In today’s Journal
* Quotes of the Day
* Taking a Book to Paper
* The Bradbury Challenge
* Of Interest
Quotes of the Day
“Challenges have this nasty habit of quickly uncovering issues in your motivation and your consistency in writing and other life issues you are dealing with.” Dean Wesley Smith
“I have been known to write 90,000 word novels in days, or sometimes I just putter on various things and it takes me three weeks to write a short novel while I am doing other things.” Dean Wesley Smith on his production
Taking a Book to Paper
There are choices for doing layout and design of your paper book. I’ve never cared for InDesign and their subscription model (to me it feels a little like being robbed over and over and over) even though I originally learned book design on InDesign’s predecessor, Aldus PageMaker. That was back when pterodactyls regularly blotted out the sun as they passed overhead. Anyway, if they offered the option to buy the program outright, I might try it.
Still, Adobe InDesign is one alternative. Vellum is another alternative. Vellum is still primarily for Mac but I understand, vaguely, there is a way to use it with your PC. There is also Affinity Publisher, which I’ve talked about in this Journal before, and also Atticus, which I bought recently and intend to try soon.
You might also take a look at “The Tools And Services I Use In My Author Business” at https://www.thecreativepenn.com/2023/04/07/the-tools-and-services-i-use-in-my-author-business/ and any comments that arose from that post.
In comments on “Atticus Experience” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/atticus-experience/, Peter informs me that Affinity Publisher, despite all its other benefits, was “a bear to learn” (so is InDesign, from what I’ve heard) and Publisher doesn’t output .epub format. Seriously, a dedicated design program that doesn’t output .epub. That is more than a little ridiculous.
So I’ll be trying Atticus when I finally get around to formatting my books for paper. As I wrote in a comment this morning, “If you couldn’t tell, I’ve been in no big rush to push books into paper. I always apply the WIBBOW rule (would I be better off writing) and writing pretty much always wins.”
Maybe I’ll leave publishing my books to paper to my heirs. (grin)
The Bradbury Challenge
Balázs Jámbor completed The Magic Land, YA fantasy at 5200 words
Chynna Pace had a good week with two stories: Lottie’s Letter, Paranormal, 2457 words and The Trouble With Magic Cookies, Fantasy, 5976 words
My own writing continues to roll. Here’s hoping it won’t dry up again.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
See “Challenges Are Battles Against Yourself” at https://deanwesleysmith.com/challenges-are-battles-against-yourself/.
See “The egg, the twist and the problem with short stories” at https://fictitious.substack.com/p/the-egg-the-twist-and-the-problem. Thanks to Oleg for the tip. Interesting post, and great for a literary discussion.
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………………… 460
Writing of Wes Crowley: Deputy US Marshal 2 (WCG9SF4)
Day 11… 0323 words. Total words to date…… 19819
Day 12… 2445 words. Total words to date…… 22264
Day 13… 3184 words. Total words to date…… 25448
Total fiction words for April……… 12641
Total fiction words since April 1… 12641
Total fiction words for 2023………… 78829
Total nonfiction words for April… 7360
Total nonfiction words since April 1… 7360
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 69620
Total words (fiction and this blog) since April 1…… 20001 (to shadow Dean’s challenge)
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 148449
Calendar Year 2023 Novels to Date…………………… 1
Calendar Year 2023 Novellas to Date……………… 0
Calendar Year 2023 Short Stories to Date… 4
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 72
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 9
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 221
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31
Disclaimer: I am a prolific professional fiction writer. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark, adherence to Heinlein’s Rules, and that following the myths of fiction writing will slow your progresss as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.