Goal for the Weekend
I realized that my Goal for the Weekend posts probably don’t make as much sense without the back story for that. Between a wife in nursing school and a two year old devil-boy, my free time is usually Friday and Saturday night, starting around ten and going as long as I can keep my eyes open. I try to get a good game plan together every Friday afternoon for what I want to accomplish before Monday morning. So, the goals: Edit. Edit a lot. I wanted to edit last night, then we had a thunderstorm which knocked out our AC. I spent all night trying to figure out what to do about that and failing. Luckily, after a restless night in an eighty degree bedroom, the AC is back up. The goal is a bare minimum of 44 pages, but I would love to do double that (actually about 100…
Ebooks VS. Hardcover Books
Writer Unboxed has a pretty important article up that I haven’t really seen elsewhere. Basically, it details the price and royalty comparison between hardcover books and ebooks, and how it effects the profit margin of publishers and authors. Basically, it comes down to a publisher explaining in an earnings meeting that they make more off ebooks because of lower royalties and lower costs. That would be fine if they brought absolutely anything to the table, had to take more risk, anything, but they are facilitating what most people can accomplish for free on their own. It’s definitely worth a read.
Writing Status 6/27
Wow, it is almost July. Seems like just the other day we were celebrating the new year. Time flies, I guess. So far, I am behind. My writing goal is pretty much shot to hell. Anniversaries, work stuff, etc. have limited that, as well as a big ol whallop of procrastination. As far as editing goes (and as bad a habit as this is, it’s my focus right now) I am on page 69 of 308. I actually should be on page 108, but didn’t do anything the weekend of my anniversary. Plan on catching up this weekend, and spending a lot of time writing. Dean Wesley Smith says make a goal, try your best to stick to it, and if you get behind just keep with the plan. That’s what I am going to try and do. But hell or high water, I am hitting this August 12th date….
Man Of Steel
Just about every writer I read has had an issue with this movie. They picked it apart for its emphasis on action, lacking the qualities that make Superman, its gritty nature, etc. I really, really wanted to love this movie and be like hah but that just wasn’t meant to be. The movie isn’t terrible, it’s just alright. The action was well done, but has the same problem I’ve always had with Superman, a whole lot of teasing with no payoff. Sure, a whole hell of a lot of buildings got destroyed, but everyone else just walked it off. They didn’t even breathe heavy. When everyone comes out of going through multiples buildings, having a train dropped on them, exploded, etc. and they don’t get scratched at all, it removes the climax of the combat. The only reason anyone stopped hitting each other was seemingly because they got bored or…
A Couple Articles by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
Read this and this. I talk about Dean Wesley Smith a lot (or I did a lot on the old Story Arcs) but less about his wife, Kristine Kathryn Rusch. I don’t really know how that happened, but I am going to correct it. Personally, I think if you take her Business Rusch posts and the Shatzkin Files, you pretty much have everything you need to know about publishing as an industry. They’re well informed, experience, very analytical and sit on different sides of the publishing spectrum. Note on that, reading Mike Shatzkin is a bit like reading H. P. Lovecraft. Not so much the supernatural aspect, more like, “What the hell did that paragraph just say?” Anyway, Ms. Rusch has an incredible way of being brutally honest, and being uplifting at the same time. If you have anything to do with publishing, no matter its form, read her stuff….
Page 1 of 7