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I had hoped to get our next anthology out last month. Complications with the long-view story made that impossible. Now it’s the holidays and, frankly, I can’t do it right now. I look at ‘what’s the consequences of not getting something done’. For me, the consequences of putting the anthology off until life is saner are pretty mild. So, that’s what I’m doing. The stories will still be there when I get back to them.
–June
Sadly, if this is the ‘publisher’ I think it is, they are charging $399 to do what you can do for free — ie. put your book up on Amazon (& etc) as an ebook. This is not for editing services, cover services, copyediting, etc. All those services cost more. For the base price they only format your book for e-publication — a service you can get for free on Smashwords, Draft2Digital, or can do yourself. (Smashwords and D2D do take a percentage of your profits on books sold through their service, so it’s not totally and completely free, but they don’t make money unless you do, which is a fair deal imo)
This particular rip off is all over the place. It’s sad, but many many people will fall for this scam. Don’t be one of them.
–June
I believe readers have a mild curiosity about who authors are and what they look like. For that reason, I think, if you feel at all comfortable with it, putting something ‘social’ out there about yourself is a good thing. That said, I do believe the curiosity is mild and if an author doesn’t want to do it, it’s probably not a big deal.
I had a friend take a picture of me holding my little girl beagle and wrote a light few lines about myself as a bio. Both are on the foobatbooks website. I did it because I’m comfortable with that. But, I don’t think I’d stress if I really didn’t want that stuff up.
-June
50% right. Mostly by guessing. Very few of these are books I’ve read or would bother to read.
–June
I chose to use the name June Dal. Dal is an abbreviation of my middle name Dallmeyer. My reasons are simple. My real name June Drexler Robertson is really really long, so long that I can’t really get it very large on a thumbnail of my bookcovers. General indi-pub wisdom is that you want to get your name large enough to read, so by shortening it I can do that. Besides that, I just like the name.
–June
The ‘right’ writing group can be a god-send. The wrong one is hell. Like everything in writing, it depends. If there is a local group you’d like to try, I advise going slowly. Try just going to several meetings and observing. Don’t dive in volunteering (either to take positions in he group or with your work). See if this group is a good fit for you.
Then, if after a few sessions you feel like it might be right for you (and depending on the rules of the group) begin participating more. Don’t start off with the project that you are invested in to your heart, if you can avoid it though. Make your first group offering something you either are very confident in or something where you know there are flaws — see how they respond to the work.
And, if the response is not helpful feel no guilt in walking away. If the group as a whole doesn’t feel like a good fit, feel no guilt in walking away. They might be a great group for some other writer, but not for you.
–June
The powerful things, good and bad, give us story ideas, as Zette said. And assuming you are talking about the unfortunate situation I suspect you are, I sort of think that person, being a writer as well, would not be upset to think this inspired another writer. Write the story and treat it as a tribute to the life of an amazing person.
–June
Seconding #8.
We really mess ourselves up when we view this as a competition with other writers.
–Jun
Anyone who says any other writer’s method is ‘devoid of creative merit’ is wrong. Beyond mere wrong, actually, because it’s the intentional denigration of another’s work in favor of ones own. It’s fine to say ‘that much pre-work would kill the story for me’ but not ‘that method is uncreative, or mechanical, or in some other way generally inferior.’
–June
I simply find the societal demands interesting. People would agree that a doctor should become a doctor because he or she feels a calling the heal people. Yet, those same people don’t object to the doctor making a living wage at that calling. Artists, on the other hand, are somehow supposed to do their craft purely for love? This isn’t the only place where society’s expectations just seem a bit odd, but it certainly is one.
I don’t think these same people object to artists making money, they simply object to the statement that artists are paid in weird and stupid ways. Perhaps, in one way, it breaks an illusion that these people have — that somehow talent is always rewarded with money, so if you aren’t making money it’s because you are untalented. I don’t know. I just found the overwhelming amount of outrage in the comments to what was basically ‘hey, artists are paid is stupid ways that other professions wouldn’t tolerate’ interesting.
–June
What I found most interesting was all the hate in the comments section, as if the artist was stealing their money by suggesting that artists are poorly paid. I found the cartoon funny and the comments strange.
–June
Lots of interesting topics to choose from here. Getting back to the original… are novels easier?
I think that every form of writing has aspects that are ‘easier’ and ‘harder’ about it. Novels have space and you can indulge a bit in how much ‘extra stuff’ you put in. If you find tightly focusing on one point in a story difficult, then I can see where you would consider novels easier.
This quote, however, seems to come from someone who is not thinking about things this way. You certainly can’t ‘ramble on’ in any good writing. Every scene in a novel has to pull its weight, just as every scene in a short story does. It’s only that you don’t have to keep the same narrow focus in a novel that you do in a short.
In a wider sense, it seems that some writers are forever trying to boost their own egos by denigrating what other writers do. This is never productive. Every form of writing is easy in its own way and difficult in its own way.
–June
