Rosepoint Publishing

Do You Need Inspiration to Write?

I’m very proud of my fellow Idaho Author Community member, G. S. Wright, for continuing to doggedly get those words out there. He has an unparalleled drive I’ve not seen in many other authors in that he is keeping, and posting, his total daily words. No, Garth is not writing a book (he’s writing several). Garth has a number of projects going, including series installments and short stories.

I admire his dedication and keen ability to keep all his plots separate in his head. It must be a youth thing, as I feel accomplished getting out one blog post a week. Back during the Blog Challenge, I took on writing a blog a day for five weeks. Thank heaven for the writing prompts, as I am slow to initiate when forced to originate. For me, writing comes so much easier and more natural when inspired. skyline

My inspirations often hit when walking the dog and I walk her several times a day. Impossible to stop and make notes, I begin dictating thoughts on my handy-dandy cell phone which is also keeping track of my steps, miles, and route.

Last week during a visit with my hikin’-lovin’ cousin came a crash course in writing prompts, inspirations, and blog post ideas. Lost! Difficult to dictate when hiking with someone and gasping for breath. Fortunately, the hiking trails themselves were inspirational and apparently something this area (Phoenix) excels in providing. Who would have given serious thought to a desert, which may exceed 120^o in the summer, would discover the winter-long pastime of hiking? Continue reading “Do You Need Inspiration to Write?”

Do You Buy A Book From The Cover? Covers Get You Noticed (or not)

Perhaps you buy a book based on the cover–I bought this one because I loved the cover. It is compelling, isn’t it? You HAVE to look at it. Is it the face, the expression, or just because it’s a cow? There is something in those whimsical eyes that makes you want to see/read more. And that’s what I’m talking about!

That old sage “don’t judge a book by its cover,” has a multitude of meanings–generally considered that we shouldn’t let first appearances seal our judgment. That’s true! But I see the cover before even reading the title–don’t you? According to Nick Thacker of The Book Designer, you do as well!

Covers Get You Noticed!

How heavily does a book cover get you noticed (or ignored)? There is a reason so many experts in the business point to obtaining a professional to design your cover–it leads to attention and credibility.

The First Impression

The cover represents that instant first impression–critical to maintaining interest. It creates a visual impression regarding your writing. Does it exhibit quality? Millions are spent on packaging. How is your packaging? Does it project the feeling that you didn’t care or just wanted to finish the book and get it published?

Covers Promote the Genre

The best covers communicate the genre of the book before the title does. The cover of the book above spoke volumes and I knew what it would be about before I read the description.

But if you think about the genre of the book you are currently reading, is the cover:

Bloody, violent, or dark? Is it a thriller, mystery, supernatural, vampire?
Muted tones of blue or pink with two people embracing–romance?
Ultra-future depictions of buildings, vehicles–sci-fi, fantasy?
An authority figure standing next to a desk pointing at you–non-fiction?

Many publishing houses are dusting off the old favorites now with expired copyrights and designing new eye-pleasing covers. Penguin Classics is having a great time with their successful reprints of the Jane Austen classics. The venerable Barnes & Noble began more than 20 years ago with its “Collectibles Editions.” Fresh New Cover! Show me the money!

I enjoyed the blog written by Liz Stinson years ago regarding the book whose cover judges you before you can open it. The subject of book covers, however, is one I’ve scrutinized before on this forum. I decided to use my grandfather’s own paintings for several of the covers for the manuscripts written and painted a century ago.

Incidentally, how did you perceive the book I introduced above? Did you correctly guess that this is a folksy, down home bit of western Americana? The book examines three generations of a family living in a gritty, small town in rural eastern Oregon. Ox (Gramps) has increasing age-related health problems as he is met by his son with the startling discovery of a skull on their five-generation ranch property that quickly has his son Jiggs questioning all he’d believed about their family origins. Jiggs’ son, Nap, is caught between the two and is too young to have sufficient experience in dealing with family issues he isn’t privy to. Jiggs, however, is determined to discover to whom the skull belongs.

While my grandfather wasn’t a professional book cover artist, it somehow seemed appropriate to use those little pasteboard paintings as they were originally intended. To quote another of those famous old sayings, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”

Become a Flatbed Driver in 6 Weeks!

You’ll remember that last week I alluded to my DH (dear hubby in RV vernacular) making the decision he’d need a job to pay off the debt incurred with trying to avoid abandoning the little box on wheels we’d tried driving east. We got as far as Indiana where he alternately wrenched on both the MoHo and the little Chevy Tracker (better known as “the Toad“, also in RV vernacular).

My intrepid hubby looked at a number of possibilities, including being the local Wally World greeter, but during the winter in Snow Bird paradise (Yuma, AZ), there is little hope of that going very far. In exasperation one day, he announced to me that he’d decided the local truck driving school looked like a dandy place to begin a new career. In a panic, I reminded him he had entered his 7th decade, we had no money for school, and I couldn’t imagine him becoming an OTR (“over the road“ in trucking vernacular) truck driver at this stage of our lives. While some schools boast a three-week course, many extend from a month to six weeks. Uh oh.

There is a serious shortage of truck drivers leading to increasing demand that will soon top 111,000 drivers. They offer financial assistance for schooling and the course is GI Bill approved. There are three kinds of schools:

Private schools (may or may not include placement)
Company paid CDL training
Public institutions–vocational, technical, etc.

Continue reading “Become a Flatbed Driver in 6 Weeks!”

Women Write More Blog Posts

In a report released by Nielsen in April 2012, the gender gap widens significantly when it comes to social media presence; specifically hosting and posting blogs.

The findings didn’t just indicate a specific difference in the propensity of women to blog, but in active social media presence in general, engaging in Facebook (no big surprise there) as well as Twitter. The subject has been the object of argument since blogs began. And as one blogger queried, “…the blogosphere covers more than just technology, does it have a gender?” Should we really assume men write tech, women write about social issues? (Or, are women writing the majority of blog posts–technological or not?) Perhaps it is time for a little poll of our own:

I loved the blog posted by Elizabeth on Goodreads in November of 2014 looking at whether or not men read men and women read women. Okay, okay, okay! But the argument is still: who is writing most blogs–today?

Women write to connect,

Men write to research, sell, and compete

You can read those same thoughts on website after website, all showing beautiful graphics proving their points. Another blog posted January 2015 by Iris on BrandWatch also breaks it down to age and income. (Neil Patel posted the same stats and graphics in October 2014.)

It’s difficult to find a recent definitive answer. Perhaps you’d assume the stats haven’t changed that much. I’ll be adding additional polls from time to time and glean some up-to-date stats to post here later in the year. Hopefully, you’ve voted on the first! ©2015 Virginia Williams

What is Nano-Punk?

In my day, a looong time ago, things were so simple: Radios with general audience series that didn’t have to be rated, black and white round-screened TV’s with programs also unrated, and books in genres you could understand just by the name (most likewise unrated). There was no nano–anything: nano-punk, nano-technology, or cyber-punk.

It was a book series I recently completed that got me started exploring “Nanopunk,” a sub-genre of science fiction. The “Futurescape” novels written by Dean C. Moore in Terraforming Earth-Phase 1-“The Plagues Era” and Phase 2-“Humanoids in Sealed Habitats” are extremely eye-opening.

Divided into two classes, fiction and non-fiction, the genres back then were easy to discern. Fiction separated into simple headings: genres

Drama
Comedy
Crime/Detective
Fairy Tale
Fantasy
Historical
Horror
Mystery
Romance
Science Fiction
Suspense/Thriller
Western

Continue reading “What is Nano-Punk?”

Do You Know Your Amazon’s Bestsellers Rank?

Do You Know Your Amazon’s Bestsellers Rank?

Or how you got there? What kind of algorithm are they using? AND, do you think your Sales Rank is achieved through reviews?

The good news: It’s not.

The bad news: It’s not.

If you’ve self-published and are beating your head against the wall trying to market and promote your book by badgering friends and relatives to post a review, you can relax.

According to Rob Nightingale in his April 2014 article, “8 Things Most People Don’t Know About Amazon’s Bestsellers Rank (Sales Rank),” Amazon won’t specifically state how the Bestsellers Rank is calculated.

amazon-rank — Rank Your Products on Amazon.

So What Is The Amazon Bestsellers Rank?

Continue reading “Do You Know Your Amazon’s Bestsellers Rank?”

Do You Know Your “Readability Stats?”

If you know your Flesch Reading Ease scores–bravo!! The concept of a readability test is new to me. Whether you had formal training and are familiar with the application or stumbled upon it yourself, the option of Flesch Readability is hidden within Word 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013, and apparently the new version of Word 2016.

Very simply, the test rates text on a 100-point scale. This is important because the higher the score, the easier it is to understand the document. For blog purposes, my objective is between 60 and 70. There are two readability Flesch tests:

Flesch Reading Ease
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level

If you are familiar with the application, can you guess where this article scores?*

Continue reading “Do You Know Your “Readability Stats?””

The Golden Persuader – By Michael Reisig

Michael Reisig, no newcomer to combining whimsical sci-fi with past-faced dramatic action-adventure, has done it again in his new release, “The Golden Persuader.” In his words, it is the story of “modern cowboys, American Indians, big city hoodlums, and some seriously illegal aliens.”

golden-persuader

Dax Dryder was trailering his horse to Abilene with his massive German Shepherd/wolf mix, Smoke, when rain, the dark of night, and his exhaustion forced him to take a break. That night would change his life forever.

Dax and his sister had been raised by wealthy parents. Being groomed to take over his father’s political life, he seriously questioned that role and took the opportunity of his father’s fall from grace to go his own way. It was shortly thereafter both parents were killed in a private plane crash under mysterious circumstances and it sealed the dissolution of what was left of his family’s estate.

What he witnessed before daybreak in the little hollow on that moonless night, however, left him shaken, feeling lucky to be alive, and headed in another direction.

Continue reading “The Golden Persuader – By Michael Reisig”