Barbara G. Tarn's Blog, page 155
March 31, 2013
Happiness is…
Sunday Surprise
… two Happiness is in a row!
(yes, the next Happines is… is tomorrow – as usual)
I’d have preferred being in New York celebrating Holi, but I guess I’m always on the wrong side of the world… besides, Shafali told me Holi is actually already gone! Love the freedom of not sticking to one single specific religion… and, by the way, my Easter egg is white chocolate, but it wouldn’t look good on the drawing!
Happy Easter or whatever you want to celebrate today!








March 29, 2013
Random Friday
Okay, before I go back to experimenting with Mobipocket Creator and Calibre, let’s have an Art Friday! I’ve almost lettered all of chapter one of Fleur de Lys, so I’ll spend the weekend trying to make an ebook – a non-reflowable all-JPG e-book. Ouch. Wish me luck.
Because I was so artsy last weekend, I also did two Caran d’Ache portraits – but uploaded only one on DeviantART as I wasn’t happy with the second, LOL. I’ll repost it here along with the original picture. I couldn’t bother to look through the 260+ pics to add the link on DeviantART, so I put them together here, just to show you how I changed the colors.
And before you ask, no, I’m not going to draw all the other 200+ pics. At the moment I have 2 more, and I might find half a dozen more by the end of the year (it’s only the first quarter after all…), but that’s it. I might find a few more on the official (?) Facebook page, but again, I won’t do more than 30 drawing tops (including last year). I only need 12 new drawings for next year’s calendar, LOL!
The Easter bunny brought the news that Goodreads enters the Amazon family… if it’s good or bad, I don’t know yet. Here’s the Goodreads blog post and the Amazon press release. I remember when Goodreads got its book data from Amazon and B&N – and then they vanished. I had to add my books manually. And if it’s good for readers, well, it’s welcome (although no, I don’t want to be able to add the books I buy on Kindle to my to-read list like someone said in the comments – but as long as I can uncheck the option, it’s fine).
I still haven’t figured out if Goodreads actually brings sales (I don’t think so), so it’s the only readers’ social media I’ll use to keep track of my reading for now. And I guess that if Amazon is back with them, I don’t need Shelfari anymore – should I try Anobii for the Italian titles? Meh. Not enough Italian friends who read anyway. And Facebook updates are pissing me off, but I don’t want to move to Google+ either. This social media thing is bothersome as a person and as an author, so I’ll stick to the old path – Facebook to keep in touch with friends and Goodreads to keep track of what I read. Sounds like a third (or fourth) job already and it’s supposed to be fun!
Starded a new book, but won’t talk about it yet. I’ll try to write more than draw this long weekend (gotta work on the body switch after finishing Star Minds 3, now with editor for final pass before publication)… so I’ll keep this short and sweet! Wishing you a wonderful long weekend!








March 27, 2013
Writer Wednesday
Not much writing done, but lots of experiments. Still trying to figure out how to format comics & graphic novels for the e-readers. On my Kindle, the ebook comes out with blank pages between panels. In spite of the very good instructions of this manual and this other manual I found on the Kindle forums (which is part of the more general “formatting ebooks for Kindle” with an introduction about self-publishing). I guess I’ll have to learn some HTML to make the books look right.

temporary cover – not sure I like it
I was also a guest on Shafali’s blog, hence the weekend spent on my comics & graphic novels after writing that post, LOL! Not selling much in that department, but if I don’t put them out there, how am I going to sell them? Some are really badly drawn, so they’ll stay in my drawers like some of the older stories (well, most of the older stories, LOL), but some will eventually come out. Maybe I’ll redraw the beginning of Mercenaries?! when I’m done with S.K.Y.B.A.N.D. before publishing it again…
I still need to put the lettering on Fleur de Lys, and will publish it in 5 parts to avoid big files to download – but the print version will be one volume. I will continue to put the comics and graphic novels on DriveThruComics first, then, when I figure out the formatting, I can add them to KDP, Kobo and Smashwords – on the latter there’s already Lady Ice and Jessamine as experiments. They went fine through the meatgrinder, why can’t I make such neat files too? Sigh. They look almost right in Calibre, but on my Kindle… not. Meh.
Moving from art to writing, here’s Shafali’s tips for wannabe artists. Substitute “draw” with “writing” and it could be my suggestions to wannabe writers. Just get your butt down somewhere and write, damn it! Carry a moleskin with you at all times and don’t forget you learned handwriting before using a computer. Don’t disdain your handwriting – it’s excellent for fast notes or that scene that might skip out of your head if you don’t jot it down right now! Writers write and artists draw!
I shelved the Amazons story as well – too much work. Besides, today I can go back to Slave Traders and the body switch, so I’m happy. I don’t worry too much if I skip a month of writing, I know I can go back to my routine whenever I want. It’s an addiction by now anyway, so even if I wasn’t writing a new story, I was still working on some projects that hopefully will see the light soon. I obviously need to slow down the production – not the actual writing, but the publishing process – and I won’t panic until the second semester of the year. I’m still on track anyway!
I’ll also have to open that CreateSpace account, as Lulu partners with Author Solutions now. Hopefully this won’t affect the old titles, but shame on them. I never paid for any of their marketing or publishing packages, but teaming with a company that’s being investigated is really dumb. Anyway, I’ll have to work on new print editions of all the books. Sigh. More publishing work that has nothing to do with writing. Meh.
More publishers behaving badly on David Gaughran’s blog. Where the slush pile went by Dean Wesley Smith (you guessed it, the indie authors…). Joe Konrath on exclusivity – still not sure about KDP Select, but maybe this year I’ll try even that. Kris Rusch about that bad book every writer eventually writes – but maybe somebody will love it anyway.
So what kind of writer are you? I’m halfway between the introverted-extroverted and the introverted. I do limited social networking and I enjoy writing this blog. Advice from Ruth Ann Nordin about what writers should do. And also some advice from David Farland – don’t be a loner like me, join a writing community (although his writers forum is quite dead by now…). I couldn’t find any for my tastes, but I’m a grumpy old woman!
I’m finishing this post by adding the poll again… if you haven’t voted yet, please do so – especially if you don’t want me to do anything! It’s only a little click, come on! *puppy eyes* Have a great week!
Take Our Poll








March 24, 2013
Happiness is…
Surprise Sunday
A month ago I did a writers wisdom post or writers on writing or words of wisdom (used to be called WoW Saturdays for those who’ve been following this blog for a long time). I thought it was time to share more of those… I still have plenty on file! So, for your Sunday, here are some wise writers’ quotes!
So many of the writers I work with I just know will never be successful because they simply lack the self-belief to push on with their ideas and deliver their stories in their own way irrespective of what the world thinks. They come to seminars by people like me hoping to find other people who will magically turn their ideas into winners for them. It doesn’t happen. Editors and producers do not descend from heaven and fix up half-arsed stories. If they could do that, they would be writers themselves. Delivering a complete and excellent story is YOUR job.
- David Baboulene
I suppose formal training does different things for different people, and all of us get interested in the process once we’re involved, but one absolute truth I am certain of is that the only essential training for writing is reading. If you are starting to write and you haven’t read a thousand books first, you’re not ready. To be a writer you must be a reader. After that writing is simply about personal confidence.
- Lee Child
What I mean by that is new beginning writers are so worried about sentences and pretty words and nifty grammar and pleasing their workshop that they forget they are storytellers. They are woking to become entertainers. Beginning writers just forget about readers and how readers are the real judges.
- Dean Wesley Smith
The world wide web has spawned an unpleasant epidemic of idiots who are quick to criticize, insult, dismiss, and reject without any accountability. These folks really believe their nearsighted and downright idiotic opinions are not only correct, but need to be voiced in public.
- Joe Konrath
And much, I should add, does not. Mr. Locke writes incisively and persuasively on finding one’s ideal target audience and giving them what they want. There’s nothing wrong with that, but I already know what I write, and I’ve long since worked out for myself that it is not my job to give my readers what they want. It is rather for me to please myself first and write the books I want to write. That’s how I came by those readers in the first place, and it’s the only way I know to serve them well.
- Lawrence Block








March 22, 2013
Random Friday
Yikes, the spambots were busy on Wednesday between 1 and 4pm – all on a Happiness is… post (the same for all)… I had cleaned the spam folder before leaving the office and when I went back to the dashboard to schedule this post I had this not so wonderful surprise!
Anyhow, spam-folder cleaned, hopping to another topic. If you are following me on Goodreads, you might have noticed the past week I was reading 3 non-fiction books in 3 different languages. Well, 2 have been there for at least a couple of years because I read them in my free time (the one in French is historical and not for immediate research purposes, the one in English is very useful but I also need to read it very slowly and figure out what applies to me and what doesn’t – and I’m sure there’s a revised edition by now, but I haven’t finished that one yet, so I’ll wait, LOL!). The third one is written by a journalist, my favorite as I enjoyed very much his Italian “lessons” – and this is English “lessons”. Of course it’s geared to Italians, but I enjoyed it very much (even if I’m fluent in English) because he also analizes the different ways of teaching languages.
I learned 2 as mother tongue (being Italian but living and going to school in France, so I spoke Italian at home and French outside of it) – still bemoaning how much I’m forgetting my French, sigh. I should be at the Salon du Livre instead of whining on the blog! – and one with a few mixed methods, as I started studying English at school (grammar lessons), then continued on my own through song lyrics and eventually DVD subtitled (English/English HOH), which is what I call the Empirical Method and is also mentioned by Mr Severgnini regarding someone who learned English through song lyrics. And that’s how I’m learning Hindi at the moment – as dear teacher doesn’t really have a method, even if he says he does. So I’m not learning from him, but from Bollywood movies&songs – just like before.
Another fun bit was imagining that English was written as it’s pronounced. I also like to say that in English pronounciation is arbitrary, but apparently there are people who advocate to write it as it’s pronounced, which would immensely help us non-native speakers! This method implies that, for example, fish written as pronounced should be written gothi: f like “rou gh”, i like “w o men”, sh like “na ti on”… There, I even found a link to the article Mr Severgnini must have read before me!
Fun, innit?
BTW, there’s no trace of the very British “innit” in that book. I guess I’m even more proficient than him, LOL! Just kidding, his is not an English course, but it will help Italians who think English is so hard to learn, by showing them how many English words have already infiltrated Italian and by teaching them a few simple tricks. This won’t rid us of Italians traveling and demanding to be understood when they speak only Italian (and especially in France, nobody is going to bother to try to understand them, LOL), but if it helps at least a few, I’ll feel less dejected when I meet one in an airport – in those cases I always pretend I’m not Italian, and my looks help, but sometimes I really want to hide under a rock.
I also downloaded the sample of Mr.Severgnini’s book on Italy & Mr.B (can you tell I like the guy?), but I refuse to pay 12euro for an e-book – for that price, I’ll get the dead-trees-book instead! That’s traditional publishers’ policy all over the world, I guess… sigh. And I like Rizzoli/BUR as they used to publish my favorite Italian author (who was also a journalist, so I loved both her fiction and her non-fiction books), Brunella Gasperini. But I won’t let them have my money for a very expensive e-book because they need to sell the paper versions first.
To end the randomness with a little image, lovely Stacy gave me the Sunshine award. As it’s been a few years since I last received it (I think 2010 or 2011 was the Blog Award Year, with many recieved from more than one person, LOL), I guess I can follow the rules (sort of, as usual).
Here are the rules to accept this award:
Include the award’s logo in a post or on your blog.
Answer 10 questions about yourself.
10-12 other fabulous bloggers must be nominated.
Link your nominees to the post and comment on their blogs, letting them know they have been nominated.
Share the love and link the person who nominated you.
Okay, here come the answers to the questions:
1 – Favorite color: Blue
2 – Favorite animal: unicorn
3 – Favorite number: 5
4 – Favorite non-alcoholic drink: tea
5 – Prefer Facebook or Twitter? Facebook, I don’t Tweet
6 – My passion: Writing, Music, Drawing, Movies
7 – Prefer getting or giving presents: Can’t bother either if it’s at fixed dates. But if I find something very specific for someone – YAY!
8 – Favorite pattern: Pattern? Sorry, don’t understand the question (I use “patterns” in Photoshop, but I guess this is something else)
9 – Favorite day of the week: Saturday
10 – Favorite flower: as long as it doesn’t have a perfume (I’m allergic to all smells)
Nominees: any of you lovely new blog followers who would like to grab it and put it on your blog! When I last did this, I had more or less 40 followers and now too many to choose from. So, like last time, if you want it, grab it and pass it on!
Anyway, that’s all for today! Have a wonderful weekend!








March 20, 2013
Writer Wednesday
… starting with some writerly advice. Definitely follow Hugh C.Howey’s advice for aspiring writers and make sure you don’t do the same mistakes Neal Pollack did (the only thing I recomment is in part2 of the interview):
I spent a lot of years trying to turn myself into a brand because they told us self-branding is a way to success. And I kind of believed the hype. It’s just not true. To this day, I see writers publishing their first book or their second book and I can just see them going overboard with the marketing and getting all hyped up about it. You just have to write. If something good happens for you, post it on Facebook or Twitter or Pinterest or wherever you make your social-media home, but don’t overdo it. Enough with the marketing! Enough with the goddamn marketing already! I’m sick of it.
I didn’t spend years trying to self-brand (but I did spend a few years trying to become a screenwriter, LOL!), but one thing’s for sure: I never sold a copy through a Facebook “like”. Nobody participates in my giveaways, either here, on Goodreads or Facebook. The blog now has as many followers as the Facebook page. And no, it didn’t increase my sales either. And nobody voted in the poll, so I still have no idea of who comes here and why.
Take Our Poll
So, Dear Spammer who wrote to me after visiting my Facebook Fanpage:
No, I don’t care about promoting to a much wider audience – I don’t have a much wider audience. I have a very small audience and I haven’t reached it yet – but if you know of any adults who still like fantasy and wild adventures (without the whiny teen hero who needs to grow up in the process) send them to the Find My stuff or Silvery Earth Chronology pages.
I’m much better off writing. Spent the weekend preparing the Italian titles for this week’s release, stripping DRM from those Italian ebooks I got last year (unreadable except on my laptop screen, which is not going to happen, ever! Now I have them on my Kindle, yay!) and then writing that Amazons story – that might end up in a drawer for some time, but I had to try.
I’m still waiting for a beta with comments on Slave Traders, so I’d rather be writing something I’ll shelve forever than not writing while I wait! Unfortunately I have a very busy week, so I won’t be able to meet with her (the Offline Beta-reader rocks!) until the next… But as I’ll be busy making projects with friends, I’m not complaining!
And I’ll be playing auntie as well tomorrow. And I’m off Dayjob on Friday. So short week but filled with creativity!
If you need help to plan your life and/or your writing, try following this 5-step process to plan your week. It’s an old post, but I found it while I was looking for a permanent weekly planner template. I was thinking I could do a weekly calendar with a Happiness Is… vignette (52 for a General Happiness is… and 52 for a Writer Happiness is…) and maybe I have found a template, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to do it. Oh, and if you’re a blogger, you might like the Blogging Weekly Planner!
Sunday I also toyed with Mobipocket Creator, seeing if I could create readable Kindle files form my comics, but even the Happiness Is… vignettes are unreadable on Kindle Keyboard – the writing is too tiny or hiddend by “colors” (it’s b&w, in case you don’t have one). Now I will try to scan older comics (the one that came out as photocopied zines in the late 1990s/early 2000s) which have bigger lettering and see what happens… You think I’m procrastinating on that story I’m not happy with? Of course! I’ll finish it and shelve it, LOL! Or maybe not. I’ll know by next weekend.
By the way, if you still have trouble with the Smashwords meagrinder, follow Ross’s advice instead of the very long Smashwords guide. I use OpenOffice and I’ve become quite proficient with docs, so I won’t need it, but if you’re still struggling with Word, check it out! And if you use OpenOffice like me and want the OpenOffice version, just let me know. I now do my Word.docs ready to be formatted for Kobo, Amazon and Smashwords with very few struggle to upload and have them come out as I want them to – but I still have problems with Calibre, I don’t like the way they show up there!
Take Our Poll Oh, and thanks to the few people who voted in the poll for 200 followers. I’m pasting it here again, just to get a few more votes (there, now you have 2 polls in one post, LOL). I will post some free fiction, I only need to revise it. Might be on Easter day or probably April (what I have in mind isn’t very Easterly, LOL!)… As for a giveaway… you’ve read above. If you really want one, you’ll have to drop more votes in that hat!
Anyway, stay tuned, I’ll let the polls on until Easter (which means I’ll repost them at least once a week, because I don’t know how to put them in the sidebar, LOL)! Have a great week!








March 17, 2013
Happiness is…
Surprise Sunday
… and it’s a blog award! With special thanks to Rohan7things who passed me the Best Moment Award! Thank you, Rohan (and BTW, if you’d like to do a guest post… you’re very welcome! It would be an interesting change of perspective! )!
No rules except passing it on, so here’s a list of bloggers… no, wait, I’ve already done that. Okay, you, yes, you who are reading this and would like to have this shiny award on your blog: just grab it, paste it and pass it on! I could nominate, but some people don’t accept awards, or they already have it, others never pass them on, so… no names. If you want it, grab it and have fun! And thanks for stopping by!
I didn’t go to Deepcon (as you might have guessed), so not much else to say. Gotta go back to those writing projects – the Italian stories that always take me back down memory lane because they’ve been written in the late 1980s early 1990s so sometimes I wonder if and how I changed. And I don’t mean physically (I didn’t, except now I color my hair – my former classmates think I hybernated for 20 years to stay as I am. Which I probably did, but don’t tell them!).
Those were stories written in my early twenties, and yeah, I guess I changed a lot since. Not my writing style, though! Pity Italians don’t read, I’m sure they’d enjoy those stories. And no, I’m not translating them because they’re too set in Italy in the last years of the 20th century – “period piece” they’d call it in Hollywood. I doubt anyone is interested anyway. And too many things would get lost in translation (that’s my main objection)!
Okay, as this blog has almost 200 followers – would you like me to do a giveaway? Post a free piece of fiction? Celebrate? Just forget about it? Vote in the poll and let me know, thank you!
Have a wonderful Sunday!







