For those of you in the United States, you know that Friday July 4th was our Independence Day. Thus I took a short break from posting, but still wanted to get at least a few links up for your reading enjoyment.

The long weekend is more than half over and I hope everyone out there is enjoying it. The good news for me is that I went to Borders the other day and splurged on several new books. The bad news is that I left my reading glasses at work, so I’m stuck with an old pair until Monday! It’s always something…

Have a happy and safe weekend!

Continue Reading

The magazine business is a tough one to break into. Even tougher are literary magazines. A majority never see a profit (even the successful ones) and many simply shut down because of rising costs, dwindling sales and a strained business model (you can only sell so many MFA program ads).

MagCloud just might make publishing that literary magazine you’ve been dreaming about a little closer to reality. I initially caught wind of this cool new service via this post from the if:Book blog.

According to MagCloud’s homepage, the process appears to be simple:

MagCloud enables you to publish your own magazines. All you have to do is upload a PDF and we’ll take care of the rest: printing, mailing, subscription management, and more.

And the price seems to be fair as well – $0.20/page plus the cost of shipping.

Continue Reading

Even in 2008, when ebooks are steadily gaining in popularity and self-publishing is becoming more and more accepted, there are still a lot of myths out there, especially about the latter. You have probably heard them: People who self-publish can’t cut it with traditional publishers (ie. they are not good enough), self-publishing is only for family memoirs/histories, and the list goes on.

During my weekend blog reading I came across this post over at the TeleRead blog. The post basically gives the top ten myths about self-publishing and seeks to dispel such nastiness. I’m not going to run through all ten myths, you can read them yourself and make your own judgment. However, I would like to add my own two cents about a few things that were mentioned.

Continue Reading

I don’t know about you, but this week has really dragged by (the last couple weeks have really dragged by it seems like). Maybe the summer heat slows things down more and drains our energy faster. I don’t know. But I do know that I’m glad Friday is here!

This weekend will probably be a busy one, though. I have several writing projects brewing that need some serious attention. Coming home after a long day at my day job isn’t an ideal time to get some serious writing done. Ahhh, I dream of the day when writing is my day job!

Have a happy and safe weekend!

Continue Reading

Yesterday, I wrote this post about how complicated writing fiction can be.

Today, however, I’m going to "jazz" things up a little. Back when I was in high school, I played the electric guitar in my school’s jazz band. Every few months we’d put on a concert (about a handful each school year).

During each performance, several of the songs we played would require a solo section. And the band director would pick people at random to play these solos. Playing a solo involved improvising. The notes weren’t written out and you basically had to follow the chord changes, in the right key and make the solo sound somewhat good.

Being asked to perform a solo in front of an audience was something I dreaded. But those who could improvise really well gave solos that were, in many cases, better than the actual song!

Continue Reading

I have been concentrating more and more on writing my own fiction lately (partially explaining the tumbleweed blowing through this blog during those times I neglect to post), and needless to say, it is very time consuming. In fact, I’d venture to say writing fiction is downright complicated!

Think about it: Writing a work of fiction involves plot, characters, setting, back story, narrative structure, point of view, timeline/pacing…and the list goes on. One can easily get caught up in these small-but-important details before even writing one word of a story or novel.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t some great epiphany I just experienced regarding the writing of fiction. No, I have always known that fiction is more complex than most non-writers (and even a few writers) care to give it credit for.

Luckily there is hope.

Continue Reading

Once again it’s Friday! I apologize for my decrease in posts this week. It has been one of those weeks where everything seems to be working against me and I can just never get enough done. Nevertheless, my goal is to always write quality posts that you find interesting, can learn from and that you enjoy reading. I try not to post just for the sake of posting something (although I am guilty of this from time to time).

With that said, I don’t know about any of you, but I’m ready for the weekend. This week has really dragged by and I’m looking forward to a little R&R. The only bad part about this weekend is that it will come to an end – my weekends end at 10pm Sunday night when I have to go to bed so I can go to work Monday in a semi-conscious state. Oh well, nothing in life is perfect.

Have a happy and safe weekend!

Continue Reading

Our society has become very impatient with just about everything. We can now do research and collect vast amounts of information with the click of a mouse via the internet. We carry around various gadgets and devices so we can do our work when away from both the home and office. We even speed through rush hour traffic to get to work faster (I never really understood this one).

But if there is one thing we (I’m mostly talking about Americans here) don’t rush, is the novel. I recently came across this post from the Guardian Unlimited that takes a lot of jabs at us, gives us credit for one thing:

When it comes to the novel, however, Americans are still willing to take it slow, or at least reward the writers who do. Indeed, in recent years a highly visible group of "Great American Novels" have emerged from 10, 12, and even over 20-year gestation periods.

Continue Reading

Last week I finished reading Harry, Revised by blogger Mark Sarvas (from The Elegant Variation). Since I made a big deal about receiving the book on my front doorstep in this previous post, I thought it’s only fair that I write a few words about the novel.

First, I must say that in the beginning Harry Rent (the protagonist) is a very unlikeable character. Who goes to a diner and hits on Molly the waitress on the day of their dead wife’s funeral? Much of the stuff Harry does in the beginning of the novel is quite selfish and he comes off as very uncaring. Even when he tries to be a "good guy" by helping out the very overweight and unattractive Lucille (another waitress at the diner), he’s doing it merely to impress Molly. Of course, the reality of his plan is much different than what he conjures up in his overactive imagination.

Continue Reading

Do you suffer from paraskavedekatriaphobia?

Today is not just Friday, it is Friday the 13th! I have never been a superstitious person, so having a Friday that happened to land on the 13th of the month never really bothered me. Nevertheless, I’m usually more interested in the historical context of these kinds of things than anything else. I found this cool article on Wikipedia that gives a brief history of the day and why people fear it.

For me Friday is Friday (and it’s always good). So I present you this week’s installment of Friday Link Love. Please have a happy and safe weekend!

Thoughts on using index cards
Index cards can be an invaluable tool for writers. Here’s a brief post that gives some very practical tips for using index cards for your next writing project.

Continue Reading