Barbara G. Tarn's Blog, page 187

Happiness is…

Six Sentence Sunday – Ether 3

Hello Sunday visitors! Missed me last Sunday? Sorry, busy busy… here we are again, with Kamar and Joyspring. Another ten years have passed when they meet again. The first scene was in Kamar's POV, but I thought I'd stick to Joyspring's for these excerpts. Links to part 1 and part 2.

She had mixed feelings about him: she remembered the baby she had held in her arms, and the proud father who had refused to go back to so-called civilization; but those feelings belonged to the old Joyspring, the innocent who hadn't met Edwyn Blackmore and his lust. She remembered also the little hands of the six-year-old fondling with her gown and legs, almost pushing her up and running in panic – what would the oblivious child have understood if she hadn't controlled herself? Once out of touch, his crystal laughter had been a balm on her wounds.

Although her mother had healed her body and time had almost erased her adventure with darkness, she still felt uneasy in the presence of male Humans, especially the ones that lusted for her. She had learned to keep them away without turning into a hysteric bubble, and had never allowed anyone to touch her.

Kamar was different, though.

Books of the Immortals – Ether is out on Smashwords & Kindle.

Now hop back to the official blog for more six sentence goodies!

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End of hiatus

So, next week we should be back to normal scheduling… at least until the end of the year!

Did I have time to read in the past two weeks? Not so much, although I did read a whole manuscript during the workshop. We had homework, but being the fast writer that I am, I never really spend much time on it, so I managed to finish that on Saturday. Then Sunday and before hopping on the plane on Monday I read Jonathan Gould's Doodling, a quick and delicious read:

this fast and funny satire reminded me of the Little Prince (although I read it many many years ago, but the traveling through planets or asteroids is similar) AND the Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy. A very enjoyable read.

And then I found this Listopia on Goodreads about Must Buy Smashwords Books and managed to vote for three fellow Creative Reviewers, Sarah, Jonathan and Splitter (whose manuscript I had been reading). Please go and take your pick too – and you can add books or vote for more than one, but I picked 3 who were already in the top 100, the rest has mostly one vote…

I also read Black Market Romance:  Hot and sexy… albeit very unusual! My favorite is the first story. I had trouble reading da sista, but it's just me… Read only if you don't have problems with sex… with aliens. And they're really alien, as shown on the cover!

Now I'm reading the last fiction ebook on my Kindle before going back to those last three PDFs I have printed out… not to mention that I had dead tree books in Oregon, so my pile is still going up, gaaah! I'll have to decide how to buy some Kindle titles (move my Kindle to France or UK for a month or two?) and leave them there for some time, as I need to attack those dead tree books that are piling on my desk – glad I don't really use it!

Have a great weekend!

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Interview with… David Farland

I read on his Daily Kicks that he wanted to do a blog tour, so I immediately offered my blog. He was supposed to be here in September, but things got postponed… which worked very well for both of us! Ladies and gents, I'm honored to have interviewed a real pro today. Please welcome David Farland. Feel free to leave comments (I hope to be able to approve them in a timely manner)!

Can you do us a summary of your writing career?

That's not easy!  I've written and edited about fifty-novel length works and anthologies, been a New York Times Bestseller seven times, set the Guinness record for the World's Largest Book Signing, worked with a number of major properties such as Star Wars and the Mummy in movies, and Starcraft and Xena in videogames.  I've trained dozens of writers who have gone on to become New York Times Bestsellers, and I've won a few awards for best novel of the year, best story of the year, things like that.  I often feel that when I talk about such things, it must have been someone else.  Most of the time, my life is rather dull–I sit and write.

Where do you find your inspiration?  Do you put yourself in your stories?

Inspiration is everywhere–movies that I watch, music I listen to, news reports, dreams after eating pepperoni pizza. (Seriously, I've gotten two novels that way!)  You just have to keep yourself open to it.  When you think about writing a lot, soon the ideas seem to come from everywhere.

As for characters, most of my protagonists are what I'd call "twisted versions of me."  I can imagine what they would think and do only by examining what I see as possibilities within myself.

When and where do you write? Do you have a specific routine?

I have a nice Lazy Boy that I write on most of the time.  I put my laptop on it and type away.  Sometimes I'll lie down in bed and write, if I'm tired.   As for when–I do it all the time, from 6:30 in the morning until about midnight.  Much of my time is spent writing correspondence, taking care of business, but the point is that I don't have a set schedule.  I like to work out in the evenings because most of the time, after working out, I'm too tired to write.  But then there are those times when you get inspired, and it drags you out of bed.

Outliner or improviser? Fast or slow writer?

All of the above.  I teach a course called Million Dollar Outlines, and I do outline sometimes.  But I've also written about half of my books just off the cuff, improvising.  As to fast or slow, people complain that I'm not writing my books fast enough, but they don't know all that I'm doing.

Indie publishing or traditional publishing – and why?

Both if you can swing it.  Traditional publishing–where someone else prints, ships, edits, and markets your book–was a good deal three years ago.  It allowed an author to concentrate on his or her work.

But with the rise of electronic publishing, the deals there aren't looking very good.  The traditional publishers are demanding too much of the author's revenue, given what they're providing.  Even then, a lot of publishers seem to be withholding monies due.

I think that we're going through a transition period.  Perhaps in a couple of years, things will settle down, and the deals will get more reasonable.

But with this latest book, I just felt that I couldn't take it through New York.

So I decided for something of a third alternative: I'm starting a new publishing company, one that will treat authors much better that what they're used to.

For those who (still) don't follow your Daily Kicks, what's up at David Farland's these days?

I'm releasing NIGHTINGALE hopefully on November 4th.  This is the beginning of a huge franchise, I suspect.  It's the story of a young man, abandoned at birth, who is raised in the social system.  When he gets kicked out of one house as a teen and taken to another, he learns for the first time that he's not human, but descended from a race of people that only look human.

The title NIGHTINGALE comes from the Asian Rainbird, or Asian Nightingale, which lays its eggs in other's nests and lets birds of other species raise its young.

I think that this book will appeal to fans of TWILIGHT very strongly.  I was Stephenie Meyer's writing teacher, and in our classes we spoke quite a bit about writing to the teen audience.  I just have never tried to bring out my own big series.

We're excited about this because we're doing something interesting.  We're putting it out as an enhanced novel, with an app for the iPad, along with over 100 illustrations and animations.  We've got a 45-minute soundtrack with it, and of course an audiobook.  The hardcover will come  out later this fall.

Do you have any other project on the pipeline?

I'm finishing up the last book in the Runelords series, of course, and we're getting ready to start pushing the movie in Hollywood.  (I wrote the Runelords screenplay earlier this year.)  I do have a producer who is interested in taking NIGHTINGALE to film, too, and so we'll be pursuing that once I finish up with the Runelords.

You're starting a writing contest, why is that?

I started writing for prize money in college on the advice of my university writing professor, Eloise Bell. I entered a story and won 3rd place in a contest. That inspired me to try harder, and within about 18 months, I won the grand prize for the Writers of the Future. That led to a three-novel contract with Bantam books.

So writing for contests launched my career, but I don't see many of them being sponsored lately. I love writing. I think that it's one of the most exciting and interesting jobs a person could have. So I want to help inspire other artists to create.

What kind of writing contest is it?

This is a short story contest, just ten pages. It can be set anywhere, any time, though it would be nice if it were set in the world of the Nightingale.

How is this contest different from others?

First, I'd really like to promote it to younger writers. I'd like to see teens enter the contest who may not have thought that writing can be a realistic choice for a career. I'd like to help them make their dreams come true.

What opportunities will the winner receive?

The winner will get $1000 cash, and will have his or her story published in the electronic versions of Nightingale. More importantly, East India Press will invite the top authors to submit novels for publication. East India Press will release these as enhanced books with illustrations and soundtracks, audiobooks, e-books, and as hardcover novels.

If the winner does publish with East India Press, I'll help them push their books toward bestseller status by giving them guidance on a level that other editors aren't trained to do.

Where can I find out about the contest?

You can learn all about it, and even find an article on how to win it at www.nightingalenovel.com.

How does one become a successful prize writer?

First, you have to be aware of the contest deadlines, and then enter before the contest ends. You'd be surprised at how many people want to win contests that they never seem to enter.

Beyond that, you need to familiarize yourself with what makes a good story, how it can be told well, and how to analyze your audience. A lot of those concerns are addressed in an article on my website at www.nightingalenovel.com. I don't believe in just telling you that I've started a contest. I want to tell you how to win any writing contest.

Well, there you have it, writers. From a real pro. I was honored to have him here, and hope he stops by sometime again or consider my humble blog for his next release! Thank you, Mr Farland, for visiting my blog!

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I believe in fairies ~ just don't ask me to define what a fairy actually is! – guest post by Vivienne Tuffnell

I'm still sort of jet-lagged, so I'll do just a little introduction… well, if you've been following my blog for some time, you probably heard from Viv and her previous book Strangers and Pilgrims. She's back in action and covers me to give me time to get back on track… ladies and gents, please welcome Vivienne Tuffnell!

Most children stop believing in fairies somewhere in their tweens, if not beforehand. It's a charming belief like Father Christmas that adults usually encourage them to hang on to but are never surprised when they finally declare in that argument-defying tone, "There's no such thing!"

I suspect I was no different, though my personal belief in Father Christmas persisted a little longer due to an incident involving bells, the interconnecting chimney system in the Victorian house I grew up in and my father's attempt to wrap an impossibly shaped toy. I've long been involved in the supernatural; a diocesan exorcist or two have been among my close personal friends and I've experienced many things that would make the researchers of Britain's Most Haunted lick their lips in glee.

But fairies? Come on, now, flower fairies with gossamer wings? Tinkerbell?

I returned to a belief in fairies some time in 1997, when we lived in an isolated rectory at the edge of the Norfolk fens. Items of small worth but immediate need kept going missing and reappearing in improbable places, often where several of us had looked numerous times before. Glasses, jewellery, keys, precious little things all vanished into thin air. My husband or my daughter or I would storm around the house hunting for the missing item, getting more and more stressed about it.

Having coffee with a friend and neighbour Sam, I mentioned this and she let out a full throated chuckle of a laugh.

"It's the fairies," she said and I spilled my coffee and spluttered with disbelief.

To my shock she detailed the things that happened, the kind of things that went missing and where they tended to turn up. Half convinced, I asked what I could do about it.

"Not a lot, really," she said. "I find leaving them sugar and the occasional glass of something sweet and alcoholic helps. They tend to return things quicker if you ask politely. And sometimes they give you things."

After this I tuned up my inner vision and I did start to sense presences, around me. Most of them were in the garden which we'd cultivated as a traditional cottage garden filled with old fashioned scented plants, but some liked the house. They liked my collection of stones, polished gemstones and crystals; these were my most commonly borrowed items. They liked my house plants and the small grove of large leaved plants that I had in the larger of the reception rooms.

So, still a little sceptical, I tried working with them, and to my surprise I found that the garden grew better and the house felt happier. Things still moved around but I didn't worry too much. Even when car keys vanished when I needed them, I tried to stay polite and eventually they were returned.

Of course, the big question is what ARE fairies? There are a number of possible options. They may be nature spirits, of the type termed devas, which work with the natural world to keep things going smoothly. In some theologies, they are the spawn of fallen angels and are to be mistrusted and shunned; these are the kind that stole children and replaced them with changelings. They may be disembodied spirits, those of the dead or those not yet born. Or one theory is that in antiquity they were a pygmy race of humans driven to the margins and subsisting by stealing from us. This last theory is somewhat borne out by the discovery some years back of a miniature race of humans on the island of Flores; nicknamed the Hobbit, these tiny folks, now extinct, would have lived at the same time as modern humans.

And of course, for some, they may just be a figment of the imagination, the product of a deranged mind, a sustained hallucination. We use the term "away with the fairies" to denote someone has lost touch with ordinary reality and is on a trip of some sort. It's a kinder way of saying someone is a bit mad. It's also the title of my most recent book.

"Away with the Fairies" is the tale of artist Isobel, trying to carve out time and space from busy family life to pursue her career as a painter. Isobel has endured tragedy and hardship but has brushed all these under the carpet in the need to get on with everyday life. But none of these things have really gone away, and her life unravels spectacularly when she hits a deer driving home. Sequestered at their isolated holiday cottage, Isobel notices odd things happening, small things appearing and disappearing and doors and windows refusing to stay shut. Dismissing it as nothing at first, she becomes immersed more and more deeply in the cycle of visionary paintings she has begun until the strange events become impossible to ignore. That's when she gets scared…..

My own experiences always tend to influence my books, so finding fairies in a story wasn't that great a surprise, though the conclusion I come to in the book was a bit of a shock to me. That is one of the great joys in writing, that finding of secrets you didn't know you knew.

"Away With The Fairies" is available as an e-book from Amazon USA, Amazon UK  And currently as a paperback from Lulu, (though in a few weeks time it will also be available from Amazon). 

It is also available at Amazon France, and Amazon Germany but I haven't put up the links from those places as I can't imagine it selling in either country.

Isobel's a sceptic, as I suspect most people are, but she learns that there are far more things in the world that she never imagined could exist…….

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I'm back!

Hope you enjoyed my guest's company… a few more will show up this week, then you'll be left to yours truly's rambling. Which might slow down a little soon, so don't be too desperate, LOL!

So, how was all? Interesting. I've got work to do, but I'm very happy. As I slowly catch up on your blogs and work on my edits, I'll also work on my indie career. And I mean "indie" in the Sarah Polla sense. Unicorn Productions doesn't have a page yet (but it will), but you can check it on Smashwords and Lulu.

I might slow down blogging next year as I focus on writing (that's also why I left all those Goodreads groups that were only a waste of time), but I'll think about the new schedule and general reorganization through the next two months. I'm thinking two posts a week, plus the weekly vignette (let's keep the Happiness going! ) and Six Sentence Sunday.

I need to write more stories – they're cluttering my head – so I'll cut on whatever distracts me. So whenever some new social media frenzy comes up, I'll wonder if I'm not better off writing. Which I most certainly will. Writing and drawing and reading (possibly books, not blogs) and the occasional movie to relax. I'm workaholic, I'm not scared!

I've redone the blurbs of Books of the Immortals Fire, Water and Ether, but I've changed them only on Smashwords, as I still have to work my way to KDP (where I haven't uploaded the latest story either, by the way), so you can check the old ones here, here and here, and compare.

Here I'll do a sort of history of Soul Stealer's blurb and you can let me know what you think. Here is the original:

Planet Earth, one century from now. Population has dropped under two billion and mankind works for the well-being of the planet, backed up by computers and eco-friendly energy. But there are still people who feel greed, anger, envy and miss something they cannot have.

Beth is a virtual director specializing in 20th century movie stars whose latest muse is the hologram of Keanu Reeves. Until the soul stealers make her meet a flesh and blood man who looks exactly like her latest virtual star, but is even more damaged than she is. Will they overcome their blocks and differences to build a real relationship?

Here's what I came up with at the workshop:

Soul Stealers by Barbara G.Tarn

In a seemingly hydillic future, virtual director Beth Golden prefers the company of holograms to real people. When her latest virtual star turns out as flesh and blood man, she must learn to accept she can't control human relationships. But dark forces conspire to bring them together even against their will – someone on Earth has a secret agenda.

Dean said: Clunky. Focus on her, if it's her story and a romance. It's a love-story, but not really a "classic" romance. So here's what I came up with.

What if your favorite virtual star became a flesh and blood man?

In a seemingly hydillic future, virtual director Beth Golden prefers the company of holograms to real people. Someone on Earth with a secret agenda forces her to face the real deal.

Which one works better for you?

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Interview with… Sarah R.Yoffa

I "met" Sarah on Creative Reviews, like I mentioned when I reviewed her book, and she kindly replied to my questions. This is the last of my series of interviews at the moment – I hope to have more authors soon. In the meanwhile, ladies and gents, please welcome Sarah R.Yoffa!

Where do you live and write from?

Raleigh, No. Carolina which is in the middle of the Atlantic Coast of the USA.

When did you start writing?

When I was about nine, I finally wrote down my first story. I started making them up in my head earlier, though. My first character, Joshua Andrew Caine, was conceived in my mind, fully-blown, when I was about five (in first grade). It was a little scary to have a fully-grown man in my head but my eldest sister once told me she thinks Joshua was actually my Guardian Angel. He was certainly very present in my mind at my most painful moments of childhood and he's stayed with me all my life. He's not only a major character in my Science Fiction Thriller series (the Phoenician Series) but also an archetype for my heroes—alpha but flawed. He's a little more pompous now than he was when I first imagined him as an overly-romanticized Hero, like Dudley Do-Right. I did have a big crush on Dudley Do-Right when I was a kid.

What genre(s) do you write?

I used to say I write science fiction action/adventure but in 2005, someone read the book I was working on editing (CONDITIONED RESPONSE of the Phoenician Series) and told me I actually write Romantic Suspense. I think they were right—so I promptly got myself researching what exactly a makes a romance novel (read 300 books in 2 months spanning 20 years of the genre from the 80s to the 2000s) and sure enough, I really wanted to write that stuff.

My first Romantic Suspsense novel (working title Lacey / Rainey Story) was drafted in 2006 (ironically, it was influenced by and "redshirts" several science fiction fans I met at Baen's Bar, the online forum for SF/F Book Publisher, Baen Books). It's been set aside more times than I can count, but is still about 75% done and should be coming out in 2012. More on that below.

Where do you find your inspiration? Do you put yourself in your stories?

Well, that's really two separate questions. To the first, all of life is story fodder. I don't think I get "inspired" by anything in particular. My characters come to me fully-formed and they bring their own stories with them. Essentially, I "watch" them (in my mind's eye) for a while and learn about them and their lives then snatch out the essence of a story that I think will be good to tell. It's sort of like watching a movie for me, and taking dictation.

Then there's the rare stroke of luck or good fortune where a character just jumps off the page—or takes over the page and story. That happens more often when I consciously "design" a character for a specific purpose. I rarely do that. My head is crowded enough with characters that come to me on their own that creating characters on purpose is something of a chore. I have to make everyone else shut up so I can think for a minute.

I'm kidding with all of that—I don't hear voices in my head but I do have a continual "run" of stories in my head. I never stop thinking about one or another story.

When I make choices about what a character will or won't do, I generally choose based on their history and where I know they have to end up. I do, however, end up recognizing a lot of my own personality traits in several of my characters after the fact. I wouldn't say I put myself into the story, though. People who know me don't recognize me in my characters—or not unless I point something out to them.

The only thing I think my characters definitely get from somewhere not me is the sense of humor. I can't believe how funny they are sometimes! I'm nowhere near that funny in real life. I honestly don't know where they get it from!

Do you have a specific writing routine?

Nope. Nor have I ever been "blocked" or otherwise unable to write. I don't usually sit down to write unless I have time for it though. When I have a "to do" list in my head, I can't think of anything else. I'm a very task-focused person.

I only sit down to write when I have time "for me." Writing is definitely a reward I give to myself. I quit working power jobs in the corporate world back in September of 2005 to try my hand at writing full-time. I had to completely redesign my lifestyle, overhaul my value system and stabilize all of the external factors before I could "escape" into the writing full-time. Then I indulged in it. I was writing 16 hours a day, 7 days a week for a few months in December 2005, January 2006 – well, editing more than writing but since I type 100 wpm, and writing is never a problem for me, I find it a lot easier to simply delete huge chunks of text and rewrite them from scratch with the correct idea in mind. It's not easy to edit existing material and make it work. It's simple (for me) to write and rewrite something until it works. Some people might call it editing but most writers I know are aghast at the idea I would literally delete 30,000 words without blinking an eye—or trash 95,000 words of a book and start again, calling it easier. That's precisely what I had to do with the Lacey / Rainey Story though.

I drafted it for Nanowrimo 2006 (November, 2006) and passed the 50k word mark (finished nanowrimo) on November 12th. By Thanksgiving I had 68k words and knew I was approaching The End of a book I never set out to write. By January, 2007, I had 95k words and felt it'd be so much easier to just keep the characters in my head and throw away all 95,000 words. So I did. I completely horrified almost everyone who'd been reading along or helping with it. Ah well.

Outliner or improviser? Fast or slow writer?

I think I already answered the second part of this. Oops. I definitely don't call what I do "improvising" but until 2006, I never considered outlining. Now I find outlining is great for those occasions when I get interrupted and have to set a manuscript aside for weeks or months. Life does intervene, alas.

Tell us about your latest book (add link if published)

The first book I'm putting out and marketing is one of the SciFi thriller series books. CONDITIONED RESPONSE is actually Book 2 of the Phoenician Series and will be published under the pen name Marjorie F. Baldwin (or "Friday" for short). CONDITIONED RESPONSE is scheduled for release in eBook format by December 31, 2011 and then in paperback by March of 2012. I'm in the midst of editing (about 70% done) and taking reader feedback via the Harper Collins site, Authonomy, so if any of your readers would like to chime in, they can sample the chapters here, and leave comments. "Friday" will reply within a day or two.

I wrote the series back in the 1980s (read more about the series here) and submitted it, one book at a time, to an editor at Del Rey Books. He loved the characters, the concepts and ideas but he had issues with my execution. In reading the books over in 2005, I have to say, I have no idea how he managed to force himself through those manuscripts, let alone found anything to love. Just goes to show you how skilled a talent spotter some people are!

Back in the 80s, he'd given me detailed critiques of each of the four books and I had set them aside, my 20-something ego unable to face the idea my books were less than perfect. I reviewed his notes and that's what I was trying to edit in the December 2005/January 2006 time period. It did not go well. I didn't know why or how to fix it. I just knew it was going to be a massive job of editing that was beyond my skills at that time, so I set the project aside temporarily.

While I was trying, however, one trick I tried was to deliberately design and create a new character (Raif), who'd be a tossaway secondary character that could provide the "every man's" view of the story. Hah. Little did I know Raif was to be one of those "jump off the page and take over the story" kinds of characters. He remains one of the first and most-popular elements of CONDITIONED RESPONSE and in fact, needs his own book. In February, 2006, I started drafting a prequel to the series and that's when I realized I needed to change the setting to make the entire thing work. I write character-centered stories, but people in my stories (like in real life) are absolutely influenced by their surroundings, so I knew I'd need to completely rewrite all four of the existing books in the series if I changed the setting to move it off-Earth and I thought (back in 2006) I'd start with Raif's Story, since it will be Book 1 in the Phoenician Series but I decided to finish the edits to CONDITIONED RESPONSE first, since it was nearer completion. Raif's Story will be the second book to come out, sometime in late 2012.

Under my own name, I have a Romantic Suspense series I've already started. The first book to come out in the Banbha Series will be finished and released in early 2012 (right after CONDITIONED RESPONSE is done). It, too, lacks a real title for the moment but I call it the Lacey / Rainey Story and I've been snippeting it for some time. Industrious investigators will find it online in various blogspots.

Lacey and Rainey are both world class assassins who share certain elements in their childhoods. Both were orphaned through violent circumstances at the age of five. Both were sexually molested as children and essentially, child sex slaves. The thing I wanted to accomplish with the Lacey / Rainey Story – besides telling a romance – was to get the message out about how severe and real the sex slave trade industry still is today. Here in the US, I think people don't realize how often children are stolen (or have their childhood stolen from them). I was not, personally, ever sexually molested as a child. I was, however, exposed to quite a bit of it around me growing up, especially in my teenage years.

Human trafficking is a theme in all of my writing—Raif and the other Proctors in the Phoenician Series are, essentially, slaves, produced for the purpose of being slaves. The violence we humans do against each other is a theme I hope to shed light on with my writing gift.

Indie publishing or traditional publishing – and why?

Indie for now. Partly it's a control issue and partly it's an impatience issue. As noted, I got editorial feedback on the entire Phoenician Series from a Del Rey editor back in the 1980s. He solicited, reviewed and critiqued not only all four of those books but also two others I had written back then (one military adventure novel, one time travel novella). I didn't handle the negative critiques well. I still struggle with negative criticism of my writing but nowadays, I have completely faith in the fact that I am a good writer. People really enjoy reading my books—and they read them more than once. I think that's the mark of a good book, when it gets read more than once. I think the key is that I write characters so well and people like character-centered stories because the reader can actually connect with the story when it's centered around someone instead of something.

Although I want my books to make enough money that I can live off the income, I'm into this business as much for the art—the pleasure I get from creating it—as I am for the money. Handing over artistic license or writing whatever a publisher thinks will sell is not appealing to me in the least, never has been. I write what I feel, what my characters need, then I find the market to whom to sell it, the people who want to read it. There are readers out there for nearly everything. You just have to find them.

I think once I have a following, I'll be in a position to approach a traditional publisher for some of my books. I would like to be traditionally published also, if nothing else, just for the experience. I plan to approach Kensington Books with some of the Banbha Series books but I'll definitely release the first one myself. We'll see how it goes after that. The SciFi books I'm maintaining control over, no question though I really do wish I could afford a Michael Whelan cover (haha).

Any other projects in the pipeline?

I think I already answered this too. Ooops again.

What is your goal as a writer and what are you doing to achieve it?

Umm, oops a third time? Didn't I already answer this with my plan for releases over the next few months or year and financial objectives to make my writing habit support itself—and me? That's pretty much it. I just want to write. I love to write. It's what I was designed to do; it's what I do better than anything else I've tried in my life (and I've done a lot of things). I cannot imagine a better end to my life than to be a successful writer. It's how I began (children have no concept of unsuccessful storytelling as all stories are magical to a child's mind), and I do so love symmetry in my storytelling. Here's to recapturing my childhood magic before I die!

Indeed, and I think you're doing great, Sarah! We have many things in common… and others not so in common, which is the beauty of it all! Thank you for playing along and best wishes for everything!

Happiness is…

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Mid-workshop post – out at the end of it!

One workshop is done, the other is about to begin at the time I'm writing this (Wednesday 19th). The next workshop's schedule will be hectic, hence the need to schedule once again (gotta love WordPress, haha! ). By the time this goes live, I'll be in the final stages of the workshop, ready to get back to Portland, then New York, then home.

So, what can I say so far… I have redone all my blurbs (except BoI Air) but am still working on a new set of writing skills. Sigh. The coming week  I'll try to do a post with old vs.new blurbs and ask your opinion before I change them on Smashwords, Kindle and Lulu. But if you really want to sell, either as indie or to New York, do attend a "Pitches and blurbs" workshop by Dean Wesley Smith – he'll teach you how to do it properly.

He's also well versed in history of publishing, and this workshop was an eye-opener. You can now see $ signs in my eyes as I make plans for the next five years! And no, he doesn't say "go Indie and forget NY". Actually, quite the opposite (but pitching to NY is a whole another workshop – the one I DIDN'T attend last February, for example). He's both trad and indie published, and so should we.

On another note: Facebook/Networked Blogs upgrades. Watch that widget of Networked Blogs go as soon as I get home and manually update my author page with my blog posts (like I've done for almost two years, duh! Who needs Networked Blogs? ). They upgraded and stopped sending my posts to the chosen Facebook page saying I had exceeded my daily quota (10 posts on every FB thing you have) – now, I was out of town and couldn't even access my Facebook profile, how could I reach the quota? Then some posts got on again, but some went missing. The app is not holding, too many people use it, I'll take it off. Their problem, not mine…

And one final thing: I had one lunch in Newport and tasted Francis Ford Coppola's Chardonnay! Now, what can I say… not sure if he should do movies or wine, actually… maybe explore a third career? Just kidding, Francis, you're doing fine with both!

Next Sunday I'll be back to normal – Six Sentence Sunday. Have a great week!

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Saturday roundup

I couldn't find anyone willing to do a guest post to fill the blanks between interviews, so I'm doing a little round up of authors who passed through this blog in the past week or years. Sort of Linky Friday but only about authors. An interview had to be rescheduled, so tomorrow no posts. I might schedule something duting my break between workshops, though… apparently wi-fi works and I'm getting used to my bro's borrowed laptop!

Authors blogs/web pages

Nikalee Livingston – go shake her blog!

Shonell Bacon blog and webpage.

Holli Castillo's blog.

Jonathan Gould blog – hey, he's even on the Indie Authors ring (the frog on my sidebar)!

Book/series pages (recommended reading)

Prue Batten's world of Eirie.

Joleene Naylor's Amaranthyne Nights.

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