Liz Meldon's Blog, page 8

Stereotypical Writing Resolutions Post

Hello one and all! A very Happy New Year from the writing crew over here (aka me)!

So, it’s finally 2015, and it’s about time I got my act together as a blogger. When I first made this website, I had high hopes of blogging frequently. For some reason, I thought I was capable of coming up with witty, interesting, and intelligent posts that would bring readers to my website in droves.

I was, of course, sadly mistaken. If 2014 taught me anything, it’s that I have big ideas, but I’m actually pretty lazy about executing them. I mean, sure, I can make myself focus to get freelance jobs done. Last year I wrote seven novellas for freelance clients. I also wrote and published a book, and continue to update a rather popular piece of fanfiction. But when it comes to interacting and reaching out to others on social media, I’m still a bit of a dud.

Hopefully, things will change this year. I’ve set up a blogging schedule for this month, just to see if it’s manageable. I’d like to post an entry every five days, though I think I should probably get some themes going to make all this easier for myself. Who knows? Even though I’ve been online in various forms since I was twelve, I sometimes still feel extremely inept when it comes to social media. I guess it’s because I’ve always been a lurker. I like to watch, then retreat to my own domain and have fun by myself.

And just FYI, that’s no way to build an audience—or friendships. Time for a change! Time to stop being lazy!

I realize that most resolutions for a new year are broken fairly fast, so I’ve decided to set myself some doable writing goals for the upcoming year. Will I be able to meet them all? Maybe. Hopefully. But I won’t beat myself up if I don’t.

And so, without further ado, may I present Liz Meldon’s Writing Resolutions:

- Blog more often: see above.

- Publish two books for my Lovers and Liars series: I feel that this one is a bit of a cop-out, since I already have The Vampire of Vancouver slated to be released in February. Whatever. It’ll still be two more books published for the series by the end of the year, so I’m not complaining.

- Write two standalones, potentially publish both: I’d like to give readers a chance to enjoy my work beyond the Lovers and Liars series. I’m aware Norse and Greek gods aren’t for everyone. I do, however, love the paranormal romance genre, so you can fully expect the standalones to fit squarely in there.

- Take on more freelance work: If possible, I’d like to do another couple of freelance jobs once I finish the ones I’m working on currently. The pay is pretty good, and I haven’t had to use any of my own money to self-publish thus far. I’d like to keep it that way.

So, there we go. Four resolutions that will guide my 2015 writing schedule.

Here’s to hoping my tendonitis-addled wrists hold up in the meantime!

2015

Happy New Years, everyone! Hope this year is fruitful and fun.

Will your book be on sale for Christmas? Debuting in December?

Hi all!

As you may or may not know, I promote people for free on my author's website. My ads run for an entire month, and I usually make the occasional tweet about all my wonderful promos.

For November, I featured talented editors and proofreaders--people you need on your team if you have any hopes to get a book published. You can check them out here , on my promos page. Who knows, maybe you'll find the right person for your piece of word art!

For December, I'd like to feature books that will either be on sale for the holidays, debuting sometime during the month, or are Christmas themed.

Kind of expected and cliche?

Don't care. I want 'em. I'd like to feature twelve books total, and will take them on a first come, first serve basis.

All I need from you is the following:
- your cover art
- the book's info (title, author)
- a link to an online retailer

Because of the way the spacing works on my promo page, I can't feature descriptions--just the title and author, unfortunately.

Message me for more details! Can't wait to find some awesome books to host.

Calling all editors, proofreaders, and other awesome folk!

Do you edit? Proofread? Beta?

I'd love to host you on my website in November. It's totally free, and I keep your name, website, and a snazzy photo up there for a whole month.

Don't believe me? Take a gander at my promos page. Everyone who is featured is spectacular and talented, and I want to get you some more traffic to your website.

Interested?

Message me!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Turkey Day, fellow Canadians! Today's the one day that Dean Winchester and I have something in common:



Love me some pie. Pumpkin pie is always necessary, but I suppose raspberry and apple are suitable substitutes.

Have a lovely, relaxing day, everyone!

Hurray for October!

Happy October, everyone!

Not only is today the first day of my favourite month of the year, it’s the first day of new promotions up on my website. I have Cruel, by Ashley R. Carlson—a short, tense sci-fi read that had me flying through it. It’s really well done, so I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a fast, tension-filled read. I also have three wonderful books from Rooster and Pig, a super fun and friendly publisher I met through twitter. They’ve been so wonderful submitting books for me to promo every month, and I’m happy to give their authors as much exposure as I can.

So, give my promos page a look—all three are on sale! What’s better than discounted books? Not much, I can tell you that.

You know, the deeper I fall into the clutches of my various social media platforms, the more I realize that my love for October isn’t all that unique. My tumblr dashboard was filled to the brim with October posts today, many of them celebrating the impending Halloween holiday. I’ve always been a fan of the night: the actor in me loved dressing up in ridiculous costumes, and the fatty in me loved trick-or-treating for hours on end, then plopping down in my bedroom to eat my candy. This year, the man and I are sort of dieting, but I’m still wholly amped to pig out on Halloween (with candy I’ll probably buy, let’s be real).

My goal this year is to watch every single Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episode possible on the 31st. I did it before when I was younger, and obviously there were less seasons to blitz through, but it was one of my favourite Halloweens. This was when I was a preteen, I believe, and living in the Middle East where no leaves change and no crisp autumn air takes hold. Canadians introduced trick-or-treating to my compound over there, which eventually turned into a big hit—how could it not?

My old middle/high school even did a little Halloween carnival. Everyone would get dressed up, some of the corridors would be a haunted house with decorated classrooms, and there would be food and bouncy castles on the back field. Unfortunately, the PTA involved with running it was slowly infiltrated by a group of South African moms, and if you know South Africans, they’re not huge on the Halloween holiday as a whole. The carnival was slowly changed to the “Fall Costume Carnival”, and it lost a bit of its edge.

Ah well. By then, I was sneaking costumes out of the drama department and partying like a grown-up with all my high school buds—I had no time for school-organized frivolity.

Hmm. This post has taken a long-winded turn. I guess I just wanted to update everyone on what’s happening this month, and why I love this month so freakin’ much (Canadian Turkey Day, Halloween, and the weather, basically). Aside from my usual monthly promotions, I’m hoping to find five or six authors I can do review swaps with for Maenad, preferably indie. I’ll get another post going on it at some point, but if you’re out there writing romance, paranormal, or erotica, I’m coming for you.

As always, November reservations for a promotion on my website are officially open! I’ll take an author’s website, pinterest, tumblr, twitter, book—anything and everything is welcome here.

In other exciting news, The Vampire of Vancouver is currently with my beta reader, and I’m chugging along just fine with it. Later this month, Maenad will be on a review tour through the Literati Author Services, which I’ll promote as it happens—so very excited to get some more opinions on the novella.

Also nervous, but that can’t be helped.

Keep an eye out for a cute post on my new life with a certain four-legged terror—along with some pictures. I’m in the midst of two ghostwriting gigs, both contemporary romances, while also waiting on a client who has gone silent on me since accepting the job. Super fun. Full plate for me over here, but I’m pushing myself to be more active this month—last month’s blogging was dreadful.

Thanks for sticking around, everyone, and I’ll be chatting with you soon!

Happy One Month, Maenad!

As of Saturday, September 20th (aka tomorrow!), The Maenad of Manhattan is one month old! First novella in the Lovers and Liars series, this paranormal erotic romance features Aphrodite and Loki thrust into the modern world, both struggling to cope with their diminishing status as gods. Plus a homicidal maenad. And a healthy dose of Loki porn smut.

I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank all the wonderful folks who have supported me over the last month. I’ve had lots of lovely people leave reviews, grab a sample download, and even buy the book.

It seems fitting to announce now that the second book, The Vampire of Vancouver, has just entered the revision and editing process. It’s a bundle of fun, and I’m excited to keep the series going. This book is more novel-length than its predecessor, and I can’t wait to eventually share it with everyone.

If you’d like to grab a copy for $1.99, there are lots of places to find it:

Amazon

Barnes and Nobles

iTunes

Smashwords

Not sure? Worried about risking your money on a debut author? No problem. Check out the reviews here on Goodreads to see what other readers are saying about it. Or just grab a free sample from any of the retailers.

Are you an indie author too? I’m doing a review swap promotion for October, and I’d love to swap books if you write romance (any genre other than western), chick-lit, erotica, or young adult!

My Worst Freelance Experience... Ever

I’ve been a freelance writer for about a year now. I don’t do it full-time, and I’m usually pretty selective about the projects I work on. For the most part, I tackle ghostwriting, beta reading, and the occasional proofreading gig here and there. I like freelancing. I like that it funds my self-pub bank account, and the projects have, for the most part, been a lot of fun. My clients have always been polite and prompt, and some have asked to work with me for multiple jobs.

But that’s not what I’m here to talk about.

No, I’m here to talk about my most horrifying experience with freelancing… ever.

I mean, so far. I’d like to think it can’t get any worse than that, and I chalk a lot of the ridiculousness up to my own naivety with freelance work. This happened a few years ago, back when I was still an undergraduate and looking for ways to expand my writing portfolio—before I discovered we actually had a writing program at my university.

Right. So a few years back, naïve-me was perusing the local media and creative ads on kijiji. Anything and everything that had to do with writing was volunteer work (as a lot of gigs are these days), so imagine my shock and surprise when I found an ad that was calling for fictional ghostwriters—and offering to pay $30 per page.

Just let that sink in. I thought someone out there. Would pay. Me. $30. Per page. To write for them.

I was thrilled, obviously. I applied right away, forking over some of my smuttier fanfiction pieces, as this was a smut-related gig. Basically, the whole premise was that clients would email the owners of this… company (?) scenarios that they’d like to see, and the job would then be forwarded to a ghostwriter to write.

Seems… kind of legit?

I was put in contact with the owner of the site fairly fast, and he gave me a trial story to run with. I was blown away. If I could make $30 per page for a 15-page story, I could quit my day job. Write full-time. I’d be rolling in cash. Fuck university, amirite?

I churned out my first story in about a week, leaving my wrists in a world of hurt, but feeling rather accomplished. Feeling professional.

And he loved my piece. I’d needed to do a bunch of research to make it specific to the request, and he thought I did a great job. That day, he emailed over a contract, and I printed it out to sign.

Now, let me break down the terribleness of this contract. First of all, it was a single page, and the majority of said page was taken up by a picture of some books on a shelf. Below it were, if I recall, two sentences that said all work belonged to this company, and the writer would receive $30 compensation per page. Just like he promised.

It was real. It was happening. I signed it, photocopied it, and then sent it back. Within a week, I had my first real job, and within another week I was sending my story in. A few days passed, and the owner emailed me to let me know the client liked my story—but there could have been more sex. Whatever. Fine. I’m just a writer, not an editor. I’d do better on the next one.

It was time to fatten up my bank account, please.

I then received an email with a link to a chatroom, and the owner asked if I could meet up on there to talk with other people who worked for him later that day. I was… a little turned off by the idea, but I figured I’d give it a shot. I signed in with the username and password he gave me, and was immediately swarmed by random users wanting to strike up a conversation, none of whom had realistic names.

So I waited. If I remember correctly, the owner had given me a screen-name of one of his employees to chat with, and when he logged on, I started a chat with him.

It was then that I learned what I was supposed to be doing. On top of writing smutty stories for clients, I was now expected to roleplay sex scenes in an online chatroom, and all the users who had bombarded me were clients waiting to play.

Uh. No.

The initial ad for the job had made no mention of this, and when I politely declined, saying I was only interested in writing the stories, the employee tried to get me to play out a scene anyway—just to see if I’d like it. No. No thanks. I said it over and over again. I said I didn’t have time to spend on this between school and work and my other writing (plus a meagre social life). I was polite initially. I grew firmer the more he fought me.

So he fired me on the spot and kicked me out of the chatroom. I was then contacted by the owner, who said the employee told him I’d been very disrespectful and rude, and was officially fired.

… What?!

I sent an email back saying that that was incorrect, that I just wasn’t interested in roleplaying, and he sent me a succinct response.

“Contact me again and I’ll call the police.”

… I just. I can't even.

I don’t even know where to begin to say how incredibly awful this whole experience was for me. My wrists were in agony after pushing myself through the two stories, and all thoughts of being able to quit my part-time snooze-fest of a job went up in flames. I was devastated.

And obviously totally unaware of how freelancing worked. When I look back at it now, I have serious doubts that I’d see any money from all this, especially not $30 per page. Thankfully, I didn’t let the ordeal sour me to freelancing. When university came to an end, I found a legitimate site to work from, with rules and regulations and amazing staff in place to ensure freelancers don’t get screwed over.

Take this tale as a lesson, kiddos. Contracts should not be majority stock image and two sentences long. You should discuss payment up front, and usually find a way to either get half before the job is started, or at least work with a site that handles escrow (which involves the client putting your payment in a secure holding area so that you know you’ll be paid). No work should be given without your pay in sight. It’s fine that a client wants to look over a rough draft or send a final copy back for edits, but you should always be paid for your time and effort.

Oh, and don’t let unprofessional douchebags push you around. Ever.

Just Keep Swimming

I feel like today is the first day I can come up for air before being sucked back into the Sea of Self-Publishing.

It's been a little over two weeks since The Maenad of Manhattan has been published. Today, however, everything is officially on sale. Smashwords and Amazon both have it listed as $1.99, though I know some of Smashwords's premium retailers still have it listed as free--I suspect it will take some time to get everything on the same page.

Thus far, self-publishing has been all-consuming. I feel that if you did your research beforehand, you can expect to feel like this has become a part-time job for you, and that's exactly where I am. I'm lucky, in a way, that my work has such frugal hours to dish out to their staff lately. I mean, I'm not exactly padding my bank account with much, but at least I can market my book. I can work on its sequel. I can make fun graphics to promote the series. I can... wait for readers? Yeah, that's it.

I've met a lot of wonderful indie authors in this process, and I'm sure you'll see them make an appearance at one time or another on my website promo page. This month we have Rosanna Leo, Deirdre Riordan Hall, Ashley R. Carlson, and Kelly Clemmons promoting their work, and I'm thrilled to have them.

As for myself, I'm still trying to grasp marketing techniques that work for me. I have a huge fear as coming across as someone who is just screaming, "BUY MY BOOK, PEASANTS!", and that's not cool. I feel, so far, the best way to garner readers is to be a reader. I've been fortunate enough to find a lot of really talented indie authors since I started looking, and some of them have been kind of enough to give Maenad a look too. It's not a requirement. It's not a marketing strategy that guarantees results, but it feels like the most fun and the most natural to me.

Some other things I've learned about self-publishing so far:

- Don't publish your book on the day you advertise--do it the night before. It seems to take most distributors a little while to get everything sorted, and it's easy to feel like a big ol' spotlight is resting on you while you twiddle your thumbs and wait for everything to sort itself out.

- Smashwords price changes take a little while to reach premium distributors.

- You get to tackle fun tax situations as an indie author, even if you aren't an American. Note to self: get an EIN.

- Checking and refreshing your book stats is borderline obsessive and unhealthy behaviour. Stop it, you.

- Book reviewers are swamped, and you probably won't hear back from the majority that you email. It's like querying agents, but not quite as disheartening.

All in all, I'm happy (so far) that I chose to self-publish. A lot of my fanfiction readers were able to enjoy my work for free, and I had a heavy hand in the final product. I may be singing a different tune in a few months, but for now, I'm just enjoying the ride.

Sometimes.

September Promos!

Hello everyone!

I don't think I've been active on Goodreads long enough for some of my newer readers to know, but I do free month-long promos on my author's site for indie authors, cover designers, graphic artists, etc.

This month features Rosanna Leo's Predator's Claim and Deirdre Riordan Hall's Mirrored, among others, so go have a look!

If you want your book, website, portfolio, tumblr, etc. advertised in October, feel free to message me or comment here. Always love to showcase talented people!