Devorah Fox's Blog, page 51

Speed editing, continued

Here’s a line that I like from Chapter Four of my novel-in-progress:

Perhaps the lounge lizard look appealed to some women, but to Holly he looked like an overaged pool boy who’d watched too many reruns of The Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.

Editing my own work is a challenge but I did spot a point-of-view problem. I’m always critiquing other writing for POV problems so I’m glad I weeded one out of my own workg!

How hard can it be?

In the 1960’s Richard Mueller was a “pizza guy,” indeed, one of the “rising stars of the pizza industry” … more

Speed editing, continued

First line of Chapter 3 of the novel I’m editing:

She had to make it on time, she just had to! If she could get to the newspaper office before tomorrow’s—really, today’s!—edition went to press, she could splatter the front page with evidence of Moneywell, Inc.’s, shenanigans the same day their stock was to go public.

 

Speed editing, Day 2

White-hot light blasted in front of his closed eyelids.

That’s the first line of Chapter 2 of my work-in-progress novel.

In editing this, I’m pleased to find that I still like the story and am interested to see how it ends. You would think since I wrote it that I would know, and I do. What’s encouraging is that I’m still intrigued by how it gets there, so editing it is kinda fun.

Speed editing

“It’s not right what they want to do here,” Holly’s father Clark Rivera had written.
That’s the first line of my next novel.

I got a first draft going in June during Camp NaNoWriMo. I had been trying to get back to it and edit it into publishable shape all summer. Now it’s Fall and National Novel Writing Month starts in less than 30 days. I want to finish the book that I started in June so I can begin another on November 1. The coffee and the red ink will be flowing during this October editing marathon.

Vroom-vroom

[image error]The Lost King is a little less lost. He’s now in the diesel e-books store.
The book is in an ePub format so you can download it and read it on all types of devices: Android, iPhone or iPad, an e-reader or a computer.
Here’s a link: http://www.diesel-ebooks.com/item/SW00000230605/Fox-Devorah-The-Lost-King/1.html

This guy gets around, doesn’t he?

Port A writers find themselves in the soup

Three Port Aransas writers have found themselves in the soup. Chicken Soup, that is … more

Fun with EPUB

For the last couple of weeks I have been having lots of fun with EPUB.
No, EPUB is not a type of digital drinking establishment, although goodness knows at the end of the project I could have used a drink. EPUB is a type of file format for e-books.

What’s this EPUB stuff all about? You probably know that my novel, The Lost King, is available not only as a print edition (you can find it at the Port Aransas Art Center) but also on amazon.com as an electronic edition, i.e. a Kindle book. Those who don’t have a Kindle reader can download a “Kindle for PC” app and read Kindle books on their computer or laptop. There are also “Kindle for iPhone” and “Kindle for iPad” apps.

Kindle books are in a proprietary format whereas Nook and other e-books use a format called EPUB. In this format, there are no fixed pages like there are in print books, or even other digital formats. The EPUB format allows the book’s content to reflow based on the size of the e-reader. So an EPUB book will look good on an e-reader regardless of the device’s dimensions.

I had for some months intended to get The Lost King out in other ebook formats and on to smashwords.com. Smashwords is an e-book distribution platform. A book on Smashwords is made available to Nook, Kobo and numerous other e-book outlets in formats other than the one Kindle uses.

I was under the impression that my book needed to be in EPUB format in order to be available on Smashwords. I spent a good few days having fun with the EPUB conversion. It took four new programs and several colorful metaphors but I finally produced an attractive EPUB file. Head held high, I marched up to the Smashwords Web site to find that no, Smashwords does NOT want an EPUB file.

I uttered a few more imprecations, then told myself if nothing else I now had a new skill. I could do an EPUB file conversion.

Instead of an EPUB file Smashwords wants a Microsoft Word manuscript. Sounds easy, right? Hold on there, E-book Breath. This isn’t just any Microsoft Word manuscript. It’s one that’s formatted according to Smashwords’ 108-page style guide. The guide wasn’t cryptic or hard to follow, not at all. It WAS time consuming to format (or should I say de-format) my manuscript to meet the specs.

A week later I could proudly say that I had acquired ANOTHER new skill. I can now prep a manuscript that passes Smashwords’ Autovetter, the automated technology that inspects the manuscript for problematic formatting errors. Even better, The Lost King passed the reviewers’ assessments and is now in the Premium Catalog. It has been shipped and will soon be available on Nook, Kobo, Apple iBooks and other e-book sites. Watch this space for the announcement. (Or, if you find it before I do, let me know.)

The best kept secret in town

I had been in Coastal Cabinets many times but I cannot tell you how many times I drove by the expanded building, the Island Home Center, without stopping in… more

SPAMSPAMSPAMSPAMSPAM

The kids have gone back to school. The summer visitors have gone home. Our beaches are deserted and we can navigate Alister Street without having to dodge golf carts and jaywalking tourists. Summer is if not officially over, effectively over.
However, hurricane season is still in force. Thus far in 2012 we haven’t had that many storms come into the Gulf. Nevertheless we can’t relax our vigil. Hurricane season lasts officially until November 30, and the months of August and September are most active for us along the Gulf Coast. So I still have my hurricane preparedness kit at the ready: spare batteries, gallons of drinking water, candles and matches, instant coffee, a can of SPAM.

Every hurricane season I dutifully buy the recommended SPAM, although I’ve never known what it’s for. Maybe if a wind-propelled flying two-by-four happens to punch a hole in the wall, I’m to use a can of SPAM to plug it up? Perhaps I’m to make a line of SPAM cans into a levee to keep high water from seeping under the door? In any case, at the end of hurricane season, I give away my unused SPAM to the food pantry.

Until now. When Hurricane Isaac was threatening the Gulf States, the subject of hurricane preparedness came up in conversation.

“Not to worry,” I said. “I have all the required supplies, including a can of SPAM.”

“You have SPAM in the house?” came the reply. “I love SPAM! Let’s eat!”

Eat? You’re supposed to eat it? Apparently so. Here are two ways to enjoy SPAM, courtesy of Sir SPAMalot.

SPAMbled Eggs (for two)

You will need: a can of SPAM, four eggs, an onion, butter, milk, ground mustard, salt and pepper. Dice four slices of SPAM and half an onion. Melt a tablespoon of butter in a skillet. Brown the diced SPAM and onion in the butter. Beat the four eggs. Add a quarter of a teaspoon ground mustard, a splash of milk and salt and pepper to taste. Microwave the egg mixture for two minutes on HIGH. Fluff up the eggs and mix in the SPAM and onions. Serve.

 and

SPAMwich (for one)

You will need: a slice of SPAM, two slices of bread (white, wheat or oat bread are fine but don’t use strong-flavored bread like rye or raisin). Put the slice of SPAM between the two slices of bread. Serve.

Here are some tasty tidbits of SPAM lore to enjoy while you munch:

SPAM is made by the Hormel Foods Corporation. First introduced in 1937, it’s canned precooked meat: The name is a combination of the words “spice” and “ham.” The labeled ingredients in the classic variety of SPAM are chopped pork shoulder meat, with ham meat added, salt, water, a binder and a preservative. The little bit of glaze in the can forms when the meat stock cools.

At the end of World War II, Hormel Foods assembled a troupe of ex-G.I. women to promote the consumption of SPAM as “patriotic.” The Hormel Girls grew to a troupe of 60 women including a 16-piece orchestra. They had a radio show.

Also during the Second World War, SPAM became popular in the United Kingdom, largely due to food rationing. A factory in Liverpool was licensed to produce SPAM which previously had all been made in Minnesota and Nebraska.

Residents of the state of Hawaii, the territories of Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands consume the most SPAM per person in the U.S. Fast food restaurants there have SPAM on the menu.

In Minnesota, there is a restaurant where the menu is devoted exclusively to SPAM. In 1970, the British comedy show “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” included a sketch wherein SPAM was an ingredient in every dish offered in a café. The sketch gave rise to the use of the name SPAM to describe ubiquitous, unavoidable and undesirable electronic communications.

If you need some SPAM for breakfast or a SPAMwich or any of the numerous recipes that you can find on www.spam.com (SPAM Musubi, anyone?) or just for your hurricane preparedness kit, you can find it at the supermarket in several flavors including low sodium, spicy, lite, hickory smoke, oven-roasted turkey, bacon and cheese. It’s available as a spread and in single-serving packs.