Jordan Castillo Price's Blog, page 81

Packing Heat 104: Who's that Guy?

Who's that Guy? I was watching a movie with someone who turned to me during the last scene and said, "Who's that guy?" about the main character. Holy hell, don't let that happen in your story!

My friend asked on her blog what pulls readers out of stories, and one of the participants mentioned that she loses interest in stories where she keeps getting the characters mixed up. On one hand, it might seem as if naming the characters very distinct and different things would help this issue. But I...

An analysis of our ebook talk

As I gathered up responses to my question about what you all wish for in an ebook, I mentioned that I was happy so many readers mentioned good proofreading and quality control.

And then a few people chimed in and said, "Well, I thought that was assumed!"

(I'm smiling as I type this, by the way, because I really am fascinated. Wouldn't it be fun if we were all in a big room together having an in-depth, face to face conversation? I'm imagining a room with free snacks.)

The top three issues were:
Go...

Winnahs!

You all rock--thanks for your awesome response on my question. I was pleasantly surprised that editing/proofreading factored high on so many people's ebook priorities, because that's something that's always been important to me, too. I might not catch every single error, but I'll damn well try my best! (I also don't do it by myself. The talented neyronrose  proofs and edits.)

Since the information and feedback you've all given is so valuable, I decided I should give out 10 copies of Betweentime...

Glad there are no stupid questions

Yay for me, I succesfully upgraded from Leopard to Snow Leopard and from CS4 to CS5. Then I futzed around with typesetting an ebook--for a really long time because Indesign was kinda different. And I went for the magical "export to epub" command, only to discover that the epub file it made sucked. Okay, no problem. I futzed some more. It still sucked. I decided there had to be a better way, downloaded the freeware eCub and played with that, decided that while it make a pretty nice epub file, ...

Wait, there's something on the teletype...

My Packing Heat listeners know I'm endeavoring to improve my reading speed with the book 10 Days to Faster Reading. And yes, I'm well aware of how befitting it is that it's taken me about two months to get through the thing.

Anyway, I'm in the final stretch of the book, and there's a checklist of reading behaviors the book is encouraging me to go through and see if I want to focus on any of them for future self improvement. One of the items is,
"I will resist the temptation to check on incomin...

Packing Heat 103: Titles

Packing Heat is a podcast I've been putting out since 2008. My goal is to help other writers stay motivated, and to encourage them to take their writing to the next level. You don't need special gadgets to listen; Packing Heat plays in your browser, like YouTube. Or you can subscribe (and leave me glowing feedback) at iTunes!

YAY
Longtime Packing Heat listener Silver is graduating. Yay!
Hemovore came out in paperback last week. Yay!

Blows My Mind
This lecture by Merlin Mann blew my mind. 1 ...

Virtual Cookies are Best!

Thank you so much for the milk & cookies, Andy, Ali and Elisa! 

Virtual cookies are best. I'm going to see if I can trim down a bit now that I have the house to myself. My body's rhythms seem to be okay with working out mid-morning and having a tiny nap mid-afternoon. Shocking about that nap thing. I've never been a napper.

Flatulence Molecules?

Sorry...I can't not-post this.

Sometimes being single is awesome. No need for one of these.

Packing Heat 102: Fleshing Out

Packing Heat is a podcast I've been putting out since 2008. My goal is to help other writers stay motivated, and to encourage them to take their writing to the next level. You don't need special gadgets to listen; Packing Heat plays in your browser, like YouTube. These are this week's show notes:
(ps - I usually post on Wednesday morning but I'm experimenting with posting Tuesday night so my morning is open for writing!)
Yay!
Nobilis' book Scouts is out in paperback at the end of this month. Pre...

Titling Fiction

Hey, gang!

I'm stuck on the title of a short story and I'm curious, do any of you have unusual ways of generating titles for your stories?

What are some of the things you keep in mind while choosing your title? What's important to you?

I may use some of your responses in Packing Heat if I get enough ideas to carry a whole episode :-)