Sunday, November 29, 2009

REWRITE

I'm about midway through the rewrite stage now. I used to hate this stage when I started it for the first book and then I came across opportunities that I'd missed. I had planned to cut as much as possible but ended up adding scenes the first time around. I'm not having as many moments like that in this book. I'm finding a few continuity errors though. Nothing major, just minor character references.

I'm not going to have it ready for release on December 8th though. Just won't have it in time and I learned with the first book how important that is.

Monday, November 16, 2009

WRITING RETREAT

My own self-imposed writing retreat turned out great. I got more work done that I had hoped and moved a lot closer to completion. I got well over 40 pages of handwritten work typed in and was even able to format the book. It comes out to 318 pages but I'm sure I'll be slimming it a bit in over the next few weeks. I had expected it to be about 110,000 words but I went a bit passed that. Well, actually, I went way past that by about 20,000 words. OOPS! I even went ahead and ordered a proof copy to work on so I'm positive I'll be able to keep the December 8th target date for official release.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

ODD THINGS

I did a Google search for The Secrets of Starpoint Mountain. It was kind of interesting to see an add for my book on a New Zealand web site. The odd thing was there is a small bookstore in Winterset Iowa selling a copy of my book. It's been read, rated 3 out of 5 for condition, and advertised as being signed and inscribed by the author. It's strange because they are asking $21 for it even though it sounds like it's pretty worn. I don't think my signature is worth that much. Yet. :-P

Sunday, November 8, 2009

HARDCOVER BOOKS

Just for the heck of it I made a hardcover edition of The Secrets of Starpoint Mountain. It's the newer version of the book and is only available on Lulu. Strangely enough after the reformatting the hardcover version is now a bit cheaper than the original paperback.

Friday, November 6, 2009

ROLLING THE DICE

I'm taking a roll of the dice this weekend and sending copies of my book to the book reviewers of The Iowa City Press Citizen, Realms of Fantasy Magazine and the Chicago Tribune. It's a chance but there is no other way to go about it. What are the chances of me getting a good review if I don't?

Thursday, November 5, 2009

MY SHORTS

I've noticed my short stories are getting pretty dark. I get an idea and just sit down to write it and suddenly it gets really wicked. I started one and wrote two pages in about twenty minutes. It was really flowing and I was writing like a maniac inside the zone. Then I went back and reread it and was pretty shocked. It was terrible. even the last story that I wrote I planned it to have a very funny twist at the end but by the time it was done it ended up with a really scary twist after that.
Hmmm? Not really sure what that means.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

BOOK 2: THE DULL BITS

I spent a good chunk of this weekend typing. I've done most of the first draft in long hand and now I have to type it all up. I write small enough that a full page of hand writing comes out to about a page and 1/3 of type. It's not as fun as the first draft but I do catch a few opportunities to add or remove things.