K.S. Nikakis's Blog, page 5
October 17, 2016
Why you should NaNo
NaNoWriMo approaches. Should you bother? This is a whole month of your time ensuring you reach your 1666 or thereabouts word counts of your draft novel per day. For what?
As of Oct 2013, I had never heard of NaNoWriMo. A few days prior, I had been conned into participating. 'Conned' because the conners actually didn't do it. But I did, and at the end of November I had around 55,000 words of a novel that had been lingering in my head for a lot of years. This became The Third Moon.
Mind you, it took me another year to get it to pitch stage. Satalyte Press picked it up and its due out any time now, and definitely before the end of 2016.
The Third Moon had been in my head for many years but when I fronted up again in 2014, I had no ideas for a stand alone at all - but two long standing projects interrupted by NaNo 2013.
My challenge was whether I could conjure ideas on command, as well as write the novel over the 30 days again. It turned out that I could. It became my first ebook, soon to be pbook, The Emerald Serpent https://amzn.com/B016GGTUXO
So, in answer to my original question: Should you bother? The answer is yes.
It will make you write that book you were meaning to get around to and it might show that you can write a book you hadn't even thought of.
As of Oct 2013, I had never heard of NaNoWriMo. A few days prior, I had been conned into participating. 'Conned' because the conners actually didn't do it. But I did, and at the end of November I had around 55,000 words of a novel that had been lingering in my head for a lot of years. This became The Third Moon.
Mind you, it took me another year to get it to pitch stage. Satalyte Press picked it up and its due out any time now, and definitely before the end of 2016.
The Third Moon had been in my head for many years but when I fronted up again in 2014, I had no ideas for a stand alone at all - but two long standing projects interrupted by NaNo 2013.
My challenge was whether I could conjure ideas on command, as well as write the novel over the 30 days again. It turned out that I could. It became my first ebook, soon to be pbook, The Emerald Serpent https://amzn.com/B016GGTUXO
So, in answer to my original question: Should you bother? The answer is yes.
It will make you write that book you were meaning to get around to and it might show that you can write a book you hadn't even thought of.
October 9, 2016
Works in Progress (WiPs)
Hi writers and readers
I note from the date that I've not blogged for some time. Lots of things happening in my life which required attention, but I've been writing away, so time to report.
My first ebook The Emerald Serpent was launched on Amazon in Oct 2015 and I've just launched my second, Heart Hunter, in Oct 2016. I hadn't realised a whole year had gone until I glanced at the dates today.
Despite being launched, these remain WiPs. I have been navigating CreateSpace with The Emerald Serpent to produce my first pbook, and I'm almost there. Up to second proof stage.
As I am now an independent publisher, it is up to me to ensure my books are top quality and mistake free, and this takes time. So, the ebook The Emerald Serpent remains a WiP because I've noticed small glitches which I have fixed and uploaded. One of the great benefits of epublishing is that you can take immediate action to fix any errors.
The other great benefit is that you learn great new skills. Getting Heart Hunter onto Amazon took far less time than The Emerald Serpent. Heart Hunter will also be a pbook but when it has time to settle and when The Emerald Serpent is shiny, new and done. Of course there is the need to use other platforms like Smashwords to increase outlets, but I prefer to bed down my learning and do things well, rather than quickly.
So, one ebook and one pbook for 2016! But wait! There's more! Satalyte Press will be releasing The Third Moon this year as well. I have been lucky to have a hybrid mix and have a great commercial publisher like Satalyte Press take on this other project.
With The Emerald Serpent at proof stage with the pbook, and Heart Hunter newly launched, I've finally got back to my Angel series begun in 2013. The first of the trilogy: Angel Blood, should be out as an ebook this year as the manuscript is at final edit. Book 2 is at an earlier draft stage, so I'm guessing by mid 2017 for that one, and Book 3 by year's end. I will update you on my progress.
Cheers
I note from the date that I've not blogged for some time. Lots of things happening in my life which required attention, but I've been writing away, so time to report.
My first ebook The Emerald Serpent was launched on Amazon in Oct 2015 and I've just launched my second, Heart Hunter, in Oct 2016. I hadn't realised a whole year had gone until I glanced at the dates today.
Despite being launched, these remain WiPs. I have been navigating CreateSpace with The Emerald Serpent to produce my first pbook, and I'm almost there. Up to second proof stage.
As I am now an independent publisher, it is up to me to ensure my books are top quality and mistake free, and this takes time. So, the ebook The Emerald Serpent remains a WiP because I've noticed small glitches which I have fixed and uploaded. One of the great benefits of epublishing is that you can take immediate action to fix any errors.
The other great benefit is that you learn great new skills. Getting Heart Hunter onto Amazon took far less time than The Emerald Serpent. Heart Hunter will also be a pbook but when it has time to settle and when The Emerald Serpent is shiny, new and done. Of course there is the need to use other platforms like Smashwords to increase outlets, but I prefer to bed down my learning and do things well, rather than quickly.
So, one ebook and one pbook for 2016! But wait! There's more! Satalyte Press will be releasing The Third Moon this year as well. I have been lucky to have a hybrid mix and have a great commercial publisher like Satalyte Press take on this other project.
With The Emerald Serpent at proof stage with the pbook, and Heart Hunter newly launched, I've finally got back to my Angel series begun in 2013. The first of the trilogy: Angel Blood, should be out as an ebook this year as the manuscript is at final edit. Book 2 is at an earlier draft stage, so I'm guessing by mid 2017 for that one, and Book 3 by year's end. I will update you on my progress.
Cheers
March 19, 2016
Heart Hunter progress
I have been involved in a rewrite of The Hunter Duology that I've now decided to keep as one book and stick with the title of Heart Hunter. As I've blogged before, this began as a Ph.D, where it had to demonstrated Campbell's 17 part hero quest, applied to a female hero. The thesis taught me something very important about how we interpret narratives, which is through a patriarchal lense. Thus, the so-called strong female heroes often touted as role models, are often men in drag.
A strong female hero is not a woman who kills as well as a man, or is as callous, or as ruthless, or is the same as the way the male hero is traditionally constructed. A female hero is one whose traditional female attributes of nurturing and connection are exulted as being just as noble and powerful as sword skill or political cunning.
When I was writing the thesis, I had a moment of despair when the male hero had to rescue the female hero, thus bringing the structure back to the traditional interpretation. Luckily the despair was followed by an insight that has guided my writing since: that the female hero commonly rescues the male hero emotionally, thus making him a fully-formed human being. This is what myths tells us over and over again: the hero must overcome his demons (the dragon), to rescue the damsel (his female elements [anima in Jungian terms]), who he then marries (accepts and assimilates) to live happily ever after.
One of the benefits of working on a story for a long time (the Ph.D dates from 1997) is that you come to recognise elements that weren't apparent in earlier versions. I've dabbled with this story on and off for years now, and it's been rejected by all the usual publishers. There has always been enough grist to persevere though, and launching #TheEmeraldSerpent on Amazon in 2015, has given me an avenue to let it live in the public arena.
As a deep fantasy writer, I am now critically reviewing the elements in the earlier version that give it the subtextual power I'm interested in. Myths often use water as a motif of the unconscious, and water is central to Heart Hunter.
The delay of the season of snowmelt, leaving the Sceadu's streams empty of water and fish, is instrumental in Chant's quest. The fact that Chant can't swim predisposes her to step in the bear trap, and that in turn forces her to accept the name the Sceadu's shamanic leader has plucked from the void for her.
Her need to cross rivers also means she must trust Tel, her other half, and complement in terms of lack. Eg Chant considers herself to be mature and ready to marry (the Shaman disagrees); Tel is too immature to risk himself emotionally (yet the Sunnen Elders believe he is excellent husband material).
Chant's quest is to bring water back to her people, but there is a second more important quest revealed at the end. The motif of water and ice, its congealed form, mirror Chant and Tel's states, and its ability to manifest in more than one state, is central to the narrative--a point I will explore in later blogs.
A strong female hero is not a woman who kills as well as a man, or is as callous, or as ruthless, or is the same as the way the male hero is traditionally constructed. A female hero is one whose traditional female attributes of nurturing and connection are exulted as being just as noble and powerful as sword skill or political cunning.
When I was writing the thesis, I had a moment of despair when the male hero had to rescue the female hero, thus bringing the structure back to the traditional interpretation. Luckily the despair was followed by an insight that has guided my writing since: that the female hero commonly rescues the male hero emotionally, thus making him a fully-formed human being. This is what myths tells us over and over again: the hero must overcome his demons (the dragon), to rescue the damsel (his female elements [anima in Jungian terms]), who he then marries (accepts and assimilates) to live happily ever after.
One of the benefits of working on a story for a long time (the Ph.D dates from 1997) is that you come to recognise elements that weren't apparent in earlier versions. I've dabbled with this story on and off for years now, and it's been rejected by all the usual publishers. There has always been enough grist to persevere though, and launching #TheEmeraldSerpent on Amazon in 2015, has given me an avenue to let it live in the public arena.
As a deep fantasy writer, I am now critically reviewing the elements in the earlier version that give it the subtextual power I'm interested in. Myths often use water as a motif of the unconscious, and water is central to Heart Hunter.
The delay of the season of snowmelt, leaving the Sceadu's streams empty of water and fish, is instrumental in Chant's quest. The fact that Chant can't swim predisposes her to step in the bear trap, and that in turn forces her to accept the name the Sceadu's shamanic leader has plucked from the void for her.
Her need to cross rivers also means she must trust Tel, her other half, and complement in terms of lack. Eg Chant considers herself to be mature and ready to marry (the Shaman disagrees); Tel is too immature to risk himself emotionally (yet the Sunnen Elders believe he is excellent husband material).
Chant's quest is to bring water back to her people, but there is a second more important quest revealed at the end. The motif of water and ice, its congealed form, mirror Chant and Tel's states, and its ability to manifest in more than one state, is central to the narrative--a point I will explore in later blogs.
February 10, 2016
The value of second hand bookshops
Haven't blogged for a little while as I have been involved in judging the excellent #AurealisAwards. This turned out to be a bigger task than I imagined, and as the awards have yet to be announced, I can't comment further on them now.
One of the things I did recently while holidaying in Port Fairy (Victoria) was to visit the excellent #TheBookwormGallery in Koroit.
This store is a mix of second hand books and paintings, but mainly books. My other half did as he always does and searched the shelves for old copies of #TheKiraChronicles. I had the rights reverted to me in 2013 but its still out there in digital land and print copies also turn up in odd places such as in second hand book stores--never the whole trilogy though.
I imagine having incomplete trilogies is a commercial nuisance for second hand bookstores, but when the owner, Dennis Melbourne, realised I was an author, he made feel anything but a nuisance. His warmth, enthusiasm and interest in my works was genuine. One of the advantages of having #TheEmeraldSerpent book trailer on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGpKx... was that I was able to bring it up on my phone to show him.
Very occasionally I have gone into bookshops to search for my books, and dealt with people who might just as well have been selling potatoes, but this experience is rare. Most times there is genuine pleasure and excitement in meeting an author, and a very real wish that your books do well.
I finished my visit by #TheBookwormGallery by buying a beautiful, colour-plated recipe book by Mary Berry ( of The Great British Bake-off fame), at $5:00 and in as new condition, a great bargain. If you visit Koroit, drop in to Dennis's store and have a chat.
One of the things I did recently while holidaying in Port Fairy (Victoria) was to visit the excellent #TheBookwormGallery in Koroit.
This store is a mix of second hand books and paintings, but mainly books. My other half did as he always does and searched the shelves for old copies of #TheKiraChronicles. I had the rights reverted to me in 2013 but its still out there in digital land and print copies also turn up in odd places such as in second hand book stores--never the whole trilogy though.
I imagine having incomplete trilogies is a commercial nuisance for second hand bookstores, but when the owner, Dennis Melbourne, realised I was an author, he made feel anything but a nuisance. His warmth, enthusiasm and interest in my works was genuine. One of the advantages of having #TheEmeraldSerpent book trailer on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGpKx... was that I was able to bring it up on my phone to show him.
Very occasionally I have gone into bookshops to search for my books, and dealt with people who might just as well have been selling potatoes, but this experience is rare. Most times there is genuine pleasure and excitement in meeting an author, and a very real wish that your books do well.
I finished my visit by #TheBookwormGallery by buying a beautiful, colour-plated recipe book by Mary Berry ( of The Great British Bake-off fame), at $5:00 and in as new condition, a great bargain. If you visit Koroit, drop in to Dennis's store and have a chat.
November 28, 2015
The Emerald Serpent Book Trailer
Video Trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGpKx...
The relationship between words and images is in the front of my mind at the moment. The whole notion incorporates the sort of book cover that best portrays what a book is about, and because I have been working on a book trailer with #DaleAlexander of #ZeroCutEntertainment, what sort of moving images best represent a book. What has emerged is how differently the two mediums work and by extension, how differently visual practitioners work, at least to me as a writer.
I am a highly visual writer, that is, I can get a whole lot of dialogue, or a story plot from seeing a single picture, or an ad. on TV or an excerpt from a film or series. Even without this stimulus, when I'm discovering a story in my head, I'm doing it visually. I can see the characters (and physically experience their emotional ups and downs.) I might add that a single word can trigger a story too, as 'sceadu' did for #TheHunterDuology but part of the attraction of 'sceadu' apart from its multiple meanings, is that it is visually (as well as phonically) pleasing.
I had a good idea of the type of cover I wanted for #TheEmeraldSerpent and worked with #AndreasNikakis to create it, but as we moved through the process, it became apparent that my visual skills (ie what effect the visuals would elicit from the viewer) were far less than Andreas's. I knew when we had reached the right effect, but he knew how to get there. Of course, there are a lot of other things to consider with a book cover, especially for a book that begins its life in the digital world. These include 'discoverability' and of course, generating enough viewer interest to prompt downloads. The title, blurb and tags are important here as well.
I have seen some superb book trailers which are as good as, or sometimes better than, film trailers and knew they cost many thousands of dollars to make, so had always thought them beyond me. However when #ZeroCutEntertainment showed me one they had produced and offered the same service, I leapt at the opportunity. Costs are kept down by working with stock images and music, and I was keen to see whether these could capture the essence of #TheEmeraldSerpent.
Dale sent me drafts as he went and we've been emailing back and forth over the weeks. It was fairly quick to find an image for Cormac, and although it wasn't like Willy Cartier, who I had in my head from early on (when I happened to see an image of him online), it captured Cormac's essence. This is when I began to realise that the book trailer would work in more of an impressionist, intuitive way; that the music and images would evoke an emotional response, and it was this emotional response that needed to accurately reflect the emotions of the story rather than accurately replicate the looks of the protagonists.
Even so, finding an image for Etaine has been much more difficult. She has the honed face of a hunter; cropped hair and the desperation of someone so damaged that her only motivation for keeping going is to kill the enemy, not to nurture herself. She is beautiful too, as all the Eadar are. The image we've settled on isn't beautiful, but it has the right feel which is incredibly important.
One of the things I was conscious of in writing #TheEmeraldSerpent was that it was Etaine's story, rather than Cormac's. I didn't want him to suddenly take over: as a leader or a lover, and yet the trailer very much centres on Cormac--as it should.
So, after being so determined that #TheEmeraldSerpent must remain Etaine's story, why am I content for the trailer to focus on Cormac? Because I realised, after viewing the trailer multiple times, that it is an excerpt of the story which has picked up on one of the story's central themes: that for things to be resolved and Etaine to be healed, Cormac must Remember. And the trailer shows this so well!
The trailer to #TheEmeraldSerpent is still in production but I'll be sharing the links as soon as it is good to go.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGpKx...
The relationship between words and images is in the front of my mind at the moment. The whole notion incorporates the sort of book cover that best portrays what a book is about, and because I have been working on a book trailer with #DaleAlexander of #ZeroCutEntertainment, what sort of moving images best represent a book. What has emerged is how differently the two mediums work and by extension, how differently visual practitioners work, at least to me as a writer.
I am a highly visual writer, that is, I can get a whole lot of dialogue, or a story plot from seeing a single picture, or an ad. on TV or an excerpt from a film or series. Even without this stimulus, when I'm discovering a story in my head, I'm doing it visually. I can see the characters (and physically experience their emotional ups and downs.) I might add that a single word can trigger a story too, as 'sceadu' did for #TheHunterDuology but part of the attraction of 'sceadu' apart from its multiple meanings, is that it is visually (as well as phonically) pleasing.
I had a good idea of the type of cover I wanted for #TheEmeraldSerpent and worked with #AndreasNikakis to create it, but as we moved through the process, it became apparent that my visual skills (ie what effect the visuals would elicit from the viewer) were far less than Andreas's. I knew when we had reached the right effect, but he knew how to get there. Of course, there are a lot of other things to consider with a book cover, especially for a book that begins its life in the digital world. These include 'discoverability' and of course, generating enough viewer interest to prompt downloads. The title, blurb and tags are important here as well.
I have seen some superb book trailers which are as good as, or sometimes better than, film trailers and knew they cost many thousands of dollars to make, so had always thought them beyond me. However when #ZeroCutEntertainment showed me one they had produced and offered the same service, I leapt at the opportunity. Costs are kept down by working with stock images and music, and I was keen to see whether these could capture the essence of #TheEmeraldSerpent.
Dale sent me drafts as he went and we've been emailing back and forth over the weeks. It was fairly quick to find an image for Cormac, and although it wasn't like Willy Cartier, who I had in my head from early on (when I happened to see an image of him online), it captured Cormac's essence. This is when I began to realise that the book trailer would work in more of an impressionist, intuitive way; that the music and images would evoke an emotional response, and it was this emotional response that needed to accurately reflect the emotions of the story rather than accurately replicate the looks of the protagonists.
Even so, finding an image for Etaine has been much more difficult. She has the honed face of a hunter; cropped hair and the desperation of someone so damaged that her only motivation for keeping going is to kill the enemy, not to nurture herself. She is beautiful too, as all the Eadar are. The image we've settled on isn't beautiful, but it has the right feel which is incredibly important.
One of the things I was conscious of in writing #TheEmeraldSerpent was that it was Etaine's story, rather than Cormac's. I didn't want him to suddenly take over: as a leader or a lover, and yet the trailer very much centres on Cormac--as it should.
So, after being so determined that #TheEmeraldSerpent must remain Etaine's story, why am I content for the trailer to focus on Cormac? Because I realised, after viewing the trailer multiple times, that it is an excerpt of the story which has picked up on one of the story's central themes: that for things to be resolved and Etaine to be healed, Cormac must Remember. And the trailer shows this so well!
The trailer to #TheEmeraldSerpent is still in production but I'll be sharing the links as soon as it is good to go.
November 23, 2015
Launching - why you should do it
Sending #TheEmeraldSerpent out on its own as an ebook on Amazon has been an interesting and, I might add, an exciting experience. By 'on its own' I mean that I've done no presales publicity; no guest blogging to promote it; no advertising and my website remains in pre-launch stage. Thus I do not have email lists to do mail outs to; nor have I appeared at events such as SupaNova to promote it; nor have I approached a 'New York Times best-selling author' (although I know one) for an endorsement. This should be a death wish in making sales, and maybe it will be, but it is the way I've begun, and making a beginning is crucial.
Between a long commute to work each day, and working full time, I decided to devote my time to launching the best quality book I could. Figuring out how Amazon works is an ongoing task, and time consuming, the recent conferences I've attended: #Conflux, #GenreCon and especially #thesmallpressnetwork have added more complexity to the mix.
Important to consider is that, once launched, #TheEmeraldSerpent will remain available. Unlike a commercially produced pbook, it will not disappear from bookstores, cease being promoted by the publisher, or be remaindered.
Also, unlike a commercially published pbook, Amazon allows me to see exactly when and where I've sold #TheEmeraldSerpent and that is exciting.
Some folks see Amazon as akin to Satan, especially their various 'library' systems, while others warn of the 'meat-grinder' of getting books through Smashwords' systems. There are other aggregators out there now too, and lots of systems for Print on Demand (POD). Exploring how each of these systems work, and whether one is better than another, is again very time consuming, and as I've said, I'm very time poor.
One of the subjects discussed at #GenreCon was the 'five book theory', that is, you need at least 5 books out to build sales momentum. This seems logical to me. While #TheKiraChronicles means I'm not a complete unknown, I'm close to being so. I've had the rights back to #TheKiraChronicles since 2013 and haven't published any fiction since then, but I've continued to write, so have a lot of stories I am readying for launch.
My next ebooks are my #HunterDuology - #HeartHunter and #RainHunter which will be out early next year. In the same period I want to have #TheEmeraldSerpent available as a POD book too, another thing I have to learn how to do to create a professional product.
So, having done absolutely none of the things the wise author-marketer should do, how has #TheEmeraldSerpent fared? It went live around Oct 11, and up till today, Nov 24, it has been bought by 16 people: 10 off the Oz site; 2 off the UK site; and 4 off the US site. Most of the 10, if not all are family and friends; as is one off the UK site. Not sure about the US site, because I've learned buyers can buy off overseas sites from Australia. Of course I hope the US sales are in the US, and that they know Steven Spielberg well, and will gush onto him about my superb book!
There have been borrowings from the KDP Select Library too, but I don't yet have a report on how many. It looks like 1 or 2 by the pages read.
For anyone whose thinking of launching their first ebook, my advice is to get on and do it, but spend as much time as possible making it into a professional product. You might be lucky enough to have a lot of time on your hands to do all the marketing things you should be doing before launch, but if not, the danger is that there will never be a right time to make your story accessible to readers.
At least sixteen people have now read my book (or will do, I hope). If I was still worrying about my marketing this book would still be sitting in my files, and no story, no matter how wonderful, ever comes alive until it goes out into the world and gets read. So - happy launching.
Between a long commute to work each day, and working full time, I decided to devote my time to launching the best quality book I could. Figuring out how Amazon works is an ongoing task, and time consuming, the recent conferences I've attended: #Conflux, #GenreCon and especially #thesmallpressnetwork have added more complexity to the mix.
Important to consider is that, once launched, #TheEmeraldSerpent will remain available. Unlike a commercially produced pbook, it will not disappear from bookstores, cease being promoted by the publisher, or be remaindered.
Also, unlike a commercially published pbook, Amazon allows me to see exactly when and where I've sold #TheEmeraldSerpent and that is exciting.
Some folks see Amazon as akin to Satan, especially their various 'library' systems, while others warn of the 'meat-grinder' of getting books through Smashwords' systems. There are other aggregators out there now too, and lots of systems for Print on Demand (POD). Exploring how each of these systems work, and whether one is better than another, is again very time consuming, and as I've said, I'm very time poor.
One of the subjects discussed at #GenreCon was the 'five book theory', that is, you need at least 5 books out to build sales momentum. This seems logical to me. While #TheKiraChronicles means I'm not a complete unknown, I'm close to being so. I've had the rights back to #TheKiraChronicles since 2013 and haven't published any fiction since then, but I've continued to write, so have a lot of stories I am readying for launch.
My next ebooks are my #HunterDuology - #HeartHunter and #RainHunter which will be out early next year. In the same period I want to have #TheEmeraldSerpent available as a POD book too, another thing I have to learn how to do to create a professional product.
So, having done absolutely none of the things the wise author-marketer should do, how has #TheEmeraldSerpent fared? It went live around Oct 11, and up till today, Nov 24, it has been bought by 16 people: 10 off the Oz site; 2 off the UK site; and 4 off the US site. Most of the 10, if not all are family and friends; as is one off the UK site. Not sure about the US site, because I've learned buyers can buy off overseas sites from Australia. Of course I hope the US sales are in the US, and that they know Steven Spielberg well, and will gush onto him about my superb book!
There have been borrowings from the KDP Select Library too, but I don't yet have a report on how many. It looks like 1 or 2 by the pages read.
For anyone whose thinking of launching their first ebook, my advice is to get on and do it, but spend as much time as possible making it into a professional product. You might be lucky enough to have a lot of time on your hands to do all the marketing things you should be doing before launch, but if not, the danger is that there will never be a right time to make your story accessible to readers.
At least sixteen people have now read my book (or will do, I hope). If I was still worrying about my marketing this book would still be sitting in my files, and no story, no matter how wonderful, ever comes alive until it goes out into the world and gets read. So - happy launching.
November 8, 2015
Writing multiple projects at the same time.
I'm still digesting what I learned @GenreCon in Brisbane, but one of the things which did come out of it, was the need to break the editing of Book 1 of the Hunter Duology (Heart Hunter) to return to Book 1 of my Angel series (Angel Blood). I pitched Angel Blood to Pantera Press while I was in Brisbane, and they were kind enough to invite me to submit, but of course, no writer submits without a 'final look'.
This raises the whole idea/problem of whether you can work on multiple projects in unison and not mix up your voice (or plot for that matter).
I hadn' really looked at Heart Hunter for a couple of years, because I got up to Book 4 in the series and got persuaded to try NaNoWriMo. Of course, if you're lucky (and work, work, work), you do make your 50,000 words+, but that is just the beginning. My 2013 NaNoWriMo project took until Oct of 2014 to be ready to pitch (The Third Moon - contracted to @Satalyte Publishing) and then it was November again and I wrote The Emerald Serpent as my NaNoWriMo project which I launched as an ebook in October 2015. Just in time for NaNoWriMo again!
Having managed to independently publish my first book, I've been keen to add to it, hence my current editing of the Hunter duology, and my decision to give NaNoWriMo a miss this year (despite a little project in my head that might have benefited).
But pitching Angel Blood means doing a final edit on it, which means immersing myself not just in Book 1, but in the story arc for the whole series.
Jumping between projects is not my preferred way of operating and I don't always do it well. I was writing The Kira Chronicles when I was doing another novel for my Ph.D and I'm still mortified by the memory of my supervisor's eyebrows shooting up when I mixed up my female heroes.
I do know of authors who write a fantasy trilogy in parallel, that is, they begin each of the books at the same time and progress through them at a similar rate. I couldn't do this, and not just because I'm a pantser (or panther - as Isobelle Carmody prefers).
And yet, an invitation to submit means getting a properly edited manuscript to a publisher in a reasonable time and that means putting other projects on hold. It's something contracted authors are more familiar with, when proofs from their previous work must be attended to when they are well into their next project.
And it might be more usual for full time writers whose increased work rate shifts projects closer together. As for me; I'm really enjoying visiting my Angel world again and frustrated I'm going to be leaving it again soon. But that's just the way it is.
This raises the whole idea/problem of whether you can work on multiple projects in unison and not mix up your voice (or plot for that matter).
I hadn' really looked at Heart Hunter for a couple of years, because I got up to Book 4 in the series and got persuaded to try NaNoWriMo. Of course, if you're lucky (and work, work, work), you do make your 50,000 words+, but that is just the beginning. My 2013 NaNoWriMo project took until Oct of 2014 to be ready to pitch (The Third Moon - contracted to @Satalyte Publishing) and then it was November again and I wrote The Emerald Serpent as my NaNoWriMo project which I launched as an ebook in October 2015. Just in time for NaNoWriMo again!
Having managed to independently publish my first book, I've been keen to add to it, hence my current editing of the Hunter duology, and my decision to give NaNoWriMo a miss this year (despite a little project in my head that might have benefited).
But pitching Angel Blood means doing a final edit on it, which means immersing myself not just in Book 1, but in the story arc for the whole series.
Jumping between projects is not my preferred way of operating and I don't always do it well. I was writing The Kira Chronicles when I was doing another novel for my Ph.D and I'm still mortified by the memory of my supervisor's eyebrows shooting up when I mixed up my female heroes.
I do know of authors who write a fantasy trilogy in parallel, that is, they begin each of the books at the same time and progress through them at a similar rate. I couldn't do this, and not just because I'm a pantser (or panther - as Isobelle Carmody prefers).
And yet, an invitation to submit means getting a properly edited manuscript to a publisher in a reasonable time and that means putting other projects on hold. It's something contracted authors are more familiar with, when proofs from their previous work must be attended to when they are well into their next project.
And it might be more usual for full time writers whose increased work rate shifts projects closer together. As for me; I'm really enjoying visiting my Angel world again and frustrated I'm going to be leaving it again soon. But that's just the way it is.
October 24, 2015
Isobelle Carmody and letting a story unfold
Recently at Conflux, the speculative fiction conference in Canberra, I listened to an interesting interview with Guest of Honour, Isobelle Carmody. I've heard Isobelle speak before and she is always excellent, honest and generous. One of the things she was lamenting was that publishers don't always give authors time to let a story fully unfold. Given the commercial imperatives of the publishing industry, I can understand why. And yet Isobelle's yearning for time for a story to reveal its full depths and richness was genuine, and it struck a chord.
As a pantser, my entire writing journey is one of discovery, and like any explorer, the journey is rarely a straight line between points A and B. I suspect I would be a quicker writer as a planner, but for me, the joy is in the discovery of the story and in the gradual revelation of characters' hearts and souls, and through them, perhaps my own heart and soul too.
Isobelle's words have come back to me today, on a hot day on the edge of Melbourne, where the north winds are rapidly turning the green paddocks around me to gold. As discussed in earlier blogs, I am editing Book 1 Heart Hunter of the Hunter duology.
As also discussed, this is not the first edit, in fact, I have lost count. I suspect if I went back through my files, iterations of this story (that started as PhD thesis) would be close to 20. So why haven't I stopped? Signed off on it? Launched it? Or given up? I certainly have a queue of other works, such as my Angel series, waiting for my return, but Hunter still holds me.
Why? Because I haven't really discovered the full depths of my two main characters: Fleet/Chant and Tel, nor the full meaning of their respective journeys. I keep getting 3/4's of the way through Book 1 and then going back to the beginning. Today I think I nailed the voice and by so doing, I think I've broken through into what lies beneath Fleet/Chant and Tel's skins.
Why today? I don't know. I've done nothing special except persevere. Or maybe it's the importance of time, as Isobelle pointed out.
As a pantser, my entire writing journey is one of discovery, and like any explorer, the journey is rarely a straight line between points A and B. I suspect I would be a quicker writer as a planner, but for me, the joy is in the discovery of the story and in the gradual revelation of characters' hearts and souls, and through them, perhaps my own heart and soul too.
Isobelle's words have come back to me today, on a hot day on the edge of Melbourne, where the north winds are rapidly turning the green paddocks around me to gold. As discussed in earlier blogs, I am editing Book 1 Heart Hunter of the Hunter duology.
As also discussed, this is not the first edit, in fact, I have lost count. I suspect if I went back through my files, iterations of this story (that started as PhD thesis) would be close to 20. So why haven't I stopped? Signed off on it? Launched it? Or given up? I certainly have a queue of other works, such as my Angel series, waiting for my return, but Hunter still holds me.
Why? Because I haven't really discovered the full depths of my two main characters: Fleet/Chant and Tel, nor the full meaning of their respective journeys. I keep getting 3/4's of the way through Book 1 and then going back to the beginning. Today I think I nailed the voice and by so doing, I think I've broken through into what lies beneath Fleet/Chant and Tel's skins.
Why today? I don't know. I've done nothing special except persevere. Or maybe it's the importance of time, as Isobelle pointed out.
October 19, 2015
Who did I write The emerald serpent for?
Well The emerald serpent is up on Amazon kdp and Amazon kdp select and I'm starting to receive some verbal feedback from readers, all of it positive. It brings to mind the hoary old question as to who writers actually write for: themselves or some anonymous/imagined audience.
I certainly need to love the characters and story which slowly forms in my mind, in fact if I didn't, there wouldn't be a story. As a pantser, I have to pursue my glimpses of things zealously, but also patiently, knowing that it takes time for the story to unfold.
I often begin with a picture or scene. The emerald serpent began with a television scene on a beach where a man looks up and sees something or someone he obviously doesn't expect. His expression goes from shock, to anger, to contempt. This man became Cormac, but it wasn't till I stumbled upon a poignant picture of Willy Cartier that I knew what he looked like. But of course, The emerald serpent is actually Etaine's story, more than Cormac's.
So, as The emerald serpent slowly revealed itself to me, I started to consider who its audience might be. I tend to write characters who are 17 or 18 which suggests a YA - cross-over audience, but Etaine is actually 25, although she was 18 when the trigger event happens. Cormac is older, and although his age isn't explicit, I suspect he was around 25 when he and Etaine first met. The whole YA designation can be problematic though and I prefer NA - or New Adult - which is late teens to mid-thirties.
The Emerald Serpent is the first story I've written with a setting that exists in this world (or this world as it was). Normally I start from scratch with a fully constructed secondary world, but The emerald serpent was a NaNoWriMo project and November marks the end of the academic year in terms of lecturing and I was a bit weary. I have a mixed Scottish heritage and love Northern Scotland, so I set it in the Caledonian Forest. There are only remnants of this ancient forest left today so the setting reflects what it would have been like several thousand years ago.
Of course, age isn't the only variable that effects audience enjoyment. The forest setting with its bears and wolves, rushing streams and snowy crags, would appeal to readers who like pastoral rather than urban fantasy, and the fact that the Eadar aren't human, nor the Fuaran for that matter, might appeal to readers of Lord of the Rings, which uses a similar mix. It has an overall Celtic feeling to it as well, which again might appeal to those who delight in the Elvish.
In the end though, I think it's the story of the characters' struggles that must attract. While I feel Etaine's behaviour is fully justified, to have any goodness in her life again, she has to change. And of course, her behaviour has the potential to affect not just herself (and Cormac) but the entire Eadar.
All these elements kept me going in my struggle to discover the story, and as I still take a great deal of pleasure in it, the answer to who the writer writes for, at least in my case, might be that they write for themselves and for those readers who enjoy the same things.
I certainly need to love the characters and story which slowly forms in my mind, in fact if I didn't, there wouldn't be a story. As a pantser, I have to pursue my glimpses of things zealously, but also patiently, knowing that it takes time for the story to unfold.
I often begin with a picture or scene. The emerald serpent began with a television scene on a beach where a man looks up and sees something or someone he obviously doesn't expect. His expression goes from shock, to anger, to contempt. This man became Cormac, but it wasn't till I stumbled upon a poignant picture of Willy Cartier that I knew what he looked like. But of course, The emerald serpent is actually Etaine's story, more than Cormac's.
So, as The emerald serpent slowly revealed itself to me, I started to consider who its audience might be. I tend to write characters who are 17 or 18 which suggests a YA - cross-over audience, but Etaine is actually 25, although she was 18 when the trigger event happens. Cormac is older, and although his age isn't explicit, I suspect he was around 25 when he and Etaine first met. The whole YA designation can be problematic though and I prefer NA - or New Adult - which is late teens to mid-thirties.
The Emerald Serpent is the first story I've written with a setting that exists in this world (or this world as it was). Normally I start from scratch with a fully constructed secondary world, but The emerald serpent was a NaNoWriMo project and November marks the end of the academic year in terms of lecturing and I was a bit weary. I have a mixed Scottish heritage and love Northern Scotland, so I set it in the Caledonian Forest. There are only remnants of this ancient forest left today so the setting reflects what it would have been like several thousand years ago.
Of course, age isn't the only variable that effects audience enjoyment. The forest setting with its bears and wolves, rushing streams and snowy crags, would appeal to readers who like pastoral rather than urban fantasy, and the fact that the Eadar aren't human, nor the Fuaran for that matter, might appeal to readers of Lord of the Rings, which uses a similar mix. It has an overall Celtic feeling to it as well, which again might appeal to those who delight in the Elvish.
In the end though, I think it's the story of the characters' struggles that must attract. While I feel Etaine's behaviour is fully justified, to have any goodness in her life again, she has to change. And of course, her behaviour has the potential to affect not just herself (and Cormac) but the entire Eadar.
All these elements kept me going in my struggle to discover the story, and as I still take a great deal of pleasure in it, the answer to who the writer writes for, at least in my case, might be that they write for themselves and for those readers who enjoy the same things.
The Emerald Serpent Book Cover
The emerald Serpent Book Cover with Amazon on Kindle:
