Update: The Horror...

I'm working on uploading my little short story to Smashwords, in, hopefully, the premuim listing. After a few days of "WHAT?!?! type stuff I decided there was too much of a learning and sidebar issue curve to take the time to do it and I opted to enlist someone's help. Thanks God for social media, I found someone who works for, or is, a publisher and she says she'll format and upload it for me for $25.
Works for me.
I have enough tech skills and experience to learn this stuff, it's mostly figuring out Word,  then adjusting the way Word displays and then being able to adjust the "settings" for the appearance of the piece when it's splashed onto the Smashwords page. Otherwise known as formatting. I cannot imagine doing this with an 80K word story. No way.
Here's the thing, and this is something for YOU to think about too. We've all heard the phrase that speaks to, "picking our battles", right? For me it's the same thing and that reality has been graphically brought home to me having spent 3 days trying to master the process of upload and tweaking and photo adjustment and a bunch of other stuff my ego wouldn't let me let go of. If I told you how many hours a day I spend, already, on the computer, or netbook(on my nightstand in my room), or laptop or iPhone(if I'm outside or in the bathroom or at Target) you might not believe it. I don't mind, in fact I love learning, but some things just don't ring my bell. Like formatting and book covers.
Excuses?
Look, I don't give a damn, I'll do what I 'gotta' do to pull this off but again PICK YOUR BATTLES.
 My point is that I'm prioritizing my time, I have to and so do you. I was absent the day someone etched in stone the imperative to learn Word so I use Works and Notepad to tweak and layout my stuff, even when I was blogging to a million or more people. It irks me that Word becomes so invasive to my system and that it costs so much.

I focus on the two peak things I need to do, every day. Write and Network. I put in biz class high speed Wi-Fi in the house. Speed, capacity and access. And, YES I actually keep in touch with the people I follow, bloggers and writers, reviewers and readers and people I just want to follow(THIS is why SPEED is paramount, both download AND UPLOAD). Learning the craft of writing came behind my blogging and radio stuff because I could do those things on the fly. I traveled for almost 3 years nonstop. Almost a year later I'm still feeling the effects of 20 hour days for 3 years, with little time or energy to write during it all.
Writing on a high level is very serious business, I'm sure you know this but I'm just saying - I take it seriously and am working on it all the time and it takes a LOT of time. So, I'm sure you too make choices, every day about all kinds of things on a lot of levels. Self publishing means self promotion and that means WORK. Building a "platform"(I'm still not sure what that means and I don't think anyone else does either even though you see it used all the time) or network, is a major element and will take time to build and maintain.
Anyway I think you get the point.
Evaluate, re-evaluate and focus on the elements you need to, stay flexible, loose and know it's a blessing for anyone in the publishing industry to give you the time of day and a miracle for someone to take an interest in you.
Technology is the horse you rode in on, nothing more.

The HORROR of it all hits me when I look back and realize I should have spent my time more wisely on the things that matter most to me at this point in the struggle. It's about WRITING  and PEOPLE.


YOU KNOW WHERE TO FIND ME....


LUVU

When the Thrill is Gone....

    You're excited about the book rolling around in your brain. (For me it's more like a bag of rocks in a dryer on HIGH) Notes everywhere, an outline maybe fills the pages of a spiral notebook. Compelling images of characters and their plight, or, hero escapades  play and replay in your mind. [You've done your research so some expert doesn't call you an idiot when the book comes out.] Finally, the moment comes when you sit down to begin composing your breakout novel, the book that will make you a household name and put an Escalade in the driveway.
You are inspired and thrilled to be a writer.
You wonder if it will be good enough as you slog through the sentences, paragraphs and pages, but you press on. The family, in the next room, is listening to Wheel of Fortune. They have no idea what the agony of artistic endeavor does to a future bestselling author such as yourself. But, in their ignorance, you love them anyway.
Your drifting. Back to the writing Einstein.....
Are you adding the elements the writing books and blogs and author vids you've read and watched tell you to? Have you practiced enough? Is this book practice? WHAT?
Commas. Dear God, watch the commas, and SHOW Don't Tell!
Make sure you ratchet up the tension like Donald Maass says in his great books on writing fire and creating breakout novels.
Right. Got it.
Modifiers, verbs and adverbs. Ok, I was absent that day.....
AND you don't want the story to appear too amateurish so you read aloud and look for rhythm, or rather LISTEN for rhythm. Gotta have rhythm....Side margins, double spacing, oh yeah.
Do I need cover art with some good looking young guy with killer abs and a haircut like the singer from Def Leopard, on the cover? Sure. Even if it's a story about redoing the driveway? Absolutely.

Bio. ( for the back cover)
 Can I use a photo of myself just after I woke up or do I need one that makes me look like an accountant with a "edge"? How about the one I took awhile back, you know, with a hip three day growth and pissed off look? Works for me....

Moving right along.

Occasionally, as you labor at the really noisy keyboard you peek through the grungy blinds to see if the news crews are stationing themselves in your yard yet, in anticipation of the book of the decade. Nope. Not yet. But they will.....
Hour after hour, day after day you write, and write, and write. You try not to go back and revise the previous chapters, but you do sometimes. Some mornings you dread sitting down at the computer, you just don't feel the "mojo" and no one will notice anyway, right? Yes, right.
Sometimes you wonder if you'll pull this off, if you have what it takes, then you read a runaway bestseller and think to yourself: Yeah, HELL NO..... 
Not knowing what else to do you plow forward through rain and sleet and hail and snow. (cue the soundtrack from the film Exodus please....someone...)
As the words and chapters pile up, you sneak a look by reading what you've written thus far and realize this novel is taking form, shape. A story, a really good one is unfolding from your finger tips.
Suddenly one day you understand. You get it. Yes, it's work, maybe even hard labor. But something now pulls you forward. Something else.
Someone from the living room yells; "Watermelon Festival in Iowa!" in answer to a "phrase" puzzle on WOF. Pat Sajak, in the background, almost sounds as if he's even interested in his own show.
You smile and refocus.
Forged in the furnace of fire you are.
When your daughters psychotic kitten leaps onto the keyboard erasing 3 hours of work in an instant and then you twist your knee trying to catch the little sh....darling...to rationally discuss the matter.
Yes grasshoppa......Forged like iron you will be.

True, the initial thrill is gone....but it has been replaced by a steel will and confidence borne of determination, a new and better kind of thrill. The willingness to do the "work" is something you now are a partaker of.
For love of the game....or craft....or art....is why you do it.  Not the thrill. Not the thrills that you once did it for, anyway. They are now gone. You don't even look in the rear-view anymore. Your lazer gaze is now fixed on the writers road, ahead to the horizon. You grit your teeth and smash the gas pedal.
The awareness that you may be way to theatrical crosses the mental field of vision like a rabbit darting across the interstate, but you dismiss it, allowing yourself a little useless drama and paying no attention to the puffs of fur coming from under the back end of the car as you zoom onward.
Amused, you sculpt the novel of your dreams, word by word and page by page.
The thrill isn't gone....you smile knowingly.....

You know where to find me....

LUVU

My REAL life...

Hi Folks,
I wanted to blog out a little update and mention a couple things.
Same as you maybe, as I careen down The Writer's Road like a pin ball on speed I'm finding that it's only when I truly slow down and give more, deeper thought to the "side-bar"(they're NOT sidebar) issues that come up when it comes to the actual fruit of my brain and inspiration, as it appears on paper.
THAT'S when it hits me. (Thank God for these moments...)
What hits me?
Let me explain: Recently I submitted a short piece I've been working on for a couple months, to someone in publishing whose name you might recognize, for her evaluation on my ability since we may be working on some other things together. (She's an industry expert, an author with 2 red hot titles and a mega force with a LOT going on.)
I realized, to my horror, that many fundamental elements of writing - WHICH I KNOW - had been left out of the flow and structure of the piece, a feel good story. It was overly descriptive, WAY too many modifiers, verbs and adjectives, the struggle came and went more as character building and NOT the axis of the "pay-off"(don't ask me what that means....) as I intended, wrongly thinking it would be perceived the way I wrote it(or not). Then, of course falling prey myself, in a couple spots, to what I call "presumed assumption" - where the author in an amateur moment omits key elements, knowing he knows them and then stupidly leaving them out thinking everyone else does too. And if that wasn't bad enough I told a little too much in the way of detail here and there, thus robbing the reader of the joy of imagination and thrill of marveling at my literary classic.
Most people stop at "trying to hard", but me? OH NO......I try too hard to try too hard. (I'm an extreme adventurer....it's a gift....the doctor says.)
For a few moments there I felt like a rank amateur until I read the first and last and a few in between comments she made regarding my ability, which was there....somewhere. I had to go back a few times to the ones mentioning that my mistakes could be fixed and that she felt I really could write.
THIS is what I mean by "side-bar" issues. We know they are not, and, in fact are the foundational elements of writing. So,what hit me in one sledge hammer moment was that the residual influence of my other writing endeavors and complete lack of regular writing sessions may have left gaps in my second nature tool box and the result was what she read and commented on.
Sometimes I piss myself off, and this moment was the mother of all piss-offs. Not at her, at myself, for not sitting back, examining the piece for just such boo-boos and correcting them.( I think, I, have comma issues, too, just, sayin',)
 Having been a blogger for a long time I'm well into 7 figures in overall readers of the various industry blogs I've written over a period of 3+ years and that's not supposed to impress anyone however it does mean that I've learned a few things. Blogging is NOT writing, fiction writing I mean. It has little to do with it other than the elements of punctuation, spelling and all that. Better writers write better blogs but better bloggers may not, or ever, be better writers.... and I was reminded of that the other day, even though I've wanted to be a writer for much longer than I've been a blogger.
Writers in the 21st Century are faced with the serious dilemma of dividing their time in the right amounts in the right directions and there really is no model for it yet other than the trial and error phase some of us are going through. For me, it's a huge shift both time-wise and mentally to get into writer mode from blogger and techie/networker mode but I'm getting better at it. We all struggle for the time and clarity to write, too.
Just a thought.....
Also, and this has nothing to do with what I'm saying here but bears mentioning - this is why I have such profound respect for journalists who are also great fiction writers, like Alex Berenson.

Update: I think I'm moving. I stumbled onto a property(that I've been stalking) the other day and may be buying. Though smaller, it has the unbelievable qualities of being closer to the beach, we would own it AND it would be 1/3 of the cost of the half acre we are on now. I guess what I'm saying is that maybe over the next couple weeks I may be MIA part of the time, doing My REAL Life....

You know where to find me....
LUVU

About this letter.....

I'm still working on my next official blog post about  my thoughts as I view the changing landscape of the publishing world and how it pertains to writers. Also a post on eBooks and how your deal with agents and publishers might change, and, what the money breakdown will be, or should be Trying NOT to rehash the zillions of other informational opinions on the countless writer and publishing industry blogs, I will as always, apply my views as I see them playing out in my own journey down "The Writers Road".

This piece below is something that appeared recently on Angie's Diary, a cool writer site you may be familiar with. This new and improved version still has not been proofed or edited by a professional.
I will be discussing it in my writers group soon but I wanted to put it up here on my blog in the meantime as a sample of an exercise in translation. The hard part was to write it in such a way as to sound like a regular guy not a writer writing it, yet still have a polished flow.
Maybe you'll take a moment to look it over and, if anything, let me know what you think.

It's a "letter", a story within a story from a dying man to his wife who passed away tragically when they were young parents. Years later, terminally ill, he writes this letter to her asking her to wait for him at this spot, their spot, a place on the shoreline, yet again. I hope you like it. I will be coming back to it every now and then to rework it. There are some things about it I do not like, others that I do and I think it's worth fine tuning. What do you think? I also want to say that this piece is total fiction other than the fact that I did turn to someone and speak those words on the backstairs of our apartment on a sunny summer afternoon by the beach many years ago when we were young. I am, to this day, happy that I took my own advice and hold forever in my heart of hearts those beautiful golden exciting days of my youth because they in fact never did come again. Sometimes, in the storms of life we cling to memories of days that once were, we treasure moments that 'may never come again'....
You know where to find me.

 LUVU


__________________________________________________________________________________


Letter to a Friend



Hi ,
Life here on earth hasn't changed much  since last we spoke. How stupid of me I thought, to write a letter to someone who would never receive it. I can almost hear you laugh even now as  I scribble on this paper.
Do you remember that summer afternoon when we were young and sitting on the back stairs where we lived by the beach? I turned to you and said, "Treasure these moments, they may never come again." Never in a million years did we think that they wouldn't and we kept on living till one of us didn't.
To this day I don’t know what made me say that. I've agonized with guilt over the years thinking I somehow caused what happened by speaking such a thing. You would have told me that I didn't, that such things will happen and we should go on as best we can. How desperately over the years have I needed to hear you say that.
You loved this spot by the water. I'm here now, writing this letter sitting on the coral rock we sat on where I first kissed you and where I asked you to marry me. It destroys and renews me at the same time to come but I still do. Our babies are so much like you and have grown up to have babies of their own. I see so much of you in all of them. I'm not sure if I've done a good job with our girls but they're beautiful and happy. I tried my best to raise them the way you would have. I brought pictures, if only you could see them. Maybe you can.
Sometimes laying in bed at night in the stillness I swear I feel you breathing on my neck and your heart beating against my back. I’ve dreamed of slow dancing with you in the moonlight till the sun came up like we did on our honeymoon. I never told you this but I needed you far more than you needed me but you probably already knew that.
The moments have seemed to slow in their passing, accompanied only by the thunder of silence but it's alright because there is no sound I want to hear now other than your voice.
It feels like I'm slipping away from this life and if I am then it means I'm getting closer to you and I‘m okay with that.
The doctor says I don't have long so I wanted to let you know and to ask you to wait here for me like you did the night I asked you to marry me and I was two hours late. When I finally got here you were waiting for me on this rock. Friends always wait for friends, you said smiling.
I never told you the truth about that because I was worried you would come to your senses and never want to marry me. I was so nervous I lost the ring and it took me and half the city to find it. Actually it was old Mrs. Murphy's poodle who found it on the side of the road in front of her house. Classic. I left it on the roof of the car when I took my jacket off. I was always in a hurry to get to you. I still am.
You told me once that it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all and if you truly love then you can never lose. You were right. You were always right. I still consider myself the luckiest man in the world to have been so loved.

There’s much more to tell you but it can wait till we're together again. Joni's husband Mikey is here to help me to the car so I'll close this letter. He's a nice boy, you'd like him. He reminds me a lot of me when I was young, maybe a little smarter.
Wait for me here, I’ll see you soon.

                                      All my love always ,

__________________________________________________________________________________

Sweet Inspiration and other phantom mysteries...

Here's the link to a guest post I recently had come out on Rich Evans Writes
His latest book is "Asylum Lake", click around on his site you'll see other authors posts and good articles.
He's on Twitter and Facebook too. The links are there.

In a day  or two I will be posting here again, I'm working on a piece for struggling writers to try to make sense of "the writers road" to publication. For many, it will be the "indie" road, maybe for me too, we'll see. Still, traditional or indie published we, as 21st Century authors, need to be aware of our responsibilities and options when it comes to promoting ourselves and our work, and there's a LOT you can do.
Let me be clear about ONE thing first though, it's this: I am NOT one who advocates blitzkrieg type self promotion on any level, online or off. First of all 99% of the world doesn't give a damn who you are and the 1% who may, well, be aware - you're putting yourself out there fighting for their time attention and money alongside thousands of others who will be too. Your mother and aunt lucy might think the world of you but the "world" doesn't even know you - YET. A big fish in a small pond is a small fish in an open ocean but you still need to survive and eat and learning to do that is what this blog is all about.
There is NO turn-key "marketing" plan out there either, I don't care what you've heard or read or ANYONE tells you although if you follow successful authors you WILL see a pattern. YOU are YOU and only you can be you. The main thing to understand is this is an industry unique in the fact that, yes, it's about money, Thank GOD, but at the same time one of the very very few in a modern world where emphasis is placed and respect is given with genuine sensitivity to craftsmanship, substance and creativity. Not to mention the fact that authors enjoy the role of relating the worlds values and image to itself in a way as old as humans have been on the earth. There is NO other industry like it, and make no mistake it IS an industry, and all this term implies.
For me, attaining a high level of skill in the art of story-telling and the craft of writing is something I am deadly serious about, not overly serious but still focused in the right things and directions.
This is our lives we're talking about here, not just our professional aspirations but our donation of precious time, sweat and tears - without measure.
Next month I have a couple radio appearances and a few guest blog sessions I hope you'll take the time to read and listen to. I've been very blessed to have made friends in this industry with writers and great human beings I would have respect for even if they weren't writers, and if I end up selling a lot of books it will be directly due to the extension of their gracious hands.
My history and background may not matter in the big scheme of things but the sum of my experiences here on earth  have given me an edge and perspective I hope to infuse into my work, my writing, and give depth and dimension to my characters and plots. I hope the same for you. Don't ever try to be anyone else, be who you are and find your own way, keeping in mind the outlines of this business. Good is good and great is great when it comes to writing, as it is in other pursuits in life and your aspirations are simply the beginning of a marathon you better train for and be willing to endure, but be joyful always if and when you are counted as one of the many in the venerable trade. I do and always will.
The ditches on the roadside of life are filled with the wreckage of broken dreams. Look if you must at the tragedy but don't look too long.
We all have dreams and no one knows for sure why some achieve them and others don't and my hope is for anyone reading this to see yours fulfilled in due time. And this, the most precious of all of life's gifts - time - is the very thing no one is guaranteed, so make the most of it and - treasure these moments for they may never come again.
You know where to find me.....

LUVU