Joshua Caleb's Blog: The Wryter Chronicles, chronicles, page 2

Amazon Prepares “Kindling” ebooks

[image error]Amazon has announced yet another form of ebook for reader consumption: the Kindle Singles. These are to be shorter works, generally of 1ok to 30k words. In other words, bigger than a blog post but smaller than novel, almost like a novella. They say this will encourage authors to write intelligent works of “natural length” and not be forced to condense or artificially lengthen their ideas to meet marketing demands.

Amazon has put the call out to “serious” authors, scientists, politicians, business leaders, historians, and publishers for pieces. The interesting thing here is that they are reaching out to writers directly, completely bypassing publishers. This is likely due to the fact that this is a somewhat new format (for ebooks and this era) and may not be covered in author-publisher contracts so Amazon doesn’t have to deal with the curmudgeon-y publishers and their old-school thinking. A very smart move and likely highly profitable for both Amazon and the writers. Interested parties are to contact digital-publications@amazon.com

The possibilities of this format are nearly endless, from bringing the revival of the serialized novel, to political manifestos and scientific essays to the masses.

As for price, nothing has been set, but Amazon did mention that the price will be “much less than that of an ebook” .

I personally think this is a great move on Amazon’s part, it really opens up the field for writers and other “thinkers” to publish content quickly and easily. I’m especially intrigued by the serialized novel aspect and could see myself participating in that segment.

So what do you think? Is this completely and utterly boring or the revival of a dead format you’ve been waiting for? Sound off in the comments.

Amazon Prepares "Kindling" ebooks

[image error]Amazon has announced yet another form of ebook for reader consumption: the Kindle Singles. These are to be shorter works, generally of 1ok to 30k words. In other words, bigger than a blog post but smaller than novel, almost like a novella. They say this will encourage authors to write intelligent works of "natural length" and not be forced to condense or artificially lengthen their ideas to meet marketing demands.

Amazon has put the call out to "serious" authors, scientists, politicians, business leaders, historians, and publishers for pieces. The interesting thing here is that they are reaching out to writers directly, completely bypassing publishers. This is likely due to the fact that this is a somewhat new format (for ebooks and this era) and may not be covered in author-publisher contracts so Amazon doesn't have to deal with the curmudgeon-y publishers and their old-school thinking. A very smart move and likely highly profitable for both Amazon and the writers. Interested parties are to contact digital-publications@amazon.com

The possibilities of this format are nearly endless, from bringing the revival of the serialized novel, to political manifestos and scientific essays to the masses.

As for price, nothing has been set, but Amazon did mention that the price will be "much less than that of an ebook" .

I personally think this is a great move on Amazon's part, it really opens up the field for writers and other "thinkers" to publish content quickly and easily. I'm especially intrigued by the serialized novel aspect and could see myself participating in that segment.

So what do you think? Is this completely and utterly boring or the revival of a dead format you've been waiting for? Sound off in the comments.

PubIt! or Shove it?

Barnes & Nobel has just opened up its own self-publishing ebook platform, PubIt! This is similar to Amazon's Digital Text Platform and Smashword.com

The process is relatively simple and similar to other e-publishing services. You upload your doc/txt/rtf/html file, BN will convert the file to epub, and within a matter of days your book will be available to purchase on the Nook or any of the BN e-reader apps.

Now there are some distinct differences in this service. The biggest of which is the royalty split. If your book is priced between $2.99 and $9.99 you will get a 65% cut of the sales. If you book falls outside of that margin, your royalty falls to 40%. By comparison, Amazon's DTP offers a 70% cut if your book is priced at $2.99 or higher. If it's lower than that you only get 35%. (Amazon also has other restrictions and don't offer a conversion tool) Apple and other platforms also use the standard 70/30 split when doling out royalties. It's kind of an odd move for B&N; they almost seem to be marketing this at indie authors who want to charge less for their ebooks to get them to the masses, while penalizing bigger names who want to charge premiums on their books. Are they trying to foster self-publishing indies or stifle their growth by capping their royalties based on their list price?

Then, for comparison's sake, there's Smashwords.com They offer a third, very compelling option if you're looking to self-publish your ebook. There, you upload your doc file and it will be converted into every e-book format imaginable plus, if you meet their formatting guidelines (clearly laid out in a pdf manual) your book will be distributed to Amazon kindle, BN e-bookstore, Sony's e-bookstore, Apple ibooks, Kobo, Stanza, Diesel ebooks, etc. This is a great all-in-one e-publishing option that offers competitive royalty splits (differing for each retail outlet) and is currently the only way (that I'm currently aware of) to self-publish your books on Apple iBooks.

So which platform are you most interested in? Does the strange royalty split turn you off? Or do you prefer Amazon's larger user base and global distribution. Sound off in the comments. I use both DTP and Smashwords for more granular control over my book and might also try out PubIt! and see what they're about.

 

image via google images.

My apologies

My apologies to any who follow this blogsite as I haven't updated it for some time. I've been sick this past week, so my brain has been all but non-functional :/ But now that I am recovered, I should be able to get back into the swing of things:)

First off, I've been contemplating the merits of book trailers. With the pending completion of my next novel and the continuing marketing struggle with my current one, I've been thinking of more/alternate ways to "get the word out" as it were. One option that is becoming somewhat popular, is the 'book trailer'. Basically it is a audio/video preview of your book, using either live actors, animation, or often simple slideshows. I've done this with Warped & Wired using video game machinima techniques. I've thought about doing it again for my next book, but am curious about the actual impact.

Do you like when books have video previews or does it just seem pointless because it's a book? Do you like more action-oriented videos or a more text-based, descriptive slideshow?

I accept any and all feedback so please sound off in the comments.

The Present Past: A Grammatical Hybrid

Today I'd like to present you with an interesting writing style that has no doubt been done before but one I've never seen: The Present-Past tense hybrid.

I'm sure most everyone is aware of the different tenses that we write and speak, present and past being the most common; "he runs to car" or "he ran to the car". The one I've used most in my writing is of course, past-tense. While technically relating to events that have already happened, it conveys a surprising amount of immediacy within the novel.

But of course, I like to experiment with new, bizarre ways of writing so I came up with this idea of writing a novel and switching between tenses. Not will-nilly of course, but when the action intensifies, the tense changes to present while the normal narrative stayed past-tense. (see how I just did that?:)

Here's a sample of what I'm talking about: (it's an early prototype so the style/grammar will be buggy) Tell me what you think. Is it too jarring? Does present tense still carry the same immediacy? Let me know in the comments.

 

Sometime, in the not too distant past, there lived in the heart of California, four children by the name of Eagleana.

Now by all outside appearances, they would seem to be perfectly normal and happy children. But in fact, this was quite the contrary. Of course they all had their fears, like most children do. Jay, the oldest, was afraid of failure; particularly failing to protect his siblings. Joy, the next oldest, was afraid of change, or anything new. Jason, the next-to youngest, was always afraid of being rejected or turned down. And Jamie, the youngest, was afraid of heights, but not much else.

But all of these fears were overshadowed by a much greater fear. A fear that tormented them day and night. A fear of shadows in the darkness; a fear of any sudden movements behind them in the daylight; and a fear of strangers that came within two feet a distance of them.

Now this may sound a bit silly for a group of children, the oldest of whom is sixteen and the youngest twelve. But, if your father was a renowned police detective, a profession that doesn't exactly bring a large repertoire of friends and whose enemies usually try to exact their revenge by threatening their antagonist's family, you wouldn't find these fears quite unfounded.

Now this story starts during the heat of a California summer. It was dusk and their mother was at her night job and the sitter (or, more accurately, the bodyguard.) hadn't arrived just yet. So they all were passing the time in the enclosed swimming pool room. Jay was reading The Art of War, Joy was busy painting butterflies on her easel, Jason was working with some gadget he had invented, and Jamie was swimming laps.

It was then that they heard a noise.

Joy jerked her head up. "Say, did you hear that?" Joy asked standing up. She was often the one who frightened easiest.

"Sounded like the front door knob." Jason responded his head still bent.

"It must be the sitter then." Jay said, laying his book down.

"Then why is the knob still rattling?" Joy asked moving closer to the glass door that separated the pool from the rest of the house.

"Maybe she forgot her key." Jay reasoned. But he also got up and moved closer to the door and looked down the hall toward the front entry.

"Then she would've rang the doorbell, or called." Joy countered.

"Maybe she's having trouble with her key? If the key isn't inserted at the correct angle or the lock mechanism is off, it can cause a minor jam." Jason replied, he too moving toward the door.

"What's wrong?" Jamie asked emerging from the water. They all gave a start.

"Someone's rattling the door knob." Joy replied.

"Then shouldn't someone go see who it is?" Jamie asked. They all looked at each other.

"The lights are off, Joy, you have the darkest clothes, you go check." Jay said. Joy, after looking at everyone, slowly crept down the hall toward the door. Approaching the door, she pressed herself against the nearby wall and carefully pulled the cyan colored curtain back and peeked outside.

With a muffled shriek, she dashes back to the pool.

"What? What's wrong?" Jay grabs Joy to keep her from falling forward into the pool. Gasping for breath, Joy tries to speak.

"There's……there's……men…….outside," Joy gasps. As if on cue, the front door bursts open.

"Hide!" Jay commands. They all dive down the different hallways. Joy dashes into her room and leaps into the closet. Jay runs upstairs to the open loft overlooking the entryway. Jason disappears into his room filled with a plethora of finished and unfinished contraptions and inventions. Jamie sprints for cover in the master bedroom.

They all waited in their hiding places, not daring to breath. They listened intently for any signs that the men were near their concealment. With every bump or noise that they made, they were sure the men would discover them.

At last they heard noises coming from the entry as the men began their search. Now I will only mention the names of the men, since they only appear once in the story.

"All right." Bach, the toughest one says. "Chips disabled the security, but only for fifteen minutes, so let's grab the kids and get out." They all split up and start rummaging through the house. Bob dashes into Joy's bedroom. He searches through the room, finally coming upon the closet. Opening the door he looks inside to see jeans and shirts hanging up in neat pairs. He notices a pair of shoes sitting underneath one pair of jeans as he closes the door. Shrugging, he leaves the room.

Bill and Bash creep into the master bedroom flashing their light around the room. One of their lights hit upon shiny wet hair in a corner. They both turn their lights onto Jamie huddled in the corner, sitting in a puddle of water. Her eyes widen as they approach

"Hey, what do we have here?" says Bill.

"Why don't you come with us, were good friends of your father." says Bash holding out his hand. Jamie stares at them, her eyes wide. Then her eyes narrow and she charges forward socking Bash in the stomach. He keels over, howling in pain.

"Hey!" Bill grabs Jamie. She twists around and kicks him in the shin. Howling, he lets go and falls against the wall as Jamie dashes out into the hall.

On the other side of the house, Beckle opens the door into Jason's room. He steps inside onto a lever in front of the door. He hears a click and a whir, then a sproing and a bucket of blocks dump onto his head. Stumbling backward, a board swings down and smacks him in the face sending him sprawling back into the hall.

"What happened?" Bach asks approaching him. "Was anyone in there?"

"Uhhhh…..No." Beckle quickly replies as the door swings closed. Bach turns, walking into the living room just as Jamie dashes in, pursued by Bash and Bill.

"Hey!" Bach grabs Jamie arm just Bill grabs her other arm. "All right, let's just go. One's enough." They start dragging Jamie toward the door. Jay looks over the balcony above, quickly surveying the scene. Then, picking up a decorative figure from a table he hurls it at a floor lamp in the family room below. It falls to the ground causing the men to turn toward the sound. Then Jay leaps over the railing and swoops down upon the group. He lands on Bach, taking Bill and Bash down with him to the carpet. Jay rolls off them and scrambles to his feet. The door bangs open as several more men rush in.

"Get the girl!" Bach shouts. Bash grabs Jamie and starts dragging her toward the door. Jay leaps forward and tackles Jamie, freeing her from Bash. Bash turns to grab her again but a rope snaps in his face. With a cry of pain, he clutches his face. Jay looks to see Jason standing some distance away with a length of rope around another contraption. Two men start for Jason. He tries to fight them off, but they grab him and start dragging him to the door. Joy stands helplessly off to the side.

"Jay!" she cries. From the pile of men on the floor Jay looks up.

"What?" he asks struggling to keep the men off Jamie.

"They're getting Jason!"

"So do something!" Jay shouts. Joy looks bewildered. She timidly starts toward the fray when sirens begin to blare outside. Everyone freezes.

"Perfect," Bach says. "Now we got hostages." Seizing the moment, Jay and Jason pull back and shove the men forward. As they stumble forward, Jay pulls Jamie down to the floor further tripping the men out the door. Jason leaps forward and slams the door, bolting it.

 

 

Live Web-Cast Writing?

I recently had an interesting idea that I wanted to bounce off my fans/followers and the world in general: would you watch me write my next novel, live via Ustream, with an open google doc to read and a chatroom to comment/question in? I know people will watch almost anything, I just wanted to know how many would actually want to watch. For me it could be a great way to connect with current/potential fans as well as provide motivation(for myself:) and a sounding board for any ideas.

So, would you like to watch/help me write my next novel? Let me know in the comments or on twitter @JoshuaCaleb75

"That's What She Said," He Said Crossly, Crossing His Arms and Tapping His Foot…..

Dialogue. The primary means of communication for human beings. Even your novel characters must you this to converse with each other. So, it should be easy, right? We all know how to talk, so writing dialogue should be a snap. Welllll…… It's not quite that simple. Let's say you did transpose a conversation from real-life, into your story, (adding the proper denotations to signal who is speaking of course) it might look something like this:

John walked up to the coffee machine. Frank was already filling his mug. "Hey Frank," John said.

"Hey John," Frank said. "How are you?"

"Doing okay," John said. "How about you?"

"All right," Frank said. "The kid broke his arm trying to climb our old tree."

"Oh, that's too bad," John said.

"Yeah," Frank said. "Kids sometimes do the stupidest things."

"Yeah, but ya gotta love em," John said.

I don't know about you, but I'm on the edge of my seat. (insert sarcasm) Okay, I'm being very extreme with this example, but you get the idea. Turns out, a lot of the conversations we have with other people can be downright boring. Not to worry though, we can spice, slice and dice up character dialogue so your readers hang on each word spok–er–written.

First step, get rid of those darn saids. 'Said' is an empty word. All it does is denote who is talking, and often is unnecessary. An alternate route would be to use said-isms: "He shouted. He sighed. He growled. He whispered" The problem is, if overused, it can become worse than just using 'said'. Since 'said' is an empty word, it often fades into the background, becoming invisible to most readers. But it's still there, taking up space.

Of course, an even better alternative is to use action to denote who is talking: "What'd you do that for?" Frank ran to the base of the tree.

Another alternative, similar to the action tags, would be no speech tags whatsoever. This only works in some instances, usually when only two people are talking and it's obvious who said what:

"Hey Frank, how are you?" John asked.

"Good, how about you?"

"Doing okay, how about those Red Socks?"

It basically comes down to using everything in moderation. A couple said-isms here, some action tags there, no tags over there, maybe an occasional adjective here for good measure. And of course we need something interesting to talk about as well. Let's try it:

John walked up to the coffee machine where Frank was already filling his mug. "Hey Frank," John greeted his friend.

"Hey John." Frank plunked the coffee pot down. "How are you?"

"Doing great. How about you?"

Frank sighed. "All right. Jimmy broke his arm trying to climb our old tree."

"Oh, that's not good. Is he okay? Are you okay?" John put his arm on Frank's shoulder. Frank was having money trouble and the last thing he needed was a big medical bill. Not to mention what the poor kid was going through.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Frank shook his head despite his positive answer. "Kids. Sometimes I wonder where their brain is at."

"Yeah, but ya gotta love em." John said reassuringly.

See what we did? Took out nearly all the saids, replaced them with some said-isms, threw in some action tags or just left the speech tag empty. Plus we needed to give them something interesting to talk about, so I increased the conflict about the boy breaking his arm and how it was affecting the father. Pretty neat, huh?

This is a very basic example of what you can do to improve your dialog. For more inspiration, try reading some of your favorite authors and see how they write dialog. Find one that suits your style and implement it in your story. Your readers will swear they're listening to a real conversation.

The Wryter Chronicles book 2 update

Just a quick update on the status of the Warped & Wired sequel. I'm currently about halfway done with the second draft. After that it should just need some polish and trimming before publication:D I'm trying to work extra hard to get it out by/before the end of the year, so here's hoping everything goes according to plan:) I should be able to post a few sample chapters in the near future to whet your appetite for the exciting adventure to come.

In the meantime, be sure to read the first book in the series, Warped & Wired or explore this site and learn all about the exciting world within my novels.

Extras! Extras!

Read all about it! I've started uploading various short story betas I have lying around my hard drive. These are short stories that never made public release and are available to read in the "Extras" section on the top nav bar. Be warned though, these stories are still in beta so there may be grammar glitches, plot holes, and spelling bugs. Read at your own risk;)

Enjoy!

Warped & Wired paperback only $7!

Greetings bookworms and ebook geeks:) Great news! I have slashed the price of Warped & Wired: The Wryter Chronicles: book 1 on my site to $7! Just use the code: ZTVN6L3Q to get the 50% discount!

Read it, Rate it, Share it

www.TheWryterChronicles.com