Jen Black's Blog, page 10

Scanning the market

 

Seemed like a good idea to scan the market and see what's happening out there in the big wide world.

So I checked a few places and settled on :

11 Top Publishing Trends (2023-2025) (explodingtopics.com)

It's an interesting read. 

Snippets: audio-books are on the rise while sales of print books waned over the last decade.

Figures quoted: 2019 65% print and  25% ebook.

Ebook sales totalled $956million in sales, mostly with Amazon kindle.

Amazon has a new subsidiary ACX which will package and list an audio file for you.

Public libraries now offer digital content and the trend is up. Libraries are pushing the publisher rules about what they can and cannot provide. Way to go, libraries!

Read 11 Top Publishing Trends (2023-2025) (explodingtopics.com)  for more detail.

Not a cosy mystery

 I confessed I was about to try a new venture.

A cosy mystery, since I have got quite close to writing one with some of my historical romances.

I got the prologue done, and half of the first chapter and realised it wasn't a cosy mystery at all. Or rather, a good friend pointed out that if I have police in it, then its a police procedural and not a cosy.

I thought about eliminating the police and decided to plough on and see what turned up next. More and more it is becoming a  police procedural. The pathologist has arrived in the third chapter and I am curious to know if my local area has a mortuary used by Home Office pathologists. Then I discovered all pathologists especially the forensic type, are employed by the Home Office. Watching crime on tv and checking up can lead to some pretty dark corners. Who knew mortuaries advertised for body washers? 

I keep checking things on Google since I don't have any police people in the family. But facts about the police can be hard to find. They do not seek publicity. In fact, they do the precise opposite. My local police force are accused of not informing people of things they need to know.

However, I shall keep plodding on and hope to invent dialogue that does not plod, have my characters spring to life on the page and end up with something I can be proud of having created.. 

Walking is great!

 Nala has been here one week today.

Fitbit says she and I walked  5.06 miles on Monday, 

3.01 on tues, 

4.5 on wed,

4.49 on thurs 

and 3.69 miles today. We used up c.1500 calories (roughly) each day.  

That's 21 miles so far (and dh is doing about the same with her) and 1500 x 5 = 7,500 calories used up, so why am I still gaining weight?

Our holiday in Zermatt was good training as we have not walked much since Perla died in October.

Two New Things

 Two New Things.

I am experimenting with writing a cozy mystery. 

My understanding of this genre is that it might have a murder but the story does not have the blood and guts type of horror so often found in  the thriller genre. I am setting it locally to make it easy on myself, so there is no location research to do. It is a total rethink in style and very different to historical romances. 

The second new thing is my new dog. I had hoped Perla would be with me for a couple of years but she only managed 9 months. So now I have Nala, a five-year-old Dalmatian from SASS who has a huge need for cuddles and affection. We've just been out this morning and done a walk of 5,573 steps. She is very active and will want another walk this afternoon. She chases tennis balls and brings them back, which neither Perla nor Tim ever did.

Actually, there are Three New Things today, because dh is picking up his new car this afternoon. Another vehicle run by computers whereas my good old manual mini keeps chugging along at 22 years old and does everything the old-fashioned way!

Baby, its cold outside

Our freezer looked as if it was bleeding to death. 

There had been a power cut.

Luckily it wasn't blood but raspberry/cherry juice! It was also lucky that the outside temperature plus the inside-the-house temperature was very low. I think it had been hovering around 1 degree C, so very little had actually defrosted - apart from the soft fruit.

Just  returned from Zermatt, we abandoned our cases, ignored the mail on the door mat and started cooking various items. I think Bill made about six apple and soft fruits crumbles which we cooked and then froze again. I cooked pork chops, chicken, duck and beefburgers. Those we ate cold over the next few days. 

The house was freezing for the first day or so but we survived and soon got back to normal. I suppose we were used to the cold after a week in Zermatt with temperature as low as -9 degrees C.

By golly, it was wonderful.

Today  I am in Zermatt, Switzerland.

I've been here four days and my walking count is going up every day. Good news, especially at altitude of 5,000 plus feet. (Yes, I still think in old statistics.)

Enjoying family time with the grandchildren every afternoon because we are too old to risk our necks on the ski slopes now. Oh that we could, but it just isn't a good idea. One has to admit that one's muscles don't have the same strength as they once did, not to mention balance and reaction time, all of which could result in an accident to someone else, never mind us.  The in-between generation is carrying on the banner beautifully, and the kids are doing great.

Meanwhile, we explore the town, which is something we never had time to do when we were skiing. After a hard days skiing, we summoned up the effort required to get us into the lift and then to the Beau Site's swimming pool and that was it for an hour, not that we swam a lot. But the jacuzzi was excellent for pummelling those tired muscles. And floating weightless seemed to be just what we needed.

Tonight we had a wonderful meal. I ate Green Thai Lamb, and by golly, it was wonderful. A night to remember.

Making an Impact.

I am currently proof-reading The Cragstone Affair.

I first published this in 2015 as the Craigsmuir Affair and decided to unpublish and re-publish in e-book format with a new cover because the spelling of the original title always seemed to puzzle Amazon. (I haven't decided if print format is worth all the effort) As I've gone through the stages, I've removed a thousand or so words and improved the prose - as you do. Is editing ever really finished? This led me to consider the opening lines and wonder if they were good enough. Have I improved on my first lines, or not, in the last five years?

The truth is, I'm not sure. I knew what the story question was before I began - could a young Victorian woman achieve her dream of going to art school AND get happily married? I solved that one positively by the end of the story and gave her a mystery  to solve and a few adventures along the way.

I read somewhere that a mystery does not need a murder in the first few lines. A romance does not have to have to begin with a kiss, but the killer thing to remember is that most mysteries have a dead body at the end of the first chapter. (Believe me or not, that pun was unintentional.)

I had my mystery planted before the first chapter ended, so that was OK. But  when I begin a new story I now spend a long time thinking what the first line might be. Looking at the line I wrote way back eight or nine years ago, I don't think I did. If anything, I thought of the bigger picture, the fact that in paragraph two she falls down the stairs and lands in the arms of a stranger. I liked that, and still do. It is a visual beginning and readers might not like it, but it pleased me and I guess I'm stuck with it now.

Editing, anyone?

 I love editing!

It is always possible to improve on grammar, spelling and everything else, for no first draft is ever perfect. The third, fourth and fifth draft can always be improved, too. 

I usually read over the previous day's work and edit it, before I begin the day's writing, but I always find better ways to say something once the plot line is established. If half my attention is on the plot, then I am not fully focussed on the editing. 

But once I have got to the end, the editing is a doddle. The plot line is established and I can relax, go back to the beginning and simply read with full 100% attention. Then it is easy to turn awkward  phrases and clumsy sentences into graceful ones, spot the double spaces and missing punctuation. The more time that elapses, the easier the editing seems to become. 

I am currently "improving" The Craigsmuir Affair, which I published seven years ago. I'm enjoying every sentence. 

Made it in time!

 

Wishing you all a happy Christmas and a prosperous and healthy 2023

My new book has been published on Amazon! 

I made it just before Christmas!

The Styford Affair is set in Newcastle, very much my local city, and it was a pleasure to discover some of its history whilst doing research for Regency times in the area.

Lizzy must break free before it is too late…

Her odious guardian threatens to marry her in order to get his hands on her fortune. She flees Newcastle’s quayside, and rich landowner Lord Styford steps in to save her from disaster before handing her over to his mother. With hopes of turning this rough young woman into a cultured Regency beauty, Lady Styford befriends Lizzy. But her guardian tracks her down and trouble follows…

Whatever the cost…

Beautiful , quick-witted Lizzy considers handsome Lord Styford rather too high-handed for her liking, but Miss Tremaine, his ex-mistress, considers her a rival for his affections and goes too far leaving Styford injured and like to die. 

A young girl's coming of age is played out on the quayside and historic streets of Newcastle, and the surrounding countryside. Here is the links to amazon Kindle author central, where you will find all my titles listed, including the new one. Happy reading!

rb.gy/2dssa9 (UK)

 

Too much dialogue?

 Ask yourself -

Do I rely overmuch on dialogue? 

There’s a trick to handling dialogue. A story needs a narrative voice to anchor us in the story, to tell us who these characters are and how they relate to each other. Without that, we lack understanding of

a) what is going on (no context)

b) where they are (no description)

c) why they are having this discussion.(motivation)

It’s good to have a description of the surroundings which may or may not be important to the conversation. Since we cannot hear the voices, we miss out on clues such as dialect, tone, emotion.

The very first literary agent I ever applied to said bluntly, “You’ve forgotten the who, why, what, where and how.” (I think those are the words she used. It was at least fifteen years ago! But if I misremembered, I’m sure you get what she meant.)

If a reader has to go back and read every word three times over to get the sense of what is unfolding, they will give up from sheer exhaustion. So remember - just dialogue may look cute, but it will not do the entire
job.