Day: December 10, 2013

Sneak Peek: Crosswind

Today we have a sneak peek from the new urban fantasy novel by Lynne Cantwell: Crosswind: Land, Sea, Sky Book 1.

Life on Earth is much improved since the pagan gods’ return. As conflict eases around the world, attention — and money — has turned to more humanitarian goals: improving the lives of the First Nations peoples and others who were repressed for thousands of years.

But the former ruling class – the military, religious, and corporate leaders who profited under the old system — are about to stage a last-ditch effort to bring their good times back.

The gods refuse to start a new war against those men, because that would make them no better than Their opponents. Instead, They have drafted three humans to help Them. Together, Tess, Sue and Darrell must find a way past their own flaws to ensure the gods’ peace will not be destroyed.

Crosswind: Land, Sea, Sky Book 1  is available from Amazon.com, Smashwords, and Amazon UK.

Here is an excerpt from Crosswind: Land, Sea, Sky Book 1 …

Continue reading “Sneak Peek: Crosswind”

Indie News Beat: TV Talent Shows for Writers? Seriously?

Literary media has been buzzing with the news of Masterpiece, an Italian game show which is offering one lucky author the chance of mainstream publication with a planned 100,000-copy print-run. Well, it had to happen, didn’t it?

Masterpiece whittled down 5,000 applicants to 70 wannabes, and thence to four “contestants” in each edition. The key section of each 90-minute show is to drop the writers in an unfamiliar environment (for example, spending a day with the blind), then take them back to the studio, sit them in front of a computer – and a studio audience, and give them 30 minutes to write what they can about it. For the two contestants who survive to the final round, each gets 60 seconds to give their “elevator pitch” to the Editor-in-Chief of the sponsoring publishing house as they travel with her in, er, an elevator. Continue reading “Indie News Beat: TV Talent Shows for Writers? Seriously?”

A Grindable, Clickable eBook Table of Contents

There’s been a lot of confusion and debate over how to create a table of contents in an eBook that will survive KDP and Smashwords conversions. Some say you have to do it all manually, and some say you can use MS Word automation. Lynne Cantwell wrote a post about the manual method, and Dick Waters just recently wrote about a more sophisticated style.

Personally, I go with a completely manual method, because I run all my eBooks through MobiPocket Creator and convert them to a prc before I upload to KDP – and that will for certain strip out any coding MS Word has graciously conjured up. The lovely Laura Clark (author LB Clark) showed me how to do this way back in 2011 when I self-published my first collection of short works with fellow author Newton Love. (The prc method was one of the ways KDP recommended for conversion back in 2011 – but you don’t have to do it this way. It’s just my method of choice because it’s what I’m used to.)

You can use this table of contents method on an existing document or a new document, that’s not a gating factor. I usually do it in an “assembly line” fashion, as that’s faster, but I’m going to do it one “chapter” at a time so the sequence is clear. Continue reading “A Grindable, Clickable eBook Table of Contents”

Free: Still A Bargain

There is a free lunch, but some would have you believe it’s not good for you… because it’s free. Most people on IU, I’m guessing, are pretty comfortable with some version of the idea that you can sell more books by giving some away.

But not everybody out there in “writer web world” is and some even take it to the next step: moronic denial. Some examples of the arguments one runs into—and should beware of paying serious attention to: Continue reading “Free: Still A Bargain”