Marketing

I have adds posted on Craigslist, US Freeads, Reddit, and one in several cities on Backpages as soon as August work is done. It's all the marketing I'm preparing to do. My opinion is the best marketing is stories piggybacking off of each other. I'm suspecting it will take 6 months and a dozen shorties on Amazon to start sales upwards. I'm only going to worry about what I can control which is the quality of my product.  

Kindle Covers

WOW. What a difference a few hours can make. I bought the wife a digital camera for Christmas a couple years ago, we thought it was broken, so I got her another, then we found out it was nothing ever wrong with the first one. Anyway, she's giving it to me on long term loan, and I go an idea for taking black and white pics of settings in my stories. I remember Elmore Leonard trade paperback covers a few years back had a unique, "everyday" feel to them. I'm not a professional photographer but I think I can catch some worthwhile shots.    

Running off at the mouth

I've never been a big talker. I guess I'm running off at the mouth today because I haven't been so excited about writing in years. My stuff is going to be read by read by somebody. I'm not going to get rich by doing this, I may not sell much, I may not sell any, but through Amazon's KDP plans and promotion somebody is going to read me. (I just wish they post a review, that would help :) Oh, just as a reminder, because I can post from my smart phone these entry's will look very different when I'm away from my laptop. The young will be very familiar with it because they text like it's going out of style. And your dear Gary, can only do so much with these fat fingers and texting on a cell. Just wanted to mention it...    

"Killing preview"

I'm going to try to post those cover previews of the first two Kindle Singles. I may tinker with these during the month, but this is the gist of what I'm trying to present. 

Faith

I'm giving this standalone some seniority. I've had this in my head for a number of year, almost as long as Waiting. I've found a little confidence. The characters, the story, all of it is really coming together even as I type this. I'm going to work on the first draft when I return to the JOB 2morrow night. Wish me luck.

Lets talk about "Killing" (part 3)

 My last post on this stuff for right now. I'm a big time Treky. Big Time. I've enjoyed all of the series for the most part, with DS9 being my favorite. What did it for me on that series was storytelling, characters, and continuity. There's that word again. Continuity. I want people to feel like they are in familiar territory when reading these shorts. I think the late, great, Robert B Parker did this better than anyone else in the literary world. I'm going to present familiar characters that will appear from time to time to give that continuity. Again, I'll be using Jacksonville as the backdrop, an are I lived at for 40 plus years for a setting. The POV character changes with every tale but some of the background folks will return for frequent visits.   

Let's talk about "Killing" (2)

Onto one of my other favorite shows is Battlestar Galactica. The new version that came out in the last few years. Let my digress a second and give tribute to Ronald D Moore the head honcho over that operation. I learned so much about storytelling from that man. Anyway, on to his creation. Have I mentioned I like gray characters? How about this, I love stories with a darkness or edginess attached to them. And that's what 5 years of BG provided for me. I want to present that in my stories. I want to be uncomfortable writing them, reading them. Very little has given me this feeling in entertainment since. Chris Nolan's Batman movies have. George R R Martin's A song of ice and fire does. James Swallow, an underrated SF writer does. I want to present characters like this. I want to present situations like this. On to the final page on this if you are so inclined... 

Let's talk about "Killing" (part 1)

Other than sports, I haven't watched a whole lot of TV in the past 20 years. However, I want to incorporate 3 of my favorite TV staples into this series of short stories.

First Law and Order: I'm talking about the original, not the solid spin offs which I enjoy but not nearly as much as big daddy. I want my readers to feel as comfortable as I did watching that show. This is what I mean by that. I didn't discover the show into the mid to late 90's. It was already heavy into syndication on TNT by then. I liked the idea that if it came on at 7pm and I walked in at 7:30, I would just about know where the plot should be. I liked the first 30 minutes were committed to the police procedural, and the later half to the lawyers. I also liked the idea the good guys didn't always win. Keep that in mind reading anything be me. I believe in gray characters. I believe in endings ending as they may and not always happy. Anyway, my Law and Order comparison is about consistency, continuity, and familiarity that I want to present in each of these stories. The covers will mirror each other. The story lines will be presented in and around my hometown of Jacksonville, Florida. Duuuuuuuvallll. There will be regulars who appear in numerous stories. They will be close in length. OK time for a restroom break and we'll talk about this some more...           

Oh yea...

...I'm not NEARLY as mean or unapproachable as my profile pic suggest. I'm just not a picture taking type of guy. lol

workin

I'm amazed at what I've gotten done today. Amongst it all, outlines for 10 killing stories along with their covers that I design myself using powerpoint. They aren't anything special but I'm striving for some things with this series: Entertainment of course, consistency in storytelling, presentation, and good writing (much better than what you will see in my blog.These are the first two that I'm planning to publish before the end of August after a stand alone I'm tenatively titling Faith. More on that e-story in a later posting.

Waiting's final call

This is the long story on my short story Waiting, then I will put this baby to bed. I wrote this original tale back in 2003, yea that long ago. It was originally around 7000 words. Gom Publishing ran a contest for SF and Fantasy the following year. The catch was the entry's could be no more than 5000 words. Ouch. I had to carve 2000 words off this thing without loosing story. Let me tell you that was a monster. Anyway, Waiting placed 4th amongst a 1000 or so entry's. Fast forward to this year. I've only written about 4 short stories and a first draft of a novel. Several crashed computers later, Waiting and my novel were all I have left. A few readers had told me they liked the story but the science lost them. I thought I'd add as much as of the original text that I could remember into this Kindle entry and boom, pow, bam, here we are. I'm pleased with the finished product. The expansion me to explore the three main characters more deeply. Trinity's and Amadeus' daughters were last minute entry's. I hate black and white characters. I love gray. I  adore gray characters, and Amadeus wasn't that. He was the Hollywood evil guy who did evil stuff just for the sake of being evil. Jonas grew to become more ambivalent. Most of all I hope I got the sceience in the SF right. Explaining the Windows effect was a beast of an effort. Anyway, enough Waiting, time for newer better things. I hope to publish two or three works in August. I'm working on these products right now. . .I mean after I finish this post. More later...

A change is a coming

I'm changing this to my primary blog this morning.