Kate Copeseeley's Blog, page 15
June 19, 2011
Knock my socks off...
Hey look, a post! Wed. didn't happen, obviously. Too much on the platter. Actually, I'm surprised I'm posting anything at all today, but kidlet is still sleeping and the husband has decided that his father's day gift to himself is building a chicken coop.
"Honey," I said, "We can do anything you want. Go for a hike, go see a movie, go play at the pool." Oh no. A chicken coop is the order of the day. So he's off doing that somewhere while I recover from having a three year old birthday party at my house yesterday. It was fine, we invited a small number of kids so it would stay low-key. The kidlet had a great time. There were chocolate cupcakes involved. :)
All in all, it's amazing I got any writing done at all, but somehow, I DID! In fact, ROW friends, I hit the midpoint of Aeris, FINALLY!!! It took me 58,000 words to get there, but it happened, and now I'm so relieved. As for my original goal, I believe it was 70,000 words. I wrote 7,600 for The Demon and His Lover (sequel to my other Samora short story) So that puts me at 65,600. Which is almost there. I have 4,600 words left until the last check-in, Wednesday, and if I put some effort into it, I'll just make it. :)
More exciting for me right now, is that I sent off the first half of Aeris to my lovely beta readers and I've already gotten some GREAT feedback, so yay for that, too. All in all, feeling good about my progress for this ROW 80 and I'm so glad I decided to join, because I really needed a kick in the pants to motivate me to get that next book started. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do about releasing books, but I'm okay with what is my process right now. They have a summer bootcamp for Nano coming up that I might join. I think it's in July. Anything to get this book finished and off my plate. :)
Onto other things, my reader friends. 11 years ago, just in time for its movie debut, I read Waking the Dead by Scott Spencer. I'd never read anything by him before, and I had no idea that when he wrote the book in question in 1986, I was eight. I believe I saw the movie cover with Jennifer Connelly on the front and assumed it was a new book. And nothing ever clued me in that it was otherwise. In other words, it turned out to be timeless, and truly one of the best/hardest books I've ever read.
I don't know what made it pop into my head this week, but it was enough for me to try and figure out what it was called, because I don't own a copy and never re-read it. These are the books that make me want to read. Yes, yes, a blockbuster by your favorite author is GREAT. George's soon to be released book or the final Harry Potter —as a fan, I'm big on those. But there is something about the unexpected pleasure of picking up a book, on a whim, and being totally transformed by it.
There are a few of these, in my life. Maybe they aren't classics or best sellers. Maybe you'll read them and hate them yourself. I don't know. I wanted to share some of them with you. Meanwhile, I'm off to find my library's copy of Waking the Dead, to see if it's all that I remember.
Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes. This book is probably her least recognized and least popular, and that is a shame, because it is arguably her BEST. It follows the first person account of Rachel, stuck in rehab against her will, for a drug problem that isn't a problem. If you knew her crazy family, you'd understand how, in a fit of paranoia and panic, they insisted she get some help. And she proceeds to spend the entire book describing the circumstances on how she actually landed in rehab. This book is hilarious, heartwarming, and knocked me on my butt halfway through when I realized how staggeringly GOOD Marian Keyes is as an author. I honestly never took her seriously until that moment, and if you've read any of her other books you'd understand why. (Not that they're bad, to clarify, they're just so light and fluffy.)
The Love Letter by Cathleen Schine is one I hesitate to nominate, simply because I've recommended her before, to my friends' dismay. I've been told that this book is slow, that it's hard to get into, and not funny. But I find it delightful! It's like that last cup of iced tea, just as the sun is going down on a hot summer day. The main character is bookstore owner and I find her perspective on life and books delicious.
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. If you do not know and love this woman by now, PLEASE for the love of all that's holy, go and find a copy of one of her books. I didn't list my favorite by her (Prodigal Summer) because by the time I read that book, I already loved her. I hate, hate, hate that this book is an Oprah book. Not because I have a thing against Oprah, but because it gives a certain perception of what the book will be like. It's an amazing book, and I loved the prose so much when I read it that I went back immediately and read it again. I consumed, devoured and savored each word and the characters of this book... wow.
Drop City by T. C. Boyle. This book was a fascinating journey back into the 1970's, during the peak of the commune, free love movement. Somehow it also intertwines with Alaskan pioneer life and mail order brides. Fantastic, riveting, and one of the most interesting premises for a book that I've read. I don't know if you could say it has a PLOT, but it definitely has a journey.
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje. I hated this book the first time I read it. I hated it the second time, too, but it was an assigned English assignment and required about four readings to get through all my papers and homework and by the time I read it the third time, I was in love. This was the first book I read that didn't have a typical chronological storyline. It was also the first book I ever read that didn't have the traditional "happy ending". That is the reason, IT IS NOT FOR EVERYONE. But because of this book, I was able to read quite a few literary fiction books without fear or hesitation. I don't think I would have read Virgin Suicides if I hadn't read this book, first. There is a section on the different types of desert winds that is one of the most beautiful pieces of writing I've ever read. That being said, I've never read another book by this author since. :)
That is the end of my interesting list. There are many many more I could add, but this is a good starting place.Happy Reading!
"Honey," I said, "We can do anything you want. Go for a hike, go see a movie, go play at the pool." Oh no. A chicken coop is the order of the day. So he's off doing that somewhere while I recover from having a three year old birthday party at my house yesterday. It was fine, we invited a small number of kids so it would stay low-key. The kidlet had a great time. There were chocolate cupcakes involved. :)
All in all, it's amazing I got any writing done at all, but somehow, I DID! In fact, ROW friends, I hit the midpoint of Aeris, FINALLY!!! It took me 58,000 words to get there, but it happened, and now I'm so relieved. As for my original goal, I believe it was 70,000 words. I wrote 7,600 for The Demon and His Lover (sequel to my other Samora short story) So that puts me at 65,600. Which is almost there. I have 4,600 words left until the last check-in, Wednesday, and if I put some effort into it, I'll just make it. :)
More exciting for me right now, is that I sent off the first half of Aeris to my lovely beta readers and I've already gotten some GREAT feedback, so yay for that, too. All in all, feeling good about my progress for this ROW 80 and I'm so glad I decided to join, because I really needed a kick in the pants to motivate me to get that next book started. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do about releasing books, but I'm okay with what is my process right now. They have a summer bootcamp for Nano coming up that I might join. I think it's in July. Anything to get this book finished and off my plate. :)
Onto other things, my reader friends. 11 years ago, just in time for its movie debut, I read Waking the Dead by Scott Spencer. I'd never read anything by him before, and I had no idea that when he wrote the book in question in 1986, I was eight. I believe I saw the movie cover with Jennifer Connelly on the front and assumed it was a new book. And nothing ever clued me in that it was otherwise. In other words, it turned out to be timeless, and truly one of the best/hardest books I've ever read.
I don't know what made it pop into my head this week, but it was enough for me to try and figure out what it was called, because I don't own a copy and never re-read it. These are the books that make me want to read. Yes, yes, a blockbuster by your favorite author is GREAT. George's soon to be released book or the final Harry Potter —as a fan, I'm big on those. But there is something about the unexpected pleasure of picking up a book, on a whim, and being totally transformed by it.
There are a few of these, in my life. Maybe they aren't classics or best sellers. Maybe you'll read them and hate them yourself. I don't know. I wanted to share some of them with you. Meanwhile, I'm off to find my library's copy of Waking the Dead, to see if it's all that I remember.
Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes. This book is probably her least recognized and least popular, and that is a shame, because it is arguably her BEST. It follows the first person account of Rachel, stuck in rehab against her will, for a drug problem that isn't a problem. If you knew her crazy family, you'd understand how, in a fit of paranoia and panic, they insisted she get some help. And she proceeds to spend the entire book describing the circumstances on how she actually landed in rehab. This book is hilarious, heartwarming, and knocked me on my butt halfway through when I realized how staggeringly GOOD Marian Keyes is as an author. I honestly never took her seriously until that moment, and if you've read any of her other books you'd understand why. (Not that they're bad, to clarify, they're just so light and fluffy.)
The Love Letter by Cathleen Schine is one I hesitate to nominate, simply because I've recommended her before, to my friends' dismay. I've been told that this book is slow, that it's hard to get into, and not funny. But I find it delightful! It's like that last cup of iced tea, just as the sun is going down on a hot summer day. The main character is bookstore owner and I find her perspective on life and books delicious.
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. If you do not know and love this woman by now, PLEASE for the love of all that's holy, go and find a copy of one of her books. I didn't list my favorite by her (Prodigal Summer) because by the time I read that book, I already loved her. I hate, hate, hate that this book is an Oprah book. Not because I have a thing against Oprah, but because it gives a certain perception of what the book will be like. It's an amazing book, and I loved the prose so much when I read it that I went back immediately and read it again. I consumed, devoured and savored each word and the characters of this book... wow.
Drop City by T. C. Boyle. This book was a fascinating journey back into the 1970's, during the peak of the commune, free love movement. Somehow it also intertwines with Alaskan pioneer life and mail order brides. Fantastic, riveting, and one of the most interesting premises for a book that I've read. I don't know if you could say it has a PLOT, but it definitely has a journey.
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje. I hated this book the first time I read it. I hated it the second time, too, but it was an assigned English assignment and required about four readings to get through all my papers and homework and by the time I read it the third time, I was in love. This was the first book I read that didn't have a typical chronological storyline. It was also the first book I ever read that didn't have the traditional "happy ending". That is the reason, IT IS NOT FOR EVERYONE. But because of this book, I was able to read quite a few literary fiction books without fear or hesitation. I don't think I would have read Virgin Suicides if I hadn't read this book, first. There is a section on the different types of desert winds that is one of the most beautiful pieces of writing I've ever read. That being said, I've never read another book by this author since. :)
That is the end of my interesting list. There are many many more I could add, but this is a good starting place.Happy Reading!
June 12, 2011
Sunday, Sunny, ROW
First, I cracked 50,000! Aeris is now at 52,570. Didn't write this morning, though. Day of Rest and all that. :) I'm really happy with where Aeris is at this point in time. I've got about 2 character sections left before part one of the book is finally finished. (Barring Edits, of course!) Then I'm sending that section off to my beta readers for notes, critiques, and general hardcore bashing. After which I'll save the notes for later.
While that is progressing, I'll keep writing on the second part. I still can't believe how long this book is ending up. I feel like I truly understand the several authors who ended up telling a longer story than they planned. My only worry is adding stuff that doesn't have to be there. I'd rather be like Rowling and Goblet of Fire than Paolini and Brisingr. (Sorry, I know, but I STILL can't get over the Dwarf wedding.)
So, one of my readers over at goodreads pretty much told me, in so many nicer words, that I'm a whiny ranter who should edit books rather than read them, as I'm so very picky. hahaha This was in regards to my last entry, where I basically talk about how upsetting I found The Strange Case of Finley Jayne.
It's hard not to get defensive, because even though there are some things that really bother me as a reader, I'm a pretty generous reader over all. The vast majority of my ratings are 4 or 5 stars and a paltry 8% of them have been two stars or less. And even though there were some factors about the story I didn't agree with, I still gave it a 3 star, which is what I consider average on the "I loved it!" scale.
I did think about being an editor once upon a time. Back when I was a naive reader in college, taking English classes, and creative writing and loving every second of it. I thought, "I could be one of those editors and then move on to writing later." I was going to be an English major and maybe even go on to get my masters. Then I ran into the English teacher from hell. As college students, we've all run into the teacher who is writing her own book/textbook haven't we? The teacher who knows everything, is hypercritical and has a proven "method" that every single student in the class must follow.
No, this is not the C or D student making excuses for herself. I'm an A student, baby. I committed myself to every class, determined to learn all that I could and be the best I could be. My previous English class had been tough, but I had made it out with an A and a teacher who I'd come to appreciate deeply, even though I didn't appreciate most of the books she'd chosen. This new teacher, however, made me hate English, even though she chose a bunch of books that I loved.
The saddest part of it was, I ended up with the highest grade in the class, (barely an A) and because of her, I left English behind forever. Instead, I chose the objectivity and order of computer science. A big switch I realize, but this is all to say, I decided that editing (and writing) were not for me. I never looked back. I didn't write for years. I don't blame her for that, I think I just got too busy with coding to think about writing stories. It wasn't until I was almost graduated that I thought about writing stories again.
Maybe I am too nitpicky in some ways about writing. It's true that I probably hold traditionally published books to a higher standard than indies. Why? Because they cost more, first of all. I think that's supposed to be the point: they cost more because they put in all the extra stuff that indies don't usually. They have artists, editors, proof readers, marketers, etc. and indies are lucky if they have a good editor and cover. But indies are cheap, and if carefully vetted, usually a good read. Traditionally published books also have a better reputation, so I tend to expect them to uphold it. So when they disappoint me, they do it big time.
As I mentioned before, I still have yet to read The Girl in the Steel Corset, so I could end up having some great things to say. I certainly have lower expectations at this point in time! :)
Also, I posted a review of Leviathan over at goodreads. LOVED IT!!! One of my favorite YA books of the year. Worth reading, if you like YA fiction.
Happy Reading!
While that is progressing, I'll keep writing on the second part. I still can't believe how long this book is ending up. I feel like I truly understand the several authors who ended up telling a longer story than they planned. My only worry is adding stuff that doesn't have to be there. I'd rather be like Rowling and Goblet of Fire than Paolini and Brisingr. (Sorry, I know, but I STILL can't get over the Dwarf wedding.)
So, one of my readers over at goodreads pretty much told me, in so many nicer words, that I'm a whiny ranter who should edit books rather than read them, as I'm so very picky. hahaha This was in regards to my last entry, where I basically talk about how upsetting I found The Strange Case of Finley Jayne.
It's hard not to get defensive, because even though there are some things that really bother me as a reader, I'm a pretty generous reader over all. The vast majority of my ratings are 4 or 5 stars and a paltry 8% of them have been two stars or less. And even though there were some factors about the story I didn't agree with, I still gave it a 3 star, which is what I consider average on the "I loved it!" scale.
I did think about being an editor once upon a time. Back when I was a naive reader in college, taking English classes, and creative writing and loving every second of it. I thought, "I could be one of those editors and then move on to writing later." I was going to be an English major and maybe even go on to get my masters. Then I ran into the English teacher from hell. As college students, we've all run into the teacher who is writing her own book/textbook haven't we? The teacher who knows everything, is hypercritical and has a proven "method" that every single student in the class must follow.
No, this is not the C or D student making excuses for herself. I'm an A student, baby. I committed myself to every class, determined to learn all that I could and be the best I could be. My previous English class had been tough, but I had made it out with an A and a teacher who I'd come to appreciate deeply, even though I didn't appreciate most of the books she'd chosen. This new teacher, however, made me hate English, even though she chose a bunch of books that I loved.
The saddest part of it was, I ended up with the highest grade in the class, (barely an A) and because of her, I left English behind forever. Instead, I chose the objectivity and order of computer science. A big switch I realize, but this is all to say, I decided that editing (and writing) were not for me. I never looked back. I didn't write for years. I don't blame her for that, I think I just got too busy with coding to think about writing stories. It wasn't until I was almost graduated that I thought about writing stories again.
Maybe I am too nitpicky in some ways about writing. It's true that I probably hold traditionally published books to a higher standard than indies. Why? Because they cost more, first of all. I think that's supposed to be the point: they cost more because they put in all the extra stuff that indies don't usually. They have artists, editors, proof readers, marketers, etc. and indies are lucky if they have a good editor and cover. But indies are cheap, and if carefully vetted, usually a good read. Traditionally published books also have a better reputation, so I tend to expect them to uphold it. So when they disappoint me, they do it big time.
As I mentioned before, I still have yet to read The Girl in the Steel Corset, so I could end up having some great things to say. I certainly have lower expectations at this point in time! :)
Also, I posted a review of Leviathan over at goodreads. LOVED IT!!! One of my favorite YA books of the year. Worth reading, if you like YA fiction.
Happy Reading!
June 8, 2011
Where Have All the Editors Gone? (A Reader's Perspective)
Short break for a word count here: 46,717. The end is in sight regarding my middle point (or part two, as I like to call it) in Aeris. Thank goodness! I was beginning to think that I wouldn't ever get to it. It didn't help that I forgot to outline my "trigger" scenario. In Compis, there were a clear set of circumstances that indicated a midpoint. In Aeris, it's a bit trickier, because I can't just start up part two where Nikka moves from one tribe to the next. All three characters have to reach a balanced tipping point. However, thanks to some rather interesting events that have unfolded, I will be able to grab onto them and run with it.
Every time I think I know how things are going to go, my little world turns right around and reminds me that I'm merely the vessel to transcribe its existence. I do not create it. :)
As for my goal: I think 50,000 by the Sunday isn't unreasonable. I've been getting up about 15 min. earlier this week, and that has really helped me get the tiniest edge over my early riser son. :)
On to a less pleasant subject, but one that has been bothering my reader brain for quite some time now. I read a LOT. I know I've mentioned it before, but I do. And I enjoy good writing. I relish it, actually. I'm not talking about blog writing or news articles, or forum posts. I'm talking about honest to goodness, I took a lot of time and effort to put this together and it SHOWS writing. Best example and the guru I will always look to for some of the best writing I've ever read, Barbara Kingsolver. She has it all —the perfect mix of prose, metaphor, simile, storyline and characters of anyone I've ever read. George is a close second to that, but even he can't match her for beauty. It's like Mary Oliver decided to ditch poetry and become a storyteller.
I realize not everyone can meet this standard. I don't demand it of many authors. Certainly, the YA genre is not expected to live up to it. Why should it? Teenagers want short, well-written but to the point prose, and romance. That is pretty much the gist of what the industry has been demanding. Sure, you can throw in a love triangle or a pair of star-crossed lovers and make them especially happy, but really, their needs are simple. Which is NOT to say that the writing must be simple or lack intelligence or prose. I'm just saying, YA doesn't demand it, not like literary fiction does.
That being said, a book SHOULD live up to its self-imposed labels. If you want to be YA fiction romantic comedy, you better be funny. If you want to write paranormal fiction, you know this means phenomena unexplained by science, living in a real world. Don't go putting cowboys in there, unless you want to relabel what you have to offer.
So here is where the short story The Strange Case of Finley Jayne comes in. First of all, yes I understand it's a SHORT STORY. Yes, I understand there is an actual NOVEL to delve into, if I want the chance. I've already bought it, thanks. What I question, is why this short story exists AT ALL. What is its purpose? To entice me with its $0.00 price tag and then convince me to buy The Girl in the Steel Corset? If so, it has failed miserably and more is the pity.
There are a lot of ways to write a short story, I've written quite a few of them myself. This is NOT the way. Finley Jayne, who could be a perfectly likeable character, is stilted, chained to this detestable storyline that stumbles along till its inevitable end, and is given nothing, really, to highlight the coolness of her character. The other characters are equally as shallow, and lend pretty much nothing to the story, except to bring us to the end of it.
It's almost as though (and again, this is a limited review, since I haven't read the novel) the author was approached by Harlequin, whom she writes ADULT ROMANCES for, and they said, "Hey, why don't you write YA, which you know nothing about, and we'll pay you." And she was like, "Sure, that sounds like fun. Steampunk is pretty popular now, I've heard, and you guys aren't publishing that through Harper Teen. Why don't I try that?" BAD IDEA.
I can tell the author has written in the time period before and has done research on it. She calls objects by their proper names. But the dialog and slang she uses are laughable. It's annoying trying to read a book set in Victorian England, when you keep getting pulled out of the story by American slang that is set WELL AFTER the time period in question. It's great if you want to throw in words like automaton, and such, but you need to DESCRIBE them to actually make us believe we are in the alternate world you've tried to paint.
At this point in time, all I can wonder is... where in the hell was the editor for this? Who let this slide? Where was the person circling words like pissed, icky, and racy with bright red pen. Why didn't someone take the author aside and say, "They aren't middle schoolers. You can use bigger words and longer sentences. Don't talk down to your readers."
My hope is that this was a blip. Maybe the publishers did a crappy job because this is just supposed to be a taste of a better book so they didn't dedicate any resources to it. I'll find out when I read the novel.
On a lighter note, I started Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan, and it is absolutely the opposite. What a wonderful, descriptive, well-written take on steampunk. I wasn't keen on his Uglies series, but this one has been highly enjoyable.
Every time I think I know how things are going to go, my little world turns right around and reminds me that I'm merely the vessel to transcribe its existence. I do not create it. :)
As for my goal: I think 50,000 by the Sunday isn't unreasonable. I've been getting up about 15 min. earlier this week, and that has really helped me get the tiniest edge over my early riser son. :)
On to a less pleasant subject, but one that has been bothering my reader brain for quite some time now. I read a LOT. I know I've mentioned it before, but I do. And I enjoy good writing. I relish it, actually. I'm not talking about blog writing or news articles, or forum posts. I'm talking about honest to goodness, I took a lot of time and effort to put this together and it SHOWS writing. Best example and the guru I will always look to for some of the best writing I've ever read, Barbara Kingsolver. She has it all —the perfect mix of prose, metaphor, simile, storyline and characters of anyone I've ever read. George is a close second to that, but even he can't match her for beauty. It's like Mary Oliver decided to ditch poetry and become a storyteller.
I realize not everyone can meet this standard. I don't demand it of many authors. Certainly, the YA genre is not expected to live up to it. Why should it? Teenagers want short, well-written but to the point prose, and romance. That is pretty much the gist of what the industry has been demanding. Sure, you can throw in a love triangle or a pair of star-crossed lovers and make them especially happy, but really, their needs are simple. Which is NOT to say that the writing must be simple or lack intelligence or prose. I'm just saying, YA doesn't demand it, not like literary fiction does.
That being said, a book SHOULD live up to its self-imposed labels. If you want to be YA fiction romantic comedy, you better be funny. If you want to write paranormal fiction, you know this means phenomena unexplained by science, living in a real world. Don't go putting cowboys in there, unless you want to relabel what you have to offer.
So here is where the short story The Strange Case of Finley Jayne comes in. First of all, yes I understand it's a SHORT STORY. Yes, I understand there is an actual NOVEL to delve into, if I want the chance. I've already bought it, thanks. What I question, is why this short story exists AT ALL. What is its purpose? To entice me with its $0.00 price tag and then convince me to buy The Girl in the Steel Corset? If so, it has failed miserably and more is the pity.
There are a lot of ways to write a short story, I've written quite a few of them myself. This is NOT the way. Finley Jayne, who could be a perfectly likeable character, is stilted, chained to this detestable storyline that stumbles along till its inevitable end, and is given nothing, really, to highlight the coolness of her character. The other characters are equally as shallow, and lend pretty much nothing to the story, except to bring us to the end of it.
It's almost as though (and again, this is a limited review, since I haven't read the novel) the author was approached by Harlequin, whom she writes ADULT ROMANCES for, and they said, "Hey, why don't you write YA, which you know nothing about, and we'll pay you." And she was like, "Sure, that sounds like fun. Steampunk is pretty popular now, I've heard, and you guys aren't publishing that through Harper Teen. Why don't I try that?" BAD IDEA.
I can tell the author has written in the time period before and has done research on it. She calls objects by their proper names. But the dialog and slang she uses are laughable. It's annoying trying to read a book set in Victorian England, when you keep getting pulled out of the story by American slang that is set WELL AFTER the time period in question. It's great if you want to throw in words like automaton, and such, but you need to DESCRIBE them to actually make us believe we are in the alternate world you've tried to paint.
At this point in time, all I can wonder is... where in the hell was the editor for this? Who let this slide? Where was the person circling words like pissed, icky, and racy with bright red pen. Why didn't someone take the author aside and say, "They aren't middle schoolers. You can use bigger words and longer sentences. Don't talk down to your readers."
My hope is that this was a blip. Maybe the publishers did a crappy job because this is just supposed to be a taste of a better book so they didn't dedicate any resources to it. I'll find out when I read the novel.
On a lighter note, I started Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan, and it is absolutely the opposite. What a wonderful, descriptive, well-written take on steampunk. I wasn't keen on his Uglies series, but this one has been highly enjoyable.
June 1, 2011
Buzzing Brain... Oh, yeah, a word count.
Word count first, for all of those visitors who come here because I'm on that linky thing:
Aeris: 39,024. I estimate that tomorrow or Friday I will hit 40,000. I don't know which, however, because I'm headed down for a quick stop to my parents' house, then sprinting back either tomorrow night or Friday morning. As I've mentioned before, my early morning wakeup is at 5:30. That is when I write. If I'm driving at either of those times (or getting ready to go to my parents' house) then I'm not going to be writing. But no matter what, I see myself hitting 40,000, my goal for this week, by Sunday.
As I mentioned last week, my word count for this book is going to be greater than the last book. One of my readers commented that what I should do is focus on finishing this book up and releasing it after new baby is born, instead of trying to do two books and have neither ONE of them be finished. Good point, really. However, my fear is that it will be another year before I have time to write again. All of you nice readers keep pointing out that I will find the time somewhere. Writers write. Maybe.
But see there's little little book called Six Keys that I wrote a while ago. It actually has a prequel and a sequel that I have planned. The Doorman's Collection has been planned for several years. Yes, seriously. I even wrote a few chapters of it. But it is set in the late 60's, and then 70's, so it is requiring a lot more research than even Six Keys did. This has meant a significant delay in publishing, because I just don't have the time to write, and take care of kidlet, and research. I don't. I get people asking me all the time when the prequel is coming out, but gosh dang it, I have no idea. And I'm sorry about that.
My fear is that Compis will be out, and maybe Aeris, then any fans of the series will be left hanging while I get my baby raising act together. So the truth is, it's time for another serious look at my goals for the next 2 years. I did this back in January, before releasing Compis and back in August, before my final edit of Six Keys. It's one of those things that continues on, I guess.
In other news, interesting things are happening in the publishing world. I can say publishing, and not indie publishing this time, because of:
Amazon getting into the Publishing Business
Another Conversation between Joe Konrath and Barry Eisler (VERY LONG, but worth it)
A Conversation between Jennifer Crusie and Barbara O'Neal (Also very long, but worth it)
I feel like I'm caught in the middle of a typhoon, with all that has happened in the publishing world in the past few weeks.
As a reader though, I will benefit tremendously, so to all,
Happy Reading!
Aeris: 39,024. I estimate that tomorrow or Friday I will hit 40,000. I don't know which, however, because I'm headed down for a quick stop to my parents' house, then sprinting back either tomorrow night or Friday morning. As I've mentioned before, my early morning wakeup is at 5:30. That is when I write. If I'm driving at either of those times (or getting ready to go to my parents' house) then I'm not going to be writing. But no matter what, I see myself hitting 40,000, my goal for this week, by Sunday.
As I mentioned last week, my word count for this book is going to be greater than the last book. One of my readers commented that what I should do is focus on finishing this book up and releasing it after new baby is born, instead of trying to do two books and have neither ONE of them be finished. Good point, really. However, my fear is that it will be another year before I have time to write again. All of you nice readers keep pointing out that I will find the time somewhere. Writers write. Maybe.
But see there's little little book called Six Keys that I wrote a while ago. It actually has a prequel and a sequel that I have planned. The Doorman's Collection has been planned for several years. Yes, seriously. I even wrote a few chapters of it. But it is set in the late 60's, and then 70's, so it is requiring a lot more research than even Six Keys did. This has meant a significant delay in publishing, because I just don't have the time to write, and take care of kidlet, and research. I don't. I get people asking me all the time when the prequel is coming out, but gosh dang it, I have no idea. And I'm sorry about that.
My fear is that Compis will be out, and maybe Aeris, then any fans of the series will be left hanging while I get my baby raising act together. So the truth is, it's time for another serious look at my goals for the next 2 years. I did this back in January, before releasing Compis and back in August, before my final edit of Six Keys. It's one of those things that continues on, I guess.
In other news, interesting things are happening in the publishing world. I can say publishing, and not indie publishing this time, because of:
Amazon getting into the Publishing Business
Another Conversation between Joe Konrath and Barry Eisler (VERY LONG, but worth it)
A Conversation between Jennifer Crusie and Barbara O'Neal (Also very long, but worth it)
I feel like I'm caught in the middle of a typhoon, with all that has happened in the publishing world in the past few weeks.
As a reader though, I will benefit tremendously, so to all,
Happy Reading!
May 29, 2011
Sale Fail and Word Count
Let's see 33,766, is the word count currently, but I hope to add another thousand to that before the day (and naptime) is over. The word count went pretty good, but I totally failed on Wednesday and Thursday. I was up until very late (for me) Tuesday and just could NOT face the idea of waking up at 5:30. Of course, my kid woke up at 6:30, but at least I got that extra hour. And a nap. And slept in again on Thursday, when he slept in until the unheard hour of 7:15. Holy cow! How did that happen?
Kicked butt on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, though. Hoping to reach 40,000 this week. Oh, and guess what... I think this book is going to be longer than 70,000 words. I have been suspecting as much, as it was being written, and I'm now fairly certain that Aeris will be at LEAST 80,000 words, but I'm thinking it may get to 90,000. I don't know. But this is going to blow my plans for having two books written by the end of August, dammit. It might end up being 1.5 books.
In other news, there has been quite the firestorm in the Amazon author world this week. It all started with Gaga and her servers crashing because of that Gaga album for 99 cents. Literally no one had sales on Tuesday and Thursday, and if they had ANY sales, it was like 18 instead of 100. Seriously. And people were freaking the heck out. I mean, I don't sell 100 books a day. EVER. But can you imagine selling 10% of what you normally do? Holy cow. And this went on FOR DAYS. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.... And people were flying through the forums questioning the book selling gods. "Where did all the people go? Did the rapture happen and only the Saints bought my books before???"
To top off Gaga, several other things went all weird. Tags disappeared. Also viewed percentages went missing. Also bought bars disappeared. Listmania stopped letting you vote if the list was helpful. It also stopped telling you how many people had viewed the list previously. Then there was the free book phenomenon. People who downloaded tons of free books (like me) were much less likely to need anything else for a while.
And no one could tell if it was the server mess or Amazon being itself and changing things up. And because so many many things happened at the same time no one could tell what it was that threw their sales off. It was all so confusing.
Today it is still a mess. Half the people have sales that are back up to normal. Half the people have not recovered one iota. Tags have appeared and disappeared several times. Also boughts have been flashing in and out.
I love it when the voice of reason comes out to try and help. It's like, people are watching stuff fall from the sky and there's a person standing out in the middle of the street saying, "They aren't bombs, I swear. It's just paper balls." But they're so high up, that no one can tell, and they believe the worst, in their total confusion.
Anyway, that was my interesting end to the week.
Happy Reading!
Kicked butt on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, though. Hoping to reach 40,000 this week. Oh, and guess what... I think this book is going to be longer than 70,000 words. I have been suspecting as much, as it was being written, and I'm now fairly certain that Aeris will be at LEAST 80,000 words, but I'm thinking it may get to 90,000. I don't know. But this is going to blow my plans for having two books written by the end of August, dammit. It might end up being 1.5 books.
In other news, there has been quite the firestorm in the Amazon author world this week. It all started with Gaga and her servers crashing because of that Gaga album for 99 cents. Literally no one had sales on Tuesday and Thursday, and if they had ANY sales, it was like 18 instead of 100. Seriously. And people were freaking the heck out. I mean, I don't sell 100 books a day. EVER. But can you imagine selling 10% of what you normally do? Holy cow. And this went on FOR DAYS. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.... And people were flying through the forums questioning the book selling gods. "Where did all the people go? Did the rapture happen and only the Saints bought my books before???"
To top off Gaga, several other things went all weird. Tags disappeared. Also viewed percentages went missing. Also bought bars disappeared. Listmania stopped letting you vote if the list was helpful. It also stopped telling you how many people had viewed the list previously. Then there was the free book phenomenon. People who downloaded tons of free books (like me) were much less likely to need anything else for a while.
And no one could tell if it was the server mess or Amazon being itself and changing things up. And because so many many things happened at the same time no one could tell what it was that threw their sales off. It was all so confusing.
Today it is still a mess. Half the people have sales that are back up to normal. Half the people have not recovered one iota. Tags have appeared and disappeared several times. Also boughts have been flashing in and out.
I love it when the voice of reason comes out to try and help. It's like, people are watching stuff fall from the sky and there's a person standing out in the middle of the street saying, "They aren't bombs, I swear. It's just paper balls." But they're so high up, that no one can tell, and they believe the worst, in their total confusion.
Anyway, that was my interesting end to the week.
Happy Reading!
May 25, 2011
Wednesday and 30K!
I did it, I hit 30,000 words. *Happy Dance* It's not even remotely halfway in the book at this point, but it's still almost halfway to my initial word goal of 70,000 words by the end of 80 days. My actual word count is 31,051. Good stuff. I think I'd like to hit the halfway point (35,000) by the next check in. Then I can start to feel better about my end goal. Right now, it's feeling like it might be in jeopardy, so let's hope I can make some major head way in the next 30 something days.
Sunday I did some really great outlining of where I want this book and the next book to go. I did this in Compis and it really paid off, even when things changed (Luka's whole story!) midway through the book. I try to be flexible in my outlining, but having a story with some spice and snap is essential for my creative process. I'm very pleased, at this point, where all the characters are going to end up at the end of Aeris.
On a totally different topic, is anyone as disappointed as I am by the season finales this year? I can think of only ONE that I liked, and several that made me so disgusted, I might not be returning as a viewer in the fall.
Bones: The writing in that show took a hideous toward the end of the season. First there was the awkward confession from Booth that he'd like to try having a relationship with Bones only to be turned down flat. Then the inevitable separation which left everyone questioning where the show could possibly continue come fall. Well, I'll tell you how: by introducing the most contrived and unbelievable plot in the history of the show, and that includes one of their interns becoming a SERIAL KILLER. I almost stopped watching then. But I love Bones' character. She is so refreshing. So I stuck it out and as a writer, knowing that Booth would break up with Hannah from the get-go, I hoped that things would settle back into normal. But NO. Bones had to go and have a revelation, and be in LOVE and now we cut to this season's end, where she is PREGNANT. Seriously, how can they possibly make this work with the storyline? This has got to be the last season. No question.
Grey's Anatomy: This show lost me when George slept with Izzie. BIGGEST MISTAKE EVER, Shonda. Seriously, that's when I realized that Shonda Rimes was NOT a good writer. And I should have taken that lesson and stayed away from everything else she put her hands in, but some how, I got sucked back into Grey's after Alex and Izzie broke things off. And the show was going great, until it just sort of fell to crap at the end of this season. Seriously. Walking away for good this time. You suck, Shonda.
Fairly Legal: This show started as one of my new faves for the season. I love the main character (Sarah Shahi) from the previous show I met her in: Life. She was fantastic on that show and again on this one, as a mediator with a life that is far from together. I put up with her horrible relationships because I liked the interplay between her and her clients. Then the season finale aired and I thought, OMG, change this woman's job and location, and you basically have "In Plain Sight" which I stopped watching in disgust a couple years in. Seriously, if I wanted a season like that, I'd just reread Gone With the Wind. Which I won't, because I HATED it.
Castle: This show has been a secret fave of mine for a while, because I love the snappy reparte and well, I've had a crush on Nathan Fillion since Firefly. But the "love story" between Rick and Kate has always felt FALSE to me. They just don't do it for me, and the constant, "I love him, I don't love him," "I want her, but I'm going to pretend I don't" crap just makes me irritated. Cut to this season's finale, where Kate gets shot in the most horrible cliche scene in the HISTORY OF TELEVISION and Castle tells her he loves her. First of all, how can anyone actually believe she is going to die??? Seriously, I know people who are worried that she won't be coming back next season. Uh... she's the main star. That's just silly. And obviously, she's not going to remember the love confession. To which I say, THANK GOD. Maybe they can just move on now.
I haven't seen Glee yet, but my hopes aren't high. The shining moment for me was Community, which had an awesome spaghetti western / Star Wars homage. It made my fan girl happiness go sky high.
Obviously, these are only my opinions, but seriously, if these season finales were books, I would have given them 2 stars apiece.
Happy Reading!
Sunday I did some really great outlining of where I want this book and the next book to go. I did this in Compis and it really paid off, even when things changed (Luka's whole story!) midway through the book. I try to be flexible in my outlining, but having a story with some spice and snap is essential for my creative process. I'm very pleased, at this point, where all the characters are going to end up at the end of Aeris.
On a totally different topic, is anyone as disappointed as I am by the season finales this year? I can think of only ONE that I liked, and several that made me so disgusted, I might not be returning as a viewer in the fall.
Bones: The writing in that show took a hideous toward the end of the season. First there was the awkward confession from Booth that he'd like to try having a relationship with Bones only to be turned down flat. Then the inevitable separation which left everyone questioning where the show could possibly continue come fall. Well, I'll tell you how: by introducing the most contrived and unbelievable plot in the history of the show, and that includes one of their interns becoming a SERIAL KILLER. I almost stopped watching then. But I love Bones' character. She is so refreshing. So I stuck it out and as a writer, knowing that Booth would break up with Hannah from the get-go, I hoped that things would settle back into normal. But NO. Bones had to go and have a revelation, and be in LOVE and now we cut to this season's end, where she is PREGNANT. Seriously, how can they possibly make this work with the storyline? This has got to be the last season. No question.
Grey's Anatomy: This show lost me when George slept with Izzie. BIGGEST MISTAKE EVER, Shonda. Seriously, that's when I realized that Shonda Rimes was NOT a good writer. And I should have taken that lesson and stayed away from everything else she put her hands in, but some how, I got sucked back into Grey's after Alex and Izzie broke things off. And the show was going great, until it just sort of fell to crap at the end of this season. Seriously. Walking away for good this time. You suck, Shonda.
Fairly Legal: This show started as one of my new faves for the season. I love the main character (Sarah Shahi) from the previous show I met her in: Life. She was fantastic on that show and again on this one, as a mediator with a life that is far from together. I put up with her horrible relationships because I liked the interplay between her and her clients. Then the season finale aired and I thought, OMG, change this woman's job and location, and you basically have "In Plain Sight" which I stopped watching in disgust a couple years in. Seriously, if I wanted a season like that, I'd just reread Gone With the Wind. Which I won't, because I HATED it.
Castle: This show has been a secret fave of mine for a while, because I love the snappy reparte and well, I've had a crush on Nathan Fillion since Firefly. But the "love story" between Rick and Kate has always felt FALSE to me. They just don't do it for me, and the constant, "I love him, I don't love him," "I want her, but I'm going to pretend I don't" crap just makes me irritated. Cut to this season's finale, where Kate gets shot in the most horrible cliche scene in the HISTORY OF TELEVISION and Castle tells her he loves her. First of all, how can anyone actually believe she is going to die??? Seriously, I know people who are worried that she won't be coming back next season. Uh... she's the main star. That's just silly. And obviously, she's not going to remember the love confession. To which I say, THANK GOD. Maybe they can just move on now.
I haven't seen Glee yet, but my hopes aren't high. The shining moment for me was Community, which had an awesome spaghetti western / Star Wars homage. It made my fan girl happiness go sky high.
Obviously, these are only my opinions, but seriously, if these season finales were books, I would have given them 2 stars apiece.
Happy Reading!
May 22, 2011
ROW Wrod Cnout Check-in
No, no, I spelled them wrong on purpose. Please don't leave me a bunch of comments telling me that I'm a big dummy. :)
I'm at 27,200 words. Argh. I just want to hit 30,000 already!!! Of course, by this time last book, I was almost done with the gathering and this time, it's just started. It's kind of like the 4th Harry Potter book, where you don't even get to Hogwarts until like 200 pages in. There is a lot of stuff I left unresolved in Compis that has to be taken up right away in Aeris. Some of the stuff with the characters is going differently than I planned, as well. Nikka and Zyander finally get to see each other again (they're pretty much my power couple), but circumstances weren't how I planned that they would be. And now I have two other characters who've decided to make their own storyline -soooo did not plan on that. Such are the hazards when you write a story from three different viewpoints. :)
This blog is usually about my reading habits and not my writing habits, so what have I been up to? Well, nothing has really grabbed me lately. *sigh* I got a bunch of freebies, but besides Matchmakers 2.0, I've been having some troubles. Which isn't to say the books suck... I'm just, listless, I guess. Demon Girl starts out good, but it's heavy on the British slang, which I'm not used to, so it's been hard for me to read, even though the premise and the protagonist are both really interesting. I'm also reading The Weight of Blood by David Dalglish and even though the writing is excellent —pretty much the perfect blend of prose and story— I'm not super keen on the main characters (at least the only ones I've been introduced to thus far). I'm a mom. It's hard for me to be on the side of a character that kills kids(that's not really a spoiler, it happens within the first few chapters). I want to keep reading and see if things change somehow or there is another character that comes along to challenge this one, but so far, I'm going to have to recommend this book more to guys than girls. If you're a big Terry Goodkind fan, you'll probably really enjoy this series. It's really dark, for fantasy, although not super gory detailed, which I appreciate after reading Goodkind.
My cousin gave me a STACK of books to read, (she's 15, and so she reads a lot of the stuff I'm into) so I'll probably start in on those, along with whatever I read on my Kindle at the gym. I guess it's true what they say, "If you want it done right, do it yourself." My books are pretty much what I want (and like) to read. Kick-butt girls, guys that aren't wimpy, but aren't total asshats, and a storyline that doesn't make me want to vomit. Character growth is good, let's add a lot of that, and minor characters that are well fleshed out. Also good. Perfect, probably not. Everyone's cup of tea -not if you liked Shiver. hahaha
Happy Reading!
I'm at 27,200 words. Argh. I just want to hit 30,000 already!!! Of course, by this time last book, I was almost done with the gathering and this time, it's just started. It's kind of like the 4th Harry Potter book, where you don't even get to Hogwarts until like 200 pages in. There is a lot of stuff I left unresolved in Compis that has to be taken up right away in Aeris. Some of the stuff with the characters is going differently than I planned, as well. Nikka and Zyander finally get to see each other again (they're pretty much my power couple), but circumstances weren't how I planned that they would be. And now I have two other characters who've decided to make their own storyline -soooo did not plan on that. Such are the hazards when you write a story from three different viewpoints. :)
This blog is usually about my reading habits and not my writing habits, so what have I been up to? Well, nothing has really grabbed me lately. *sigh* I got a bunch of freebies, but besides Matchmakers 2.0, I've been having some troubles. Which isn't to say the books suck... I'm just, listless, I guess. Demon Girl starts out good, but it's heavy on the British slang, which I'm not used to, so it's been hard for me to read, even though the premise and the protagonist are both really interesting. I'm also reading The Weight of Blood by David Dalglish and even though the writing is excellent —pretty much the perfect blend of prose and story— I'm not super keen on the main characters (at least the only ones I've been introduced to thus far). I'm a mom. It's hard for me to be on the side of a character that kills kids(that's not really a spoiler, it happens within the first few chapters). I want to keep reading and see if things change somehow or there is another character that comes along to challenge this one, but so far, I'm going to have to recommend this book more to guys than girls. If you're a big Terry Goodkind fan, you'll probably really enjoy this series. It's really dark, for fantasy, although not super gory detailed, which I appreciate after reading Goodkind.
My cousin gave me a STACK of books to read, (she's 15, and so she reads a lot of the stuff I'm into) so I'll probably start in on those, along with whatever I read on my Kindle at the gym. I guess it's true what they say, "If you want it done right, do it yourself." My books are pretty much what I want (and like) to read. Kick-butt girls, guys that aren't wimpy, but aren't total asshats, and a storyline that doesn't make me want to vomit. Character growth is good, let's add a lot of that, and minor characters that are well fleshed out. Also good. Perfect, probably not. Everyone's cup of tea -not if you liked Shiver. hahaha
Happy Reading!
May 18, 2011
Amazon Quality Standards & ROW80
First of all, I'm Aeris is currently at 23,154. Still plugging away, still making it in at least a few hundred above my word count. If I don't get distracted (easy to do with a wireless connection) I can still pull off my nanowrimo record of 1600ish words in an hour. Monday I wrote 1745. Tuesday was 2385 (my son slept in!). Today was less at 1248, because I got distracted by a different story, which caught my eye in the Kindleboards. I'm hoping to hit 25K tomorrow, if nothing catastrophic happens.
Which reminds me, I need to back up my file. Okay, that done, I wanted to mention something that the Kindleboards are abuzz about this morning. So one of the authors in the forum got an email message from Kindle Digital Platforms informing them of some typos in their work and advising them that they needed to make the appropriate changes. The author was said to have hired an editor, but obviously, the editor was not as skilled at finding errors as they claimed (or the author was lying?).This led to a 6 page firestorm on Kindleboards.
Everyone wanted to know if this was something Amazon was going to be doing. They wanted to know if it was random sampling. They wanted to know what qualified as a "typo". Some felt it was unfair that indies were being "singled out" and "targeted" —sorry, that one made me laugh out loud. Amazon is one of the biggest supporters and earners from indies in the entire online, e-reader world. Why in the world would they TARGET their cash cow?
The author posted an excerpt of the book in question, several people made comments, it was decided the author would hire yet ANOTHER editor and re-upload, so the issue was pretty much resolved by the time I got to it.
But what a great question and philosophical debate that ensued. Let me assure you, there was not a single author there who didn't seem to be in favor of quality standards, if Amazon was indeed enforcing them in the future. I think most of the authors on there are committed to making sure they have a good product to sell. Most of us(who give a crap) hire editors of one kind or another (some hire two!) and when someone gets feedback on typos, they are quick to try and remedy the problem.
I think MOST of us realize that it will only damage our industry and our reputations as a whole, to just throw a book together and post it online. Unfortunately, there are outliers. Maybe there is a great storyteller, whose books are full of grammar and typo errors. Or maybe there is a clean book, grammatically, but the story is horrible. Those exist in both places.
I have to say, in my reading thus far, even when I have encountered errors, there have been few of them. I don't think I'm the worst judge of grammar, either.
That being said, some of the most popular authors that are indies have many, many grammar issues in their books. I won't name names, but my mom recently complained about a certain million dollar earning indie author whose books she read, where the grammar and spelling was atrocious. So obviously these things don't bother EVERYONE, since people are still reading those books.They bother me, though. They do.
As a reader and a writer, I think we have a responsibility to try and hold up some kind of standard. What is that? I'm not sure. Let's call it the "try really hard" standard -where if we see a problem as a reader, we let our fellow readers know. And if we're a writer, maybe we should be hiring editors instead of just throwing books up on the web. Just maybe. But guess what, dear readers of books, there is something you can do! Just like in our political system, we can let our reps know what we think of the job they're doing, at Amazon, you can let them know if there is a book that is FULL of poor formatting or typos or grammar errors. It's located at the bottom of a book's sales page.
It looks like this:http://www.amazon.com/Door-Canellin-Gatehouse-ebook/dp/B004WXF2C2/#suggestion-box
If you read a book, ANY book, that you've seen a lot of errors in, you can report it to Amazon and they will let the author or publisher know. Voila! Enjoy your week, and happy reading!
Which reminds me, I need to back up my file. Okay, that done, I wanted to mention something that the Kindleboards are abuzz about this morning. So one of the authors in the forum got an email message from Kindle Digital Platforms informing them of some typos in their work and advising them that they needed to make the appropriate changes. The author was said to have hired an editor, but obviously, the editor was not as skilled at finding errors as they claimed (or the author was lying?).This led to a 6 page firestorm on Kindleboards.
Everyone wanted to know if this was something Amazon was going to be doing. They wanted to know if it was random sampling. They wanted to know what qualified as a "typo". Some felt it was unfair that indies were being "singled out" and "targeted" —sorry, that one made me laugh out loud. Amazon is one of the biggest supporters and earners from indies in the entire online, e-reader world. Why in the world would they TARGET their cash cow?
The author posted an excerpt of the book in question, several people made comments, it was decided the author would hire yet ANOTHER editor and re-upload, so the issue was pretty much resolved by the time I got to it.
But what a great question and philosophical debate that ensued. Let me assure you, there was not a single author there who didn't seem to be in favor of quality standards, if Amazon was indeed enforcing them in the future. I think most of the authors on there are committed to making sure they have a good product to sell. Most of us(who give a crap) hire editors of one kind or another (some hire two!) and when someone gets feedback on typos, they are quick to try and remedy the problem.
I think MOST of us realize that it will only damage our industry and our reputations as a whole, to just throw a book together and post it online. Unfortunately, there are outliers. Maybe there is a great storyteller, whose books are full of grammar and typo errors. Or maybe there is a clean book, grammatically, but the story is horrible. Those exist in both places.
I have to say, in my reading thus far, even when I have encountered errors, there have been few of them. I don't think I'm the worst judge of grammar, either.
That being said, some of the most popular authors that are indies have many, many grammar issues in their books. I won't name names, but my mom recently complained about a certain million dollar earning indie author whose books she read, where the grammar and spelling was atrocious. So obviously these things don't bother EVERYONE, since people are still reading those books.They bother me, though. They do.
As a reader and a writer, I think we have a responsibility to try and hold up some kind of standard. What is that? I'm not sure. Let's call it the "try really hard" standard -where if we see a problem as a reader, we let our fellow readers know. And if we're a writer, maybe we should be hiring editors instead of just throwing books up on the web. Just maybe. But guess what, dear readers of books, there is something you can do! Just like in our political system, we can let our reps know what we think of the job they're doing, at Amazon, you can let them know if there is a book that is FULL of poor formatting or typos or grammar errors. It's located at the bottom of a book's sales page.
It looks like this:http://www.amazon.com/Door-Canellin-Gatehouse-ebook/dp/B004WXF2C2/#suggestion-box
If you read a book, ANY book, that you've seen a lot of errors in, you can report it to Amazon and they will let the author or publisher know. Voila! Enjoy your week, and happy reading!
May 15, 2011
Late to the Show...*Edit
First of all, I just want to say, I'm never late. I'm not. It's impossible for me. Even with a toddler, I am always 10 min. early. Late, for me is on time.
So, I meant to post this morning, but I wanted to mop my floor because I FINALLY got my seeds in the ground (just in time, as you'll soon see) and I was so excited that I forgot to take off my muddy shoes when I danced through the house in triumph. Needless to say, I left yucky tracks everywhere. Thank goodness we don't have carpet! Then was church, and then, the mild storm we'd been experiencing became a massive, yucky, hail and thunder and lightning storm. Aaaaaannnnd, the power went out.
Of course, it was disappointing not to be able to post my word count (more on that in just a sec), but the most irritating part was that I was exactly halfway done with baking my bread.
At this point in time, you might be saying, "Bread?? What the heck, are you Miss Suzy Homemaker?" After all, I just mentioned mopping, gardening and baking in the same entry. And it's true, I bake bread. But it's not like I'm up to my elbows in bread dough wearing a giant ruffled apron. It's called No Knead Bread, people and it will change your life. Seriously. Anyone can make this stuff. Google it.
I mean, yes, I like to make things. I can make jam. Of course, I do it in the crock pot. It's literally the easiest thing to do in the world. Dump in a bunch of fruit and sugar and cook it in your crock pot until your house smells yummy. You can freeze that stuff in a bag and bring it out when you feel like it. I'm like Modern Suzy Barbie Doll over here. :)
Anyway, onto the word count. 17,684 for Aeris. I didn't get more than 300 words written yesterday before my kid woke up, all ready to start the day and today, well, that's supposed to be my day of REST, but I'll probably see if I can get anything written in the hour after kidlet goes to bed before I turn into preggo zombie woman. As for my goals, well, my original goal was 875 words a day, I think. I've been hitting almost double that every day that I've written this week, and I'm hoping to keep it up. Good luck to everyone else!
*Holy Crap! I just realized I'm supposed to be halfway to 70,000 words by now. Eeep. Gotta get going!!
I've been talking for a while now about how I was going to review RUN by Blake Crouch. After several hangups, I now have the chance to do so.
This book is going to be hard to describe, because there are about 2 still moments in the entire thing. It is aptly named. :)
So, Run is a really cool mix of sci-fi and thriller. I think that is what saves it for me. Thrillers are great, but I've heard Crouch is a bit on the graphic side, so this book was probably the only book of his that I could have read and not put aside with a wrinkled nose.
There are a lucky few authors out there who have a mix of both education and talent, and Crouch is one of them. His story telling is superb, if jolting at times. By starting the story with a family on the run from a strange phenomenon that has turned humanity into one big us vs. them fight, he puts the reader on one big run with them to the finish line -which we don't find out until much later.
At first, the book is all about survival, the problem is, the crazies(as I like to call them) are everywhere, they're brutal, and they WILL find you. The main character and his wife, plus their two kids drive from here to there, never seeming to successfully find a safe haven.
I give this book 5 stars for the following reasons:
-the storyline and pacing are incredibly addictive. I was up until late in the night finishing this sucker. That is a good story
-the back story between the husband and wife is carefully interspersed throughout the novel and Crouch does it well. I love it when characters are given depth over the course of a story. Let me tell you, as a writer, that is hard to do.
-the ending draws everything up into a neat little bow, with explanation, resolution, and a firm idea of what happens in the end, to all the characters. Thrillers can a lot of time have abrupt endings, but this didn't, and I appreciated that.
There are a few nit-picky things I do want to mention, just because it's ME.
The first is that I find it REALLY REALLY hard to believe that the crazies found this family everywhere they did. It's like they were all professional trackers or something. The odds of that happening are highly unlikely. And if it's because of the phenomena, then Crouch should have made sure to include that explanation.
The constant action was a bit wearing at times. I think it would have affected me less if it was the man and wife and their teenage daughter, but the little boy was just 7. That was pretty harsh and left me wondering if Crouch has kids. It's pretty tough, as a parent, to read what happens to a KID in this book. I mean, at one point, he has them literally crossing a MOUNTAIN, after having had nothing to eat or drink for days. Harsh.
So, if you like a fast-paced RUN (why can't I say that except in all caps??), then this is the book for you.
So, I meant to post this morning, but I wanted to mop my floor because I FINALLY got my seeds in the ground (just in time, as you'll soon see) and I was so excited that I forgot to take off my muddy shoes when I danced through the house in triumph. Needless to say, I left yucky tracks everywhere. Thank goodness we don't have carpet! Then was church, and then, the mild storm we'd been experiencing became a massive, yucky, hail and thunder and lightning storm. Aaaaaannnnd, the power went out.
Of course, it was disappointing not to be able to post my word count (more on that in just a sec), but the most irritating part was that I was exactly halfway done with baking my bread.
At this point in time, you might be saying, "Bread?? What the heck, are you Miss Suzy Homemaker?" After all, I just mentioned mopping, gardening and baking in the same entry. And it's true, I bake bread. But it's not like I'm up to my elbows in bread dough wearing a giant ruffled apron. It's called No Knead Bread, people and it will change your life. Seriously. Anyone can make this stuff. Google it.
I mean, yes, I like to make things. I can make jam. Of course, I do it in the crock pot. It's literally the easiest thing to do in the world. Dump in a bunch of fruit and sugar and cook it in your crock pot until your house smells yummy. You can freeze that stuff in a bag and bring it out when you feel like it. I'm like Modern Suzy Barbie Doll over here. :)
Anyway, onto the word count. 17,684 for Aeris. I didn't get more than 300 words written yesterday before my kid woke up, all ready to start the day and today, well, that's supposed to be my day of REST, but I'll probably see if I can get anything written in the hour after kidlet goes to bed before I turn into preggo zombie woman. As for my goals, well, my original goal was 875 words a day, I think. I've been hitting almost double that every day that I've written this week, and I'm hoping to keep it up. Good luck to everyone else!
*Holy Crap! I just realized I'm supposed to be halfway to 70,000 words by now. Eeep. Gotta get going!!
I've been talking for a while now about how I was going to review RUN by Blake Crouch. After several hangups, I now have the chance to do so.
This book is going to be hard to describe, because there are about 2 still moments in the entire thing. It is aptly named. :)
So, Run is a really cool mix of sci-fi and thriller. I think that is what saves it for me. Thrillers are great, but I've heard Crouch is a bit on the graphic side, so this book was probably the only book of his that I could have read and not put aside with a wrinkled nose.
There are a lucky few authors out there who have a mix of both education and talent, and Crouch is one of them. His story telling is superb, if jolting at times. By starting the story with a family on the run from a strange phenomenon that has turned humanity into one big us vs. them fight, he puts the reader on one big run with them to the finish line -which we don't find out until much later.
At first, the book is all about survival, the problem is, the crazies(as I like to call them) are everywhere, they're brutal, and they WILL find you. The main character and his wife, plus their two kids drive from here to there, never seeming to successfully find a safe haven.
I give this book 5 stars for the following reasons:
-the storyline and pacing are incredibly addictive. I was up until late in the night finishing this sucker. That is a good story
-the back story between the husband and wife is carefully interspersed throughout the novel and Crouch does it well. I love it when characters are given depth over the course of a story. Let me tell you, as a writer, that is hard to do.
-the ending draws everything up into a neat little bow, with explanation, resolution, and a firm idea of what happens in the end, to all the characters. Thrillers can a lot of time have abrupt endings, but this didn't, and I appreciated that.
There are a few nit-picky things I do want to mention, just because it's ME.
The first is that I find it REALLY REALLY hard to believe that the crazies found this family everywhere they did. It's like they were all professional trackers or something. The odds of that happening are highly unlikely. And if it's because of the phenomena, then Crouch should have made sure to include that explanation.
The constant action was a bit wearing at times. I think it would have affected me less if it was the man and wife and their teenage daughter, but the little boy was just 7. That was pretty harsh and left me wondering if Crouch has kids. It's pretty tough, as a parent, to read what happens to a KID in this book. I mean, at one point, he has them literally crossing a MOUNTAIN, after having had nothing to eat or drink for days. Harsh.
So, if you like a fast-paced RUN (why can't I say that except in all caps??), then this is the book for you.
May 14, 2011
Some Freebies(on Amazon!) and 2 Reviews:
So, apparently Amazon is doing a super sale right now where a bunch of authors have free books. Being the crazy, can't not download a free BOOK to save my life, I have taken advantage of this lovely sale and downloaded like... uh... 30 books. I imagine you are going to get a lot more reviews from me in the near future. But there are something like 7,000 books for free on Kindle right now, how do you decide? Well, first of all, for kindle lovers and owners, there is a GREAT website out there that a fellow author pointed out to me recently called: ereaderIQ. Go there, fall in love. :)
But there are still like 500 books to choose from, so let me help you even more. These are books I've chosen because: I've "met" their authors online in kindleboards and they seem pretty cool, they have a good set of reviews under their belts, and they have a decent sales ranking (which tells me they sell a lot of books). I haven't read ANY of these authors before. None of them has ASKED me to promote them here. Just, FYI.
Basically, anything thing with a review average greater than 3.5 and a sales rank lower than 20,000 is a book I downloaded. Here they are, in no particular order:
Oh, one more thing. Matchmakers 2.0 and The Black God's War are both novellas.
Enough of that. Onto the review. First the good. Matchmakers 2.0 was the first story I read from my new downloads.
It's the story of Mick, former guppy studier and current employee of MatchMakers.com —a local South Carolina company that matches up their customers based on a fancy computer algorithm. Obviously, computers don't always work. Which is why the company then sends the profiles to their crack team of professionals who use their wits, education and the occasional coin flip to figure out who goes with who.
This is a charming story, filled with multiple snappy comebacks and witticisms that reminded me a lot of the dialog from Gilmore Girls, without the endless drama. The characters are interesting, the story moves along well, and the ending is perfect for a "novel nibble". Overall, I would recommend this novella to anyone wanting a short story to get them through a long line at the DMV, etc.
There's just one thing. Just one little thing that kept this story from being a 5 star for me. There are NO descriptions of what the characters look like. Seriously NOT A ONE. I get that this is a novella. I get that any descriptions there are would be short and to the point. But come on... not one eye color, height, weight, hair color, nose shape, mouth size, etc. to be found in the ENTIRE story. I thought I was going crazy at first, so I went back and double checked it. I read the whole thing again and sure enough, not one. Cute is the best description you're gonna get, people.
I haven't read the other books of hers, but frankly, it makes me afraid to fork out the cash for a NOVEL. I need character descriptions. Now, I went back and read every review of Matchmakers 2.0 (there are 73 of them) and no one else commented on this issue, so I guess I'm in the minority here. But if that kind of thing is a big deal for you, then you might want to take this novella with a grain of salt.
So Matchmakers 2.0 : 4 stars.
My next review is something I've yet to do here, review a non-indie. However, this book was so epically bad, that I just HAD to share it with you.
So, word of mouth has failed me. This book was a recommend from a random girl at the library who told me it was her FAVORITE book in the whole entire world. *sigh* After reading it, I feel out of touch with the whole genre. Maybe I'm too old to read YA fiction. Maybe the time has come for me to give it up.
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater did not start out well. First of all, it was really slow. Nothing was really drawing me into the story. Usually, by the 4th chapter or so, there is an obvious storyline that is pulling you along, keeping you reading. I put this book down a bunch of times, thinking, "This is not that great." But I stuck it out, because it was someone's favorite book.
Then I got to page 63. This chapter is told from the male protagonist's viewpoint. "I was a leaking womb bulging with the promise of conscious thoughts..." Um... WHAT? Did you seriously just compare your supposedly hot main character to a woman's menstruating womb??? I've read some weird metaphors before. I once read a book where Toni Morrison compared a woman's tongue to a wagging dog penis. But it wasn't like she was a main character. It wasn't like we were supposed to think she was this sexy, stunning wolf boy. I can't believe this book got through TWO editors without either of them saying, "Hey, you might not want to compare your main character to a bleeding uterus." Shame on Abby Ranger and David Levithan. SHAME.
This was just a perfect example for me of the author doing what she does consistently in this book which is go waaaay over the top with the descriptive language. Now, let me clarify. I LOVE prose. I LOVE descriptive language. Have you ever read a Barbara Kingsolver book? Chock full of the stuff. But she knows where to stop. Comparing your main character to a bloody uterus is someone who doesn't get the fine line between prose and "purple prose".
Second thing about this book that bothered me: It had several conflicts that never really did anything much whatsoever. Usually when you read a book, you get a conflict right away. This book has several elements that could have been the conflict for the story.
-We have Shelby, werewolf obsessed with the main guy and dangerously crazy. But other than one big scene involving her, she isn't really mentioned and nothing really happens with her storyline
-We have Jack, newly turned and savage. There could have been a great story element involving his rehabilitation and introduction to the new world he lives in. But no, again, he is barely mentioned except for a few key scenes, then fades away from the story.
-Then there is the "cure" for lycanthropy, which to me is the least well explained element in the story. I find it hard to believe that the characters had to resort to the ends they did in the book. There are plenty of ways to accomplish the same thing without the craziness they did.
The third and fourth things about the book that bothered me were related, so I'm combining them. Have you ever watched a TV show with a teen protagonist and even if the parents start out being ultra cool and involved, over time the show fades them out into these sort of "half parents" who don't seem to give a crap what their kids are up to, don't seem to ever be around because they're BUSY, and generally don't parent at all? These are those parents. And despite the fact that many of these shows exist and are watched by millions, I find it hard to believe that even THOSE parents would be as clueless as THESE parents. Their daughter is attacked by wolves, and they don't care. She is off with their cars at all hours of the day and night and they don't care. She skips school to hang out with her boyfriend and they don't care. Her boyfriend starts LIVING IN THEIR HOUSE and somehow they have no idea??? This is just an obvious way for the author to let her characters get up to whatever business they want without having to worry about the parents getting in the way. And it doesn't work AT ALL for the plot.
And the way Grace and Sam HANG all over each other, like RichandAmy from Zits may be highly amusing in a comic strip satire way, but only serves to drag this storyline down to adolescent in the most alarming fashion. Love is great, really, but this is ridiculous and only a hormone filled teenage girl could take any of this seriously.
Shiver : 2 stars (bordering on 1).
I will review RUN when I post my word count on Sunday. Happy Reading!
But there are still like 500 books to choose from, so let me help you even more. These are books I've chosen because: I've "met" their authors online in kindleboards and they seem pretty cool, they have a good set of reviews under their belts, and they have a decent sales ranking (which tells me they sell a lot of books). I haven't read ANY of these authors before. None of them has ASKED me to promote them here. Just, FYI.
Basically, anything thing with a review average greater than 3.5 and a sales rank lower than 20,000 is a book I downloaded. Here they are, in no particular order:
Oh, one more thing. Matchmakers 2.0 and The Black God's War are both novellas.
Enough of that. Onto the review. First the good. Matchmakers 2.0 was the first story I read from my new downloads.
It's the story of Mick, former guppy studier and current employee of MatchMakers.com —a local South Carolina company that matches up their customers based on a fancy computer algorithm. Obviously, computers don't always work. Which is why the company then sends the profiles to their crack team of professionals who use their wits, education and the occasional coin flip to figure out who goes with who.
This is a charming story, filled with multiple snappy comebacks and witticisms that reminded me a lot of the dialog from Gilmore Girls, without the endless drama. The characters are interesting, the story moves along well, and the ending is perfect for a "novel nibble". Overall, I would recommend this novella to anyone wanting a short story to get them through a long line at the DMV, etc.
There's just one thing. Just one little thing that kept this story from being a 5 star for me. There are NO descriptions of what the characters look like. Seriously NOT A ONE. I get that this is a novella. I get that any descriptions there are would be short and to the point. But come on... not one eye color, height, weight, hair color, nose shape, mouth size, etc. to be found in the ENTIRE story. I thought I was going crazy at first, so I went back and double checked it. I read the whole thing again and sure enough, not one. Cute is the best description you're gonna get, people.
I haven't read the other books of hers, but frankly, it makes me afraid to fork out the cash for a NOVEL. I need character descriptions. Now, I went back and read every review of Matchmakers 2.0 (there are 73 of them) and no one else commented on this issue, so I guess I'm in the minority here. But if that kind of thing is a big deal for you, then you might want to take this novella with a grain of salt.
So Matchmakers 2.0 : 4 stars.
My next review is something I've yet to do here, review a non-indie. However, this book was so epically bad, that I just HAD to share it with you.
So, word of mouth has failed me. This book was a recommend from a random girl at the library who told me it was her FAVORITE book in the whole entire world. *sigh* After reading it, I feel out of touch with the whole genre. Maybe I'm too old to read YA fiction. Maybe the time has come for me to give it up.
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater did not start out well. First of all, it was really slow. Nothing was really drawing me into the story. Usually, by the 4th chapter or so, there is an obvious storyline that is pulling you along, keeping you reading. I put this book down a bunch of times, thinking, "This is not that great." But I stuck it out, because it was someone's favorite book.
Then I got to page 63. This chapter is told from the male protagonist's viewpoint. "I was a leaking womb bulging with the promise of conscious thoughts..." Um... WHAT? Did you seriously just compare your supposedly hot main character to a woman's menstruating womb??? I've read some weird metaphors before. I once read a book where Toni Morrison compared a woman's tongue to a wagging dog penis. But it wasn't like she was a main character. It wasn't like we were supposed to think she was this sexy, stunning wolf boy. I can't believe this book got through TWO editors without either of them saying, "Hey, you might not want to compare your main character to a bleeding uterus." Shame on Abby Ranger and David Levithan. SHAME.
This was just a perfect example for me of the author doing what she does consistently in this book which is go waaaay over the top with the descriptive language. Now, let me clarify. I LOVE prose. I LOVE descriptive language. Have you ever read a Barbara Kingsolver book? Chock full of the stuff. But she knows where to stop. Comparing your main character to a bloody uterus is someone who doesn't get the fine line between prose and "purple prose".
Second thing about this book that bothered me: It had several conflicts that never really did anything much whatsoever. Usually when you read a book, you get a conflict right away. This book has several elements that could have been the conflict for the story.
-We have Shelby, werewolf obsessed with the main guy and dangerously crazy. But other than one big scene involving her, she isn't really mentioned and nothing really happens with her storyline
-We have Jack, newly turned and savage. There could have been a great story element involving his rehabilitation and introduction to the new world he lives in. But no, again, he is barely mentioned except for a few key scenes, then fades away from the story.
-Then there is the "cure" for lycanthropy, which to me is the least well explained element in the story. I find it hard to believe that the characters had to resort to the ends they did in the book. There are plenty of ways to accomplish the same thing without the craziness they did.
The third and fourth things about the book that bothered me were related, so I'm combining them. Have you ever watched a TV show with a teen protagonist and even if the parents start out being ultra cool and involved, over time the show fades them out into these sort of "half parents" who don't seem to give a crap what their kids are up to, don't seem to ever be around because they're BUSY, and generally don't parent at all? These are those parents. And despite the fact that many of these shows exist and are watched by millions, I find it hard to believe that even THOSE parents would be as clueless as THESE parents. Their daughter is attacked by wolves, and they don't care. She is off with their cars at all hours of the day and night and they don't care. She skips school to hang out with her boyfriend and they don't care. Her boyfriend starts LIVING IN THEIR HOUSE and somehow they have no idea??? This is just an obvious way for the author to let her characters get up to whatever business they want without having to worry about the parents getting in the way. And it doesn't work AT ALL for the plot.
And the way Grace and Sam HANG all over each other, like RichandAmy from Zits may be highly amusing in a comic strip satire way, but only serves to drag this storyline down to adolescent in the most alarming fashion. Love is great, really, but this is ridiculous and only a hormone filled teenage girl could take any of this seriously.
Shiver : 2 stars (bordering on 1).
I will review RUN when I post my word count on Sunday. Happy Reading!
