Ray Else's Blog: Writing with Head and Heart - Posts Tagged "sci-fi"
My new sci-fi book 'Our Only Chance' is live!
Happy to announce I have delivered on my promise to write this sci-fi book, "Our Only Chance," about an A.I. android teenager in Japan who wants to be a real girl, and who may just be smart enough to pull it off, if she can keep Mother in the dark and avoid the clutches of the notorious Yakuza. A fast-paced read that will challenge your brain and touch your heart. Check it out!
For those interested in how I wrote this book - I started as usual with thinking about and then visiting a country, in this case Japan (you can see my Japan pictures at rayelse.com). I pondered on the country's unique culture and where might lie a story that would interest me and others. Samurais, manga and anime characters, robots and advanced technology with very civilized people, but also a sense of doom (atom bombs and radiation and Godzilla).
Once I had a basic idea for the book, I wrote an outline and then a first draft. I took long walks to think about the story and my characters, how they would act, what they would say to each other. Since I work full-time as a programmer, most of my writing was done at night and on the weekends.
I write quickly and had a first draft of two hundred pages in two months. I shared it with a few people, and realized I was telling the wrong part of the story. I largely tossed the writing, but not the story idea, and started over with a new outline. I wrote a very different second draft in six weeks. This time I was lucky to share with a beta reader who is himself a sci-fi writer, and he pointed out a lot that was lacking in terms of character development. (For those of you who want to write, or are writing, I highly recommend getting reader feedback.) So in my third draft which took me another month, I fleshed out the characters and motivations so they would make sense to a casual reader.
Finally I paid an editor to check the book for spelling and syntax mostly, while I continued to tweak it on vacation in Hong Kong and Siem Reap, Cambodia (searching out locales for the follow-on book to this A.I. series, "Fountain of Souls"). Did final proof reads, again and again, continuing to tweak the writing, making sure the book touched me where I wanted it to touch the reader, and made me laugh where I wanted the reader to be amused.
That's about it - now I have to start the marketing cycle. 2017 belongs to "Our Only Chance: An A.I. Chronicle!"
For those interested in how I wrote this book - I started as usual with thinking about and then visiting a country, in this case Japan (you can see my Japan pictures at rayelse.com). I pondered on the country's unique culture and where might lie a story that would interest me and others. Samurais, manga and anime characters, robots and advanced technology with very civilized people, but also a sense of doom (atom bombs and radiation and Godzilla).
Once I had a basic idea for the book, I wrote an outline and then a first draft. I took long walks to think about the story and my characters, how they would act, what they would say to each other. Since I work full-time as a programmer, most of my writing was done at night and on the weekends.
I write quickly and had a first draft of two hundred pages in two months. I shared it with a few people, and realized I was telling the wrong part of the story. I largely tossed the writing, but not the story idea, and started over with a new outline. I wrote a very different second draft in six weeks. This time I was lucky to share with a beta reader who is himself a sci-fi writer, and he pointed out a lot that was lacking in terms of character development. (For those of you who want to write, or are writing, I highly recommend getting reader feedback.) So in my third draft which took me another month, I fleshed out the characters and motivations so they would make sense to a casual reader.
Finally I paid an editor to check the book for spelling and syntax mostly, while I continued to tweak it on vacation in Hong Kong and Siem Reap, Cambodia (searching out locales for the follow-on book to this A.I. series, "Fountain of Souls"). Did final proof reads, again and again, continuing to tweak the writing, making sure the book touched me where I wanted it to touch the reader, and made me laugh where I wanted the reader to be amused.
That's about it - now I have to start the marketing cycle. 2017 belongs to "Our Only Chance: An A.I. Chronicle!"
Marketing and Audio Book Creation
So the first part of my big marketing campaign for Our Only Chance: An A.I. Chronicle with AuthorBuzz launched this month and I'm selling books every day, a trickle to begin with (3 paperbacks/ebooks a day) which I hope will soon turn into a flood when the campaign and word of mouth get in gear.
Marketing is a gamble - I have thousands riding on black (ink) - in some ways a present to my readers because the odds of even breaking even on such expensive marketing are Vegas odds.
Yes self-publishing and marketing seem a sucker's bet, yet I do love to read reviews where I can tell my book touched the reader! That my story intrigued her!
My other big news is that I have contracted at acx.com with a professional narrator ($1,800) to do an audio version of Our Only Chance. The audio book should be out and available on Amazon, iTunes etc by November 2017. Which means I'll need to do another expensive marketing campaign then! (Excuse me while I go hack into a bitcoin vault to pay for all this ;-)
Ray
Marketing is a gamble - I have thousands riding on black (ink) - in some ways a present to my readers because the odds of even breaking even on such expensive marketing are Vegas odds.
Yes self-publishing and marketing seem a sucker's bet, yet I do love to read reviews where I can tell my book touched the reader! That my story intrigued her!
My other big news is that I have contracted at acx.com with a professional narrator ($1,800) to do an audio version of Our Only Chance. The audio book should be out and available on Amazon, iTunes etc by November 2017. Which means I'll need to do another expensive marketing campaign then! (Excuse me while I go hack into a bitcoin vault to pay for all this ;-)
Ray
Novel birthing pains
Just finished and published my fifth novel, Fountain of Souls. You'd think by the fifth it would have been smooth sailing, but no. Several times I scrunched up huge chunks of the book and recycled it! Took nine months and then some to feel I had accomplished what I had set out to do, write something worth reading, something with smarts and soul.
A writer friend of mine asked me my (sometimes painful) process of novel-birth, and since others might be interested, I've detailed it below:
starts in my head. there has to be the grip of an idea or emotion that draws me toward it, a draw that must be sustainable for months if not years (initially could be a good title or first chapter or turn of phrase or interesting character to explore).
then my characters - I need a good feel for my main character(s) - sketch them out a bit, what they look like, their personalities and motivations - they become companions as you know (this is ongoing)
sketch my main themes - usually there are 2 or 3 that are part of the draw of the story for me and the reader - the theme can be a quest (like what is a soul?) and I may not have the answer at the beginning, hopefully by the end I have at least explored to the reader's satisfaction the theme
I ponder "the story" taking long walks, in the shower, wherever, and make notes of incidents that I want to happen, things I want my characters to say (this is ongoing thruout the writing of the book). I write snippets but really I am still gestating the story at this point
I write an outline of some kind - I have done a single page outline, and I have done a chapter 1 this happens, chapter 2 this happens all the way to chapter 20 (which usually expands to 40 or so short chapters). Either approach can work, a one or two page sketch of what you want to happen, or an outline broken into chapters. Maybe start with the sketch and then turn that into a chapter by chapter breakout. These "outlines" are guides only, and I freely change them as I write and get a better understanding of my story
I gestate more - take a trip for location ideas (like to Iceland for Fountain of Souls) - letting the story grow inside me - this can take two or three months
At some point I begin to write, pondering the story as I write it, concentrating less on the "writing" than on the storytelling initially, unless I feel especially inspired/poetic that day. What I mean is that the way I write typically is minimally, then return when doing drafts to flesh out the writing, the characters, adding "moments" (hopefully inspired moments).
The story then grows organically over time - say three to six months - with me doing edits of existing chapters and writing new ones
I am especially looking for things that don't feel right at this point in the book - I want it all to "feel right". Reading out loud helps.
First draft complete. Should at least tell the full story, if not elegantly
Second draft complete - reads better now. More "moments"
Third draft - ready for beta read
Fourth draft - usually ready to publish
That's all!
best regards - happy reading and writing - Ray
A writer friend of mine asked me my (sometimes painful) process of novel-birth, and since others might be interested, I've detailed it below:
starts in my head. there has to be the grip of an idea or emotion that draws me toward it, a draw that must be sustainable for months if not years (initially could be a good title or first chapter or turn of phrase or interesting character to explore).
then my characters - I need a good feel for my main character(s) - sketch them out a bit, what they look like, their personalities and motivations - they become companions as you know (this is ongoing)
sketch my main themes - usually there are 2 or 3 that are part of the draw of the story for me and the reader - the theme can be a quest (like what is a soul?) and I may not have the answer at the beginning, hopefully by the end I have at least explored to the reader's satisfaction the theme
I ponder "the story" taking long walks, in the shower, wherever, and make notes of incidents that I want to happen, things I want my characters to say (this is ongoing thruout the writing of the book). I write snippets but really I am still gestating the story at this point
I write an outline of some kind - I have done a single page outline, and I have done a chapter 1 this happens, chapter 2 this happens all the way to chapter 20 (which usually expands to 40 or so short chapters). Either approach can work, a one or two page sketch of what you want to happen, or an outline broken into chapters. Maybe start with the sketch and then turn that into a chapter by chapter breakout. These "outlines" are guides only, and I freely change them as I write and get a better understanding of my story
I gestate more - take a trip for location ideas (like to Iceland for Fountain of Souls) - letting the story grow inside me - this can take two or three months
At some point I begin to write, pondering the story as I write it, concentrating less on the "writing" than on the storytelling initially, unless I feel especially inspired/poetic that day. What I mean is that the way I write typically is minimally, then return when doing drafts to flesh out the writing, the characters, adding "moments" (hopefully inspired moments).
The story then grows organically over time - say three to six months - with me doing edits of existing chapters and writing new ones
I am especially looking for things that don't feel right at this point in the book - I want it all to "feel right". Reading out loud helps.
First draft complete. Should at least tell the full story, if not elegantly
Second draft complete - reads better now. More "moments"
Third draft - ready for beta read
Fourth draft - usually ready to publish
That's all!
best regards - happy reading and writing - Ray
Kindle Unlimited
I opened up my A.I. Chronicles to Kindle Unlimited reading in October, and 43 books have been read in a little over a month. A lot of 'read it all in one day' readers too, it appears. I love em. Now if I could just get them to put their reviews on Amazon and GoodReads! 'Our Only Chance' is 1 rating short of 100 ratings on GoodReads, and 8 short of 50 reviews on Amazon!
My books: Our Only Chance: An A.I. Chronicle and Fountain of Souls.
All my best, Ray
My books: Our Only Chance: An A.I. Chronicle and Fountain of Souls.
All my best, Ray
