In today’s Journal
* Quote of the Day
* Yesterday
* Pricing your book
* Today
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quote of the Day
“Just let the writing be a fun place to go, to escape to. Don’t make it special. If you do, it gets wrapped into all the life drama. Just leave the writing as an escape to go play.” Dean Wesley Smith
Yesterday I got the three covers done and the three short stories published, so I’m caught up for now in that regard. But there was zero extra time for writing or for working on the shared-world bible.
The first cover took what seemed like forever. The dimensions just didn’t work out right the first time (or the next few times), so I went over it and over it, breaking it and putting it back together. Which is weird, because I use a self-created template (on Serif PagePlus) to create covers. I’m all about efficiency. I hate touching work twice, much less several times.
Anyway, that one finally worked, and the next two covers literally took only a few minutes each. Then I created promo docs and published everything. When I finally looked up, it was after 4 p.m.
Very early this morning I added those three stories to my inventory spreadsheet and then added four to the short story page on my website. Then I spent a half-hour or so writing my first patron-only topic, an essay on organization, both pre- and post-publication.
Three of the new stories I added this morning are in the world of my Blackwell Ops novel series: Seven Minutes in Belfast, The Death of Federico Parizzi, and Empirita Sanchez de Uvalde (though that story is also included in the second story).
And one is science fiction, set on an arid planet: The Rain Cart.
All four are tense, fast-paced stories and chock full of psychological suspense as I “live” in the protagonist’s mind.
Each ebook is priced at $2.99. Or you can sign on as a patron for as little as $3 per month and get all four plus a bunch of other stuff. (grin) Just sayin’.
***
Pricing Your Book
In “Of Interest” today there’s an article on pricing your book. It’s a little helpful in a things-to-consider kind of way, but the author doesn’t really get into actual pricing.
If you’d like a copy of the current pricing guidelines I use for paper and ebooks, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com and I’ll send it to you.
***
Today will probably be another nonwriting day (other than all of this and the topic I sent the patrons).
I’ve been meaning for awhile to shift all my novels, novellas, short stories, short story collections, poetry collections and audio lectures over to my publisher site at StoneThread Publishing. It’s declutter time.
Fortunately, I’ve kept STP up pretty well, so mainly that will mean redirecting the appropriate menu items and links on my author site to StoneThread, then deleting the pages from my author site. Shouldn’t take more than a few hours.
Then I’ll move into a copyedit I’ve put off too long and maybe doing more on the bible I’m creating for the shared world I hope to launch on January 1.
Today or tomorrow, I’ll also format and publish a new collection of short fiction, Mobster Tales 3.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
See “I Can Get It for You Wholesale — Pricing Your Book” at https://www.thebookdesigner.com/2019/11/i-can-get-it-for-you-wholesale-pricing-your-book/. One addendum: You can price your book at the break-even point or slightly over if, like me, you go to paper primarily to drive readers to buy your ebooks, which are far less expensive by comparison.
See the extremely interesting “An Oxford Murder” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/an-oxford-murder/.
See “Paralysis by Analysis” at https://prowriterswriting.com/paralysis-by-analysis-one-writers-opinions/.
The Numbers
Fiction words today…………………… 0
Nonfiction words today…………… 1590 (620,Journal) (970, patron topic)
Total fiction words for the month……… 6481
Total fiction words for the year………… 391574
Total nonfiction words for the month… 7120
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 288200
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 679774
Calendar Year 2019 Novels to Date…………………… 7
Calendar Year 2019 Novellas to Date……………… 1
Calendar Year 2019 Short Stories to Date… 4
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 43
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 197
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31