M.B. Mulhall's Blog, page 28

Writing through your emotions

For me, the holidays are never quite as cheery as they used to be. I'm not quite sure why that is (although I have a few ideas…) but it makes me moody and unhappy and just down in general.

So rather than just curl in a ball and try to sleep through it, I use it. I write through it. Use my emotions to write those difficult scenes. It can be therapeutic to have your characters act out the emotions you're struggling through.  Have them get in an argument with someone. They can yell loud and not have the neighbors complain.  Have them sit in a dark closet and cry their eyes out. If you need a hug, have someone come across them in their time of need and envelope them in a warm crushing embrace. If you're frustrated, have your character kick tires or punch a hole in the wall. At least you won't break your own toe or have a to Spackle a wall.

It doesn't always have to be the down side of emotions either. Your happiness, feelings of love and joy can make a scene especially poignant as well. Even your sarcasm can lend to the realness of a character and their actions. Don't be afraid to make your characters act like you.

They say to write what you know.  That doesn't mean just the knowledge you've learned in school or gained in life experiences. It means use your surroundings, use your emotions and put pen to paper and make those characters come to life. You want them to be realistic and believable and by using your emotional state, you can make those characters really come to life.

Wanted: Book bloggers & reviewers

Attention all book bloggers and reviewers! I am looking for some people to participate in a blog tour for my young adult paranormal novel Near Death .  The tour will run towards the end of January, giving everyone about a month to read the book. I will provide the digital versions of the book  for you to read.

So what kind of reviews am I looking for? I'm looking for the typical, this is what it was about and this is what I liked/disliked about it but I'm also looking for quirky different reviews. You want to make a poster? Go for it! You want to act out your favorite scene? I'd pimp you all over youtube!  You want to interview me or some of the characters? Just understand I won't be able to control what those people say!  You want to write a song? I'll sing the chorus!  Surprise me.

The only requirements I'm going to ask from you guys in order to be included in this is to note your interest in the comments along with a link to your blog/reviews and your email address. You also have to be willing to post a review on Amazon, Smashwords and/or Goodreads. I won't ask you to do all three (although I'd love you forever if you did).

Just to sweeten the deal,  I will award a prize to the blogger who gets the most traffic the day they post their review. I'll make a list of recent releases and you'll be able to choose two. Who doesn't love free books?!

If you're not a book blogger or reviewer yourself  but have favorites of your own, please feel to recommend them as well!

It's here!

After many years of labor and delivery, Near Death has been born into the digital world!

I am excited, nervous, sick to my stomach and relieved that  it's done with. Well, there's still promoting, but for the most part, it's done!  I will do a big launch in January when the print version will be ready to go as well, so keep an eye out for it. There may be contests and prizes involved!

This book has been so many years in the making. The idea bounced around in my head for several years before it ever made it's way to my hard drive. The majority of it was written during a time in my life when a lot of turmoil and unhappiness swirled around me. It was my place to escape to, where I could control the lives of others when I felt that I couldn't control my own.  After the draft was complete, it was put away, as I was unsure what to do with it next and those life issues ended up overwhelming all aspects of my days. It sat, for several years, before I picked it back up and worked on it again.

It really has been a labor of love and I hope that people will enjoy it, but if for some reason they don't, at least I can take pride in finally completing something I've started, even if it took years.

Should you decide you're interested, digital versions can be found on Smashwords for Nook, Kobo, Sony, Kindle and other e-readers as well as PC reading.

If you own a Kindle and would prefer, it's also available on Amazon.

I ask that if you are kind enough to purchase and read it, please consider leaving an honest review at Smashwords, Amazon or Goodreads. I know not everyone will love it, so don't be afraid to say so if that's the case. Of course, if you do love it, feel free to gush as well! Regardless of whether you love or hate it, thank you for giving it a chance and sharing your opinions with other potential readers.

 

 

Can't stop tweaking!

No, this is not a post about having a meth habit. I'm talking about tweaking your work. While it is important and helpful to go through and make some changes, there has to be a point when you say enough is enough.  Of course I'm not talking about a first draft, I'm talking about your finished already edited work.

My novel, Near Death, is in its final days before being unleashed into the world wide web. I'm doing one last read through looking for formatting issues and typos. Makes sense, right? Important stuff to be done, no doubt.  I've found some issues and was able to correct them, but I also found myself thinking "Gah this sentence sucks. I should re-write it " or "This scene seems… sophomoric. I should erase it and re-write a whole new scene".

NO! No I shouldn't! I've been through this work five times already. I've made hundreds of changes. I was finally happy, paid to have it proofed and spent all that time formatting. If I make these major changes, I have to go through a lot of that all over again and the book will never get released.

I think my fear of being a failure is coming through and trying to keep me from publishing. We should confront and conquer our fears, no?

I have come to the conclusion that while I love the story, I will never be 100% happy with it, always finding something to tweak to "make better". I've decided that I need to let it be and release it into the wild. Take flight little book! You are great just the way you are!

 

So you're self publishing…

It's becoming a more common thing these days with the explosion of e-readers and the ease of being able to publish digitally. The downside to it, is the people who have realized it's an easy and quick thing to do and race to get their work out without taking the time to make it the best they can.  That makes the rest of us look bad.

So what needs to be done before you self publish?

Obviously, you need to write a book.  If it's fiction, make sure it's got a proper beginning, middle and end. Make sure there's conflict and resolution.  Make sure your characters are well developed and speak accordingly (right kind of language for their age, the location, the time in history, etc.). Make sure it's properly formatted. If you don't know what I mean, pick up a fiction novel you have laying around the house. See how dialog is broken out rather than wrapped into a paragraph. Check out section breaks and chapter breaks.  These are things that readers are used to and it will make it easier for them to follow your story.

When you think you've got a good rough draft, find some people to read it. Family and friends are okay, but know that you ought to have some others (internet friends or whomever) to read through it so you're sure you'll get good rounded feedback. Have them look for plot holes and unanswered questions. Let them be frank and tell you if something doesn't work, if they don't like a character, etc. While you're the author and you get final say, take all the comments and suggestions seriously and see if you need to make a change.

Once you've had readers, get back to editing. Edit, edit, re-write and edit. I can't stress it enough. Yes traditionally published books can have a mistake or two (we're all only human, right?) but we as self publishers/indie authors need to take extra care to try and catch all the typos and grammatical errors because we're more under the microscope about such things.  Do yourself a favor, hire an editor (if you can afford it) or a proofreader (normally a cheaper route).  I don't care how many other people have read it or how many times you've gone through it. Things have been missed.  A good editor and proofer will bring up things your other readers have not. They will suggest cutting lines and/or scenes to make your story flow better. They will tighten up the work and polish it to make it shine. I promise you, it's worth it.

When the editing is all done, it's time to format. As discussed earlier this week, it can be time consuming and frustration, but it's super important. I've read self published books with weird spacing and strange typeface. It's very distracting and takes away from the story. Take your time. Get it right.

Another thing to spend a good amount of time on, is your c over image. Please realize that just because you're artistic enough to be able to write a novel, that doesn't mean you're artistic enough to make a professional looking book cover. Yes, there are exceptions out there and feel free to try, but remember, people are most likely going to first be attracted to your cover, and if it looks amateurish, they may think your writing is as well.  There are plenty of artists out there who are looking for work and looking to build a client base for that sort of thing, so take the time and search some out.  If you see indie books with covers you especially enjoy, drop a line to the author and ask who did their cover. They will more than likely be happy to pass along the name and contact info.

Alright, you've got the finished product. You're good to go, right? Well…yes and no. You're good to upload your work to Amazon or Smashwords, but now you've got to put on your promoter hat and start marketing yourself and your book. That can be a full time job in itself. Be careful not to cross the line of being obnoxious tweeting and posting every twenty minutes to buy your book. Do some online research and see what works and what doesn't. There are giveaways, blog tours and all sorts of other options. Explore them all!

So there you have it, the steps to self publishing, more or less. As you can see, to do it right is not a quick and dirty job. It's time consuming work, but it'll be better in the long run and you'll be helping yourself to get more sales and helping your fellow indie authors by putting out a quality product. I'll thank you in advance for that!

Formatting Blues

So you've finished your novel. You've had it beta read and edited and you've decided it's time to publish (that is if you're self publishing).  It looks lovely in your Word document or whatever processing program you're using so you think it's good to go.

WRONG

So, so wrong.  Now it's time to format. Format for a digital version; you need something that will work for several different e-readers. Format for the print version; making sure words don't bleed over the edge and that chapter titles start in the same place and that the gutter margins are deep enough. Sounds easy enough, right? It is fairly easy, but it's time consuming. Especially if you have a longer manuscript.

You have to take out spaces and indentations. Make sure things line up and that page breaks are in the right place.  Once you upload it to say a place like Createspace, they will review and tell you what's wrong with it. Wrong page size, wrong margins, images under the required DPI (which I believe is dots per inch). They will offer templates (which are handy!) but know that when you use them, you'll most likely have to go back through and make sure it didn't move things, that page breaks are still there etc.  It's very frustrating.

Do yourself a favor and check out formatting requirements in the beginning. Copy and paste your manuscript into the template of the right size before you go through making those adjustments so you  won't end up doing it twice. Save copies as you go in case formatting goes crazy and you need an earlier version.

When it comes to digital versions, Smashword has a free e-book/PDF that will walk you through the steps of how to format for e-books. It's very handy and I recommend it because Smashword offers e-book versions for many different kinds of readers, including Kindle, so you should only have to do the digital formatting once. Yay for time saving!

Plan on formatting taking some time. Plan on it being frustrating, but have patience and stick with it. I can't tell you the amount of e-books I've read (both self and traditionally published) that have had bad formatting issues. Please don't be one of them. Your readers will appreciate it and it's one less thing for someone to complain about when they talk about self publishing!

Now what?!

Oh yeah…it's Thursday. That means it's a regular blog posting day again! Back to the norm.

I said no more NaNoWriMo posts, but I've got to do at least one follow up.  So it's December 1st. Do you feel lost not having a deadline anymore? Do you still have to actually finish your story? Are you done and need to do editing? Here are some tips for you.

If you still have story to finish, give yourself a deadline. Tell a friend that you know will pester the shit out of you until it's done.  If you're anything like me you'll want to finish just to shut them up!  You don't have to keep to the same grueling NaNo schedule, but if you're already in a daily writing niche, why let that go to waste? Keep it up!

If the story is done and you want to dive right into editing….DON'T!!  Put that story away. Let it sit in a drawer for a week or more. It needs to mellow and you need to take your mind off of it. After it rests for a while, take it back out and read it through. Make notes as you go along. Things you want to change or add, questions you never answered, etc. Don't worry about all the typos and little things on the first read through. Look for the big things: plot holes, contradictions, etc.  Fix those and then go back for the little things. Trying to edit can seem incredibly overwhelming when you have a 150+ page manuscript, so keep it simple at first.

Now maybe you wonder what am I doing now that NaNo is over.  Welp, my Nanovel needs finishing *BUT* I have a novel that I just got back edits on so I need to finish going through those.  For that same novel, I just got the completed front and back cover art. Squee! I'm so excited it's finally all coming together. I'm hoping to get it all ready in the next week or two so I can give away copies for the holidays.

What are you folks up to now that the November frenzy is over?

 

ABC 123(4)s of NaNo: 4 is for Four Weeks Gone By

4 is for four weeks gone by. Four looooong weeks. Or four super short weeks if you can't believe it's over already. It's hard for me to believe it's over already. I can't believe I've posted everyday this month! (heh sorry but after this it goes back to the twice a week schedule!) It's been a fun journey and I hope you guys have enjoyed it and have gotten something from it as well. Congratulations on making it to the end!

 

Day 30: You've made it to the end! You deserve HUGE props for sticking it out, even if you missed the ultimate goal. Try to keep writing if the story isn't at the end and if it is, put it aside for a short while and then go back and edit! Make your creation into something amazing!

Also don't forget to go back and check day 9 if you want cash in on my earlier offer!

ABC 123(4)s of NaNo: 3 is for Three Cheers for you!

3 is for three cheers for you!  It's the day before the end of the month and you are still with us! You might be working frantically now to get to the end since there's only one day left, but take a moment to pat yourself on the back for the great work you've done so far. Three cheers for you!

Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray!

 

Day 29:  Need that final push? Need someone to kick you in the ass? Leave a comment with a Twitter name and/or an email and I'll be by to give you that needed kick!

ABC 123(4)s of NaNo: 2 is for Two Days to Go

2 is for two days to go!  Well two days after today. You've come so far. I can't believe it's almost over myself. This month seems to have flown by.  I hope you guys have enjoyed the ride of your own novels and hopefully my little daily posts have given you some motivation to help keep you moving.

Day 28: You've come this far! There's no giving up now. The end is near!