Barbara G. Tarn's Blog, page 171

Sunday Summary

So, I’m back! Glad you enjoyed last Sunday’s guest post, I admit Verchiel is my second favorite vampire – but I’m glad he was in time out and allowed his author to reply to comments! :-)

What have I been doing? Last weekend in Certaldo, but this time I didn’t pay the Medieval Dinner fare. I went alone and by train, so I didn’t bring the dress either. I spent 2 nights at the hotel Il Castello – cooler than outside where this year it was very hot. The first night the hotel was full, the second night I feared I’d be the only guest, but luckily a couple of foreigners showed up to spend the night. So I wrote and read and Monday morning I took the train to Massa, my father’s hometown.

Now, when I arrived in Certaldo and decided to send a message to a friend, I found out I had no cell phone. Panic. How was I supposed to let Mom know I was safe? I went back to the hotel and sent a message to my brother through Facebook (she panicked once because my cell phone was off and I wasn’t home). Then I managed to find a public phone and it even worked with coins, yay!

Luckily I have most numbers written down on my PAPER organizer, but the newest acquisitions aren’t there. So I didn’t have the number of a friend I hoped to meet while in Massa. Monday night I found her e-mail through my cousin’s PC and told her I was phone-less. My phone seemed switched off, so I guessed I just left it at home. More days writing and reading (see my GR shelves for reviews), then Friday I came back. Bus strike finishing when I got to Rome, so it took me one hour and a half to get home.

No cell phone. It vanished. I don’t think it was stolen because it’s not smart enough for cell-phone addicts (it’s only a phone, no apps, no internet, no MMS), so I’m guessing I misplaced it or lost it or the town faeries took it.  I finally got a replacement SIM card, because tomorrow I’m going on the other side of town with my 16-year-old car, so for my own comfort I’d rather be able to call for help.

This cost me 1euro of phone calls from public phones + 40cents of parking + 10euro replacement SIM card. Sigh. And I have to manually put back in all the numbers – family is already there, but friends… OK, I’ll rebuild the list one at the time.

Anyway, yesterday I went with my brother to various places (he needs stuff but so do I, and the tech-stuff I’d rather buy with him – and then I went looking for that replacement SIM card) and spent the afternoon going through CVE3. Finishing today, hoping to send it out to betas tomorrow.

I’ll try to get back on track, reading blogs soon. Next week I’m still off DayJob, but I’ve got a lot of work to do! If the heat doesn’t kill me first… I hate the summer. Have a great Sunday!

Random Friday

Writers, please take the survey on the state of publishing – pub, unpub, trad pub, indie pub, just do it (hey, I even invented new words!)! Now I shall let David Farland speak – writers AND readers pay attention!

David Farland’s Daily Kick (reposted as it came in my inbox)

If you pay much attention, you’ll hear a lot about writer’s networking. Most of the time, when we talk about social networking, we think about Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or similar sites. On those sites, I sometimes feel as if I’m primarily linked to other writers. I know from talking to many of you, that you may feel the same way.

Yet it seems to me that as authors, we ought to be spending more time trying to connect with readers than with writers.

The power of social media as a sales tool was brought home to me recently by a friend who created a site that sells movies online. He put up a documentary and started selling it, linking it to a social media site for people who talk about movies. In a matter of weeks he got millions of dollars in sales, and he’s on his way to creating an empire.

Some sites already cater to book lovers. Amazon.com, Barnes&Noble.com, and similar sites have some built-in social marketing capability.

Similarly, you have Facebook, MySpace, Google+, and similar sites where people might tell their friends about their favorite books.

Then there are places like Goodreads, where readers not only post their reviews about books, but also often belong to specific reading groups. Goodreads lists some 20,000 different reading groups, where like-minded people discuss their favorite books.

And of course you have private blogs, where people simply talk about their hobbies—which may include reading.

It seems to me as an author, that all of these resources might be helpful in spreading the word about a new book. Often we will look for ways to advertise—by purchasing television ads, getting books reviewed in newspapers, and so on. But those methods can be expensive, and to be honest, I don’t think that they’re as effective as word-of-mouth advertising. It used to be that newspapers did a lot of book reviews, for example, but over the past decade, most of the papers have shut down their book-review lines, citing the cost of it.

In the past few weeks, I’ve been getting dozens of pieces of fan mail about my latest release, Nightingale. I suspect that for every ten pieces of fan mail that I get, only one person will mention it on Facebook, or put up a review on Goodreads, or mention it in a blog.

So I’m wondering if it would be helpful to educate your fans on how to help spread the word. You might say something like this:

1) “If you loved this book (or any other book) the best thing that you can do for the author is to write a brief review, then post it on Facebook with a link to the purchase site.” The review doesn’t have to be extensive, just something as simple as “I just read the coolest book! Check it out: www.nightingalenovel.com”

2) You can also post your review on Goodreads or similar sites. Here are a few: librarything.com, shelfari.com, books.google.com (use with gmail), anobii.com, weread.com, chapters.indigo.ca, revish.com, reader2.com.

3) Post your review on your own private blog. Sure, it might only have a couple of dozen readers, but the six-degrees of separation principle suggests that your review could help create a domino-effect, one that would eventually help the book get made into a movie or otherwise go ballistic.

4) Tweet about the book to your friends.

Of course, if a reader were to take any one of those actions, it would be wonderful for you as the author. If they’d do two or more, it would take you much further down the road to becoming a bestseller.

Yet I have to wonder. What other opportunities are out there? I’ve heard, for example, that there are some good new social media sites in Europe that allow people to join into fan groups. Some sites for young readers are closed to adults, some are for librarians only, and so on. So in order to better educate myself, I’m going to ask: What cool new networks for book-lovers excite you? Send your answers to dwolvert@xmission.com, and if I get a nifty list together, I’ll compile it.

—

Dave has a couple of openings left in his Novel-Rewriting Class in August, and more in September. If you have a novel that you think has strong potential, but you just need to get over those past few hurdles, check out his workshops here.

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Art Wednesday

Because this post is scheduled (they all are, doh! But I won’t be checking my e-mail every five seconds to see if there are any comments) and I’m mostly offline, I thought I’d do an art Wednesday for a change. Because that’s what I do to relax when I need to decompress. So, latest drawing done on June 10 – Hritik Roshan again. He’s not my muse yet, but I’m mulling over a Desi vampire, so eventually… maybe… not this year!

I got the DVD with subtitles at last, as some parts still escaped me when I watched the movie in VHS (because it never came out in Italian theaters and it’s one of my 3 favorite movies of 1999), it even has a French audio track (I saw it advertized on French movie mags at the time and really wondered why oh why Italian Duranies and Spandau Ballet fans – so numerous in the 1980s – were left out of this little independent movie). I hadn’t watched it in years (because my VCR broke) and it was great watching it again. And as I mentioned on June 8, today’s the day that my former muse (from the 1980s) turns a year older… so I’m putting this old drawing when he was 25 and I was 20 – it’s included in the artbook available only in print on Lulu. And Happy Birthday, Nigel John Taylor.

Now, I used to do lots of these drawings as illustrations for the stories, so I’ll end this with Lost&Oliver original drawing (that has been redone for the cover with Photoshop coloring). CVE3 is complete, but I’ll read it again when I get back home for a final check before I send it out again. This is a scene from Chapter 2 (which will probably be included in the sample chapter anyway).

I’ll be back on Sunday with a summary of what I’ve been doing under the Tuscan sun! Have a great week!

Happiness is…

Guest post…

OK, this is the first of couple of scheduled posts (actually, they’re all scheduled, but I won’t be here to check your response , so be patient with me, LOL) and I am allowing this guest to take over the blog for a day. I have already interviewed Joleene Naylor last year, and was quite happy to host her again. Except maybe it’s not her. Anyway, I leave you to today’s guest! Have a great Sunday!

The history of vampires?

First I would like to thank Barb for hosting me and my giveaway (see details at the end of this post) on the third stop of the blog tour celebrating the release of my newest book in the Amaranthine series, Ashes of Deceit. Barb is a sweet person and the author of the fantastic Silvery Earth universe.

Since Barb writes a lot of historically inspired fantasy, I have prepared a post about the history of the vampire which I hope will be entertaining and enlightening. We will begin in Russia. The first mention of the vampire was used to call a priest a “Wicked vampire” or “extortionist vampire” in-

mmmfmfmMMffFFFFffHHhh? HmmmMMmmmphhhh? HHmyyy! Mmmmfffffrrrmmppphhh! Hhhemp!

(translation: what the hell? Why is there duct tape over my mouth? Wait! Where did these ropes come from! Help!)

There. Shut her up just in time. Oh, I guess you’re probably wondering who I am. Hold on, let me plug the author’s ears – there we go. As I was saying, my name is Verchiel and I’m a vampire from her Amaranthine series, though I don’t show up until the third book. I guess she didn’t want to dazzle people with my brilliance too soon.

I don’t usually do this sort of thing – tie my author to a chair – but can you imagine reading a dry old post about some supposed history (which we all know is wrong, anyway)? She’s supposed to be attracting readers, not chasing them away!

If you want to know about the history of the vampire, I can tell it to you. Long, long ago someone, somehow made a vampire, who made a vampire, who made a vampire, and the whole thing continued on and on until – voila! – I came into being!

Despite being the pinnacle of vampire evolution, I am not the main character of the Amaranthine books. That… honor, if you can call being tortured by our author an honor, belongs to Jorick. He’s a crusty old vampire who likes to brew, stew and yell, but all the ladies think he’s hot, including Katelina. She’s his human girlfriend. Since I’m so fond of her, I can say in the nicest possible way that sometimes she has the brain power of a turnip. But, hey, brilliance is over rated! Would you rather spend eternity with an intellectual who will write long, boring posts about the history of things *cough* or with someone who can’t figure out how to open a pop bottle? Having been around, I can tell you that the second option is more fun.

(Unless it’s the case of our author, who writes those posts AND can’t figure out how to open a pop bottle. Just saying.)

But our author has one good point – she occasionally writes. Whether she writes well or not is a subject of debate. (I usually take her side. I want my own spin off series, after all) and as she might have half mentioned, she’s managed to crank out four full length novels and several short stories. Since the proof is in the pudding, as they say, I think now might be the time to share an excerpt of the latest book, Ashes of Deceit:

(During a battle with Senya, one of the Guild’s Executioners, Crabby old Jorick has asked Micah and Loren – fellow vampires – to take dear little Katelina and a couple of incapacitated vampires, and hit the road before things get too out of hand. Micah does, but he steals Senya’s car in the process.)

*****

It was after midnight when Micah announced, “We need gas, and Lunch’s growling stomach is driving me fucking nuts.”

Katelina glared at a passing tree and imagined slugging him.

A truck stop glowed in the distance. Micah pointed to it and asked, “Who’s got cash?”

“Not me,” Loren chirped from the back seat.

Micah snorted. “What’s new? I think I’ve got a five, but that’s it. Looks like you’re buying, Lunch.”

“Stop calling me that,” Katelina snapped. “And I don’t have any money.”

“Ah, fuck. All right then, check the glove box. Maybe the bitch left her purse in here.”

Though Katelina couldn’t imagine Senya with a purse, she did as instructed. The first thing she found was a gun.

“Holy shit!”

Micah rolled his eyes and steered into the truck stop. As he parked, Katelina gingerly moved the weapon aside and rifled through the contents of the glove box. There was a collection of IDs, all with Senya’s photo and different names; a cell phone, which Katelina pocketed; a package of wet wipes that Micah grabbed; and several road maps dotted with familiar symbols.

Loren snatched one of the maps. “What’s that?”

“It’s a map of the dens,” Katelina answered absently. “The different marks mean different things, like who’s on their side and who isn’t.”

Micah snorted. “I suppose Jorick told you that.”

“No, Verchiel.” She glanced up to see the scorn in his eyes doubled. “There’s no money.”

“Eh, I’m hungry, anyway.” Micah glanced back at Loren, “I bet you are, too?”

The teen nodded.

“And we should probably revive those two.” Micah jerked his thumb towards Torina and Alex. “Do you think we can catch two people with Lunch dragging us down?”

“You can’t hunt people!” Katelina cried, too horrified to notice the insult.

“Sorry to say, Princess, but yes we can.”

Loren cut in. “What if we just revived Alex? One person would be easier to kill than two.”

“You don’t need to kill anyone!” Katelina cried. “Verchiel fed off that Santa Claus guy and left him alive!”

“Santa Claus?” Micah snorted and waved it away. “I don’t wanna know. If it was just me or Loren, then yeah, we could drink offa someone without killing ‘em, but we need more than that for the three of us.”

“You can hunt animals!” Katelina gestured to the darkness beyond the glowing oasis of artificial lights.

Micah snickered. “You ever seen that commercial where they stack up all the breakfast cereal to show how much you’d ‘need’ to eat? Imagine those bowls are little raccoons.” He and Loren laughed and Katelina glared. “Besides, unless you wanna get stuck along the side of the road, we need money. Last I looked, Bambie and friends don’t carry cash.”

Katelina waved her fist furiously. “I won’t be part of this!”

Micah slipped the car into gear and drove to the back of the station. “We don’t want you to, Princess. You look like shit. Anyone who saw you would run.”

*****

Wasn’t that fun? I know, I’m not there, but at least they were talking about me. Oh-oh. It looks like Joleene is getting loose, so we better skip right to the giveaway!

One lucky commenter will receive a coupon code for a free ebook from Smashwords. Since this is a series, the winner may choose which of the books they would like to receive:

Book 1: Shades of Gray - Katelina’s “friend-with-benefits” is murdered for stealing something from a coven of vampires. Hunted as an accomplice, she must rely on Jorick to survive. But what happens when her knight in shining armor turns out to be one of the monsters?

Book 2: Legacy of Ghosts – For Katelina and Jorick, peace is hard to come by. Kateesha plans to fight the same battle as Jorick’s fledgling, but a common enemy isn’t enough to overcome previous betrayals. Drawn into a deathly conflict, Jorick and Katelina must overcome old regrets, or lose their future to the ghosts of their past.

Book 3: Ties of Blood – A trip to Katelina’s home starts a chain reaction; she and Jorick meet Verchiel, a too friendly vampire, then the police arrest Jorick for kidnapping. Worse, The Guild wants to question them. Will Malick, the head of the vampires, punish them? Or will the mysterious vampire following them do the job first?

Book 4: Ashes of Deceit – Katelina and Jorick must rescue a captured vampire and discover who kidnapped him and why. The truth isn’t easy to find. As Oren’s attack on the Guild draws closer, Jorick and Katelina are led back to the Citadel. When the flames of war ignite, can they rise from the ashes, or will they be consumed?

Follow the tour for more chances to win!

You can find more of Joleene Naylor and her vampires at her website: http://JoleeneNaylor.com or check out her blog at http://JoleeneNaylor.WordPress.com or her facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/joleenenaylorbooks.

Barb’s note: as it might take me a couple of days to moderate comments from new visitors, as I’ll be mostly offline this week, please be patient – the winner will be announced next Sunday or contacted directly by the author! Thanks for participating – and go read the Amaranthine series (I should comment too, but I don’t have time to read the fourth book now, so I’ll just buy it when my TBR pile goes down, LOL)!

Random Friday

OK, last crazy day at crazy DayJob, then I have my 2 weeks off. One I’ll be mostly offline, so you’ll have some scheduled posts (well, they all are, actually), the second I’ll be back and scanning, relettering and formatting like crazy some of my old works (graphic novels).

Now, these nights I’ve been watching movies and you can guess my latest Amazon shopping spree brought me mostly Bollywood movies. So, if you like a sweet romantic comedy, go for Socha Na Tha. Both protagonists are lovely and there aren’t too many dance numbers, if they’re what bothers you.

After the Hollywood Rock star with Mark Wahlberg, I tried Bollywood Rockstar. And I totally disagree with the manager/friend of Jordan – you don’t need to suffer to write or sing or be creative. I haven’t suffered that much, but I have a wild imagination and never stopped jotting down stories. Never tried writing songs, but I don’t believe in the “starving artist” myth. So there goes, for me the premise of the movie was unbelievable, LOL.

Anyway, in this case I preferred the Hollywood story to the very dramatic Bollywood story (no, they’re not related at all, they weren’t trying to tell the same story, they simply happen to have almost the same title). And in the most recent case, the title is even kind of misleading – the Hollywood movies talks about rockstars and fans and wannabe stars, the Bollywood one about a guy who wants to be a rockstar but manages to screw everything, including his beloved’s life. So the rockstar side of the story is kind of in the background.

Finally, I don’t remember which of my Desi friends suggested the original Umrao Jaan when I bought the Aishwarya Rai version (Hema or Shafali?), but because I like Rekha a lot (since she played Rasa Devi in Kama Sutra a tale of love), I ended up getting that one too. Then I’ll probably have to read the novel as well, LOL!

Anyway, this is my first “attempt” with Old Bollywood – the movie is from the 1980s but it looks like a movie from the 1950s the way it’s filmed and how the image is “ruined”. BUT Rekha is beautiful, the costumes are luscious, the jewelry fabuous, so… if you want to check the other face of Bollywood, then check this movie.

The 2000s version is probably more faithful to the novel because there’s the “frame” where Umrao tells her story to the author of the book – totally absent in this older version. Based on the Wikipedia article about the book, of course, as I can’t speak Urdu and don’t have time to read the English translation at this time… did I mention my TBR pile never goes down?   Anyhow, hope to manage some reading and writing while I’m offline next week. Sunday we have guests, so make sure to come back!

Writer Wednesday

In spite of driving me crazy with the premium distribution and the NCX (not sure the meatgrinder recognizes the word Chapter in another language, which means manual TOC on Italian titles, sigh), I’m still loving Smashwords. They’re even doing some promotion a la Amazon! In my latest trip on the site to leave a review, I saw in the left hand column “People who recently viewed this book also viewed these books” and “People who purchased this book also purchased”. It’s not on all books, but it’s a start, so yay for Smashwords!

Now, even if Amazon saved your life, like it did for Jessica Park, don’t forget the Kindle is not the only e-reader on the market, and that if you go KDP Select you’re not reaching the part of population that read e-books in e-pub format (Sony, Kobo, i-Pad, smartphone apps, etc)… We want to reach every possible reader, don’t we? It’s an international market, remember? The US might be at the head at the moment, but the rest of the world is following and Amazon hasn’t opened everywhere yet… so for the sake of your readers, try not to give exclusivity to anyone.

Now, about reviews: I never respond to any review on any of my books (OK, sometimes I have to remind the reviewer to post it everywhere, but I never ask to change anything), neither good nor bad. Yes, I read them. Yes, I pout over the “bad” ones. That’s why I don’t check my B&N page anymore because there are plenty of anonymous no-text reviews that are only a waste of my time. And I don’t think adressing the reviewer is professional in any way. But you might want to read the point of view of someone else – and the comments as well. I never respond to reader reviews. But this is a free world, so do what you feel comfortable with!

Just remember – it’s the end of the world as we know it, especially in publishing. Kris Rusch’s analysis is spot on, as always. I still think the best marketing tool is writing a good book, publish it, and write the next one.

Now I’m falling behind with CVE3 because I’m not happy with it, but by the end of the week I should be ready with the new version. Still looking for betas, in case anyone is interested. Then I’m back to finishing the sci-fi title so I can send it to betas for a summer reading. But I’d love to publish CVE3 on August 1st, so if there are any volunteers, please let me know ASAP.

And this month I’m not publishing anything, because  I was supposed to upload a couple of Italian short stories. None of my Italian friends volunteered to review what is already out, so why bother? Yeah, Facebook friends,  I know! Anyhow, Italians don’t read, so what’s the hurry? I’ll take June off from publishing – except the last week I’ll be formatting and relettering like crazy to put stuff on DriveThruComics. But that’s another market – comics and graphic novels don’t always go with prose.

By the way, Dear SKYBAND Reader, I’m coloring chapter 11. Our heroes have reached the former Black Empire (due to the skin color of its inhabitants, not because they’re eeeeevil), so I had to do some research (like for the Islands Empire) for new architecture… here’s a sneak preview of the first town they reach (there’s no lettering at all – I’ll do that when I finish coloring).

Now as DayJob gets crazier and I prepare to my two weeks off (but don’t worry, I’ll be offline only for one week, mwahahahahaha!), as the weather is hot cold hot cold rainy sunny rainy sunny and whatnot (Mother Earth must be really pissed at us, can’t blame her) and my blood pressure goes up and down accordingly, making me sleep at all times and my stomach struggle with any food, I’ll just trudge on my path, looking forward to this brand new world!

Happiness is…

Random Friday

And mostly Movie Friday just because in my exhaustion I watch a lot of movie (not to mention my latest Amazon shopping spree, glee!).

I normally don’t watch Oscar winners, especially AFTER they won, but The Artist has always been on my ToWatch list. I love

I also got some Bollywood goodies so here goes: Rock On!! nice movie on bands and friends and choices, with rock songs with Hindi lyrics – and apparently they’re shooting a sequel (what’s with sequels of all the 2006 movies? Dhoom2, Krrish, Rock On!! are all from 2006 and there’s a sequel in the works! ). And then I watched Desi Boyz, a comedy about finding unconventional jobs during a recession, with a couple of love-stories thrown in for  good measure and the obvious happy ending. Music a little too electronic for my tastes, but well… can’t have it all! And can dance. Arf.

Finally a “period piece” (because it’s set in the 1980s, which equals “history2 in movies because he production designer must find clothes and accessories from that time, yikes!) – The Dirty Picture. It’s the only Vidya Balan picture I’ve seen so far, but she seems to be exactly how the Bollywood Addict describes her. And it’s a grear story, pity a third of the English subtitles were absent, so you heard the voice over and had no idea of what he was saying. OK, I got what happened, but I would have loved to have a translation of everything. Greedy, I know. I better go and start learning Hindi, so I’ll do without stupid subtitles! 

OK, I don’t normally do this, but as he turns 50 (half a century), Happy Birthday to Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran! He always came third in my heart, but well… it’s because he’s not as tall as the other two! Gee, bad fan, I forgot to mention my favorite’s b-day two years ago… bad bad fan… Ah, well, but I bought his movie on DVD so I can watch it subtitled now, LOL! Stay tuned for that… hey, if I get it on time, I’ll review it for his b-day on June 20!

Have a great weekend!

Writer Wednesday

So it’s spring – depression and earthquakes (real or metaphorical). The earth is still shaking in Emilia Romagna (not that I feel it, but I have friends there) and DayJob is shaky for the “new” tax that should be paid by June 18th. The only good thing Mr.B had done was eliminate the tax on “first house” (if you have money to buy a second or third house, you also have money to pay taxes on those, right?) – now it’s back. And a region of Italy has no houses to account for. Can’t the government take the hint and try to find the money where it actually is instead of taxing poor citizens that have lost their roofs?

Anyway, at DayJob we’re supposed to accept payment for that tax, and the management doesn’t seem to know how to handle the “emergency”. So it’s a constant flux of e-mails and instructions and they have no idea of what to do. We’re already losing professionality without this mess. So – depression for five hours a day. Can’t quit yet, because the other source of depression comes from Real Job or Indie Publishing. Smashwords is backlogged with the premium catalog and keeps rejecting novels without TOCs, Amazon KDP has probably found too many pirated books among the freebies and wants to be sure I’m the owner of my own copyright and every day I seem to be wading a river of mud instead of just another day. Add the crazy weather with temperatures going yo-yo, and you can imagine how I look forward to being off everything for a couple of weeks.

The only thing that keeps me happy in all this? Well, writing, of course. On Silvery Earth they don’t have phones, PCs and the internet and life is much simpler, LOL! Which means I’ll never stop writing, but I might slow down the publishing part – I probably was going too fast. So stop, breathe and then keep going. I mean keep writing. If it’s not ready, don’t hit “publish”. I might publish a couple of Italian shorts, but I’m not really selling any Italian titles (did I mention Italians don’t read?), so why bother? I’ll just go back to writing the next English book.

And maybe eventually I’ll have covers like Joe Konrath. I mean, even Dean Wesley Smith and WMG Publishing are redoing their covers, but I don’t want to change the looks of Silvery Earth’s titles yet… Unless everybody at Chicon7 tells me my covers suck, that is! Anyhow, better go back to writing now. It eases my depression, you see!