Elizabeth Guizzetti's Blog, page 29

Off to V-con!

Heading up to Vancouver, Canada today for V-con! I will be doing panels and workshops today and tomorrow. My tummy always gets a little queasy with these public speaking style conventions. It’s always amazing how quickly one becomes an “expert.” Still I hope I offer aspiring authors some good advice.

Dennis is at working at home so the dogs don’t freak out. Isn’t that sweet?

Here is part of my packing list: flyers, books excerpts, postcards, Freebie posters

My schedule for V-con is:

Can You Write SF Without A Science Background? – Friday 3pm 

Is it easier to write a science fiction story if you have the technical or science background or does it get in the way? Can you write believable science fiction without a science background? How do you weave in the science without making it an info dump?

(This is going to be so much fun. I am going to explain that yes I am a college-dropout who writes hard sci-fi. Yikes)

 Donna McMahon (M), Kristi Charish, Dave Duncan, Elizabeth Guizzetti, David Ng, Wolf Read

Reading – Friday 7pm

I am going to be reading chapter 7 & 9 from Other Systems. Also the first 25 people to show up get a free mini-button!

Drawing Monsters – Saturday 10am

I am going to teach how to draw both cute and colossal monsters in this workshop. Supplies provided.

So You Want To Be A Writer? – Saturday 11am

For brand-spanking new writers. What the writing life entails and what it’s really like to be a full-time published author trying to stay afloat. How in the world did I get to be the moderator? Well I definitely know what it is like to struggle to stay afloat.

Elizabeth Guizzetti (M), Don DeBrandt, Alyx Dellamonica, Julie McGalliard, Lorna Suzuki

Sources Of Inspiration – Saturday 2pm

Panelists discuss what acts as a source of creative inspiration for them. This one is pretty self explanatory yet I have no idea what I am going to talk about: Projects building on other projects, Newspaper articles maybe? 

Karl Johanson (M), Don DeBrandt, Alyx Dellamonica, Elizabeth Guizzetti, Stephanie Johanson

Drawing Maps Of Your World – Saturday 6pm

During this drawing workshop, I will show how to draw a map of the world for your next novel or graphic novel. This is for all the people who want to be Gods or Goddesses of their very own world!

Drawing: The Shepard

I created this drawing after visiting the ruined castles in Wales. I am going to be coloring it this week.

Check back on Monday morning to see my progress!

Faminelands Book #3: Mareton’s Curse is in Beta Reading!

I finished the artwork for Faminelands 3: Mareton’s Curse in August, Maria and I have gone through the first edit. The next step is Beta Reading: which means we are having a few people take a look at it.

The story opens with Galdor’s wedding and follows Roan, Orin, and Lark as they leave the village and seek Mareton’s prince who has been kidnapped and about to be sacrificed in order to make it rain. Will they find him in time?

I am very proud of some of the artwork in the book. Also I would like to announce that this issue is also special, because it is Maria’s first writing credit. I will be talking about how the creation of this book was a little different than the creation of previous ones later in the week as well as how character’s grow over a series.

Release Schedule:

On October 10th through November 10th, we will be starting a kickstarter campaign for the cost of printing with some awesome reward tiers so look for updates on that.

Beta reading will end on October 31st.

After the campaign ends, I will be sending it to the printer in order to have it ready for Emerald City Comic Con 2013. It will be available on trade paperback and digital with extras on CD or download. The webcomic will restart the first weekend of January. Also at Emerald City Comic Con we will be having a raffle of some original character artwork of Lark and Orin each day of the convention.

More information to come….

Jet City Comic Show Wrapup

So I had a wonderful comic book show. As I said in the previous post, Maria couldn’t make it due to a nasty bug, but I soldiered on and had a great convention.

This was the commissioned sketch I did.

I was in Artist Alley table 48 right next to Jonah Charney who is the creator of Espresso City. IT was his very first con.  And the fine people from QEW Publishing a small press who creates comics and novels.  Choosematic Books was across the hall from us. They are bringing back “choose your own adventure” style books for geeky grownups.  We always have a great time and saw all of our comic book buddies from Dark Slinger Comics who creates horror comics such as Ghost Assassin and Van Helsing.

I did a commissioned sketch for a themed sketch book  and sold some books. I had two lovely people mention how really excited to see that I have continued slowly building my writing and artistic career. I admit we had a few disappointed folks for the fact Faminelands #3 is not out, but they were all thrill to know it was done and scheduled now to come out for Emerald City Comic Con. That’s right, we are going to be elfing out at ECCC ’13! I also had a short interview which I will post a link to as soon as I get notification it is up.

I admit, I wanted to sequence how I set up my table, and I took the first photo of my open suitcase and then forgot, because I got busy setting up.  If I remember at Bellingham I will do a post on it, if I don’t, well then I guess I won’t.

Getting ready for Jet City Comic Book Show and I sold a short story this week!

So this week most of my time has been spent getting ready for Jet City Comic Show which is Saturday. Unfortunately Maria (and her poor kids) are sickies so I will be heading out to the wilds of Seattle Center without her. I will be at Artist Alley table #48 selling my comics and handing out free chapters of my novel Other Systems.

It’s nice I got everything in my handy-dandy giant red hard plastic suitcase for Jet City, because it means I also packed for V-Con in the smaller suitcase–also red but with polka dots so I feel prepared.

A lot of new authors and artists wonder what should I bring to a con so here is a list of things that I bring to every con where I am tabling such as Jet City:

1) Comics and books to sell.

2) Posters and mini-buttons to sell

3) 3-step Acrylic tray style riser to hold Faminelands and Lure

4) Smaller literature holder to hold Out for Souls & Cookies

5) Easels and poster holder. I use a sideless slotted mail file–it works great

6) First Aid Kit with lots of Bandaids and Neosporen: you slice your hand on a piece of plastic and you will be lucky you have them. Also it’s amazing how many ladies are wearing uncomfortable footwear and get blisters. Ladies, unless you are confident and comfortable in heels stop trying to impress your boyfriend. It is fun for an hour at max, then not only does no one care that your feet hurt, we don’t want to hear you whine about it. Still as a generally nice person who happens to keep bandaids in my kit: I will give you one.

7) Food and Drink for me and any minions which show up

8) Binder clips, scissors, index cards

9) Pens for signing books, ball point pens for everything else.

10) Tally Sheet, Change bag, Credit card reader, Iphone and Ipad. It’s weird, but in different places I get better reception on one or the other so I always bring both.

11) Business cards, freebie chapters and other marketing materials, banners

12 Table cloth

13) A emergency kit for non emergencies: nail file, clippers, tampons, breathmints, hair brush, Tylenol, Advil, carmex, hand wipes, antibacterial gel, vitamins, and Zertec. Though honestly, I have been at a con without Zertec and I suppose Maria felt it was an emergency when I was having an allergic reaction, because we sent our minion out into the world and made her go buy us some.

I think that is everything I bring.

At a con away from home, I also bring two outfits for everyday. One for during the con wear which for me is business casual or a costume. The other is my off hours clothes. If the hotel has a pool, I always bring my swimsuit. If I am invited to a party I also bring a dress.

Finally, the other exciting thing: Perihelion is restarting their online science fiction magazine and bought my story Unintentional Colonists which is set on Jupiter’s moon Europa. It’s gone through editing and I okayed the galley last night so check it out 11/12/12!

Some days you need a sunbeam

I imagine that my pups are intelligent. They ring a bell to go outside and got the sit and wait commands down. While they are “book smart” and play with dog-genius puzzle toys, sometimes I don’t think they have very much “street smarts.” Because though Rosie left room for her brother in the sun, as you can see, he climbed up on the windowsill to sit in a sunbeam. Oh yeah and then then he started barking because he couldn’t get down. Yep, I am cruel, because I took a picture before I saved him.

And the winner is Ellis Nelson!

Ellis Nelson of the blog http://ellisnelson.com is the winner of the 250 Followers drawing.

You have won a prize of an electronic copy of Other Systems and three space wallpapers including this one which is my digital representation of the Cat’s Eye Nebula.

Thanks to everyone who followed or liked my blog/twitter/FB this weekend!

Note: I contacted you via FB, because I couldn’t find an email link on your blog. If you happen to see this first, please collect your prize by emailing me  at elizabeth@zbpublications.com

 

250 Followers! Enter to win a copy of Other Systems!

So I planned to do this last week and then started a reading rampage, got lost in a world of other people’s creations, then went to an open mike at the Ballard Library and read the scene where Abby gets on the space elevator …and completely forgot to post this. Opps.

Regardless between my blog and twitter I now have over 250 followers.So I am going to have a random drawing for a electronic copy of Other Systems in the form of your choice: Mobi, PDF, or Epub and three awesome space wallpapers which will come to you in the form of three 1920 x 1080 jpgs at 100 dpi.

If you want to enter, all you have to do is like this post if you are a follower or follow me this weekend either on twitter (e_guizzetti) or as a reader to this very blog!

Yes any one who follows me today will be entered automatically. The contests runs today until Monday 12:01 PST.

I will contact the winner via email or on the contact page of your blog or twitter account. Random Drawing will be conducted by RandomPicker.com. I will post the name of the winner on this page.

Good Luck!

 

 

Reading Rampage #3: The Review of Born In Flames

Born in Flames is the debut novel of Candace Knoebel. It is the first part of a trilogy which I am looking forward to finishing since I love dragons and loved the concept of the book, however, I always feel a bit disappointed in first books, because I want to know what else happens in the story, but my impatience is hardly Knoebel’s fault… I WANT MORE!

So that being said, I enjoyed this book, Knoebel’s narration style and The Born in Flame’s storyline feels fresh.

The protagonist Aurora is strong, stubborn and a bit hot headed but her counterpart Fenn is level headed and only wants to keep her safe. Due to this, I liked him better, but Aurora holds the book up due to her strength. They were both real enough that I was able to connect to them easily.

Great story and highly recommend it!

Reading Rampage #2: Review of Trang and Trust by Mary Sisson

I loved these books. I am reviewing them together so I don’t screw up and give everyone spoilers.

Trang starts with Wouter Hoopen the general manager of the Titan Station trying to get funding and worried about his future promotion potential. Then everything changes when a hole in space opens and on the other side is an alien station.  Sisson has a true gift to write humor in her narration.

Phillipe Trang the first human representative  is a wonderful character, but my favorite character is Shanti one of his body guards from the Special Forces. Sission excels at characterization through dialogue and I love how Phillipe and Shanti’s relationship evolves through the books.

All of her characters and alien races have distinct traits which make them unique, yet there is enough familiarity to get a solid picture in the reader’s mind. Her descriptions are so well blended into the narrative, I never feel the information dumping problem of some science fiction.

Now in Trust, the book starts a few weeks after the end of the first novel. Sisson focuses more on the Cyclopes and Magic Man which is nice because as the reader it gives us more time to know them better. And we see Trang evolve as a character, which I personally love.

Terrific Books–if you are a science fiction fan, check them out! 

I’m really excited to see where the series goes. I would just like to warn readers the novels deal with some adult themes and  have harsh language.