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The Something Good Happened Today Thread
Thank you and well done as well. Seems like we're both doing the same thing but using different media platforms. ^_^
Tempted to post Louis CK's bit on optimism, but I'm a jerk like that.:D
Charles wrote: "Tempted to post Louis CK's bit on optimism, but I'm a jerk like that.:D"
If you would have, I would have just fought back against the jerk-ness with a cheesy yet effective Maya Angelou quote. I've got quotes too.
I think they'd just cancel each other out.
No, no. A Maya Angelou quote is worth far more than a Louis CK quote. Talk to me when your guy has a Presidential Medal of Freedom. :>
Alexis wrote: "By now, most of us all know that this self-publishing journey can be an agonizing hell! But it also has its amazing and cool moments.. So how about a thread to celebrate the little things that happ..."Exciting stuff. Every like and look at our blogs or FB is a victory. Every retweet makes your message go out there like a note in a bottle in the vast ocean of social media. You never know who is looking and where it will go. Hopefully it will tickle someone's fancy and multiply like a zombie virus- only with pleasant results!
Alex wrote: "V.M. wrote: "Nice! Milestone achieved! It's good to celebrate the little wins along the way:)"So true, the therapist I dealt with a while back told me that one of the best ways to get through thi..."
Exactly!
I'm here for the happy. Carry on!
I celebrated for you with a raspberry and orange scone and a cup of coffee. First carb I've had in 8 months- so thanks- keep the milestones coming!!
Mod
What? Really? I guess I'm doing it wrong. I'm having the time of my life!
Okay... good moments... twice today stuff I was writing moved me to tears. In public. And I didn't care.
Dwayne wrote: "Alexis wrote: "By now, most of us know that this self-publishing journey can be an agonizing hell!"What? Really? I guess I'm doing it wrong. I'm having the time of my life!
Okay... good moments...."
Aww Dwayne. There was me thinking it was only me just loving it all....
Edited. Such a hasty generalization on my part. 
:p
Congratulations on all of your happy milestones. Like some here, I'm not good at FB, so I'm not even going to try. My reasons for happy today: I was down for a bit, then I got a nice review for one of my books. Boy, did that cheer me up!
Aaannnddd, I'm almost finished with my next book. Just one more read through. When you first sit down and start writing out a story, you work hard on it, and it gets to the point where it's finished and ready to be put out there is a happy achievement.
Congrats on the good review AND being almost down with your book! Must be a great feeling indeed.
Thank-you, Alexis, and Alex:)This thread is so up-building, reminding us what to be happy about. I'm thankful for that, too. I hope it has a long run!
Something good happened today - a great name for a thread where Indies can find support. I'm one of those who loves writing but today I had a tummy-turn when I saw my first book had received another review in the .com market. My UK reviews are higher but I always hold my breath when I see I have a new review in the US - it could be the dreaded two star!But it wasn't - it was a five star with some nice comments. Thank you to that person for their kindness. It was something good and I wish them a great life!
You've got it all to come, Alex. I'm sure there'll be times when you jump for joy and other reviews will cause you to ponder both on your writing and the person who left the review!
Don't let them bother you. I have a theory that you need a variety of reviews, otherwise the buying public thinks it's all fake. Reviews are subjective and not everybody is going to like what they are reading. I try not to obsess about a low rating, I just hate it when they are cruel about it. The kindest thing a reader ever did was leave a no star rating on one of my son's books. I really respected her. She said she couldn't finish it, it wasn't to her taste, but she didn't want to pull down his ratings because something wasn't her cup of tea. I thought that was fair and honest.
Bzzzzzzztttt! Positivity! Fun folder! Something good! (Translation from Christina's brain: please stay focused on the good things. Bringing up negative reviews never does anyone any good)
And so, something good that happened today: I forgot I was running a free promo and still managed to squeeze out some downloads! Woot!
Mod
Take it all and welcome it. You're an author. You can handle the slings and the arrows along with the rainbows and sunshine. We're made of such tough stuff that one little star can't pierce our hides. We laugh and watch them bounce off as we continue to write. After all, we write for the love of the story, not for the love of the stars.
All reviews are the same... the opinion of one reader being shared with others. Yes. There will be some nice ones that will touch you. But, welcome the not so nice, too. Here is why:
1. Some readers will shy away from books with a lot of four and five star reviews. They assume the author is putting his or her family and friends up to reviewing.
2. Sometimes something in even the most negative of reviews could spark interest in a potential reader.
REVIEW: This book is about elephants. I hate elephants.
POTENTIAL READER: I love elephants. I will buy this book.
3. There are some readers who actually enjoy reading negative reviews.
4. If the review is dishonest, most readers will be able to tell and will disregard it, so don't let it bother you.
5. Every negative review can be a badge that you can wear on your heart that says to the world, "at least I was brave enough to tell the world my story."
Dwayne, As a reader, I agree with your first four comments.1 - That's what I think.
2 - I want to know what others didn't like in case I feel the same way. However, I often like what others don't.
3 - I like to read good and bad reviews before making a decision.
4 - I can recognize a sham slam review.
5 - We'll see how I feel about this after I publish my book. : D
Hugs, Sue
Mod
Not to mention, it's fun writing books with my wife.
Riley,What a sweet comment!! You're so right - everyday is a blessing. : )
Got up. Walked the dog. Wrote some. Did some food.All in all an ordinary day.
But good. I like my life. Therefore something good happens every day.
Alex wrote: "My something good for today, I just had enough page reads show up to suggest someone has read my novel from start to finish. If they did, that means they read it between Thursday and today which su..."Review is up- congrats- it was really good. Read like a police crime drama on TV.
Got a good write-up yesterday in the local paper. People talked to my wife that they saw my name and new book in the paper. Feels good, but sales? Not yet to write home about.
Is that a tv show in the UK? I don't watch much tv, but it had for me a 'lil Hill Street Blues vibe- that's probably before your time. It was a realistic police drama from the 70's or 80's. It very definitely had the feel of more books coming. Good luck with it. ;)
Awesome Alex! Carole you're indeed a marathon reader.
Leo, hopefully your sales will get a bump soon!!
Okay, so, this isn't going to sound positive at first but hear me out. So I got a proof copy of my book today and I was flipping through it when *gasp!* a mistake! One of my fancy little scene-change divider things wasn't centered. At first my lazy side wanted me to ignore it - one little hiccup, who cares, right? Even big name authors have a few hiccups in their books. (Note: I tend to get very "I want to get it over with already" during the final publication of my books). But my OCD perfectionist side wouldn't have it. So I go in to fix things up and discover that that wasn't the only divider that was screwy. There were about four dividers in all that needed to be centered.
So now everything is nice and fixed and pretty much ready to go. Thank goodness for my OCD perfectionist side or I wouldn't have caught what was, in fact, a much larger issue.
I've also gotten more followers to my blog. Seems like posting snippets of your story along with artwork attracts a bit of attention.
Mod
I never manage to know how many words a book is going to be. I have one coming out soon that's pretty short at about 70k and one that has been out a while at 270k. I guess if I have a rule it's start at the beginning and carry on until you get to the end.
A happy thing?
I think I've finished editing my latest magnum opus...
Mod
The fine people of Support for Indie Authors are partly to blame. I started the first attempt at the novel over a year ago and put several working titles out and asked people to vote. That one won.
There was a time when my stories became shorter as I edited. It's just the reverse these days. I used to have bad habits like repeating things, putting more detail than necessary, repeating things, having too many scenes that added nothing to the story and repeating things. Now my rough drafts are very and they need
Dwayne wrote: "It will clock in at about 120,000 words. That may not seem like much, but..."I believe me, that seems like much to me! Good on ya! :-)
Alex wrote: "I'm having a bit of a funny thing with my word counts at the moment because I used to be quite wordy, but through comments and feedback on Wattpad I've learned to cut back and get to the heart of m..."I'm shooting for 85.000-90.000 myself which means I'll have to cut a lot of scenes. If I may offer a bit of unsolicited advice, save the scenes you cut! You can always add a little message at the end off the book that says: Visit my blog for extra scenes/deleted scenes that didn't make the cut.
It's a way to drive readers to your blog and to connect with them.
Or you can have a post or two where readers get "to catch up with the characters" and you can use your cut scenes for that as well.
Alexis wrote: "Alex wrote: "I'm having a bit of a funny thing with my word counts at the moment because I used to be quite wordy, but through comments and feedback on Wattpad I've learned to cut back and get to t..."Really smart!!!
Thank you both!Something GREAT happened to me today: I discovered Scrivener. How have I managed to live so far without this app? I'm never writing in Word again. I love it. Worth the money.
*Not an ad, lol.
Alex it's obvious: Carole and I are your good luck charms. :p Is your book on Kindle Unlimited? Is the program satisfactory?
May you have thousands of downloads!!! ;)
That is such a good tip, Alexis, to save the scenes you cut for those purposes. My problem is not too many scenes, but need more. The most my books average are 56,000-60,000 words.Something good happened to me. I think I've already mentioned it here, but I had some creative car signs made up along with my website address. A young lady pulled up in front of the house to see what they were. She said she would always see the car driving down the street with those signs. After my daughter explained it to her, she said she would go right home to look up the website. I don't know if it was her, but about two days later, someone read a couple of my books.
The car signs aren't making me rich, but they get a lot of attention, and people asking me about them. I thought I'd share that.
Any publicity is good publicity. Lot's of companies pay you to wrap your car (with an ad)- what a great idea to do something on your own. I bet you could deduct your car on your taxes as well. Make sure to ask your accountant about that though. I put up posters in all the local supermarkets and stores. I have friends in different states and I asked them to do the same.
Groovy wrote: "That is such a good tip, Alexis, to save the scenes you cut for those purposes. My problem is not too many scenes, but need more. The most my books average are 56,000-60,000 words.Something good ..."
Groovy, that's so .. groovy! :) What do the car signs look like?
@Carole--Thank-you, Carole, I didn't know I could do that. I'm certainly going to now:)@Alexis--I used one of my book covers as background (Cause She's A Good Girl), then put a catchy phrase on what type of books I write (Page-Turning Suspense, EverAfter Romance) along with the words, Amazon E-Book and my website at the bottom.
Thanks for saying it's "groovy"--LOL!
Groovy wrote: "@Carole--Thank-you, Carole, I didn't know I could do that. I'm certainly going to now:)@Alexis--I used one of my book covers as background (Cause She's A Good Girl), then put a catchy phrase on w..."
Groovy double check with your accountant that you can deduct the car. I think it could be- it's advertising., but I'm not positive. ;)
Alex wrote: " 70k may become the average for me.That may put off some readers because the books are a little shorter, but I figure if I feel good about the story I've told, that's good enough, and the right readers will find my work and like it. "
Hey Alex, all of my books are 42K to 48K and have done alright :). Are you going to set up an author profile on goodreads? I keep going to your page to see which book you wrote, but it is a regular member profile. Best of luck with your book :).
Something good happened to me today - one of my colleagues caught me to tell me he'd just finished my first book, he'd bought all the others, and been blown away by the writing...*happy*
J.C. wrote: "Something good happened to me today - one of my colleagues caught me to tell me he'd just finished my first book, he'd bought all the others, and been blown away by the writing...*happy*"You right now:
:D
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I'll start off: I'm finally OVER 50 likes at Facebook. It gives me hope that Project Build-A-Platform will be a success. Next up: 75 likes.
How about you?
*Excluding Dwayne who is having THE time of his life and Jane. Lol.