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R J Askew ~ One Swift Summer
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Gingerlily - The Full Wild
(last edited Oct 18, 2014 09:48AM)
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Oct 18, 2014 09:48AM
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yeah, and I have a lit match in my eager fingers .. light swift touch paper stand as close as possible .. k-booooom
Buy buy Swifts! For modern beings in need of a reboot. *bows*
found an amusing thread on linkedin for editors - my god, the things they agonise about .. ellipses .. Oxford commas .. it is the most arcane debate I've come across in a while .. oddly comforting .. I feel a bit of fake shadowing their quest for purity.
New cover, new title, and a few wrinkles ironed out .. watching swifts is now One Swift Summer .. time for a nightcap.
Nice cover. You appear to have not combined your reviews for the first version. I believe you do this on edit/combine. Unless you wish to keep them separate, of course.
I am all at sea with this .. have just been reading the arcane notes on librarian ways .. my hope is to replace the old cover with the new one .. but I am not sure if this is acceptable to goodreads even
R.J. wrote: "I am all at sea with this .. have just been reading the arcane notes on librarian ways .. my hope is to replace the old cover with the new one .. but I am not sure if this is acceptable to goodread..."Try this. It is a bit involved but it does work.
http://mimibarbour.blogspot.co.uk/201...
David, THANK YOU very much for that. The note from Mimi Barbour exactly covers my case. I will give it a go tmr. I am waiting for an editor to give me a corrected word version of my story. I sometimes lose faith in these web sites. But then someone like you offers such great help and my faith is restored. best regards, Ron
OK that's it .. I've had enough of this place. I'm off. All I wanted to do was change the front cover of my story. Clunk, clunk, clunk. Nada. All I've succeeded in doing is deleting the story.
For what it is worth my story is now titled ONE SWIFT SUMMER. It seems to be in the system, but it is not on my page. But who the hell cares? I get no response from goodreads.
This site is a waste of time. It is too clunky to use from an author's point of view and there are far too many threads that have bugger all to do with books. Yes, I know one can ignore these threads, but why have them here at all? The place resembles facebook in many ways. My parting comment to the moderators is cut out the junk and focus on books and reading. Examine the threads. They are monstrous. This site is now the online equivalent of Japnaese knotweed. Best regards. Ron Askew
Ooh, Ron! Did you get out of bed the wrong side?Is One Swift Summer the same book as Watching Swifts?
Hi Kath, yes it is the same story with a new title and cover and a reformat. And thank you for your detailed read a while back now. I incorporated most of the changes you suggested. The truth is I can't relate to people online. I have no patience for doing the chit chat. And I am inept at the clickery. So I am off. I plan to do it live. I will read and look the audience in the eye. Best wishes for the future. Ron.
Hi RonSeriously, I think you might have a good plan.
If you do do some readings it'd be great if you could wander back and report how they work and whether you feel they're a success
Blushes. A kind-hearted librarian - hugs n kisses - sorted out my problem and my correct cover is now in place. I confess I was impressed. You know how it often is with websites. You try the help function but nothing happens. Goodreads did respond. So the site gets my vote for helpfulness. I still think it is clunky, but then so am I in my clickery.
Hi Jim,I did some readings a few years back and enjoyed it though I was not well rehearsed. This time I have more time and so will be on the ball. I'm slightly troubled with my accent, am from Lancaster and I murder As and Us. Mug, rug, luv, art, heart. Mustn't let small matters stop us though.
brgds Ron
FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREE FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Oct 25-25
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_n...
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_n...
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_n...
'Literary fiction at its best'
New title, new cover, adds editing - formerly Watching Swifts
Please spread the word - THANK YOU *bows*
*bows*
freebies flying off the shovel .. and I have a cunning new link that unifies the bits of the amazon empire .. but don't ask me how I got it .. myBook.to/OneSwiftSummer
Free Oct 25-26
hurrah .. a shed load of downloads .. but will any of them actually read and of those few who read how many will get it .. at least pay-to-read eyes normally want the story .. I don't trust freebie hunters but there we are .. a ragged-trousered indie must bob around on the Online Ocean .. enough!
Hurrah 4 places ahead of of M's book in the amazon.co.uk free listings Stella Rimmington's routine genre spy saga is at #66 .. yours truly's hextraordinarily unusual One Swift Summer is at #62.
All meaningless of course. The only real winners are amazon/kindle as they get masses of free content from thousands of talents to fill the electronic pages of their e-readers.
And if M sends 007 round to nobble yours truly, fear not. I'm make him PAY for his copy of One Swift Summer
Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Now there's a mouthful!He has quite a beard, too!
http://s.fixquotes.com/files/author/f...
I wonder how FD wld have made out as an Indie .. 'Erm, the title is Crime and Punishment' What's it all about Fyodor? 'Erm, well, how may I put this? As I said on my Facebook page, I'd just got back from serving a 10 in Siberia.. By the way, did you LIKE my scenario for the 'Bruvs Karamazov'? And I'd appreciate it if you wld sign up for my C&P event. Yeah, it was tough having to put the novel out in monthly bites, but I thought it was a way to build momentum. And the word of mouth I got going on Goodreads was awesome. Is the protagonist in C&P me? Heck, yes. I have long had a Napolean complex and it is clearly cool to murder in pursuit of a higher principle. I mean, all the SUPERMEN dictators of the 20th century saw the logic of this stance, right? If your interested I've youtubed the murder scene from Crime and Punishment. Check it out under 'Dostoyevsky Pawbroker's must die.' And pay no attn to SPOILERS from that other bearded Russian dude. I swear that Tolstoy is a philandering swine. And thanks again for your pre-order for 'The Bruvs Karamazov.' Yeah, you were spot on when you said it reminded you of the guys in Eastenders, Phil and what's the other one, the ugly one? - gotta go, got a little Czar aggro to outsort. Chill dude! Big shout! Dostoyevsky - Indie Author, Moskow, Russia. p.s. I mean how cheap was it of Tolstoy to parade The Black Virgin of Smolensk around like that for cheap literary impact. Cheap tricketer. He should have stayed in the army and copped a canonball in da Crimea. Not that, I'm bitter, like.
Halloween nears .. this short started out as a puff for a series of stories I collaborated on. Indie Shadwick is a messed up creative, the power behind Jack O. Savage. But he sucks the life out of her, in part because she knows that other women idolise him, which leaves her insanely riven. She dies under the wheels of a Penzance to London express. But that is far from the end of her .. in fact it is just the beginning:INDIE GHOSTING - that thousand word stare
Now that I am dead.
Don't look so shocked. You always knew there was no escape. Always said I'd be back for you.
Well, here I am, a-pageanting through your helpless perception. Two poems a-straining on their leashes. Down, you two! Behave.
No point, Jack. Absolutely no point looking around. Not where I am, silly! I'm here. Yes. Behind .. your eyes.
Now that I am dead.
I've taken to it, Jack love. No surprise there, my life being what it was. But this! O this! The opportunities for mischief! Beyond measure, I can tell you.
I tried out my powers on a taxi driver. He crashed. I was shocked, the thought, shocked. I didn't mean him to. But he did. Seeing my pale face in his rear view.
The power is tremendous. Feel it coursing through me now? So dead, I'm electric!
He didn't die, the driver. I didn't set out to kill him. Though I must admit the thought of expediting another's passage does have a certain novelty appeal. 'Take me to Death, my good man. I tip well, damned well.'
The places I've been to, Jack. Wherever I please. Windsor Castle. The old lady. Because she's there. Curiosity. She sensed I was there, quiet though I was. I think she thought I was death come for her at last. I kept very quiet. I didn't move. I just stood there in the back of her mind, watching. The view through her Britannic majesty's eyes. She knew I was there, alright.
I wander minds. Tis my way. I wouldn't exactly say I haunt them. Do you feel haunted now, love? No, thought not. How could you? I love you, Jack. Still do. Said I would and I still .. do. Love you.
So here I am. Loving you from the great beyond, behind your eyes.
Relax. I said I'd be back. Your pulse is going faster than that..
Sorry, Jack. I know how you felt when I passed. I watched how you were. I realise now you meant all those lovely things you said to me. You know, chickens and children.
If only I hadn't been so stupidly jealous. Things would have been so much easier between us. But then would you have wanted them to be? Honestly now, would you?
I excited you, didn't I? In a dull and disappointing world, your Indie gave you a reason to shave. I'm rather proud of that, actually. Slip of a woman like me with a man like you you! God, I loved you. Yes, I was more intelligent than you. Yes, I was ten times more lucky in my creativity than you.
I always used to think it would end, that my luck would pitter-patter out on me. That's what made me so desperate for another bite of you and another and another. The fear of losing you. How wrong I was!
But then how do and of us ever know? Perhaps it was my crazy fear of losing you, my desperate love that did it for you.
Would you have loved me as you did if I'd been Belgium's number one quilting queen, as calm as a crocheted cloud? Methinks not.
Feeling a little better now? Good boy. I do believe you are. You knew I'd be back. You knew your Indie wouldn't just lie down and die like a loser.
We were winners, Jack. Everything we touched, apart from ourselves. But then the love we made. More than most people make in ten lifetimes. God, we were hot.
Now that I'm dead, I've been wondering how we'd have been had we still been an 'us' at ninety. I think you'd have killed me actually. Or my manic upswings might have driven you over the edge. And that now it would be you ghosting around in my lost mind. Doctor I have a deceased poet's being behind mine eyes. The look on their faces.
Speaking of which, I've been fine since I've been dead. No more annoying cerebral oscillations, existential tipping points. No more of anything actually, but I have to say there is a certain joy in not being all over the place. And, another thing, you notice how delightfully quiet it is once you go ex-body. The gratuitous noise in life is truly awful. Oh yes, death is much less raucous than life's monstrous gannet colony. Pecketty-peck. Heed me, read me.
How do I look, Jack? Come on, in your mind's eye. Focus! How do I look in death? I think my hair suits me longer, don't you? If you like it, I think I'll keep it long. What do you say? Tell me.
Jack, I'm going to do something now. Get ready. I'm going to straddle this synapse. Something tells me..
There. How does that feel?
Something tells me that I can still turn you on, even from the great beyond.
How does this feel? Tell me. It's me Jack Savage, your Indie. Still hot for you, hotter actually. There's been no one else Jack, not before and not since, my death that is. Only you. Can you feel how I am for you, rocking back and forth on this synapse of bliss.
That's it, let me feel you still love me Jack. It's been a while. I've been through a lot. I need you more in death than I ever did in life. Can you cope? I know you found it hard to cope with me in life. Can you cope with me in death? I hope you can because I need you Jack. Kiss me Jack. Kiss me sepulchrally.
That's it my Jack. Sort yourself out for me. I need you too, need to know my womanly power over you lives within you. Do it for me, just do it. I want you to. Go on, your Indie loves you so.
The things they wrote about us, about me, about you. Little did they know! Imagine if they could see us now, engaged in this act of haunting love. Not that I want them to. I know you would, you shameless showman you! But then my body is, ach was, not as drop-dead as yours. You might not be be able to write as good a line as I, but the lines of your ribs! I always loved your ribs the most. My butcher's model you. Even now! Even now, you work me up.
Goooooooood boy, Jack, good boy you, o you.
I confess I've thought of borrowing another's body, taking them over, possessing them for a season, coming to you, Indie re-incarnated, taking you. Some beautiful body, stunning you. Would you like that? And then I'd speak to you through her and you would know it was me, come to you. I'd unleash these two poems into your being. You could write them down, be my amanuensis. You are a man, aren't you?
Save here I am, as I am, your Indie. I wouldn't want you wanting another's body, even with me inside it.
Jaaaaaaack! O Jack. Don't look so sad. There's no need to cry. Don't cry. Please don't cry. You don't want the tears of ghost staining the cushions of your soul. Come on Jack.
Oh no. I'm sorry, I'm really sorry Jack. I've upset you. It's all been too much for you. You're still far too alive to cope with my death. I see it. I see it now. I have to go. But I'll be back. Perhaps it will be easier next time. Promise me you won't block me. Promise. Don't block me like some potentially unwanted programme.
The thought of not being able to visit you...
Promise.
Promise Jack! Or this will not end at all well for you - now that one is dead.
YOU SEE THEM CHAINED TO RAILINGS AND LAMP POSTS AROUND LONDON, WHITE 'GHOST BIKES' .. POOR DEEP LEE WAS A STUDENT FROM KOREA WHO DIED NEAR KINGS CROSS ST .. THERE'S A PIC OF THE ACTUAL BIKE AT THE END HERE .. IT'S THE LIVING WE NEED TO FEAR - ESP NIGHTMARE DRIVERS - NOT THE DEAD london GHOST BIKE
Following, always a-following
Following you now
Riderless
Ticking of spokes
What?!?
Just a bike!
A riderless bike
All white, just a-coasting along behind you
Bell, white
Saddle, white
Tyres ... white
White, whites, eyes, white
Can you see me? Deep Lee
Sharper now?
Or now?
Moreso on your way a-home
Late at night, No-No-November
To an empty, emptier, emptying red, bed, bled, dead
https://www.goodreads.com/photo/autho...
Time to focus on marketing. Three years after putting a story on amazon this might seem a little late. Add on the 18-mo I wasted on Harper Collins' authonomy.com and I'm 4-1/2 years out of pocket. I now wonder if a story which has been out and about for a while, but not caught a breeze can redeem itself? Or is such a story like one of those houses you see in the house ads that never sells, month after month because the owners had just got it all wrong time and price wise?I don't think so. Give an ebook a new title and a new cover and off we go! Bang out a few thou copies via a freebie and... Then what? I know, give that zombie of a website the kiss of life! Ever kissed a zombie website before? Thought not. I have two of them actually rjaskew.com and iTweetYouNot.com - the second of which probably tells you all you need to know about my social media skills. I watch others here there and everywhere who are like social media gymnasts the way they do the biz, all slinky tweets n sexy facebooks. Alas, my electronic smile is as left-handed as my real one. So social media will never get me that thousandth sale.
How about a bit of old fashion rsss licking on a local level? St Albans has just hosted its first ever literary festival. Whoop! Whoop! Tezza Wogan was the headline act, it was that classy. Squirts n swoons.
Anyway, I pulls my black-faded-to-rust hoodie hood up and slinks into Waterstones on the high street last Thursday night, like a fox in the waste bins. Of the 40 or so peeps there, about 23 read their stuff. This was good. Far better than tapping one's life away, ineffectually trying to ingratiate oneself to other newbie wannabes. I am animated. A couple of the readers are stoked. And, luckily, none of them stinks the place out. I don't like to witness abject jabbering in public. It bothers me. There but for.. y'know.
Anyway, come half time, I close in on one of said readers and start to give it large. The full praise and curiosity attack. The poor guy had probably never been more bigged up in all his life. And I was genuine about it. I loved his stuff. My hand was shaking, such was my enthusiasm.
Fact is, it was great to meet real authors, reading their stuff to real people. I mean it was, erm, - real, I suppose is the only word for it.
I latch onto a woman who wants to know if anyone has published an ebook. You may well imagine my sharky smile as I reach for my handly little silver case packed with biz cards of my new front cover. Damn, did you see that sly glint on my front tooth as I deploy my TV-teeth smile. Not that I actually have TV-teeth, but we can all dream.
Anyway, she hangs on my every word - I cld see her turning puce and choking. I can't believe anyone knows less than me about the ebook biz, but they do. I get home and I sell a tranch of war loan to buy her book. 77p. My review is live by noon the next day. I actually loved the book. Genuinly. No seriously, I loved the book. It is a masterly piece of satire. But the author does not even own a kindle and hasn't a scooby about how to catch the breeze for her story. I cld weep. Esp as she also can't actually buy yours truly's rebranded n relaunched product, as Harper Collins might refer to a book. Da Product. Da Branding. Da Da. Time to relaunch DaDaism Da maybe Da?
Anyway, that was the end of my BIG marketing push. The book signing I planned to go to, and the Sat afternoon seminar, and the local poet's gig on Sunday in some half-baked-potato bar were all sadly missed. But hell, I did manage to hand out that one biz card, so I'm still in with a shout.
Meanwhile, here I am, tap, tap, tapping, rap, tap, tapping my life away from by amply proportioned kitchen - seats eight - in he heart of St Albans, Deadrie the dishwasher churning away happily to my right. Nice dishy-wishy-washer - writing an ebook are we for NoNov, are we? I wonder how Tezza Wogan's marketing push went. I believe he has a book to sell right now, too. Don't we all. Ahm only buy'en 'is if he's buy'en mahn, like. Cue 'Wonderwall - Oasis', ah kid.
The place for you sir, is TV monologues (I mean that as compliment, not insult).
top writing free Nov 14-15 .. not for wimps .. myBook.to/SeptFirst .. some stories are experienced more than read .. ach, I don't believe I just said that .. just download it please .. costs you nothing and it may move you
Downloaded, and when I find time I will read and review. Rare commodity of late, is time.
David wrote: "Downloaded, and when I find time I will read and review. Rare commodity of late, is time."Thanks very much David. Yes, time is the thing .. still it is on my side today .. I was going to do some house painting, but the weather is a touch too damp .. and my wife got the date of a friend's birthday wrong so this evening is free. I'll prob squander an hour tweeting the freebie! What a game.
Have a kewl yule .. I hope Santa brings lots of cracking books your way xx
As opposed to crackling books? ;)A very merry christmas to you :) xx
Gingerlily - Elephant Philosopher wrote: "As opposed to crackling books? ;)A very merry christmas to you :) xx"
But the Crackling is Superb: An Anthology on Food and Drink by Fellows and Foreign Members of the Royal Society of London
That looks an interesting book Jim. A tad pricey though.
Gingerlily - Elephant Philosopher wrote: "That looks an interesting book Jim. A tad pricey though."At under £4 for the hardback?
The one I looked at was £14
arf, arf, I love this place! (hardback)
Phew, how long can it take to write a brief biog? Think mine is at last OK. Done and re-done, cut n polished. At least the same set of words, with the same pic now appears in about 10 places. Basic branding stuff I suppose, but not obvious to many, esp me. Most of my pvs attempts came out all contorted and crazy. Simple and direct is sometimes the hardest outcome to achieve.
I think I'm learning patience. My revamped webbie is not ready. A while back I'd have posted it half-cocked. Not now. And I seem to be managing not to tweet rubbish for the sheer sake of tweeting. Progress.
~ happy new year one and all ~ here's to a super-uber-mega-massively creative and successful 2015 ~
Happy New Year, Ron. I wish you a successful 2015.
Phew, at last, my revamped website is finally in businesss. I hope you will find the blog a worthy read as the weeks go by...the latest is on how Amazon reviews can be good fun ... even one star put-downs ... tell me what you think pls >> http://rjaskew.com/
I plan to relaunch One Swift Summer this coming Friday will start with a lower price to coincide with the RSPB's garden birdwatch. New this, new that, new webbie... http://rjaskew.com/
I'm planning a blog on birds in literature. I'd appreciate any examples. The doves in The Woodlanders .. the little bird that lands on the fisherman's rod in The Old Man and the Sea .. the two bullfinches at the very end of Life and Fate. I know there are many examples in poetry. But how do birds embellish story plots? What bird scenes spring to mind for you?
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