I admit it, I lost my focus. You could probably tell because blog updates have been few and far between the last couple of months. Sure the holidays had to have a lot to do with it, and personal relationship problems had a lot to do with it, but the other business i'm trying to run has a huge part of it too.
As the saying goes, you cannot serve two masters. And Lord, if that ain't the truth! ,I'm sitting here 5:40 in the morning, reassessing my goals and trying to get back on track.
The good news is, I finally got myself a domain name and a web hosting package. My site is there, but since my laptop isn't working right now, i haven't been able to design the site yet. Should be up and running soon though, income taxes are on the way and I'm planning on buying myself a nice desktop computer, with plenty of space for all my web-design/writing programs.
I'm also getting a nice new desk where I can keep all my stuff organized, maybe a new all-in-one printer, since the one I'm using now is acting funny.
Inclosing, I'm just glad a i caught myself worrying about my other business too much. I was about to drop another $100 to buy domain names for it, and I still might, but I have to remember, the writing comes first. The writing is what I've been dedicating most of my life too. The writing is where my focus needs to be. Even though the other job offers quick, easy money, and lord knows writing full novels (which is what I'm presently doing, haven't gotten into writing novellas yet) is anything but easy. But as morbid as it sounds, when I'm dead, i'd rather be known as a great writter then a great internet marketing person. Sooo this is me, getting back on the ball. Very happy I caught myself before I fell off completely. :)
Okay,so I've been gone for over a month! Sorry, I don't plan my vacations so i can't alert people when i decide to take one. I knew the holidays were going to make me too frazzled to concentrate on my writing, so I decided to take that month off that Steven King suggested in his book "On Writing". Now when I do the final edit I can decide if the story is going the way I wanted it to, and edit it with new eyes. I also got a job blogging for someone else so that takes up a lot of time as well. Still, the ball is rolling and i'm ready to get this book out there!
Plus, I got someone to draw a pic of one of my characters, VEGAS! LOL! I think it's cute, not exactly how i pictured him, but I love other peoples interpretations of my characters. Just the kind of boost I needed to get me motivated and get my story out there.
What sweet early Christmas gift for me! Ohh, and sample chapters of the book are coming soon!
First thing is I want to sing the praises of my Natural Reader. This little gizmo can valuable to any writer. I use this thing to read my story back to me when i've had enough of reading it myself. Editing with this program is awesome, because it reads your story back to you and you can hear when something isn't right.
Usually the advice is to read your book outloud, but I find this kind of tedious and less effective than natural reader. Even though you are less likely to see words that aren’t there when you read out loud, I find that I still make that mistake sometimes. The natural reader doesn’t make that mistake, it see’s only what’s there and it makes re-reading the same book (that you’ve read 300 times already, no doubt) a little more fun.
Another thing I wanted to talk about is Amazon and how it almost totally DESTROYED ITSELF over a book about how to molest children. Unbelievable! I'm late with my rant so im sure everyone is over it, but this really pissed me off. And not just for the reasons everyone else is pissed off about it either, uh-uh, I have some completely selfish reasons for being upset :P
I was one of the, i'm sure, THOUSANDS of people who wrote angry letters to amazon telling them to pull the book out of their stores. If nothing else, think how bad this makes the self publishing industry on Amazon look? I KNEW there was going to be the industry slaves who were going to use this as evidence that no book should be published without gatekeepers making sure it's proper for the viewing public.
Yes, during a few online discussions about this fiasco, a notable one being on the Huffington Post, I saw people stating exactly that!
As if all self published authors are just trying to slip complete anarchy past the publishers and get it to the public to dismantle what's left of our good society. And look, to be fair, my book does contain a pedophile in it, but rest assured, my pedophile is attacked and humiliated in just about every section he appears in! And that's good, that's how it should be.
Because pedophiles are DEFINITELY bad people, and we cannot make fun of people because of their race--we cannot make fun of people because of their religion--But damn-it, do not tell us that we cannot make fun of pedophiles!!!!!
Anyway, that's my mini rant. I was feeling guilty for not blogging here. On top of everything else I'm working on my new blog so that's another reason for the slowness getting the post out.
Hope everyone else had a great Thanksgiving. I did, now to go bust my ass to see if I can top it come Christmas.
Usually the advice is to read your book outloud, but I find this kind of tedious and less effective than natural reader. Even though you are less likely to see words that aren’t there when you read out loud, I find that I still make that mistake sometimes. The natural reader doesn’t make that mistake, it see’s only what’s there and it makes re-reading the same book (that you’ve read 300 times already, no doubt) a little more fun.
Another thing I wanted to talk about is Amazon and how it almost totally DESTROYED ITSELF over a book about how to molest children. Unbelievable! I'm late with my rant so im sure everyone is over it, but this really pissed me off. And not just for the reasons everyone else is pissed off about it either, uh-uh, I have some completely selfish reasons for being upset :P
I was one of the, i'm sure, THOUSANDS of people who wrote angry letters to amazon telling them to pull the book out of their stores. If nothing else, think how bad this makes the self publishing industry on Amazon look? I KNEW there was going to be the industry slaves who were going to use this as evidence that no book should be published without gatekeepers making sure it's proper for the viewing public.
Yes, during a few online discussions about this fiasco, a notable one being on the Huffington Post, I saw people stating exactly that!
As if all self published authors are just trying to slip complete anarchy past the publishers and get it to the public to dismantle what's left of our good society. And look, to be fair, my book does contain a pedophile in it, but rest assured, my pedophile is attacked and humiliated in just about every section he appears in! And that's good, that's how it should be.
Because pedophiles are DEFINITELY bad people, and we cannot make fun of people because of their race--we cannot make fun of people because of their religion--But damn-it, do not tell us that we cannot make fun of pedophiles!!!!!
Evil does not deserve civil rights!
Btw, while we're on the subject of pedo's...the news and media beats it into our heads that you can't tell a pedophile by how they look, and i do believe that's true...but every pedo I ever seen on the news LOOKS exactly like you would expect a pedo to look...
BWAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!!!
Anyway, that's my mini rant. I was feeling guilty for not blogging here. On top of everything else I'm working on my new blog so that's another reason for the slowness getting the post out.
Hope everyone else had a great Thanksgiving. I did, now to go bust my ass to see if I can top it come Christmas.
Okay, the truth is there's a little secret about my work that i've been keeping. I was going to explain myself eventually...after I felt like I was really a success at this self publishing thing.
The secret is that I actually did have an agent that was interested in this work. A very big agent (in the YA fantasy world anyway). Now, he asked for a copy of my manuscript, but I guess I didn't feel the work was ready to send it to him yet. Then by the time I felt it was ready, I had gotten all swept up into the idea of self publishing. Even though a lot of people were telling me I was crazy for it.
And I did feel crazy for doing this up until a few days ago. I mean, who the hell doesn't jump at the chance to work with an agent? Only a moron right?
Imagine if I fail at this self publishing thing. OMIGAWD! I gave up the chance to work with a real AGENT! What a failure!
Except, the more blogs I read, the more I talk to other authors in and out of the industry, the more unspectacular the whole traditionally publishing route sounds to me. And at this point no matter what happens, I know I wouldn't be happy publishing traditionally. Why? Because I know my personality and I am not the type who can tolerate suits telling me what "art" is. There are suits and there ate artist. Suits know marketing, they know distribution channels, they know other suits, but ART? No.
Now, I get it. To be a rich, super successful writer you need marketing, you need suits. So rather then deal with suits I've restructured my goals, career wise, a little. My dream is no longer to be a multi-millionaire. My dream is to be one of the best writers ever. Not "the best that I can be", the best writer, PERIOD.
A suit isn't going to help me accomplish that goal. A suit is going to kick my book into shape so that it sells lots and lots of copies. An editor? Yes, they definately help. An agent? Hmmmm.... Publisher? Not really.
I'm putting this out now rather then when I become a "successful indie writer", because a successful indie writer is someone who sells more then 100 copies of their book. Call me conceited, but I'm pretty sure I can sell more than 100 copies of my awesomeness :) . So, I'm going to say that I'm successful enough to be sure about the path I'm on.
Another thing about the agent that contacted me. He has an author in his stable ("stable" i don't know what else to call them)who is very successful. I see her books everywhere, that's why I got weak in the knees when this particular agent seemed intrested. I went to this authors website and a read an except of her book..hmmm what can i say. I was not impressed. A little chigrined may be better wording for it. But at the time it was cool to me. I mean if he liked her book he would certainly LOVE mine. Better chances for me right? And maybe that was true, maybe it wasn't. But now looking back on that, it just proves my point that suits know marketing. They don't know art. The fact is you can sell ANYTHING if you market it, just right.
So, knowing that fact. I thinks to myself "If a suit can pretend to know art, maybe a writer can pretend to know marketing". Marketing is an ART in a way, isn't it? Yes, there is an art to it. Red paint here, in this portrait, bring out this emotions, expresses this idea. A finely worded ad, placed here, will get me X amount sales. Check stats to see if my message is reaching the public. HAZAH! My bank account will show that my art is relevant! AHAHA!
Everyone always uses the music industry as an example so im going to do it to. Industry music today SUCKS. Everyone knows it. The stuff on the radio is crap and you have to be drugged up to stand to listen to it. That's probably why so many American teenagers are hocked up on anti depressants and ADHD drugs.
Just sayin'.
Industry music sucks butt. And why is that? Because suits don't know shit about art. They'd rather brainwash the public into buying nonsense because it's easier and less risky for them. You can't tell for sure how real art will catch people, because all emotions aren't the type that lead people to buy stuff. And the emotions that lead people to buy stuff are the only emotions suits care about.
The suits jobs just keeps getting easier, they don't have to put any work into an artist anymore. Computerized voices and the artist are already trained to follow orders by the time they reach that level.
Now I will admit, industry books aren't anywhere near as bad as industry music. There are some pretty good industry books out there. But the devil is in the process and how the authors get treated. The writer has already cleaned and polished the book by the time an agent reads it. The writer has done all the hard work, yet gets somewhere between 5-8% of the profits. Is that fair? Doesn't seem it to me. If it seems fair to you then by all means go for it.
But before I sign on with anyone, I want to see if maybe I might be as good at playing a suit as the suits are at playing artist. Gotta be brave, gotta be bold and sometimes do things that are a little crazy.
As expected, I can't decide on a pen name. I had a good one in mind but now I don't know if I like it anymore. Too androgynous maybe.
It's just like me to worry about silly little details like that. I think it's a Virgo thing. Some of us can be nit-picky and a perfectionist about certain things. It's taking me a while to learn things don't have to be perfect all the time, sometimes you just have to get it DONE. I'm trying to use that same logic when it comes to my book. If I waited till it was PERFECT it would never come out. I have to get it done.
I'm driving myself bat shit with all this editing. It's that perfectionist-ism (okay, I don't know the word for it) that is going to be the death of me and this project.
Alright, each chapter has to be relevant to the story. Each chapter has to be clear and add something to the bigger picture. Each chapter should be as short as possible. What's this characters motivation? What kind of emotional response will people have to this scene? Then I get side tracked by all the little details...change the story this way...change the story again to fit the other changes I made...then it's just me ripping my hair out in front of my laptop. I ain't got no more damn hair left.
I do have other books I'd like to write, plenty others. Today, I sat down and wrote the titles or general ideas of the books I'd like to write and launch after American Sorcery School. I had about 20 altogether, including a few series. I figure that's enough work for about 10 years, no? If I put out 2 books a year, which sounds like a comfortable pace, in 10 years my self pubbed books should have built me a pretty sturdy living.
In another 10 years I'll be 41. 20 books should be generating enough income for me to live off of and who knows what can happen in 10 years. Maybe I have a few really good years where I can manage more than 2 a year. Maybe one book or a series gets picked up for a movie or television show. You never know.
Either way, if I can keep a steady work pace, I should be able to say that I am making a living as a writer by the time I'm 41. If my books sell poorly, it would be because I'm not marketing myself properly and I would guess within ten years I would have gotten the jist of marketing. Either way it's going to be a wonderful feeling. Having a career that I fashioned and that I am totally in control of.
I never had "career plan" before that was so…so....simple? A career plan where I am actually as excited about the PROCESS and the WORK as I am excited about the MONEY and the TITLE. Honestly, I am more excited about the process and the work, because I know financially I am probably going to have it tough for the first few years while I build my career. I'm ready and I have my mind set and I'm going to give this all I've got.
There's a little more to the plan though, but I'm astounded by just how basic it is at the core. I mean if I had done this ten years ago…
If no one's noticed I put a new resources for writers page up.
http://allfiredup123.blogspot.com/p/places-to-list-your-blog.html
I'm still hard at work. Editing, editing, editing. GRRRRR!!! It's a labor of love. The day I have my book launched I'm going to have to run to the beauty salon and get a weave, or all the bald spots on my head plastered over or something…sigh…
This has to be a quick one because I'm going nuts trying to get all this work done. My to-do list has the ability to regenerate itself; as soon as I cross one task off, two more task appear in it's place like a demonic alien hydra! eeeek!!! -_-;;.
Updates?--Okay, I figured out why it's so expensive to POD my book. My book was too long. I just butchered the thing in half o_O;; WTF?! That act nearly made me quit life. After all the blood, sweat and tears (okay, no actual blood... but definitely tears demmit) to get my story to work and get it where it made sense, I had to DELETE nearly half the book, which means I practically have to rework the entire thing over again. ARRRGGHH *smoke shoots out of ears*!!!
Also, typing my book up innocently in Microsoft word I had no idea that 360 in whatever setting I was using (the "I-think-I'm-a-real-writer-setting?") translated to 466 pages in the ready for print template. At about $0.015 a page, my book would have been waaaaay too expensive.
Kill your darlings, Kill your darlings. Isn't that what Stephen King was talking about in "On writing"?
Well, my darling is dead and hopefully it will be born again, better and stronger. Actually it is...once you hit the delete button on about 10 chapters and realize that there is still a good story there...a more focused one...Yeah, you really didn't need that 10 chapters anyway and it was just mindless--though entertaining--filler.
I got the Lightning Source Application. **EXCITING**
It's long. I'm about halfway done with it. I'm at the part where they are asking me for banking info and I figure now was the best time for me to go open that business checking account so I can use that.
I've been struggling for a while deciding whether or not to use a pen name and I finally decided to go with a pen name. Why not? Having a secret identity is sexy :)
So my small business account will be opened under my pen name (if I can.. well see)
What else? Editing insanity. Lightning Source. Pen Name. Business Account. Oh and I still have the husband/son/life/and work thing. YESH! Better to be busy then bored though and I'm definitely not bored.
Alright, enough out of me for now...I got work to do!
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Contributors
- Demon Hunter
- I'm a writer who is going in indie. My first novel should be up and ready for sale soon and I'm having a blast learning all about the world of indie publishing