Ryan Schneider's Blog, page 19
May 18, 2013
Kerouac, Vonnegut, Ellis, Mailer, and You. Or, Why You Write.
Jack Kerouac said, "What a [writer] most wishes to hide, revise, & un-say, is precisely what Literature is waiting & bleeding for."
Kurt Vonnegut said, "We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down."
A writer friend and I have been discussing writing and publishing. He's not sure which way to go, traditional publishing or indie publishing.
In an email I sent, I said the following:
Treat your writing as a business. It's something serious. You put time into it every day, either by pecking the keys or by thinking about what you're going to say when you sit down to peck the keys.
Create a formal writing practice and practice a set number of days per week. Then, take the # of hours allocated per day to writing and divide it into 4.
Say it's 4 hours per day.
Spend 3 hours writing (75%), and 1 hour marketing and building your brand (25%). This can be anything from creating a website & blog & Twitter & Facebook & Goodreads account, to researching the publishers & agents who work with [authors who write books similar to yours].
Indie pubbing is the new slush pile. That's the new reality of the publishing world.
Set small goals for that 25% of your time.
Otherwise it can become overwhelming. If you do sometimes feel overwhelmed and discouraged, it's okay to simply take a step back from all the marketing and brand-building and go back to writing. Forget about all that stuff and focus on the creativity.
Because as Brett Easton Ellis says, 'Write for yourself. Work out between you and your pen the things which most intrigue you.'
Norman Mailer said, 'Writer's block is nothing more than failure of the ego.'
He's right.
Because you are occasionally going to get one- and two-star reviews. But you will also get four- and five-star reviews. But a mere 1% of readers take the time to write and post a review. Most readers say nothing. It's therefore impossible to know how they felt and what they thought of your book.
You may find this unsettling. Discouraging. To the point where you wonder can you even do this? Are you ever going to make any real money? Are your books any good? Will you be able to support your family this way? What else can you do? How can you make money? Now you have to go and write/edit your Work In Progress and you have all those thoughts in your head.
But then you go back and read your five-star reviews your four-star reviews and you feel better and you go back to writing/editing. You get out of your head, get out of your own way, and get back to work.
Being a professional, regardless of profession, means leaving your emotions out of the equation. It applies equally to writing. It's tough because writing is deeply personal. But when a firefighter pulls a person out of a smashed car and does CPR and the person dies before their eyes, that is also deeply personal.
They still get up and go to work the next day.
Because that is what they do.
Just like writing is what you do. You get up every day and you do the work.
Because there are days when the writing flows and the words come and the story happens and the characters speak and its pure magic happening before your eyes and you wonder where it's all coming from, how can you be doing this? It must not be you, because 99% of the time you feel like you have no idea what you're doing.
Yet it all works out in the end. The story reaches its inevitable conclusion which hopefully also feels like a surprise to the reader.
Then the day comes when the story goes out into the world and must stand on its own because you did the best you could with it, and whatever stars it gets on Amazon are beyond your control. Some people will connect with the work, will love it, will give it five stars and will gush and rave. Others will give four stars and will be more subdued. But they still liked the book. Others will give one or two 2 stars. There may be something to glean from those reviews. That you will have to decide for yourself.
And then tomorrow you get up and go back to work.
You sit down in front of your computer and try to figure out how you can share your books with the world, how you can make your books better, how you can make yourself better.
Because that's all you have control over. You can't control reader feedback or the number of stars. So you must do your best not to obsess over them. You must be like Tom Cruise in TOP GUN. Cocky and arrogant and sexy and confident that you can do ANYTHING. You can make the words do what you want them to do, make the characters run and play, stumble and fall, laugh and cry, live and sometimes die. You must do your best not to be like Maverick after Goose was killed during the flat spin that wrecked their airplane, confidence shot, self esteem in the toilet, ready to quit. You're not going to be happy unless you're going Mach 2 with your hair on fire, your fingers flying across the keys as the magic happens and the story pours out of you and onto the virtual page.
Because this is what you do.
You didn't choose this; it chose you.
That's what a calling is. It means you keep writing no matter what. You do not deny, belittle, or ignore your gifts. You cherish them and use them to the glory of God or whatever your personal concept of Source/Life may be. You get up and you go to work. You're a writer. You write. That's what you do.
Kurt Vonnegut said, "We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down."
A writer friend and I have been discussing writing and publishing. He's not sure which way to go, traditional publishing or indie publishing.
In an email I sent, I said the following:
Treat your writing as a business. It's something serious. You put time into it every day, either by pecking the keys or by thinking about what you're going to say when you sit down to peck the keys.
Create a formal writing practice and practice a set number of days per week. Then, take the # of hours allocated per day to writing and divide it into 4.
Say it's 4 hours per day.
Spend 3 hours writing (75%), and 1 hour marketing and building your brand (25%). This can be anything from creating a website & blog & Twitter & Facebook & Goodreads account, to researching the publishers & agents who work with [authors who write books similar to yours].
Indie pubbing is the new slush pile. That's the new reality of the publishing world.
Set small goals for that 25% of your time.
Otherwise it can become overwhelming. If you do sometimes feel overwhelmed and discouraged, it's okay to simply take a step back from all the marketing and brand-building and go back to writing. Forget about all that stuff and focus on the creativity.
Because as Brett Easton Ellis says, 'Write for yourself. Work out between you and your pen the things which most intrigue you.'
Norman Mailer said, 'Writer's block is nothing more than failure of the ego.'
He's right.
Because you are occasionally going to get one- and two-star reviews. But you will also get four- and five-star reviews. But a mere 1% of readers take the time to write and post a review. Most readers say nothing. It's therefore impossible to know how they felt and what they thought of your book.
You may find this unsettling. Discouraging. To the point where you wonder can you even do this? Are you ever going to make any real money? Are your books any good? Will you be able to support your family this way? What else can you do? How can you make money? Now you have to go and write/edit your Work In Progress and you have all those thoughts in your head.
But then you go back and read your five-star reviews your four-star reviews and you feel better and you go back to writing/editing. You get out of your head, get out of your own way, and get back to work.
Being a professional, regardless of profession, means leaving your emotions out of the equation. It applies equally to writing. It's tough because writing is deeply personal. But when a firefighter pulls a person out of a smashed car and does CPR and the person dies before their eyes, that is also deeply personal.
They still get up and go to work the next day.
Because that is what they do.
Just like writing is what you do. You get up every day and you do the work.
Because there are days when the writing flows and the words come and the story happens and the characters speak and its pure magic happening before your eyes and you wonder where it's all coming from, how can you be doing this? It must not be you, because 99% of the time you feel like you have no idea what you're doing.
Yet it all works out in the end. The story reaches its inevitable conclusion which hopefully also feels like a surprise to the reader.
Then the day comes when the story goes out into the world and must stand on its own because you did the best you could with it, and whatever stars it gets on Amazon are beyond your control. Some people will connect with the work, will love it, will give it five stars and will gush and rave. Others will give four stars and will be more subdued. But they still liked the book. Others will give one or two 2 stars. There may be something to glean from those reviews. That you will have to decide for yourself.
And then tomorrow you get up and go back to work.
You sit down in front of your computer and try to figure out how you can share your books with the world, how you can make your books better, how you can make yourself better.
Because that's all you have control over. You can't control reader feedback or the number of stars. So you must do your best not to obsess over them. You must be like Tom Cruise in TOP GUN. Cocky and arrogant and sexy and confident that you can do ANYTHING. You can make the words do what you want them to do, make the characters run and play, stumble and fall, laugh and cry, live and sometimes die. You must do your best not to be like Maverick after Goose was killed during the flat spin that wrecked their airplane, confidence shot, self esteem in the toilet, ready to quit. You're not going to be happy unless you're going Mach 2 with your hair on fire, your fingers flying across the keys as the magic happens and the story pours out of you and onto the virtual page.
Because this is what you do.
You didn't choose this; it chose you.
That's what a calling is. It means you keep writing no matter what. You do not deny, belittle, or ignore your gifts. You cherish them and use them to the glory of God or whatever your personal concept of Source/Life may be. You get up and you go to work. You're a writer. You write. That's what you do.
May 15, 2013
10 Questions with SciFi Writer Phillip Richards
This Author Spotlight features science fiction writer Phillip Richards.Phillip is the author of LANCEJACK (The Union Series).
The first book in The Union Series is C.R.O.W.
Tell us about yourself, Phillip.
I joined the army at the age of seventeen after pretty much dropping out of college. Let’s just say I didn’t do very well on my mock exams! Funnily enough, though, it actually worked out alright for me in the end. I’ve been in the army for 12 years, and have completed several tours in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. I'm now a sergeant, having just returned from my most recent tour in Helmand. My job is a busy one, often involving long hours, but I still find the time to pursue my old childhood hobby, writing science fiction. I have recently had the honor of publishing my second ebook, LANCEJACK , and am already planning a third!
1. How did you get into writing?
I’ve enjoyed writing for nearly as long as I can remember, in fact I still have my first ever complete written story which I wrote when I was eight years old! I used to love writing short stories, mostly science fiction, although it was always a secretive affair. Don’t ask me why, but I hated people seeing my work, I only wrote for my own enjoyment. It was only in the last few years that I thought I would try to write a full novel, and even then the intention was never to attempt to publish it. I think it was my mum who persuaded me to do that, good old mum!
2. What do you like best (or least) about writing?
There is absolutely nothing I dislike about writing itself! If I didn’t love to do it then I would never have bothered! I love being able to allow my imagination to run wild, visualizing everything I write as though I were directing my own movie. It’s also wonderfully therapeutic, because it allows me to explore emotions and memories that sometimes stay locked away. Publishing my work and seeing people read and enjoy it has to be the icing on the cake, though. I never thought that my books would actually sell many copies, to be honest I was thrilled just to see my book on Amazon!
3. What is your writing process? IE do you outline? Do you stick to a daily word or page count, write 7 days a week, etc?
I wish I could write seven days a week! Alas, since I am a platoon sergeant I spend a huge amount of my time administrating my soldiers. It’s like being the father to thirty children, all of whom like to drink! Once I have my plot and characters mapped out I tend to write about five pages a day- when I’m free. To some writers that may sound pathetic, but believe me, in my line of work that’s a hardcore part time job!!
4. Who are some other writers you read and admire, regardless of whether they are commercially “successful?”
There are so many writers whose books I enjoy that I almost feel bad having to pick some out! Arthur C. Clarke and Terry Pratchett are the first names that spring to mind, both authors whose books I have read repeatedly over the years. I’m presently enjoying the Roman books by Simon Scarrow, a series that I have almost finished in less than two months- he’s written quite a few! I like his books because he clearly has an enormous knowledge about the Roman era, and he uses that knowledge to create stories that are totally believable.
5. Should the question mark in the above question be inside or outside the quotes?
I’m not too sure if I’m stumbling into a trick question, but I’m pretty confident that it should be outside regardless! I think that I agree with the commas, though. Success- in my own opinion- is in creating a good quality piece of literature that people genuinely enjoy. Sometimes a book can sell well on its publicity, rather than by the quality of the work inside.
6. What’s your stance on the Oxford Comma?
Well, until I read that question I hadn’t a clue what it even was! I had to look it up on Google! I am most definitely behind the Oxford Comma, firstly because that’s how I have always written, and secondly because it most accurately reflects the way that I speak. I don’t have anything against the other camp, though! The individual way that an author writes is what creates his ‘voice’, and so if he chooses to speak with or without a serial comma then that is his decision!
7. What is your book LANCEJACK about and how did it come to fruition?
LANCEJACK is the second book in the Union Series and the sequel to C.R.O.W. The series follows a young soldier, Andy Moralee, who is enlisted into the Dropship Infantry, an elite unit trained for surface combat on other planets. Andy once again returns to New Earth, a planet ravaged by endless war, only to find that a new enemy threatens to overthrow the Union government.
Both books are influenced by my experiences within the army, altered to fit into a science fiction setting. The overarching theme, though, is that human conflict of any kind comes with terrible consequences. Because of this there are no aliens in my stories, and no ‘clean’ energy weapons. War is brutal, vicious and terrifying, and although I want my readers to enjoy my work, I want them to put my book down remembering just that.
8. What’s your current writing project?
The third installment of the Union Series, Eden. I’m still only at the design stage, but I’m already very excited about it. That’s all you’re getting for now, I’m afraid, I haven’t even decided the release date!
9. What book(s) are you currently reading?
When The Bough Breaks by Chris Nuttal. It’s military science fiction, like my own work. Got to check out my competition!
10. Who or what inspires your writing?
The Army! Parts of LANCEJACK are inspired by recent experiences in Africa, Iraq and even an exercise in Canada. The military doctrine and tactics are carefully revised and altered to encompass new weapon systems in a realistic manner. The Characters are not real, admittedly, but the way they behave, speak and interact with each other is as real as it gets. My advice is that if you don’t like the troopers in my book then for heaven’s sake, don’t join the infantry!!
Finally, is there anything you’d care to add? Please also include where people can read your published stories, buy your books, etc.
Yes, I would like to thank you for this interview! I would also like to thank all of those people who have bought and read any of my work, it is truly an honor to know that people out there appreciate what I do. Visit my website http://militarysciencefictionblog.blogspot.com/ for news, updates, and for the release of Eden!
Thanks, Phillip. That's impressive that you're writing and publishing novels while on active duty. Hat's off to you, brother. Stay safe and keep writing. Looking forward to Eden.
And thank you for your service.
Check out Phillip's books C.R.O.W. and LANCEJACK
May 10, 2013
Fun, Futuristic, Sexy, Smart Sci-Fi Novel in Need of Immediate Reviews
Hi, gang.
My new novel Eye Candy is in need of immediate reviews on Amazon.
95% of consumers report that they value peer-recommendations when shopping online.
To build up the number of reviews for Eye Candy , I am offering a complimentary ebook copy for whomever wants to read it and post an immediate review.
In your review, I ask for 2 things:
1. Be fair;
2. No spoilers. We want new readers to have the same fun reading experience you had.
The review can be any length; totally up to you. Whatever you feel like saying (bearing Numbers 1 & 2 above in mind) is welcomed.
Please visit the Contact page on this site and enter your information, including your email address so that Amazon and I know where to send your complimentary ebook copy of Eye Candy .
That's all there is to it.
Note that Eye Candy is intended for mature readers. The movie version will probably be Rated R.
I thank you for your time and look forward to reading your reviews!
May 7, 2013
10 Questions with Gutsy Writer Sonia Marsh (@GutsyLiving)
This week's Author Spotlight features Sonia Marsh, author of the travel memoir Freeways to Flip-Flops: A Family's Year of Gutsy Living on a Tropical Island.Sonia Marsh is a “Gutsy” woman who can pack her carry-on and move to another country in one day. She’s a motivational speaker who inspires her audiences to get out of their comfort zone and take a risk. She says everyone has a “My Gutsy Story®”; some just need a little help to uncover theirs. Her story, told in her travel memoir Freeways to Flip-Flops: A Family's Year of Gutsy Living on a Tropical Island , is about chucking it all and uprooting her family—with teenagers—to reconnect on an island in Belize.
Her memoir has received 3 awards at the 2013 London Book Festival, the 2013 Los Angeles Book Festival and the 2013 Great South West Book Festival.Sonia has lived in many countries – Denmark, Nigeria, France, England, the U.S. and Belize – andconsiders herself a citizen of the world. She holds a degree in environmental science from the University of East Anglia, U.K., and now lives in Southern California with her husband, Duke, and their rat terrier Cookie.
1. How did you get into writing?I always wanted to become a journalist as I’m curious, and love to interview people from different parts of the world. After my family’s year of living in a hut in Belize, I knew I had a real story to tell that was unique and would spark people’s interest. When we returned to the U.S., I decided to take classes, attend writing conferences, and hire editors, to mold my journal into a commercial travel memoir.
2. What do you like best (or least) about writing?I like “connecting” with people and expressing my inner thoughts and honest feelings. I do not write fiction (yet) so I enjoy sharing part of myself and covering issues that I believe can either motivate or help people question and think about things in a different way. I do this through my blog posts at www.SoniaMarsh.com.
What I like least is the “fear” of not coming up with a second book that can match the adventure and uniqueness of my first memoir. I always approach my writing in terms of, “how does this differ from all the other books out there?” I guess I look at things from a marketing perspective from the start. This comes from years of studying the publishing business, and listening to editors and agents at conferences.
3. What is your writing process? IE do you outline? Do you stick to a daily word or page count, write 7 days a week, etc?Since I published my memoir in August 2012, I spend most of my time promoting and booking events, rather than writing my next book. I started my own publishing company: Gutsy Publications, and am working on publishing an anthology of the “My Gutsy Story®” series I started on my blog in October 2011. As far as my preferred way of writing, it would be keeping a journal, and transforming it into a memoir.
4. Who are some other writers you read and admire, regardless of whether they are commercially “successful?”Augusten Burroughs for being so “raw” and “honest.” I also enjoy Nigel Marsh, (no we’re not related) for writing Fat, Forty and Fired, about quitting his job and staying home with his 4 young kids. I am reading Key West, an indie-published book right now, and I love a mixture of humor, travel and getting to really know the narrator.
5. Should the question mark in the above question be inside or outside the quotes?Inside.
6. What’s your stance on the Oxford Comma?I believe in using it.
7. What is your book Freeways to Flip-Flops: A Family's Year of Gutsy Living on a Tropical Island about and how did it come to fruition?
"A suburban family discovers that trading materialism for a simple life on a tropical island helps them reconnect in unexpected ways."
What do you do when life in sunny Southern California starts to seem plastic, materialistic and just plain hellish?
For Sonia and Duke Marsh, the answer was to sell their worldly goods and move to an unspoiled, simpler life with their three sons in Belize, Central America, a third-world country without all the comforts and distractions of life in the developed world.
Sonia hopes the move will bring her shattered family back together. She feels her sons slipping away from her, and her overworked husband never has time for her or the boys.
This is the story of one family’s search for paradise. In this memoir, Sonia chronicles a year of defeats, fears and setbacks – and also the ultimate triumph of seeing once-frayed family ties grow back stronger from shared challenges and misfortunes. For Sonia, paradise turned out not to be a place, but an appreciation of life’s simple pleasures – a close-knit family and three well-adjusted sons with a global outlook on life.
My friends encouraged me to keep a journal in 2004 when we left for Belize. I started my journal a year before our move. I knew this would be the best way to keep my story authentic. I wanted to capture every important moment, emotion, and keep the dialogue real between my three sons, and everyone we encountered.
8. What’s your current writing project?Publishing an anthology of the “My Gutsy Story®” series. I trademarked this and you can read the first 3 online versions here. A print version will come out in September, 2013.
9. What book(s) are you currently reading?Key West, by Jon Breakfield
10. Who or what inspires your writing?
Experiencing adventure through travel, and always planning a new way to move abroad for awhile. I like to read and write about a new experience, a different culture, and a new lifestyle.
Finally, is there anything you’d care to add? Please also include where people can read your published stories, buy your book, etc.
I welcome new friends, bloggers, writers and readers at Soniamarsh.com.
Contact me at: sonia@soniamarsh.com, Facebook, or Twitter @GutsyLiving
Freeways to Flip-Flops: A Family's Year of Gutsy Living on a Tropical Island
My memoir is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle, atBarnes & Noble in paperback and Nook, and at Indie Bookstores.
Do you have a “My Gutsy Story®” to share?If any of you are writers or published authors, and wish to share something "Gutsy" you've done that either:· Changed you· Changed the way you think about something· Made your life take a different direction
Submission Guidelines:
· Written, no more than 1,000 words· Check out guidelines and prizes. http://soniamarsh.com/my-gutsy-story-contest
Kindle Paperback
My Review of STARLINER by David Drake
I just finished reading Starliner by David Drake.
I was browsing the Amazon Science Fiction Top 100 one day and stumbled across Starliner quite by accident.
(As a brief aside, the first three books in my sci-fi series The Go-Kids (PG-13), beginning with A Shadow Passed Over the Son (The Go-Kids Book 1) are also in the Amazon Top 100. Please grab your free copies if you've not done so already, so we can coax those babies up to the Top 10!)
The cool cover for Starliner was arresting: the image of a massive space-faring luxury vessel floating in space.
Plus it was free, so I grabbed it.
I'm glad I did because it turned out to be a heck of a lot of fun. It's got 73 reviews on Amazon and a 3.5-star average.
The story follows the adventures of the Empress of Earth (the name of the ship) and its new 3rd Officer Ran Colville as passengers are ferried through vast interstellar space and between outlying worlds. War between two rival planets is imminent and threatens Ran's maiden voyage.
I won't say more than that because I loathe spoilers, but suffice it to say that hyjinks ensue.
The story felt like an episode of The Love Boat in space. We meet the prominent crew members of The Empress of Earth, as well as some of the passengers, and the story alternates between several separate but interwoven story lines.
I have two criticisms of Starliner:
First, the presentation. The book was originally published by Baen Books in 1992. The conversion to ebook format was obviously done via character recognition software, because it did a very poor job. There are typos, comma splices, and missing periods on nearly every page. At first I thought David Drake and/or the editors/proofreaders/gofers at Baen were effing stupid. Then I realized the scanning of the printed manuscript is what caused the problems. Nevertheless, they are rampant and the book needs to be converted all over again. It's still readable. Just a bit of a nuisance.
Second, Drake's writing. On his website, he states that he wrote Starliner for himself, which is great. And most of the time the writing is great as well. But occasionally I had difficulty following who was doing what, who was speaking, or who had spoken, and I had to re-read a few sentences.
All in all Starliner is great space opera in the classic tradition. David Drake is a well-known and beloved science fiction author who's been writing for a long time. I will likely investigate his other titles.
I recommend Starliner and give it a solid 4 stars.
If the formatting had been clean, I probably would have given 4.5 or 5.
To purchase Starliner on Amazon, follow one of the links below. As of this writing it is still FREE on Kindle.Kindle Paperback*
May 3, 2013
My Review of Iron Man 3 (and why I hate spoilers)
My wife Taliya and I enjoyed a screening of Iron Man 3. It was an interesting and tiny bit frustrating experience, so I thought I'd share it.First, know that I will not discuss the story in-depth because I hate spoilers. You know M. Knight Shamalawnmower's movie The Village? Somebody blabbed the ending of that movie and ruined it for me. So the whole time I was watching, I was waiting for the end I knew was coming. Totally ruined it.
And one night a couple years ago, I was listening to Coast to Coast A.M. and some dingleberry guest blabbed the premise/conclusion/twist on Eagle Eye, that thriller with Shia Labuffalo. Oh, I was pissed.
If you've seen a movie (or read a book!) and others haven't but intend to, keep your trap shut! Why is that so difficult?
Are people SO miserable that their only means of making themselves feel better is by ruining an experience for someone else?
Get a life. Seriously.
Anyway, I'm supposed to be talking about Iron Man Trois.
We get a complimentary 1+1 free movie ticket from our credit card company every month. We went online and booked a 9 p.m. show for Iron Man 3 (in 2D). When we got there, it was one of those newer choose-your-seat type of theaters, and the only seats were in the first three rows. No, thank you.
So we chose the 10 pm show, which was in 3D for about $5 more. Cool.
Now, the caveat: when Avatar came out, we saw it in 2D first. I don't remember why, but we did. Liked it a lot. Then, we went and saw it in 3D. We were able to enjoy it on a new level, already knowing the story and therefore being able to really enjoy the visuals.
So that is why we didn't purchase tickets for Iron Man 3 in 3D in the first place.
At 10:00 pm, the movie began. We were enjoying it. But the picture was rather dark. Several times I lifted up my 3D glasses in order to compare the brightness. Without the glasses, it looked like a regular movie, albeit a bit blurry, especially during an action sequence. With the glasses, it was dark. Like watching a movie with your sunglasses on. And it became annoying. I lifted my glasses up 10-15 times because of it. During one particular action sequence, I was trying to figure out who was flying where and bouncing off of what.
It had something to do with the 3D glasses.
The ones we had didn't look like any of these. Here's an article about them from BusinessInsider.com about Disney's marketing stratgey.
So, the presentation of the film left something to be desired. The 3D was cool, but the dimness of the screen was not. I would have preferred that we saw it in 2D.
Something I found particularly interesting, and which I did not know, is that Iron Man 3 was directed by Shane Black. He rose to prominence in the late 80s for having written Lethal Weapon, and was also part of the trio of writers who penned Iron Man 3.
All in all, I would recommend the film. Particularly to fans of the series.
One thing I would advise is that you see The Avengers before seeing Iron Man 3. These films all come from the Marvel universe, as anyone who has seen the first two Iron Man movies knows, as well as The Hulk or Thor, etc. So there are references to The Avengers in Iron Man 3. I've been trying to watch The Avengers for a few months and can't seem to make the time. But I shall make the time for certain now that it was referenced in Iron Man 3.
As for the 2D vs. 3D, that's up to you. But I wish we'd seen it in 2D. It would've been a more enjoyable experience overall.
Oh, one final thing. Make sure you sit through the entire credits. Again, if you're a fan of the series and of other Marvel projects, you know why.
Cheers.
April 30, 2013
Word Up! - JUST RELEASED! 10 Questions with Writer's Writer Marcia Riefer Johnston (@MarciaRJohnston)
Cover art by Brian Hull.Cover design by Vinnie Kinsella.
This Author Spotlight features a book on writing penned by an expert.
I therefore give you Word Up! by literary luminary and writer's writer Marcia Riefer Johnston.
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Photo by Wendy Hood.When Marcia was 12, American Girl magazine printed her eight-paragraph story, “The Key,” and paid her $15. She has been writing ever since.
She studied under Raymond Carver and Tobias Wolff in the Syracuse University creative-writing program. She taught technical writing in the Engineering School at Cornell University. She has done writing of all kinds for organizations of all kinds, from the Fortune 500 to the just plain fortunate.
Marcia has written for the scholarly journal Shakespeare Quarterly, the professional journal Technical Communication, and the weekly newspaper Syracuse New Times. She used to write letters by the boxful. She has contributed posts to her daughter’s Peace Corps blog, texts to her son’s Droid, and answers to her husband’s crossword puzzles. Her words have landed on billboards, blackboards, birthday cakes, boxes of eggs, and the back of her book. She lives in Portland, Oregon.
To share her love of writing, she has collected some one-of-a-kind essays into a book:
Word Up! How to Write Powerful Sentences and Paragraphs (And Everything You Build from Them).
We chatted with Marcia earlier this year. Word Up! is now available for purchase in print, with an ebook version coming in August 2013.
1. How did you get into writing?
When I was maybe nine years old, my best friend, Shannon Wood, gave me a blank book. I had always loved reading books. Suddenly, I was inspired to write one. I sat down to do just that, only to discover that I had nothing to say. But I clung to the notion of myself as a writer. When you believe long enough that you can do something that you can’t do, lo and behold, you discover that you can.
2. What do you like best (or least) about writing?
What I like best: The pleasure of getting it right—finding the perfect word, crafting the ring and rhythm of a sentence, discovering the structure that a given piece needs, nailing an ending. And then I love hearing from readers when they experience those pleasures for themselves. For example, fellow tech writer and self-professed grammar geek, Jennifer DeAngelo, writes, “I find myself forcing others to listen while I read ‘this great part’ out loud every few minutes. My dogs will soon be English experts!” That’s what drives me to write—getting to have, and then share, those moments of earned joy.
What I like least: The time required to get it right. Even the best writers have no shortcut to good writing.
3. What is your writing process? IE do you outline? Do you stick to a daily word or page count, write 7 days a week, etc?
The writing I do for myself fits around my technical-writing contracts. When I’m on a big job, I might not do any of my own writing for months. I have no word-count or page-count goals. Inevitably, something comes along that sparks the urge to write on an age-old topic (all topics on language usage are age-old) in a way that strikes me as unique and fun. Once that flame gets going, I’m a moth who can’t stay away.
Someone asked me recently how many revisions a typical essay goes through. She reported that her husband revises a typical piece five times. Five! I didn’t know what to say. The concept of countable passes brought me up short. I don’t revise in discrete iterations. Writing is editing and vice versa. Each essay evolves continuously, one change after another, over and over. One essay might take the better part of a day; another might take weeks.
When I’m working on an essay, I wake up each day with ideas for additions or deletions. I keep pads of paper everywhere—next to the bed, in the bathrooms, in the car, in the office, in the kitchen. In between bouts of writing, ideas come unbidden. A lot gets worked out for me while I sleep. I don’t mean that in a mystical way. Good writing requires many kinds (and many repetitions) of thinking, critiquing, weighing. It’s a rush unlike any other when your brain is processing processing processing, and the thing you didn’t even know you needed SURFACES. Aha! Quick, get me to a keyboard.
4. Who are some other writers you read and admire, regardless of whether they are commercially “successful?”
Hemingway was my first inspiration in terms of craft. My book, Word Up! includes my two favorite quotations from him, both classics. Here’s one:
If a writer … knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows … The dignity of movement of an ice-berg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water. A writer who omits things because he does not know them only makes hollow places in his writing.Here’s the other:
The greatest difficulty, aside from knowing truly what you really felt, rather than what you were supposed to feel … was to put down what really happened in action; what the actual things were which produced the emotion that you experienced. The real thing, the sequence of motion and fact which made the emotion … would be as valid in a year or in ten years or, with luck and if you stated it purely enough, always.A writer could do a lot of fine work following nothing but those two principles.
I also admire Ray Carver and Toby Wolff. I had the privilege of studying with both of them in the creative writing Masters program at Syracuse University. What an opportunity! Ray and Toby made us, their lucky students, feel that our words mattered. Their affirmation meant as much as any lessons I learned from them. If anyone reading this hasn’t yet discovered Ray Carver’s short stories “A Small, Good Thing” and “Cathedral,” stop right now and go find them. And if you haven’t yet read Toby Wolff’s memoirs This Boy’s Life and Old School, do you ever have a treat waiting for you.
I also love Barbara Kingsolver, especially her essays. Her Small Wonder and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle take my breath away—in terms of both what she says and how she says it.
And Mary Karr … beware. Reading her is enough to put you off considering yourself skilled or entertaining. Her Liar’s Club tops my list of books to recommend.
5. Should the question mark in the above question be inside or outside the quotes?
It was a setup! Okay, I’ll bite. That question mark goes outside. If you were quoting a question, you’d put the quotation mark inside.
I wish that American usage (like British usage) treated commas and periods with similar logic. When you have a word in quotation marks, like “this,” who on earth decided that the comma belonged inside? If I put a word in italics, like this, how am I supposed to get the comma inside the italics? I mean! Ooooh, Ryan. Do. Not. Get. Me. Started.
6. What’s your stance on the Oxford Comma?
[Dear reader, Follow this answer to its end before drawing any conclusions.]You are going for, blood aren’t, you Ryan? I, say why bother with that extra, comma in fact why, do writers care so much, about commas anyhow since, they just take, up space and readers, can figure out what we, mean right? Those sticklers who insist, that the Oxford, Comma creates clarity, while taking, up hardly any, space well they are, just a bunch, of curmudgeons! Writers should put, commas wherever they like or not just let their words flow as nature intended straight from the brain and let the natural rhythms emerge organically who needs commas when you get right down to it writers who need to lean on crutches like commas can’t hardly call themselves writers now can they and no in case you’re wondering no I am not serious I figure if you’ve read this far you surely have your own opinion on this question and have heard it discussed enough times to have yawned at any straight answer I might have given.
In case you’re still wondering, and if you haven’t come to terms with this question for yourself, and if you don’t have a style guide forced on you at work making the decision for you, then let me give you a straight answer after all and say yes, I cast my vote adamantly in favor of the Oxford comma (aka serial comma, aka Harvard comma, aka the comma before the last item in a series). I just used one in the previous sentence before the final if clause in the series. Did you notice? Probably not. That’s the beauty of these handy little curved marks of punctuation: they make reading easier. Why leave them out when they’re so darn useful?
I know, I know, newspaper columns, etc. Save that snippet of space if your style guide says you must.
I couldn’t put it better than Bryan Garner, whose big, fat Garner’s Modern American Usage, by the way, every writer needs. On page 676, he puts it like this: “Omitting the final comma may cause ambiguities, whereas including it never will.”
Hear, hear! Or is it Here, here? Now there’s a question for you, Ryan. Two can play at this Q&A game.
It's Hear, hear! As in, "Hear him! Hear him!" It's what proper English dudes say when they agree with what has been said and want to vocalize said agreement.
I knew this. Then I got scared and looked it up. But it is "Hear, hear!" Thank you for educating us, Marcia. See that, everyone? Free learnin' goin' on right here.
7. What is Word Up! about and how did it come to fruition?
Ah, back to a serious question. Actually, I love all of these questions. Bring them all on!
I’ve had a passion for the English language since I was deprived of it during my year as an exchange student in Austria in high school. I also credit my English teachers for teaching me writing skills that too few people get these days. Lots of people are hungry for better writing skills. And these skills are teachable. I realized that I had something of value to offer and could have a ball doing it.
For a longer answer to your question, see “Tribute to a teacher who put ‘Word Power’ in his students’ hands”: http://howtowriteeverything.com/blog/about-this-blog
8. What’s your current writing project?I’m still putting the final touches on the Word Up! ebook. One reviewer recently described the challenge this way: "One of my first impressions of your book was, This is going to be a real booger to convert to the Kindle [or any ebook]. Your book is richly formatted, which is great for the reader, but horrible for the conversion process. Between the footnotes, callouts, scripted titles, index, and appendixes, this is a ton of work for someone in post-production. Nothing is impossible though."
In my dreams, everyone who owns Strunk and White’s Elements of Style (and, if they’re lucky, Art Plotnik’s spunky Spunk & Bite) along with Lynn Truss’s Eats, Shoots & Leaves will add a copy of Word Up! to the same shelf.
In fact, I see this book sitting in the bathrooms of those homes. I see guests (even those who aren't writers) picking it up and, an hour later, emerging with a smile.
9. What books are you currently reading?
You're joking, right? Do other authors find time to read? I can't wait to get back to it!
10. Who or what inspires you to write?
Inspiration comes from anywhere language can be found: a hospital-hallway sign, a snippet of song, a Tweet, a book, a bakery cake, a billboard, the back of my brain.
Finally, is there anything you’d care to add?
Yes! I’d like to give you, dear reader, a sense of why I bothered to write yet another book on writing. The world already has too many writing books. If you piled up all the books on writing, you’d have a precarious, weird-looking stack reaching … way up there. But the world can’t have too many writing books of the kind I like to read, the kind I set out to write. This book doesn’t say the same old things in the same old ways. This book follows its own advice. Practices what it preaches. Shows what it tells. This book uses powerful writing to talk about powerful writing.
Powerful writing entertains, heals, motivates, sells, enlightens. It marks the biggest and smallest occasions of human existence. Powerful writing changes things—for a person, a classroom, a country, a planet.
People tell me that this book will appeal to advanced writers, and I hope that's true. I also believe that "advanced" can apply to high schoolers and college students. It's easy to underestimate what teenagers are capable of. This book could be used in the classroom—I’d love for teachers and students to discover it—but it’s not a textbook. It’s not exactly a style guide either, although it does get into grammar and style. I think of Word Up! as an inspiration guide. One reviewer (content strategist Rahel Bailie) says, “You rarely get this kind of knowledge in such an engaging way. Read the book like a collection of short stories.”
That’s the kind of experience I wish for you in reading Word Up!
Where can people find you online and buy your book?
Selected chapters are available, free, under the “Excerpts” tab on my website: “How To Write Everything” (http://howtowriteeverything.com)
The book, Word Up!, released on April 27, 2013, National Tell a Story Day. Please come to my website for details.
If you made it all the way to the end of this interview, I wrote this book for you—and I can’t wait for you to get your hands on it.
Will you, dear reader who has hung in all the way to the last word, help me get the word out about Word Up? If you're on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Google+, please follow the Word Up! pages. (You know, click that cute little "Follow" button. Or "Add to circles." Or "Like.") These pages are all listed in one convenient place, here:
Word Up! on the Web - http://howtowriteeverything.com/pass-the-word/
Sign up, and then—most helpful of all—let your followers know about Word Up! too. Everybody needs a good word.
Thank you. —Marcia
Thank YOU, Marcia. In my opinion, the world can never have enough books on how to write well. Or even correctly. Or even semi-correctly. Language is a fluid medium and is ever-changing, constantly evolving. That's part of what makes it so much fun. But every pyramid has a solid foundation.
And once again, thank you!
If you haven't yet done so, visit Marcia online at HowToWriteEverything.com and follow her on Twitter:@MarciaRJohnston (author)@WordUpTheBook (book)
Ernest Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon (New York: Scribner, 1932),153–154; First Scribner e-book edition 2002, http://books.google.com/books?id=Wn69.... Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon, 11–12.
10 Questions with Writer's Writer Marcia Riefer Johnston (@MarciaRJohnston)
Cover art by Brian Hull.Cover design by Vinnie Kinsella.
This Author Spotlight features a book on writing penned by an expert.
I therefore give you Word Up! by literary luminary and writer's writer Marcia Riefer Johnston.
Photo by Wendy Hood.When Marcia was 12, American Girl magazine printed her eight-paragraph story, “The Key,” and paid her $15. She has been writing ever since.
She studied under Raymond Carver and Tobias Wolff in the Syracuse University creative-writing program. She taught technical writing in the Engineering School at Cornell University. She has done writing of all kinds for organizations of all kinds, from the Fortune 500 to the just plain fortunate.
Marcia has written for the scholarly journal Shakespeare Quarterly, the professional journal Technical Communication, and the weekly newspaper Syracuse New Times. She used to write letters by the boxful. She has contributed posts to her daughter’s Peace Corps blog, texts to her son’s Droid, and answers to her husband’s crossword puzzles. Her words have landed on billboards, blackboards, birthday cakes, boxes of eggs, and the back of her book. She lives in Portland, Oregon.
To share her love of writing, she has collected some one-of-a-kind essays into a book:
Word Up! How to Write Powerful Sentences and Paragraphs (And Everything You Build from Them).
We chatted with Marcia earlier this year. Word Up! is now available for purchase in print, with an ebook version coming in August 2013.
1. How did you get into writing?
When I was maybe nine years old, my best friend, Shannon Wood, gave me a blank book. I had always loved reading books. Suddenly, I was inspired to write one. I sat down to do just that, only to discover that I had nothing to say. But I clung to the notion of myself as a writer. When you believe long enough that you can do something that you can’t do, lo and behold, you discover that you can.
2. What do you like best (or least) about writing?
What I like best: The pleasure of getting it right—finding the perfect word, crafting the ring and rhythm of a sentence, discovering the structure that a given piece needs, nailing an ending. And then I love hearing from readers when they experience those pleasures for themselves. For example, fellow tech writer and self-professed grammar geek, Jennifer DeAngelo, writes, “I find myself forcing others to listen while I read ‘this great part’ out loud every few minutes. My dogs will soon be English experts!” That’s what drives me to write—getting to have, and then share, those moments of earned joy.
What I like least: The time required to get it right. Even the best writers have no shortcut to good writing.
3. What is your writing process? IE do you outline? Do you stick to a daily word or page count, write 7 days a week, etc?
The writing I do for myself fits around my technical-writing contracts. When I’m on a big job, I might not do any of my own writing for months. I have no word-count or page-count goals. Inevitably, something comes along that sparks the urge to write on an age-old topic (all topics on language usage are age-old) in a way that strikes me as unique and fun. Once that flame gets going, I’m a moth who can’t stay away.
Someone asked me recently how many revisions a typical essay goes through. She reported that her husband revises a typical piece five times. Five! I didn’t know what to say. The concept of countable passes brought me up short. I don’t revise in discrete iterations. Writing is editing and vice versa. Each essay evolves continuously, one change after another, over and over. One essay might take the better part of a day; another might take weeks.
When I’m working on an essay, I wake up each day with ideas for additions or deletions. I keep pads of paper everywhere—next to the bed, in the bathrooms, in the car, in the office, in the kitchen. In between bouts of writing, ideas come unbidden. A lot gets worked out for me while I sleep. I don’t mean that in a mystical way. Good writing requires many kinds (and many repetitions) of thinking, critiquing, weighing. It’s a rush unlike any other when your brain is processing processing processing, and the thing you didn’t even know you needed SURFACES. Aha! Quick, get me to a keyboard.
4. Who are some other writers you read and admire, regardless of whether they are commercially “successful?”
Hemingway was my first inspiration in terms of craft. My book, Word Up! includes my two favorite quotations from him, both classics. Here’s one:
If a writer … knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows … The dignity of movement of an ice-berg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water. A writer who omits things because he does not know them only makes hollow places in his writing.Here’s the other:
The greatest difficulty, aside from knowing truly what you really felt, rather than what you were supposed to feel … was to put down what really happened in action; what the actual things were which produced the emotion that you experienced. The real thing, the sequence of motion and fact which made the emotion … would be as valid in a year or in ten years or, with luck and if you stated it purely enough, always.A writer could do a lot of fine work following nothing but those two principles.
I also admire Ray Carver and Toby Wolff. I had the privilege of studying with both of them in the creative writing Masters program at Syracuse University. What an opportunity! Ray and Toby made us, their lucky students, feel that our words mattered. Their affirmation meant as much as any lessons I learned from them. If anyone reading this hasn’t yet discovered Ray Carver’s short stories “A Small, Good Thing” and “Cathedral,” stop right now and go find them. And if you haven’t yet read Toby Wolff’s memoirs This Boy’s Life and Old School, do you ever have a treat waiting for you.
I also love Barbara Kingsolver, especially her essays. Her Small Wonder and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle take my breath away—in terms of both what she says and how she says it.
And Mary Karr … beware. Reading her is enough to put you off considering yourself skilled or entertaining. Her Liar’s Club tops my list of books to recommend.
5. Should the question mark in the above question be inside or outside the quotes?
It was a setup! Okay, I’ll bite. That question mark goes outside. If you were quoting a question, you’d put the quotation mark inside.
I wish that American usage (like British usage) treated commas and periods with similar logic. When you have a word in quotation marks, like “this,” who on earth decided that the comma belonged inside? If I put a word in italics, like this, how am I supposed to get the comma inside the italics? I mean! Ooooh, Ryan. Do. Not. Get. Me. Started.
6. What’s your stance on the Oxford Comma?
[Dear reader, Follow this answer to its end before drawing any conclusions.]You are going for, blood aren’t, you Ryan? I, say why bother with that extra, comma in fact why, do writers care so much, about commas anyhow since, they just take, up space and readers, can figure out what we, mean right? Those sticklers who insist, that the Oxford, Comma creates clarity, while taking, up hardly any, space well they are, just a bunch, of curmudgeons! Writers should put, commas wherever they like or not just let their words flow as nature intended straight from the brain and let the natural rhythms emerge organically who needs commas when you get right down to it writers who need to lean on crutches like commas can’t hardly call themselves writers now can they and no in case you’re wondering no I am not serious I figure if you’ve read this far you surely have your own opinion on this question and have heard it discussed enough times to have yawned at any straight answer I might have given.
In case you’re still wondering, and if you haven’t come to terms with this question for yourself, and if you don’t have a style guide forced on you at work making the decision for you, then let me give you a straight answer after all and say yes, I cast my vote adamantly in favor of the Oxford comma (aka serial comma, aka Harvard comma, aka the comma before the last item in a series). I just used one in the previous sentence before the final if clause in the series. Did you notice? Probably not. That’s the beauty of these handy little curved marks of punctuation: they make reading easier. Why leave them out when they’re so darn useful?
I know, I know, newspaper columns, etc. Save that snippet of space if your style guide says you must.
I couldn’t put it better than Bryan Garner, whose big, fat Garner’s Modern American Usage, by the way, every writer needs. On page 676, he puts it like this: “Omitting the final comma may cause ambiguities, whereas including it never will.”
Hear, hear! Or is it Here, here? Now there’s a question for you, Ryan. Two can play at this Q&A game.
It's Hear, hear! As in, "Hear him! Hear him!" It's what proper English dudes say when they agree with what has been said and want to vocalize said agreement.
I knew this. Then I got scared and looked it up. But it is "Hear, hear!" Thank you for educating us, Marcia. See that, everyone? Free learnin' goin' on right here.
7. What is Word Up! about and how did it come to fruition?
Ah, back to a serious question. Actually, I love all of these questions. Bring them all on!
I’ve had a passion for the English language since I was deprived of it during my year as an exchange student in Austria in high school. I also credit my English teachers for teaching me writing skills that too few people get these days. Lots of people are hungry for better writing skills. And these skills are teachable. I realized that I had something of value to offer and could have a ball doing it.
For a longer answer to your question, see “Tribute to a teacher who put ‘Word Power’ in his students’ hands”: http://howtowriteeverything.com/blog/about-this-blog
8. What’s your current writing project?I’m still putting the final touches on the Word Up! ebook. One reviewer recently described the challenge this way: "One of my first impressions of your book was, This is going to be a real booger to convert to the Kindle [or any ebook]. Your book is richly formatted, which is great for the reader, but horrible for the conversion process. Between the footnotes, callouts, scripted titles, index, and appendixes, this is a ton of work for someone in post-production. Nothing is impossible though."
In my dreams, everyone who owns Strunk and White’s Elements of Style (and, if they’re lucky, Art Plotnik’s spunky Spunk & Bite) along with Lynn Truss’s Eats, Shoots & Leaves will add a copy of Word Up! to the same shelf.
In fact, I see this book sitting in the bathrooms of those homes. I see guests (even those who aren't writers) picking it up and, an hour later, emerging with a smile.
9. What books are you currently reading?
You're joking, right? Do other authors find time to read? I can't wait to get back to it!
10. Who or what inspires you to write?
Inspiration comes from anywhere language can be found: a hospital-hallway sign, a snippet of song, a Tweet, a book, a bakery cake, a billboard, the back of my brain.
Finally, is there anything you’d care to add?
Yes! I’d like to give you, dear reader, a sense of why I bothered to write yet another book on writing. The world already has too many writing books. If you piled up all the books on writing, you’d have a precarious, weird-looking stack reaching … way up there. But the world can’t have too many writing books of the kind I like to read, the kind I set out to write. This book doesn’t say the same old things in the same old ways. This book follows its own advice. Practices what it preaches. Shows what it tells. This book uses powerful writing to talk about powerful writing.
Powerful writing entertains, heals, motivates, sells, enlightens. It marks the biggest and smallest occasions of human existence. Powerful writing changes things—for a person, a classroom, a country, a planet.
People tell me that this book will appeal to advanced writers, and I hope that's true. I also believe that "advanced" can apply to high schoolers and college students. It's easy to underestimate what teenagers are capable of. This book could be used in the classroom—I’d love for teachers and students to discover it—but it’s not a textbook. It’s not exactly a style guide either, although it does get into grammar and style. I think of Word Up! as an inspiration guide. One reviewer (content strategist Rahel Bailie) says, “You rarely get this kind of knowledge in such an engaging way. Read the book like a collection of short stories.”
That’s the kind of experience I wish for you in reading Word Up!
Where can people find you online and buy your book?
Selected chapters are available, free, under the “Excerpts” tab on my website: “How To Write Everything” (http://howtowriteeverything.com)
The book, Word Up!, released on April 27, 2013, National Tell a Story Day. Please come to my website for details.
If you made it all the way to the end of this interview, I wrote this book for you—and I can’t wait for you to get your hands on it.
Will you, dear reader who has hung in all the way to the last word, help me get the word out about Word Up? If you're on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Google+, please follow the Word Up! pages. (You know, click that cute little "Follow" button. Or "Add to circles." Or "Like.") These pages are all listed in one convenient place, here:
Word Up! on the Web - http://howtowriteeverything.com/pass-the-word/
Sign up, and then—most helpful of all—let your followers know about Word Up! too. Everybody needs a good word.
Thank you. —Marcia
Thank YOU, Marcia. In my opinion, the world can never have enough books on how to write well. Or even correctly. Or even semi-correctly. Language is a fluid medium and is ever-changing, constantly evolving. That's part of what makes it so much fun. But every pyramid has a solid foundation.
And once again, thank you!
If you haven't yet done so, visit Marcia online at HowToWriteEverything.com and follow her on Twitter:@MarciaRJohnston (author)@WordUpTheBook (book)
Ernest Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon (New York: Scribner, 1932),153–154; First Scribner e-book edition 2002, http://books.google.com/books?id=Wn69.... Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon, 11–12.
April 25, 2013
James Patterson, The New York Times, J.A. Konrath, E.L. James, and you and me. Oh, and ebooks.
One of the few blogs I read regularly is the Newbie's Guide to Publishing, wholly owned and operated by indie publishing wunderkind Joe Konrath, aka J.A. Konrath.
Joe is one of the hardest-working writers I know of. He's been traditionally published, traditionally screwed by the publishing industry, and now is a 100%-independent self-published (and sometimes controversial) writer. He pumps out new books regularly. He also earns upwards of six figures a month. $120 an hour, 24 hours a day, according to his figures. He's been busting his ass at this for 20 years. He's earned it.
Joe recently blogged about an ad James Patterson posted in the New York Times, decrying the ongoing downfall of book stores et al:
James is basically suggesting the goverment (ie the taxpayers: US!) bail out the bookstores, libraries, and publishers who are losing money because they are too stuck in the proverbial mud to adapt to the evolving business model that is indie publishing and the ebook phenomenon.
Puh-LEASE!
Why don't we simply cut to the chase: the government not only publishes the books, it publishes ONLY the books it deems appropriate, thereby dictating to us, the American Public, which books we can and cannot read. Possession of non-sanctioned books is illegal. Reminds me of any number of dystopian novels decrying just such a possibility.
Do you really want state-controlled media? Do you really? Are you sure? Because in some parts of the world, that's already how it is.
Anyway, Konrath's point is that the publishing industry is archaic and committed to the status quo because the status quo is their bread and butter. Supporting writers is not. Supporting the readers who support the writers also is not. (This is not to say that there aren't scores of hard-working, book-loving folk working their tails off in the publishing industry!!!)
Furthermore, as Joe points out, James Patterson earns $94 million dollars per year. Fine. Great. I don't begrudge James his success one bit. It's important not to spend one's time mired in envy and pissing and moaning about how lucky the other guy or gal is while we simply aren't. Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity. In other words, EARN IT.
Point being that Jimmy Patterson has a vested interest in the welfare of the publishing industry because it is the business model that has supported him and helped him create his empire. James is not a bad guy, from what I hear. He runs charities and helps get books into the hands of children. As Joe himself sez:
Patterson is doing a great deal of good for the world, with www.readkiddoread.com, with his scholarships, with all of the books he gives away.
Fostering a love of books is paramount. My mom and dad did it for my siblings and me. If they hadn't, who knows what I'd be doing today. Waiting tables maybe. Who knows.
And don't get me wrong, I LOVE book stores. Libraries, too. When the Borders Books right by our house closed, it was horrible. I was genuinely sad. I used to go there ALL the time. Almost daily. I took my laptop and wrote there. I wrote much of The Go-Kids series there. I drank a lot of coffee, bought a lot of food, bought a lot of books, and read a lot of books. And the coup de grace, I met my amazing and lovely wife Taliya there at that Borders!
So yeah, when we drive by or have dinner at the nearby Macaroni Grill where we had our first date, and we see the empty building, it sucks.
I often racked my brain trying to figure out how I could own my own book store that would be profitable enough for it to keep its doors open without being in a net loss each month.
Still trying to crack that nut.
Writer David Biddle has penned an interesting article at TalkingWriting.com about the relationship between book stores and independent writers. He mentions Konrath as well. It's worth a read.
But I digress.
The problem is not books; it's business.
Imagine it's 100 years from now. 2113. A man is riding the monorail to work. He is reading a book. Some trashy horror thriller he found online.
A man standing beside him suddenly seizes the book, rips it from his fingers and darts out the door of the train just before the doors close.
A plainclothes cop witnesses the crime, draws his weapon, fires, and kills the man. The cop then returns the book to its rightful owner. Because the book is an antique worth several hundred (thousand?) dollars. It's an actual book. And only rich people can afford actual printed paper books.
This is the future as I see it (as described in my SciFi novel A Shadow Passed Over the Son, which is currently #60 in Amazon Free SciFi; hooray!). Maybe not the getting shot on sight part, but the rarity of printed books. It's coming. If we extrapolate even a tiny bit, we can compare books to records or 8-tracks or cassettes or CDs. They're not the medium by which people consume their entertainment. (As Joe has illustrated many times.)
Little kids in school are already being given iPads instead of textbooks.
Patterson is a wealthy writer. So is E.L. James (author of the 50 Shades series).
Prepare yourself to see a lot more E.L. James's, and a lot fewer James Patterson's.
Just keep writing.
Just keep reading.
You can't stop progress, right?
The ebook revolution and its technology is connecting writers with new readers and readers with new writers. The gatekeeping middlemen who had heretofore held the reins and essentially extorted the source of their fortune (writers, musicians, artists...) are now being relegated more and more to the sidelines. Maybe they'll find a way to wrestle back some of the control they have historically had.
Maybe not.
Either way, the march toward a digital future is inevitable.
Ebooks are only going to become more popular.
It's not a great and evil conspiracy. It's simply common sense: a more convenient, less expensive, fun way for readers to buy and read books.
How many people do you know who have an iPad/tablet? A smart phone? An e-reader such as a Kindle, a Kindle Fire/HD, a Nook, a Kobo, a Sony, etc, etc?
How many people do you know who still have a telephone land-line in their house?
Joe is one of the hardest-working writers I know of. He's been traditionally published, traditionally screwed by the publishing industry, and now is a 100%-independent self-published (and sometimes controversial) writer. He pumps out new books regularly. He also earns upwards of six figures a month. $120 an hour, 24 hours a day, according to his figures. He's been busting his ass at this for 20 years. He's earned it.
Joe recently blogged about an ad James Patterson posted in the New York Times, decrying the ongoing downfall of book stores et al:
James is basically suggesting the goverment (ie the taxpayers: US!) bail out the bookstores, libraries, and publishers who are losing money because they are too stuck in the proverbial mud to adapt to the evolving business model that is indie publishing and the ebook phenomenon.
Puh-LEASE!
Why don't we simply cut to the chase: the government not only publishes the books, it publishes ONLY the books it deems appropriate, thereby dictating to us, the American Public, which books we can and cannot read. Possession of non-sanctioned books is illegal. Reminds me of any number of dystopian novels decrying just such a possibility.
Do you really want state-controlled media? Do you really? Are you sure? Because in some parts of the world, that's already how it is.
Anyway, Konrath's point is that the publishing industry is archaic and committed to the status quo because the status quo is their bread and butter. Supporting writers is not. Supporting the readers who support the writers also is not. (This is not to say that there aren't scores of hard-working, book-loving folk working their tails off in the publishing industry!!!)
Furthermore, as Joe points out, James Patterson earns $94 million dollars per year. Fine. Great. I don't begrudge James his success one bit. It's important not to spend one's time mired in envy and pissing and moaning about how lucky the other guy or gal is while we simply aren't. Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity. In other words, EARN IT.
Point being that Jimmy Patterson has a vested interest in the welfare of the publishing industry because it is the business model that has supported him and helped him create his empire. James is not a bad guy, from what I hear. He runs charities and helps get books into the hands of children. As Joe himself sez:
Patterson is doing a great deal of good for the world, with www.readkiddoread.com, with his scholarships, with all of the books he gives away.
Fostering a love of books is paramount. My mom and dad did it for my siblings and me. If they hadn't, who knows what I'd be doing today. Waiting tables maybe. Who knows.
And don't get me wrong, I LOVE book stores. Libraries, too. When the Borders Books right by our house closed, it was horrible. I was genuinely sad. I used to go there ALL the time. Almost daily. I took my laptop and wrote there. I wrote much of The Go-Kids series there. I drank a lot of coffee, bought a lot of food, bought a lot of books, and read a lot of books. And the coup de grace, I met my amazing and lovely wife Taliya there at that Borders!
So yeah, when we drive by or have dinner at the nearby Macaroni Grill where we had our first date, and we see the empty building, it sucks.
I often racked my brain trying to figure out how I could own my own book store that would be profitable enough for it to keep its doors open without being in a net loss each month.
Still trying to crack that nut.
Writer David Biddle has penned an interesting article at TalkingWriting.com about the relationship between book stores and independent writers. He mentions Konrath as well. It's worth a read.
But I digress.
The problem is not books; it's business.
Imagine it's 100 years from now. 2113. A man is riding the monorail to work. He is reading a book. Some trashy horror thriller he found online.
A man standing beside him suddenly seizes the book, rips it from his fingers and darts out the door of the train just before the doors close.
A plainclothes cop witnesses the crime, draws his weapon, fires, and kills the man. The cop then returns the book to its rightful owner. Because the book is an antique worth several hundred (thousand?) dollars. It's an actual book. And only rich people can afford actual printed paper books.
This is the future as I see it (as described in my SciFi novel A Shadow Passed Over the Son, which is currently #60 in Amazon Free SciFi; hooray!). Maybe not the getting shot on sight part, but the rarity of printed books. It's coming. If we extrapolate even a tiny bit, we can compare books to records or 8-tracks or cassettes or CDs. They're not the medium by which people consume their entertainment. (As Joe has illustrated many times.)
Little kids in school are already being given iPads instead of textbooks.
Patterson is a wealthy writer. So is E.L. James (author of the 50 Shades series).
Prepare yourself to see a lot more E.L. James's, and a lot fewer James Patterson's.
Just keep writing.
Just keep reading.
You can't stop progress, right?
The ebook revolution and its technology is connecting writers with new readers and readers with new writers. The gatekeeping middlemen who had heretofore held the reins and essentially extorted the source of their fortune (writers, musicians, artists...) are now being relegated more and more to the sidelines. Maybe they'll find a way to wrestle back some of the control they have historically had.
Maybe not.
Either way, the march toward a digital future is inevitable.
Ebooks are only going to become more popular.
It's not a great and evil conspiracy. It's simply common sense: a more convenient, less expensive, fun way for readers to buy and read books.
How many people do you know who have an iPad/tablet? A smart phone? An e-reader such as a Kindle, a Kindle Fire/HD, a Nook, a Kobo, a Sony, etc, etc?
How many people do you know who still have a telephone land-line in their house?
April 24, 2013
Results for Ryan's Free THANK YOU eBook Sale
In order to celebrate the recent release of my new novel Eye Candy, I had a two-day sale last weekend. Saturday and Sunday, most of my titles were free for digital download through Amazon's KDP Select program.
It was two days of advertising mayhem. And it was a blast!
I must say, it was a roaring success.
So THANK YOU to everyone who purchased a book or retweeted one of my tweets announcing the sale, both before and during the actual two-day event. I couldn't have done it with out you.
I thought I would share some of the numbers with you. My fellow writers will no doubt find this intriguing, and hopefully readers do as well. The indie publishing phenomenon is ever changing, and it can be difficult to determine which advertising tactics are best (and which ones aren't so productive).
The only advertising I did was on Twitter. I did a similar sale last year on Halloween and sold over 1000 books. So I thought I would try it again in order to share the news about Eye Candy.
The first day (Saturday), sales really took off in the Amazon UK market. I was pleasantly surprised.
A few hours later, similar numbers began to appear for the US market as well. I remained pleasantly surprised.
I continued to work Twitter like mad. I contacted as many fellow writers as possible and asked them to RT to their followers, which of course they did. (THANK YOU, guys!)
Sunday rolled around and my head was spinning. But the numbers continued to rise. Amazon UK began to slow down by midday, but the US kept on charging. Perhaps folks in the UK weren't on their computers as much on Sunday as they had been on Saturday.
France, Germany, and Canada all had sales, with Canada leading the pack. I even had my very first sale in Japan, which is great because I think Japanese readers would enjoy my books.
Only Spain and Brasil showed zero sales. Alas, something to shoot for next time!
By Sunday at midnight Pacific Standard Time, the sale concluded.
Overall, Eye Candy was the title downloaded the most, which is what I wanted given that it's a brand new book and I wanted to get it into readers' hands so they could enjoy it, spread the word, post reviews, and get hooked so as to purchase my other titles.
Total Books Sold: 1344
Books sold by country:
US 1046
UK 210
DE 46
FR 4
ES 0
IT 2
JP 1
CA 35
BR 0
Books sold by title:
#1 Eye Candy 357
#2 The Leap 113
#3 Get Off 94
The remaining titles decreased slowly, but most were in the 60 range, with the lowest being in the 30s.
Overall, I am thrilled with the outcome of the sale. It's impossible to know exactly how many people purchased books because many people purchased multiple titles or even a copy of every title.
I am perfectly happy with this.
The sale has already begun to generate new reviews, which is always nice, especially when they're positive; plus they help foster sales by building credibility.
The next couple of weeks will reveal if there is an increase or decrease in sales averages. For my next sale, I will do a coordinated effort utilizing other channels both free and paid (Goodreads, BookBub, etc...) and will compare the results. I'm excited to see what happens.
But more than that, I'm excited that so many people now own a copy of Eye Candy. 357 to be exact. I hope each and every one of them reads the book and enjoys it. That's what this is all about. Writing from the heart to share a story I was passionate about and spent a year-and-a-half writing. The sharing is the manifestation of the original idea. We now have a global campfire around which we can all sit and enjoy a good story.
To that end, I want to say Thank You once again, and I look forward to sharing many more stories with each of you.
It was two days of advertising mayhem. And it was a blast!
I must say, it was a roaring success.
So THANK YOU to everyone who purchased a book or retweeted one of my tweets announcing the sale, both before and during the actual two-day event. I couldn't have done it with out you.
I thought I would share some of the numbers with you. My fellow writers will no doubt find this intriguing, and hopefully readers do as well. The indie publishing phenomenon is ever changing, and it can be difficult to determine which advertising tactics are best (and which ones aren't so productive).
The only advertising I did was on Twitter. I did a similar sale last year on Halloween and sold over 1000 books. So I thought I would try it again in order to share the news about Eye Candy.
The first day (Saturday), sales really took off in the Amazon UK market. I was pleasantly surprised.
A few hours later, similar numbers began to appear for the US market as well. I remained pleasantly surprised.
I continued to work Twitter like mad. I contacted as many fellow writers as possible and asked them to RT to their followers, which of course they did. (THANK YOU, guys!)
Sunday rolled around and my head was spinning. But the numbers continued to rise. Amazon UK began to slow down by midday, but the US kept on charging. Perhaps folks in the UK weren't on their computers as much on Sunday as they had been on Saturday.
France, Germany, and Canada all had sales, with Canada leading the pack. I even had my very first sale in Japan, which is great because I think Japanese readers would enjoy my books.
Only Spain and Brasil showed zero sales. Alas, something to shoot for next time!
By Sunday at midnight Pacific Standard Time, the sale concluded.
Overall, Eye Candy was the title downloaded the most, which is what I wanted given that it's a brand new book and I wanted to get it into readers' hands so they could enjoy it, spread the word, post reviews, and get hooked so as to purchase my other titles.
Total Books Sold: 1344
Books sold by country:
US 1046
UK 210
DE 46
FR 4
ES 0
IT 2
JP 1
CA 35
BR 0
Books sold by title:
#1 Eye Candy 357
#2 The Leap 113
#3 Get Off 94
The remaining titles decreased slowly, but most were in the 60 range, with the lowest being in the 30s.
Overall, I am thrilled with the outcome of the sale. It's impossible to know exactly how many people purchased books because many people purchased multiple titles or even a copy of every title.
I am perfectly happy with this.
The sale has already begun to generate new reviews, which is always nice, especially when they're positive; plus they help foster sales by building credibility.
The next couple of weeks will reveal if there is an increase or decrease in sales averages. For my next sale, I will do a coordinated effort utilizing other channels both free and paid (Goodreads, BookBub, etc...) and will compare the results. I'm excited to see what happens.
But more than that, I'm excited that so many people now own a copy of Eye Candy. 357 to be exact. I hope each and every one of them reads the book and enjoys it. That's what this is all about. Writing from the heart to share a story I was passionate about and spent a year-and-a-half writing. The sharing is the manifestation of the original idea. We now have a global campfire around which we can all sit and enjoy a good story.
To that end, I want to say Thank You once again, and I look forward to sharing many more stories with each of you.
