Jaye Marie's Blog, page 1907

Are we going to Hell?

Paradise Lost...
Out in the garden, a mother blackbird is frantically trying to keep a fallen nestling safe, probably more than one. Her strident alarm call has been going on for two days now. Not constantly, but whenever a cat gets too near, or she thinks a danger warrants it.
This happens every year and usually ends in disaster.
It seems disaster lurks everywhere, just waiting for the opportunity to strike. This world is rapidly turning into a painful place, a place I don’t really want to be.
I tell myself it has to be my imagination, these incidents of terror and sadness cannot possibly be accelerating, but fear they are.
Just lately, it has been hard to concentrate on anything much, what with all the disasters. It seems every time you turn on the TV, something else has happened.
I’m sure we are all haunted by the scenes of slaughter on that far away beach in Tunisia, and now the tragedy in the UK.A plane taking part in an air show has just fallen out of the sky, not so far from where I live. Happy people were going about their lives when death pounced and took them away.
It would appear that none of us is really safe, disaster can strike at anytime, anywhere, and I want to run around like that mother blackbird, screaming a warning to keep us all safe.
But safety seems to be an illusion, perpetuated by the notion that these things simply cannot happen to you, not to ordinary people.
But it can. More often than not, the ordinary people suffer most.
How can we hope to rise above this misery, this depression, knowing our beautiful world is going to hell in a basket?

“The Road to Hell…

feels just like this...
…is paved with good intentions.”
We are told to learn the mantra ‘I am a writer’ to establish our resolve and determination.Well, yesterday I learned a new one…
I am in the early stages of revising… lovely word that, isn’t it?
What it really means is, you painstakingly hunt down and ferret out all the errors you were unaware of in the initial writing.
Normally I love to edit. Admittedly, up until recently, I have been editing other people’s work, but optimistic about editing my own work. Should be a piece of cake, I thought.
We are constantly reminded of the words your writing should never contain, not if you wish to appear intelligent and I was busy checking when the realisation hit me. I hadn’t written a single sentence without including at least one ‘was’ and sometimes more than once!
What could be wrong with me? I knew better than that, or at least I thought I did.
Just to be sure, I ended up checking all my previous edits. They were fine, so this must be a recent development. Another wrinkle my old brain had acquired? Could it be regressing, finally turning into a bowl of porridge?
Added to all this annoyance, the discovery that there is no easy replacement for this word. Some words can be substituted quite easily, but not this one.
Could it be possible my writing and editing days were almost over? It certainly felt that way.
(I found seven ‘was’ in this piece…now only three)
What faux pas do you make? (and what do you do about them?)

How to Beat the Meatgrinder…

I have been with Smashwords.com for some time now, and in a way, I like them better than I like Amazon. I sell more books on their site, for a start.
It’s a lot harder to upload your books with them, but that may be a good thing. I thought I had the formatting they insist upon down pat, so was not prepared for the trouble I had last week. 
Smashwords distribute your work to so many outlets in the US, including Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, WHSmith and far too many more to list here.  Apple had just decided to update their requirements, and my book failed.

 

If you haven’t tried them yet, you will want to know about something they call ‘The Meatgrinder’. If you don’t follow their instructions to the letter, this Meatgrinder will fail your book in record time. You will still be published on Smashwords, but not their premium list that gets all the lovely distribution.
As I say, been there, got the t-shirt, so when I received an email from them saying my book had failed, I was gobsmacked to say the least.They do tell you what is wrong, that’s if you can understand the lingo, so I changed a few things and tried to upload my book again. And again. Only to fail repeatedly. I didn’t understand, what was I doing wrong?
Nearly reached this point!








Almost at the point of pulling my hair out, I had an idea. I had uploaded all of Anita’s books before and they were fine. There had to be something different about mine. So I took a long hard look at all of them, just to see if there was a difference somewhere.I checked the font, headers, page breaks, paragraph returns, anything at all where I might have slipped up. But found no difference between my book and Anita’s.I wiped the formatting and did it again, with the same result.




Smashwords are very helpful, with all kinds of advice and instructions for you to solve the problem. They told me something called the EPUB was wrong and some other technical term was missing, none of which made any sense to me, being a dyed in the wool technophobe.

Then the phrase ‘chapter heads missing’ suddenly started to make sense. All of Anita’s books had proper chapter headings, where mine were just numbered. Could this be what was wrong? Surely not. How could a simple thing like this be causing all this trouble?
But it was. Once I put in the missing words, my book sailed through and would now be distributed far and wide…

Amazon Link for The Ninth Life...    amzn.to/1f7taIW

Help Wanted…

Amazon Link... amzn.to/1f7taIW


Have you ever had one of those days when you cannot make up your mind? Well, I must have broken every record for indecisiveness.
Normally, I know exactly what I want to do and how to get it, most of the time anyway. I usually come unstuck when my lack of ability lets me down. However, that was not the problem I was having.
 Cover choice...number one



Choosing a suitable cover for my first book, The Ninth Life, was difficult enough at the time, but once I saw that beautiful cat’s eye, I was sold.
Now that I am editing the sequel, The Ninth Death, I was pretty much prepared for the same thing. But I must have chosen dozens of covers by now, and loved them all for a while, only to realise I had not really found the perfect one at all. Or had I?

Or this one?The process was more difficult I think, because it was a sequel. Should sequels have similar covers? Or should they stand alone as someone once recommended?I double-checked this idea at length, only to discover that sometimes they do, but not always. Not exactly helpful…
(You will also notice that I've had fun with the title too...)
 So many times, I have found one, quite liked it and said it was passable and would do. But would you settle for ‘passable’?
 
No, and neither would I. Therefore, I am appealing to anyone who is passing, to see what you think and tell me. I have narrowed it down to a choice of two, although in my heart I think I know which one it will be…
Feel free to give me your verdict, whatever it is. I welcome all of you to give me your two pennorth!

#AmRevising (Part One)

After breathing a huge sigh of relief as I finished the first draft of ‘One Last Death’ last week, I finished the first read through yesterday.

And before you say it, I know you are supposed to wait a while, but I was keen to get started.I was pleased to discover that some parts were impressive, but there were several holes in the plot that would have to be addressed.

Now I love to edit and proof read, probably my schoolteacher head asserting itself, and usually just wade through from the beginning to the end.

This time though, I thought I would do it a little differently. As there are four, very different characters in ‘One Last Death’, I have separated all of their chapters and will concentrate on them one at a time. When I am satisfied that their stories and plotlines are suitably finished and complete, I will reassemble the book, ready for the third draft.
Not sure of the merit of this, never having done it this way before, but I am confident of my instincts and determined to see if it works.


See you next week for Part Two, to see if it’s working…

My Favourite Places x5… The Physic Garden, Petersfield.

One of my favourite places is actually in my hometown. Somewhere I love to visit whenever I can, just to recharge my batteries.
It is called a Physic Garden, some kind of garden left over from long ago and not a garden in the sense we use, but one full of medicinal and therapeutic plants and flowers.
It is quite large and walled on all sides. Obviously very old, as some of the walls are currently shored up with wood to stop them falling down, which is a shame, but would cost a small fortune to put right.
The last time I was there, I noticed some mistletoe growing quite low down on one of the oldest apple trees I have ever seen. Most of the plants and trees are ancient too, with some varieties I have never seen before, and all are helpfully labelled for your information.
It is an oasis of calm, in the middle of a busy town, and has saved my sanity on more than one occasion. I always manage to find something I have not noticed before, or sometimes just to sit and absorb the peace is enough.

The place is always full of birds and insects, and if you sit quietly on one of the many benches, it is like being in another world, in another time. One I usually prefer to the one outside, that’s for sure.
I always hate to leave and wish it were my garden, to be able to walk around it at any time of the day or night would be wonderful.

The Power of Books x4… Simple Says

There has been a lot of talk lately about bullying and how wrong it is. How damaging and cruel and all the places you find it. One of the worst places, I think, is inside the family unit.
Ordinary people, who wouldn’t dream of bullying in the general sense, can be guilty of the quite severe bullying of a family member. Most families have at least one relative whose modus operandi is to shoot people down. Usually condoned as ‘being for their own good.’As if nagging someone to the point of insanity can ever do any good.
Sometimes, even the kindest people think they have the right to do it, simply because they are family, especially if they think the recipient deserves it.
I am sure quite a lot of us have been on the receiving end of severe nagging that all too often can slide into bullying. There is a very fine line separating ‘helpful suggestions’ from the cruel taunting that is present in too many of our homes.
Here follows an excerpt from Simple Says by Anita Dawes, a story about such family bullying. Even more despicable in this case because the abused is a mentally challenged man, someone with the mind and heart of a child. Someone who only had one friend in the world, his half- sister, Leanne.


“Simple was almost well enough to leave, but Belle made us stay a few days more than we needed.  Said she liked the company.  As we left, she said I should come by some time, ‘Bring Simple if you want.  There’s a bed and food on the table whenever you have need of it.’I thanked Belle for her kindness and told her I understood there was more than one way of telling a story.  Simple was pulling at his ear, the way he did when Lizzie cries, or when his thoughts won’t settle or his mind won’t let him hold on to one long enough to say what he’s feeling.  He didn’t need to tell me, I could feel his fear alongside my own.  I took his hand, the one that didn’t want to let go of his ear and led him towards the clearing, to the path that would take us home.On the way, I told Simple Gran wouldn’t be mean to him no more, that I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt him again. We walked slowly; there was no need to hurry as I was in no rush to see Gran.  When we stopped every now and then to eat the food Belle had given us, I wondered how it would be.  Simple was still pulling at his ear, while trying to tell me Gran was gonna be mad at him. Then he said he couldn’t go back.  ‘Lizzie s-sad, Simple didn’t get b-baby.’It didn’t seem to matter what words I used, his mind was stuck on Lizzie having what she cried for.  Then it hit me.  I would work on Lizzie!  The thought came like a flash of lightning.  If I stopped her from carrying on, Simple would stay out of trouble.  I was feeling better about going back with every step we took.We needed to reach the caves before it got much darker.  I could feel rain coming and the need for sleep was slowing my body to a stumble.  We staggered on and finally saw the mouth of the caves.  I never thought the sight of them would be welcome, but it was a temporary haven.  Better than what awaited us at Gran’s.”
You can find more of Simple Says here…

Technophobes Beware!

Reposted from anitajaydawes…
 

When I started blogging in 2012 to promote our books, I knew it wouldn’t be easy. Not for me, anyway. They made it sound easy. Just choose one, click here and there, and you’re up and running.To start with, choosing which one to go with was not that easy. I wanted our blog to look amazing, be simple to use and not cost anything.
I tried a few before I got to Blogger, the one run by Google. Most of them said they were easy, and they probably are for most people, but my little brain seems to have a glitch.I have always had this glitch. People will try to explain things to me, but there will always be at least one little detail, that if I understood it, would make the whole thing make sense of all the others. Sometimes, after many attempts, the penny will drop. Now and again, it will refuse and I will have to give up.
 
Fortunately, I did succeed in setting up our first blog. After many false starts and dummy runs, several layout changes and mucking about in general, we had ourselves a reasonably attractive website. Domain and all.  I thought that was all I had to do. I posted regularly, but they were short and amateur. No images, and precious little imagination.Well, in my defence I was learning.
Now, some kind of communication is important for people like me, and before long, I realised that Blogger does not have the capability to answer any of my questions. You had to post your question to a forum and hope someone just like me had run up against the same problem and knew how to put it right.


  This brings me to my other problem. Whenever I do ask for help, the answers are usually so technical they mean nothing to me.Just lately, much has been said about the importance of your email list. Now, because there was a subscribe button on our blog, I mistakenly thought we had the makings of one. But I don’t think I do.The one that comes with the Blogger package is something called Feedburner, but as far as I can tell, it doesn’t do anything at all. There is no list, no information and no analytics. At this point, I wanted to run screaming and hide under the stairs. But, because I’m stubborn and want to succeed, I looked around for an alternative.  Mailchimp or Eweber were recommended most strongly as being, wait for it… simple to use…blah, blah.
I spent an entire afternoon with Mailchimp, shredding my nerves and any patience I had left, and got precisely nowhere. To be fair, it all went well, until I tried to import any lists I might have had already. They found none. More than two years of blogging and not one name.That was when I think Mailchimp went off me. I tried to move on, as they said building a list was easy. All I had to do was copy and paste this code into my blog to install the subscribe button. You could then run a campaign to attract more subscribers. You know, free books and stuff. Sounded great, but when I tried to set this up, it refused, saying that I had no list to send campaign to. Duh?
That was when I gave up; resigned to the fact I had probably gone as far as I could. Same old story really. Close, but no cigar.
Now, I say I have given up, that the blog will have to do as is, but I know I will probably have another go, just to see if I can make it work. This is how I have ever gotten anywhere, but boy it gets me down sometimes.
Maybe I should just retire for real and get out my knitting, but I know I’m not quite ready for that yet.
Any one else have this much fun?

Well, how do you know if you are a writer?

posted by Jaye Marie...



 

I have been pondering on that question for quite a while now, probably because I have been trying very hard to convince myself that this is what I am. And before all you proper writers gang up on me, I know this is not the way to behave. The greatest obstacle I must overcome is not believing in myself.

However, knowing this has not helped me much this week. I have been writing, actually finished ‘The Ninth Life’ last year but not sure if what I write is any good. On a good day I do, but I don't get too many of them these days. I should know better, because I read a lot and do know a good book when I see one.

What I would love to know, does everyone else feel like this at some stage? Or is my brain too old (at 71 years) to obey my feeble instruction to come up with remarkable fiction content?

Now don't get me wrong, I quite like the novel I have written and the sequel is shaping up well. I think I have the plot nailed down. I even have an ending of sorts. Then the blues descend and I think it is all rubbish and that I should go back to playing solitaire on my PC.

Here's where I am grateful that I am incredibly stubborn.  I can do a complete about turn, and be determined to finish what I have started. I just wish these dark days would sod off and leave me to my scribbling because most of the time I am blissfully happy trying to create something I have never done before.

Anita thinks I am quite mad. (This is nothing new by the way; she has always known that I am bonkers!) She says I should shut up moaning and just get on with it. Apparently, she never has any moments of doubt, she totally believes in her characters ability to write the story for her. In fact, she says that her only problem was keeping up with them!

I can testify to her ability, as I am the one who edits her manuscripts, so maybe she is right. My characters did rally round, so maybe between us we manage to create something good? I hope so, because I need to finish the sequel…



P.S Would anyone like to share his or her writing experiences with me?

The Rose…

The rose stands in the garden, bareNo petals on the ground.The winter took her flowers awayNo perfume to be found.
Silver frost on sharp thornsCold and silent is the air.Spring is indeed a long way offMemories of when she was fair.
Of long summer daysAnd the heat of the sun.The soft dew on her faceAnd the bees having fun.
Now the warmth has all goneShe stands naked and cold.Waiting patiently all winterShe slowly grows old.
But she will not lose her beautyThough time comes and goes.Each summer is a miracle,A peaceful, lovely rose.
Written by Jaye Marie 1970