Deby Fredericks's Blog, page 71

Daily Science Fiction

Today I’m talking about one of my favorite online magazines, Daily Science Fiction. As the name implies, they publish one story every day, five days a week. Their stories span the spectrum of the genre — science fiction, fantasy, horror, and odd things in between. The link above is to Friday’s story, a mother’s bittersweet take on Portal Fantasies. But every day is different, you never know what it will be, and for me that’s part of the pleasure.

Subscribing to Daily Science Fiction is free, and I’ve been getting their stories for three or four years now. Yet, despite being free to the reader, Daily Science Fiction is a paying market. They pay the SFWA standard. In fact, it’s one of my dream markets. Any time I write something that might fit their length, I submit to them first. So far, they haven’t taken anything of mine, but hope springs eternal. They say you should read the publications you want to sell to, after all.

You might see a small conflict here. The site pays writers, but readers don’t have to pay. Recently, they have begun asking for memberships. At $15 a year, it’s really cheap. So I’m urging you to check out Daily Science Fiction. Come for the free stories. Maybe you’ll stay for the membership, after all.

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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Woeful No More

I am happy to say that we solved our Internet connectivity. I’m somewhat conflicted to say that we solved it by bailing from our previous provider and switching to someone else. I feel bad because we were with them for a long time, and this was the first major service outage.

Maybe it’s dumb of me to even feel guilty. We had neither land line nor Internet for almost two weeks. There was a big storm that flooded a junction box, apparently. Still, for a major utility to be unprepared for storm damage is pretty surprising.

Anyway, my husband couldn’t stand it any more and arranged for a different provider. We’re in the thick of getting everything set up. Just like you don’t realize how much you depend on the Internet, you don’t quite realize how many places you have to enter that password. I’m sure we’ll be finding things that need updates for the next several days.

So! What’s going on with you guys?

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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Internet Woes

This will be short, because I’m using my cel phone as a hot-spot. That’s because our Internet is down. A cable is broken. It may not be repaired until May 31st. First-world problem, right? I mean, all three of us have cel phones. But our data is limited. The DSL isn’t.

It’s been very frustrating, and kind of pathetic, how limited we are without the Internet. We’re so used to it. We take it for granted.

“There’s nothing on TV…” because we don’t have Netflix. While a shelf full of movies gathers dust. “I can’t hear my music…” because Pandora is unavailable. We do have a rack of CD’s patiently waiting, though. “I can’t write…” because my favorite blog is online only.

That last one is my daughter’s complaint. I’m old fashioned and write on a desktop PC, which is doing just fine despite being an ancient dinosaur from 2012. However, the outage has hobbled my ability to market my books and communicate with friends.

So please, CenturyLink, repair the cable and let us live in the modern age again!

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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#NewRelease: The Tower in the Mist (Minstrels of Skaythe #1) by Deby Fredericks #sorcery #fantasy

Teri Polen has been kind enough to feature my latest book, The Tower in the Mist. Thank you, Teri.

Books and Such

If you’ve visited Deby’s blog, you know she loves dragons – and I mean, who wouldn’t?  Because – dragons, right?  Deby has also published several fantasy books, and is here today with her new release, the first book in a series.  Isn’t that cover awesome?  Beautiful colors.  Welcome, Deby!

Mages vs. Amazons vs. Giant Badgers vs. Tyranny!

Zathi’s job is to capture renegade mages, but Keilos isn’t like any other mage she’s dealt with. Her drive to bring him in only leads them deeper into a cursed forest. Together, warrior and mage will face deadly beasts and grapple with decisions that compromise every principle. Until they stumble upon a place of ancient, forgotten magic. Zathi must choose — allow Keilos to claim it, or kill him once and for all.

Buy Links:
Amazon

For other formats:

Draft2Digital link: https://books2read.com/u/3nK1Mo/div>

Author BioDeby Fredericks has been a writer all…

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Cover Copy

At last weekend’s convention, my volunteer position was to sit at the registration table and put people’s cards through a Square. Most people paid with cash, and attendance was unfortunately light. One way I got through slack times was by browsing a table of second-hand books that were being sold for charity.

As I picked through them — because, books! — I got a very interesting look at the back cover copy over decades spanning maybe 1960 to 2010. The cover art and title styles were interesting, too, but the copy was what caught my attention. After the art sparks an interest, you want to know what’s inside, so cover copy is an important sales tool.

During the 1980s, cover copy was really focused on what you could call Author Reputation. They mentioned awards, especially the Campbell Award, or previous best-sellers. One book’s copy consisted of a brief, general statement, something like “the brightest new voice of this generation.” This was oddly amusing, since I had never heard of the author. How bright was this voice, actually?

Later, in the 1990s and 2000s, author reputation was supplanted by Famous Author Blurbs. No book cover was complete without a snippet from s review. Even today, some cover copy is made up of nothing but blurbs. There also were, and are, comparisons to more famous books. This is fantasy, so Tolkien was the main comparee. Possibly this was an inspiration for the current Also-Bought system on Amazon.

These covers bothered me. As a possible reader, I want to know these three things: 1) Who are these people? 2) What are they doing? 3) Why does it matter?

You probably remember about a month ago, when I was testing variations on my cover copy for The Tower in the Mist. You can see how my focus was on the characters and story rather than awards and blurbs. (Although, if someone wanted to give me an award, I wouldn’t turn them down.)

Anyhow, it was interesting to have such a big sample of books and get that insight into how publishers tried to market them.

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

Convention Weekend

I will be volunteering at Empire Game Con this weekend. So you all get a break from my ramblings. Hope you all get lots of writing done and I’ll see you again on Wednesday.

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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Tropes to Treasures

Stock characters. Stereotypes. Tropes. Whatever you call them, they both exist and do not exist simultaneously. They are pervasive, and very sneaky. You sit there writing, and a stock character pops out of your subconscious mind without your realizing it.

A stereotype, according to Dictionary.com, is “a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing.” So you think of a particular place or kind of person, and a certain picture immediately appears in your mind. An “Arab” with a head-rag who is hateful to women and Jews. The country of Thailand as a haven of drug use and prostitution.

This kind of stereotype is not real, because nothing in life is that simple and concrete. When you take the time to learn about the country of Thailand or “Arabs” as part of the world’s heritage, it immediately becomes clear that there is so much more nuance and variation than the trope captures.

Yet stereotypes are real, because they show up again and again. They are ingrained in our minds. One time, I was working on a short story and it felt very off to me. Reading back through, I realized that every one of the men characters was an ugly trope. There was a mean dad, a deceitful preacher, a lazy cop. Actually, there was only one woman character, and she was a stereotype, too — a weak mom who should have stood up to the dad but didn’t.

I was annoyed with myself for falling back on these negative types. As a writer, I pride myself on doing better. So I tore that story down to the ground and started over again. The dad became strict but concerned, rather than dominating his son, who was the main character. The policeman was honestly doing his job. The preacher vanished entirely. The mom offered her son words of support.

When we’re trying to get that first draft down, it can be all too easy to rely on stock characters. But when you get to revisions, it’s always better to resist the stereotypes. Allow interesting variations, or even deliberately turn the character to make readers question that stereotype. Turn those tropes into treasures.

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

First Review!

My first review has come in on The Tower in the Mist, and it’s a lovely one. Alden Loveshade delivers perceptive comments on his Loveshade Family Blog. Thank you so much, Alden!

I also have a minor puzzle. One of my goals for the year has been to revitalize my author newsletter and get more activity going there. They say these can be a great way to connect with fans and perhaps get them to use those purchase links in the e-mails.

So far this year, I have improved my record of putting the newsletter out on time each month. I’ve tried to have entertaining things to say. Although one person does interact consistently, which is more than I had before, I have unfortunately seen more people drop off the list each time I send one.

Maybe it’s natural, and those who were accustomed to the previous moribund newsletter find monthly contact a bit too much. It’s a little disheartening, all the same.

What’s an author to do? Keep on trying until I weed out the disinterested subscribers, I suppose. And keeping peeking back at Alden’s review to cheer myself up!

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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Word Counts, Part 2

Word counts can be useful for more than helping you decide where and how to market a particular story. You can also use them to track your productivity. Writing… and productivity. Ha ha, right?

Word counts really can help you set goals, though. Say you’ve been working on your WIP for a while, and you need a push to the finish line. If you have a goal of 7,000 words total, and you have 5,000 already done, you might set a goal such as “write 2,000 words in the next week.” Then, knowing how many words you typically get in a day, you can calculate how many days you need to finish the story. Or, if you usually get a certain number of writing days in a week, you can calculate how many words you need to write each time.

Where word counts can be problematic is when we flog ourselves for not meeting a goal, or when we use them to compare ourselves to other writers. If you’re like me, there’s a steady stream of people posting stuff like, “I wrote 1,700 words today.” For the person who wrote that, it’s a celebration that they met their goal, and maybe a way to inspire themselves for the next day’s work.

But if you’re having a rough day and only wrote 170 words, it can be a real downer. Lots of people get Imposter Syndrome when they hear that someone finished a story, or sold one, or have a new publication. Generally speaking, it’s never a good idea for writers to compare ourselves to other writers. The process and the finish products are so different, it really is like apples and oranges.

For myself, I’m more of a “it will be done when it’s done” type of gal, but everyone has their own ways, right? So try to keep your goals in perspective and be kind to yourself.

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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Word Counts

Amid all the excitement of publishing The Tower in the Mist, I also managed a third draft revision of its sequel, which I’m now calling The Grove of Ghosts. It started out being 36,850 words and ended being 36,760. Having only a 90-odd word difference convinces me that the story is really solid at its length.

The whole exercise made me think a bit about word counts and why they matter. One factor is that the word count is a defining characteristic for our genre. The way I was taught is this: 1) Flash fiction is anything under 1,000 words. 2) Short stories are 1,000 to 10,000 words. 3) 10,000 to 15,000 is a novelette. 4) 15,000 to 30,000 is a novella. 5) 30,000 to 90,000 is the Dead Zone. No publications buy stories at this length. 6) 90,000 words or more is a novel.

Based on this, maybe you can see why I was worried that my novellas were 32,000 words (The Tower in the Mist) and 38,000 words (The Grove of Ghosts) in their first drafts. Strictly by the word count, both of them are too long for the novella format.

The word-count-as-definition trope comes from the 19th and 20th Centuries, when all publications were on paper and editors had to gauge how many pages a given story would take up in their magazine. And the calculation still holds true in print books and magazines, which require editors to balance page counts vs. price point.

However, as an author of e-books, page count is really a non-issue. With no actual book to fit on actual shelves or ship in actual boxes, I can write 38,000 words and call it a novella. I don’t have to worry that it’s in the Dead Zone. The calculation that I have to make is price point vs. value to customer. After buying my e-book, I want my reader to believe they got a fair value for what they paid. If the book is too short, they may feel cheated. It it is too long, they may suspect I padded it to inflate the word count.

What’s your thought about word counts and story length over all?

Did you know I have an author newsletter? You can get it! I’ll even give you a free e-book for signing up. Just click here.

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