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GOOD CHEER HOLIDAY BUNDLE…
This Just Went Live!!! That’s right, just tonight, and I think this is an amazingly special bundle of holiday stories of all kinds and types. Perfect reading for this holiday season in so many ways. And one of the coolest things in this bundle is a book that explains the importances and contains all of The Santa Claus Stories by L. Frank Baum. Yes, the Wizard of OZ L. Frank Baum. With all his Santa Claus stories, he helped cement the images and traits we take for granted now for Santa Claus. And now, for the first time ever, they are gathered together and reprinted in one book, WITH ALL…
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The True End of Trade Publishing…
At Least As Anyone Knows It… Trade publishing is what I call traditional publishing. The reason for the word “trade,” very, very, VERY simply put, is that the publishers don’t sell directly to readers, they sell into the trades. The trades in publishing are a distribution system that is an old-fashioned channel to get books from an old-fashioned printing presses to warehouses to distributors to bookstores and then into the hands of readers. (By the way, three of the major trade printers have filed for bankruptcy or shut down. That is another really bad sign that causes books to be extremely delayed.) Trade publishers do not care about readers and…
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Two New Classes… Two New Storybundles
All Kinds of Fun Stuff… I have three books in nifty StoryBundles right now. The first one is the Space Opera Storybundle and my collection, A Billion Earths is exclusive to the bundle, so you can get it along with some other really nifty books by great writers. The second book is an anthology I edited called A Twist of a Knife (best mysteries from Pulphouse Magazine.) It is in the Twist of a Knife Storybundle along with some other wonderful mystery books. I also curated this bundle and I also have my Cold Poker Gang novel Bad Beat in there. Three books in two Storybundles. How much fun is…
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A Problem I Am Just Starting to See…
Submissions to Major Magazines… I flat believe that everyone writing short stories and who wants a writing career long term should get into the habit of sending short stories to major magazine markets. I have gone over the reasons may times. All upside when your stories start to hit. And I have just assumed it was some fear thing that stopped writers from submissions of stories to major magazines. Fear caused by baseless critical voice issues that I just assume that if a writer can’t get past the fears, they will never be a long-term writer. And I think all of the above is true still. No opinion change on…
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A Challenge For Everyone for 2021…
My Challenge of 70 While I Am 70 Pushes Me… So I got a comment about structuring a short story publishing challenge for 2021 for others, especially writers just starting out. And I think it’s a great idea for a bunch of reasons for most writers. So I thought I would go into the reasons and the idea here. Challenge: Publish 52 Short Stories Stand Alone In 2021 Note, I did not say write, I said PUBLISH. Stories would have to be stand-alone, most selling for $2.99 electronic and $4.99 paper. (Under 3,000 words sell it for $1.99… never 99 cents.) A lot of writers I know have collections published…
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WMG Holiday Spectacular Kickstarter About to End
Just Over One Day Left… This ends on Tuesday at 12 noon, folks and you don’t want to miss it. The 2020 Holiday Spectacular Kickstarter campaign is like we did 1n 2019, only better. For those who get the 2020 calendar in this campaign, you will get an original holiday story delivered to your inbox every day from American Thanksgiving (November 26th) through January 1st, 2021. (Yes, sort of an Advent Calendar using original short stories.) What a fantastic way to ride out of this crazy year. Over 25 professional writers have written original stories for this and the entire project is edited by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, award-winning editor. Kris also does an…
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WMG Holiday Spectacular 2020
ONLY FOUR DAYS LEFT!! This ends on Tuesday at 7 pm, folks and you don’t want to miss it. The 2020 Holiday Spectacular Kickstarter campaign is like we did 1n 2019, only better. For those who get the 2020 calendar in this campaign, you will get an original holiday story delivered to your inbox every day from American Thanksgiving (November 26th) through January 1st, 2021. (Yes, sort of an Advent Calendar using original short stories.) What a fantastic way to ride out of this crazy year. Over 25 professional writers have written original stories for this and the entire project is edited by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, award-winning editor. Kris also…
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Book #1 of 70 Book Challenge
This Came Out On the First Day of the 70 Book Challenge… That’s right. On my birthday. TWIST OF A KNIFE: Best 10 Mystery Stories from the First Year of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine. Well, it is not officially published yet, but you can get it in the Twist of a Knife Storybundle. So it actually is published and available. It is exclusive there for another two weeks or so, then it will go on sale around the world and be sent to everyone who supported the Pulphouse Kickstarter campaign. It was the 4th stretch goal. The book was a fun one to put together, actually. And I had help from…
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So Today This Started…
A Twist of the Knife… A Mystery/Crime Bundle – Curated by Dean Wesley Smith This is the blog I wrote for the Storybundle you can get at https://storybundle.com/crime Every Type of Mystery and Crime I love reading mystery and crime stories. I write mystery and crime stories. I edit mystery and crime stories. In fact, in every issue of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine that I edit, I try to have at least two or three mystery or crime stories of various types. And since the readers of Pulphouse look for something different, the types of mystery and crime stories range across the entire spectrum of the mystery genre. I really noticed those differences when…
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Moving Forward Again…
The Election in the States is Over… So finally, after four long and lost days of far too much junk food and watching television, this election is finally over and we all can get started forward again. So a couple of the classes that we pretty much stopped this summer will be firing back up shortly. Let me list them here, while it is still possible to jump into them at half price for a few more days. The Decade Ahead… All four quarters… When Covid hit, we tried to do a duel course on this for a short time, one writing with Covid and one after Covid, but as…