Rosepoint Publishing

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”

The 4th Annual Phoenix Festival of the Arts-Coming in December

The Margaret T. Hance Park in Phoenix, Arizona, is home of the fourth annual Phoenix Festival of the Arts on December 11 – 13, 2015. Jointly sponsored in part by APS and Lou & Evelyn Grub, the arts festival hosts a weekend-long event showcasing arts, entertainment, exciting food trucks, and over 125 vendor booths! And, of course, there will be a beer and wine garden.

I love craft fairs, art festivals, or book signings, either private or with a group.

Phoenix Festival of the Arts

Presented by the Phoenix Center for the Arts, the event is free.

This park, dedicated in 1992 and named for Phoenix’s first female mayor, covers over 32 acres. It is actually situated over a freeway tunnel and is part of a major cultural center that includes a Japanese Friendship Garden and Irish Cultural Center.

The Phoenix Publishing and Book Promotion group now consisting of over 582 members will have two booths strategically planned for two hour intervals in each of the three days. I will be posting the times for my participation at a later date.

The dynamic organizer, Laura Orsini, has a full spectrum of marketing and promotion planned from banners with author’s book covers to MeetUp T’s.

I’m especially excited over the postcard that Laura is planning and having printed that will include a QR Code linking the participating authors to their websites, books, social media addresses, and 10 pages of content.

The Meetup typically meets twice a month that may include seminar type meetings with handouts or guest speakers. The wide range of topics cover everything from creative writing, publishing, self-publishing, eBooks, marketing, and social media. Within the social media spectrum are discussions covering “Life Beyond Facebook,” and other related sites.

Additionally, there is also an informal Meetup to match names to faces, network, and exchange tips. Laura has set up a group blog to keep us actively writing to which we contribute once a month (and we’ve volunteered to do so–mine is the 12th of the month). We’ve recently completed a grueling 35 day Author Blog Challenge!

This Meetup has met my expectations of finding help in the marketing of the books published for my grandfather–my responsibility even if they had been traditionally published–and I’m really looking forward to the Phoenix Festival of the Arts!

Resource Box

A Great Source of Writing Prompts

Writer’s Block—ugly words–but something that happens to most who would be authors. So it is that I am always looking for “prompts,” those lovely little ideas that would prompt an article, story, or more. It was when I downloaded “The Authors Publish Compendium of Writing Prompts“ by Emily Harstone that I finally thought I’d found Nirvana.

This was a free for the download fount of prompts and is divided into a number of different categories:

Quick, simple prompts
Classic prompts
For novelists
For poets
For creative non-fiction writers
Focused on craft
For groups

Rose Point Publishing

The first group includes ideas such as first sentence, last sentence and a 10 word short story.

The prompts are laid out in a clear, easy format, describing the location, character(s), and possible action scenarios. For instance, the prompt for “Castaway” (classic prompts #2 above) sets a main character on a small island with only three items. How the character ended up there is part of your own idea as well as whether the focus will be escape or survival. Continue reading “A Great Source of Writing Prompts”