, not ALL proceeds will go to the Companion Animal Fund, as some will have to go to production costs. But I will not take a cut.
By "limited edition," I mean a print run of 50. If you would be interested, please comment here, so that I can make a guess as to whether it's worth doing. And if more than 50 people indicate interest, I will consider making it a print run of 100 instead. A comment is, of course, not a commitment.
A COMPANION TO WOLVES
5 copies of A Companion to Wolves (hardback): $25 per copy
5 copies of A Companion to Wolves (paperback): $7 per copy
THE DOCTRINE OF LABYRINTHS
10 sets of the Doctrine of Labyrinths in paperback: $35 per set
2 copies of Mélusine (hardback): $30 per copy
3 copies of The Virtu (hardback): $30 per copy
2 copies of The Mirador (hardback): $30 per copy
3 copies of Corambis (hardback): $30 per copy
And I will auction off my last set of the Doctrine of Labyrinths in hardback. Starting bid will be $100.
All items will be signed. They will be personalized at the discretion of the buyer. I will ship anywhere in the world.
The sale and auction will start on February 2, 2011, at two o'clock P.M. Central Standard Time. The auction will run until two o'clock P.M. CST, February 3, 2011. The sale will run until either everything's gone or it's obvious people are done buying. All payments will be made via PayPal, and there will also be a button for those who don't want or can't afford to buy anything, but who would still like to make a donation.
Have I forgotten anything? Have a question? Please leave a comment!
---
*Meduse is my name for the world of the Doctrine of Labyrinths.
The Ben Jonson Memorial Fundraiser will take place on February 2, 2011 (Ben's birthday). All proceeds will go to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital's Companion Animal Fund.
Please spread the word!
I will be selling:
MISCELLANEOUS
1 copy of Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 42.1 (Winter 2002), which contains my sole academic article, "Speaking and Silent Women in Upon Appleton House: $5
1 copy of Concussed, from Concussion (Eastercon 2006), which includes stuff from a whole bunch of cool people--M. John Harrison, Hal Duncan, Elizabeth Hand, Jay Lake, Jo Walton, Elizabeth Wein, etc.--and "Toward a Praxis of World-Building," which is a reprint of a couple blog posts of mine: $5
1 copy of Paradox: The Magazine of Historical and Speculative Fiction 10 (Winter 2006-2007), containing my novelette "Amante Dorée," about a transsexual prostitute/spy in an AU New Orleans: $5
1 copy of The Queen in Winter (New York: Berkley Books, 2006)--fantasy/romance anthology with stories from Claire Delacroix, Lynn Kurland, Sharon Shinn, and me (my story, A Gift of Wings, is set in Meduse*, although it has no other connection with the Doctrine of Labyrinths): $20
KYLE MURCHISON BOOTH
1 copy of Lovecraft's Weird Mysteries #7 (first publication of "The Inheritance of Barnabas Wilcox"): $5
1 copy of All Hallows 35 (February 2004) (first publication of "Bringing Helena Back"): $10
1 copy of All Hallows 41 (February 2006) (first publication of "Drowning Palmer"): $10
10 copies of the first edition of The Bone Key (you should know, if you're thinking of buying it, that The Bone Key is going to be rereleased later this year, with story notes, a new introduction, and a new cover): $15 per copy
I also want to do a limited edition chapbook of the four uncollected Booth stories: "The Replacement," "The World Without Sleep," "White Charles," "The Yellow Dressing Gown." Working title is Unnatural Creatures. Price will be $20, although in this one instance, not ALL proceeds will go to the Companion Animal Fund, as some will have to go to production costs. But I will not take a cut.
By "limited edition," I mean a print run of 50. If you would be interested, please comment here, so that I can make a guess as to whether it's worth doing. And if more than 50 people indicate interest, I will consider making it a print run of 100 instead. A comment is, of course, not a commitment.
A COMPANION TO WOLVES
5 copies of A Companion to Wolves (hardback): $25 per copy
5 copies of A Companion to Wolves (paperback): $7 per copy
THE DOCTRINE OF LABYRINTHS
10 sets of the Doctrine of Labyrinths in paperback: $35 per set
2 copies of Mélusine (hardback): $30 per copy
3 copies of The Virtu (hardback): $30 per copy
2 copies of The Mirador (hardback): $30 per copy
3 copies of Corambis (hardback): $30 per copy
And I will auction off my last set of the Doctrine of Labyrinths in hardback. Starting bid will be $100.
All items will be signed. They will be personalized at the discretion of the buyer. I will ship anywhere in the world.
The sale and auction will start on February 2, 2011, at two o'clock P.M. Central Standard Time. The auction will run until two o'clock P.M. CST, February 3, 2011. The sale will run until either everything's gone or it's obvious people are done buying. All payments will be made via PayPal, and there will also be a button for those who don't want or can't afford to buy anything, but who would still like to make a donation.
Have I forgotten anything? Have a question? Please leave a comment!
---
*Meduse is my name for the world of the Doctrine of Labyrinths.
