Serendipitious Finds

Sometimes you get little signs in life.  Mine was that I found a little book that includes "The Language of Flower" on Thursday at a Hastings bookstore.  It was only 50 cents. The book is A Bouquet of Flowers by Barbara Milo Ohrbach.  I've been working on Flower Language Compilation for fun and for research for my Secret Project, but I haven't worked on it for a week or so.  This was a sign to take it up again.  I have a few more public domain works I want to add to my Excel file before I am satisfied with my list.  I'll try to work on those this week.




Besides that bit of serendipity in book form, I also found The Indie Author Guide by April Hamilton.  (Not for 50 cents, but for $10.)  I've only just started looking through it, but it looks like it will be especially helpful when I do POD.

I love it when God sends good finds like this my way.  There were lots of other books I got there, including mostly 50 cent books, but these were the two finds I was most tickled with, but I'm sure the others will be unexpected sources of entertainment, research, or fiction fodder, too.

By the way, if you are interested in these books, please click on the links above if at all possible.  I'm an Amazon Affiliate and I get a little when people buy from my links.  Thanks!

Unofficial Sample Sunday

I'm doing an unofficial #SampleSunday, since I couldn't get with it today on KDP boards.  So I posted mine:

RT #samplesunday Roderis gets letters from the dead.  PDF sample of published ebook: bit.ly/KCwQ3c #nook #kindle #fantasy #writing

And I'm finding any fantasy,  history, science fiction, and horror from the #samplesunday list, and posting the links of that looked interesting below (listed in alphabetical order by title under each category).  I hope to find some more to post today yet.

Fantasy:

• Berserker by William Meikle - http://t.co/YwrBw3kg
• Hunters & Prey (Immortalis #2) by Katie Salidas - http://t.co/zyG3GQ3q

Science Fiction/Fantasy:

• The Warden Threat by DL Morrese - http://t.co/wYXObkfw

Science Fiction:

• Hidden Fires by Katharine Eliska Kimbriel - Sample

Related Links: More Info about SampleSunday

SEO and the Writer

Interesting site about SEO and businesses at Entrepreneur.com.  This article includes several interesting tips--or rather SEO mistakes to avoid--some I've heard before, but some I haven't.  The two most interesting are "Sin No. 3: Not using descriptive internal anchor text" and "Sin No. 7: Thinking all search traffic will go directly to your home page."  Both made me think more about what I am doing with my webpage. 

For instance, I should be making more descriptive links, for that affects searches.  It's an easy trick, and one I'll try to do more often.

Number seven made me think about what each of my individual pages are showing.  I'm still working on building my webpage, but as I do so, I need to think of what type of message is coming across.  What kind of "branding" as an author am I conveying.

Good stuff.  Well worth the read for authors with websites.

Two Site Updates: LOTD/Amazon and Flower Language

The first update is Letters of the Dead is now up on Amazon.com.  I'm a little behind on working on the other versions.

The second update is that I've compiled a (Victorian) Flower Language Dictionary from three public domain works so far.  Right now it is a rough version, but I do plan on adding more to it and making an html file on my site.  But for now, I only have Excel files.  Why am I doing this?  Because I intend to use it in some way in a story or two, but also because it's fun and I hope others will derive some pleasure from it.  Enjoy!

Letters of the Dead: Now Available at B&N--Also, Samples!

Letters of the Dead is now available for sale at B&N.  I have started the upload process for Amazon/Kindle, and it should take around 12 hours for it to be available there.

But for the meantime, I have some samples available too, in different formats--epub, mobi, PDF, RTF, and HTML.  You will have to sideload the epub or mobi onto your device.  The PDF, though, isn't intended for reading on an ereader since I never found out how to make them work well with it.  Also, I'm not sure how to get the Open or Download Screen to pop open when clicking mobi or epub on the site, so you'll have to right click those for now.

Phew!  I tackle other site updates and Smashwords tomorrow.

Letters of the Dead Update

I started the process going on self-publishing LOTD. I've uploaded it B&N only so far, but I will work on other versions soon. It will take a day or so for the ebook to be available for sale on B&N. Next, I'll work on the Amazon/Kindle version.  After that, I'll work on a Smashwords version.

I'm just tickled that it's finally come this far.  It's finally ready.  It's finally going to be up.  This one had never left my mind, always whispering to be finished, but it gave me many problems since its origin in 2006.  Only by the grace of God have I managed to complete it today.

Anyway, I'll keep you all updated on its availability for sale and when downloadable samples are ready.


Note:  Original cover art images by digitalart (background; skull and crossbones) and Simon Howden (letter, quill, and ink pot). Cover by Jodi Ralston.

Updates and Good News

The first good news is that Letters of the Dead is finally ready for publishing.  As I try not to do business work on Sunday, I'll have to do one very-very-very last look through and fix on Monday and start publishing it to B&N.  After that, I'll start on the Kindle version.  And eventually (after I do a test run on The One Who Sees), I'll try it at Smashwords.  I'm exhausted but happy.

The second bit of good news is that my webpage is getting a new look.  It's only skeleton right now, but my main goal for rushing it into place is to have a landing spot for my ebooks (in the author's notes).  That landing spot will be the fiction page.  I still have a lot of work to do, but here it is so far http://www.chiaroscurohouse.com/index.html.

I'm pleased with my progress so far.  Especially considering I was good for nothing until Friday, and even then, not good for much, coughing my head off.  But that's a good sign.  When a cold moves into my lungs, that tells me it is almost beat.  It's the last place it stops by before my body gets over it entirely.  Today, my cough is far rarer, which is why I got most of my work done today.  I did a lot of ebook work yesterday, and more today along with webpage work.  And coming up soon, starting Wednesday I'll be on summer break at work so I can work on the site and catch up on all the things I've been neglecting this last couple months (such as emails, sorry!).

Anyway, I do intend to take a little break after I get LOTD on the two main sites.  Then I'll start on the sequel story to The One Who Sees.  Then after that I want to work on LOTD's sequel, Eyes of the Gods. I also hope to work on a Secret Project during all this.  But a break first.  Phew!