A.C. Flory's Blog, page 10

My house in Palia

Palia is an MMO [Massively Multiplayer Online game] that’s like a non-violent cross between the SIMS and games like ESO [Elder Scrolls Online] and Final Fantasy XIV that have a strong, player housing component.

I started playing Palia when I couldn’t login to ESO, now it’s become the place I go to at the end of the day…to relax. I created the video below to showcase some of the truly innovative features of this odd little game. If you’ve never tried an MMO before, then Palia could be a gentle introduction to the genre. Enjoy.

cheers,
Meeks

Oh my sainted aunt…?

I get vertigo just standing on a chair to change a light bulb, so watching this Youtube short literally made me ill. But…this village is a tribute to human courage, skill and sheer, obstinate determination. Happy Sunday my friends.

Meeks

An issue close to my heart…

Like Laurie Boris, I was bullied as a little kid and othered as a teen – apparently I was known as the Freak. Not sure if that was because I was different to the other girls at my all-girl convent school, or because I had the temerity to tell the head nun that I didn’t believe in god.

Whatever the reason, lunchtimes usually found me in the school library, reading. Books were my escape, and books were my friends. Banning books is just another way of reinforcing the ‘othering’ that makes one group hate another group. It’s not ‘freedom’, it’s mind control by omission.

Please read Laurie’s post. I didn’t even know there was a Banned Books list in the US. Now I have to do some research to find out if there’s one here in Australia. I suspect there probably is.

Meeks

Bans off Our Books

A cubby in a class of its own

When I was a kid, I loved building cubbies: cubby houses to the uninitiated. Those cubbies owed more to imagination than actual engineering skill, so when I saw this video, my inner child went nuts:

Hope you have a great weekend, everyone.

cheers,
Meeks

Type 1 Diabetes – functional cure getting closer

There’s a lot of asthma and type 1 diabetes in my extended family, so I always keep an eye out for any research that might give them a better quality of life. And this might be it:

‘Implanting a pouch of stem-cell-derived pancreas cells under the skin of type 1 diabetics has enabled them to live without insulin injections for years and maintain non-diabetic blood sugar levels, according to the results of a clinical trial. It’s a big step towards a functional cure for the disease.’

The pouch seems to work well in clinic trials, but…it requires immunosuppressant medication to stop the body from rejecting the pouch and its contents. This medication comes with its own problems because it lowers the body’s defences against infections such as the ‘flu, or Covid, but I suspect that most people suffering from Type 1 Diabetes would take the risk, just to be free of insulin injections.

If you or someone you love has Type 1 Diabetes, please read all the details in this New Atlas article.

Happy weekend, everyone.
Meeks

ESO Housing Walkthrough – Tel Galen

After the technical woes I experienced with ESO [Elder Scrolls Online] some months ago, I honestly didn’t think I’d be making any more housing videos. But here we are, and I am seriously proud of this one because the house has a modern feel, something that’s hard to achieve with the building styles available.

Anyway, I uploaded the video about an hour ago so you can watch it here, or click the link on the bottom of the video to watch it on Youtube. I believe the video is slightly larger on Youtube. Either way, I hope you enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed making it.

Have a great weekend, cheers,
Meeks

Making an Audiobook, with Google Play Books

Since posting about Laurie Boris’ new audio books [via Audible], I’ve received quite a bit of interest from other Indie authors about how to make an audio book. I’ve never done it, so I was delighted when author Audrey Driscoll came to the rescue. I hope you find her article as interesting as I did. Over to you, Audrey!

A while ago I turned two of my books into AI-narrated audiobooks on Google Play Books. I did it mostly as an experiment. (Most of my writing-related activities started as experiments.) I also decided to offer the books as free downloads, a decision I believe to be correct, considering the ethical considerations of using AI. To be clear, I would never have gone to the trouble and expense of making audiobooks with live voice actors. It wasn’t a question of AI or human, but AI or nothing at all.

Based on this experience, here are some of my thoughts on audiobooks for the indie author:

What are your reasons for creating an audiobook version of a book you have published? To make (more) money? To find a new readership? Curiosity? Experimentation? Answers to these questions will determine how much time, money, and effort you are willing to give to the project.How are you going to create the audiobook? Buy the necessary equipment, set up a recording spot, read your book yourself or hire a reader, and learn how to work with sound files; or use something like Amazon’s Audible? Or deploy the AI-based utilities offered by Google Play or Apple? The AI voices are generated from zillions of scraped sound files, not from paid contributors, so that might be an ethical issue.Will your audiobook be free or priced, and if the latter, what price will you set?

Once you’ve decided to make an audiobook, there are a few other decisions to consider:

Will you have a single narrative voice or more than one? My books have first-person narrators, so one voice was the logical choice, but books in which different characters are featured in alternating chapters may need more than one. Google Play offers more than a dozen different voices, male or female, of different ages and with several accents.Is your audiobook going to be simply a reading of the text as published, or would you prefer to make the audiobook more like a dramatic performance? This would require multiple voices and possibly sound effects, music, and changes to the text (removing dialogue tags, for example). In my opinion, this is a more ambitious project than a mere audiobook. It would be an adaptation of the book, rather than a different format.

In Google Play Books (which is the only audiobook utility I’ve used), you can listen to your book with the text displayed on your screen. This permits you to change the text if necessary. Even though my intent was to produce a straight reading of the text, I did find it necessary to make some minor changes for clarity.

Whether working with a human or an AI reader, be prepared to deal with pronunciation, especially if your book contains unusual names or made-up words. AI voices, although surprisingly human-sounding, do have some oddities of intonation that can to some extent be improved by adding pauses or modifying speed. It took me a bit of time and effort to work out the most worthwhile tweaks.

Finally, I found that apart from the audiobook as a new “product,” it enabled me, the author, to re-experience my books in a new way. I would recommend that authors explore their books through audio simply for that reason. (Google Play Books requires you to have a live ebook version available on their site before you can create the audiobook, but this isn’t a major obstacle except for those whose books are in KDP Select, which requires exclusivity.) Making the audiobook versions available to others for a price or for free would be a separate decision.

And there you have it, an in depth overview of how to use Google Play Books to create your own audio book.

Thanks, Audrey, and cheers all!
Meeks

Audio books from Author, Laurie Boris

Author, editor, and friend, Laurie Boris has just created audio books of two of her novels – Drawing Breath and Boychik. And she’s giving them away:

‘The giveaway begins on September 1 ends on September 8. You can enter each once per day. You just have to answer one simple question: “What are you reading?” (That’s first, because I’m nosy, and second, because I love a good book recommendation.)’

To read the post, and join in the fun, click here. To learn a bit about my connection to Laurie, keep reading, as it involves Drawing Breath.

Once upon a time, back when the internet was young, I met Laurie on a wonderful website called ‘Indies Unlimited’. Not only did the website have fabulous how-to articles on how to become a self published author, it highlighted books that Indies had already published. Drawing Breath was one of those books. I read it, and knew that Laurie Boris could Write. Clean, beautiful prose that spoke to my heart as well as my head.

When it became my turn to think about self-publishing, I turned to Laurie to edit my book. Despite not writing in the scifi genre, Laurie taught me a hell of a lot about how to use language to speak to any Reader in any genre. I’ve never forgotten those lessons.

I’ve since read every, single book Laurie has published, and I’ve loved all of them, but something about Boychik grabbed my heart in the same way that Drawing Breath did. That’s why I’m so very pleased that both stories have a chance to reach new Readers.

This is my gift to you. I promise, you won’t regret it.

-hugs-
Meeks

This is the laws of physics at work!

Apologies for all these short videos from Youtube but…some of them are simply mind-blowing. I just have to share with my friends.

cheers,
Meeks

I want one!!!!

Astribot won me at the vacuuming, but I fell in love with the waffle flip.

cheers,
Meeks