I’ve been playing a bit of hooky it seems. I’ve only written a few thousand words in the last week or so. That’s not enough. The benefit of that is my current novel gets the benefit of a little more cogitation. I came up with a great wrinkle today that is better than my original conception. It will add some more emotion to the story.
My Writers of the Future entry (WotF) just didn’t have what it takes. I knew when I sent it out to first readers that it wasn’t up to snuff. It wasn’t. So now I’ve got an outline I’m thinking about. It’s loaded with significantly more angst at the front. I only hope I can get the rest of it to follow. For me the first draft of a story is all about story arc. Then I’ll let it sit awhile before I go after it again. That works best for me, because I write pretty fast and while that works for getting the gist down, it’s not the best for the story. Then I’ll change things around a little and add some more character and setting.
I think its a bit easier for working on the first draft of a novel because I do a lot of prework on the world and sketching out the main characters. Still a pause can refresh and let you find nuances to the story that you didn’t think of when you started out.
Now I’ve just got to spend more time writing and less time reading and watching sports. 
Tags: writing
I threw this site together late last year and didn’t spend any time making it my own. Not that it’s really my own, but I did some customization in the past few weeks. Nothing extraordinary mind you, but some tweaks. Now there are links to my published books right to their pages on Amazon. I’ve also added a blogroll. The blogroll contains blogs and links to fellow writers and to some good resources.
In the midst of all that, I’ve started my Shattuk Downs series. I’m not sure I’ll be publishing that as Guy Antibes, but it depends on how the book turns out. I’ve given it a good start and I’ve just about gotten the beginning done.
No real evidence that my new pricing strategy is working. I’ll give it a couple of more weeks and do some more tweaks. In the meantime, I continue to write.
Tags: blogging, Shattuk Downs, writing
I conducted an experiment. When I introduced Panix, I raised all of my prices. SoS was 2.99, The Star Amulet was 3.99 and Panix was 4.99. well after three weeks, Panix has sold one book per week. Not exactly shattering. The Star Amulet hasn’t sold a single volume in the first two weeks of this year. So I’ve reduced the prices. SoS is now 1.99 as well as The Star Amulet. Panix is still priced a bit higher at 2.99.
I’ve also retagged Panix on Amazon to include it as a Historical Fantasy to see if it might show up on more searches. I’m going to do the same thing with The Star Amulet and take the Juvenile tag off.
We’ll see if that will make the books move a bit more. This e-publishing stuff is fun and requires flexibility.
Tags: pricing, self-publish, tags
I’m excited about a new series I’m developing. It may be published under a different name because it’s definitely for a different market and old Guy doesn’t write that kind of weepy, girly stuff. Anyway, it takes place in a mythical world… Just Like England in 1800! My own personal take on a Jane Austen novel played straight up.
I’ve got the scenes outlined and have a good direction. I’ll be drafting it this month and we’ll see how it shakes out. I’m sort of excited about the concept. This is a small ball kind of series. It’s about a little isolated region that is pretty much self sufficient. It’s far away from wars and foreign intrigue, quite different from Panix. Think of Pride & Prejudice and Cranford/Lark Rising mixed together in a world a tiny bit different than England.
I read an interesting post on Dean Wesley Smith’s blog on being a Writer vs. an Author. I’d say I’m more writer than author. I agree that one has to write a lot to succeed in the new e-pub world. I’ve got a goal to put up twelve books by the end of next year. I’ve got some WIP to tone up and publish and a lot of new writing. More Samantha and Ian, this series. I’d like to do my Brull novel and some original work besides.
It will be an exciting year!
I don’t really want to cry, but waah, waah, waah. I had a bad review on Amazon for Sword of Spells. I’d sold three hundred ebooks in three months and then this review popped up. The guy just didn’t get Brull or Sword of Spells. He thought it was a novel. It’s not, its a serial collection. Any reasonable person would catch that. He didn’t and it cost me. Sales have plummeted from 5 a day to one (if I’m lucky) a day.
Panix hasn’t taken off, but that’s okay. It will. I’m confident that will find a following. The Star Amulet is a kid’s novel (Juvenile-Middle Grade). I need to brush it up a bit and I’ll be changing the series name to ‘The Nile City Adventurers’. Samantha’s also getting a year older. A reader told me she reads more like thirteen or fourteen. She’ll probably end up at fourteen with Ian remaining at ten. No other changes other than some identified typos.
I’ve completed PANIX and it’s final title is PANIX Magician | Spy. It came out at 105,000 words long. I’ve got to thank my wife Bev and Meredith and Donna from the Dave Farland’s Writing Group, the Pied Pipers, for their contributions both typological and plot logical.
This is my first full-sized novel published. PANIX started out two and a half years ago as part of a Liberty Hall Writers Group exercise. It’s changed a bit, but the most of the original concept is still there. It’s good to have it published. You can find it on Amazon at http://amzn.to/sTJPfl If you’re a Amazon Prime member you can read it for free for 90 days.
If you do read the book, I would greatly, greatly appreciate a review on Amazon. Reviews really power sales and any would be wonderful.
The Star Amulet is now available on Kindle, Nook, Smashwords and soon to be up on iBook, Sony and other e-book outlets.
Samantha and Ian are plunged into ancient Egypt at the time of Rameses II and struggle to return back to their hometown in Nile City, MO. They meet up with a High Priest, who is also a magician, a cat who is the daughter of the goddess Sekmet and Bafu, the town sheriff.
The evil High Priestess of Kethmebis is out to get the kids and they have a hard time staying out her her way. Magic and mayhem abound as the the ten-year-old Ian and the twelve year-old Samantha learn to cast spells and that’s still not enough to keep them out of trouble.
The Star Amulet is suitable reading for pre-teen to adult.
Now that I’ve had Sword of Spells up on Amazon for two months, I can announce that SoS has sold 271 copies. Not a world beater, but it’s a darn sight better than letting the stories sit in my computer, unread. In October, 96 copies went out the door and in November it was about 175. I don’t have any reports from B&N or Apple yet. These are kindle sales only.
I still have my BrullofThura twitter account open and, after a week’s vacation, Brull is again tweeting his adventures.
How remiss!!!
I did Nano and wrote out the rest of Samantha and Ian. So I got a little sticker for ‘winning’ Nano for the third straight year.
I’ve had it out for a critique and it’s now in for proofreading. It ended up at about 46,000 words so to fill it up I did a bit of research and started the next book in the series, writing another 5,000 words.
Panix has been proofread and I received a couple of good critiques. I’m in the rewriting phase. I needed some deeper thoughts on the part of my characters and am strengthening some relationships. I also added a section at the start that I can use as the start of a motivation the main character has for the length of the novel.
I have finished the covers and the titles. ‘Samantha and Ian in THE STAR AMULET’ for my Samantha & Ian book. For the other it will be: PANIX Magician | Spy.
Now it’s rewriting and editing until they are in shape to post up on Smashwords and Amazon before the end of the year.
Panix has been through edits and comments. I’ll be incorporating the proofreading edit and do a little rewriting based on some alpha readers next week. I expect Panix will be up mid-November.
I’ve decided that Motes and Meddles isn’t quite ready for prime time so I’ve put it on the back burner for awhile.
So what takes M&M’s place? I promised a little girl who is near and dear to my heart to write a story for her. So I’ve outlined a MG series that chronicles the adventures of Samantha & Ian, a brother sister team who have the misfortune to be transported to 13th century BC Egypt. There’s a broken magical amulet involved that will take Samantha & Ian back and forth in time to different eras. Each time, a bit of mayhem ensues. I expect to get the first book (30,000 to 50,000 word targets for each book) out in December.
By the way, Sword of Spells is up for sale at all major e-book outlets including Amazon, BN Nook and iBook.
