Linda Maye Adams's Blog, page 86
July 1, 2016
Fantasy Short Story Available
It’s been fifteen years since the Hunter visited Ilya’s village. Fifteen years since the world went in another direction and left the village behind. Fifteen years since the Hunter killed Ilya’s mother.
Now the Hunter is back.
And it’s started killing again.
Ilya’s only chance is the arrival of the circus clowns. But they have a price that she isn’t sure she can pay …
Available for $2.99 on:
Amazon
Smashwords
Filed under: Books Tagged: fantasy, Short Stories
June 30, 2016
The joy of creating your own covers
When I was thinking of going the traditional route, I heard over and over that writers had very little say in their book covers. I heard also horror stories where a writer got stuck with a cover that was inappropriate for the book.
So there’s something very magical about designing my own covers and picking what’s right for my story and the genre.
It’s like another piece of telling the story, something to draw the reader in.
The bad part is when I start looking for images it’s a lot of “Oh, Shiny!” There are a lot of wonderful images that would make covers. I usually have to go back to my lightbox later and delete all the other ones I bookmarked (grin).
These are some of the covers for what’s coming. Quartet of Clowns is already out.
Filed under: Thoughts
June 29, 2016
Libraries on Cruise Ships
One of the things about reading paper newspapers is that a lot of articles get posted online that never end up in in print like this one on libraries on cruise ships.
My grandfather took a ship across the ocean from San Francisco to Korea when he was little boy. His father was a missionary, and made this trip a number of times from the old records. They must have had a glorious library in those days, because the trips were longer.
The ship I went on, Navigator of the Seas, did have a library, but not many books. I suppose that reflects everyone bringing ebooks. I brought my own supplies, but still, I wouldn’t have mind perusing through the shelves.
Sometimes the best finds are by accident.
Filed under: Culture, Entertainment Tagged: Cruising, Library, Navigator on the Seas
June 28, 2016
Navy’s one size fits all on uniforms
When I was in the army, I never much liked the skirt part of the Class A uniform (which was green then). The reason was pretty basic: If I wore the skirt, I had to wear those god-awful pumps. My feet are very wide, and anything pointed = bad, bad idea.
Women have always had two parts to the uniform, a pants and low quarters shoes version, and a skirt and pumps version. Now the Navy is now proposing to make all the uniforms for women look like the ones men wear, to make everyone look equal. But instead:
“By trying to hide female sailors and Marines in formation by putting them in male uniforms, it suggests that leaders are ashamed of women. Servicemen and women can be equal without having to wear the exact same uniform that, when it comes down to it, was designed for men, not women.”
The bad part is that the upper levels of leadership can’t see this. Speaks for how much the leadership still can’t relate to having women in the service. This is why it’s so important that more women get into the upper ranks where these decisions are made.
Filed under: Military Tagged: Military Women, Navy
June 27, 2016
What does a veteran look like?
I’ve seen a couple of these turn up over the last few days: A woman veteran uses one of the courtesy spots some merchants provide and gets a nasty note from anonymous person telling her she can’t park there because the parking spot is for veterans (read: men).
Once the soldier takes off the uniform, what exactly does that veteran look like?
They might be tall. They might be short.
They might be thin. They might be heavy.
They might wear a suit. Or they might wear a skirt.
Not all veterans are men.
Filed under: Military Tagged: Military Women, Women Veterans
June 26, 2016
Changes to the Blog
You’ve probably noticed some updates to the blog that are different.
Currently I have two websites, one over at http://www.linda-adams.com, and the blog. I built the .com like how I did David Hedison’s site. Same provider, too (which my brother recommended).
But when I published 13 books, I ran into some problems.
The first one was that web design takes a lot of time. That’s time NOT writing. I stopped doing David’s site because I wanted to do more writing.
I’m a writer, not a web designer. (Obligatory Star Trek quote.)
So I started using a template the host provided. They had plenty to choose from. But the template created the second problem: Their market is based on the assumption you might update the site a few times a year. The template is difficult and fussy to update, consuming about as much time if I were to design it myself.
So I’m looking to merge the two sites on this blog.
I bought a new domain name, http://www.lindamayeadams.com, which is already hooked up.
I’ve also begun blogging seven days a week. I’ve been having trouble with productivity, so I’m hoping the blog with joggle me into writing more on the fiction side..
Filed under: Thoughts Tagged: David Hedison, Star Trek
June 25, 2016
Wonder Woman for President
I watched the TV series Wonder Woman in it’s original run (The Mighty Isis was the first woman superhero to make TV). The series stared Lynda Carter, who had won Miss World USA.
I grew up reading a big book of the old Wonder Woman comics. The stunts in the TV show were awesome. Never got too violent; they were more of the showy, flashy ones that were typical of the 70s shows (Bionic Woman, Knight Rider, Six Million Dollar Man).
My favorite season was the second season. That’s where they brought the stories into the current era and introduced both spies and science fiction. Particularly memorable was one episode where David Hedison guest starred as a charming thief who romanced a queen (still one of my favorite performances of his). I always thought there was a sequel in there, but disappointingly not.
Now Lynda Carter is going to be playing the President of the United States on Supergirl! That’s going to be awesome.
Filed under: Entertainment, Lifestyle Tagged: Bionic Woman, David Hedison, Knight Rider, Lynda Carter, Six Million Dollar Man, Supergirl, The Mighty Isis, Wonder Woman
June 24, 2016
The case of the watermelon
Nothing says summer like seeing the first of those wedges of watermelon come out at the grocery store. That beautiful red fruit, dripping with juice. Yum!
I always like to buy one of those quarter wedges. It’s a huge piece of fruit, and a quarter wedge is about the right size so I can eat it before it goes bad.
This year, the grocery store I normally shop at is not offering wedges. They have the cut up water melon in the containers, which goes for something $5-$8 each, and some packaged pieces cut off, which is about a cup of watermelon. Also expensive.
So I went to store two, and they were just like store one.
Store three had the wedges.
Grocery stores, this just starts to feel like you’re ripping off the customer under the guise of “convenience.”
Filed under: Food Tagged: grocery stores, Shopping, Summer, watermelon
June 23, 2016
Good writing doesn’t exist before the 1950s?
I’m reading this writing craft-book. Pretty good book. It ventures into some non-traditional territory and I’m learning things from it.
Only one problem…
The writer only uses literary book examples that were published before the 1950s, plus his writing, of course.
As if nothing good was published after 1950 (except his writing).
When I was using critique as a form of learning, I would read a modern book and think, “This is terrible.” In fact, I’d started to come to the conclusion that book writing had gone downhill since I started reading.
One day, someone left some free books on the break tables at work. They were from the time when I thought books were a lot better. Not only that, it was a writer I remembered reading, so I grabbed the books.
Was surprisingly disappointed. The books weren’t that good, compared to today. We’d evolved, and in some really good ways.
I realized that I was reading so critically that I was destroying the pleasure of my reading experience. Last week, I was enjoying Lee Child’s new book, Make Me. Wish the writer had included best sellers from today. Lee Child’s pretty good at the skills the book was teaching.
Filed under: Writing Tagged: Fiction Writing, Lee Child
