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Branding
Kris and I Talk All the Time About Branding… Most writers only limit that word “branding” to how their covers look similar in series. How their name in a certain font looks from book to book, and so on. That is all important, but honestly just a tiny touch at branding. When you are taking something out for license, like to a gaming company, or toy company, or anything like that, you detail out your branding on your project. Fonts, type of art, colors and a ton of details are all important to how a product overall looks when transferred from text to media of some sort. Clothing and styles…
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AI Art and Audio…
Topic of a Lot of Discussions Among Writers… Lots and lots of early adaptors in the indie writing world are trying AI. For audio, the technology is jumping ahead at full speed and the prices are slowly coming down. For nonfiction, I like the idea and think the quality and technology is almost there now. For fiction, I personally am still on hold until the AI can use my voice and other issues are fixed. But I do know a lot of writers who are trying books with audio. Still too expensive in my opinion, but it does save time. Also limits markets at the moment. The AI art for…
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Second Part of My New Challenge…
I Should Have Set This Up From January 1st… I started off the year with the challenge to write a short story per day for the entire year. I did fine for three months until the very issue I had been worried about before I started finally caught up with me. I wrote some stories through the summer, but back at my normal pace of about 50 new short stories per year. I was going to do 100 stories in the last 100 days, but the day before I was to start that, Kris and I were talking and I said, “I can’t figure out why my critical voice is…
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Fun Challenge
October Until The End of the Year Challenge… Actually, only part of it. A really fun publishing challenge. Shortly I will be putting up on Teachable all the Collection Classes for 2023. 18 different ones. Six from the first year we did them in 2021 (and if you bought the full year, yes, you can take them in 2023.) Six from the second year. And six new ones for 2023. I will have all of these posted in about a week or so. Each collection class is 9 weeks long and you write five stories during that time, as well as learn how to put a collection together, do the…
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Writers of the Future Deadline
Before October 1st… The quarter is over on Friday, the last quarter of Volume #39. So you have until Friday to get your stories in. Not only does Writers of the Future pay 8 cents per word, but if you get in the book you get a free trip to Hollywood, a free week-long workshop taught by top writers, and nifty prize money if you win one of the top spots. That speaks nothing about the fantastic awards show. Stunning, just stunning. And no worries about me already seeing the story. I am the editor. I will know your name if you win. But Jody Lynn Nye and a cast…
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Some Updates and Other Fun Stuff
First Practice Run… Actually, no real running, only 2.5 miles of walking because no one cared that the course was short. For me, the practice came at getting up so early to go running. It was fun. First real run is Sunday, with an actual 5k course and timing bibs. I figure this coming Sunday will set the mark for the slowest of the year as I do more and more running and the weight drops over the fall. That is the plan, anyway. (grin) Publishing Fun… I spent most of today laying out the next issue of Smith’s Monthly. I do all the covers, all the layout, and, of…
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Last Two Days of September Workshop Sale!!
This Ends Sunday Evening… So just over 24 hours left in this one. All October Regular workshops are available. And the new Study Along classes. And three new classic workshops that used to be regular workshops. So if interested, go to WMG Teachable. Find the class you are interested in, hit purchase and then on the next page put in the code: SeptemberRegularSale50 Hit apply and you should have the class at 50% off. Here are the October Regular Workshops. Six weeks long and I reply to all assignments. Class #31… Oct 4th … Covers 101 Class #32… Oct 4th … Heinlein’s Rules Class #33… Oct 4th … Writing into…
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Writers of the Future Contest…
You Might Be Eligible And Not Even Know It!! And if you are eligible, you should enter every quarter without fail. Okay, I have been around the Writers of the Future contest now for 39 years. I was the first person across the stage to get my award and my first story has been in print in Volume #1 for this entire time. At Pocket Books, we patterned the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds contest on Writers of the Future and I edited that for ten years. I became a judge for Writers of the Future after we stopped the Star Trek contest. Now, I am responsible for putting the…
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Regular Monthly Workshop Sale
Last Full Week of Every Month… Can’t believe it is the last full week of the September already. Wow. The sale code to get everything 50% off on WMG Teachable is SeptemberRegularSale50 Just hit purchase on anything you want and on the next page put in the code and hit apply and your choice will be 50% off. NEW STUFF BEING ADDED… October regular workshops are being added and will all be up in a day or so. I will do a list here, but for the next few days you can still get the active September workshops and I’ll work with you to get caught up on the first…
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Why Do We Do Kickstarters?
I Got That Question Today… The question sort of caught me by surprise, to be honest. First off, surface reasons. 1… It gets new books to readers ahead of the publication date and at a discount. Fans of a series or a writer enjoy that. I know I do, which is one of the reasons why I back so many campaigns. 2… It gets our work out to readers we might never find and they might then buy more of our work. This is called discoverability. 3… It is amazing promotion and advertising and you don’t have to pay for it. In fact, if you do it right, you get…