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Two Cool Things!
Really Worth Checking Out… The first is a brand new series of blogs/articles from professional writer Chris York, who writes mystery and science fiction, but these days mostly really amazing cozy mystery novels under a couple of names. Chris is married to writer J. Steven York and they have been our closest writer friends for more decades than any of us care to think about. Anyone who has come to a major workshop for WMG, either on the coast or here in Vegas, knows Chris. Anyhow, since the beginning of this year, Chris retired from her long-time day job as an accountant for a major hotel and condominium complex and…
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A Quick Covers Post
Different Aspects of Cover Art… I tell writers to do their own covers. The levels of critical voice excuses I get back are amazing. And all the excuses are geared to make sure the writer fails. After all, that is what critical voice does, it stops you. In this modern world, unless you have a ton of money you want to just toss into a garbage can, no writer can afford to hire covers done. Wait, let me change that. No moderately prolific writer can afford the time, the money, the problems that come with having someone else do your covers. Moderately prolific? Four novels and a number of short…
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Friday Night and Exercise
Talking Exercise for a Minute… Since it is Friday night and even the streets of Vegas are mostly empty, I figured it might be time for me to talk about what I promised a while back, and that is regularly blogging here about exercise and weight loss. It has been brutally hard to do either this last month. Vegas has had the hottest August on record EVER! Think that through. Las Vegas, known for heat, just broke all records. Oh, joy, which made going outside impossible unless you are out and moving at dawn, and even then some of those temperatures this month would have taken a long time to…
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Working on the Survey…
For The Return of Boss Kickstarter… It ended tonight and thanks, everyone, for the great support. Really fun. But now I am working on the survey that will get sent out in a week or so. Basically I am rebuilding the entire campaign… twice. Not kidding. And adding some extra stuff people can grab if they want, or if they missed it in the campaign. At some point, Loren and I will do some videos in the Kickstarter Best Practices about surveys and the many ways they can be handled after you run a successful kickstarter. Kickstarter itself gives you a decent tool to use. And using that is pretty…
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Last 18 Hours…
As I Write This… The Return of Boss Kickstarter campaign ends at 8 pm West Coast Time tonight (Thursday) and looks like we are going to go past the 6th stretch goal. So writers, you get four Pop-Ups as stretch goals, worth $600 total. We already have two of them recorded and will be finishing up the last two and have them all up before the survey goes out in a week or so. Also a lot of great reading as well as stretch rewards, plus everyone who backs this gets the new Diving novel Thieves as well. So make sure you don’t miss it. This turned out really well…
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Best Workshop Deal Ever….
In the Return of Boss Kickstarter Campaign… Kris’s wonderful Diving Universe novels and novellas and short stories are all in the subcategory of Science Fiction called Space Opera. So back when Kris finished the new Boss novel and we were talking about what cool things we could do for the campaign for writers, we came up with the idea of teaching a special three-week workshop called How to Write Space Opera. It will only be offered through this special Kickstarter campaign and now only for two more days. Ends Thursday Evening! But since the Diving Books are space opera and learning how to write great space opera is a tough…
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The Return of Boss Kickstarter…
Is Down to Counting Hours… As I write this, 65 hours left. Only that much time left to sign up for the new special workshop, or get the two new Diving novels early. Or a bunch of other great stuff. We have made it through five stretch goals, which means there are some great extra books and for writers three Pop-Ups that everyone will get automatically. And there is still time to hit that last stretch goal and add in even more. So help us pass the word. Or if you haven’t looked at it yet, click over to The Return of Boss Kickstarter campaign and look at all the…
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What Is The Point?
My Blog Tonight… No Point… I was going to write a blog tonight about something beginning writers do that I got three different notes about just in the last two days. One from a new professional writer who knows better, one from a full professional sending me a link that was funny, another was from a beginner asking me what I actually thought and how to do it. The subject: Tracking Rejection Times. So what do I actually think about doing that? I think it is just about the stupidest thing a writer can do. And then it dawned on me (while I was writing back to one of the…
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Just Hit 5th Stretch Goal!!!
How Cool Is That? I am, of course, talking about the Return of Boss Kickstarter campaign that is going on now. And we have a nifty sixth stretch goal and a seventh waiting in the wings. So I figured that with 5 days left (ends Thursday evening), and since we still have another stretch goal we are aiming for, I should detail out what every backer at the $5 level and above gets at this point in time. To start off, anyone, backer or not, can follow the link in the campaign story and get a free electronic copy of the novella “Diving into the Wreck.” That is the award-winning…
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September Workshops Are Up
They Start Very Early This September… On the 1st and 2nd. So they are now all available, including the new workshop COVERS 101. And yes, lifetime subscribers, September Covers 101 is in your subscription and you can take it the first time through or wait until later in the fall or winter. Your choice. (Boy, lifetime workshop subscriptions are an amazing deal.) Here are the workshops in September. Notice Kickstarter Basics Workshop is going to run every other month, so its next time up is in October. I will have the October workshops live in the next day or so as well. Getting ahead and caught up at the same…