Richard Raley's Blog, page 44
April 19, 2012
Conquering Hero Releases
"Conquering Hero" is a short story set in the King Henry Tapes world. It takes place after the School Story of "Cat Killing Coyotes" and revolves around December Evaluations. Nice little slice of life story, told in third-person, and using a couple of POVs we don't get to see in KHT.
If you love all things King Henry, you'll love this as well. If Welf is your favorite character...first of all, what is wrong with you? Second...your guy's pride might be getting stomped on a bit.
Conquering Hero by Richard Raley at Amazon
April 11, 2012
One Year and Three Books Later
It's almost been a full year since I officially joined the ranks of Indie-dom and began publishing digitally over Amazon's KDP. It's been tough, fun, terrifying, and sometimes even glorious. The BETROTHAL began it all for me on April 24, 2011, the first book I finished writing and one that probably would have never seen the light of day if KDP didn't come along.
The BETROTHAL ended up my experiment book for practically everything. Learning how to finish a project, editing a project, formatting a project, making a cover, putting it through the system, seeing it utterly bomb and not realizing for a few months that hey, you need to tell people about it and get people to review it, silly writer.Doing promo work has been the largest task with the biggest learning curve over the year. It's not fun, it's not what I like. I'm a mad scientist in his lab, not a salesman. It's not in my personality. But still, for my pretties I do try. Book bloggers remain the bane of my existence. Nice ladies all (99% of book bloggers are female...probably because they kill the males after mating with them) but the entire system is chaotic...I felt my small bit of German DNA calling for codes, standardization, and order as I looked, searched, and hunted for review policies. It has a lot in common with trying to decipher forgotten languages, especially if the blogger in question has a thing for curly fonts.
The EATERS began in June 2011 and I must bashfully say hasn't moved much yet but I promise I will get to it eventually...This is because of THE KING HENRY TAPES, the first book releasing in September 2011 and the second March 2012. My Urban Fantasy series is still struggling to get its name out in a crowded, if insanely popular, genre, but has received highly positive marks from everyone who has read it. I know eventually people will find it and they will buy it and they will devour every novel I put out with King Henry Price in it over the next decade...but waiting...knowing you're sitting on the next big thing...it can be agonizing.
Looking forward to the next year in my Indie career it's going to be different. Three novels in one year...that won't be happening for Year Two. I've got nothing sitting here to edit or ready for publication. The table I print and stack finished chapters on is completely bare. This year will be about writing. About starting and finishing my next round of novels and stories.
Because I'm still as hungry as when I started this...and I'm not stopping for nothing.
March 12, 2012
Tomorrow is the Day
King Henry Price, honored and learned graduate of the Institution of Elements, has settled back into his normal life, running his Artificer shop, creating new designs, selling old ones, and ignoring the occasional explosion when testing goes haywire. He's been minding his own business...only when he happens across a bunch of bullies picking on a woman, he can't resist the opportunity to smash faces, can he?The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes will be released officially tomorrow, March 13th (I spit on you, bad luck numbers), though you'll probably be able to grab it later today if you check for it, since who knows how long Amazon's KDP will have something "in review" or not. Probably not even the designers.
King Henry never expected the bullies would be part of the Coyote Nation, he never expected that he could be starting a war, and he surely never expected one of his lost sisters would be on the other side.
Jordan Josephine Price...found you at last.
There's also some price changes going about. The Foul Mouth and the Fanged Lady is going to be at 99 cents for awhile to try to attract every possible reader and...it will be having 4 free days from the 13th to the 16th!
Now I need to write the third one...
February 29, 2012
Cat Killing Coyotes: The First Sentence
Now that we're almost into March and the release of the book is fast approaching, I suppose it is time for me to start the promo, pump up, pimping posts again.
So here we go...first sentence of The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes:
Release date is still moving around, think early April at the latest!
So here we go...first sentence of The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes:
There are days when I wake up in the morning and I just want to kill someone.
Release date is still moving around, think early April at the latest!
February 20, 2012
New Covers for FOUL MOUTH...again
It took four versions for me to end up with a BETROTHAL cover I can tolerate until I'm making the big bucks and can pay for true awesomeness on the artist front, so I suppose it's not really a surprise that I'm now on attempt number four with the FOUL MOUTH books as well. This time, I actually like what I've done and I think they'll hold in there until the coming millions of readers actually find the series.
Fanged Lady:
Little King Henry:
We'll launch the Cat Killing Coyotes cover next month sometime in the pre-release build up.
Fanged Lady:
Little King Henry:
We'll launch the Cat Killing Coyotes cover next month sometime in the pre-release build up.
February 14, 2012
Foul Mouth Second Drafts
All writers have different methods to get to the end of the road. For me, the second draft is all about readying the novel for the rest of the process. It's about coming back to the work with fresh eyes after a break, looking at it objectively, marking the parts where there can be additions, marking the parts that need rewrites, and removing the junk a first draft will always have.
Reverse Readthrough - I don't write Foul Mouth books chapter to chapter. I write the "school" story first, then the "shop" story, and only mix them later. When I start editing I put the emphasis backwards, starting with "shop" then going through "school", to try to balance the focus. Usually this readthrough has some typos fixes, the occasional inspirational or clarifying sentence, but nothing large or earth-shattering.Passivity - probably the most important part of editing, this is a word by word search of certain phrases that hold back and create a flat boring read. I'm looking for "was", "wasn't", "weren't", "were".Words That Suck - also a word by word search but here it's just my personal pet peeves, the words that the writing mind uses as a crutch but the editing mind should nix. I don't like "thing", "obvious(ly)", "sudden(ly)", "because", "no doubt", "well", "stare", "smile", "mumble", etc."That" Edit - one word. Often worthless and unneeded, get it out of there. Character Edit - For "Fanged Lady" this was focused on Annie B, only her scenes, trying to focus on her dialogue and focus on the scenes from her point of view. For "Cat Killing Coyotes" it will be T-Bone.Chapter-By-Chapter Edit - The first time I get to read the novel as the reader would, chapter to chapter, switching from "school" to "shop". Here's where I mark addition places and rewrites for the third draft, probably more typo fixes too.
Reverse Readthrough - I don't write Foul Mouth books chapter to chapter. I write the "school" story first, then the "shop" story, and only mix them later. When I start editing I put the emphasis backwards, starting with "shop" then going through "school", to try to balance the focus. Usually this readthrough has some typos fixes, the occasional inspirational or clarifying sentence, but nothing large or earth-shattering.Passivity - probably the most important part of editing, this is a word by word search of certain phrases that hold back and create a flat boring read. I'm looking for "was", "wasn't", "weren't", "were".Words That Suck - also a word by word search but here it's just my personal pet peeves, the words that the writing mind uses as a crutch but the editing mind should nix. I don't like "thing", "obvious(ly)", "sudden(ly)", "because", "no doubt", "well", "stare", "smile", "mumble", etc."That" Edit - one word. Often worthless and unneeded, get it out of there. Character Edit - For "Fanged Lady" this was focused on Annie B, only her scenes, trying to focus on her dialogue and focus on the scenes from her point of view. For "Cat Killing Coyotes" it will be T-Bone.Chapter-By-Chapter Edit - The first time I get to read the novel as the reader would, chapter to chapter, switching from "school" to "shop". Here's where I mark addition places and rewrites for the third draft, probably more typo fixes too.
February 1, 2012
Foul Mouth 2's First Draft is Done
Talk about a weight off my shoulders. Of course I had BETROTHAL even before I got around to FOUL MOUTH, so it's not strictly the sophomore jinx, but this was a tough one. Mostly because so much of what's going on is set up work for the later novels in the series and the contained plots keep blowing up in our hero's face. How does one write a novel about mistakes and failure without the novel itself becoming a failure? It's a conundrum, but one I think solved. There's a lot of great scenes in this one. Maybe thee outright funniest scene I've written so far in my writing career.
Next up will be three to four months of editing. Maybe one rewrite on a chapter. Nothing huge. Which means...May? I guess. Hard to have a firm release date as an Indie.
The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes, coming soon to a Kindle near you.
Next up will be three to four months of editing. Maybe one rewrite on a chapter. Nothing huge. Which means...May? I guess. Hard to have a firm release date as an Indie.
The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes, coming soon to a Kindle near you.
December 20, 2011
RR's Top 10 Spec-Fic Novels of 2011
We'll run this thing countdown style, but first with a preamble: almost half my reading this year was non-fiction, so I missed a few of the "big" releases (Stephenson, Bakker, etc.). I look forward to comments complaining about how your favorite author (besides me) is missing.
THE BEST
10. Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson - Sanderson barely makes the list this year. Considering the book was barely a book that seems fair. Yes, it's Mistborn with guns...and that's AWESOME, but it wasn't much of a story. Short, short, short, and we all want more, more, more.
9. Magic Slays by Ilona Andrews - The only Urban Fantasy novel to make the list and of course it's going to be Andrews. Andrews is the top of that sub-genre. This novel was a pause in the larger Kate Daniels story, but still had some rocking scenes.
8. The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss - A novel that brought us both the laughable Fae Super Sexathon and the amazing Cthaeh, it was pure Rothfuss, with an unbeatable readability, clue's to the trilogy's mysteries all over the place, and...Kvothe being an ass.
7. God's War by Kameron Hurley - I love this world! Bugs, deserts, Middle Eastern and African influences. Characters that are hard, a plot that is harder, and a world that is hardest of all.
6. The Iron Jackal by Chris Wooding - Wooding's steampunk meets Firefly series keeps on going and I keep eating it up. This time we got some major world-building going on and perhaps it didn't have Black Lung Captain's pace and character work, but it still has enough of Darian Frey and his crew for anyone.
5. Stonewielder by Ian C. Esslemont - A Malazan novel, so obviously I loved it. With a whole new continent to explore, Malazans, Crimson Guards, and plenty of gods and goddesses causing the usual convergences this one felt formulaic to the series, but I'm not complaining.
4. The Crippled God by Steven Erikson - The last book in the mainline Malazan story went out big...then decided big wasn't enough and went ludicrous speed. There were some good conclusions here, some long speculated moments coming about, and some interesting open doors for the future. RR needs more Karsa STAT.
3. Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey - It's not the space opera notes that work best in this novel but the noir and mystery notes. The fast pace, no-holds-bared action, and complex social themes may not have made it the "best" read of the year, but they did make it the funnest read of the year.
2. Infidel by Kameron Hurley - That's right, Hurley makes the list twice. Her second novel was even better than the first. Every problem I had was solved, the world was further explored, the characters faced serious challenges, and some insane HOLY BLEEPAGE got thrown around on twists and turns.
1. The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie - Say one thing about Logen Ninefingers, say he's not required to make an Abercrombie book great, but even the mentioning of his name goes a long way. Abercrombie kicked a lot of character and plot BLEEP in this book but they both fail before what the man did with chapter structure. The "letter" and "battle" chapters were just as great as advertised, making this my spec-fic book of the year.
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS
5. Still No Scott Lynch! - Scott Lynch's long awaited third Locke Lamora novel continues its waiting period. Lots of rumors on this one, maybe it's handed in, maybe it's being revised, maybe he's writing book 4 at the same time. Or maybe not. All I know is a year without Scott Lynch's style and skill is worse off than one with it.
4. The Unremembered by Peter Orellun - One of the most pushed and pumped debut novels of the year. It had an amazing cover. It had all the might of Tor behind it. Yet...the major who read it looked on it in horror. The prose...the purple prose! The rip off of Eye of the World. A cry came out from across the blogosphere: what was Tor thinking pushing this? Perhaps worse than the novel itself was the manipulation on review sites like goodreads and Amazon by unknown forces to see the novel given high marks.
3. The Dragon's Path by Daniel Abraham - In an amazing feat, Daniel Abraham managed to make both my "best of" and "disappoint" lists (he's part of the writing duo going by James S. A. Corey). This novel lacked all the joy and tight plotting of its brother, it also had bland characters that were hard to like and a world that was forgettable. A decent novel, but not up to the standards of his other work.
2. Snuff by Terry Pratchett - For the first time I asked myself if Terry Pratchett has himself a ghost writer. Just an odd book that was as not Discworld as you can get. Pratchett is in my all time top 10...this one was a huge let down.
1. A Dance With Dragons by George (Not as) R.R. (As Me) Martin - We waited six years for Dany, Tyrion, and Jon...we got a waffling girl, turtles and pigs, and not an Other in sight. My three star review on Amazon received over 1,000 helpful notes so I know I'm not alone in my disappointment. No matter how good the Theon/North storyline might have been, the rest...was all disappointment.
DEBUT AUTHOR OF THE YEAR
Kameron Hurley for her great work with both God's War and Infidel. Not only is she the debut author of this year, she's the author I'm most excited about since the Debut Explosion of 06/07. If you haven't checked out her books, start zapping them onto your Kindle immediately.
THE BEST
10. Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson - Sanderson barely makes the list this year. Considering the book was barely a book that seems fair. Yes, it's Mistborn with guns...and that's AWESOME, but it wasn't much of a story. Short, short, short, and we all want more, more, more.
9. Magic Slays by Ilona Andrews - The only Urban Fantasy novel to make the list and of course it's going to be Andrews. Andrews is the top of that sub-genre. This novel was a pause in the larger Kate Daniels story, but still had some rocking scenes.
8. The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss - A novel that brought us both the laughable Fae Super Sexathon and the amazing Cthaeh, it was pure Rothfuss, with an unbeatable readability, clue's to the trilogy's mysteries all over the place, and...Kvothe being an ass.
7. God's War by Kameron Hurley - I love this world! Bugs, deserts, Middle Eastern and African influences. Characters that are hard, a plot that is harder, and a world that is hardest of all.
6. The Iron Jackal by Chris Wooding - Wooding's steampunk meets Firefly series keeps on going and I keep eating it up. This time we got some major world-building going on and perhaps it didn't have Black Lung Captain's pace and character work, but it still has enough of Darian Frey and his crew for anyone.
5. Stonewielder by Ian C. Esslemont - A Malazan novel, so obviously I loved it. With a whole new continent to explore, Malazans, Crimson Guards, and plenty of gods and goddesses causing the usual convergences this one felt formulaic to the series, but I'm not complaining.
4. The Crippled God by Steven Erikson - The last book in the mainline Malazan story went out big...then decided big wasn't enough and went ludicrous speed. There were some good conclusions here, some long speculated moments coming about, and some interesting open doors for the future. RR needs more Karsa STAT.
3. Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey - It's not the space opera notes that work best in this novel but the noir and mystery notes. The fast pace, no-holds-bared action, and complex social themes may not have made it the "best" read of the year, but they did make it the funnest read of the year.
2. Infidel by Kameron Hurley - That's right, Hurley makes the list twice. Her second novel was even better than the first. Every problem I had was solved, the world was further explored, the characters faced serious challenges, and some insane HOLY BLEEPAGE got thrown around on twists and turns.
1. The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie - Say one thing about Logen Ninefingers, say he's not required to make an Abercrombie book great, but even the mentioning of his name goes a long way. Abercrombie kicked a lot of character and plot BLEEP in this book but they both fail before what the man did with chapter structure. The "letter" and "battle" chapters were just as great as advertised, making this my spec-fic book of the year.
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS
5. Still No Scott Lynch! - Scott Lynch's long awaited third Locke Lamora novel continues its waiting period. Lots of rumors on this one, maybe it's handed in, maybe it's being revised, maybe he's writing book 4 at the same time. Or maybe not. All I know is a year without Scott Lynch's style and skill is worse off than one with it.
4. The Unremembered by Peter Orellun - One of the most pushed and pumped debut novels of the year. It had an amazing cover. It had all the might of Tor behind it. Yet...the major who read it looked on it in horror. The prose...the purple prose! The rip off of Eye of the World. A cry came out from across the blogosphere: what was Tor thinking pushing this? Perhaps worse than the novel itself was the manipulation on review sites like goodreads and Amazon by unknown forces to see the novel given high marks.
3. The Dragon's Path by Daniel Abraham - In an amazing feat, Daniel Abraham managed to make both my "best of" and "disappoint" lists (he's part of the writing duo going by James S. A. Corey). This novel lacked all the joy and tight plotting of its brother, it also had bland characters that were hard to like and a world that was forgettable. A decent novel, but not up to the standards of his other work.
2. Snuff by Terry Pratchett - For the first time I asked myself if Terry Pratchett has himself a ghost writer. Just an odd book that was as not Discworld as you can get. Pratchett is in my all time top 10...this one was a huge let down.
1. A Dance With Dragons by George (Not as) R.R. (As Me) Martin - We waited six years for Dany, Tyrion, and Jon...we got a waffling girl, turtles and pigs, and not an Other in sight. My three star review on Amazon received over 1,000 helpful notes so I know I'm not alone in my disappointment. No matter how good the Theon/North storyline might have been, the rest...was all disappointment.
DEBUT AUTHOR OF THE YEAR
Kameron Hurley for her great work with both God's War and Infidel. Not only is she the debut author of this year, she's the author I'm most excited about since the Debut Explosion of 06/07. If you haven't checked out her books, start zapping them onto your Kindle immediately.
December 17, 2011
Christmas is Cancelled
Okay, maybe not Christmas, but I am officially considering BETROTHAL 2 to be shelved. I'd never actually planned for the "series" to be anything but the first book. It was developed as a simple funny book that would be easy for me to write and finish, since I'd yet to complete one at that point. It's fine for what it is, but...I don't read humor/romcom/lad lit. It's not my thing. I don't 'get' it. It's hard to sell it. It's hard to understand what it's fans are after and expect.
Fantasy is my thing. Sci-Fi is my thing. Creating crazy ass worlds, that's my thing. BETROTHAL was meant to be a one off and forgotten, probably never published if the Indie boom hadn't happened when it did.
So why did I even bother to try to write a sequel? Most my family. I got so much "when's the next one coming out?" and "what happens next?" and serious whining over a sequel that I caved and thought I could at least try.
But my heart just isn't in it. Another wedding, more torturing of poor Phin, and yes there is some funny in the 1/4 of the draft I've finished, but...all my thoughts are with other projects at the moment...mostly King Henry Price. Writing BETROTHAL 2 feels like homework...I don't quite like that, so for now, consider it disappeared into the mysterious aether of my trunk.
Fantasy is my thing. Sci-Fi is my thing. Creating crazy ass worlds, that's my thing. BETROTHAL was meant to be a one off and forgotten, probably never published if the Indie boom hadn't happened when it did.
So why did I even bother to try to write a sequel? Most my family. I got so much "when's the next one coming out?" and "what happens next?" and serious whining over a sequel that I caved and thought I could at least try.
But my heart just isn't in it. Another wedding, more torturing of poor Phin, and yes there is some funny in the 1/4 of the draft I've finished, but...all my thoughts are with other projects at the moment...mostly King Henry Price. Writing BETROTHAL 2 feels like homework...I don't quite like that, so for now, consider it disappeared into the mysterious aether of my trunk.
December 12, 2011
New 2012 Covers for FOUL MOUTH
I ended up making this change mostly for the same reason I did with BETROTHAL. When you're using thumbnails to sell your book it all comes down to big fonts that are easy to read. I still like the original cover for FANGED LADY but as I moved into CAT KILLING COYOTES I could never get the graffiti font to be bold enough to read at small sizes.
I didn't want to abandon the original idea of trashing artistic masterpieces in true rebellious style, so I looked to find a happy medium by keeping both "THE FOUL MOUTH" and my name in graffiti but bringing in the Pistolgrip font over single color bars, with a single word highlighted in white instead of black. I also had to throw in little comments from King Henry about the piece in question...got to have a little fun.
THE FOUL MOUTH AND THE FANGED LADY 2012 COVER
I'll show off the CAT KILLING COYOTES cover closer to release (March = Unlikely, April = Questionable, May = Probable).
I didn't want to abandon the original idea of trashing artistic masterpieces in true rebellious style, so I looked to find a happy medium by keeping both "THE FOUL MOUTH" and my name in graffiti but bringing in the Pistolgrip font over single color bars, with a single word highlighted in white instead of black. I also had to throw in little comments from King Henry about the piece in question...got to have a little fun.
THE FOUL MOUTH AND THE FANGED LADY 2012 COVER
I'll show off the CAT KILLING COYOTES cover closer to release (March = Unlikely, April = Questionable, May = Probable).
