Ruth Nestvold's Blog, page 22

Digging Deeper Into Author Earnings

Ruth Nestvold:

An interesting analysis of the influential Author Earnings reports by the very savvy Phoenix Sullivan.

Originally posted on David Gaughran:

The Author Earnings team are attempting to do something which hasn’t been done before, and their work can’t be refined and improved unless there is some intelligent criticism of their approach and findings.

Today I’ve invited Phoenix Sullivan to blog on the topic. I’ve known Phoenix for a few years now, and if there’s a smarter person in p...

The search for the apple for WIPpet Wednesday

In the last week and a half, I have managed to delete about 3000 words in notes and unnecessary scenes from Shards of Glass. Once I finished that task, I started added new (and hopefully better!) words this week. After having been up to 16,000 words, Shards is now coming in at 14,100. Progress is once again being made!

Of course, most of my time is being spent on the translation. I still want to devote a post to that relating to our recent trip, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet. Maybe s...

“10 Tips for Choosing the Right Book Title” via Anne R. Allen

I just read an excellent article on book titles in the ebook age that I had to share with readers of this blog. Take for example all the great advice in Tip #3 alone:

3) Study Titles that Work

Here are some title categories that are “tried and true.”

The hero’s name
This is the oldest type of title in the book, literally. A title simply stating the name of the protagonist has been around since the birth of the novel. Names made up the most common titles in early fiction. From Don Quixote,...

Cover creation advice according to genre, via Freebooksy

Freebooksy posted an interesting visual analysis of successful book covers by genre today:

http://www.freebooksy.com/create-best-selling-cover/

Unfortunately, fantasy is not one of the genres for which they provide examples of successful covers. And in the “paranormal” category, they throw in Steampunk, which wasn’t exactly paranormal last time I checked. *g*

Despite that, the article is definitely worth a look. Even if using their advice is no guarantee of success. Example: according to th...

Back to Facets of Glass for #WIPpet Wednesday

I’m slowly getting back into a productive routine again after the disruption of travel and then recovering from jet lag. The translation is going well, and I’ve also gotten back to writing and marketing, organizing several new promos for my books in recent and upcoming weeks. I’m also submitting short stories to traditional markets again — something I have to do more of.

Quantifying the writing, on the other hand, is a bit more difficult. I’ve done a lot of work in hard copy, trying to map o...

Shards of Glass for #WIPpet Wednesday, and a request for feedback on the cover

Hi again, everyone! Long time, no read. :)

While I was off visiting relatives, assisting with deck building, doing garden work in the garden of my daughter’s new house, and eating fresh crab, the nearly final cover of the third Glassmakers book arrived in my inbox.

I’m pretty happy with how it looks, but my cover designer agreed to allow me to run it past my readers on my blog and Facebook before finalizing it. Unfortunately, I haven’t had a lot of time for blogging in the last few weeks,...

Villa Diodati 14 (and 13 too … )

VD14

A little over a week before we flew to the States to visit relatives, I got back from the most recent incarnation of the Villa Diodati workshop. VD14 was once again in southern Spain, but probably for the last time, since we are losing our venue, unfortunately. Ah well. We will find other cool places to meet, I am sure.

This workshop was one of the biggest we’ve had, with ten participants.

Front row: Sylvia Spruck Wrigley, Ruth Nestvold, Grayson Morris, Christian Walter, Jeremy Sim
Ba...

The sadly rabid puppies: Link update

I’ve been hanging out with friends and family I don’t see very often, so I haven’t been following the whole sock puppies scandal very closely. But it keeps cropping up on various discussion threads and lists I’m on, and I can’t help but reading up on the scandal. Here are some of the better posts I’ve come across in recent days.

My Clarion West instructor George R.R. Martin wrote an excellent summary on why the sad puppies are rather deluded regarding their feeling of being excluded by the n...

Second quarter goals

I got a bit sidetracked yesterday by the hijacking of the Hugo Awards for SFF, which I wrote about in my last post. Now that is off my chest, I can get back to business: my goals for the next quarter.

For the next couple of weeks, this list and my blog will be largely on hiatus while I try to catch up with relatives on another continent.

Writing:

Write an average of 2500 words a week.

Finish Shards of Glass (that btw is not the final cover, so any and all comments and suggestions welcome...

The Hijacked Hugo Awards, 2015: New Tales of Beset Manhood

Well, that at least was what I intended to do when I first found out what was behind the exceedingly odd list of Hugo nominations this year. What, no Asimov’s? No F&SF, Strange Horizons, Interzone, or any of the other big names besides Analog? And who in the blue blazes is this John C. Wright person, who has THREE nominations in the novella category, as well as one each in short story and novelette? I cannot think of a single heavy-hitter in SFF in my lifetime who has dominated the ballot t...