Category Archives: Platform

Decisions, decisions

So, at present, Water and Grimaulkin are at the editor’s. Grimaulkin Tempted is up to 10K words already and I’m in need of another subplot. So far I have:

Main plot: Scott’s ex comes back.
Subplot A: Becky, his cousin, is being followed by a mysterious person.
Subplot B: Mike is being used as the downstairs mover.

I need a magical subplot C, something to get the Rosicrucians involved again. Or a subplot D, another Satanic murder (though that’s going to be be in the third book, I think). Another minor demon involved? Not sure. Also maybe something involving Rufus, the dog.

Earth is going to be the next erotica series, I think. I need to do more research on the Earth signs to find out good places to put them, and what powers they control.

Also, I was reminded of War Mage. In my excitement over Grim, I’ve let that go to the wayside. I didn’t care much for some of the editing, and so I put it aside. I tried to rewrite it from the beginning based on my beta reader’s suggestions, but it just didn’t want to work. Jake Logan is a gay writer. L.A. Jacob can write both gay and straight, but the military has to come from Jake. L.A. Jacob reins in the sex part, which is why the sex is alluded to in War Mage, not explicit. The Dark Prison, the third book, has no sex (yet). War Mage has to be complete by July for a September release.

Man, I have so many irons in the fire. And I’m going to buy a microphone to start doing podcasts! Maybe. But I am buying a mike. The podcast will be about writing and magic. I will probably have it “sponsored” by Paper Angel Press and Zarra Knightley Publishing. In other words, I’ll shill their books. Not sure about author interviews yet. I’m not one of the best interviewers –it’s been a very long time since I’ve done interviews. There’s one podcast I listen to where the guy asks the same questions of every guest, and I don’t want to do that. You can tell he doesn’t do much research on the guests he has.

So that seems like enough for this week.

Comicon, WNRI

Heidy Ho, neighbor! (As my character, Grimaulkin says.)

I finished Grimaulkin. Very proud of myself. 62,000 words. I need to edit it next month and hopefully get it ready to go for next year around this time.

I’m trying NaNoWriMo anyway, though I don’t think I’ll succeed. I’m doing a Casey story, set in the time of Queen Anne. It’s based on the four Mohawk Kings (3 were actually Mohawk, and one was Mohican) who visited London in the early 1700’s. Casey is their interpreter, and a woman of the court falls in love with him. It’s sort of a romance which, as everyone knows, is not my bag. Right now, the beginning is slow because I’m establishing the time period. I suppose I have to switch to the female’s POV at some point, and I’m not looking forward to that.

On November 8, I’ll be on WNRI.com at 9:30 am for the Rhode Island Author’s Hour. I hope I get some softball questions. He’ll ask if I’ve been in the military, I’m sure. “No, but my husband was a big fan of the Army and I acquired a lot of my interest through osmosis.” We’ll see if I can remember that.

And last, but not least, I’m doing RI Comicon! I’m in booth 15G in the Dunkin Donuts Center (aka “the Dungeon”) under the name of Paper Angel Press.  There should be a lot of traffic for people who are going to see the celebrities. I’m diagonally across from the “Kids Con”, so will hopefully get parents who are into understanding the whole Building Baby Brother concept. I’m also going to be reading cards (if Comicon can have a medium with two sold-out shows, why can’t I read cards?) and really pedling the books. I have 30 copies of Homecoming, 5 each of Building Baby Brother and Best Intentions. I’m offering a bundle, at the convention only, of each one of the books, plus “Custer’s First Stand” and a card reading for $25. Yes, I’m giving up my royalties for that, but I’m trying to get the books sold.

No War Mage, it didn’t make it. I’m going to get a different editor for that book, I think.

I may not post next week due to being at Comicon. But I’ll live tweet every sale from there! My handle is @warwriter.

Results

Last week I sold one copy–thanks, Kristen! This week I also sold one copy–thanks, Mark! Hope you both enjoy the book!

War Mage still is not finished editing. I have one month until RI Comicon, and it takes about a week to get the proofs ready, another week to ship it to me. That leaves two weeks for editing on my part, which I was hoping to have. Unfortunately, this month, I can’t take any extra days off because it’s our crunch time at work.

Needless to say, I’m getting worried.  Our editor is under a lot of pressure, I get that. But this is time sensitive, and I need copies of a promised book in a month.

Just another thing to add to my anxiety plate.

Meanwhile, Grimaulkin is up to 32K words. I am getting to the end of the mini-story (you’ll see what I mean when you read it; and you will read it, right?) and I still have about 20K words to go. I had hoped to do 55K for this book. Although I might go long on this one and introduce another mini-story/mystery in addition to having Mike finally go out with Scott, and Mike finally meet his parents at the wedding. If this is a stand-alone, then I can do that. I’ll have to see how it sells. How many people would want to read about a gay mage just out of prison? That reminds me, I have to come up with a hook for him.

This one guy at the Scituate Art Festival yesterday sold a book to nearly everyone he came in contact with. He was amazing. I noticed that he engaged people, first asking “What do you like to read?” and then going into his book. His book is a mixture of genres, he said. He also talked about reviews. I have to point out to people that my book has a 5 star review on Audible. He was an excellent salesman. I wish I had that much engagement when I present my book. It’s something to learn from.

So, I’m going back to Grimaulkin and try to figure out what other mystery he can get himself into with Bennett, how he asks Scott for a date, and other filler until I hit 55-60K. Any ideas, let me know in the comments.

Mission Statement

I’m terribly sorry for not putting up a blog last week. I got bitten by a writing bug, and I’ve been on Hemingway (my iMac Mini, located in my cellar) this past week, rewriting Grimaulkin, while I wait for War Mage to get out of the editor’s hands. So far, in one week, I’ve written 20K words  I’m dong this instead of NaNoWriMo. Maybe. I have a story idea for NaNo which, depending, I might do.

Anyway, last week I planned on a blog based on a podcast that I listen to. It’s called Write Now!, by Sarah Werner. She’s refreshing because she has a gentle and encouraging voice, she hasn’t published anything yet, and she wants to give encouragement “to write every day.” Her last podcast (not the “Coffee Break” one) was about developing a Mission Statement. What is my purpose for writing?

I did a little journaling about that. (Which reminds me: I need to somehow burn my journals so that no one finds them after my death.) I came up with something that might sound pretentious, but I think is truly why I write.

I will express what I intrinsically believe through authentic stories.

All of my stories have a theme. these themes are my values. “Home and family is where your heart is.” “Revenge is sweet at first, but eats you up inside.” “The straight and narrow is difficult for any man to follow.” These three themes are for Homecoming, Dark Prison, and Grimaulkin respectively.  These are things I believe. How can I write something I don’t believe in?

This is why I can’t write romance. I don’t believe in it. Why is it important for me to show people what I believe? Because, I think, I never had any validation for my beliefs. What I believe in, my values, are progressively odd according to my family and even my friend.  Somewhere out there, others believe in my values.

The key woard here is “authentic”. This is why I feel guilty for creating Jake Logan. He’s not real. He’s not authentic. L. A. Jacob is. And from now on, I’ll be writing as L. A. Jacob. This is why War Mage has jake Logan and L.A. Jacob, because I’m eliminating Jake from my consciousness. Maybe if I ever become famous–which I doubt–I’ll re-release Homecoming under my own name.

Next week, I’ll be appearing at the RI College (my alma mater) Homecoming Day, in front of the Adams Library. I’ll be signing books and probably writing Grimaulkin while I wait for people to come by. Like the last time, I don’t expect to sell much because my subject matter is not, shall I say, pertinent or interesting to most of the people there.

Comicon is just over a month away!

My first appearance – wrap up

At the New England Author Expo last Wednesday in Danversport, MA, I was ready. I had my talking points. I had my swag. I had my setup.

I sold nothing.

But people were impressed with the idea. My business cards went more than the cards for the books, so I ordered more and updated them. War Mage cards went more than Homecoming cards. The post cards, very few. The brochures, I think 2, and I passed those out myself.

The guy next to me had only his books. He was a bit OCD about them – if someone handled them, he would wipe the covers clean. He sold one. One guy looked at his set up, looked at my set up, and said, “Are you serious?” to him. “No business cards? Nothing someone can take away?”

One guy came up to me and said that he loved my idea, and wanted to see what would happen with it. He’s in line for the second book, he said.

I bought a book called a “digest” that someone did. He said it was meant to be like a “whet your appetite” kind of book, with short stories from his different worlds. I thought that, or an anthology of the writers in Paper Angel Press, would be a cool idea. However, thinking it over, I wondered if people would do that, or want to read the stuff for free on the website. The Digest is a good idea for people who don’t like the internet, but these days…nah.

I went to a panel about Marketing and networking. Got some good ideas. I asked about “swag”. 1) Make it useful. 2) Make it pertinent or symbolic of your book. (The guy next to me had 50 cent pieces lined up on his table, and I said, “Oh, what does that have to do with the book?” “Nothing,” he said. “I just figured if someone wants to give me two quarters for one.”) 3) avoid as much paper as you can. (bookmarks = bad “Nobody uses book marks anymore.”)

Now, I’m not a marketing maven. I don’t want to quit the day job because that’s where I get my inspiration from; and to rely on my muse to pay my bills is a very scary thought. I don’t plan on running all over the state and country to try and jostle my way into position. I make some money, fine. I made enough to pay for Hulu and Netflix for the next three months. That was awesome!

The way I do marketing is the way I do gardening.  I throw the seeds on the ground and hope some grow. Some will get eaten by birds– trivialized, or disappear under the Amazon ratings–but some will thrive and grow–someone will read it and I’ll have a fan.

My next appearance isn’t until October 2, at the RI College Homecoming Day. I might be the only one, because they were excited to see me at the College. Either that or I expressed interest early, like I usually do.

What I’m reading:

  • Best Intentions by J. Dark. Still.
  • Tarot Interactions by Deborah Lipp, just started.

Take a look at my Goodreads lists to find out what I’m reading and what I’m going to try and read. Be my friend!

I am on chapter 2 of the rewrite of Grimaulkin. It’s slow going because I feel I have rehashed this story so many times now, and I have to come up with seven years worth of stuff while he’s in prison (he gets out when he’s 22-23). I also have a new pintrest and instagram site.

Do I Really Need an MFA?

My friend, trying to be helpful, sent me a link so a university offering an online MFA. “You’re writing, so you might as well get credit for it,” she said. I don’t know if that was what the school told her to write or what she decided to write before sending it to me.

For the heck of it, I filled out the application.  For four days I got spammed, constantly, with emails and phone calls and text messages saying they wanted to talk to me about my degree.  At all hours of the day and night, they tried to get a hold of me. I ignored them, because I found out that the start of the semester was June 9, and it’s long past that.

It got me to thinking, though, do I really need an MFA to write professionally? Perusing the Writer’s Digest fiction winners over the past few years, most of them had MFA’s. Some of them were professors. Do I need to provide a CV when entering the Writer’s Digest fiction sweepstakes?

The key word is “professionally.” Our work world is so entranced by how much paper you can accumulate from different “accredited” schools to prove that you’re good at what you do. That’s not necessarily true. You can be a good writer without having a degree saying that you are, I truly believe that. Academic fiction is far different than commercial fiction, and I think commercial fiction is open to anyone.

I say this not because I don’t have an MFA. I am the type to enjoy school and learning, being exposed to things that I normally wouldn’t be exposed to. But as for one or two professors to judge my work on a literary basis as opposed to a commercial basis, I don’t think that’s fair.  I am not a literary writer. I have a story. I tell it. So what if I follow certain rules, certain conventions, to make it commercial. Not only do I want to tell the story, but I want to make the reader enjoy it, not scratch their heads at what I wrote.

The purpose of an MFA, to me, is to get a better job. So that is why I would persue it. As for whether or not it would improve my writing? I really don’t care.

Aside: I’m reading Best Intentions, Glass Bottles Book 1 (Or is it Glass Bottles, Best Intentions, Book 1? Hereafter it’s Glass Bottles), which is written by my press-mate J. Dark. I’m going through the first chapter, and she broke a cardinal rule that I strive to follow: Don’t infodump the world in the first chapter. She did. But she did it well enough so that it moved the story along. Unfortunately, it’s not my cup of tea because it’s got a female protag (I have a thing about that), so I’m reading it to see how she handles the female protag, which is all the rage right now. Is she a badass or a bitch or neither or both? I’m not quite sure; I’ll have to get back to you on it.

I haven’t reviewed this book yet because, like I said, I’m slogging through only chapter one and it wouldn’t be fair. It’s a magical murder mystery; I like that. I would suggest, if you like female protagonists, magic and mystery, then jump into this book with both feet. She’s good.

Appearances

Here’s where I plan on being in New England to promote my book and books from Paper Angel Press.

New England Author Expo, July 27, Danvers MA
Autumnfest, October 8, 9, or 10, Woonsocket, RI
Big E, Some time in September – October, Springfield, MA
New Bedford Fall Book Festival, October 15 or 16, New Bedford, MA
RI Comicon November 11, 12 and 13, Providence, RI

I’m gunning for the RI Author Expo, December 3 in Cranston, RI, but that depends if I get a spot.

As for the writing…not so much this week. I was thinking about writing, but I didn’t actually do anything. I wrote in my journal for the most part, and even then I skipped 2 days. I started to work on the rewrite of Grimaulkin Rising. That has to have extensive rewrites. I’m not looking forward to that, though I want to get it done by the end of the summer.

I also have to start work on the next book in the War Mage series, and make sure that it’s LONGER. The torture isn’t going to be all it’s about. It has to be about the other magical creatures that he meets in Iraq. More dragons? Other wizards that aren’t dicks? The Black Lions? The development of his and Chrissie’s relationship? Need to get this together, start an outline or at least some index cards.

Wish me luck – I’m going to a job interview on Tuesday for a “Communications Consultant” at my company. Not quite a step up, but it’s a step over so that I can hopefully use my talents somewhere else. If I do that, then they own my creative mind and writing time will be cut even more. Maybe. We’ll see.

A new year, a new blog

Hello!

Real Soon Now (tm) I’ll be an actual published author. The date we’re now looking at is late February. This gives me time to have War Mage possibly read by my beta reader before going off to the editor (or should it be the other way around?).

Anyway, I have a blog right now that consists of mostly Champions Online stories. I’m going to be changing that to just Champions Online stories. I try and do other writing every day (that’s the new year’s and birthday resolution, btw), but I have no place to put it so people can see the progress.

I plan on having the webmaster create another blog for me, this time for a daily word count of 800 words, which is what the other blog was supposed to be. Thing is, most of those fans are from Champions Online, so they’re not interested in seeing stuff like Iron Butterfly or War Mage, or dips into other genres like dystopian fiction or romance, or other writing prompt exercises that I find on the web or in my many writing prompt books that I own.

I’ll link to it from this blog, of course.

Now, what else? I decided to put aside Iron Butterfly in favor of editing War Mage. I’m not doing so well with that. I find myself not editing, but reading. And although I see everything in my mind’s eye in three dimensions and with colors and smells and textures, I’m not putting it across very well on the page. Maybe I should try scriptwriting.

I’m not lyrical or flowery, it’s the journalism teaching in me. I pay attention to what people say, how they say it, not what’s around them, and that translates to the page. They’re talking heads in space. Mind you, I can keep the pace going and advance the plot, but as for the setting, or the surroundings? Not so much.

So I’m going through the manuscript, in chunks and sections, not in sequential order, to see if I’m describing everything well enough. Also doing line editing at the same time. I’ll edit for consistency on another pass.

I’m also working on trying to get together a mailing list. I’d do a newsletter once a month to let people know what I’m working on and what’s coming next down the pipeline. Maybe once I get that going, I’ll put together a Patreon account and try and get people to see if they want to patron me to write stories for them. I could do different things, like write novellas or short stories for people using characters either from Champions or from other books, Or I could do a few non-fiction pieces about the writing craft and stuff. Or I could get some artists from deviantart to do work for me. (Hmm. Anime Grim…)

This year I hope to have 3 published books, not counting Homecoming. War Mage, maybe Iron Butterfly at a different publishing house that does romance-with-a-twist, Blood From a Stone with Paper Angel…or who knows, maybe something entirely different.  What’s important this year is the marketing and getting my name out there, I think. The writing, although still daily, will be secondary.

Oh, and to blog here at least once a week, probably on my own stuff or ideas on what I’m doing to help plot/character.  Watch for my book reviews on Goodreads. This year the goal is 100 books!

Branding/Platform

Finished NaNo last week. I think the story is solid to actually do something with. Maybe I’ll fix it up and send it out, but I’m not in a hurry to do so.

So what I’ve been doing since then is working again on Brothers of the Zodiac. I finally put together a timeline for each of the Brothers and their lives, I also found a Hymn to Ishtar and I’m using that instead of the Descent of Inanna to the Underworld ad the introductory pieces. I’m still using astrological terms for their story titles.

I have to work on a platform, getting together a mailing list for when Homecoming comes out, and also when the next book comes out. I’m writing under a pseudonym, Jake Logan, because guys have a better chance of actually getting books sold than girls. Maybe if I write a boy/girl romance or some such, I’ll use my real name, but for the sci-fi/fantasy stories it’s better if I pretend to be a guy. However, if it takes off, I’m screwed.

Not to complain about that!

My audience is male, mostly gay male. I plan on using Jake Logan as an m/m erotica/romance writer too. I know that some women read m/m romance, but I shouldn’t put my name on it because then I’m not “authentic”. Heck, I’m not authentic with a pseudonym, either, now that I think about it.

But the object here is to sell books, and I’m trying to think of the best way to market them. If it means I need to be a man, then so be it. (Should I be a transgendered male?)

I’m going to be setting up a website for Jake and a mailing list and blog for him. Hopefully the book comes out and I get tons of readers! I doubt it, but it’s good to dream.