Judith Post's Blog, page 70

What is Success?

When I first started writing, and knew that I was new and had a lot to learn, I felt like a success if I could just finish a short story and have all the parts in the right place with no big  problems.  If the story came together well enough, I’d read The Gila Queen to see if it might fit anywhere.  (The Gila Queen’s a marketing newsletter that I subscribed to.  It’s still available online, but I haven’t looked at it for a long time.  If you’d like to:      https://hellnotes.com/gila-queens-guide-to-markets-166/   )

I really enjoyed The Gila Queen, because it listed small magazines that were looking for short stories and paid in copies, as well as established publications that paid cash for each word.  If I found something that looked like a good fit, I’d mail (yes, snail mail) my story off and hope for the best.  If the editor wanted it, I felt like a success.  Now, mind you, success might mean that I received two free copies of the mag with my work in it.  I didn’t care.  Someone wanted my work.  Sometimes, success meant that a respected editor took the time to write a thoughtful rejection about why my work didn’t fit their magazine.  To me, that meant my writing was good enough to warrant a bit of their time.  And I was grateful.

Another reason I liked Gila Queen was because editors looking for stories for anthologies would list what they were looking for or the theme for that edition.  And often, those themes gave me ideas to try.  And sometimes, those ideas came together in a story that the editor took.  Eventually, those small sells led to bigger sells to bigger magazines, and after that, I got brave enough to try to write a book.

My first stab at a novel only stretched to 20,000 words–what some might consider failure.  I considered it success, because I’d never written anything that long before, and I’d learned a lot from the experience.  My second “novel” came in at 40,000 words and a tiny press in Baltimore bought it to print as newspapers for passengers to buy at airports to read on their flights.  Success.  Of course, no one ever heard of Gourmet Killings, but the editor liked it and passengers bought it.  Good enough for me.

These days, I still measure success with a slide rule.  For my Jazzi series, I look at numbers–rankings and sells.  But for Muddy River, I’m letting the series build slowly, so if my numbers are tolerable and I hear a good review, hey–success.

Why am I going on about this?  It’s a fluke, really.  John Tesh just happened to be on the radio when I was listening to it to pass time.  And what waa he talking about?  Success.  His message?  People say, “I’ll be happy when I’m successful.”  But success is hardly ever exactly what they thought it would be.  Or it comes at a higher price or more work than they anticipated.  He believed that the cause and effect should be reversed, that “happiness brings success, not vice versa.”  Because we  measure it differently.  We count one success at a time and are happy when we reach the next one.

I’m not saying disappointment doesn’t flatten me sometimes.  We all get frustrated and mumble about quitting, giving up, it’s too hard.  I felt like I was beating my head against the author wall when I wrote romance after romance that couldn’t get any traction.  But when that happens, it’s time to stop and rethink, to try something else.  And sometimes, we have to realize that we’re aiming for an impossible goal.  A near miracle.  We’re setting our goals and dreams too high.

That’s what Ilona Andrews’ blog was about today.  Sometimes, we’re simply unrealistic. http://www.ilona-andrews.com/on-writers-self-validation-of/ We don’t reach the pinnacle of success, so we consider ourselves failures.  Instead of embracing what we’ve done right or well, we look at where we’ve fallen short.  I’m not saying to quit trying.  We should always do our best.  We have to give ourselves the best chance we can to reach our goals.  But when we don’t, it just means that that particular effort didn’t work.  So we have to try something else and try again.

Keep hitting those keys, and happy writing!

 

 

 

Cover Reveal: Eventide by Mae Clair #thriller #supernaturalsuspense

My blogger friend, Mae Clair, is doing a cover reveal of her book. The desolate, creepy setting fits her dark, supernatural tales. I loved the first two books in her series. You might want to check them out:

From the Pen of Mae Clair

Hi, friends! Thanks for joining me today as I roll out the cover of the final book in my Hode’s Hill Series of novels. A special thanks to Staci Triolo for designing the snazzy header image for me. Isn’t it great? I was so appreciative of Staci’s help, given I feel like I’ve been treading water lately. But then I know she is, too. Most writers recognize it as a regular state of mind.

Every once in a while, we get something sparkly to distract us. For me it’s my latest cover.

Release Date: December 31, 2019

Genre: Supernatural Thriller / Suspense /Mystery

Publisher:  Kensington Publishing • Lyrical Underground Imprint

As with the first two novels in the Hode’s Hill series, Eventide features a dual timeline with two mysteries—one set in the present, one in the 1800s—that intertwine at the end.

Blurb:
The darkness is coming . . .

The…

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No More Webpage

I’ve had a weebly webpage for years.  I used it to put up free chapters of books I wrote and never did anything with.  That sounds odd, I know, but I played around with different genres here and there, and sometimes, I liked them, and sometimes, one YA book or one caterer married to a cop mystery was enough.  I don’t regret writing them.  I enjoyed all of them.  I was never convinced offering free work online was a brilliant idea, (and I’m still not convinced it is), but I enjoyed sharing work I wouldn’t publish with readers.

I still love Verdanta–the island home I created for nymphs and sprites who invited a small group of mortals to stay with them one week a month to let the beauty of the island and the energy of their magic help “fix” them after Life hit them a little too hard.  I still love Chintz and Callum–the caterer and cop–because I wanted to try my hand at a Murder Club mystery, and it was FUN.  And I’ll always have a soft spot for the YA book, THE FAMILIARS, with Zoe–the witch–who could take off her shoes and stand barefoot in a park, then watch lush, green grass grow in all directions where the ground was once dead.

I used the webpage to write free short stories, too, so that I could cling to characters I’d grown too attached to but no longer wrote about in books.  I don’t know how many Babet and Prosper stories ended up there.  A lot.

But the sad truth is, to keep the stories moving so that readers didn’t forget the first chapters before I reached the last, I had to put up chapters or scenes at least two or three times a week.  And I am now officially out of books cast in drawers, and I don’t have time to write that many free short stories any more.  So this Tuesday, I hit the “you can never go back” button and deleted the entire webpage.  It was bittersweet.  All of those stories no longer available.  But they’d have just hovered in cyberspace and gone unnoticed anyway, if I didn’t keep up the page, so it was a good thing.

I still intend to add snippets and the occasional short story on a page I created on this blog, and I hope readers find them and enjoy them.  But deleting my webpage was a turning point for me.  It means I’m serious about staggering two series and still hitting deadlines.  And I’ve experimented enough, I’m ready to settle down to two kinds of mysteries I really enjoy writing.

Whatever you’re working on, I hope it’s going well.  And happy writing!

 

It’s Up!

I just wanted to share that my third paranormal mystery, Mixing It Up With Mortals, went live on Amazon today.  Yay!   https://amzn.to/2ymaQrW

Raven and Hester are asked to find out what happened to a new, start-up supernatural settlement.  All of the parents are dead, their bodies covered with puncture marks.  All of the children are missing.  Where are they?  With Murlyn, a warlock who practices black magic involved, the stakes are high.  They have to find the children.  And fast.

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The British are coming~

I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m not much of a fan of thirty-minute comedies or evening game shows on TV.  I’m hooked on Dancing With the Stars, but it hasn’t been on for a while, and I’ve never bothered with whatever they chose to replace it.  I watch foodtv on Saturday mornings, but that’s it.  Most everything else is repeats and competitions.  That’s why I signed up for Netflix.  We watch shows on it once in a while.  But then I signed up for BritBox.  And my poor HH’s life has changed.

I love British mysteries, and boy, are there a lot of them–old Hercule Poirots and Miss Marples, plus new ones I’ve never heard of.  Diana Riggs is Mrs. Bradley with clever murders and droll humor, Rosemary and Thyme has its two female sleuths stumble over dead bodies while working on landscaping and sickly lawns, and Shakespeare and Hathaway are a cute blond/frumpy P.I. pair.  HH watches a mystery with me occasionally, but he’s more partial to The Great British Baking Show, not that I’ll ever spend three hours making a perfect Victoria Sponge, but he can dream:)

We used to turn off the TV after the evening news.  Now, we flip to BritBox and watch an hour of something entertaining before he settles behind a library book and I pick up my Kindle.  In the days WC (With Children), our TV habits revolved around family entertainment or one of their favorites, but now, AC (After Children), we can watch what we want.  And it’s wonderful.

I’ve always been partial to British mysteries.  I started out with Agatha Christie and then got hooked on Martha Grimes with Scotland Yard Inspector Richard Jury.  And then I discovered Elizabeth George and her Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley.  Maybe they were an extension of my love of Pride and Prejudice.  I’m not sure.  But they have a certain feel about them, nothing gritty like American P.I.s.

Lately, I’ve become equally enamored with cozies.  Instead of an English village with a shop that serves tea, I’ve grown fond of small towns with diners and breweries.  I’ve traded an inspector for an amateur sleuth, but the murders are all quite civilized.  It’s rude to splash gore on the walls or furniture.  For variety, I’ve added an occasional paranormal mystery to the mix with witches who solve murders or own bakeries, and I still toss in a thriller or urban fantasy now and then.  But this summer, I return often to low-key pleasant reads and TV. It suits my mood.  Who knows what winter will bring?  For now, though, hope your reading and writing are going well.  May the words flow!

 

My new cover

This is a quick post.  I just want to share the cover Michael Prete designed for me for All The Missing Children.  Hopefully, I’ll have it online soon.  My goal was the end of July.  Then there’s going to be a long dry spell for my paranormal mysteries while I write Jazzi 5.  I’m over 14,000 words on that, and it feels good to snuggle into a cozy again.

Anyway, here’s the cover.  I still need to write a zingy blurb for it, but that’s like pulling teeth for me.  Painful.  Here’s what I have so far:

Raven and Hester are looking for missing children. Someone kills their parents, then snatches them.  They find an orphanage that sells children for high prices to supernatural couples who can’t have any of their own. . . and run up against Murlyn–a warlock who’s happy to steal power and magic from any hapless witches who are weaker than he is.

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The aliens are coming!

I’ve mentioned Staci Troilo before in my blogs.  She has a great webpage and offers generous writing advice and links on it once a week.  She’s also a great writer.  And, under the pen name D. L. Cross, she recently came out with a new book, which I’ve read, and am SO happy to share with you.  I really enjoyed it!  And yes, it’s about aliens invading Earth, but has so much more–legends and history and ancient artifacts all woven into a mesmerizing, exciting story.

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Excerpt:

Landon had already been perspiring from the exertion of digging, but now flop sweat dripped down his face and stung his eyes. He’d never faced a weapon in his life before today. Now he’d been confronted by guns twice in the same night.

It wasn’t an experience he cared to repeat. Presuming he got through this instance safely. Something told him guns for hire operated under the “dead men tell no tales” maxim.

Despite his fear, though, his fingers went rigid. He doubted he could release the disc if he wanted to. And he most certainly didn’t want to. The artifact glinted in the moonlight. And the red laser dots aimed at his chest added a warm ambient glow to the gold he clutched tight to his abdomen.

Beautiful, in a macabre kind of way.

“I won’t ask again.” The man’s voice was muffled as he spoke through his mask, the sound lending to the sinister and lethal vibe of his group.

“Professor,” Billy said, “give him the disc.”

Landon shook his head, his fingers still locked.

“Professor?” The mercenary cocked his head to the side and stepped closer to study Landon’s face. He was now within arm’s length. Not that Landon would even consider striking such a man. “Thorne? Landon Thorne?”

Well, that couldn’t be good. “You know me?”

A few of the commandos laughed. The man in charge clapped him on the back. “Damn, son. You just made my job a hell of a lot easier. You’re comin’ with us.”

Dev stepped forward. “You can have the disc, but he stays with us.”

The merc turned his head. “You’re in no position to make demands.”

It happened too fast for Landon to react. In hindsight, he might convince himself he saw it coming, but he couldn’t even be sure he could lie to himself so convincingly. One second, five armed men were holding up his group, then the next second, his four companions had guns drawn. It was a Mexican standoff, pressure mounting, and he had a feeling the event that would break the tension would be something in him breaking — most likely his skin, followed by bones and vital organs as a bullet or ten sliced through him.

He finally unfroze and raised his hands in the air. “Easy now. Everyone, just take a breath. I’m sure we can come to some kind of arrangement that satisfies all parties.”

“I’ve got an arrangement for you.” Nadia adjusted her grip and made a show of training her weapon on the merc in charge. “We keep the professor and the disc, and you guys leave without us blowing holes through you.”

Instead of getting angry, the guy laughed. “Funny, darlin’. I was gonna say the same thing to you.” He didn’t even bother turning his gun from Landon to her. One of his men already had her covered.

 

Blurb:

He lost his job. Lost his girl. Now it’s all he can do not to lose his life.

Landon Thorne is a disgraced archaeologist, a laughing stock in his field because of his unconventional beliefs – he’s an ancient astronaut theorist. No one takes him seriously.

Until an alien armada targets Earth.

Now Landon’s in high demand – by the US government and someone far more sinister.

They race across two continents to the Gate of the Gods, the one place on Earth that might give humans an advantage over the aliens. But no one is prepared for what they’ll find.

And not everyone will make it out alive.

Universal Purchase Link | More Information | Invasion Universe Newsletter

 

Bio:

D.L. Cross has loved science fiction ever since she was a young girl and fell for Major Don West on television’s Lost in Space. To this day, she still quotes the show, though her favorite lines were spoken by the robot and the antagonist. Parallel universes or alternate realities, aliens or dinosaurs, superpowers or super viruses, time travel or AI… no sci-fi theme is off limits and all of them fascinate her. D.L. Cross also writes other genre fiction under the name Staci Troilo, and you can find more information about all her identities and all her work at her website: https://stacitroilo.com.

Thanks for inviting me here today. I’m excited to share an excerpt from The Gate, Book 1 of the Astral Conspiracy series in the Invasion Universe.

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Rejection

I haven’t written a short story for a long time.  Short novels?  Yes.  Novellas?  Love ’em.  But a short story?  I haven’t tried any since C.S. Boyack got me in the mood to write a few when he posted his October Macabre Macaroni stories, one a week.  I used that month to post dark stories on my webpage–with mixed results.  Horror and dark fiction have never been my strong point, but that’s exactly why I wanted to try it.  Some people would advise me to do what I do well, or at least better.  But once in a while, I like to push the envelope, to see how far I can stretch.  And I learned that I’m not much better at horror or dark fiction than I was with my earlier stabs at it.  Oh, well.  Can’t win ’em all.

BTW, C.S. Boyack wrote a short story that October I loved.  In case you’d like to try it: https://coldhandboyack.wordpress.com/2018/10/09/macabre-macaroni-second-helping/

Anyway, I digress.  Sometime last year, I got what seemed like a brilliant idea at the time.  If I could write a Jazzi and Ansel short story and get it into Alfred Hitchcock’s mystery magazine, it would be a great way to promote their series.  To say that I didn’t think this through enough would be an understatement.  But I’ve read quite a few novellas by favorite authors who use shorter fiction (66 – 100 Kindle pages) as teasers to keep readers happy during long pauses between their regular books.  And I’ve enjoyed all of them–Lynn Cahoon’s Tourist Trap holiday novellas, Jenna Bennett’s honeymoon and holiday novellas, and Anna Lee Huber’s pre-wedding novella for Keira and Gage.

I decided that to be successful these stories needed:

  The same tone and voice as the books
   To establish the characters and their relationships just like the books
   Great mysteries to solve like the books
   The same feeling/setting as the books

Mind you, each of these things takes a bit of time, some extraneous scenes not found in short stories but possible in novellas.  I tried to accomplish all of the above with a lot less words.  And once I got all of those words written, I sent the story off.

A truth about Alfred Hitchcock magazine:  they only accept online submissions.  Then they give you a code to check your story’s status.  Upfront, they tell you that they’re so bogged down with submissions, you won’t hear back from them for 6 to 7 months.  Make that more like a year, maybe a few days shy of that.  And then you don’t receive an e-mail.  You only know you’ve been rejected when you check your code and see REJECTED next to the story’s title.  Now, I wasn’t heart broken when that happened.  I was a tiny bit ticked that they treat writers so shabbily, but publishing’s changed over the years, so I got over that.  I pretty much knew that the way I’d written the story made its chances  slim.  I used to sell to Alfred Hitchcock, and I had more success with 2,000 to 3,000 word mysteries.  This heavy monstrosity was 8,500 words.  Only an author with a big name can get away with taking up that much magazine space.  But it was a Halloween story, and if no one else wrote one, I might get lucky.  And the story events happen during the events of book 3 in my series, so I had a year to wait anyway.  So why not try?

But once it was rejected, I gave it another look.  And I wasn’t happy with myself.  I’d tried to marry a short story with a novella and ended up with a mess.  A short story needs one, straightforward mystery with hardly any distractions or extras.  A novella has the length to play with different elements, but that’s why it takes more words.  So…

I spent last night and all day today reworking the story.  It’s 7,000 words now.  And I like it.  I’m going to put it up on the blog’s snippet page closer to when The Body in the Gravel comes out September 24th.  My learning curve reinforced something I already knew, but a rule I thought I might be able to bend.  A short story is…a SHORT story.  And I’m up for trying to write another one for Alfred Hitchcock sometime.  But not for a while.  Right now, all of my attention has to focus on writing Jazzi Book 5–The Body in the Past.  (At least, that’s the title for right now).  I’m hoping to write one chapter every weekday I can.

Another lesson I learned?  Failure isn’t the end of the world.  AND, if you want to break into a market, you have to give them what they WANT.  No tinkering with their tried and true playlist.  Ah, well, my short story adventure has to wait for another day.

For now, try to stay cool, and happy writing!

 

 

 

We All Have Favorites

I listened to Chuck Wendig’s podcast this week where he discusses everything about writing and marketing and death threats.  Yes, he got them, but his writing is a bit irreverent.  Still…  it’s writing.  If a reader doesn’t like it, he can toss it in the can.  I’m not good at podcasts, at sitting still and listening when there’s no person to focus on.  Lectures where I can watch a speaker?  I can concentrate for hours.  A faceless voice?  I end up fiddling, losing my concentration.  But I’m glad I made the effort to listen to Wendig.  He intrigued me to try his talk when he said that he thought series were always a matter of diminishing returns.

What?  I’d always heard that series helped a writer BUILD an audience.  And I still believe that.  But that’s not what he meant.  He meant that a writer gets fewer and fewer reviews the longer the series goes.  And he’s probably right.  Just look at some of your favorite authors’ first books compared to their fourth or fifth.  He says a writer’s ego needs some of that praise and when it dwindles, it’s harder to feel inspired to write.  Well, you can judge that for yourself.  But here’s the link to the podcast, if you’re interested: https://wegrowmedia.com/chuck-wendig-on-owning-your-voice-and-choosing-the-path-of-your-career-as-a-writer/#disqus_thread

Anyway, I listened to his talk, and then I got to thinking about series.  I happen to love them.  I’m much more inclined to buy a book in a series I love than a standalone that I’m not sure about.  And that even goes to second or third series that some of my favorite authors write.  I mean, let’s be honest.  We all have favorites.  These are my truths:

I love Lynn Cahoon’s Tourist Trap series more than her Cat Latimer or Fork to Table series, even though they’re all good.  Why?  Beats me.  I just like the mix of people more and the romance between Jill and Greg.  I still buy the other series, though, just not as many.

I love Ilona Andrews’ Kate Daniels series AND her Hidden Legacy series.  Have I tried some of her other books?  No.  Same goes with Patricia Briggs.  I buy every Mercy Thompson book, but I haven’t gotten into her Alpha and Omega series.  And I could go on.  I love Jenna Bennett’s Savannah Martin.  Not so much any of the others.

Why?  The same author writes the books.  They’re writing is topnotch.  Always.  But I’m not the only reader who struggles with this.  Martha Grimes tried to write a few break away books when she got tired of writing about Richard Jury.  All readers did was complain that they wanted another Superintendent Jury.  Same with Elizabeth George and her Thomas Lynley and Barbara Havers mysteries.  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle killed Sherlock Holmes but had to bring him back when readers complained so much.

Why does one series click when another one doesn’t?  I don’t know.  But I think a series can help build an audience, and the readers who love one series might not buy another one.  There are no guarantees.  But that’s life, isn’t it?

Have a great week, and happy writing!

 

Don’t Panic

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I’ve been blithely writing away, Ta da da, happy as can be, on Muddy River mysteries for a while now.  As if I didn’t have a care in the world.  I mean, I’m self-publishing this series, so there are no deadlines.  Right?

Except there IS a deadline for the next Jazzi Zanders mystery due–number 5.  But it’s not until Nov. 4th, months away.  Except…it takes me months to write a Jazzi cozy.  I still wouldn’t have actually counted out the months on my fingers except that I went to Amazon and accidentally found this: https://www.amazon.com/Body-Apartment-Jazzi-Zanders-Mystery-ebook/dp/B07TT2RWQ5/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=The+Body+in+the+Apartment%2C+Judi+Lynn&qid=1562355467&s=gateway&sr=8-3.    A blurb for book 4, that doesn’t even come out until March 17, 2020.  Kensington was way ahead of me…again.

That made me seriously look at how much time I had to do what.  And all of a sudden, the lazy days of summer didn’t look as lazy anymore.  Yes, I panicked.  I couldn’t dawdle around finishing Muddy River 3.  I glued my fanny in chair, hit the keyboard, and wrote like the crazed person I occasionally become.  And today, at last, I finished the last chapter of the first draft.  RELIEF!  I can pass the pages on to my trusty critique partners and start work on Jazzi 5 on Monday.

And I’m even pretty much on track.  I shouldn’t have to buy stronger hair dye to cover any more gray hairs trying to get it done in time.  I won’t have to rush it.  I think that always shows (at least when I do it).

So, now that I can take a deep breath, I can settle down in front of my computer and write one scene or chapter a day every open weekday for months and months without having to try to write a kazillion pages in a short period of time.  I can breathe again.  And enjoy the summer.

Hope you had a great Fourth and happy writing!

(And if you live elsewhere in the world, hope your fourth was great anyway:)