My vampire world has been renamed Coffee and Blood. I didn’t like Shadows and Secrets. It will revolved mainly in trilogies. The first was called Wraith’s Rebellion. The next is called Harvester.
Here is a little preview, which will be included at the back of Death Mask.
I’m a lazy, lazy bum. Or, at least, I feel like a lazy, lazy bum.
The advice all writers are given, especially going into indie publishing is, “Just keep writing.” That’s not just to mean that you write forever and a day, but that you write, publish a book, then write some more.
I haven’t really been doing that. I feel like during the summer, I’m not myself. At least, not my productive self. All I want to do is head out into the sun, or clean my apartment. Thanks to two cats fighting over territory, it seems there’s always hair and kibble everywhere.
I need to start another mass edit of Death Mask, which was supposed to launch August 9th. There’s still a chance that it will launch on time. It’s a very slight chance, but still a chance.
I have almost a week in August off and I plan to write Fragments. This is the much waited for second book for the Daughters of the Alphas series. I thought that Masked Intentions received mixed reviews at best, but I keep getting questions on when the next book will be coming out, so…
When people ask for something, give it to them, especially if it was already on your to-do list. Just jump that sucker up some. Unless you were having issues for another reason.
I’ve fixed everything up so that I can edit at work. I’m so flipping pleased with myself. New tablet. Old one… uh… yeah, I could use it for writing if I was super patient. But I couldn’t use it to edit or access pretty well anything except Facebook… ish. That’s the problem with that kind of tablet. Without the ability to install new tech, the thing became obsolete. And I think its company realized its mistake because the new ones can be upgraded.
In the meantime, the old one will sit to the side and gather dust but it’s still useful if necessary. I can breathe again, I can do my things again. I can touch a button and see all the things. Darn it, when I come on the new tablet, it’s like viewing the sites from a laptop instead of getting a mobile version that makes me pick up and shake the tablet in frustration.
I feel like I’m ready to get back to work. Like, maybe, I was a little burnt out from so many words so quickly, so much work while working the full-time job. Now the only problem is all those nifty ideas that I’ve had over the past year, that I haven’t gotten around to? They’re all arguing over which gets to go first.
Have you ever seen the Simpsons episode where Mr. Burns gets told that he has pretty well every illness possible? I feel like that almost. Except instead of diseases, it’s ideas and I’m the doctor and Mr. Burns is my muses humming and skipping away instead of listening to me and just fixing the problem.
I swear, if they toss me one more idea… I’ll… I’ll…
I have no idea what I can do to them that they wouldn’t enjoy. They were the ones giggling at the back of my mind as Mr. Wrightworth beat on someone ruthlessly.
I’m marketing At Death’s Door more today. I’m going to say this, but only because I’m bored: Ugh.
If there are any marketers reading this and I’ve accidentally submitted to your site twice, I apologize. Beth’s had me do this for her, so I thought the site looked familiar because I was there for her, but no.
Ugh.
Marketing is repetitive. You can pay other services to submit to other pages, however you pay them to submit your book to the free services of other sites which doesn’t guarantee you promotion. This means that… well, do it yourself! If you submit to 45 sites the chances of being picked up by one are pretty slim unless you are some sort of best seller with six million reviews. For all you or I know, those sites are automatically ignored because they’re basically spam bots.
Now if it’s a network, that’s a different story.
So paying such and such a price to do that when there’s a Fiverr option (of five bucks) to do the same thing is pretty well pointless. But beware Fiverr, there are some who say they’ll post your book to Facebook pages, ect, then send you doctored photos. Beth caught someone last year doing that. She’s very focused on anything Fiverr. If she can’t track what you did, then you did nothing and she wants her money back.
And if you send her images of “open” Facebook groups and she can’t find them on Facebook, she’s going to demand her money back, then report you to Fiverr, and give you a one star rating because stop ripping indie authors off you mean people.
Submitting to sites goes by fairly quickly, after an hour I had about twenty sites. Maybe a few less, I’ve been wandering in between submissions because it’s such repetitive work. I don’t mind repetitive work if it’s with my hands. Sorting blueberries, removing paper bits from fiddleheads, that kind of thing. The copy and paste and switch windows in a different pattern every time, that’s what’s getting to me.
I like patterns, they make my job easier.
Here’s the thing with marketing (for those brand new at it) you want all your links open in tabs in behind. Open a new tab for each site you visit, then close it once everything is complete.
I visit sites often which have the go forward then back thing going on, but marketing, I often close the tab I’m working on. It’ll also help you trace back and forward. So at the moment I have the original search through Google (good ol’Google) then the first result I opened, and from there I actually found another site with many links and that’s the site I’m working on. Once I’m done I can just close the tab and go backwards, or keep it open and use it to compare the links between sites and maybe save myself a few clicks.
Some people ask for ASIN, then they ask for the link to your Amazon book, do not go to Amazon and look up your book. Go to your bookshelf in KDP and click on the US site from there, this will give you a clean link. If you look it up on Amazon, there’s a bunch of numbers at the end.
Want reviews? If six people click that link with the numbers and try to review, you’re going to have a bad time. It’s some kind of referral number. Use a clean link. And in that clean link, the ASIN is present. I think that might be the most frustrating, yet easiest part. I just keep the Amazon link on the clipboard and then delete the webpage and leave only the ASIN when they request it.
If you find yourself getting bored, take a break. Wander the internet, check social media, write a little bit. Boredom makes it a laborious process.
Some sites require a certain number of reviews. The magic numbers seem to be 3, 5, or 18. Nothing outside of that, which I find odd. But hey…
So those who pay for reviews get a head start. Annoying, nope, I will not pay for reviews, not if I can help it.
At Death’s Door currently has four reviews, bringing it to 4.7 Stars on Amazon. Yesterday morning, it had two. I’m dancing, but now I’m just one off of meeting about two thirds of the sites’ requirements. I used to itch for that third review, now I’m itching for the fifth.
Some sites require family friendly books, or no erotica. Most of the sites I chose accept erotica because I’m now keeping a list for later reference. Just a list, not the links themselves. For my next free day I will search each one, which will take me to a new page, in case they move it.
Some sites require you to sign up for free account. For the most part I avoid these. For starters, I never remember the log in and I’ve never heard of these sites.
Many require you sign up for their author newsletters and/or the newsletters sending out the free books. So look at it this way: a site says they have 40,000 readers of their email. They also have a lot of different authors who have advertised on their site. How many of those 40,000 are actually readers, and how many are just authors who are sitting on the newsletter and not paying attention to the emails?
In order to tell if you’ve been advertised, though, you have to sign up for the email and check the days that you requested. The last time I did this, the sites I applied to all sent me an email saying, “Your book will be promoted the days you requested” except it wasn’t. If it’s not guaranteed promotion, just say so! Most sites do.
Don’t tell me you’re going to do something, then don’t.
There are ever a very few that don’t tell you anything at all. They want you to submit an inquiry for more information. I take that as I do jewelry that has no price. Either I can’t afford it, or the seller is snooty and thinks I can’t afford it, either way they aren’t getting my money. I prefer to give my money to those who are transparent and up front about everything.
One site kind of threatened you with the possibility of being drawn for reviews, and that those reviews may not be kind, if you don’t do the paid option. That was a little odd, I’m not certain if I should take that as they will find everything wrong with your book, or if it was just friendly advice. I’m hoping it’s friendly advice…
It’s not that I have writer’s block, but that this happens when I get close to the ending of something. It happened with Contract Renewed and prematurely with Contract Sealed. There’s just something about ending a book that gives my brain a stutter and a little death.
I’ve been working on Wraith’s Rebellion since September. My fingers are trying to tell me that’s ten months. I’m not really trusting them at the moment, as I’m having difficulty moving the joints and that interferes with a lot of reasoning skills because of the pain.
If the damp could go away, I’d be ever so happy.
So working out the ending and saying goodbye to Quin and Helen is seriously messing with me. It’s not like there have been a lot of characters, this has been a very intimate story and unlike with Izzy and Nate… and Mr. W, it isn’t done and in the past.
They just feel cozier to me, and I don’t want to give them up, but this will be the end of their story. The world might continue, but I don’t think they really come up again unless Anna does tell me her story, then it’d be text based communication only.
In the meantime I’ve been playing video games. Mainly because the arthritis is causing enough pain to drain me to the point of nothing, so by the time I get home from the day job there’s a fog in my eyes and I still have the nightly things to do, like dinner, dishes, and cats.
Please buy my books so I can quit my day job.
I had never intended on full quitting, but it’s working with my hands. I know they say with arthritis to use it or lose it, but I can do stretches or colouring books, nail painting and fine work for cover design. Things which help with my career rather than help someone who yips and yaps at me because someone my age couldn’t possibly have arthritis and why am I not moving faster to serve their purpose?
I’m talking clients, not boss. The boss is quite understanding and we’re discussing training for another position because… well, hands.
In the meantime, while this stupid rain continues and the damp gets into my joints, I’ve started promoting At Death’s Door even though I swore I’d wait for more reviews on all the books before I did that. I’ve been considering setting out a cover goal for myself.
One pre-made cover for each day off the regular job. Once I reach ten covers, I’ll start selling them. Take that money and reinvest it in the books. Etc and so on.
I’ve been considering getting a website. But here’s the thing. My credit card expires next month and I haven’t received the new one yet. I’m worried about starting and subscription service, in case the credit card company has decided my paying the card on time all but that one time isn’t good enough and and they don’t send me a new one.
It could seriously mess with my plans, but that’s life. Always kicking me in the face.
After all that trouble last year, I had a couple quiet months. Then on Sunday my kitchen ceiling started leaking. Did my job, notified the landlord. No response. Then on Thursday same thing, except four this time.
Did my job, notified the landlord and pointed out the mould growing on the ceiling now. Said he’d be there Friday.
I have no idea if he did anything. The ceiling isn’t leaking anymore but it’s not raining as hard. My kitchen smells like mould and mildew.
Know where you don’t want that stuff? In your food.
I’m so sick of chasing people with the same comment or question sixteen times, then having them act like I’m imposing on them because I want an answer as to what will be done about this thing that is their responsibility.
Answer the first time, and I won’t have to ask again.
So I need to look for a new place on top of everything else. Due to the area being an “up and comer” people are moving into it which is jacking up the rent. I can’t afford to move on my income, and I’m “well above” minimum wage.
I was told recently that minimum wage was meant to be living wage, how much you had to make to support a family. I can’t support myself on more than that!
Not anymore, not with people jacking up the rent because people are moving from Toronto because they can’t afford to live there either.
Dear world, I was told there were breaks that people catch. You lied, I want a refund on hope invested so I can convert it into something more useful.
As an added note, I think my autocorrect is starting to lose its mind. Oh boy.
When I decided to make my own covers, I moved them and then started getting confused so quickly. It’s nearly impossible to find anything, and I find myself cursing the moron who set it up.
That’s me, still.
I opened At Death’s Door in Paintshop and tried to make the wrap, except I couldn’t because I wasn’t organized. I had no idea where the texture was that I used, the original image is in freaking purgatory it seems, and, oh yeah, I don’t have the template to make the book because At Death’s Door is longer than my other books by a little bit.
The paperback version hasn’t been formatted because I don’t have Microsoft on my desktop.
Microsoft, why in the hell do you sell an operating system without the blood processor? Why does that make sense, in what world?
You money grubbing…
So there goes the small black number I had from my royalties. I was planning on spending that on Paintshop, which is still in the trial phase for me. Instead I will have to pay out of pocket for that, but Beth reassures me that if I keep all the receipts and I use it only for my work, I can write it off at the end of the year.
In the past, I have taken my document from my computer (which has OpenOffice and whose page numbering I can never figure out) to either my laptop (now dead for good) and my tablet (so close to dead I’ve left it at work over the weekend rather than lug it home). So I had to update in order to get the book to do what I wanted.
Which meant that I had to get office to do the format to get the template to do the wrap to get the paperback copy of At Death’s Door. If I had been more organized, I would have done this over the past couple weeks, but nope. No, I did not do those things because I am not a bright person.
I’m going to have to reorganize everything. Files and subfiles and folders and cover work and a sub folder for every step of the way then the completed cover and document in the outer most folder. That’s what I’m going to have to do, and I don’t know how long it’ll take to reorganize the entire thing.
But I also have to go out and buy clothing because the trip to Cuba with Dorian is in a couple of weeks and I have absolutely nothing I’d wear in public. Especially in the swimsuit or fun in the sun style of clothing.
That’s pretty well my entire weekend, and I’m already procrastinating by writing a blog post, go me.
Making a cover has a learning curve. Now, I’m not under the belief that just anyone can sit down and make a nice cover. Unlike formatting, it’s not something that can be explained in a single blog post.
For myself, I have a long history with both graphic design and art. Don’t take that as meaning I’ve gone to school or anything. I worked with photo-manipulation software when I was a teenager. There was nothing else to do and this was in the age where your computer still made sounds as it connected to the internet, and was slow as could be. If you wanted to grab a picture, you had to wait ten minutes to an hour for it to download, my connection sucked that much.
I have, over the years, continued to use photo-editing software in the form of Gimp. Gimp was not what I was raised with and I found myself frustrated over the things that I couldn’t do, or couldn’t figure out. The text box alone…
What I was used to was a pirated copy of either Paintshop Pro, or Photoshop Pro. I had used the good stuff and knew that my trouble with Gimp was the limitations of the software. Though it is free and great for beginners.
As a teenager and into my early twenties, I drew a lot. Except it always came out awkwardly un-balanced. Turns out one of my lenses is crooked or misshapen and without special man-made lenses, my perspective of the world was forever slanted. Isn’t that fun? Especially when you can’t freaking draw with them on because it’s very uncomfortable.
My jobs over the years have involved a great deal of visual balance. This is a requirement for graphic design. If you have no sense of balance, or how to make a piece balanced, something will forever bother the reader who glances over your work.
My most recent job involves colour, measurements, creating designs, and guiding clients through the design choices to create a custom look that suits their needs. In the past three years I have learned more about colour and balance than I thought possible, or that I ever thought I would need.
So, with all that, I had a shitty little monitor and a mouse with some photo-editing software. I found drawing and working with the mouse to be annoying and blocky, like I was making the shapes with my shoulder instead of my wrist.
I grabbed a tablet, just a cheap one, nothing overly fancy.
Still have the shitty little monitor.
Why does the monitor matter? Well, each computer monitor is a bit like a snowflake. The monitor I have now is several years old, has dead pixels all over the place and I swear is getting darker with time.
Creating the cover for At Death’s Door, I thought I did really well, until I got it onto my cell phone, which is a much newer screen, and spotted things which I couldn’t see on my monitor. Things which made it look like a three year old had tried to colour the cover.
I would have caught it, had I actually been able to see the colour problem on my monitor. Once I saw it, and I zoomed in, I could kind of see it, but I still had to use my cell phone as a guide.
Hence the monitor’s new title, “shitty little monitor.” It works great for all things not graphic design.
Even with the proper equipment, this takes time, effort, and practice. Lots of practice. I like the practice, it’s quite invigorating to work on something besides writing and editing constantly. I’m also not playing a game, so I don’t have that guilty voice at the back of my head whining about how I should be working.
After getting a cover done, I step back and think that there was a better, smoother way of doing that thing. I remember for next time. Yes, my first few covers are going to be a little lumpy. Yes, it could be years before I produce the types of things which others would actually pay for.
But that’s actually my end goal with this. Not just to make my own covers, but to sell covers as well. That way, when I get aggravated about writing or editing, I can take a break, do some arts and crafts, and still make money.
I just need the practice.
I opened At Death’s Door and discovered that I was almost done with the first round of edits. These were mainly typos, autocorrect issues, and some formatting. The story is now on my phone in pdf form and I’m going to give it a read to check the global edits. This includes adding things that I couldn’t during the initial writing, going back and revisiting all descriptions, and such on and so forth.
I found a premade cover today that I quite like the look of, one from someone Beth has used in the past. They’re even offering to do the wraps now! Beth had to make her own… or maybe Beth didn’t read the entire site like she lectured me on doing several times. She gets like that sometimes.
So I need to rush through and get the edits set up so that I know the approximate length of the print book to get the cover ordered. Once I have the additions to it and the cover on order I’ll run back and start over as if I haven’t done any edits at all.
Which means a read and mark down edits. Then a read to make certain I didn’t create a typo in the mean time, because I do that because I’m stupid. Then through a grammatical editing program which does all right. Then another read to make certain I didn’t make a typo again, because I do that because I’m stupid.
Then I’m going to ask for a beta reader.
While they have the book I’ll read it again in the freaked out way I do. Which is basically as follows:
OH GOD SOMEONE IS READING MY BOOK WHAT ARE THEY READING WHAT DID I DO OH GOD WHY DID I DO THAT THERE’S A COMMA MISSING RIGHT THERE IM STUPID AND SHOULD JUST GIVE UP.
No punctuation whatsoever, just screaming at the top of my lungs inside my head as I start ripping it apart for more errors.
As Beth says, the editor in me hates the writer in me.
At Death’s Door was titled ‘Vampire’ until just a few chapters ago. This is written on my phone and will be extensively edited on a computer. Or, edited as any of my works are. There are two more books to be written, though I’ve not dabbled much in the plot of those so I can’t even give away the ending!
Vampires come out to humans and interviews are set up. Many humans are still skeptical as the vampires haven’t given physical proof besides some historical records. Those doing the interviews expect fluff and a little grief stricken darkness. A smidge of “oh, how killing mortals pains me!”
Most interviewers get just that. Boring vampires with boring lives (or at least edited for mass consumption) then there’s Quin.
Who probably shouldn’t have ever been on the list of interviewees. Like. Ever.
I had Tuesday off my day job and worked sixteen hours to get Contract Taken up on Amazon. I did a preorder in case anything went amiss … it did.
Now, I could have simply pulled the book and started again but I’m worried if I tried that, it’s never go up. So yes, I’m doing a preorder on my first book. This is not usually suggested.
But at least the book will go up.
When Dorian found out what I had done, he scolded me.
About the long work day on my day off, not the preorder.
I was up at 9am and didn’t get to bed until 2am. I did take probably 15mins every four hours to do chores, feed myself, and feed the cats. The last hour was spent trying to find a way to use fonts in a book on Amazon.
It looks so … unfinished without them. Unpolished, like I just don’t care. I’ve seen others use them, but I just can’t seem to figure it out myself.
Using a free epub converter (I discovered this morning) does the same thing!
When I told Dorian that he scolded me again!
Because I told him I wasn’t going back to work until next week. I will start writing today (get between me and writing, and I’m likely to bite you. In his case, literally) but I swore I wouldn’t do anything else.
It’s a long weekend, meaning Dorian and I are both off. I get the feeling I’m going to be … er … tied up most of the weekend and at this point I’m not sure it’ll be in a naughty fashion. I’m in so much trouble, he couldn’t even bring himself to threaten to smack me.
Someone asked a valid question though, and she’s willing to do a review on the book, but can’t use Amazon. So I was just trying to do a fulfillment now rather than next week when I’m running around like a crazy person before heading on “vacation” to a wedding across the country.
I don’t know what to do about the font and formatting thing. I don’t want to have to pay someone to format for me. I should be able to do it myself, but no one wants to tell me how.
I have just over a month to figure it out.
Ah, the WordPress app. Beth suggested it while the tablet is having issues. You don’t even have to publish it, just put notes in a draft. I’ve tried all sorts of note programs and Office type programs but none of them really work. Or, if they do work, they don’t really make a file I can take to my laptop/tablet.
Yesterday morning I edited a chapter. Then I did two blog posts first on the way to, then on the way from work. As soon as I got home I was on the phone with UPS because my package did turn up.
Then I went back to editing and did another chapter, and another this morning.
UPS’S driver obviously entered the wrong city, which happens, I get that (and it turned up, so how could I complain?) And I was able to get answers and timely responses from them.
I had, however, entered a ticket for my My Choice thing, because when I did the authorization apparently nothing took. I opened it under the tracking number for this package and was told to confirm I had entered it. I said yes and asked how I go about doing that again since obviously it didn’t work. And how would that work with Canada Post being weird?
This morning the person responsible for the ticket responded with “I see your package was delivered to *wrong city* I hope you found our customer service helpful.”
That wasn’t what this ticket was about.
With Canada Post being weird, I need to go through UPS to get hard copies of my books. The other service that runs starts with a ‘d’ and I can’t recall the name, but they suck. The drivers will not attempt delivery to apartment buildings. They drive up and idle for a bit, then leave claiming they were unable to make contact. As they did to me on four occasions for two different packages.
So my frustration at this dismal service does link into my writing.
My local postman may mark something as delivered and then not deliver the notice for three days, but at least my package is safe at the local post office. It’s also about a third of the cost.
I hope they resolve their issues soon.
On the editing front, I’m now on chapter sixteen. I checked the word count today. I shouldn’t have.
Contract Taken is about 87k words, Contract Broken is about 89k word. Currently Contract Renewed is sitting at 76k words.
Going in, I knew it was shorter. When I started it was 66k words. I wrote its bare bones and knew that as I finished. The point was to get the skeleton out and to add the details later. Chapter fifteen was three pages of nothing but dialogue. It’s now five pages, but could probably be expanded on for physical reaction to emotion and stimulus.
I definitely will need to do another go-through for editing and checking on that sort of thing.
With four chapters left, I’m not even certain how I managed this because I swear there were two more chapters of sex and three more of other stuff.
There’s definitely not enough sex. Of course I’m trying not to repeat too much, wouldn’t want to bore anyone. I think I’ve done well so far, but while I could easily add more, it’d probably be summed up by Izzy as, “a regular play session,” which kind of makes it sound boring. However, I’m concerned that if I go into details of a regular play session, the reader will find themselves bored because they’ve already had that.
I could add some suspension play, I know both of them are interested in that, but I have absolutely no experience with suspension. It’s something that Dorian isn’t interested in, let alone has the setup for, and I can’t play in public at all.
I’d just start crying, like last time.
It’s kind of funny how I’m very private about play (using an anonymous pen name to say I do play doesn’t count) yet I’m parading Izzy’s exploration of play before my readers.
Once I go through the edit, I might ask Dorian for help. And I’ll be specific that I don’t mean seduce me for ‘inspiration’ purposes. He’s supposed to help me with Nathaniel’s trilogy as well.
I know the male perspective of books can be well-received but Nathaniel isn’t like that. One book is about Izzy, I think. The other two are about before her. Everything that led up to his meeting her.
I sound a little ramble-ly, I know. But doing a blog post helped me stay focused through the day yesterday, do I’m hoping it’ll help today as well.
Aya DeAniege 