K. Ferrin's Blog, page 29
July 10, 2014
Some Fun Magicless Swag
Love the books and want to sport some Magicless gear? We’ve got you covered! Check out our selection of fun Magicless gear at the Bookish Swag link on this website, or you can go to the Bookish Swag site where you can customize the teeshirt to the color, size, and tee style you like best here: http://www.zazzle.com/bookishswag
Here are some of the fun things we’ve got available. Remember, you can customize!
Gauche Tee
Another:
Mages Still Bleed
And for some absolute silliness:
Flip Flops!
Have fun!
K.
July 8, 2014
Magicless Inspired Artwork
Over the course of writing the book I had a couple pieces of artwork created in addition to the cover. First, I created a character sketch of one of the characters from the book, Noz. He is not a central character, but he plays a pretty important role within the book.
Noz
I also had an artist put together an image of one of the scenes from the book. This was an early draft, if you look at the cover you can see the characters changed a bit.
Scene from Magicless
Magicless is now available online through all major retailers. The ebook is only available through Amazon.
K.
July 3, 2014
Magicless Cover Reveal!
I am excited to formally introduce all of you to Magicless, my debut young adult fantasy novel. I am so excited to share the cover with you, and to finally see the product of all the weeks and months of hard work!
Magicless is available as an EBook (on Amazon), as well as in paperback and hardcover versions at all major book sellers. If you like the cover, check out the designer at the following link. WARNING: She’s awesome! http://www.ravven.com/blog/portfolio/
Hard Cover Jacket
About Magicless:
Deep in the Oakwood, a boy is born without magic.
In a land where powers flow through one’s veins as naturally as water down a mountain stream, Micah is an aberration detested by everyone – everyone except Alekka, a gifted but solitary mage who understands the price of isolation. Her sensitivity to the thoughts of others drives her to seek solace in the forests surrounding Aclay, a small village that has been living under a malevolent shadow for hundreds of years.
As fear and loss ravage the countryside, the two outcasts form an unlikely bond forged in loneliness and surrounded by the flickering silhouettes of destiny. When their home is destroyed, the outcasts must join a volatile group of their peers on a journey that threatens to strip them of everything they cherish, imperil everything they’ve ever known, even force them to question the nature of reality itself. Can they find the key to stemming the tide of darkness without losing themselves along the way?
July 1, 2014
Book Release Details
I knew planning the details for the launch of my debut young adult epic fantasy novel #Magicless would be fun, but reality is so much better than imagination in this case! I’ve got a slew of stuff planned for the month of July, leading up to the book launch itself on July 18th, and here are the details!
Launch Party: Details coming soon! Let’s just say, there will be balloons.
Sneak Peaks: I’ll be posting sneak peaks from #Magicless on my blog every Tuesday for the month of July.
During the week of 7/14 I’ll be giving away free autographed hard-covers of #Magicless as well as book themed swag (goodies) with fun Twitter contests, stay tuned for details!
Launch weekend (7/18 – 7/20) the ebook will be FREE on Amazon.com
During the first Saturday of the launch, (July 19th), send a receipt of your purchase of a print book to @ScrivK and get a free t-shirt of your choice. You can see the Tee’s here: http://www.zazzle.com/bookishswag
K.
June 26, 2014
Bias in SF and Fantasy Revews
There is a lot of debate regarding whether there is gender bias within the sci-fi/fantasy genres. A lot of what is thrown around on the interwebs are opinions rather than objective analysis based on data. Being the analytical person I am, I thought I’d do a mini-analysis myself and see what the data suggests about this gender bias.
I pulled a query on sci-fi/fantasy books on Amazon and ranked it in descending order by the number of reviews. I logged the name of the book, the author, the sex of the author, and the number of customer reviews for the top 100 books on that list.
A couple of things to keep in mind:
I used Amazon’s definition of sci-fi/fantasy. This is somewhat problematic in that some books were clearly included in error (such as Gone with Wind). I did not interfere with Amazon’s algorithm, I did not want to introduce any of my own bias into the data
I counted customer reviews only
This data is volatile and changes with every new review submitted, so each time this query is run you will see variations in the data
This is a small sample (top 100 books ranked by # of reviews), but it does come from a very large source (arguably the largest source) of customer reviews of sci-fi/fantasy on the internet
Here are the results of the analysis:
Conclusion
There is a clear and dramatic bias in the reviews being done on authors within the sci-fi/fantasy genre’s on Amazon.com that favors male authors. The implications for this are far reaching. Amazon uses these reviews as a decision mechanism for inclusion in their “You might like” lists as well as their book spotlight positions. If an author is not getting reviewed it may preclude them from gaining this extra visibility on Amazon itself and impact book sales, perpetuating the problem.
Additionally, people often use Amazon reviews to determine whether or not to purchase a book. I do this frequently myself. My book club uses reviews as well, frequently including them in our ‘pitches’ when trying to decide which book to read next. The extent to which these reviews convince readers to purchase a book reflects directly on the ability of the author to make sales, enhance their bank accounts, but more importantly, to make it onto high profile Best Seller lists such as the New York Times.
This is a problem within the sci-fi/fantasy genre, and it is a problem that it is quite easy to fix (see my post A Light in the Dark: How Writers Create Social Change) by simply ensuring you are reading authors of diverse backgrounds and that you are reviewing them publicly on sites like Amazon and GoodReads, not just on your blog.
K.
By the way, who do you think the review-hog authors were? Tweet your guesses to @ScrivK or comment below.
June 24, 2014
Quotable Tuesdays – Dr. Seuss
Dr. Seuss Quote
June 19, 2014
Four Ingredients Critical For Success – No Matter What You Do!
1. Be Present to Win: You must show up and do the work if you want to win in life. You will not win through passivity.
2. Scare Yourself Every Day: If you don’t scare yourself every day you are not doing it right. Growth is scary. If you stick to your comfort zone and never reach beyond, you are stagnant.
3. Destruction Spawns Creation: Every act of creation is first an act of destruction ~ Picasso. From the smoldering remains of devastation can come the most inspiring acts of creation. Don’t be afraid to kill off the old and unproductive to make room for the new.
4. Habit is Often Not a Good Thing: Just because you’ve always done it that way doesn’t mean it’s not stupid. Take a look at things from a fresh perspective and you may just find that your a dumb ass, at least in regards to certain habits or behaviors. Don’t feel bad, we all are. The smart ones see it, and change it.
June 17, 2014
Quotable Tuesdays – Terry Pratchett
Terry Pratchett Quote
June 12, 2014
Sci Fi vs. Fantasy – Throw Down!
Fantasy and Sci Fi are often co-mingled, so much so that some folks (outsiders of course) think they are one genre! As a hard core fan of fantasy I often find this irritating, although I do recognize there are some benefits as well. But here it is… a Fantasy vs. Sci Fi throw down!
NOTE: Make sure you hover over the infogram, it’s interactive!
