Andrew McDowell's Blog, page 5

Smorgasbord Book Promotions 2024 – Share an Excerpt – #Fantasy – Beneath the Deep Wave (One with Nature Book 2) by Andrew McDowell

Many thanks to Sally Cronin for featuring an excerpt from Beneath the Deep Wave on her blog.

Smorgasbord Book Promotions 2024 – Share an Excerpt – #Fantasy – Beneath the Deep Wave (One with Nature Book 2) by Andrew McDowell

On a side note, I had a wonderful time at the Maryland Writers’ Conference this past weekend. I learned a lot about public appearances and signings, which I hope to put to good use in the future, and I sold six books!

Nightmare Whiskers Pre-Order

As I mentioned in an interview last week, Fae Corps Publishing will be releasing a new anthology later this month featuring one of my poems, “The Black Cat.” Check out this YouTube short:

If you’re an eBook reader, you can preorder it!

In the meantime, if you’re looking for other spooky anthologies to read this Halloween season, don’t forget these others from Fae Corps Publishing featuring my fiction and poetry, including a poem in the style of “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe (whose death day happens to be today).

Goodreads | Barnes & Noble | Books2Read

Barnes & Noble | Goodreads | Books2Read

Barnes & Noble | Goodreads | Books2Read

And I’ll conclude by saying if you’re in the need of some Halloween music, I highly recommend Kristen Lawrence. She even put Poe’s poem to music!

Interview with Ari Meghlen

Many thanks to Ari Meghlen for this opportunity to talk about my latest book.

This is the third time I’ve been featured on her blog (fourth if you count my appearance on the Merry Writer Podcast).

Interview With Author Andrew McDowell

“Trees” by Andrew McDowell

Many thanks to Barbara Leonhard of MasticadoresUSA for publishing my image poem, “Trees.” Enjoy!

“Trees” by Andrew McDowell

Counting Words and Pages (Video)

For those who haven’t watched it yet, here’s my presentation on word and page count last month at the Annapolis chapter of the Maryland Writers’ Association, shortly before Beneath the Deep Wave was published.

Here’s the handout:

Counting Words and Pages NotesDownload

And here’s the original post that inspired it:

Count your Lucky Length

Be sure to watch my previous writing presentations as well!

How to Format Your Manuscript (Video)

Evolution

You may be surprised to see this again, after I’d taken it down yesterday, having already posted this month. But I will explain my reasons further down.

In terms of this post’s title, I’m not talking about Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. Instead, I’m talking about evolving as a writer. Every writer’s life becomes a journey in itself, and just as they grow as people, they grow as writers.

I’ve always struggled with perfectionism and getting things right, and it feels extremely frustrating when things turn out not to be perfect. This is true with writing. I felt bad as I discovered errors, typos, and flaws in published work, but I’ve also discovered that it is natural for typos to appear and gradually be fixed. It turns out that books can and have been changed post-publication. Even I had a preconceived notion that books are static once published. Now I know that’s not true. I’ve had to read more and more about how to use language, as I’ve discussed once before, such as when it comes to redundant phrases or even synonyms that are not always truly the same.

It’s like what Mark Twain said, that the difference between the right word and almost right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug. He was right. Now that I have another book, I have expected that the same process might happen all over again, but hopefully not to the extent it was with my first. One does indeed learn a whole lot with one book, just as one learns from attending conferences and conventions.

The simple truth is I care about my writing, and I am willing to invest my own time to making it better. It has felt like a ping-pong process going back and forth, figuring out what works and what doesn’t. But I’ve persevered through it. Persistence and patience, I know now, are essential. No writer should rush to publication. I also have learned and accepted that I don’t need to be perfect, perhaps more so than before. I am at peace with that.

Now, for the almost nine years that this site has been up, I have stuck to posting once a month. However, after mistakenly posting this yesterday, I had a bit of a mini breakdown. Anyone who knows me knows I’m on the spectrum, and thus I’ve always preferred patterns and routines, and leaving them has set me off. However, yesterday’s events were another reminder to me of how much anxiety I can have, and I’m happy to say that over the past year I’ve been able to break free of some patterns and overcome some preferences.

This is now one of them. I understand now that this pattern of once a month reached a point where it was controlling me, not me controlling it. Therefore, if I am to be more positive and less perfect, if I am to evolve as a person and a writer, it’s time to let go. So from now on, no longer always one post a month. Sometimes there will be more, maybe sometimes not. But I feel it is the right choice.

Further Reading5 Authors Who Edited Their Books After Publication5 Novels that Were Totally Changed Years After Publication

Launch for Beneath the Deep Wave (Video)

Many thanks to Jenny for a wonderful opportunity to promote Beneath the Deep Wave and another upcoming anthology from Fae Corps Publishing that I’ll be featured in.

Wishing all my fellow Americans a Happy Labor Day tomorrow.

It Won’t Be Long Now

That’s right. I find it hard to believe that Beneath the Deep Wave will be available in a few weeks (on the 23rd). Ever since Mystical Greenwood first premiered, many people have been asking and asking when sequel would come. Well, the wait is almost over. I won’t be a one-book author for much longer. I am excited but also nervous. Hopefully, critics will feel I’ve gotten better and not that I’ve lost my touch.

Don’t forget you can still preorder the Kindle for Beneath the Deep Wave. Print copies will come after the release.

You can mark it to-read on Goodreads as well, and you can preorder the paperback and Nook through Barnes and Noble. Other vendors offer eBook preorders too.

Many thanks to Sally Cronin and Fae Corps for helping to promote it as well.

Smorgasbord New Book Spotlight – #Fantasy – Beneath the Deep Wave (One with Nature Book 2) by Andrew McDowell

Meet The Author

In the meantime, a micro memoir I wrote, “Eight Ball Corner Pocket,” is featured in the newest issue of Pen in Hand from the Maryland Writers’ Association.

You can mark it to read on Goodreads.

Also, on the 21st, I will once again be giving my presentation on word and page count, this time for the Annapolis chapter of the Maryland Writers’ Association. It’ll be via Zoom only. So please register and join me at 7pn Eastern Time! Information can be found on the MWA website. You can help promote it on Facebook too!

Speaking of the Maryland Writers’ Association, registration is open for their annual conference in October. Early bird prices are available for one more week. I’ve signed up, and I hope to sell some books there. See you there if you can make it!

Now the pressure will be on to complete the third and last book in the trilogy. I imagine I will be besieged with the same questions.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Recycling is something we’ve been told since childhood is vital for protecting our Earth, and I don’t dispute that. Today, however, I want to talk about another kind of recycling, one which may serve writers well, especially if they are suffering writer’s block. This is literary recycling.

And no, I do not mean recycling entire plots or characters. Definitely not. That would be counterproductive. Every writer, in my opinion, ought to strive for something different in every project. Recycling entire plot structures or character arcs would not only be boring for readers but also indicate to them that the writer isn’t showing any growth in their art.

What can you recycle literary wise, then? Scenes, scenarios, passages, anything that will not simply fit during the editing process. This was something I first discovered during my long and checkered history of writing Mystical Greenwood. New scenes were written, and some were altered, characters removed, , etc. All for the sake of pace and telling a better story. That left some passages cut through different drafts, ones which I simply couldn’t fit back into the story. But I liked them. I didn’t want to simply trash them.

Instead, I used some of them as starting points in Beneath the Deep Wave. And you know what? The same thing happened again! Some bits were moved around, and a few would no longer fit within. So I’ve decided to simply use them again, but this time for the third One with Nature book. A few others were also saved for other projects that I thought they would work better in. They simply would require a few tweaks, such as changing names or other factors to accommodate different settings and structures.

It’s a good feeling to not entirely throw out some words you’ve written, especially when it might be possible to fit them into a different puzzle, perhaps even better that what they might have been before. The only other thing I would caution is be careful not to inadvertently use the same plots or plot elements over again. When I first started my pets mystery in college, at some point I realized I was using some similar elements to my fantasy story. I knew I had to make some changes.

Don’t forget that Beneath the Deep Wave is coming out next month! One another announcement: I have reopened my social media accounts on Twitter/X and Tumblr, with the same usernames as before. It wasn’t an easy decision, nor a light one. I remember leaving them for the sake of my mental health, and in the former’s case, it hasn’t had the best reputation, especially since its rebranding. but I am also aware that I did gain followers and readers/reviewers on each. Hopefully, I will be able to use them now wiser than before. So, if you were following me there before, you can do so again. Don’t forget about my other sites as well.

TumblrXFacebookYouTubeGoodreadsAmazon

To all my fellow Americans, I hope you had a happy 4th of July yesterday.

New Poetry Publications

Hello, everyone. If you remember from last month, I attended Balticon. Well, I had a good time, met some good people, was on some interesting panels, and I was able to sell three copies of Mystical Greenwood!

Also, in recent months, I’ve been featured in a couple new poetry anthologies. Check them out!

Many thanks to Gabriela Marie Milton for the opportunity to contribute for haiku poems to this anthology! Available in paperback, Kindle, and Goodreads.

I’ve also had this Christian poem published in the online magazine, Words of the Lamb, which has featured me before!

Take My Hand

I mentioned this anthology a few months ago, but thanks again to Robbie Cheadle and Kaye Lynne Booth for allowing me to contribute not only six poems but also six of my pencil drawings! So yes, you can see me in action as an artist and writer! Available in paperback, Kindle, and Goodreads.

If you’re a poetry lover, be sure to check out my poetry page for other poems as well. And for you fantasy and fiction lovers, don’t forget that Beneath the Deep Wave will be coming out in a few months! You can preorder the eBook edition and mark it to read on Goodreads!