Re-Treading Water

That sounds like some kind of exercise program. It is in a way.

I’ve been self-editing again. The reason for this is that I spoke to my Locum Editor and discovered after some navel gazing that the stuff I sent wasn’t the best and I explained I would not be going ahead with the manuscript assessment until I had polished it up.

So that’s what I’ve been doing. This is because I know my usual editor will be free to kick my arse in a few weeks and I would rather have discovered my lack of talent now, rather than ship it off and get my wrists slapped more than required.

There is noting so irritating as an Editor telling you where, when and how bad you are when you already know and they’re telling you about something you could have fixed beforehand – if you weren’t LAZY.

As a self-publishing Indie author (which I am now, I think) I have this notion that there’s a lot of competition and you have to ‘bake-in’ that process of getting right or as close to right as you can before and Editor even slaps eyes on it.

It saves you time. It makes you a better writer, especially when you start writing the way you should have edited.

So I have broken out the polishing kit and some glitter.

Unfortunately there is the other side of the coin that you go ‘word-blind’ and end up not seeing the apostrophes for the colons. Sometimes you have to just hand it over and let the Editor do their job.

Anyway, it’s back to waiting for a bit until Hannah comes back to me.

Have fun and be excellent to each other. 🙂

Platform Soul

Do not fear, this is not a terrible chimera of Elvis, Otis Redding and a blond police officer called Ken Hutchinson.

It’s a bit of a mangled idea about Author Platform, as every random scribbler is supposed to have one now it seems. My personal preference for genre – that which I am drawn to, is Science Fiction – but this is not a platform.

A platform needs more.

So we must escalate this to a specific, marketable idea, where it can infiltrate certain circles. So Military Science-Fiction, then, where things overlap and markets begin to expand with soldiers, sailors and aircrew who recognise themselves can get their kicks about that uppity junior officer “sticking it to the man” or a celebration of excellent quality non-commissioned personnel getting the recognition they deserve.

But what about something a bit wider, for those that are minded that way, but for whom the all-out gung-ho military fetish doesn’t fit the bill. After all, I was robustly told once:

“I’m not one of your flippin’ Squaddies”

Polly

She did use the word ‘flippin’, no lie.

So for Children of The Glyph – (and sequels!) I’m messing around with a concept called Paramilitary Science-Fiction to see if it will work as a platform.

You heard it here first.

Not everyone wants to read about the army, or military stricture as they have tried it and/or don’t fit into it. P-SF is a blend of Space Opera and Military SF which gives the reader more than grunts. It gives oddballs a chance to shine, those that don’t fit, but aren’t criminally insane or morally despicable.

This fits a couple of theories about marketing – writing to that market and writing what you enjoy and love.

If you want to live as an author, you need to do both.

On another note, a chap over on the Bolter & Chainsword has bought/downloaded all of my Azhov books and is working through them. Reports are good so far and I’m going to see if I can encourage him to poke a review onto Amazon for me.

If anyone else has my Novellas in the Azhov series and already hasn’t done that, please consider doing so. To those that have: Thank you.

Well, that’s it for now Dear Readers and Good Followers, have a good day. 🙂

Yellow Sock Monster

I guess it’s Copyrighted now!

This is a nickname between myself and some friends – it’s basically a reference to a Gremlin that lives at the back of your washing machine and gobbles up your socks, leaving only odd ones to be found in the drum.

But you’re sure. You scooped up both of those socks! Out of the basket and into the drum, having sorted them carefully, so the colours don’t run. You check the drum, spin it slowly.

No sock.

Hmm, you think. Maybe it dropped down the back of the basket, or as you were carrying it? A search is undertaken.

No sock.

You know the dog doesn’t have it. He’s sitting snoozing on the sofa. Wait! What’s that? A dog toy.

No, the Yellow Sock Monster(TM) has had it! The blackguard!

The YSM is really a metaphor for doubt and I’m afraid I have a bit. My locum editor will shortly be calling for my manuscript and it’s like being at the dentist or the doctor. Did you clean your teeth? Have you used deodorant?

I’m concerned I have what are know as “Point-Of-View” or POV issues with my characters – in fact I’ve been told I use a few too many, but I don’t see how I can tell the story otherwise.

This is how it starts.

Oh well, I know it’s a storm in a teacup really. Some poor folks are having to dig down into the Earth for clean water. Perspective and the Yellow Sock Monster.

I sense a novella coming on.

Know when to Fold

Some projects just aren’t going to take off, but I’m hoping this blog post isn’t going to be prophetic. I’m not quitting writing by the way – just having to put the brakes on a few things.

Firstly, Covenant. It’s not working, and I have fallen out of interest with it. This does happen and instead of trying to bust through the wall and grind on, it’s better to leave it as it is and come back when I want to get excited about it again as opposed to turning it into some abomination that I hate working on.

If I release it like that – the readers will know it too, so for now, it’s reluctantly shelved.

Another small fly in the ointment, I had heard nothing from the RPG Publisher that contacted me to do freelancing for them. I sent in the NDA as requested but despite being a good boy and not shouting from the rooftops, nothing else came of it.

Now, I did say this might happen, but I’m disappointed all the same, so finally after three months of silence, I told them I was no longer interested. Perhaps jumping the gun a bit some might say. Maybe, but I’m not just going to be strung along. I have my own projects and my own future and if they were interested, they would have come back to me before now – you know when someone wants you on board, they keep pestering you.

They obviously were’t terribly concerned, so they can go their way, I’ll go mine.

Last week, Dear Friend Polly and I attended the meeting of a Writing Group. I wasn’t terribly comfortable there to be honest and I know a few chaps I’m in contact with who feel the same, I suspect for the reasons I did. Their MO was to have timed readings by the authors and the rest of the group would offer advice.

Not sure I can do that. I’m alright at speaking, but reading it and hearing it are two different things and I’m not sure it works – for example, the nuance of homophones (the kind I like to use) does not translate and must be explained, breaking the spell.

They do not allow a new ‘member’ to participate in readings until they have done four sessions, no doubt to thin out the time wasters and poorly committed, but I don’t know if I have sufficient desire to go back.

Know when to fold ’em.

On a vaguely related note, I have been looking into Agents and Publishers. Advice is not to do that until you have a Manuscript (MS), so make sure you have a wad of paper before doing so.

That’s when the wheels came off.

I read this article – unfortunately it is not dated (https://jerichowriters.com/do-literary-agents-want-self-published-authors/) so I cannot point to how modern it is, but as attitudes are slow to change (in my perception of things and after reading David Morrell‘s (Come on, man! Him again?) advice on the subject, it takes a good while. So buckle up, because I have 10,000 followers to find, 5,000 books to sell and 50,000 God-damned tweets to make (probably will not do that).

Also on the subject, the Esteemed Writer above notes that you should always try to publish through an Agent first, then go to Indie. Go figure – remember how I said my impatience was both a vice and a virtue? Hmm.

So I got a book in Marketing, because Children of The Glyph is going out, one way or another, and this is one hand I’m not going to fold.

Portential

Yes, that spelling is atrocious, yes it is a word which now exists and I claim Copyright upon it.

What devilry is this?

I couldn’t resist.

This is an Author Proof, which is what happens when you upload to Amazon and demand (from your Chaise-Longues for bonus points) that they print it out as a book so you know what it will look like.

But it looks good. Sooooo good on my shelf. You want motivation? A shot in the arm? This is it. This is the lead you’re going to turn into gold. You can see it, you can feel it.

It’s REAL! 🙂

If reality was a plastic sheet – like clingfilm, and the future was just behind it, this is the fingernails that tears veil, rends the plastic until your future is in your hands – it’s literally waiting to be taken!

It still isn’t finished. (Le sigh). I have contacted another Editor to have a look at it for me. I’m not going behind Hannah‘s back, as at the moment she has her hands full (literally!) and Helen Bleck was recommended to me. I have chosen to solicit a quote for work, which should appear on 20 January 2020.

This is mainly due to pressing need and no reflection on my working relationship with Hannah at all – if anything, from her emails I think she wants to get her teeth into my story as a reader first and an Editor second, which tickles me.

My dear friend Polly has also been doing her share of lifting, much like Ian and has read my manuscript and is preparing to bombard me with her findings. I welcome it. Between all these ladies and the guys around me, we might actually pull this thing off.

Perhaps I could just ask them to write it?

No?

Bah! Back to the boulder!

Flying Free

Just to let everyone know that, if you missed it, Wings of Azhov will be free on the Kindle Store all week this week starting on Monday 06/01/2020 (weird to write 2020 like that for the first time!) until Friday 10/01/2020.

You can find it HERE.

It’s probably the better of the trilogy plot-wise to be honest and was quite satisfying to write. My Characters kind of took over a fair bit, with surprising results. I keep trying to recapture that wonderful vibe, but alas, I am doomed to second rate hack-smithing! :p

Covenant is proceeding again and has stopped fighting me for now. I am sure it’s going to be a special experience.

That’s all folks and thanks very much for the recent likes and follows – it all helps! 🙂

Blog On

Got my Amazon.com author page setup – kind of, finally. You can find it here

I expect to add more to it soon, but you can see my ugly mug and some more about me if you’re interested (or nosey) – although most of what is there you already know if you follow this humble blog.

Well, that’s all I’ve got for now, just keeping you all up to speed.

Hope you all have a good day. 🙂

Perspective Matters

Happy New Year everyone 🙂

Beware: Rambling wall of text incoming!

My Vampire action novel, The Covenant is kicking my backside. The reason for this is that it’s old, so I’m overhauling it and have pared it back from 60,000 words to about 20,000 so far. Unfortunately, because I am a witless hack, I wrote it in First Person and now, after reading about POV uses, I convinced myself to convert it to the more usual Third Person.

This is both working and not, since a lot of the time I’m having to re-draft a lot of the “I tell” into “he showed” and the overall tone has changed from a non-fiction story of a deep-cover government spy to a straight action flick. This is both disappointing and sensible at the same time.

Whilst the “sensational exploits of a secret world” is alluring because it hints that the reader is immersed in it…

“The world you live in is just a sugar-coated topping. There’s another world beneath it – the real world.”

The Daywalker, Blade.

…there are two problems.

Firstly, if the world is real and this is a secret, who wrote it and how did they get away with it? If it’s a world-shattering secret, how would the book ever be in your hands, especially when the premise of the book is to keep everything under wraps?

I know that suspension of disbelief is a thing and every writer of fiction aspires to invoke it, but that leads us to the second problem…

The Protagonist is safe.

Novels/Plots rely on conflict and the well-being of the protagonist with whom you can root for or identify with etc is a powerful connector. If this is a secret which must not be named and everyone is dangerous enough to pull the head off a human with the ease of twisting off a toothpaste cap, it robs the powerful enemy of any threat to the protagonist and it is why I scrapped the original first chapter of the book as it was a Flash-Forward.

Other issues raise their ugly head here as well. I am a big fan of the Ultraviolet TV miniseries, starring Idris Elba, which is no surprise to the fabulous Readers and Followers who frequent this blog. It is a large influence on this work.

As such, my neck-nibblers are referred to as Rhesus IX, which is a conglomeration of Rhesus (types of blood) and the Factor 9 enzyme that is found in the X of the XX and XY chromosomes at position 22 (If I remember right). In short, the lack of Factor 9 incurs Haemophilia Type B, where a person cannot clot blood properly. The combination here is to pay homage to the Latin numeral “Code V” of Ultraviolet and to avoid discomfort to sufferers of what is a difficult condition. As they all are – I have a few myself.

I’d prefer the scientific approach, which is conducive to never saying the word ‘Vampire’ but we are dealing with the supernatural as well and they talk amongst themselves. One way or another, I’m going to hit tropes (not cliches – but I digress).

This raises the question of Point-of-View all the more, because the only way to tell/show the reader is in exposition or backstory dump and I’m not sure it’s convincing.

Does it sound better from the mouth of an expert (I tell you realism) or does it work better as over the shoulder, (he showed a story)?

My friend Ian suggested to make it a discovered memoir. It could work…hmm. Then he told me to work on something else. So I added 2,000 words to Children of the Glyph – which Dear Reader and Good Follower is a whole other post…

Back to the boulder.

Hit it.

So, am waiting to hear back from my Editor and my Cover designer (the book is done and on Amazon to protect the IP) I’m going to be like that gunfighter and take on the next guy in the street.

I’ve been plagued with nightmares recently and all of them involve explosions, so I’m going move away from my Sci-Fi, but keep with the Horror theme and go back to my Neck-Nibbling epic.

The Covenant is on the chopping block and only one of ’em walking away partner…

“You’re a professional. You get it out there and move on.”

– Dean R Koontz.

And a bit of Jocko Willink: “You finished something? Good. Chance to start something else. 🙂