Dale’s Comments (group member since Aug 13, 2023)

Dale’s comments from the Under the Weeping Willow group.

The Kickstarter went live today. See https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/.... If you can pledge or share the link (or both), I would be grateful.

My Kickstarter for The Fibonacci Murders is now in preview. You can see it at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/....

If you're into audiobooks and would like to contribute when the project launches on April 23rd, please click the "Notify me on Launch" button. Also, feel free to share the link around. I need all the help I can get!

Thanks!

The cat narrowed its eyes. "Reality is an illusion," it said. "I mean, look at me. I have nine lives, right? That's what you humans always say. What's real about that? Nothing. I have one life, like you. It's just that mine..." For a moment it looked around as though lost for words. "Mine," it continued, "is sort of like a ball of string. You only see nine segments of it, because it's all wound up."

Well, if I may be permitted a bit of shameless self-promotion, my science fiction novel The Belt might qualify. I'm not sure it's true dystopian, but it is set in a society where (as I say in the blurb) only the rich and the ruthless survive.

Sometimes the motivation can flag. Sometimes you just need time to do something else for a bit. Still, 16,000 words is a strong start.

I'm up to 8,000 on Rooftop Sonata. I thought it would go faster, but so far I've only been able to get a small amount down at any one sitting.

📚 Alana (professional book nerd) ✝️ wrote: "Oh, sorry Dale, I missed your message!

Its a fantasy book :D I am very excited about it, and Hunter is right, I am a bit obsessive about my book ;) "

No problem. I suppose most of us can be a bit obsessive about our books. ;-) Sounds like an interesting tale.

Where are you in the process right now, and what's the motivation problem?

Talk it up!

📚 Alana (professional book nerd) ✝️ wrote: "A milestone I recently reached in my book I have been working on in my book is 20,000 words, which was really big for me! :D"

Congratulations! What genre? Anything you'd care to say about it? (Sometimes writers don't like to talk much about their works in progress.)

I'd be interested in hearing what other writers are working on. What have you recently started, finished, published, or otherwise reached a milestone on?

I'll start. Since 2019, I've been working on a novel titles Penitence. It's been a bear of a project, but two weeks ago I finished the first draft. The novel has its roots in a short story I wrote back in 1991 about a . . . get this . . . pandemic. But it's a pandemic of a different sort. The disease doesn't kill people. It makes them go violently insane, so everyone is killing each other or themselves. The story line revolves around two survivors who flee New York City and end up on the other side of the country, encountering various manifestations of the disease as they travel.

Having finished the first draft, I've set it aside for a bit and am now working on a humorous crime caper titled Rooftop Sonata. It will be my second Bernard and Melody caper, following Weasel Words. Bernard and Melody Earls are a husband-and-wife team of thieves who rob from the rich and give to themselves. This time, their target is the manuscript of an opera by German composer Richard Wagner that was believed to have been destroyed in Hitler's bunker at the end of World War II. But maybe someone got it out of Germany and now has it stashed in a private collection...

I also have a science fiction short story appearing online on Sci-Fi Shorts (https://www.scifishorts.co/) next Monday, February 5th. Titled "Off the Deep End," it deals with a guy who spots something odd in the deep end of his swimming pool while he's trying to repair a glitch in his solar roof.

Here's another one for you:

Revise. Revise. Revise. Revise. Revise. Then get someone to edit what you end up with.

Just out of curiosity, how many writers here love the revision process? (I'm guessing most of you dislike it, fear it, or hate it. Or all three.) I'm planning on creating a talk for writing groups in my area titles "The Joy of Revision." The point would be to help writers embrace the process and enjoy it.

Cari wrote: "I think you should wait to hire an editor if you're still a novice writer. If you have friends who are willing to red-ink your writing, ask them. That's what I'm doing since I'm still a teen (and n..."

I may have missed this when it was posted. You are correct: professional editors don't work for cheap (and if they do, they probably aren't very good!). If you plan to publish, it's worth it. If you are just writing mostly for yourself, your family, your friends, you don't need to incur the expense.

📚 Alana wrote: "@Dale how did you get ISBNs for your books? (I am thinking about publishing mine even though it will probably be next year...)"

I purchase ISBNs through Bowker (since I'm in the U.S.; the ISBN authority varies by region). Because I intend to keep publishing 2 or more books a year if things go well, I purchased a block of 100 of them. If you by just one, it's $25/ISBN, as I recall. If you buy 100, the prices goes down to something like $5.25/ISBN, but of course you need the money to get that many.

You need one ISBN per format, but Kindle books don't need them; Amazon uses it's own number (AISN), which it assigns automatically. So in my case, I use two ISBNs per book: one for the paperback and one for the epub. I haven't done hardcovers yet, but if I ever do, that would require a third.

Hunter wrote: "Also, I submitted my book to be put on Goodreads!"

Congratulations!

I'm resigned to it by now. For years I've said I wanted to get a t-shirt that reads, "I hate typogorphical errors." ;-)

Close cousins of the typo tricksters....

Hunter wrote: "What the heck, why all these grammar mistakes?"

The grammar gremlins got you!

Aside: Haven't tried pecan pie. Good grief. Go get some! ;-)

Alana wrote: "🤪 I wish I could! Unfortunately, I don’t have a job because of the hiring around here being sucky sooooo"

Ah. Well, yeah, that could be a problem...

Alana wrote: "Of course!! As soon as I have some money I’ll buy at least one of your books and read it :D"

Again, thank you! Now stop posting here and go get some money somewhere. Uh, legally, I mean. Don't steal it. ;-)

Yum. Too yum. With butter. Or cheese. Or caramel. Or chocolate. Or....

Pecan pie?