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Another Quick Trip…
Headed for Vegas With My Computers… Where I will stay for a longer time this trip before having to head back to the coast in July to do a final clean-out of the big house. Right now I am sitting, after a long day of getting ready and packing and then driving, in a casino hotel in eastern Oregon. Going to play another practice poker tournament tomorrow evening here before moving on toward Las Vegas and home. I have gone through the first seven videos in the poker master class I am taking to refresh myself. Fun to have my focus there for a few short hours again. Learning, even…
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A Picture of Me Typing
On My Little iPad… Since my office in the condo in Las Vegas is not set up yet, I was sitting at the table in our condo dining room working on something when Kris got this picture as I was paying no attention. Since today I spent all day shuttling cars around here on the Oregon Coast (returning rental car, having our Cadillac tuned up), and in meetings at WMG and stores and cleaning up stuff, I figured I would just do something easy here tonight. So here comes the picture. You can see the mountains to the west of Vegas through the shades. And I had a fun dinner…
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A Fun Series
Ghost of a Chance Series… I am just finishing up a book called The Deep Sunset: A Ghost of a Chance Novel. The original titles on these things and complete lack of branding made these almost impossible to sell. So I renamed all the books and Allyson did a nifty series branding on these, sort of a take-off on the new Poker Boy covers, but not really. I will go back at some point and redo the covers on Smith’s Monthly with these novels in them. I love this new branding and it really gave me a boost to finish the novel I’ve been puttering along on and tonight I…
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A FUN CHRISTMAS PRESENT
A GUEST ESSAY…SOME FUN FOR EVERYONE… Those of you following this blog know I never do anything with guests and don’t ask me to because I will always say no. Always. But in this case, I read Judge Bubba’s most recent Christmastime Essay/Letter and got such a kick out of it, as I have with all his letters, that I asked Judge Bubba if I could do this and he graciously said, “Sure, why not?” Some background. When I am in Boise visiting friends, I tend to hang around with lawyers and judges. I am not sure why they let me tag along at times. I only have three years…
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Cat Picture That Has Nothing to Do With Anything
Two of our three cats sitting in windows enjoying the fresh coastal air. Galley is the old orange guy, Sir Duke is the new kitten. This is for you, Kris. (grin)
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Full Year of Smith’s Monthly
I thought this looked kind of cool. Who knew I could actually get all of the first year out and on time? (#12 shipping later this month.) And I’m still going strong. Fun! It’s in grayscale because it’s an ad in Smith’s Monthly interior.
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The New World of Publishing: Having Fun… Again
(Note: I wrote this in July 2013 and am posting it here again up front (without a word changed) because, to be honest, I’m getting a lot of certain types of questions from writers. This works as an answer to those questions. So here it is again. You might want to read it again, even if you remember it from July.) Having Fun Yeah, I know. A weird topic for a blog: Having Fun. Over the last week or so I had the fantastic pleasure of being in a large room for a week with thirty-five very-well-published professional writers, all excited about writing and publishing and having fun. That’s right. In…
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Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing: #9… Writing is Hard
Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Publishing will be out later this winter with an introduction. And then it will be followed by a book called Killing the Top Ten Sacred Cows of Indie Publishing. But first I wanted to put each myth or “Sacred Cow” up here again as I promised. The Myth: “To be Good, Writing Must Be Hard.” —- This myth comes in many forms and has many faces, but let me put it as plainly as I can to start. Myth: To be Good, Fiction Writing Must Be Hard. (And it can’t be fun.) Total hogwash, of course, yet it is stunning how many new…
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Ghost Novel: The Day After
I just finished close to a 70,000 words on a novel I was hired to do by a New York publisher. Did it in ten days here and blogged about my days and how I did the words. The editor on the book reported that it arrived just fine. I can give ZERO hints about the content of the book, so please don’t ask. I only talked about the writing process and my day around the writing process. Someone local came up to me today and congratulated me on finishing the book and I said, “Congratulations on going to work today.” I do not think the person understood. (grin) Thanks…
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Ghost Novel: Day 7
As I said in every post so far, I’m going to have one post per day here for the “ghost” novel writing process that I was hired by a New York publisher to do. I am now aiming for 9 to 10 days to finish this novel. I can give ZERO hints about the content of the book, so please don’t ask. I am only talking about the writing process and my day around the writing process. I will add to this post at different times during the day right up until I head to bed so you can follow the process. At the end of each post I will…