I'm not a terribly experienced writer. I came to the forum a few years ago as a demonstrably poor writer who wanted to get better. Through the encouragement (and occasional head bashing) I found here, my writing improved. I want to pass that along. I said elsewhere, and I'll say here (in particular because I'm not the first person to say this, but it bears repeating): The sole job of the opening paragraph is to draw readers in; to tell them that they want to read more. It doesn't matter if it's a 500-word short story or the opener for a million-word novel series, if you don't draw them in, you lose them. In most cases, an opening sentence should have action. To have action, you need a character, even if they are implied (e.g. the observer). The action doesn't have to come out of the fevered dreams of Michael Bay, it can be simple, quiet, and closely-held. The key to that action is that it has to be consequential. It has to let the reader know that something is happening; that whatever it is will generate a result. They don't need to know (yet) why it's happening, just that it is. The rest of the paragraph should decompose the consequences of the action. First sentence: this thing happened (or is happening). Second sentence: this is the result of the thing happening. Third sentence (if necessary): this is the effect of the result of the thing happening. Let me provide two (completely made up right now) opening paragraphs. Anyone feel free to run with them and create a story, though I won't be hurt if you don't (honest). Compare that to this: The second paragraph certainly communicates more. It's longer, so it must, right? But does it tell the reader any more about why they want to care about what's happening? Honestly, maybe the first paragraph doesn't, but at least it gets the reader in and out in a few short sentences. Grab 'em, hold 'em, keep 'em.
I used Draft2Digital to expand the publication of my novel, and that included a print version. The process was simple, and while the interior layout isn't perfect (there are a few random page breaks that I don't know where they came from), the general result is excellent. I'm excited about it. It's strange to hold a book in my hand that has my name on it (see the Gallery tab on this post).
I don’t even know when the last time is I logged on here, let alone posted content, reviewed others’ content, or acted like a member of this community. I’m still alive, still writing. In fact, I’ve started taking a class from David Gerrold, which is exciting. In case anyone’s interested, I’ve launched a new website with a series of shorts I’ve been working on, called Tales of the West. Stop on by if you care.
The black feral cat is watching the squirrels and ignoring the junkos; the grey feral is nowhere to be seen, but it's never far. A doe and her fawn wander the neighbor's lawn, nibbling on the new growth, while the chickens in my yard cower in the corner of the fence, wary for the hawk, half their size, who regularly visits. We haven't heard the owl or the eagle for a week or more, but they will return. They always do.
I stole this from a Facebook post by someone named David Needle, as shared by the great David Gerrold. It seemed worthy of posting here. • An Oxford comma walks into a bar where it spends the evening watching the television, getting drunk, and smoking cigars. • A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly. • A bar was walked into by the passive voice. • An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening. • Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.” • A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite. • Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything. • A question mark walks into a bar? • A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly. • Papyrus and Comic Sans walk into a bar. The bartender says, "Get out -- we don't serve your type." • A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud. • A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves. • Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart. • A synonym strolls into a tavern. • At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar -- fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack. • A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment. • Falling slowly, softly falling, the chiasmus collapses to the bar floor. • A figure of speech literally walks into a bar and ends up getting figuratively hammered. • An allusion walks into a bar, despite the fact that alcohol is its Achilles heel. • The subjunctive would have walked into a bar, had it only known. • A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned a man with a glass eye named Ralph. • The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense. • A dyslexic walks into a bra. • A verb walks into a bar, sees a beautiful noun, and suggests they conjugate. The noun declines. • A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert. • A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget. • A hyphenated word and a non-hyphenated word walk into a bar and the bartender nearly chokes on the irony.
Life has been complicated for months, but I'm not dead yet. I'm also not writing, but that's another story. Wait, what...? No, never mind. I stayed up WAY past my bedtime last night and finished "Never Leaving Laramie" by John W. Haines. If you like true-life adventures (think Rinker Buck, et al), written eloquently (Robert Traver, etc.), put this collection on your list. I say "collection" because it's a series of short stories about his adventures around the worlds over a couple decades, ending in tragedy (that he tells you about right up front, so no spoilers here). The entire collection hangs together because the stories are sequential, and have the common theme of him returning to places or people after a trip, and always referring back to Laramie.
Well, I've gone and done it. I created a special edition of my debut novel by inserting a graphic of an autograph and a map of the area the story takes place (created by our own @Night Herald no less). I "minted" ten copies of the book as NFTs and put them on Rarible for sale for 0.1 ETH each (about US$200 at today's exchange rate). I have no idea if they'll sell, and it cost me about US$75 to go through the process (prices for minting vary throughout the day, but I just went with the prices that were offered at the moment I did it). One neat thing about selling an NFT on the blockchain is that if someone buys it and sells it on (I presume after consuming whatever's inside), I get a 10% royalty on the sale, and every sale thereafter. So if, for instance, my novel got sold on for 0.25 ETH (about US$500), I'd get US$50 on that transaction. Every time. The NFT craze is almost inexplicable, and I have no idea if my book will sell. But at least I'm offering something that can be consumed, rather than just crappy "art" that's being offered right now (there's some good art being offered too). This will be interesting if it goes somewhere. https://rarible.com/token/0xd07dc4262bcdbf85190c01c996b4c06a461d2430:476116:0x5dbe716cd5fafc467c4b4d9425ea6d7d16622d89?fbclid=IwAR0jj8hRdzf53Tw7sFORJN6-4DiMTxOwj5sYQvmQoGFCXGiYydgKuqsymA0
My novel is up to ten reviews on Amazon (globally, thank you @Steve Rivers for the UK-based review) with an average rating of 4.9 stars. I'm tickled! Squee!!
I'm excited. I mean, I'm really excited. It's live. Presale only right now, and there's still time for me to agonize over this phrase or that and push an update (feedback is coming in from beta readers), but it's live! The release date is March 12 (Friday, my birthday). If any of you feel so generous as to want to spend US$5 (~GBP 3.5) to support my dream, click the link below. But beyond that, thank you to everyone who helped me get through this. This organization is mentioned in the dedication. Thank you all. https://www.amazon.com/Lives-Time-Part-One-J-D-ebook/dp/B08Y7F9BXV/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=lives+in+time+by+j.d.+ray&qid=1615130685&s=digital-text&sr=1-1
I'm creating the KDP listing for my novel, and am struggling a bit with the description copy. Here's what I have so far. Feedback appreciated (as always).
I'm a little bit scared. Maybe a lot. For the better part of three years, I've been working on a novel. I had an idea... well, my wife had an idea, and I had the determination to write a story around it (she's the smart one, you see; I get by with perseverance). I wrote, re-wrote, got feedback and encouragement from friends who are actual writers, polished, polished, and polished some more. Finally I contracted some artists to produce a cover and a couple of interior drawings. In short, I've done all the things. Last night, I worked on final formatting, and with the exception of one niggling little formatting issue that no one else will notice and I can live with, the final package is finished. It's ready to publish. Of course, there's more to do. I created a Facebook page, and started making some posts there, but I need to do more with that. And I need to figure out a roll-out campaign, find a handful of people to give free copies to so they can read and provide reviews, and maybe spend some money on advertising. There are checklists for all this and more, and I can follow directions. But I'm scared. I've put a lot into this, and frankly I'm afraid it's not good enough. Oh, I know it's not GOOD WRITING, but I believe it's passable; better than a lot of what's self-published on the Kindle platform. But what if I have a giant blind spot, and the rest of the world thinks differently? What if, in the final analysis, in the court of public opinion, my work has no value? Part of me says that I have to take the leap. I have to take the risk, take the hit, learn from my mistakes, and keep at it. That's what the pros would tell me. It's what they're going to tell me. It's probably what's going to happen. Because (and those of you who really know me will verify this), I'm stubborn. But I'm also scared.
A few more tweaks and here's the final (still with creator watermarks). I'm so excited. Yes, it's not perfect. But for the money, it's amazing (to me). View attachment 23067
I am once again feeling inspired. Over the winter, I steeled myself to make a few revisions to my WIP, and have polished it (Mythbusters proved this was possible) to the point that I'm confident that it's ready for production. I wouldn't mind one or two more beta readers, particularly if they were women, because I want to be sure that I have Celeste's perspective well-written. As I crested the hill that overlooked the valley of publication, I began to think once again about cover art. I've been following a couple of cover art groups on FB, and engaged one of the companies for an eBook cover and a social media banner to match. The company is MiblArt, and I was very impressed with the process and the results. In short, for a US$149* basic fee (plus $39 for the social media banner), they did a cover from an assembled collection of stock art (a fully illustrated cover is available for more money, but I didn't want to, nor it seems need to, spend that kind of dough). I filled out a form that gave a basic description of the novel, some significant visual elements, and provided a list of covers that I liked the look of and why (I referenced their gallery for their convenience, as it's an excellent gallery with a broad representation of cover styles). Two days later -- yes, only two days -- they replied with an email and a sample cover image. I was gobsmacked. It wasn't perfect, but very close. I replied with a few revision requests, the designer asked a few more clarifying questions, which I answered, and three days after that, I have a cover image that I'm very pleased with. Their basic agreement is that "unlimited revisions" are available, but I see no need to keep asking for tiny tweaks to an otherwise excellent cover. I could obsess over details until I was blind, but what they've provided is so much closer to the content of the story than many professionally-published novels I've read that it's immeasurable. So, without further ado, here's the art as it stands (scaled to fit in the file size limits). Mind you, to date, they haven't charged me a dime. There's a watermark on the image, which will come off after payment, but it's faint enough that it doesn't impede my ability to review the quality of the work, which again is high. Feedback is welcome. View attachment 23066 * MiblArt tells me that, as a customer, other customers referred who mention me get a 15% discount.
I'm so despondent right now, the idea of being creative in any fashion is beyond me. The state my country is in is... wow... I don't even have a word for it. Nothing seems to fit. We were supposed to be the nation that the rest of the world looked up to. Oh, I know, we haven't been that in decades, but it always felt like we could get back there with a little effort. Now I'm looking for an exit strategy.
More basement mining turned up a box of stuff, much of which I'm embarrassed that I ever wrote. Oh, what an angsty young man I was. Not all of it is bad, though; flakes of gold to pick out of the sand and mud. One of them I posted in the Workshop, a poem titled "Dear, dear John". Others I'll post as they pan out.
