Xavier Edwards's Blog, page 20

More Flash Than Action

[image error] I managed to address the issues plaguing the lack of descriptive content for my ebooks on Google Play. Amended versions of the books have made their way onto Google, so now it’s a matter of waiting for Google to clear out the caches and the new information should be there.
After the previous successes in getting the ONIX data sorted out, I finally published to Kobo, so now I wait for them to look through everything I supplied and list my books soon.
I also managed to sort out the publishing pipeline to iTunes. After going through the motions with iTunes Producer, I was thinking that my ONIX template probably would have been a good fit. Maybe if I fiddled with the settings some more I’ll get it worked out. I pushed both an .epub and .ibooks version of both published books to iTunes. Whether they allow two separate versions of the same title (different ISBNs so it shouldn’t matter that much) to be published at the same time, we’ll have to wait and see.
Amazon have also been quite useful, and I now have an author page, as well as what could only be described as a vanity author page, at http://www.amazon.com/author/xavieredwards. Lucky me.
Smashwords will now be pushing “A Hero’s Return” across to Sony, Barnes & Noble, Diesel, and Baker-Taylor, with “The Special Scent” currently being reviewed for release.
I’ve been busy doing things, but there’s not a lot to show for it in terms of new books, or immediate results. The results will be forthcoming, but for now it’s work against a future return.
I will say that I spent a little bit of time today typing up a story that I discovered tucked away in the back of a notebook. It’s nowhere near complete or very far developed, but there’s several interesting threads that I managed to leave dangling which should make for a good read down the line.

Not The Writing I Expected

I have now updated “The Special Scent” to reflect its appearance on Google Books and Google Play, so there’s a little bit of good news.
What hasn’t been so good has been the significant amount of time writing I have spent today. It will all ultimately end up helping you, the reader, find my books online, but for now the process is quite annoying. I am talking about configuring ONIX metadata that some ebook resellers like to see before they list my books.
ONIX metadata makes all sorts of sense, but it’s pure XML. As they say, XML is like violence, if you’re still having problems, use more until it’s solved. I spent far longer than I really wanted going through the standard and crafting by hand a template ONIX file that will accompany all future releases. This brought back some bad memories of writing lengthy software code by hand, but at least it’s all done now.
My next big problem is trying to work out why Google Play is looking at an odd part of the actual ebook metadata for the content description. If I can’t find why it’s doing so, I’m probably going to have to re-publish to Google, with each book synopsis stuck in the place that Google is looking.
I hope to have both books published to Kobo and the iBookstore by the end of the week, or at least submitted for processing. Then I can devote more time to writing, and the other things I love doing.

“The Special Scent” Arrives

[image error] Well, it’s always nice to be pleasantly surprised. In this case, it’s an early release for “The Special Scent”. Find it now, on it’s own page, or across the Internet. I have also updated the book page for “A Hero’s Return” to reflect its appearance on Google Books and on Google Play.
It was a little embarrassing that, as the book was ready for publishing, I discovered a rather obvious spelling mistake in the first couple of paragraphs.
Oops.
A quick recompilation of the book and everything was all okay again. It goes to show that no matter how much effort you put into the planning phase, sometime things sneak through.
Two additional artists have granted permission for use of their works, selections of which you can see associated with this post. Please support them as with the other artists.
PetiteChik Momasko

New Artists

My editor has returned my latest script and, now that I have been brave enough to actually look at the work that’s been done, my next book “The Special Scent” will be published very shortly.
Experience with the ins and outs of preparing the different versions needed to make each site happy has at least made the process transparent enough that I shouldn’t have too many issues with getting the next title published.
Now that I’ve effectively got the first two out of the way I have poked around the other manuscripts I have sitting around and have identified the next likely candidate for publishing. Expect that it will be published no later than mid-June.
Two additional artists have granted permission for use of their works, selections of which you can see associated with this post. Please support them as with the other artists.
HammettLady silvestru

Great News

[image error] I had enrolled into the Google Books program at the same time as I was setting up all my other online retail accounts, and was wondering why “A Hero’s Return” wasn’t showing up as having an available ebook, despite that being how I had uploaded all the data to Google.
After a bit of a struggle with the ins and outs of the Google help system, I finally found that I had missed a setting in a submenu of a tab that I hadn’t really looked at up to that point. From there I managed to establish how Google will pay me for purchases through Google Books and Play. I was a little disappointed that the process wasn’t clearer and I had been getting more annoyed at it as time dragged on and nothing was happening. So, now we have to wait a couple of days for Google to finish verifying everything and “A Hero’s Return” should appear properly for readers who prefer Google’s services.
Google’s odd behaviour was only a sidebar to the bigger strain of continuing to wait for my Kobo and iBookstore accounts. Not more than 24 hours after I sorted out the Google Books issue, I received messages letting me know that both Kobo and the iBookstore accounts were granted.
So, over this weekend those services will see “A Hero’s Return” published to them and, hopefully, “The Special Scent” will return from the editor in time for publishing this weekend as well.
Everything is now in order and I can get back to the business of writing.

Always Busy

[image error] Life has finally settled down again, after the absolute chaos of the last couple of weeks. I’m getting a lot of reading done but not so much writing at the moment - still waiting for my editor to get back to me with the next book in the line.
I have found, though, that keeping a mix of writing methods at hand it always useful. After not having written anything significantly by hand for a number of years, I found myself in the situation recently where pen and paper was all I had to capture the story forming in my mind.
It took a little bit of effort to get used to writing large amounts of text, as well as getting it neat and tidy on the page, but at the end of the process I was quite proud of what I had achieved.
Writing by hand always seems to necessitate a different approach to thinking about the plot and character development and way of thinking about what comes next in the story. It can be a really powerful tool in the writer’s arsenal, and is one that I found a lot more enjoyable than I initially thought I would.
Now I just need to find the time to type out what I wrote...

Books Are Here

[image error] I’ve finally gotten around to completing the addition of the books section to the site. My first title, “A Hero’s Return”, is now listed online. Keep an eye out for the next title, which is scheduled to be “The Special Scent” and is expected to be published within the next couple of weeks.
Links to all the places you can buy the books online will be supplied as part of the book descriptions and, on many of the sites, you will be able to read a sample portion of the book for free.
I would also like to thank another artist for graciously licencing their works for the website and use with ebooks. Please support their work.
ShakilovNeel

Forward Progress

After something of an up and down week, things are looking up again. Another draft is with the editor, the cover art is coming along nicely, the ISBNs are sitting ready, and I have several ebook reseller accounts ready to go.
My latest iBookstore account attempt hasn’t been held up, yet, so there’s hope that the EIN has now propagated through all the necessary systems to let me have my long-awaited account.
The illness from the last couple of weeks has finally lifted, and I’m now back and fully serviceable, able to write without feeling like I’ve been trying to drive through a wet newspaper. If it was the flu, at least it hit early in the flu season and before the first set of frosts really landed.
It has been pretty over the last few days, with thick frosts, dense fog, and beautifully clear days. Autumn looks like it’s on the way out and, if some of my friends are to be believed, we’ll be seeing snow a lot lower down this year, and early, as well.
That’s the sort of weather that bodes well for curling up inside with a good ebook - mine.

Another One In the Works

[image error] Another book is entering late stage production at the moment. It will be with the editor within the next couple of days and, after that, it will only be a matter of a couple of weeks until it hits the ebook sites.
I’m still waiting on my EIN to be promulgated through all the requisite systems to allow my iBookstore account to be setup, so we’re still stuck waiting for iTunes representation for my works. On the positive side, representation on Kobo is moving along nicely.
What has been slowing down the rate of new posts and, sadly, the rate of work on my writing, has been some quite involved adult learning courses that I have had to take over the last week. While the concept of adult learning is wonderful, and should be expanded to as many fields as possible, it can be awfully vague and imprecise, especially when coming from a background of rigid yes / no, pass / fail, milestones must be met kind of attitude. The result is that it is slower than expected, but the upside is going to be some rather useful qualifications at the back end - qualifications in high demand.