WordPlay

Every time I start first draft on a hefty project, my brain sprints for the gate.  There begins a long process of negotiation: the muse vs. real life.

Really, the brain wants nothing to do with it.  “Noooo,” it whines.  “Why can’t I have it aaaalll?”

Because it apparently just doesn’t work that way.

So after a certain amount of struggle, the muse will give a little ground–just enough to keep certain critical real life activity from imploding–and Real Life will give a little ground.  Or maybe a lot of ground.  Eventually, a lopsided balance of sorts will be struck.

But on this first day?  The brain is not interested in coming out to write a blog.  On this particular first day, the brain is a lot more interested in a proper opening for the story so many readers requested–Ruger’s story in my Nocturne Sentinel series.  The classic background character who sparkled on screen and demanded some time of his own, that’s Ruger.

Not that I’m complaining.  Neither is my muse.  My brain, as usual, is still trying to find the balance.

(Someone tell me I’m not the only one.)

Meanwhile, I think “A Bitch in Time “is still lingering as a freebie–that’s still a gone-any-minute thing–and Wolverine’s Daughter is on a 30% sale at ARe  until the 27th.  They’re both clickable from my Backlist eBooks page.  Happy reading!

Going naked in public.  That’s kind of what it’s like, when you’re a writer.

It’s definitely what it’s like during the days a new piece is released.

I mean, there’s all that, “Will they like my work?  Will they see in it what I see in it?  Will they walk away happy?  Or will they give me one star at Amazon because of something Amazon does?”

Not for the faint of heart.

Later, the muse might not feel quite so vulnerable (or, more likely, she’ll find something else to feel vulnerable about).  After all, this piece isn’t about ME.  It’s about finding ways to explore an idea while conveying it, and it’s about entertaining.  For me, in the end, it’s about providing for others what means so much to me when I read a book/story that carries me away.

So after a while, the muse will find the presence of mind to breath again.  But now?  Now she’s holding her breath.  Pretty hard, actually.  Because now it’s still the first days, and it’s new and scary and hopeful all in one.

I hope you like it.

Touched by Fire
$2.49
An Original Release; Novella

Leyana is a creature of beauty…a creature of fire. She looks like an angel, but she’s driven by a geas–one acquired on the night she died. She spends her evenings exacting revenge on those men who would try to harm what she’s become. Only a man of strong heart can survive her allure–while at the same time reaching her deeply enough to free her from the geas. Paul Campbell might be that man…or he might lose himself to her altogether.

Yes!  It’s FREE THINGS!

Well, free books, anyway.

Well, free Kindle books.

It’s my strong philosophy that self-pubbing authors should support as many retail venues as possible with their business.  Sometimes, though…logistics defeat us.

So, because I wanted to offer some reading gifts this week, and because I wanted to know what I’m talking about when it comes to the KDP Select program (ie, the Kindle program that requires exclusive distribution), I put three of my pieces into the program for the minimum time frame, 90 days.

Honestly, I’m not impressed.  I don’t think it’s worth the cost, by any means–both the obvious lost sales at other venues, and the potential costs of this program in the big marketplace picture.  But in the meantime, here we are–three free pieces of fiction!

EMERGING LEGACY (short story prequel to WOLVERINE’S DAUGHTER) is available through the rest of today.

MAKING THE RULES  (the orphaned Bombshell action-romance), is available through Thursday.

FOUNTANE OF(short SF story in the Frederic Brown tradition) is available today through Friday.

And for those of you who don’t have a Kindle…well, I understand completely.  I have a Nook (her name is Nookita) myself!  Let’s say…I am not unaware.  And there are some Nook books in my Backlist eBooks sale. 

As a consolation prize…

Suddenly, a Beagle!  It’s Dart Beagle, on the last corner to the glove as he certifies for the TD test!!

Yep, it’s that time again.  Who isn’t having a sale?  Who doesn’t want you to buy, buy, buy?

Well, count me in.

This is the time of year when all the hungry e-reading devices need to be fed.  New devices, gifted devices, well-loved devices in the hands of holiday-frazzled readers who just need a moment to get away from it all.  Naturally, we’ve got a sale coming up at Backlist eBooks: a slew of $.99 Try Me titles, easy to find and with all the buy links for various formats right there.

SEE HOW EASY:

December 23rd through January 8 > Backlist eBooks > Favorite author or genre > $.99 will be right there in the title!

And while you’re waiting for the day after tomorrow, here’s what happens when Tieg the Officially Adorable Dachshund heard Connery’s Monday video with his Sounds of Woe: A Rush to the Rescue!

Do you suppose he ever found Connery lurking behind that laptop?

Late last week I “picked up” a new ebook from a small press.  I read only a short way into it and realized it didn’t meet my standards for craft, storytelling, or character presentation.  Bummer.

So I “picked up” another ebook, this one a sample.  Not from a small press, but the prose was dull and the bones of the plot showed through.  Still, there was something about the concept that caught my interest, so I told Nookita to check it out at the store.  Oh, wow, really?  Almost ten dollars for this ebook?

Yeahhhhhh…. 

No.

There’s a reason some of my ebooks are priced at 99c–it’s a Try Me strategy.  The first book mentioned above was  a Try Me priced book, and I was okay with taking that chance even when it didn’t pan out.

There’s a reason the rest of my works are priced reasonably--and why we have that philosophy over at Backlist eBooks, too.  Mine are 99c for the stories, $1.49 for the novella, and $3.99 for the full-priced books–because I think ebooks should cost a reasonable amount.  That second book’s price isn’t one I’ll pay for my favorite authors, never mind a casual read.

So after an evening like I had last week, what’s a reader to do?

Go back to Little Women, that’s what.  Luxuriate in the tried-and-true, and retreat, for the moment, from the combat shopping experience ebooks sometimes offer.   Besides, I first read this book so very long ago (as in, when I could still count my age on both hands), so I don’t remember the details.  And Jo is up to something–!

I’ll poke my head out again bye-and-bye.  Read any good, reasonably priced ebooks lately?

So many things!  All happening!

There’s the barking dog thing.  Jury’s still out–after three days of blessed silence last week, Thursday and Friday were nonstop barking.  Non.  Freaking.  Stop.  Barking.

Another neighbor thought she had an opportunity to touch base with Barking Dog Neighbor over the weekend.  I need to catch up with her so I have the scoop before I clip request #2 to the gate.

There’s the paddock footing thing–we have a line on some more shreddings, of much better quality than before.  Delivery imminent, we hope!

There’s the ConneryBeagle thing.  We’re still trying to find a balance of his meds and still trying to find ways to support him through this.  He’s looking a little stronger, if not quite himself.  Still, that’s GOOD–and the only reason I can measure it that closely is because of the agility, and my pretty highly honed awareness of how he runs when he’s feeling strong.  He’s pretty cheerful, and that’s great–and he certainly still thinks his agility and his tracking are great fun.

In fact–moving onto the next thing–he had a chance to do both this weekend.  He and Dart headed to a local UKI trial, our first real experience with this new venue.  The courses were European in style, and lots of fun, and the venue was small and friendly.  We ran our first Speedstakes courses, and our very first snooker.  Whee!

Dart grabbed a couple of Qs–and somehow kept enough brains to mainly stay inside the rings.  ConneryBeagle would have Q’d in all his runs had he not slipped in the thick, long and really wet grass to take down a bar.  So, yeah–fun!

Where, you ask, did the tracking come in?  Out in the trial’s huge off-leash play area, the grass and clover were equally thick and deep, and a friend’s small dog lost a couple of favorite toys in it–toys the combined efforts of the rest of us couldn’t find.  So Connery put on his tracking harness, played a few article indication games with the dog’s remaining toys, and made the conceptual leap to my request to search out additional toys.

Which he found.

SO PROUD!!

Oh, there’s the book thing: as of today, the second draft pass is done for Tiger Bound, the next Nocturne Sentinel.  There are a few more details to polish up, and then off it goes to my editor!

And then, finally, there’s the backlist ebook thing.  I’m having such fun with the covers, I’m still poking away at them in the midst of everything.  So without further ado, here’s Feef’s House!

$.99
First Released: 2003, DAW anthology Space, Inc.
Backlist eBooks Store: All Formats

Feef is a smelly, insecure little creature who calls the Toklaat Space Station home. Shadia is a tough, independent itinerant worker who calls no place home—until the day Feef needs help…and offers her something priceless in return.

“Durgin has a remarkable gift for inventing unusual characters doing incredible things.”
–Kliatt

[included in The Heart of Dog anthology]

Ready for some Wednesday Goodies?

Here’s a goodie to start with…for those of you who read Monday’s Barking Dog Blog (which was written late Sunday)…Monday was the first real test of the Barking Dog Response…that is, would Neighbor listen to the request in the note I wrote?

Monday, I am pleased to say, was quiet.

Tuesday, I am pleased to say, it rained most of the day–so basically, who knows if it would have been quiet or not.  But the rain was a major boon (and it came without the massive hailstorm that ripped apart this area last year at just this time), so either way…definite Goody.

Why, I might even risk riding Duncan on our north flat today!  (But, hmm…I think I’ll have earplugs, just in case.)

Otherwise, on the Goody front?  I got another short story out in the backlist offerings!

$.99
First Published: 2004, DAW: ReVisions
BACKLIST EBOOKS: ALL FORMATS

In Neil’s world, there are miniature seeing-eye horses, service pigs, stock-guarding llamas, and bred-up Siamese guard cats—because in Neil’s world, dogs were never domesticated, and never will be. But it seems no one’s asked the dogs what they think…

Originally published in the DAW anthology, ReVisions—an anthology of alternate history stories that consider what would have happened if scientific and technological breakthroughs–and challenges–occurred long before they did in real history.

[included in THE HEART OF DOG]

Definite GoodieFest day.  Got any to share?

A year ago–which is approximately 3.72 centuries in digital revolution time–I was just putting up the first of my backlist.

I’d meant to have them all up by now, but that was before I expanded my own personal revolution into the Backlist eBooks project with partner Pat Ryan, and that’s required a massive amount of time, so…I’m about halfway through my various backlist books/stories.

When I started with the backlist, my focus was on creating a cover “look.”  You know…glance at the cover and instantly recognize it as mine.  I had a strategy and everything!

Well…the learning curve, it be steep.  It wasn’t too long before I realized my strategy was too restrictive, and shed it for new ideas.  Now my new covers have a new approach, and most of my old covers have been replaced–some by the aforementioned Pat Ryan (she of many talents), and some by my own self.  The change hasn’t propagated through all of the retail venues, but this is their doing, not mine.  *annoyed sniff*

When I put Fountane Of up for sale, I didn’t actually put it up for sale–I gave it away as a teaser, and didn’t worry too much about the cover.  Well, that all evolved, too, and currently Fountane Of is 99c like the rest of my short stories.  And LO.  It finally became time for a new cover, and that’s what fun I had this past weekend, in between the plumbing excitement moments.

Fountane Of

(That link?  It’s a peek at the new Backlist eBooks web site, and what all the book pages will look like when we’re done!  At the moment, we’re only just getting started)

I’m thinking Touched by Magic is the next project–I’m about halfway through it, and skipped over to get the non-series books done first.  Well, after I turn in the next Sentinels book, put the polishing touches on the new Nose for Trouble edition, launch the September Nocturne Demon Blade Bite, and get the Nocturne Sentinels Bite through production…

*runs away*

It may have come to your attention (somehow, though certainly I never talk about it ahem) that I’m working on a project called Backlist eBooks with my partner-in-crime, Patricia Ryan.  You know, that big collection of well-published authors and their self-published versions of their backlist books?

Our plan all along has been to launch a rather stupendous web site from which readers have details on each book, easy purchase options, and super-easy window shopping.  We had something very specific in mind, chose our designer…got on the schedule.

The schedule, as it turns out, involved a significant wait.  So we’ve filled that time by gathering authors, setting up an interim site and a FaceBook page, pulling together sales events, and creating a solid little community behind the scenes.  We even applied for a trademark (just call us Backlist eBooks(TM)).  We’ve learned a lot in the past almost-year, and we’re all raring and ready for what we call the new uber-site.

*does the little dance of glee because…*

The first draft of the site is on the test server! 

I’ve spent the last couple of days learning it inside out, discussing with Pat the things we’d like to refine and making sure we’ve anticipated the best possible interface for both our authors and their readers–as well as making sure we’ve got a good plan for making it all work.  We’ll get the site finalized as soon as we can, and then our authors will commence to add their books and it will be so COOL WE CAN HARDLY STAND IT!

But it sure is hard to get any work done with all this dancing going on…

Yup, it’s the last week of the sale.  So it’s one more chance to click through to the comments, where some of the members of Backlist eBooks have provided links to their sale books.  Because, yeah…the sale is over in five…four…three…
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(here’s the original post!)

Oh, it’s true.  I get a little incoherent about this sort of thing. Just too enthusiastic (and sadly lacking dignity).

Well, Smashwords is having its big summer sale, and so many of us in Backlist eBooks are participating…we loves us a sale, and Smashwords makes it so easy.  How can we not?  From 25% to 100% off (with some books sitting at 99c), a site-wide promotion.  Everyone wins!

Of course, we also want to make it easy for readers, and getting the word out on the short available notice is a trickier thing.  So here we are!  My sale books (and links) are listed in this post; in the comments, you’ll find a collection of Backlist eBooks authors with their own linked titles and genres.  Go ye hence and feed that Kindle/Nook/Sony/e-reading device of choice!

My Smashwords Author Page
Books on Sale:
The Heart of Dog (dog stories, specfic)
Seer’s Blood (fantasy)
A Feral Darkness (fantasy)
Making the Rules (Action-Romance)
Hidden Steel/Making the Rules boxed set (Action-Romance)
Hidden Steel (free!) (Action-Romance)
And one free story for treasure hunters…