Month: October 2012

Silver Screen Dreams

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that an author in possession of an idea for a book, must be in pursuit of a fortune.* Alas, the dream of a million-dollar author contract has always been hard to realize. The difference today is that the goalposts have moved.

Back in the bad old days before the Internet, an aspiring author with a dream, but no publishing industry connections, basically had one hope: to find an editor who believed in his or her story enough to publish it. A lot of people submitted their stuff “over the transom” — i.e., they sent their unsolicited manuscripts to the publishing house, where they languished in a slush pile until somebody was assigned to box them up and send them back. Occasionally, an editor would publish something out of the slush pile and make a tidy sum thereby, which reinforced the idea that it could happen, no matter how dismal the ratio of slush-pile blockbusters to returns. Continue reading “Silver Screen Dreams”

And the winner is… Jerriann Law

Congratulations to Jerriann Law, the winner of our weekly Flash Fiction competition and thanks to everyone who participated – excellent entries!

The winning entry is rewarded with a special feature here today and a place in our collection of winners which will be published as an e-book at year end.

Without further ado, here’s the winning entry: Continue reading “And the winner is… Jerriann Law”

Ed’s Casual Friday: My TGI(‘m)I(ndie) moment of the day.

Warning: I’m going to talk a little bit about my own writing in this post, which I usually try to avoid on Casual Friday in favor of topics that are of more general interest to people who are not, well, me. But I’ve got a point, I promise.

I am presently in the midst of writing the fifth book in an epic fantasy series, and quite suddenly, the wonderful absurdity of that statement hit me. Continue reading “Ed’s Casual Friday: My TGI(‘m)I(ndie) moment of the day.”

Preditors and Editors Needs Your Help

We were very pleased to learn that Indies Unlimited has been listed as recommended by Preditors & Editors (P&E) in the site’s Promotional and Marketing Services section.

For those few who may not yet know, Preditors & Editors is a valuable resource for writers, representing something along the lines of a Consumer Reports for the publishing world. Before you shop your manuscript, it pays to check with sites such as P&E. If nothing else, check them out before you ink any deals with anyone.

On a personal note, I will relate that P&E helped keep me from making what could have been a costly mistake. When I first finished my novel, I shopped it to every agent I could find. The only two who responded with interest were listed in P&E as NOT RECOMMENDED.

Both these “agents” saw a lot of promise in my manuscript if only I was willing to invest a little money in editing, formatting, marketing, cover design, publicity, carpet cleaning, etc., and fortunately, they happen to provide exactly such services. Continue reading “Preditors and Editors Needs Your Help”