Today I mostly wrote ... the word count thread. Showing 2,751-2,800 of 4,252

[Tim]

I wrote over 1000 words in April (gosh, wow! knock me down with a knocky-down thing!) Nothing yet in May, but ya never know...

[Will]

I'm not counting words as I'm editing

[Kath]

I'm editing too, but adding a hundred or two each session. Then I'll get to the place where I left off and do some new writing. 201 this morning. Off out to sow seeds in the greenhouse now.

[Will]

Yesterday was my gardening day. Now I'm pretending to work

[M.T.]

I'm editing too, although I'm also trying to launch some books and ugh ... it's a right pain in the arse. But am really enjoying the whole tinkering aspect. Had to send the latest K'Barthan off today. Still haven't.

BTW 1,000 words is 1000 more that weren't there in March, Tim!

Cheers

MTM

[Pam]

I made my own epub - used Sigil to take a HTML file which I originally created with Word but then extensively cleaned up in a HTML editor as Word puts in loads of rubbish. I do quite a lot in Sigil, splitting the book into files for each chapter etc as I read it can make a big difference to the response of a large book especially on old readers. Create a HTML Table of contents and NDX one etc. It was quite a learning curve but I documented the process with my learning along the way in a long document and then produced a checklist. I need to update the checklist now to include all the Kobo and D2D stages too.

I tweak the epub at the end BTW as Kindle requires some cover related changes to avoid doubled up covers - it is in a white paper of theirs on the KDP site which I found a couple of years ago when first researching it. So there is a generic epub and a slightly tweaked one for uploading to KDP.

I haven't yet uploaded the epub to Kobo again with the changes I needed on D2D, because I suddenly remembered I had bought a copy to check on my own Kobo (and forgotten till now that I need to check it). So I am now wondering, if I upload the new version, will I be seeing that or the old one on the reader. Couldn't find anything when googling about whether it would update the file on people's readers if you have updated it.

[Alicia]

Wow.

[Will]

I'm having some print cover issues with KDP - for convenience we are using their cover templates, and the latest book keeps on getting rejected for issues with the spine.

[Pam]

Oh dear, sorry to hear that Will. I have that pleasure to come - haven't even started prepping a paperback yet.

[M.T.]

Ugh, me neither. I've sorted the insides for the free giveaway story in paperback (only doing a few to give away) but I'm not sure how to print it. Does KDP let you print stuff without putting it on sale?

Cheers

MTM

[Kath]

I don't think KDP does but there are loads of print companies who'll turn your document into a book. Husband's botany group produced an A4 glossy book from last year's survey results. They are doxdirect.com

[Kath]

508 today. :)

[Pam]

Still doing publication type activities - today adjusted my price on KDP having already scheduled it on Kobo, and published through Draft2Digital. Haven't yet had time to look again at the KDP paperback templates or even consider what fonts to use for a printed book.

[Kath]

319 today. I'm not breaking any word-count records!

[M.T.]

Editing pictures today, but I seem to be getting a solid 400 or 500 words in every day, just with editing the books. It's all go.

Cheers

MTM

[Alicia]

Good job, MT. Keep it up.

[M.T.]

Thanks. I hope things are still ticking over for you too. ;-)

Not sure how many words I did today, but definitely got the ten minutes in and that’s what counts! ;-)

[Alicia]

Some of the life pressure from the past weeks has let up, I'm eating far fewer carbs, and the brain actually worked for a while today, so all good.

I didn't count the new words, but eliminated a problem which was bedeviling me, and didn't lose as much as I had feared. And there were a few new words.

[Will]

Phew, cover issues sorted for the paperback, so that's live - now I can start formatting the fifth in the series.

[M.T.]

Nice going Will. I did about 275 yesterday and about the same today. Not sure how much it's added to the story though as it's mostly edits!

Does anyone want to see the artwork for my new covers? Not that I'm over excited about them or anything.

[Will]

Me! Me! Me! I'd like to see them.

[Jim]

three days of meetings in London so no writing but I do have photos for a blog

[Alicia]

The scene I've been writing since March 22 is finished.

I hope the next one 1) doesn't have a move in it, 2) takes me a lot less time.

[M.T.]

Alicia wrote: "The scene I've been writing since March 22 is finished.

I hope the next one 1) doesn't have a move in it, 2) takes me a lot less time."

I hope I don't have to move house more than once before I die. I hate it.

Jim wrote: "three days of meetings in London so no writing but I do have photos for a blog"

It was a good one.

[M.T.]

Will wrote: "Me! Me! Me! I'd like to see them."

Here's one me duck:



Here's the other one, this is a freebie that is only available to folks who sign up to my mailing list.

[Leslie]

I wrote absolutely nothing, zilch ! Oh it is so nice to be on holiday. I'll be thinking of you all slaving away over hot keyboards as I sit and have my cold beer in the sun! As they say, someone has to do it and right now it's me.

[Alicia]

Leslie wrote: "I wrote absolutely nothing, zilch ! Oh it is so nice to be on holiday. I'll be thinking of you all slaving away over hot keyboards as I sit and have my cold beer in the sun! As they say, someone ha..."

Very funny.

I basically live at a resort, and I have to struggle daily to get myself to the keyboard and get my writing done - it's the ostensible reason I initiated the whole move here. The social life is taking a lot of time!

Enjoy your vacation.

[M.T.]

I’ve done very little this week. It’s been ... well, I’m going to write a very long blog post about it.

Cheers

MTM

[Will]

Understandable. Mary.

I've not got much done besides struggle with KDP to get paperbacks back on line.

And found to some annoyance that it is faster to get paperbacks from Amazon's actual page for the book than by ordering author copies from KDP. I really need to find some cash, get some ISBNs and source the paperbacks elsewhere

[Pam]

Started wrestling with a KDP template today - a lot of weird issues keep popping up. I think some might be due to copying my book into it and it bringing the styles with it so will try copying some stuff into something like Notepad first to strip off the styling. Only did the opening matter and chapter one to see what problems would then occur in the PDF. Blooming page numbers keep appearing and disappearing in various places. they have loads of sections in the template so have been tackling issues with those in places too.

Meanwhile blooming Draft2Digital remain obstinately silent after one acknowledgement on 14 May so my sample file is still full of rubbish characters on all the sites distributed to. Am thinking now I will have to set the book up on Smashwords and delist it on D2D.

[Kath]

1209 today. Happy with that.

[Alicia]

Good job, Kath. At least someone is producing words.

I'm almost back - there is so much to load into the brain.

[Kath]

Excellent - onward and upward!
1219 today. That's probably it for the rest of the week, though. Numerous activities going on.

[Alicia]

Keep it up. 1500 a week is a good-sized novel a year.

[Kath]

Unexpected afternoon off the mad lot of village activities so I've managed another 863 words. Little lie down now. I think! ;)

[Alicia]

Finally some progress: 1534 ALMOST finished words yesterday.

Apparently, if the planets are aligned, I can still write.

Pray it continues.

[Kath]

Oh, well done. Lets hope it takes on its own momentum.

[Alicia]

And another 700+ today to finish the scene.

And I immediately started the next one.

As soon as the migraine aura goes away, I may make more progress. (I can't see through it - it occupies the center of my visual field.)

Thanks! It feels so much better.

[Jim]

glad things are moving forward :-)

[Kath]

932 today. Total is just a sniff under 60k so it's progressing quite well.

[M.T.]

I've did 2,000 words, but it's my Father's eulogy and it's only supposed to be 1,000 so I'm getting out the shears today to prune it back! People keep banging on about how the service is going to be too long. The poor man stipulated in his will that he wanted a requiem mass, that's a Eucharist and it takes an hour. If that's too long for them then they can just fuck off round the back of the church and have a fag or something. It's what Dad asked for and it's what he's getting.

[Jim]

M.T. wrote: "I've did 2,000 words, but it's my Father's eulogy and it's only supposed to be 1,000 so I'm getting out the shears today to prune it back! People keep banging on about how the service is going to b..."

It's his funeral, and given you're doing the eulogy I don't think the vicar or whoever is officiating is going to want to say too much so I wouldn't prune back all that much
After all most clergy would reckon to preach for fifteen to twenty minutes

[M.T.]

Jim wrote: "M.T. wrote: "I've did 2,000 words, but it's my Father's eulogy and it's only supposed to be 1,000 so I'm getting out the shears today to prune it back! People keep banging on about how the service ..."

This is true but my brother's doing half so we reckoned 1000 words each would be about 15 minutes!

[Jim]

The purpose of a funeral is to help the family and friends of the deceased heal.
The deceased is beyond worrying about it. You obey their last requests as a gesture of respect and because not doing would up set people. But the important part of a funeral is the healing of the living. That's what the eulogy does, it's the first formal steps along that road.
So when I did the eulogy for my cousin's wife I started by saying that she was known, affectionately, for asking the second question before you'd had chance to open your mouth to answer the first one, so that's how I delivered the eulogy, no gaps or dramatic pauses :-)

[Kath]

Jim's right. Jim's very often right!

[Gingerlily - The Full Wild]

Jim is a wise old owl.

[M.T.]

Jim is right. My usual method would be to make a list of bullet points. Check my watch as I started talking, and then stop when seven minutes are up. But I feel I need to be slightly more organised with this one, I hate writing it down because it takes the spontinaety out of it.

Cheers

MTM

[Jim]

Kath wrote: "Jim's right. Jim's very often right!"

we're in infinite monkey's typing at random territory here, even Jim can be right :-)

[Jim]

Gingerlily - Deleter of Worlds wrote: "Jim is a wise old owl."

As a church warden Jim has been at a lot of funerals ;-)

[Kath]

As a once-church-organist so has Kath!