tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17344041805674242952024-03-19T04:20:46.751-07:00Author Donya LynneAuthor of the award-winning All the King's Men Series and sensual romance that haunts your emotions. Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.comBlogger188125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-12829074607234543642015-02-26T04:47:00.002-08:002015-02-26T05:05:13.064-08:00Fifty Shades Haters, Please Be Nice<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKhJORVHV9Sfvv33brFShCyzRQFwkceOCmTcifikxhEmTw0WSzz9c7GXWDTO6kSoip5WJQFR4c6f_Y2g6yDphhxG4e2S6jYn3WSxF9BEOa6i0kecRwBAw6vHvL7HOs7-3SWBFtnlWHVag/s1600/collection-fiftyshades-gallery_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKhJORVHV9Sfvv33brFShCyzRQFwkceOCmTcifikxhEmTw0WSzz9c7GXWDTO6kSoip5WJQFR4c6f_Y2g6yDphhxG4e2S6jYn3WSxF9BEOa6i0kecRwBAw6vHvL7HOs7-3SWBFtnlWHVag/s1600/collection-fiftyshades-gallery_0.jpg" height="180" width="320" /></a></div>
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So...you're not a fan of Fifty Shades of Grey. That's cool. I get it. In a way, I'm right there with you. Here's the thing, though. If you don't like Fifty, you don't need to be rude about it.<br />
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I rarely post about Fifty Shades of Grey. I wasn't a ginormous fan of the books. I didn't hate them, but I didn't love them, either. If I had been the developmental editor on these books, I would have pointed out:<br />
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<ul>
<li>The characters don't show enough growth.</li>
<li>There is simply too much sex for sex's sake. Let's cut some of it out so the story shines.</li>
<li>The BDSM lifestyle is severely misrepresented. Let's do a bit more research.</li>
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However, I'm not a developmental editor. I'm an author. One who imagines one day achieving the kind of success E.L. James found with Fifty Shades. As such, I respect and appreciate what she's done. The books <i>are</i> entertaining. They aren't the worst I've ever read. There's a good story in there. What's more, she opened readers' eyes to a whole new realm of fictional possibilities and ideas. She let writers know that writing about taboo subjects wasn't so taboo, after all. She opened doors, struck chords, and gave the publishing industry a serious kick in the pants. One that was much-needed.<br />
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It is my duty as a responsible, open-minded author to examine what she's accomplished and learn from it, whether I liked the books or not. This is my profession, and to turn up my nose at another author's success smacks of jealousy and high-handedness. It reeks of publishing piety.<br />
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Here are a few facts:<br />
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<li>Not everyone is going to like every book I write, but that doesn't mean my books won't be loved by <i>others</i>.</li>
<li>I'm not going to like every book I read, but that doesn't mean <i>no one</i> will like them.</li>
<li>While some people love Fifty, others don't. And that's okay. That's the nature of the business. I don't have to like Fifty Shades for it to succeed.<i> You</i> don't have to like Fifty Shades for it to succeed. It HAS succeeded. Now the question is why?</li>
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I have my theories about why Fifty has been such a huge success, and I give major props to James for finding new ways to obtain publishing stardom in a world previously dominated by the Big Five. Well played, James. Well played indeed.<br />
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My point is that while I may not be a huge fan of the books, that doesn't mean I don't appreciate and respect her accomplishments, or that I have no interest in seeing the movies, or that I'm not a fan of E.L. James. She's a superstar. Bow down and pay fealty. The chick has big woman balls and did her thing. You go, girl!<br />
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Now, let's get back to those folks who aren't fans of the books, the movie, or anything associated in any way with Fifty Shades and would rather barf gravel than hear one more thing about Fifty.<br />
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As I stated earlier, I rarely post about Fifty Shades. However, when I<i> have</i> posted, I've noticed something disturbing that has rubbed me the wrong way. On every post I've made about Fifty, someone (or more than one someones) inevitably posts a disparaging comment. A comment that makes it clear that this person is one of those folks who is totally over Fifty and has come to hate the color grey in all its shades.<br />
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Well, I'm over the Patriots winning so many Super Bowls, but that doesn't mean they're going to stop winning, no matter how much I bitch about it. And while I may post on my own Facebook wall about my disgruntlement, or share my feelings on another person's post who feels the way I do, I don't jump on a Patriots fan's post and proselytize the merits of playing with properly inflated balls. That would be counterproductive and achieve nothing but pissing someone off and causing a big ol' fight. When I see a Patriot's fan posting and rubbing yet another Super Bowl win in the faces of opposing football teams' fans, I simply keep on scrolling, grumbling to myself about those "damn Patriots." <i>Grrr.</i><br />
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My point is, I do not disrespect another person's post by posting disparaging comments on it.<br />
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With that said, I'm extremely tolerant. Almost to a fault. I usually let something go on for a long time before I stand up and say, "Okay, enough's enough." Well, I'm there.<br />
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Some of the comments that have been made on my Fifty posts have come off a bit like personal insults directed at me. Whether that was intended or not makes no difference. That was the perception. As if because I simply posted about Fifty, regardless of what I said, meant I was somehow a lower form of life in this person's eyes.<br />
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Sharing one's personal preference is one thing, but doing so on another person's post, where she's sharing <i>her</i> personal preference, and in a way that can be perceived as personally insulting to her, does not create warm and fuzzy feelings. It's rude and, more importantly, unnecessary, plain and simple. And it causes hurt feelings.<br />
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Yes, I've seen the posts made by those who are sick and tired and beyond ready for the Fifty Shades train to pull out of the station and follow the railroad tracks off the edge of a very flat Earth (or, if you're an Asgardian, off the jagged edge of the shattered rainbow bridge). Do I stop and point out to those people that they're missing the point? That they should consider the importance of Fifty to the publishing industry? That E.L. James, like Madonna, has done something monumental regardless of what the dissenting masses think of her? No. I keep on scrolling. Why? Because everyone is entitled to their opinion and their personal preferences, just as I'm entitled to mine.<br />
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So, next time I post about Fifty, if you don't like him, please just keep on scrolling rather than drop a disparaging comment on me. I promise, Fifty's fifteen minutes of fame will one day be over. And I have a right to be excited about seeing the movies without someone trying to diminish my excitement with less-than-nice comments.<br />
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Be kind to one another. Share smiles instead of frowns.<br />
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Until next time, peace out.<br />
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-DDonya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-33070435194269582762015-02-14T05:04:00.000-08:002015-02-14T05:04:34.457-08:00It's Good to be Different In a Sea of Fifty Shades ImitatorsWhen I was growing up, Sundays meant listening to Casey Kasem's American Top 40. My dad was a music lover, and we had two reel-to-reel players and an entire shelving unit of stereo equipment and music. Neil Diamond, fifties rock, and Top 40 pop were staples in my house, and the radio was always on.<br />
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To my young ears, music was supposed to have lyrics. Songs that had no lyrics were somehow inferior to songs that did.</div>
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And then Chariots of Fire came along in 1981.</div>
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The main title for Chariots of Fire steadily climbed the U.S. music charts until it finally reached #1. It went on to hit the top 10 in five other countries' music charts, and the top 40 in two others. Why? The title song of Chariots of Fire was different. It appealed to people on a different level. We'd never heard music like this before. Electronic? Synthesizers? New age? Wow! What is this cool stuff?</div>
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Looking back over time, a lot of "different" people and things found success. The Beatles. Elvis. They were "different." Even Peyton Manning revolutionized the way professional football teams played the game with his no huddle offense. Before he came along, no one had ever "no huddled" except in a two-minute drill. Peyton used the two-minute offense in the first drive of a game. Caught other teams completely off guard. If only the defense had been better at that time, the Colts might have won quite a few Super Bowls in those early Manning-era years. At any rate, the point is, things are new and different find more success than those things that aren't.</div>
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In literature, different works just as well. E.L. James proved that with Fifty Shades of Grey. J.K. Rowling did it with Harry Potter.</div>
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But have you noticed that when someone different comes along and revolutionizes behavior, ideologies, music, sports, etc., a whole train of followers jumps on board and imitates the differentiator? For example, Vangelis's electronic sound paved the way for a flood of other musicians who also played electronic music, finally culminating in today's wildly popular Electronic Dance Music (EDM). The Beatles took rock 'n roll to a completely new place. Next thing we knew, tons of bands were playing rock like the Beatles. Those other bands even started growing their hair the same way. Everyone wanted a Beatles haircut.</div>
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And as for Peyton Manning? Well, offenses throughout the NFL started using no huddle offenses to capitalize on the success he had shown them was possible.</div>
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Which brings us back to Fifty Shades of Grey. When that book came out, authors everywhere rushed to put out their own version of Fifty to ride the success James created. I even found one book where the author admitted that she wrote it because she wanted to ride the successful coattails of Fifty Shades. And, no, that book was nowhere near as good as Fifty. In fact, it was obvious the author was uncomfortable writing sex scenes and erotic content. With that said, a handful of copycats did find moderate success as readers clamored for more books like Fifty Shades. But those who followed have not (and will not) come close to reaching the same level of success as E.L. James. Why? Because she was the originator of this trend. The originator of a trend will always find greater success than those who follow. Still, even a fraction of that success is appealing. I get that.</div>
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However, now, with the first Fifty Shades movie newly released, the Fifty Train is just about played out. The movie will revive the books temporarily, but as the movies continue being made, the popularity will gradually dwindle until the meteoric rise to popularity fizzles into a spark, and then into obscurity, where, one day, those who have experienced the phenomenon firsthand will look back and say, "I was there when..."<br />
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The truth is, readers have grown weary of billionaire heroes and "innocent" heroines, as well as BDSM. They're starting to itch for something new. A few informal reader polls have indicated as much, and all you have to do is search the internet to find more readers saying, "Please, stop with the BDSM!" <a href="http://www.heroesandheartbreakers.com/blogs/2012/11/untie-me-already-over-bdsm" target="_blank">Here's a blog post titled Untie Me Already!: Over BDSM from Heroes and Heartbreakers</a>, if you're interested in reading what someone else has to say on the subject.<br />
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Remember how popular Twilight was a few years ago? Now, sparkling vampires have become a punchline. Fifty's fifteen minutes of fame has about run its course, and readers are starting to look for the next big thing. When will Ana's Inner Goddess or bottom-lip biting become a punchline? Or has it already? It's inevitable. It will happen. That's simply the reality, not a criticism.</div>
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I'm not dogging Twilight or Fifty. I LOVED the Twilight books, as well as the movies, and I'm as psyched about the Fifty Shades of Grey movie as just about everyone else. My point is that every trend has a beginning and an end, and a lot of times, the end is marked with people making fun of the trend. Bell-bottom jeans? Yeah, they were once cool. In the 70s. But in the 80s and 90s, you were an uncool has-been if you wore them, and people let you know it. And speaking of the 80s, which was my era, big hair was all the rage. Now, it's a punchline, just like sparkling vampires and inner goddesses. Check out the bite-size Twix commercial if you don't believe me. </div>
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So, what will the next book trend be? Because it's coming, whether you're ready for it or not. Maybe a better question is, are you still following the Fifty trend, or are you moving on to something else? Because those who are moving on—those who are striving to be different—are the ones positioning themselves to be the next trendsetter.</div>
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Many will follow, but only a handful will lead. </div>
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Be a leader. Be different.</div>
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You might just find yourself writing the next blockbuster if you do.</div>
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Happy Writing</div>
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-D</div>
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-13831603502531075252015-02-12T05:10:00.002-08:002015-02-12T05:10:24.101-08:00Errors - Whose Responsibility Are They?An interesting question regarding how to judge a book when it's full of errors was posed this morning on an author board I'm a member of. You see, many members of this group, including me, are judges in a huge annual writing contest, and one of the things we're up against is who should take the blame for typos, spelling errors, and punctuation errors. Should we dock the author and reduce the score, or do we look the other way under the premise that it's the editor's fault, not the author's?<div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN5AiAYFXToZoM7UfFM7yNI-QKFdOMXO6gSlEhn8QEdzCi2LgJzmaFK3c9oU4bHjeNQcDqYBvLxQa_YqfLfQ09yV223LtDLMPSbKIXs4T8vK0UnsB4g9sJyO0TumLW_LuBmqzpFhcc5r4/s1600/Punctuation-makes-a-difference-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN5AiAYFXToZoM7UfFM7yNI-QKFdOMXO6gSlEhn8QEdzCi2LgJzmaFK3c9oU4bHjeNQcDqYBvLxQa_YqfLfQ09yV223LtDLMPSbKIXs4T8vK0UnsB4g9sJyO0TumLW_LuBmqzpFhcc5r4/s1600/Punctuation-makes-a-difference-2.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I bet U Turn is getting tired of hearing "no."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<h2>
To Dock Or Not To Dock?</h2>
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To answer this question, I think we need to look at the types of errors being made, as well as the volume.</div>
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First of all, we all make errors. I've never read a book that didn't have at least one error in it. Most have several. But as long as there aren't too many mistakes, and the reading experience isn't severely impacted, it's easy to look the other way.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSEdNAZf1nhlSFB_UcCYD-E0-yd-WcD2v4ojSMtVE-rt9GTAkI0qm7SDiHx0s26yeTqs2idGW-rf0rXhnBRacOQYl74R6fUAqdiYgtXRtvEfyWAiHxtPUmUuLRFQ0VxR9WWM0DGT6Vh5g/s1600/ar131063566578795.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSEdNAZf1nhlSFB_UcCYD-E0-yd-WcD2v4ojSMtVE-rt9GTAkI0qm7SDiHx0s26yeTqs2idGW-rf0rXhnBRacOQYl74R6fUAqdiYgtXRtvEfyWAiHxtPUmUuLRFQ0VxR9WWM0DGT6Vh5g/s1600/ar131063566578795.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Is this message only for the guardians of parents? And what are "ate's?" And time's what? This poster is a hot mess.</td></tr>
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Where we run into a problem is when there are errors on every page. And not just errors, but glaring errors. Errors that make your skin crawl because they're so absurd that even a bad editor should have caught them. Errors that muddle the message and confuse the reader as to what is actually being said.</div>
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Yeah, those errors need to be docked. There's no excuse for them, and they've impeded the reading experience so severely, you have no choice but to deduct points. </div>
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Additionally, I recently read a book that contained a ton of errors, but what was weird about them was that the author made those errors half the time, but wrote them correctly the other half. For example, she punctuated dialog tags correctly with the comma half the time. The other half she punctuated the dialog tag incorrectly with a period. Maybe an example would help:</div>
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Correct: "I want to go home," she said.</div>
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Incorrect: "I want to go home." she said.</div>
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She did this throughout the entire book. And she made this same kind of half-right-half-wrong error with other punctuation, spelling, etc. I was like, "She knows how to write it correctly, so why is she writing it incorrectly half the time?"</div>
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I had to dock points for that.</div>
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<h2>
Who Do Errors Reflect On?</h2>
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Let's look at a few examples:</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1knTcY6GHlsnfErZTrcPJAqrIeQ5WdjGU5hcEBu7sH9TvdwOjtKZ0wVRWc1dh8FsPc0NT6OfPhHjRKU6-LgomtVH78mEw-TouDQaNtwGBVracT2ejA6xXDI3mHLEkpBm_awbrg_hTWQ4/s1600/12345.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1knTcY6GHlsnfErZTrcPJAqrIeQ5WdjGU5hcEBu7sH9TvdwOjtKZ0wVRWc1dh8FsPc0NT6OfPhHjRKU6-LgomtVH78mEw-TouDQaNtwGBVracT2ejA6xXDI3mHLEkpBm_awbrg_hTWQ4/s1600/12345.PNG" height="145" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"We are committed to 'excellense'"? Apparently, you're not.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii881BFFbZVYHeUqcy7KN3zf4aoqcNN9ko4KpMNPlMzp13hMTvtLYfHLiEpoI3Bmqr6iV7sQil1q7Qka-IrnYc54CDJzyQ53qxlz21Cvt-WYq20Nj9uPRlhjhegU5uHfkgMwdm5ilcPa4/s1600/error-252x300.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii881BFFbZVYHeUqcy7KN3zf4aoqcNN9ko4KpMNPlMzp13hMTvtLYfHLiEpoI3Bmqr6iV7sQil1q7Qka-IrnYc54CDJzyQ53qxlz21Cvt-WYq20Nj9uPRlhjhegU5uHfkgMwdm5ilcPa4/s1600/error-252x300.png" height="200" width="168" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Were" opening...? I guess you're not now, huh?</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI15n04mMlpjoZGtcKsVDDC4ZgO5ldsn0Lhg5qnq0uIw49paR2wM2DjXPslNWsBBer3r87nuPPvyhebSb9Zx95Z7LJ7Jg2Thho_EbfCzyG89lj6FRAYqeP7t8VG5QqyThoEn3_uOp0VLs/s1600/only-lanoguage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI15n04mMlpjoZGtcKsVDDC4ZgO5ldsn0Lhg5qnq0uIw49paR2wM2DjXPslNWsBBer3r87nuPPvyhebSb9Zx95Z7LJ7Jg2Thho_EbfCzyG89lj6FRAYqeP7t8VG5QqyThoEn3_uOp0VLs/s1600/only-lanoguage.jpg" height="162" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you're going to preach about our "lanaguage" to those who don't speak it, maybe you should learn it first. </td></tr>
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Like it or not, errors reflect on the person or business who made them public. The business who is committed to "excellense" just showed they're not that excellent. Dunkin Donuts' sign reflects on the business, not the person who printed the sign. And, yeah, the patriot in the minivan just shot him- or herself in the foot. </div>
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In other words, in each of the above cases, not only was the message diminished by the errors, but they reflected on the person or public entity who represents them.</div>
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In the book world, that person is the author.</div>
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Who is Responsible for the Errors?</h2>
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Like it or not, when it comes to errors in books, the author is ultimately held responsible. Not the editor, not the publisher, not the proofreader. The AUTHOR.</div>
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Think about it. When you're reading a book that's full of typos, do you say, "Ugh! That editor needs to learn how to edit," or "Ugh! This author needs to learn how to write."?</div>
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Maybe you're the one in a hundred that honestly blames the editor, but I've seen enough readers complain to know that 99% of the time, the author is blamed for typos, punctuation errors, misspelled words, and even bad formatting (which is WAY outside most authors' realm of responsibility, by the way). These readers aren't blaming the editor or proofreader. They're blaming the AUTHOR.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYgMaEb_HFsAO9kvpNZJet8wqge4GRD_ZPl8MUoFpivujzt6SRFQoLgc9FzBASTkZg5JzcSq2THpgnK4C__Go31uZKGN6iQ9FtTyOSvDBSSHrCtr7WzyurMILptle5-21MQaWB-oO1Em4/s1600/download.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYgMaEb_HFsAO9kvpNZJet8wqge4GRD_ZPl8MUoFpivujzt6SRFQoLgc9FzBASTkZg5JzcSq2THpgnK4C__Go31uZKGN6iQ9FtTyOSvDBSSHrCtr7WzyurMILptle5-21MQaWB-oO1Em4/s1600/download.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Don't dig your own grave with bad editing.</td></tr>
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I once published a story with a small press. The publisher edited it in-house, but they never ran their edits by me for approval. When the story was published, I found that they had completely changed entire sentences, punctuation, and even the spelling of certain words, and in doing so, they created a lot of errors in my manuscript. Also, the book was for an American audience, but they formatted to British standards (colour instead of color, flavour instead of flavor, etc.). If you're writing for an American audience, you need to edit by American standards.</div>
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At any rate, I was furious. Luckily for me, I am extremely well-versed on punctuation and spelling. I edit as well as I write (with one exception: compound words. They are my nemesis). So, when I send my manuscripts to my editor now, it's really more about getting a second set of eyes on my story, so she can find the mistakes my author's eyes glossed over. And she's awesome sauce with compound words, so whew! Thank goodness for that. But my point is, I know an error when I see one.</div>
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So, back to this inept editor who marked up my manuscript with errors. Her mistakes reflected on ME. My name was on the book, not hers. As such, I was the one who stood to lose readers, not her. Because let's face it, there are a lot of savvy, educated readers out there who will ditch an author for a lot of things, including typos. That is the reality, like it or not. You can bitch and scream and try to "educate" those readers about whose fault those mistakes are, but it won't work. Those readers will still blame the author. It's a fact of publishing life we authors have to accept and strive to minimize in any way possible.</div>
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For me, the way I minimized the problem was by never publishing with that publisher again. If this was the care they were going to give me, then thanks but no thanks. My reputation as an author is too important to me to let them foul it all up. And if they were going to be the cause of me losing readers, they needed to be cut loose. Ba-bye! I need a team around me that understands that this is MY work, MY reputation, and MY livelihood they're influencing. Those who take care of me, I will take care of in return. Those who don't...I wish you well, but see ya.</div>
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And therein lies the crux of this post. Authors need to take greater responsibility for their work, as well as greater control of the editing process, even when they're with a publisher. After all, it's the author's name on the book cover. As such, it's the author who has the most to lose from bad editing. Take the time to read those edits and not just trust that they're right. And if your publisher publishes your work without getting your approval on edits, it's time to find a new publisher.</div>
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Going back to the initial question then, how do you judge books with errors? My thoughts are, if a book is full of errors, no matter whose fault they are, judges should judge accordingly and deduct points if those errors are prolific and negatively impact the story and/or reading experience. Because, like I said, ultimately it's the author who's responsible for their own work.</div>
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Agree? Disagree? Feel free to weigh in in the comments.</div>
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Happy Writing!</div>
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-D </div>
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-8264750264125451922014-12-29T07:30:00.000-08:002014-12-29T07:30:00.730-08:00What Readers Want—And Don't WantTwo days ago, I came across a post on Facebook by author <a href="https://www.facebook.com/laceymweatherford?fref=ts" target="_blank">Lacey Weatherford</a>, where she had polled her readers for what types of books and story lines they're tired of seeing. I thought the post was interesting, so <a href="https://www.facebook.com/AuthorDonyaLynne/posts/572648426169940?comment_id=573053686129414&notif_t=like" target="_blank">I decided to poll my readers</a>, as well. Between these two posts, there were many similarities about what readers are tired of reading. Some of the responses might surprise you:<br />
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<ol><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSSa9-o1OJB9oxJXUMtAR2WEQGFzcYe64sC64d1snVQ6ihk87sQZSmmnXXhrvqrCDre6ctRrX-argtGy0hZadMNoXpp_tY6ZTxEpatfbVq8HaH9ynv6J848uKMzfsh51L9_Xy21G1VTlQ/s1600/ball+gag.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSSa9-o1OJB9oxJXUMtAR2WEQGFzcYe64sC64d1snVQ6ihk87sQZSmmnXXhrvqrCDre6ctRrX-argtGy0hZadMNoXpp_tY6ZTxEpatfbVq8HaH9ynv6J848uKMzfsh51L9_Xy21G1VTlQ/s1600/ball+gag.gif" height="200" width="153" /></a>
<li>BDSM topped the list. A lot of readers are apparently totally over D/s. As in, it's been beaten to death with the flogger of overindulgence and whipped beyond novelty, to the point that readers are gagging on their ball gags.</li>
<li>Fifty Shades knock-offs were second on the list. If you count responses of "billionaires who hook up with a recent college grad/innocent young woman/etc." or any such derivative thereof as Fifty knock-offs, this was easily the number one answer. But since Fifty Shades was what made BDSM so popular, how about we just lump these first two responses in one gigantic category called "Readers Would Like To See This Die A Fast Death."</li>
<li>Weak Female protagonists ranked high, as well. We're lumping comments such as "wishy-washy," "stupid girl who falls for the bad guy," and "weak females who let their men walk all over them" in this category. In other words, readers want a strong, smart heroine who doesn't do stupid things or let her jealous friends persuade her to do something idiotic to risk her relationship. Thank God for Samantha, Gina, and Cordray of my AKM Series. Strong girls ROCK!</li>
<li>Unfaithful hero/man-slut. I was shocked to see so many responses for this, because it's common knowledge that in a romance, you don't want a hero who's sleeping with every girl in town. There are exceptions to this, but they have to be pretty compelling exceptions with realistic, believable reasons for the man-slutting.</li>
<li>Virgins (male or female), especially the female virgin with the man-slut. Snooze-yawn. This was why I made sure Karma wasn't a virgin in my Strong Karma novels. Even I thought that wasn't realistic.</li>
<li>Motorcycle club books, aka Sons of Anarchy.</li>
<li>Insta-love. This one received a lot of hate, as well.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPLCBUTm-BeU0sX0UGkqbP9nrxYO7L0eynsVRp8P6W2z6qQ7y_DuywrVAiSMLnVdizYBTUODbv862m_wE7AecQe4J-M9sfGh5KZZkQv-mI3_JM2OvNiFaspuHlyjzaJz4cafkZcv0nLOI/s1600/tumblr_mgzmmoXuqc1ribi8mo1_r1_1280.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPLCBUTm-BeU0sX0UGkqbP9nrxYO7L0eynsVRp8P6W2z6qQ7y_DuywrVAiSMLnVdizYBTUODbv862m_wE7AecQe4J-M9sfGh5KZZkQv-mI3_JM2OvNiFaspuHlyjzaJz4cafkZcv0nLOI/s1600/tumblr_mgzmmoXuqc1ribi8mo1_r1_1280.jpg" height="150" width="200" /></a></div>
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<li>Erotica (surprise!) One reader commented that this was the first year she didn't have any romance on her Christmas wish list. The sex has become overwhelming. A lot of readers would like to see more tension, plot, and story over sex. Thank goodness my contemporary books are taking a turn this direction.</li>
<li>Vampires. One reader said she's tired of vampires being seen as the good guys. This one makes me sad, as I love my AKM vampires. However, readers have said my vampire stories are so unique and fresh that they make an exception to read them. So, yay! Here's to being unique and fresh! But I will say that I've been playing with the idea of a novel where the vampire is the bad guy and follows a more traditional, "Dracula" approach. So, even I would like to see vampires represented as the bloodthirsty, evil beasts they've been portrayed as in the past.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<li>Repetition, repetition, repetition. Readers are tired of seeing an author play out the same story line over and over with different characters. One gal even said she is sick of repetitious sex, where the same language is used in every sex scene.</li>
<li>Speaking of sex: Readers got a good laugh regarding overly creative descriptions of sex and body parts, such as "his love wand invaded her slick love cave," or "his engorged muscle slammed through her cervix." Ouch! Um, that's not even remotely sexy. Does the author know how painful that would be? This is the hazard of trying too hard to use words other than dick and pussy/vagina. As Stephen King says, keep it simple. If a character has to take a shit, say he has to take a shit, not that he has to perform an act of excrement removal. In other words, he drove his cock into her vagina. Nuff said?</li>
<li>Rape disguised as romance was another item readers don't like, but it opened an interesting conversation about how rape should be presented in novels, and that it can be used as an excellent device to show a character's strength and ability to overcome adversity.</li>
<li>Cliffhangers. Nothing new here. This continues to be something readers generally don't like. The warning to authors is, "Hang readers off a cliff at the risk they'll grab you and take you down with them." </li>
<li>Serials (but I think that's because the readers who said they didn't like serials read serials written by authors who don't truly understand what a serial is, based on the reasons given for not liking them.).</li>
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So, do you agree? Disagree? Is there anything missing? Add your two cents in the comments. What do you want to see more/less of in future romance books?</div>
<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-35959589419374097462014-12-28T06:54:00.002-08:002014-12-28T06:54:43.158-08:00The Quest for 1,000,000 Words - Crushed It! Now what?Last week, I hit the goal I set out for myself in January: to hit 1,000,000 words written. Now I'm looking toward the next year. Without goals, how do you measure success? How do you know what to shoot for?<br />
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Sometimes to look forward, you have to look back. To make goals for next year, you need to look at your accomplishments for this year so you can build on them.<br />
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For me, this year has been a blend of frustration and achievement. Frustrating because I'd put myself way behind in 2013 by running a lot of promotion and one huge blog tour. This killed my writing production, which carried over into the first half of this year. What I learned from that is to do a much better job planning and organizing promotion, and to ensure I always put writing first. After all, I'm a writer. I should be writing at least as much as I'm promoting. </div>
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<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Year In Review</b></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU_cpx_mQNW2jM2S1N5xr5YwIxy82EnZVWDSjGJhnSdEOuowte8I4nmVoCfTncmRIdCjUliXzWfaEWejERaIOnyhCWuOgqfbXcRC-QPHU0tSBu77WPct-byYciwFRKUeHL9srhh4_nLWo/s1600/Finding_Lacey_Moon_ebooksm%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU_cpx_mQNW2jM2S1N5xr5YwIxy82EnZVWDSjGJhnSdEOuowte8I4nmVoCfTncmRIdCjUliXzWfaEWejERaIOnyhCWuOgqfbXcRC-QPHU0tSBu77WPct-byYciwFRKUeHL9srhh4_nLWo/s1600/Finding_Lacey_Moon_ebooksm%5B1%5D.jpg" height="200" width="132" /></a>Once I recovered from my promotional misstep and the ensuing stress it caused, I got back on track. I spent a lot of time completely shut off from social media. In February, inspired by the Olympics, I plunked out a 60,000-word novel called Finding Lacey Moon in two weeks. That novel is now in the hands of my editor and slated for a February 9, 2015, release. Finding Lacey Moon is a winter story, so it made sense to hold it through the summer. I'm glad I did. During editing, I rewrote half the book, and my toughest beta reader, who was lukewarm with the first version, said that she absolutely adored the new version. This was the first time she didn't have any feedback to improve the story, so I guess it's good.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitmWsJ2k1PnlaAv9kD4dc0BtxnalnmHIPFmYtCiJ7yIROjqmqgqduUsrgk6eSBFPmexOKJRzEqLYyadKDqRH5eTeZHbexeWVGYOmIhDK_jeBLEm270uaYMkEcbnDuJSU-rVrYkjztqSb4/s1600/All+the+King's%2BMen600x900.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitmWsJ2k1PnlaAv9kD4dc0BtxnalnmHIPFmYtCiJ7yIROjqmqgqduUsrgk6eSBFPmexOKJRzEqLYyadKDqRH5eTeZHbexeWVGYOmIhDK_jeBLEm270uaYMkEcbnDuJSU-rVrYkjztqSb4/s1600/All+the+King's%2BMen600x900.jpg" height="200" width="133" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKAzjBlud9KfFsTppFxu6cNnJOfGZddb0Ntw8c9pseBmrPQf5krplFu88C3BcEF5cqneatAPcj7sK98SXKZIidj_ilGp7o5aI6BOfepVKDyxLesPVdv5NzqG1G5d1ZQh3ITY3BTvUTPKk/s1600/Good+Karma600x900.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKAzjBlud9KfFsTppFxu6cNnJOfGZddb0Ntw8c9pseBmrPQf5krplFu88C3BcEF5cqneatAPcj7sK98SXKZIidj_ilGp7o5aI6BOfepVKDyxLesPVdv5NzqG1G5d1ZQh3ITY3BTvUTPKk/s1600/Good+Karma600x900.jpg" height="200" width="133" /></a>After writing Finding Lacey Moon, I finished my AKM prequel, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/All-Kings-Men-The-Beginning-ebook/dp/B00JTJ63S6/ref=pd_sim_kstore_5?ie=UTF8&refRID=0790VGBHBXVZC22KBVPM" target="_blank">All the King's Men</a>, which I published in April. Then I hunkered down on book one of the Strong Karma Trilogy, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Good-Karma-Strong-Book-ebook/dp/B00M57CLIK/ref=pd_sim_kstore_5?ie=UTF8&refRID=13278YMK0BYBARWHW1F5" target="_blank">Good Karma</a>. This 150,000-word novel had haunted me for two years and during two-and-a-half full rewrites, I think I wrote more than 600,000 words to get Good Karma to its final version.<br />
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The other challenge preventing me from finishing GK was that I kept putting it off so I could work on my All the King's Men Series. Good Karma finally forced me to shut down everything else so I could focus only on it. I hated stopping work on Bound Guardian Angel, which is the next AKM novel, but with the Strong Karma Trilogy taking up every single brain cell, nothing else could get through. My choice was to finish Good Karma, along with all the other Strong Karma books, or stop writing completely.</div>
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In August, Good Karma came out. Book two of the trilogy flew out of me at that point, and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Coming-Back-Strong-Karma-Book-ebook/dp/B00OFBC7M4/ref=pd_sim_kstore_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=13RCMG83S2WGDZHE3XWE" target="_blank">Coming Back To You</a> was published in November. Both book have received rave reviews, for which I'm so grateful.<br />
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Then I took time out to rework an old novella called The Arms of Winter I got the rights back to. I added 40,000 words to the novella, turning it into a novel, and completely reworked the plot and the ending. This was the story as I'd always envisioned it, and I republished it under the new name <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Winters-Fire-Donya-Lynne-ebook/dp/B00QCNPO46/ref=pd_sim_kstore_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=10FT2BFVGP68NB381300" target="_blank">Winter's Fire</a> this month. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7wnqKJm-gYIJOA2oJBV7JKXDAe8ABY3iVl2R_aMoDBJFnN6ejype4T7MVwf_zyMxyGrTA2PZurJjhp7GSH7earhXwilS5XDrZ6GTSwqxzZnGaJAkIsZ02hQPWvTtd4wXJmxhOARGcDMQ/s1600/ComingBackToYou-600x900.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7wnqKJm-gYIJOA2oJBV7JKXDAe8ABY3iVl2R_aMoDBJFnN6ejype4T7MVwf_zyMxyGrTA2PZurJjhp7GSH7earhXwilS5XDrZ6GTSwqxzZnGaJAkIsZ02hQPWvTtd4wXJmxhOARGcDMQ/s1600/ComingBackToYou-600x900.jpg" height="200" width="133" /></a><br /></div>
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Now, with the end of the year less than a week away, I just finished the first draft of Full Circle, the final book of the Strong Karma Trilogy, and have begun work on Bound Guardian Angel again. </div>
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<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>The Year Ahead</b></span></div>
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Now that I know where I've been, it's time to look toward where I'm going in 2015. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTy2efO2FoNgqxKYu5eM3RV_Hoo2Ia7KL6RULt3ZFEKhXR8LoOa4RpHcH4MqyKrsZ8fLZ0DOS3jMKf4paflKdvavICcdQgEbw3jvd8QmfRXIIOsn-QhEqr0-mMUjDRHYZgpGQILyjXTBw/s1600/Winter's%2BFire-600x900.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTy2efO2FoNgqxKYu5eM3RV_Hoo2Ia7KL6RULt3ZFEKhXR8LoOa4RpHcH4MqyKrsZ8fLZ0DOS3jMKf4paflKdvavICcdQgEbw3jvd8QmfRXIIOsn-QhEqr0-mMUjDRHYZgpGQILyjXTBw/s1600/Winter's%2BFire-600x900.jpg" height="200" width="133" /></a>I didn't spend a lot of energy and effort on promotion in 2014, because I needed to get back on track with my writing. This year, with the release of the much-anticipated Bound Guardian Angel, I am planning another massive blog tour. But instead of trying to coordinate it myself, I'm hiring three blog tour coordinators and will let them handle ninety percent of the coordination. This way I will still be able to hit my writing goals instead of focusing four months of energy on the tour.</div>
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With that said, I'm planning a new release every other month in 2015. Finding Lacey Moon comes out in February. Full Circle is projected for April. An All the King's Men omnibus is planned for release in June, and Bound Guardian Angel is currently slated for August, although I have vowed not to rush that book. If by some chance it's not ready, I won't release it. Trace's book is too important. Right now, I don't see any reason why it won't be ready, but I've recently been diagnosed with a tumor on my pituitary gland. I don't think the current treatment plan will negatively affect me too much, but if the treatment changes, my productivity could change, as well. We'll have to see. In October, I want to release the Strong Karma Series Companion, which will include some deleted scenes, and perhaps a novella and a handful of short stories. Lastly, I'm shooting for Severin's Muse to come out in December. </div>
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Each of the projects scheduled for 2015 is already started, thanks to a very productive 2014, so hopefully that will bode well for each of them releasing on time. But now I need to get back to splitting my time with promoting my books. Thanks to a solid plan, I think I'll be able to make it work without losing my mind.</div>
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<b><span style="background-color: white; color: #4c1130; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And Beyond</span></b></div>
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I've already started scheduling for 2016-2018, because in this business, you need to plan in advance to meet readers' and publishers' expectations. </div>
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So, are you ready for a new year? Have you taken stock and looked ahead? If not, what are you waiting for? Time's a wastin'.</div>
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See you next year!</div>
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What's up for the winning? Check out this list:<br />
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<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Insidious-Tales-From-Dark-Side/dp/0991401182/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028439&sr=8-8" target="_blank">Insidious</a> </b>by Aleatha Romig<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/One-Hold-Tia-Louise/dp/1494469170/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028495&sr=8-1&keywords=one+to+hold+tia+louise" target="_blank">One to Hold</a></b> by Tia Louise<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Last-Resort-Kate-Roth/dp/0991151453/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028583&sr=8-1&keywords=Last+Resort+by+Kate+Roth" target="_blank">Last Resort</a></b> by Kate Roth<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Falcon-Tia-Catalina/dp/0990663817/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028613&sr=8-3" target="_blank">Blue Falcon</a></b> by Tia Catalina<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Heartless-Chasing-Hearts-Vanessa-Marie/dp/1497478154/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028663&sr=8-1&keywords=heartless+by+vanessa+marie" target="_blank">Heartless</a></b> by Vanessa Marie<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Soundless-Silence-Sherlock-Holmes-Novel/dp/0990991504/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028711&sr=8-1" target="_blank">Soundless Silence</a></b> by M. Katherine Clark<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Good-Karma-Strong-Volume/dp/1938991052/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028742&sr=8-2" target="_blank">Good Karma</a></b> by Donya Lynne<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Waking-Beast-Awakening-Pride-1/dp/1607358220/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028876&sr=8-2&keywords=Waking+the+Beast+by+Lacey+Thorn" target="_blank">Waking the Beast </a></b>by Lacey Thorn<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Revealed-Britni-Hill/dp/0692287973/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028918&sr=8-1" target="_blank">Revealed</a></b> by Britni Hill<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Embracing-Destiny-Suzanne-Purewal/dp/0982904800/ref=sr_1_2_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419028955&sr=8-2&keywords=Embracing+Destiny" target="_blank">Embracing Destiny</a></b> by Suzanne Purewal<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/No-Stranger-Anya-Breton/dp/1503327868/ref=sr_1_2_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419126407&sr=8-2&keywords=Anya+Breton" target="_blank">No Stranger</a></b> by Anya Breton<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nicky-D-Ellis/dp/1497493625/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419029298&sr=8-1&keywords=for+nicky+by+a.d.+ellis" target="_blank">For Nicky</a> </b>by A.D. Ellis<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cheyenne-Bride-J-Devine/dp/161935280X/ref=sr_1_1_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419029333&sr=8-1&keywords=The+Cheyenne+Bride" target="_blank">The Cheyenne Bride</a></b> by J.J. Devine<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Intoxicated-Felony-Romance-Jeana-Mann/dp/0989771415/ref=sr_1_2_twi_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1419029364&sr=8-2&keywords=Intoxicated" target="_blank">Intoxicated</a> </b>by Jeana E. Mann<br />
<b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Embers-Center-O-Line-Book-1-ebook/dp/B00QUAB5QW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1419029406&sr=8-1&keywords=Ember%27s+Center" target="_blank">Ember's Center</a></b> by Jillian Jacobs<br />
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-46775055043560651062014-12-13T13:33:00.002-08:002014-12-13T13:33:54.563-08:00Write More in Less TimeI think that at one time or another, every author has wondered how they could write more in less time. Is it possible? If so, what's the secret?<br />
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The answer is so simple and something you've heard so many times. You're going to say, "Really? Is it really that easy?" And my answer is, "Yes. Yes it is." Bear with me a moment.<br />
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I've been a full-time writer since May of 2013. This is my job now, and like with any business entity, I'm learning how to function as a business, right down to creating a business plan and a company structure. Of course, my structure at the moment is little ol' me, but even I need structure. And in the last few days, I've learned that structure is everything.<br />
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If you're like me, you hate maintaining a strict schedule. Keep in mind a schedule is not structure. Structure forms the walls and foundation of your time. Structure gives shape to an idea or process much the way it gives shape to a building or architectural masterpiece that would otherwise be just a heap of metal. A schedule fills the building, or structure, with desks and cubicles and people. A schedule is the technical aspect of shaping the metal into something pretty.<br />
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For me, a schedule usually means filling a room, or in this case, my mind, with unusable clutter that bogs me down. As a writer, I'm a creative entity. Schedules don't serve me. They stunt my creative flow because they make me think about what I have to do next. So, schedules and I don't mix well.<br />
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However, I learned today that structure and I get along fabulously.<br />
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Last week, I took a free course called How to Write 50 Books a Year! by sisters <a href="http://www.ellejames.com/" target="_blank">Elle James</a> and <a href="http://www.delilahdevlin.com/" target="_blank">Delilah Devlin</a>. Fifty books in a year!?!? I know, that's impossible, but that doesn't mean we can't aspire to write more than we do.<br />
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Here's what I learned from the class that helped me blow my daily writing goal out of the water this morning (more on that in a minute):<br />
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<ul>
<li>The power of goal setting is immeasurable.</li>
<li>Discipline is key.</li>
<li>My time is as important as everyone else's.</li>
<li>I needed to be brutally honest about how I was spending my time, and just as brutal about killing the time wasters that were preventing me from hitting my daily goals.</li>
<li>I needed to have a plan I could stick to.</li>
</ul>
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The first day of class, I wrote my author bio for five years from now. That was fun. Here's what I came up with:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background: white; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Donya Lynne, author of such award-winning and bestselling series as the
All the King’s Men franchise, Strong Karma, Hope Falls, and Cupid’s Playground,
spends most of her time writing and building new fictional worlds for readers
to love. In her free time, she enjoys vacationing—and writing—in relaxing
locales such as McCall, Idaho, which was the inspiration for her Hope Falls
Series, as well as on the beaches of the Carolinas and California. A New York
Times Bestseller, Donya is working on the next novel in her Progeny Series, the
much-praised dystopian spin-off from the All the King’s Men, Knights of
Justice, and Children of the Sphinx family of series.</i></span></blockquote>
Next, I wrote down what I called my shoot-for-the-moon goals for next year:<br />
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<ol>
<li>Write 3 novels of 60,000+ words</li>
<li>Write 3 novellas of 40,000+ words</li>
<li>Write 3 short stories</li>
<li>Send query letters to 5 agents</li>
</ol>
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What's funny is that it's only been a little over a week since I wrote those goals, but now that the class is over and I've employed structure, I think those goals are a bit puny.</div>
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The next thing I did was identify the obstacles getting in my way of writing more books. There were six things on my list, but here are the main three:</div>
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<ol>
<li>Distractions</li>
<li>Administrative and Accounting Tasks</li>
<li>Tetris Battle</li>
</ol>
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Tetris Battle? What's Tetris Battle, you ask? It's a Facebook game. An addictive Facebook game. I used to justify my Tetris escapades by saying I needed a break to let my ideas simmer. I needed a break to shut off the voices. Blah, blah, blah. Excuses. All of them excuses. I knew it then, and I know it now. I didn't need a writing break or to let my ideas simmer. I wanted to get my fix. Tetris was my nicotine, my crack, my addiction.</div>
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I calculated how much time I'd spent in Tetris Battle over the last couple of months. You see, when you log into Tetris, it starts off by telling you how many rounds you've won and how many you've lost. In the latest spinoff in Tetris Battle, I'd played over 300 rounds. Each round is two minutes long. That's 600 minutes. That's TEN HOURS!! In the original Tetris Battle, I'd played well over 2,000 games. That's over SIXTY-SEVEN HOURS! I didn't even count the other types of Tetris that I played (there's different styles and arenas to play in), and I was already up to 77 hours of time lost. Being that I can write between 800-1100 words an hour, that's 61,600-84,700 words I could have written while playing Tetris. That's a novel or a couple of novellas. </div>
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Kind of puts things in perspective, doesn't it? Any author who plays Candy Crush, Tetris, Angry Birds (do people still play Angry Birds?) or any other online game but complain they don't have enough time to write, I beg to differ.</div>
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So, two days ago, I opened up my apps and, without hesitation, removed Tetris and any other game that could lure me in. Gone. Cold Turkey! And, really, I don't even miss it. When I faced the numbers and gave myself an honest gut-check, I realized Tetris was killing my writing career. I refuse to let that happen.</div>
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Now, remember at the beginning of this post when I mentioned the simple secret to how you can write more in less time? Do you want to know the answer? Tetris is part of the answer. So is your cell phone. And your email. And Twitter. And Facebook. And your cat, your dog, your kids, your husband, the INTERNET! Distractions are the main culprit. When it's time to write, it's time to turn off, shut down, close the door, and issue a commandment you are not to be interrupted until you open the door again (unless something's burning, bleeding, or broken).</div>
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"But, but, but...those are my kids. I don't want them to think they're not important?" You're not making them think that. You're showing them that you're important, too. That your time is just as valuable and important as theirs. You're teaching them that you respect yourself as much as you respect them. If they can't give you just one tiny hour of time per day, or two hours on Saturday and Sunday, then they need to learn how, and you need to learn how to set boundaries by teaching them. This will teach your children discipline and resourcefulness. You're not asking for the moon, just a little me-time. You deserve that as much as they do. Show them that. They'll respect you more for it and grow up to be more well-adjusted in a world that doesn't always give you what you want just because you want it.</div>
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Shutting off my social media and my phone has been one of my biggest problems when it comes to writing. I feel I have to be on and catching everything all the time, or I'll fall out of touch and fans will forget about me. What that way of thinking has given me is a whole lot of stress. I became overwhelmed. I was trying to do <i>everything</i> all the time. As a result <i>nothing</i> was getting done.</div>
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Check out what I did this week to solve this problem, which also solved the problem of my other obstacle, administration and accounting:</div>
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After doing a mass cleaning of my office and tossing out anything that I hadn't touched or looked at in several months or longer, I decided when I wanted my daily writing time to be. Then I got real with myself and said, "This is your job. You need to be up by 6:00 just the way you would be if you had to drive to a day job." You have to be disciplined if this is going to work.</div>
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Then I set this structure for my day:</div>
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<b>6:00-7:00</b> Check email, yahoo groups, FB groups, etc.</div>
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<b>7:00-12:00</b> Write. Nothing but write. I'm BIC HOK (Butt in Chair, Hands on Keys)</div>
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<b>12:00-2:00</b> Lunch, shower, watch Young and the Restless (my guilty indulgence), and take out the dogs (they're up until 1:45 so they don't interrupt my writing time -- see how this goes? I'm limiting distractions.)</div>
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<b>2:00-5:00</b> Read, editing, judge contest entries, write blog posts, check email, check social media, promote, research for next book, plot development for next book, character sketches for next book, etc.</div>
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In this way, I'm not scheduled, but I'm structured. Structure gives me an orderly framework to work in without restraining me. Giving myself a few time blocks for general purposes still allows my creativity to flourish while keeping me on point.</div>
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And did you notice what I'm doing there? I'm using my writing time for my current story while I use my afternoon slot to prepare for the next story. That way, when I'm finished with one, I'm ready to jump right into the next. No wasted time between books.</div>
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Once I had my structure, I performed a lot of calculations. I won't go into all that here, but I've kept track of my daily writing for over two years. I went back through and found my daily average, which was a lot lower than I had hoped. Then I mapped out the eight books I want to write or at least draft in 2015 and included the projected word count for each. I added up the total, then divided by my average daily count. Ugh. That was depressing. The numbers showed it would take me almost a year-and-a-half to finish those eight books. Since that won't do, I performed a bunch more calculations in Excel and determined that if I wrote 2,150 words per day for only 22 days in each month, I could complete all eight books in less than a year.</div>
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BOOM! Boo-yah! Shazam!</div>
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It's not fifty books, but eight is better than four, especially when one book is projected to be about 140,000 words long, and two others are expected to be 80,000 words. Imagine the damage I could do if I were writing short stories or novellas! I could get fourteen 40,000-word novellas out of my eight novels. That's a lot of cannoli! And I'm not even Italian.</div>
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But I'm not done. Knowing what it will take to complete all those projects is not the same as actually completing them. I needed a plan and some goals.</div>
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I knew I wanted my 2015 daily average to go up. A lot! My daily average in 2013 was actually higher than in 2014 by 200 words. In 2015, I want my daily average to be knocking on the door of 3,000 words/day.</div>
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To do this, I need to be ready to start the next book as soon as I finish the one before it, hence giving myself prep time in the afternoons while I concentrate on writing in the mornings. I also need to know how many words and days each book is going to take, hence all the calculations. This will also help me figure out when a book will be ready for publication. I also need to be superbly organized, hence the reason for purging my office this week. But I also need to take regular steps toward <i>keeping</i> my office organized, as well as in handling all the administrative tasks that come up.</div>
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The "sisters," as we began to call them in our class, provided us with a Word calendar (I would link it here, but I don't want to get into any trouble by sharing the handouts outside of class. However, creating calendars in Word isn't that hard using Tables. It might take a bit of time, but it's well worth the effort. Once it's built, you just have to make a few modifications from month to month and year to year.). What's nice about this is you can easily add to it, update it, and make changes to it as necessary, which is a bit harder to do with a paper calendar without turning it into a dysfunctional mess of scribbles and scratch-outs.</div>
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On my Word calendar, I filled in two days a month as "Admin Days." Typically, the 1st and 15th were my Admin Days. These are days used for tracking income and expenses, balancing the checkbook, cleaning the office, mailing birthday cards to readers, writing blog posts, assigning ISBNs, ordering copyrights, updating my website, sending out agent queries, etc. These are days completely set aside for non-writing endeavors. I also entered my errand days on my calendar. I take one day a week to run errands so I can remain home the other six days and work. Very little writing gets done on errand days, if any at all. I also filled in any events I'll be attending next year, as well as notes on contests I'm judging and workshops I'm giving so I could plan accordingly. Lastly, I determined my the daily writing goals for the days I'm writing and filled in those numbers for January. I'll fill in the next month's numbers on one of my admin days. This way I don't get too far ahead of myself.</div>
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The calendar now hangs on my bulletin board beside my desk. As each days passes, I cross it off. I won't allow myself to cross off a day until I've met the goals for that day. I've also added a few handwritten notes at the top of each month for where my focus will be that month. For example, January's focus is on publishing Winter's Fire and finishing the draft for Full Circle while I prep to return to my draft of Bound Guardian Angel.</div>
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After days of planning, today was the first day of this new, more structure method, and it was a HUGE success! I can already tell.</div>
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My word goal was 1,860. When I sat down at 7:00 and started writing, I had no idea how I was going to hit it. I was at a place in my manuscript where I wasn't sure where to take the story and lead in to the scene I needed to write.</div>
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Ah, but the other thing I learned from "the sisters" was to turn off the internal editor during writing time and just write, no matter how awful the writing sounds. So, I did that. Within minutes, I was on a roll and wrote a powerful scene between my heroine and her father, who disapproves of her choice in men. Maybe some of what I wrote is shit, but I can edit shit. I can't edit nothing.</div>
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In less than ninety minutes, I had written 1,872 words. Goal met. In less than five hours, I'd written 4,561 words, doubling my word goal. Since September 1, I've written more than 4500 words in one day only three times. THREE. And that was when I was uber motivated, wrote "all day" (ah, but I didn't actually write all day, because I allowed myself to be distracted way too much...obviously), and the words were flowing out of my fingers on a tidal wave. And in less than five hours this morning, when I wasn't feeling the least bit inspired, I cranked out over 4500 words because I shut everything else off. And there was some good stuff there to work with when editing time comes around. Without adding the structure to my writing business this week, I wouldn't have done that.</div>
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Will maintaining this structure be easy? Not at first. It take 2-3 weeks to build a new habit. After that, it will probably feel funny if I'm not hitting 4500 words every day in my 5-hour writing slot. And this time next year, I'll have a bounty of finished stories either published or in edits, with a bunch more in the planning.</div>
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What's great is that this plan works whether you have eight hours, five hours, one hours, or thirty minutes. You just have to use it.</div>
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Here's to better—and more—writing in 2015. May you find structure and bounty in your new year, too!</div>
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-D</div>
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<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-9075670234098899212014-09-01T05:19:00.001-07:002014-09-01T05:22:13.413-07:00Blond vs. Blonde - To E or not to E?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXqkWgKSAKT5eUJP4F_adOxW5a0HN20sXUKYU_6MTn2sivMAjNsvxx5PDyiPYacq0dZsUegE5ndwPppgyKJfwiDuuPlD-Ofn8WSfOBtXtUdmAQ0-WK9RHIEXntZnDHfQH9VhqM-BZKjzM/s1600/lettre_e0008.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXqkWgKSAKT5eUJP4F_adOxW5a0HN20sXUKYU_6MTn2sivMAjNsvxx5PDyiPYacq0dZsUegE5ndwPppgyKJfwiDuuPlD-Ofn8WSfOBtXtUdmAQ0-WK9RHIEXntZnDHfQH9VhqM-BZKjzM/s1600/lettre_e0008.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
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The dilemma of blond vs. blonde - to E or not to E has been putting writers in a stymie for as long as I can remember. When I began writing, it stymied me, so I looked up the definitions of both spellings over two years ago. I had a character who was blond (or is that blonde?) and wanted to make sure I described her correctly.</div>
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The other day, I posted a writing tip on my fan page about these two seemingly similar but different words. Since I link my fan page to Twitter, I purposely kept the post short so I didn't go over the 140-character Twitter rule. Here's what I wrote:</div>
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<span data-mce-style="color: #00ff00;" style="color: lime;"><em><br /></em></span></div>
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<span data-mce-style="color: #00ff00;"><em><span style="color: #674ea7;">"Blonde" is a noun. "Blond" is an adjective. I can call a woman a blonde, but describe her hair as blond. <a class="_58cn" data-ft="{"tn":"*N","type":104}" data-mce-href="https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/writetip" data-mce-style="color: #3b5998;" href="https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/writetip"><span data-mce-style="color: #00ff00;">#writetip</span></a></span></em></span></div>
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Who would have thought such a short post—and one tiny vowel—would stir up such a bustle of activity, but I received messages and emails all day about this. My critique partner and I even got into a friendly face-to-face debate over this last night.</div>
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<br /></div>
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So I took it upon myself to do more research and found that "blond vs. blond - to E or not to E" has three schools of thought.<br />
<span style="font-size: 13.3333330154419px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 13.3333330154419px;">That's right, it seems that not even our English dictionaries can agree on blond vs. blonde. Here are the three schools of thought I turned up:</span></div>
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<span data-mce-style="color: #ffff00;"><span style="color: #990000;"><br /></span></span></h3>
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<span data-mce-style="color: #ffff00;"><span style="color: #990000;">School of thought #1</span></span></h3>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.3333330154419px; line-height: 19px;">
My Random House Dictionary defines <strong>blond</strong> as<em> "having light-colored hair and skin; light-colored; a blond person</em>.<em>"</em> It defines <strong>blonde</strong> as a <em>"blond woman or girl." </em>In other words, you would use blonde as a noun when referring to a woman but call her hair blond (adjective) when describing her hair. Also, since the dictionary specifically refers to blonde as a blond woman, one can infer from the definition for blond that a man with blond hair would be referred to as "A blond." Note that for the man there is no E. I also remember reading online two years ago (for the life of me I can no longer find the link) that a woman is referred to as blonde while a man is referred to as blond, when using the word as a noun.</div>
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Examples:</div>
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The blonde led her guests to the table.</div>
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She has such lovely, blond hair.</div>
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Jeremy was a blond who had big blue eyes.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span data-mce-style="color: #ffff00;"><span style="color: #990000;">School of thought #2</span></span></h3>
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My Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines blond and blonde as being interchangeable. The entry looks like this:</div>
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Blond or Blonde: Adj : fair in complexion: also : of a light or bleached color - blondish.</div>
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Blond or Blonde: n : a person having blond hair.</div>
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<br /></div>
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According to my Merriam-Webster Dictionary (I have the Garfield version...yes, Garfield the cat. Hey, don't judge me), there is no difference between blond or blonde when it comes to masculine and feminine or color. </div>
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You could say a woman had blond or blonde hair. You could call her a blond or a blonde. You could call a man a blond or a blonde.</div>
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<br /></div>
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This is probably the least popular school of thought.</div>
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<br /></div>
<h3 style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; line-height: 19px;">
<span data-mce-style="color: #ffff00;"><span style="color: #990000;">School of thought #3</span></span></h3>
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I did an online search last night and found the school of thought my critique partner and her editor follow. This school of thought says that when you're referring to the feminine, you use <strong>blonde </strong>as both noun and adjective. When referring to the masculine, you use <strong>blond</strong> as both noun and adjective.</div>
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Examples:</div>
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She's a blonde with blonde hair.</div>
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He's a blond with blond hair.</div>
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She has blonde highlights</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.3333330154419px; line-height: 19px;">
He wants to dye his hair blond.</div>
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She's having a blonde moment.</div>
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He can be such a blond when he asks such silly questions.</div>
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<br /></div>
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In this way, the English language follows the rule of masculine and feminine that other languages follow. For instance, in Spanish, certain words have both a masculine and a feminine spelling. In English, we don't distinguish between the two. However, in the case of blonde vs. blond, this school of thought does.</div>
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So, what does all this mean, other than you're more confused now than you were five minutes ago? What it means is that there really is no right or wrong when it comes to blond vs. blonde - to E or not to E. Well, the only wrong you could commit is if you are inconsistent in which school of thought you use. Pick one school of thought and be consistent. I tend to subscribe to #1. My critique partner uses #3. Even if you use #2, you still need to be consistent. Yes, you may be able to use the spellings interchangeably, but if you use both blond and blonde in your writing, you'll just look like you don't know what you're doing. If you're going to be a #2 school of thought person, pick one spelling and stick with that.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Now excuse me, I need to go have a blond (or would that be blonde) moment.</div>
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Happy Writing!</div>
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D</div>
Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-59664137430899258272014-06-03T08:40:00.000-07:002014-06-03T08:40:06.747-07:00Always Behave Professionally, You Never Know Who's Watching<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi16cYD94HdJjkZ29IhbPvWSytT2NTn4Q3ZuGG0bljtR8HNXaameDrN-pL7i29X3HlukgOLTGqrF8Wt7AFUbqzg7i_YTmgMoqiEhk4AjrWBst2WhYwxZVD6RRPUIvy_glxjH4Z13hfPvYo/s1600/Fear.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi16cYD94HdJjkZ29IhbPvWSytT2NTn4Q3ZuGG0bljtR8HNXaameDrN-pL7i29X3HlukgOLTGqrF8Wt7AFUbqzg7i_YTmgMoqiEhk4AjrWBst2WhYwxZVD6RRPUIvy_glxjH4Z13hfPvYo/s1600/Fear.jpg" height="170" width="320" /></a>Last night, I had what some could view as a life-changing experience. A celebrity reached out to me, and I got to talk to him on the phone. Here's how events played out:<br />
<br />
I went to the chiropractor for an adjustment. Hubby was there for his appointment, too. As I was sitting beside him, checking my email, I pulled up a message and scoffed. Hubby looked over. "Check this out," I said. It was an email allegedly from this celebrity's personal assistant, asking me to contact his manager at my earliest convenience. No reason was given, just an email and a phone number. "Do you think this is some kind of scam?" I asked hubby. "Should I reply back?" Hubby said, "Sure. Just don't click on any links." He's a computer guy, so he's pretty cautious about opening emails from unknown sources.<br />
<br />
So, I replied back with a short email that said I had been asked to contact him but wasn't sure why. Off I went about my business. I got my adjustment, grabbed a snack at home, watched my recorded The Young and the Restless, then went to meet my friend and critique partner to discuss self-publishing and my latest WIP.<br />
<br />
After returning home and eating dinner, I checked my email. There was a message from this celebrity's rep, thanking me for replying so quickly and asking me to call him on his personal mobile.<br />
<br />
I was watching MasterChef at the time. I was not calling until MasterChef was over. I was busy, you see. Uh-huh. Well, keep reading.<br />
<br />
My curiosity began to get the better of me. Maybe this was legit. Maybe this really was this celebrity's rep. So, I started doing some internet searches for his name during the commercials. Hmm. Yep, there was this guy's name, associated with the celebrity in question. And, oh look, there's the rep's email address linked to one of the celebrity's YouTube videos. Okay, this was looking more and more like the real deal.<br />
<br />
MasterChef ended, and while I was now getting excited, I forced myself to stay cool as I dialed the number. Yep, this could still be all a big fat hoax. Not likely, but my wary inner voice was hovering nearby to keep me on my toes.<br />
<br />
The rep answered, and I said, "Hi, this is Donya Lynne?" As if I didn't know who I was, right? Yes, by now I was pretty sure this was for real. "Donya Lynne! Pleasure to finally meet you!" the rep said. We proceeded to have a pleasant, upbeat conversation, and then he said, "Hey, I've got [celebrity] right here. Hold on and I'll put him on so he can talk to you." At least, I think that's what he said. I was a little flumbergasted that Mr. Celebrity was right there, and that, yes, I was about to oh-so-(not)-casually chat with him.<br />
<br />
Don't ask me what was said between me and Mr. Celebrity. I know the gist of it, but my brain was starting to misfire right about this time, so perfect recollection of what was actually said now eludes me. Mr. Celebrity was really cool, very appreciative, and said a lot of nice things. I just can't remember them. I really need to work on my memory. For real.<br />
<br />
I then hung up the phone and proceeded to laugh for about two minutes. Hubby, having heard my entire side of the conversation (and knowing I had, in fact, talked to Mr. Celebrity) calls from the next room, "Are you having a bit of a fangirl moment, honey?"<br />
<br />
Really? Do you have to ask?<br />
<br />
But, in hindsight, it wasn't so much as a fangirl moment as it was the realization that good things come to those who do good deeds and refuse to let fear hold their tongue. You see, a little over two years ago, I contacted Mr. Celebrity and asked him to appear on my book cover. "That's ballsy," you might say, but my way of thinking is "Never be afraid to ask. The worst they can say is no, and the best they can say is yes. You have everything to win and nothing to lose by simply asking." We emailed back and forth a few times but couldn't make the cover happen. I was on a shoestring budget at the time and didn't have the resources to pay for the rights to use one of his pics. But he was gracious, and so was I. Not able to make it work, I bowed out of the discussions with a sincere "thank you for at least considering" and went on my way.<br />
<br />
Afterward, I could have gotten angry. I could've become defensive and immature. I could have behaved badly and lashed out that I couldn't make this endeavor work and had been told, in essence, no. I've seen others take "no" personally and do worse for lesser reasons. In fact, I've seen some do worse for lesser reasons and being told no in the last few days.<br />
<br />
I always preach that authors need to be careful what they put on their platform, because this is their professional reputation they're building and showing the world. Don't post profanity-laden messages all over social media. Don't troll. Don't bash anyone—ANYONE—in the business. Not other authors, not publishers, not editors, not agents, not cover artists, not cover models, not potential cover models...NO ONE! Don't post controversial subject matter such as politics, religion, or your own personal opinions about touchy subjects (I learned this one the hard way and refuse to walk that path again). Don't go on and on about your health problems (the occasional post is okay, but posting about your health issues every day is a drag for your readers, and they don't want to hear it). Your author platform—<b><i>your brand</i></b>—is about you, as an author. Be social and be professional, but keep your posts relevant to your author persona, not everything else going on in the world, your life, and your head.<br />
<br />
Why?<br />
<br />
Well, because this celebrity is going through a re-branding right now, and, in my case, if I hadn't maintained my professionalism and my own brand awareness, I doubt he would have reached out to me. Furthermore, if I hadn't reached out in the first place over two years ago, he might not have reached out to me now. By sucking down my fear and "going for it," I put my name in his head, and by maintaining my professionalism, I indirectly earned the right to speak to him on the phone last night.<br />
<br />
I won't divulge the nature of our conversation, but for those who pay attention, you'll be able to figure it out over the next few months. Maybe. But even if you don't, that's not the important thing here. The lesson to learn is to be fearless and professional...and to never take "no" personally. All the rest falls into place with time.<br />
<br />
Peace out and happy writing<br />
-DDonya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-55013983364806778272014-04-26T07:02:00.000-07:002014-04-26T07:02:01.855-07:00How a Godzilla Dream Became a Romance Couple<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFMozjL_TNyzYeawNg0B4sC4KetNrOwJFd2qtTGO4XXIytSXKD9ju9mNVPbfRvf47LTYEEDwqC2zPeo5FREHYWlRxeAavh37QGkpEQlXxiKx0vWHbyR84xFG5ONUbmXhzl3-xNobbwzBA/s1600/godzilla_1984_02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFMozjL_TNyzYeawNg0B4sC4KetNrOwJFd2qtTGO4XXIytSXKD9ju9mNVPbfRvf47LTYEEDwqC2zPeo5FREHYWlRxeAavh37QGkpEQlXxiKx0vWHbyR84xFG5ONUbmXhzl3-xNobbwzBA/s1600/godzilla_1984_02.jpg" height="320" width="262" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Hey, baby, wanna make out?"</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823;">Maybe it's because I'm a huge Godzilla fan and am getting
psyched over the new Godzilla moving about to come out, but I dreamed about,
yes, Godzilla last night. And not just about Godzilla, but about being a
prisoner in a weird Chinese prison (I know Godzilla came from Tokyo, but in
dreams you've just gotta go with it). The warden was very cruel and wouldn't
let me take my cat figurines and trinkets when was released (again, you've just
gotta go with what a dream gives you). So, I'm released from prison, and all
these news reports come in about these two (not ONE, mind you) bizarre,
mutating creatures that have been sighted, growing at an accelerated rate.
There was TV footage and everything. I knew it was Godzilla and was both scared
and excited all at once. But I had to leave. So, I go in search of my
valet-parked beige Honda (uh-huh, go with it) so I can get outta Dodge before
the big bad monster destroys Beijing. Apparently, dream Godzilla lives
underground and causes intense seismic disruption, because vast land
destruction began to occur, swallowing up buildings and people and
cars...including my beige Honda. Then I woke up.</span><br />
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdheLBYFX7pKphrQGyBXSMAHS3vPF5RaEDQDf52ZdhXlOVfRdS8cPzN9fF4cGUx0MrHk5IjjwlY7xjXlTFecdBGIa73njcrTjUYupnbM8YdLwlTpvstdF3rFJizrf_WS0cs0Ep_dxNNa8/s1600/Love-Romance-Love-Romance-Couple-SO.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdheLBYFX7pKphrQGyBXSMAHS3vPF5RaEDQDf52ZdhXlOVfRdS8cPzN9fF4cGUx0MrHk5IjjwlY7xjXlTFecdBGIa73njcrTjUYupnbM8YdLwlTpvstdF3rFJizrf_WS0cs0Ep_dxNNa8/s1600/Love-Romance-Love-Romance-Couple-SO.jpg" height="320" width="248" /></a><span style="color: #141823;">What's my takeaway from this dream? That I have two story
characters, one male and one female, where the male is trying to rescue the
female from her captors and utter destruction taking place all around her, but
she is a feisty bugger and wants nothing of being the damsel in distress. As
she proclaims she doesn't need his help and darts for her own vehicle to flee,
a series of explosions wipes out her attackers...AND her vehicle. Seems the
hero got carried away with the pyrotechnics. Anyhoo, she spins on him, knowing
this was his doing. "Just great! Now how am I supposed to get out of here,
Einstein?" He grins with self-satisfaction. "Looks like you're coming
with me, after all." And so their relationship begins.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="color: #141823;">All this from a beige Honda Godzilla dream. LOL. And I
don't even own a beige Honda.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 15.455999374389648px; margin-bottom: 6px;">
</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="color: #141823;">But this just goes to show that story inspiration can
come from anywhere. You just have to open your eyes, mind, ears, and heart. Oh,
and having an emotional love affair with a movie monster doesn't hurt.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPs4ycM0uabJd-BacLe0ca3kZPgrRqZ1N3gcEBF5pBAaBuyKLFtmKcOkOcgHZD0rwN5XrxJvLCbU-Vld4FQx_Gd3lc8jcwAUiLAk3r_ri-y0w4VOaxnYD-6I3RkDOH8QhyphenhyphennrOArWTLQ3Y/s1600/bold-beige-metallic-honda-city-2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPs4ycM0uabJd-BacLe0ca3kZPgrRqZ1N3gcEBF5pBAaBuyKLFtmKcOkOcgHZD0rwN5XrxJvLCbU-Vld4FQx_Gd3lc8jcwAUiLAk3r_ri-y0w4VOaxnYD-6I3RkDOH8QhyphenhyphennrOArWTLQ3Y/s1600/bold-beige-metallic-honda-city-2011.jpg" height="158" width="200" /></a></div>
<o:p></o:p>Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-60536524119049510262014-01-13T03:37:00.000-08:002014-01-13T03:37:02.956-08:00ChangesChange is good.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
For a while now, I've been looking at redoing my blog and incorporating it into my website. Over the weekend, I did begin talking to a web developer about this reconstruct. In the next few months, I'm hoping to have a brand new website with my blog incorporated within. As soon as I have more information, I'll let you know.</div>
Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-70606235253654649072014-01-07T07:26:00.000-08:002014-01-07T09:12:41.897-08:00Authors Be Warned: Robert Quill - Con "Artist"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOlw4Lr2EONzF4I_9yPt4-mXSxhadEy9Hz8MDv1la3pofS0POsvnnJlk97ZkyFhj1rrjxswbsQ3bvWfe6IZAPUikZMpNdAzkTmSBrm16CErpOrS46xDs6YC2Qne6UNUmumFnBlVwSBaPo/s1600/RobertQuill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOlw4Lr2EONzF4I_9yPt4-mXSxhadEy9Hz8MDv1la3pofS0POsvnnJlk97ZkyFhj1rrjxswbsQ3bvWfe6IZAPUikZMpNdAzkTmSBrm16CErpOrS46xDs6YC2Qne6UNUmumFnBlVwSBaPo/s1600/RobertQuill.jpg" /></a></div>
Well, add me to the growing list of authors who have commissioned Robert Quill, paid him, and then never heard from him again.<br />
<br />
Last May, at the RT Convention in Kansas City, I commissioned Mr. Quill to create two prints for me of one of my AKM characters, Micah. He gladly charged me $400 and told me it would take about three months to create the prints. Here is what has happened since:<br />
<br />
In June, I emailed him to ask him if I paid for VIP service. I couldn't remember if I had and wanted to make sure I did. <i>No response.</i><br />
<br />
In October, which was five months after RT and two months after I should have received my artwork, I emailed Mr. Quill to inquire about the status of my order. I had given him two extra months past what he had stated for my delivery, but it was time to begin inquiring. <i>No response.</i><br />
<br />
October-December were incredibly busy months for me with a book release and a huge blog tour, so I didn't get back around to following up with Mr. Quill until last week, because, honestly, time got away from me. I could barely remember what day of the week it was and forgot my own birthday. I emailed him again January 2 to inquire about my order. <i>No response.</i><br />
<br />
I contacted the RT organizers and asked if there was anything they could do to help facilitate communication with Mr. Quill, since it was there that I met him. I also wanted to let them know what has happened so they would reconsider allowing him to have a booth at future RT conventions. They assured me that he has been banned from the convention in the future, because apparently, they have received a lot of complaints about him similar to mine. They also said one of their organizers would attempt to contact him to try and get a resolution to my situation. <i>No response from Mr. Quill.</i><br />
<br />
I emailed him again yesterday morning, stating clearly in my subject line that he needed to reply immediately to avoid legal action. <i>No response.</i><br />
<br />
However, I'm pretty sure Mr. Quill has received my messages, because in the five days since I emailed him on January 2 to today, he has shut down his website. I pulled it up last week to ensure he was still around, and it was there. This morning, I tried to pull it up, and it's gone. UPDATED TO ADD: Lo and behold, his website came up again about an hour ago, as of 1/7/14.<br />
<br />
Hmmm. Not a good sign.<br />
<br />
So, this morning, I filed a dispute with my bank for the $400. I asked them, "What if he doesn't respond to the dispute?" and was told, "He <i>has</i> to respond." I was like, "Well, he had better say yes to my dispute, because if he says no, I'm taking him to court."<br />
<br />
During my research into how to reach Robert Quill, I found that I'm not alone in my troubles. Check out these links to others who have also been unable to get a response from him. Note that Robert (and his wife) did reply on the blogs. Interesting that they can respond to public outcries against him but not to private emails.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.abigailhilton.net/abbies-blog/2011/11/3/robert-quill-deadbeat-artist.html" target="_blank">Abbielog - Deadbeat Artist</a><br />
<a href="http://www.killianmcrae.com/author-to-author-warning-avoid-artist-robert-quill/" target="_blank">Killian McRae - Author-to-Author Warning</a><br />
<br />
For those like me who are unable to receive responses from him, perhaps these links will help. I'll be saving these for my own files in case I have to sue him to get my money back:<br />
<a href="http://www.wizardworld.com/robertquill.html" target="_blank">Here's a listing for him on Wizard World</a><br />
<a href="https://www.facebook.com/RobertQuill" target="_blank">Robert Quill on Facebook</a><br />
<a href="http://www.bbb.org/concord/business-reviews/artists-commercial/robert-quill-in-barrington-nh-92024912" target="_blank">Better Business Bureau Listing</a><br />
<br />
That's my story. Be warned and stay away from this guy. He took advantage of me, took my money, and that's the last I saw or heard of him. I guess I should have known something was awry when I returned to his booth at RT (when he told me to so I could see the sketches of the artwork he promised me) only to receive a curt and almost rude remark of how he hadn't had time to do it, yet...as if it was my fault. I should have asked for a refund then. Live and learn. But hopefully I'll help others learn from my mistake.<br />
<br />
UPDATE: I did send Mr. Quill a Facebook message this morning, as well, notifying him that I've been trying to contact him and that I've filed a dispute with my bank for the $400. So far, no response. We'll see what happens.<br />
<br />
<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-36536698985939125792014-01-05T07:11:00.001-08:002014-01-05T07:11:50.414-08:00365 Ways To Be A Better Writer - Week One Recap<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I hope everyone is ready for Winter Blast 2014. As I'm writing, the snow has arrived here and is coming down pretty heavily. And what better way to spend a snowy Sunday morning than to hunker down indoors and recap this week's writing tips on how to be a better writer.<br />
<br />
I won't always do a weekly recap, but since this series is still so new, I thought it appropriate this week.<br />
<br />
We started the 365 Ways with last week's <a href="http://donyalynne.blogspot.com/2014/01/365-ways-to-be-better-writer-5-year-plan.html" target="_blank">blog post on creating a 5-Year Plan</a>. Since I already spent ample time on that topic, I won't rehash it here. The other topics I hit this week are:<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Know yourself</li>
<li>Read "On Writing" by Stephen King</li>
<li>Editing</li>
<li>How to start your story.</li>
</ol>
<div>
Let's look briefly at each one:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><u>Know Yourself</u></b></div>
<div>
They say to write what you know, but you also have to write what you love. And to write what you love, you need to know yourself. For example, if you have no interest in vampires, you don't want to write a vampire novel. If you don't like <i>reading</i> romance, then don't <i>write</i> romance.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Right now, male/male (m/m) romance is super hot in the romance world, but authors who aren't comfortable with homosexuality shouldn't write a m/m romance simply to cash in. Same with Fifty Shades of Grey. I recently read an erotic romance written by a gal who admitted that she isn't comfortable writing sex scenes and only wrote the book because she wanted to jump on the Fifty Shades bandwagon. The problem was that I could tell as I read the book that she was not comfortable writing sex. It was glaringly obvious and detracted from my reading experience. What could have been a fabulous erotic romance came off as only lukewarm. Know yourself first, write what you love second, and then write what you know.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Also, know when you do your best writing. I'm a morning writer. I seem to be more productive before 2:00PM, the earlier the better. I used to get up at 4:30AM and get 2,000 words written by 6:30AM. Other people are more productive late at night. Still others write well in short spurts. This is individual to each author, and only you know when it's best to write for you. Also, do you prefer music or silence? A warm beverage at your side? A dish of m&m's? Once you know when and how you do your best writing, you'll soar.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><u>Read "On Writing" by Stephen King</u></b></div>
<div>
This is pretty self-explanatory. I will say that this was one of the first writing books I ever read, and many of Mr. King's advice has stuck with me almost verbatim. I'm not a big fan of Stephen King's fiction, but that doesn't mean he doesn't give excellent advice. He does. Read this book over and over and over until you've nailed his advice. He knows what he's talking about. I always say that if you want to be a bigtime author, you need to emulate a bigtime author's behavior when they're writing.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><u>Editing</u></b></div>
<div>
Too many self-publishers publish too quickly. They get impatient. They finish their rough draft and do a cursory read-through, and that's it. They might have a friend do a quick proofread or "edit" (I've seen some of these "edits" done by friends, and I'll just say, DON'T USE YOUR FRIENDS TO EDIT unless they are professional, trained, and educated editors), but that's it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That book is your baby. The writing within it is your reputation as an author. Would you really treat your baby that way? Is it smart to sacrifice your reputation for a quick dollar? No. So, this is my advice: Write your first draft, put it away for a month or two, pull it back out and re-read it, and if you don't immediately vomit from how bad it is (and you might) start editing and rewriting it. After each edit/rewrite, set it aside for a few weeks, then come back to it and do another edit/rewrite. Do this about five times, maybe more. Send the story to your beta readers with the explicit instructions that you want them to shred your story to pieces (I'll be talking about beta readers later in this series of blog posts, so stay tuned). Once you get your beta feedback, do another round of edits and rewrites. [By the way, I usually send out my first or second draft to my beta readers, but I have thick enough skin to take the beating my betas will give me based on one of my early drafts. Most authors don't have thick enough skin to take this harsh criticism, so I'm recommending you send out a later draft. Of course, if your skin is thick, and you trust your betas to be excruciatingly brutal like mine are, then send them your first draft. It could save you a lot of editing and rewriting on things that will end up not mattering.] After you've addressed your beta feedback within your manuscript and are happy with the story, hire an editor. An actual trained and educated editor who comes with some credentials. Let the editor do their thing, and then implement his or her changes. Give the story one final proof (I do a proof, and I have someone else who also does a proof), and THEN you can publish. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
True story about the importance of editing: Several months ago, I saw that an old friend of mine had published a book. I visited her wall. Less than a month prior, she had posted that her book was "about" halfway finished, but that she wasn't sure just how long the book would be, because she was flying by the seat of her pants as she wrote it. Okay. Stop. Think about that. Less than a month before she published her book, she was "about" halfway done with the book...which means that she finished the book probably a week or so before she published it. Yes, I went to the book listing on Amazon, and yes, I "looked inside." What I found was astonishing. It was obvious she hadn't done any editing or proofreading at all, and what I read was filled with not only errors, but too much "fluff" that detracted from the story and led to confusion. It was, in a word, awful.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Good storylines don't mean squat if the story is poorly edited (or not edited at all) and/or poorly proofed. No story is good enough to overcome poor execution. Edit, edit, edit!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><u>How to Start Your Story</u></b></div>
<div>
The best way to grip your readers is by starting your story at a point of change that leads to questions about what will happen:</div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>Your pregnant heroine walks in on her husband in bed with another woman. (What will she do? Will she leave him? Will she meet someone new? Will she be able to make it on her own?)</li>
<li>A mother is getting her kids ready for school when an explosion shakes the house. (What caused the explosion? Will she be able to save her kids? Will their crumble? If so, then what?)</li>
<li>Your middle-aged hero is unjustly fired from the job he's held for ten years. (Will he be able to find a new job? Why did he get fired? Will he sue? Will he get retribution against his former employer?)</li>
<li>Your heroine opens an envelope which contains divorce papers. (How long were they married? Do they have kids? Was he cheating? Was she cheating? Why are they divorcing? How old is she? Is she scared to be single again?)</li>
<li>Your hero is in a car accident and loses his leg. (Was it his fault? The other driver's fault? Is he hurt? How will this affect his life? His job? His relationship?)</li>
</ol>
<div>
Right away, your character(s) are under duress in some way. This is interesting. This is conflict and dramatic tension. These are the things readers want. They don't want to read three pages of your heroine washing her car as she talks about nothing of importance with her friend, who's helping her. Yes, I once tried to read a book that opened that way, and yes, I stopped reading after three pages.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
You get maybe a page or two to grab your reader. If you don't grab them fast, you'll lose them.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The thing to remember about all these tips is that they're just that. Tips. They aren't the end-all-be-all gospel. Every writer has their own take and style, but every author has to start somewhere. Take from my tips what works, and leave the rest. And maybe something I've said might just spark you down a path you never would have gone otherwise. That's what it's all about, discovery new paths and methods of professional growth. I'm excited to help each of you find your own path of writing discovery and growth this year.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Happy Writing in 2014!</div>
<div>
-D</div>
Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-86388839293612970962014-01-01T01:00:00.000-08:002014-01-01T01:00:04.850-08:00365 Ways To Be a Better Writer - The 5-Year Plan<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM19cgbk9HGE3IYLD70j05pMoHlrzKDXEsqBPzxckA1ugtLZi5Z2B6xeqjKmfxrervKtEJ_b9wvgy731bWQ-0S-kQLVtJbAhQuJH0rvGYfooEBDfH3YZF-AjEZ267v2qVfqlrU3tOVDE8/s1600/5-year-plan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM19cgbk9HGE3IYLD70j05pMoHlrzKDXEsqBPzxckA1ugtLZi5Z2B6xeqjKmfxrervKtEJ_b9wvgy731bWQ-0S-kQLVtJbAhQuJH0rvGYfooEBDfH3YZF-AjEZ267v2qVfqlrU3tOVDE8/s320/5-year-plan.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
This post begins my series this year that I'm calling 365 Ways to Be a Better Writer. Every day on my Facebook page and profile, I'll post a new nugget that will, in some way, make writers better. Perhaps it will be a tip on writing craft, or a way to dig up new ideas, or perhaps it will pertain to the business or marketing side of writing. Then once a week, I'll write at least one blog post about one or more of the nuggets I posted that week.<br />
<br />
Since it's January 1, I thought this would be a great time to talk about Nugget #1: <b>The Five-Year Plan.</b><br />
<br />
Every writer should have a five-year plan. You have to know where you're going and what you want to achieve if you're going to get there and achieve it. Think of your five-year plan as your road map to reach the destination you've projected for yourself.<br />
<br />
What do you include in your Five-Year Plan? This could vary for everyone depending on where you are in your writing journey, but it could include:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Your targeted annual sales for the next five years</li>
<li>How many books you want to publish each year (including their titles. Use "working titles" if you haven't yet named a manuscript.)</li>
<li>How many drafts you want to write each year (including their titles or working titles)</li>
<li>Total number of words you want to write (make sure the number of words you're targeting makes sense given the number of drafts you want to write and the number of books you want to publish. For example: If you plan to write three novel-length drafts, you will need to write a minimum of 180,000 words)</li>
<li>How many books you want to read on the writing craft (including the titles of those books if you already know them)</li>
<li>How many writing classes you want to take (and the names of those classes, if applicable)</li>
<li>The number of conventions you want to attend, including which ones and the dates.</li>
<li>Any contests you want to enter</li>
<li>Your five-year bio</li>
</ul>
<div>
The point is, it's your plan. Include those things you want to achieve and that you feel are important at each step in your journey as an author. If you're just starting out, your plan might include more study-related items. If you've been writing for a few years already, your plan will likely include more publishing-related items. But really think about what it is you want to achieve each year, especially year one (2014). Be realistic. If you haven't published a single book and haven't even written one, don't make "Publish four books" part of this year's plan. It won't happen and you'll be setting yourself up for failure right out of the gate.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
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I've been planning for the past couple of months to devote all of 2014 to writing. Everything I've done since the end of October has been to prepare myself for one solid year of writing. There's a few reasons for that, some personal and some professional, but this change in plans made me pull out my the Five-Year Plan I worked up in May and revise it. This is what my 2014 plan now looks like:<br />
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<b><u><span style="font-size: 14.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2014<o:p></o:p></span></span></u></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the year of writing. No book conventions, perhaps
only one blog tour at the end of the year, no big giveaways.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Get all books in print and update ebook listings.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Start searching for an agent.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Enter local chapter RWA contests, Golden Heart, RITA.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Enter IPPYs with Good Karma, Bad Karma, and Bound Guardian
Angel.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><u><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Publishing Goal: 6
books<o:p></o:p></span></u></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Good Karma<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All the King's Men - The Beginning (novella prequel)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bound Guardian Angel<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Severin's Muse (novella)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Trace of Submission (novella)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bad Karma<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><u><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">First Drafts
Completed (aside from those published): 7 books<o:p></o:p></span></u></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Learning to Walk (m/m contemporary)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Right Type (working title for CA contemporary romance)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One Night (contemporary romance)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Taming the Savage (Maddox)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Marked (KOJU, book one)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Strong Karma<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Losing Control</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Taking Control</span></div>
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<b><i><u><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Publishing Rights<o:p></o:p></span></u></i></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Regain my publishing rights for Moonlit Hearts through XOXO
Publishing.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
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<o:p>As you can see, I have a MAJOR writing year ahead of me. Will I reach all my goals? I don't know. All but three of my planned drafts have been started. I just need to finish them. And all but two of the books I plan to publish have been started or are in some stage of editing. But I know one thing for sure. If I don't map out my goals, I definitely won't reach them, and I won't have anything pushing me to keep surging forward when I would rather take a day off. Goals give you that. They give you a guide and motivation to keep going when you would rather watch TV.</o:p></div>
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I've broken out 2015-2018 the same way, but with less detail for each subsequent year, even though I have noted how many books I want to publish and draft in those years, with a general idea as to what they will be. And at the end of my 2018 plan, I've also written a short bio about myself based on what I've outlined in my Five-Year Plan.</div>
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You'll note that I don't include my word count goals on my Five-Year Plan. That's because I track word count goals on a white board hanging beside my desk. I've got the next four months plotted in a grid:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jan = 68,200 words or 2200/day</div>
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Feb = 96,000/3429</div>
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Mar = 84,000/2710</div>
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Apr = 88,000/2839</div>
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Here's the thing you have to remember about making a Five-Year Plan. It's always evolving. I visit mine a couple of times each year and revise it based on where I am and what has come up. For example, just this morning, two new short novels popped into my head that I immediately started working on. Obviously, I want to get those drafted in the next year, so I added them to my 2014 plan. This might mean that another story could get bumped off, but for now, I think I can accommodate all my projects with some serious elbow grease.</div>
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What else do you think should be included on a Five-Year Plan? Did I miss anything?</div>
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Happy Writing! And may 2014 be the best writing year of our lives...so far. :)</div>
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-D</div>
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-41844198011047090812013-12-29T09:28:00.000-08:002013-12-29T09:52:12.984-08:00Author Platforms<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsw_3A_wTqoVw0EkNFXolTEktDogei5VFEtPrxkW-REfi-hN4pEWSJ75W8-kttrKRio_gUsTz_ub65G-8XeLzcpxyhH2DBlM2g-Cl0sRHTYIfqWaX5szXrEk5Ag9RG3tTL0xYq25xPf3g/s1600/author+platform.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsw_3A_wTqoVw0EkNFXolTEktDogei5VFEtPrxkW-REfi-hN4pEWSJ75W8-kttrKRio_gUsTz_ub65G-8XeLzcpxyhH2DBlM2g-Cl0sRHTYIfqWaX5szXrEk5Ag9RG3tTL0xYq25xPf3g/s200/author+platform.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
When it comes to an author platform, there are some things that an author really shouldn't talk about or post on their social media outlets using their author persona: politics, religion, anything considered even remotely related to either of those two topics, or any subject that could be construed as controversial. There's something to be said about an author using social networks to be social, and then there's using social networks in a social way that negatively affects an author's platform.<br />
<br />
I just read an author's post that said the author's Facebook page had been shut down. The reason wasn't stated, but the post explained that this author, who writes male/male romance, posts "interesting" articles or links on a variety of subjects that have nothing to do with writing, but which are political in nature and include topics that many would find controversial, such as marriage equality and gay rights. The post also stated that pics of men kissing are among favorite pictures to post.<br />
<br />
While a part of me applauds this author's courage to stand up for what he/she believes in, their author platform is not the place to do so. His/Her page was shut down because someone (probably a lot of someones) complained about the content on his/her page. Being that a lot of m/m authors don't get arbitrarily shut down simply for being an author of m/m romance, it's a good bet that it was the other non-writing related content that worked up whoever reported the author's page.<br />
<br />
Was it worth it? Was it worth having the author's page shut down—a page he/she had built and put a lot of effort into, and which had an impressive number of likes? Just to voice his/her personal beliefs?<br />
<br />
This is where it gets tricky for an author. I found this out recently when I posted my opinion on what I believe is an over-medication of kids with ADHD (more on this later). I never knew this topic was such a sensitive one, but as an author, I NEVER should have posted my personal beliefs and feelings about something like that using my author platform. That's not what an author platform is for. It's not what MY author platform is for. Here's an excellent post that defines author platform and what activities make up and detract from it: <a href="http://janefriedman.com/2012/03/13/author-platform-definition/">http://janefriedman.com/2012/03/13/author-platform-definition/</a><br />
<br />
I've excerpted out a couple of sections from that blog post, highlighting a couple of key points:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: 'Open Sans', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 1.5;">What platform is NOT</span><br />
<ul style="border: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: 'Open Sans', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: outside; margin: 0px 0px 1.714285714rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about self-promotion.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about hard selling.</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="background-color: yellow;">It is not about annoying people.</span></li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about being an extrovert.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about being active on social media.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about blogging.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not about your qualifications, authority, or experience, although these are tools for growing or nurturing a platform.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not something you create overnight.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not something you can buy.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not a one-time event.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">It is not more important than your story or message (but hopefully it grows out of that).</li>
</ul>
<h1 style="background-color: white; border: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; font-family: 'Open Sans', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 1.5; margin: 1.714285714rem 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
What activities build platform?</h1>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: 'Open Sans', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 1.714285714rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
First and foremost, platform grows out of your body of work—or from producing great work. Remember that. The following list is not exhaustive, but helps give you an idea of how platform can grow.</div>
<div style="border: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: 'Open Sans', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 24px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<ul style="border: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.714285714; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: outside; margin: 0px 0px 1.714285714rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Publishing or distributing quality work in outlets you want to be identified with and that your target audience reads.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Producing a body of work on your own platform—e.g., blog, e-mail newsletter, social network, podcast, video, digital downloads, etc—that gathers quality followers. This is usually a longterm process.</li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Speaking at and/or attending events where you meet new people and extend your network of contacts.</li>
<li style="border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="background-color: yellow;">Finding meaningful ways to engage with and develop your target audience, whether through content, events, online marketing/promotion, etc.</span></li>
<li style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2.571428571rem; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Partnering with peers or influencers to tackle a new project and/or extend your visibility.</li>
</ul>
</div>
If something has the ability to annoy another, even if it's just a faint possibility, it should not be posted. There's a reason why politics and religion are the two subjects everyone says never to discuss in social situations. They are extremely volatile subjects that can turn a friendly evening into a war. I've seen it happen. Gay rights? Marriage equality? Your beliefs on Catholicism or Islam? Nope...they're off limits unless you want to risk putting yourself—and your fan page—and your business—in jeopardy, not to mention your readership. Look at what one poorly timed, socially controversial comment from the Duck Dynasty guy did. Do you want that to be you?<br />
<br />
Some might be saying right about now, "Well, my target audience is one that reads m/m romance, so I should be able to post about gay rights and marriage equality. I should be able to post pics of two guys making out, because my readers like that." Wrong. I write erotic romance and have a reader group where only fans of my stories are members. Even so, when another member began posting pictures that were a little too racy or provocative, some of my members grew uncomfortable. I had a few leave the group. I had another message me and tell me that while she loved the group, she couldn't have those pictures coming up in her newsfeed, even though the models weren't showing their private parts. I write pretty graphic erotically charged sex scenes. Nothing is left to question. So, shouldn't my readers enjoy pictures of half naked hot men? Why would they complain about something like that when what they're reading something I've written that's ten times worse?<br />
<br />
The truth is that reading something and seeing something are two totally different things. Reading hot scenes is a lot easier to hide than seeing hot pictures. And the reality is that people view Facebook at work and in front of their families, which include kids. They want to know that they're not going to pull up a picture that could upset a coworker, boss, child, or husband who might be looking over their shoulder. And to be honest, even I was uncomfortable with some of the pictures being posted. Me. The author who writes the graphic sexy-smexy stuff. So, I'll say it again, just because someone likes to read it (or write it) doesn't mean they want to see it. It doesn't make them a prude (I dare anyone to call me a prude, because that is so not the case), but there is something to be said for good taste and reader respect.<br />
<br />
And just because someone reads m/m romance doesn't mean they want to be exposed to your opinions on gay rights and marriage equality. Your readers follow you because of your BOOKS, not your opinions. I've had to unfriend authors who posted constantly about their political agenda, their beliefs, etc. I wanted to ask them, are you an author or an activist? I've left behind m/m authors who posted rants about anti-gay bloggers, anti-gay politicians, anti-gay everything. It was like, OMG, do you have a life outside the world of homosexuality and political activism? I hadn't followed those authors because I wanted to be exposed on a daily basis to their anger and rants about the injustices against gay people. I get that enough from the news. I mean, hey, I'm all about marriage equality and gay rights, too, but my author platform is not the place for me to throw my beliefs about those topics out into the world.<br />
<br />
If you're an author, then be an author. If you have a strong belief about marriage equality, write it into the character development of your next book (as long as you're not preaching to the reader through your characters, using real-world controversial topics can create a wonderful plot arc. I use them all the time to great effect with my readers. In fact, my m/m romance, Heart of the Warrior won over an enormous amount of traditionally het readers and positively changed more opinions about gay rights than any post I could have written ever could, and I have the fan feedback to prove it). But don't spew your opinions and beliefs on your wall and think your readers like it, because more often than not, they don't. And it sends a confusing message about your intentions. If you're an author, be an author. Engage your readers and followers in constructive, less antagonistic ways, and you'll cultivate a loyal fan following.<br />
<br />
Remember my example of how I posted my opinion regarding ADHD medication? I lost two readers from that post. Two that I know about. All because I used my platform to voice a personal opinion I never should have posted. How many others turned away from me that I'm not even aware of because of that five-minute mistake? All the work and cultivation I had done to build my readership, my platform, and social relationships with my fans/friends was annihilated in a blink from one careless post. Over a year of hard work and careful cultivation was destroyed for at least two of my followers over a subject I had no idea was so sensitive. My words were twisted by one into something I never even said, to the point that she called me an ignorant judgmental bitch—over something I didn't even say, but which she perceived incorrectly from what I <i>did</i> say. But there was nothing I could do. Nothing I could say at that point. None of the funny, witty, socially acceptable comments I'd made in the past year-and-a-half that this person had liked made a bit of difference. In less than five minutes, I killed all that with one misguided post that never should have gone on my platform.<br />
<br />
I will NEVER make that mistake again.<br />
<br />
So, I speak from experience when I tell all authors to watch what they post. Make sure it relates to your platform and can cause no fallout among your readers. This is especially true for self-publishers, who have no agent, publisher, or publicist shielding you and guiding your social endeavors. Be smart, guard your platform like the priceless entity it is, and leave the controversial subjects to someone else. And if you really can't NOT speak out about those political, religious, and controversial topics, at least don't do it using your author platform. Start a page elsewhere that doesn't connect in any way to your author platform. That's a lot safer.<br />
<br />
I'll visit "author platform" again with my 365 Ways to Improve Your Writing Series coming in 2014.<br />
<br />
Happy writing!<br />
-DDonya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-52746372824529612482013-12-22T11:06:00.002-08:002013-12-22T11:06:53.170-08:00Resolutions and My Advice to New Writers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
A new year is right around the corner. Time to make your New Year's Resolutions. They need to be measurable, challenging, yet attainable. I'm keeping mine simple:<br />
<br />
1) Reach 1,000,000 words written<br />
2) Publish six books<br />
3) Begin a social media series of posts called "365 Ways to Improve Your Writing"<br />
4) Write one blog post per week on that week's 365 ways.<br />
<br />
So, while I was thinking about next year's goals, I started thinking about what advice I would give new authors going into their first full year of self publishing. What kind of goals would a new author be wise in making in 2014?<br />
<br />
You see a lot of authors buying a bunch of swag and hosting tons of giveaways, book launch parties, blog tours, etc., and for someone just coming in to the world of self publishing, it could be very tempting to go gung-ho all-out and do it all. But here's what I've found after trying this route: It's extremely 1) time-consuming, 2) exhausting, and 3) not necessarily as productive as you'd think. In 2013, I did three blog tours (one that lasted two months and took about 160+ hours to prepare for and run), ran several giveaways, and hosted my first book launch party for my latest release, Return of the Assassin (which also took about 20+ hours to prepare for). Here's what I found worked and didn't work so much:<br />
<br />
<b>Blog tours </b>are great to help get the word out about a new author or a new book, but you have to be ready to put in a LOT of time and effort to do one. Even one that lasts only a week or two takes a ton of preparation and effort. You should write a unique post for each blog, not simply recycle the same post over and over. Bloggers want to see the effort. Some bloggers won't even host you if you give them a recycled post. Read what other authors are writing on their blog tour posts to get an idea about what works and what doesn't. Shorter is better, however, I have written "short stories" for my AKM Series as blog posts, and fans love those. I've interviewed characters from my books, written holiday themed posts, and all sorts of fun things. Be unique. Be fun. That's the trick. But blog tours are great ways of networking and gaining exposure. I've made some great friends from blog tours.<br />
<br />
<b>Swag?</b> Eh. I've bought hundreds of dollars worth of swag and haven't seen any return on investment. Swag is nice to have to hand out, but be smart about what you buy. Don't just buy it to buy it. Unless you're going to a book convention or are to a point where you're doing big giveaways, you really don't need it. Swag is an expense you can hold off on if you're a new writer.<br />
<br />
<b>Giveaways.</b> There are varying opinions about giveaways. I've done them, but haven't seen any increase in business because of them. For me, they just don't work to gain new readers or impact sales. If someone is interested in your book, they're going to buy your book. Not because you gave away a Kindle Fire, but because your book enticed them. For me, a giveaway is more a way for me to give back to my fans than to find new ones. So, if you're looking for new fans, giveaways probably aren't the way to find them. They'll enter your contest, win or not win, and move on to the next contest and/or to a writer they know.<br />
<br />
<b>Book launch party.</b> My launch for Return of the Assassin was HUGE! It was a three-hour event, and I couldn't keep up with the activity and buzz it created among readers. More posts came at me faster than I could reply. With that said, a launch party when you're a brand new author could leave you depressed. You haven't yet built up an audience, so it might psychologically depress you when only four or five people show up. I never threw a launch party for any of my first five books, but I felt it was time with ROTA. But I kid you not, after three hours, I was a vegetable from exhaustion. Wow!<br />
<br />
<b><u>Just Write For Right Now</u></b><br />
With all that said, if you're a new author, what do you do to gain new readers? Here's my ultimate advice: WRITE. Just write. Learn how to write better. Study writing. Don't worry about blog tours, swag, giveaways, launch parties, or any of that other stuff. There's plenty of time for all that later. Build your body of work, and focus on quality, not quantity. I've known authors who put out a book a month and don't sell squat, because the quality of their books suffers from the constant churn to get the next book published fast. And then I've seen the authors who've published one book that was well written and carefully planned, and they make enough from that one book to retire from their job. One author I know made the New York Times Bestsellers with her third book and was able to quit her job, all because she <i>wrote well</i>, not often. She is very successful now, and she has a rabid following. But it all began with <i>excellent quality</i>. So, that should be your primary focus as a new author.<br />
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For me, I spent 2013 doing everything <i>but</i> writing, and I have vowed to get back to the basics in 2014. I won't be running any big giveaways, nor will I do any big blog tours, if any at all. I won't be attending any book conventions, either. In today's market, an author needs to be prolific to be successful. And as a writer, I need to write, so this works great for me. I only published two books this year, and that's not good enough. With six on next year's docket, I need to focus on writing first and foremost. And isn't that what it's all about for writers, anyway? The need to write? Once you've got a healthy body of work, then you can start adding in the other stuff (see below). That's when blog tours, giveaways, and parties will have the greatest impact, anyway. To do giveaways and tours and parties with only one or two books for sale is kind of like dumping baby fish into a pond and then immediately going fishing. Let the fish mature before you fish them out, otherwise you're just wasting time and effort. So, in 2014, I write. In 2015 I'll promote.<br />
<b><u><br /></u></b>
<b><u>Best Thing I Ever Did To Gain New Readers</u></b><br />
With five books on the market, I ran a freebie of my first book, Rise of the Fallen in January of this year. Sales had been steady but slow, but after I put up my freebie (and spent $100 to advertise it on a couple of sites), downloads went through the roof. I think I had over 100,000 downloads of ROTF in one month. Sales of the other books skyrocketed, and the likes on my Facebook fan page took off. Within three months, I'd made more from book sales than I had in a year at my day job. I haven't looked back since. BUT...without a decent body of work already published, the freebie would have been a waste. So, I repeat, get a body of work published, and THEN start your hard marketing and promotion.<br />
<br />
Good luck! And here's to a happy and productive 2014<br />
<br />
-D<br />
<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-22930136658076079412013-12-18T04:56:00.000-08:002013-12-18T04:56:10.525-08:00Protecting Reviewer's Rights<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
A troubling new practice has recently been brought to my attention. One that disturbs me and leaves me scratching my head all at once. Authors, publishers, and blog tour organizers are telling reviewers what kind of reviews can and can't be posted for their books.<br />
<br />
I'd love to hear from reviewers if you have encountered this, but here are my initial thoughts on this subject.<br />
<br />
First of all, nobody has a right to tell a reviewer what they can and can not say in a review. One gal I know writes extremely humorous reviews. She's magnetic in her humor, and I love reading her posts. So do a lot of other people. She recently started a review blog. She's an avid reader and wanted a place to express her writing and her opinions of the books she reads. So, she read a book, wrote a review, and then sent it to the author before posting it. The author replied that she didn't want the review posted because, in her opinion, it "made a mockery of the seriousness of her literature." The book was about naughty aliens, according to this reviewer, so...how "serious" could that be? It's not like we're talking Tolkien or Shakespeare here. And the review was a good one. It just had a humorous flare. What author turns down a good book review?<br />
<br />
Another friend of mine, who has been reviewing books for quite some time, said that she has been asked to take down reviews that were deemed "too negative" and that authors, publishers, and now blog tour organizers are telling reviewers that they can't post anything less than a 3.5 star review of a book...and some won't allow anything less than a 4-5 star.<br />
<br />
In my opinion, this is absolutely WAY out of line. For authors, publishers, and blog tour organizers to dictate what a book reviewer says about their books goes against a reviewer's freedom of speech. If an author doesn't want an honest review of their work, then they have no business writing. By the very nature of the profession, once an author publishes their work, they have no control over what the public thinks, nor should they try to sway, persuade, edit, force, or bully anyone to say only positive things about their work. By writing and publishing a book, an author is saying that it is free to be reviewed by whoever wants to review it however they choose to do so.<br />
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A reviewer does not need to seek ANY author's opinion or approval for ANY review he or she writes, and I have never been asked by a reviewer to give my approval. That's not my place. I've done my job by writing the book. Now it's the reviewer's job to do theirs without my interference, and if I'm lucky, I'll garner some honest criticism that will help me write my next book. And if anyone ever did ask me for my approval of their review, I would politely express that it's their review for them to write it how they want. Reviewers are not obligated to seek an author's acceptance of their reviews. That is their opinion and their writing, whether bad or good. Just as an author is free to write a story in whatever manner they want, a reviewer has the right to express him- or herself the same way and publish their work free of an author's intrusive editing or dictation of their work.<br />
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Again, this is my opinion. What's yours? Are you a reviewer who has been told to remove a negative review or that you had to post a good one to be included on a blog tour, etc.? I'd like to hear from you.<br />
<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-73611224368849469072013-11-15T11:49:00.000-08:002013-11-15T11:49:30.224-08:00Authors Buying Reviews - My TakeRecently, a major fiasco blew up in the GLBT writing genre over authors buying reviews. I was mostly detached from this event, but as an author who has written—and will write—more GLBT novels, I was interested in hearing what happened.<br />
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The long and short was that an author who's relatively new to the scene was accused of buying reviews. I know this author personally and in no way would I ever believe she would buy reviews. She's probably THE hardest working author and promoter in the biz and has the energy, stamina, and tenacity of the Energizer Bunny. How she manages to keep up with life, writing, and blog touring the way she does is beyond me, but she does it, and she does it well. Let's call this gal Cindy (since I'm protecting the names of the parties involved).<br />
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Cindy and I have a storied history, but she proved herself to me when she caught my back when others simply wanted to stab me in it. Others were lying and spreading jealous hate about me, and Cindy didn't abandon me like others did. Her goal was to get at the truth, and she did that and more, uncovering one of the absolute worst episodes of lying, conniving, and back-stabbing I've ever witnessed. And I was the unfortunate and unwitting victim. To this day, what happened still upsets me because of who was involved (someone I thought was my best friend). But Cindy hung in with me and supported me through it, and she outed the bad guy and gave them a quick and sure kick in the ass on my behalf. And she handled herself professionally and with humility. For that I'll always be grateful to Cindy.<br />
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I tell that story, because this is how Cindy is with everyone. She's personable and reasonable, and she strives for the truth and what's right. She has earned everything she has through hard work, five-star reviews and all.<br />
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So, to hear she was being accused of buying reviews shocked me, because there's no way she would ever do that.<br />
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There's been a lot of finger pointing and deflecting from everyone, and I'm in no way blaming anyone, but I did want to add my two cents because this is such a hot topic right now.<br />
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It's been said that Cindy was never openly accused, and her name was never "outed" as a review buyer, but here's what DID happen, and I can see why Cindy (and all of her fans) would think she was being accused, because I would have felt the same way:<br />
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A couple of weeks ago, a blog post went about about the practice of authors buying reviews and how despicable it is. And, yes, it's a despicable act. It's the equivalent of cheating in most cases (in rare cases, an author pays an agency to find reviewers for their book and it's a legitimate arrangement, but in most cases, these arrangements are illegitimate, where an author pays for hundreds or even thousands of five-star reviews). I did not see the blog post, but I heard about it, and I think I've figured out who wrote the post (it's one of three people, but I'll just refer to the poster as Jane to encompass all three to cover my bases). In her post, Jane decried review buying, and I guess a formulaic explanation was given to ascertain or reveal suspected authors who were buying reviews. The formula was something like this: relatively new author + few published books + new book release + over 100 reviews in less than two weeks + most of those reviews were 4 or 5 stars. That's just a guess, based on what I've been able to garner from reading about this situation and in talking to Cindy. In addition to this formula and the outcry against buying reviews, Jane also posted a link.<br />
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Okay, when you post a link in a blog, there's really only four reasons to do so:<br />
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<li>To prove your point</li>
<li>To support your point</li>
<li>To provide an example of your point</li>
<li>To explain your point further </li>
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When readers clicked on the link, they were taken to a site (Amazon rankings or listings? I'm not sure which) where the only author listed who was "guilty" of all the formula points and accusations was Cindy. So, rightfully so, Cindy got a little upset. Because if a link is meant to prove, support, provide an example, or further explain what is being stated, and Cindy was front and center in the link as being guilty of everything Jane was accusing review buyers of doing, wouldn't you infer that Jane was singling Cindy out as an author guilty of buying reviews? I would, whether that was the intention or not. I would have felt the same way Cindy did if it had been my name that came up in that link. In fact, I don't know a single author who wouldn't have felt like they were being accused in such a scenario. So to say that Cindy jumped to conclusions is ridiculous, because every single one of us would have jumped to those same conclusions.</div>
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And many did, because Cindy's fans fired back in vast numbers. Cindy didn't have to do a damn thing, because her fans went ballistic for her. Which I think is pretty ironic since, in the past, it's Cindy who has gone to bat for her friends. Good karma, I say. She's good people, and her fans and friends are going to stick up for her.</div>
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So, here's my thinking:</div>
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<li>If Jane really intended to single Cindy out with her blog post and link, then she needs to own up to it, take responsibility, be accountable for her actions, and say, "Yep, I thought she was buying reviews, and I accused her." If she realizes she was mistaken, then print a retraction and a profuse apology EVERYWHERE. This is Cindy's professional reputation being messed with, and I get pretty damn passionate about professional reputations. Ask anyone who's ever messed with mine. You do not touch another author's professional reputation unless you have irrefutable proof of wrongdoing...and even then, it's probably best not to touch it then, either.</li>
<li>Now, if Jane really didn't mean to single Cindy out, and it was just an unbelievably bad coincidence that her link made it look like she was, then Jane needs to, once again, APOLOGIZE PROFUSELY EVERYWHERE. This is about the time I would be groveling and kissing everyone's ass I could think of to make amends. I wouldn't be back pedaling. I wouldn't be laying blame elsewhere. I would be taking it square on the shoulders and sucking up big time, and then I would lay low for a while while the fires burned out. Because there are a lot of pissed off Cindy fans out there right now. Woo-howdy! Ain't no lie about dat!</li>
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All-in-all, my opinion about authors buying reviews is..."Who cares?" I'm already busy enough and can't even keep up with my email. I don't have time to add a crusade against authors who buy reviews to my to-do list, because, really, how am I really going to prove who's buying reviews, anyway? I posted this on another blog earlier, and I think it says everything I'd like to add here:</div>
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<br />If an author wants to buy reviews, who really gives a flip? Who cares? That’s THEIR karma, not mine or yours. If they want to cheat now, they’ll pay later. Do I really need to get on a soapbox and denounce the practice? Do I need to take my time and energy away from my life, my current writing project, my fans, my sanity…just to create a crusade against review buying? Hell no. As we’ve just seen from this situation, it does nothing but create a whole lot of stress, grief, and distraction from what’s really important.<br /><br />Will I ever buy a review? No. Do I think buying reviews is fair? No. Will my ranting about it and causing hurt feelings toward others, whether intentional or not, make the problem go away? No. Amazon and other booksellers are already well aware of the problem, and steps are already being taken to mend it, so do I need to draw even more attention to this issue to make sure the powers that be are aware of it? No. Do I need to trouble my fans with this by spraying it all over my Facebook page and blog? No. Will this problem ever completely go away? No, so why stress myself over it? Does another author buying reviews really, ultimately, and truly affect my skills, efforts, and success as an author? No. Plenty of authors who don’t buy reviews are highly successful, and I don’t see any of them bitching about the practice of other authors buying reviews. Would my efforts be better served by focusing on my writing projects, my promotion, my fans, my blog tours, my marketing, and my platform? YES! Resoundingly, YES! So there’s what’s important. </blockquote>
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You can’t change the world, you can only change yourself. I can’t make another author who wants to buy reviews—who sees value in it—stop buying them simply because I don’t like it. And all I’ll do if I go public and out the author is turn a whole lot of fans—mine and the other author’s—against me. Even if I don’t name the author in my rantings, the author I’m ranting about (or another author or authors) could take exception and think I’m talking about them for one reason or another and retaliate. And then you’ve got a giant mess like this one. Is it worth it? If it is, by all means, let loose. But I’d rather not jeopardize what I’ve worked so hard to create by taking that risk. To me, losing my fans and my sanity isn’t worth it. This situation isn’t even about me, and it’s stressful. I can only imagine the stress and distraction this has caused to the parties on both sides if it’s this stressful to me. </blockquote>
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So, that’s my two cents. Who give’s a flying flip if an author wants to cheat? If they’re going to cheat, they’re going to find a way to cheat. If they’re not buying reviews, they’ll use another method. They’ll find a way, so who cares if you defeat review buying? Before long, it will be something else—another evil to protest. But know this: Karma always comes back around. Have faith in that and focus on your own stuff. </blockquote>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghXPNy4ohYBk94Btrm2E_u1RR8Ht2G8Xfqthnux2BriYo03UyTMPiC0BA9kMEFdsJri1GwsS_6SyrmmUUPkqwg5r5TJdlJQdwS8UveRLZ5taPb2fImkmgQodKeeWr6ICMW52DLyoe82XI/s1600/look-before-you-leep4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghXPNy4ohYBk94Btrm2E_u1RR8Ht2G8Xfqthnux2BriYo03UyTMPiC0BA9kMEFdsJri1GwsS_6SyrmmUUPkqwg5r5TJdlJQdwS8UveRLZ5taPb2fImkmgQodKeeWr6ICMW52DLyoe82XI/s200/look-before-you-leep4.jpg" width="199" /></a></div>
And I think that about sums it up. I'll just leave you with this thought: Look before you leap. Once you've leaped, you can't go back to the safety of the edge of the cliff when you look down in midair and realize you're falling onto a bed of jagged rocks. You'll have to take your cuts and bruises and climb with bloody fingers back up the cliff face to reach safety again. <div>
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Happy Writing! </div>
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-D</div>
Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-15279982657518705192013-11-05T00:01:00.000-08:002013-11-05T00:01:01.102-08:00If You're an Author Without Goals, You're an Author Without a PlanRemember in the movie, <i>Pretty Woman</i>, when the homeless guy says, "Do you have a goal?"<div>
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Well? Do you?</div>
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A couple of weeks ago, I realized how important goals are. I was coming up on the release of the fifth book in my All the King's Men Series, and I was having "a moment." You know "the moment." It's that point when you start to panic right before you pull the trigger on a book release, when you don't feel like you'll never have enough time to get it all done, when the world comes crashing in on you? Yeah. That moment.</div>
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I called mine a mini-panic and talked with my hubby for about an hour as I "processed." What can I say? I'm a processor. Talking aloud about what's troubling me usually helps me resolve the problem. During the course of our conversation, which was really sort of a meltdown (poor hubby), my hubs said something that resonated with me the following morning. He said, "What are the three most important things on your list right now?" At the time, my answer was, "It's all important." The following morning, I changed my mind, took a seat at my desk, erased all the to-do items from the white board that hangs by my desk, and thought about his question for about five seconds before I identified the three most important things I need to focus on for the next eight months:</div>
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<li>Writing</li>
<li>Getting my books in print</li>
<li>Updating all my ebook listings and blurbs</li>
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BAM! Done. Who's da bomb? I'm da bomb. Those are the only things listed on my white board right now, and I've set monthly goals to achieve them.</div>
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Taking a closer look at my three primary objectives, here is why they made my top three list:</div>
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<b>Writing.</b> This is THE most important goal on my list. In the past three months, my writing productivity has been all but nonexistent, despite the fact that I retired from my day job in May and was cranking out almost 100,000 words per month at the time. I'm lucky to have written 50,000 words since July. This isn't good for a writer who has over eight books sitting in her mind wanting to be written. So, I'm starting to stress about not getting any actual writing done. And I haven't been getting any writing done because I've had to focus too much on administrative things and peripheral tasks that have taken my focus away from writing.</div>
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<b>Getting my books in print.</b> I've been saying for a year that I'm going to do this, but much like my writing, it keeps getting pushed off by other tasks. Well, no more. I need to break down and make this happen. Too many people have contacted me looking for my books in print, and I need books to take to conventions and to give away autographed copies of. This has to be a priority.</div>
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<b>Updating all my ebook listings and blurbs.</b> This doesn't seem like a big deal, but it's a time-consuming one. I need to update buy links for every e-retailer, add at the end of each ebook an excerpt for the next in the series, and update my contact links. And then I need to reload to all the sites where my books are listed.</div>
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Once I had these three goals in place, selecting what to keep on my immediate to-do list and what not to became easy. Basically, if it doesn't positively impact one of the above three objectives, it doesn't happen. This means that I won't be going to RT next year, and most likely won't go to the RWA convention, either, unless I get invited to sit on a panel. If that happens, I'm there. But I'll address such items on a case-by-case basis.</div>
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It also means that I probably won't run a blog tour for at least a year unless it's a small one that I hire a professional agency such as Orangeberry, Parajunkee, or AuthorBuzz to run for me. I've run three tours this year, and I simply can't take the months of time it takes to plan a tour and coordinate another one like the one I'm running right now until I've gotten through the next eight months or so. I love blog tours, but they don't impact my three objectives, so unfortunately, for now, I need to put them on the back burner until maybe this time next year, although I may reach out to a few close bloggers for an easy-breezy mini-tour once Trace's book is released. We'll see how it goes.</div>
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I also created a calendar (mine is in print...I'm a hard copy kind of person) through December, 2014, and marked down my deadlines for all my projects.This will help keep me on track and focused on meeting my writing objectives. And as I work with Amazon to allow me to post pre-orders (which only a tiny handful of indie authors are allowed to do), this publishing schedule will help me stay on track to meet their deadlines.</div>
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Why am I doing this? Why am I sacrificing conventions I love and blog tours I look forward to and creating publishing schedules for myself? Because I need to if I'm going to write all these books I need to write before I die. And I would like to publish Trace's book before the end of next year. If I don't get to writing it, that won't happen, especially because I want to make sure his book is awesome. There's high fan expectations for his book, and I want to ensure I meet expectations, which means I need to dedicate major writing time to his book.</div>
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To help free me up to write more, I will also be hiring a professional formatter for my books. No more formatting my own. Formatting for all the different platforms, e-retailers, and print can take a week or more. That's a week I could be writing, which is worth the small expense to pay someone else to do it...and do it better than I can...as well as for more platforms than I can, such as Apple. The formatter I want to use will also update ebook listings when new books come out for a small extra fee...and load them for me. Talk about getting my writing time back! </div>
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So, if you don't feel like you're getting anything done in your own writing career, perhaps you need to do what I've done:</div>
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<li>Identify your top three objectives for 6-8 months.</li>
<li>Slice out anything that doesn't positively impact those things.</li>
<li>Find ways to delegate other tasks elsewhere to accommodate your goals. </li>
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Do you have a goal? You've gotta have a goal.</div>
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-D</div>
Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-6668273746926436792013-10-28T21:00:00.000-07:002013-10-28T21:00:03.632-07:00Hot Halloween Heroes Blog Hop!<a href="http://www.felicityheaton.co.uk/blog/hot-halloween-heroes-giveaway-hop/" target="_blank" title="Hot Halloween Heroes Giveaway Hop"><img alt="Hot Halloween Heroes Giveaway Hop" border="0" src="http://www.felicityheaton.co.uk/images/hothalloweenheroeshop.jpg" /></a><br />
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Halloween is my favorite holiday. I like it better than Christmas. What other holiday allows you to dress up like your favorite character (or like a table and a lamp—yes, we had a trick-or-treater at our house a couple of years ago dressed as a table and a lamp. She was way cool.) and solicit everyone for candy? It's got to be a dentist's favorite holiday.</div>
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But there's more to love about Halloween than just the costumes, the carved pumpkins, and the treats, especially if you're a paranormal lover like I am, whether a reader or a writer. Vampires have come a long way since the days of Dracula pulling his cape around his face and whisking a damsel in distress into his coffin for a little one-on-one time that usually ended with two red dots on her neck. Nowadays, there are vampires like Wrath, Vishous, Vlad, and even my hot blood-sucking tamales from my award-winning All the King's Men Series, who make Dracula look like a pansy. These are alpha vampires with muscle, moxy, and attitudes bigger than Texas. They're also vampires with human-like problems to overcome. And we love a sexy vampire with problems, don't we? I know I do.</div>
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Today (October 29) is my birthday, and I want to celebrate it with my vampires while browsing through the other bloggers involved in this blog hop. The vampires I'm inviting as special guests to my birthday party are the hero and heroine of my new book, Return of the Assassin, book five in the AKM Series, which just released today. Malek and Gina have waited a long time for their story to be told, and I'm excited about adding their heart-wrenching love story to the mix alongside, Micah & Samantha, Severin & Arion, and Io & Miriam. Malek & Gina are two vampires who must overcome tragic, painful pasts if they are to find happiness, and I'm thrilled to have been able to tell their story in Return of the Assassin. I love me a good vampire story, don't you?</div>
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As part of the blog hop, <u><b>I'm giving away a $10 Amazon gift card, as well as all five e-books in my AKM Series</b></u> to one lucky winner:</div>
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<li>Rise of the Fallen</li>
<li>Heart of the Warrior</li>
<li>Micah's Calling</li>
<li>Rebel Obsession</li>
<li>Return of the Assassin</li>
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<b><span style="color: purple;"><i>Make sure you enter your email in the comments and answer the question: What do you like most about Halloween? </i></span></b></div>
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<a class="rafl" href="http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/7b1bef7/" id="rc-7b1bef7" rel="nofollow">a Rafflecopter giveaway</a>
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-15678459337171609782013-10-27T06:58:00.001-07:002013-10-28T03:36:31.038-07:00Return of the Assassin Now Available!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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My latest book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Return-Assassin-All-Kings-Men-ebook/dp/B00G7WGTDC/ref=sr_1_18?ie=UTF8&qid=1382878721&sr=8-18&keywords=Return+of+the+Assassin" target="_blank">Return of the Assassin</a>, is now available, albeit three days earlier than anticipated. It was due to come out on Oct. 29, but for the first time ever, Barnes and Noble pulled the trigger finger faster than lightning to make the listing go live within five hours of my uploading it. So, ROTA went up everywhere as of last night.<br />
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The first eighteen hours of publication have been amazing, with the book ranking the highest of all my books within ten hours of initial upload to their site. Two five-star reviews have already been posted, and fan reaction has been incredible. Lots of tears (everyone I've asked so far said they cried while reading the book), and many have said already that this is the best book yet in the series. I'm blessed for that, because a lot of times, books in series become less interesting as the series ages. Five books in, and my readers say the books just keep getting stronger.<br />
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Reviews have been outstanding, including a fabulous GraveTells review that had this to say:<br />
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<span style="color: #674ea7; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>"<span style="background-color: white;">If you've been waiting for the next Black Dagger Brotherhood, this is it, but with a story arc and featured characters that stand on their own merit and writing that is as complicated and talented as J.R. Ward's without the abrasive, almost gangster style. I dare you to read Return of the Assassin and remain completely unmoved by the events in this book. And to think, this series has so much potential awesome left to explore!"</span></i></span><br />
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I do get compared to J.R. Ward quite a bit, and I'll admit she's been influential in my writing. I love the multi-POV story lines, and I like brash banter, much like she does. So, I don't mind the comparisons. It's an honor to be compared to her.<br />
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Now it's time to turn my focus to the next book in the series, Bound Guardian Angel, which is Trace's much-anticipated story. With high expectations come increased odds that those expectations won't be met, so I have to work extra hard on this one to make it the epic story fans hunger for. But I think I can do it. With the draft already started, Trace's story promises to deliver a few interesting scenes of action I've never seen anywhere. I think readers will have to peel themselves off their ceilings after they read his story. We'll see.<br />
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But for now, let me introduce you to a few new characters you'll meet in Return of the Assassin:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9i8zBSGtX3QOE8_i79SSbhIc4B5bqvNYBxGZmRg5w6uVFerotfJnXAb5ClmrzgQuc5WJC25rc_LM9KkytY1NqZD0fYqs614ETyBKUhuez2z_Ogt4ITwBqZtrcYUVVyFQRpnhaYLGWFSk/s1600/DeangeloDemonio3+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9i8zBSGtX3QOE8_i79SSbhIc4B5bqvNYBxGZmRg5w6uVFerotfJnXAb5ClmrzgQuc5WJC25rc_LM9KkytY1NqZD0fYqs614ETyBKUhuez2z_Ogt4ITwBqZtrcYUVVyFQRpnhaYLGWFSk/s400/DeangeloDemonio3+%25281%2529.jpg" width="298" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Savill Hawke is introduced in Return of the Assassin as "just a boy," but as you can see, he will grow up to be quite a man. Savill is a musical prodigy and a half-blood vampire with gentle powers, despite his scary exterior. His story is tragic, and he will endure a lot of anguish once he recovers from the induced coma we find him in in ROTA. Consequently, and partly inspired by another character he meets when he awakes from his coma, he will cover himself in tattoos: cobras up both arms, scorpions on his chest, the devil on his torso, and possibly a black widow on his back. What he's been through will make him want to push everyone away, and the tattoos are part of the armor he'll use to meet that objective. (muse: DeAngelo Demonio)</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Trevor Knight, a full-blooded vampire, is Gina's best friend. At one time, he dated her brother, Gabe. He was also romantically involved with his business partner, Talon Justice, who he started the Knights of Justice with. The Knights of Justice is a security detail in Miami that's similar to All the King's Men, only without the royal credentials. Trevor wants a mate. A true mate. One he forms a biological bond with. This is something he yearns for, and it's why he broke up with Talon, because that link never formed with Talon. He is loyal to his friends and deadly to his enemies, and he will go to great lengths to protect those he loves. (muse: Alejandro Corzo)</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgGSc-DjKMDOWMQMV0PXzaUkk5e5ZkcKe75tZgop7gDXA6DFiM6O8NJjNu4QVzDrIqJrt7tHFjqiG053xLIGhxjhfLCaKNQ_3Zpvg0SW98_ulz5X3gR-AqGWNZdlXSLbgWa-SWONUL3EM/s1600/01Kieran03.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgGSc-DjKMDOWMQMV0PXzaUkk5e5ZkcKe75tZgop7gDXA6DFiM6O8NJjNu4QVzDrIqJrt7tHFjqiG053xLIGhxjhfLCaKNQ_3Zpvg0SW98_ulz5X3gR-AqGWNZdlXSLbgWa-SWONUL3EM/s400/01Kieran03.JPG" width="398" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kieran Teague a deadly half-blood vampire who possesses special powers that caused him to be "marked" and ostracized from his clan. Even though this pic doesn't show them, his chest, torso, back, and arms are covered in tattoos so black and dense, they look burned into his skin. These markings are warnings to others of how dangerous he is. But deep down, Kieran is a tender-hearted, misunderstood male. And he aches that his clan banished him. His markings shame him, and he carries a lot of guilt. Instead of hiding his tattoos, he readily shows them to push anyone away who dares to get too close. The pain of losing everyone he loved has made him wary of anyone who threatens to enter his heart, and he would rather chase them away than let them in, only to lose them later. (muse: Ivan Rusilko)</td></tr>
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<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-26333816055835556492013-10-18T09:14:00.001-07:002013-10-18T09:14:13.081-07:00Why Are You Here?<div>
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When I logged in to Facebook this morning, one of the first posts I saw was the following, posted by a fellow author, who also happens to be the muse for one of my favorite characters. His name is Dr. Ivan Rusilko, and he's one of the authors of The Winemaker's Dinner novels. He's a truly inspirational person, but this morning's post was particular moving. This is his post:</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; line-height: 18px;">Why I Am ... Where I Am! </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; line-height: 18px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; line-height: 18px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; line-height: 18px;">Three years ago I was dragged from a burning truck that had been wrapped around one of the many palm trees that line the causeway leading from Miami to Miami Beach. At the time I was in, what I thought was, the best part of my young 26 year old life. Established international fitness model, second year as Mr USA and all the "craziness" that accompanied the title, beautiful </span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px; line-height: 18px;">Latin girlfriend, and the transition from a lowly medical student into full fledged physician... all while beginning a brand new life in an exotic unknown city that was far far from the backwood, beer chugging, cow milking, camp fire indulging lifestyle of Northwestern Pennsylvania. Little did I know at the time that titles and image and partying are privileges the universe affords to those on a trial bases which can be greedily repossessed in a tormented instant regardless of race, religion, personality, good looks, popularity, or amount of Facebook friends and Twitter followers.<br /><br />The morning after nearly losing my life I stood staring, bathed in nothing but the suns early morning rays, at a battered face decorated with discolored bruises, tightly drawn stitches, and freshly burnt skin. As I studied in awe the rapidly negative transformation my appearance had undergone in less than 24 hours, the even more rapid melancholy realization, which ripped through my mind faster than the airbag had exploded across my face hours before, came to light.<br /><br />Life is sturdy, life is fickle, life is educating, life is stupid, life is beautiful, life is ugly, life is trusting, life is two faced, life is amazing, life is cruel, life is reliable, life is unreliable, life is ordinary, life is mysterious, life is benign, life is malignant...<br /><br />But when it is all said and done ... Life is Nothing but a Game... A game that only a few unfortunately get to truly play... This game isn't played on sand, or clay, or turf, or ice... Its outcome doesn't depend on how tall, fast, strong or focused you are... It boils down to simply how you play it... Those without the fear of regret are the ones that can make the smartest most calculated random stupid decisions resulting in game changing plays that dictate a truly well lived existence... A successful life... When you overthink and try to decipher the secrets of this games playbook to plan ahead -> you've already lost because there is no special formula, no magic bullet.<br /><br />With the type of medicine I practice I could have easily fixed the three lingering scares that still stretch across my face from the accident but I chose to wear them as flesh colored tattooed reminders of my answer to every decision I have been faced with from the day inspiration stared back at me through swollen eyes...<br /><br />~ Buy the Ticket... Take the Ride... And Play the Game... Because Waking Up Every Morning is FUCKING AMAZING So Don't Waste It!<br /><br />If your life was a movie would people watch it? More importantly would you?</span></blockquote>
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A picture accompanied Ivan's post, and it showed the truck, his bruised face, and how he looks today, scars and all. </div>
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After reading his post, I broke down in tears. Not because I was saddened by his ordeal, but because I was both moved by his words as well as by the reminder of what got me where I am today.</div>
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My story is that all my life, I lived in fear. I was afraid to take chances, to be myself, to say no when I wanted to say no and yes when I wanted to say yes. I was afraid of what people thought of me. I was afraid if people knew the real me, they wouldn't like me. I was afraid of disappointing my friends for fear they would abandon me. I was afraid of hurting my father by following my own path instead of the one he wanted me to follow. I feared failure in every facet of my life, and that fear crippled me.</div>
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My parents divorced when I was in second grade, and my dad gave up so much to stay close by to be the father he knew we needed while my mom indulged her inner child and pretty much left my brother and me to fend for ourselves. I had no childhood because of this. At a young age, I became the mental adult in the household, since my mom got custody. I learned by third grade not to expect much, because my mom had very little to give after she satisfied her own desires. While my friends' parents drove them back and forth to school events, mine made me find rides or I couldn't go, because she didn't have time to take me. So, from a young age, I experienced abandonment, and this scared me, whether I want to admit it or not. I started trying to be everything to everybody else, but left myself behind in the process.</div>
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Every other weekend, I got to see my dad...until my mom decided she preferred to spend her weekends with her boyfriend, and then my dad took my brother and me every weekend. He loved having us, but he suffered from the divorce, too. And I was daddy's little girl, so he took a particular interest in raising me not to be a "silly girl" or "like my mother." I wanted to please my dad, so I did everything he wanted. As an adult, I can look back now and see how a part of me did this so he wouldn't leave me. I wanted to make my dad happy, because he deserved happiness. He, my brother, and I had all been hurt so much by what Mom did to us all, and I took all the responsibility on my shoulders to make everyone happy again.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfcbUE-TQDF77vrHw5ze5CGCjRSxR4DDjRhIM5zeQ8170IDB7bDgiMMcituiTLS9EEc-xRgdA2lxaeNUTczL7cwZixwcs_HILsLTz9NEhtuy5u5WySHJS8UOM2Y8Muom4i1mFy-bcI_us/s1600/life-purpose.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfcbUE-TQDF77vrHw5ze5CGCjRSxR4DDjRhIM5zeQ8170IDB7bDgiMMcituiTLS9EEc-xRgdA2lxaeNUTczL7cwZixwcs_HILsLTz9NEhtuy5u5WySHJS8UOM2Y8Muom4i1mFy-bcI_us/s320/life-purpose.jpg" width="320" /></a>In the process, I lost myself.</div>
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I learned to fear upsetting the status quo. I became afraid of showing myself, because deep down I feared I wasn't good enough...that I wasn't worthy of love. As I got older, this fear manifested everywhere. I had taken on my dad's dreams for me and had lost sight of what I wanted. My dad wanted me to be a scientist, like him. So I took all the heavy duty academic classes. But now I look back and see that from birth, I was meant to be a writer. I was always writing. Always reading. I was a prodigy with the written word, writing intensely mature poetry before I was even out of grade school. The following is a poem I wrote around first grade:</div>
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<i>Together we can conquer the unconquerable</i></div>
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<i>Tall buildings, mountains, and skyscrapers will fall to our mercy</i></div>
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<i>But why destroy such beauty?</i></div>
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<i>As long as we have each other, that is all that matters.</i></div>
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I mean, really? A seven-year-old wrote that? Me? This was the kind of writing I did when I was in my single digits age-wise. But what did I do? I made myself miserable following a dream my dad wanted me to follow. I surged into my higher education loaded with science and math when what I really wanted was to take more art, music, and English. But fear stayed my hand and I let me dad dictate my life all through school, only to drop the dream when I failed Calculus my senior year.</div>
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For the next twenty years, I drifted from one unsatisfying job to another, afraid to take a chance on my writing until one of my employers fired me for being "different."</div>
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To be honest, my chronic fear is what made me "different." Deep down, I wanted to throw up barriers to prevent anyone from getting too close to me and to prevent me from getting too close to them, because all my life, those I got close to ultimately left in one way or another. If I didn't get too close, I wouldn't be hurt when they left, so these barriers were "good," right? No. They were fear manifesting to keep me safe.</div>
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And I suffered for years because of this.</div>
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I firmly believe that when we're not following the path we were meant to follow, life will force us in directions so that we can find that path. By the time I was fired from that job (unjustifiably, I might add), I had been laid off from previous jobs twice and left three other jobs because I saw the layoff coming and got out before I was unemployed. My woes in my work life were just one way that the universe had been trying to tell me that I wasn't doing what I was meant to do. But thank God I was "different," because if I hadn't been, I might still be working for that company now and still wouldn't be published. As it stands, being different eventually led me to my dream of becoming a published author.</div>
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I've begun to address my fear issues, and even though the past few years have held some struggle, I'm finally on the right track to take my life back. But I'm all about silver linings. And the silver lining from my lifetime of fear is that it has made my writing better. Readers seem to love the angst, emotion, and passion in my books, and I know it's my own experiences that created those elements.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5ANrpCrqcQkMwo9q5iyy24dkRgDljuy7VtW98jKPjYLbvuJLcUl2Un9n-u1s4Enia2zNbI3bifXAUb3X2LVmYEvfIw7h17D7_fkQ8HQZUkb1fvoPTuZl7E8xkTrQ9MQet6fvt4XzI0YE/s1600/Why-Are-You-Here-1-5-a23368853.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="151" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5ANrpCrqcQkMwo9q5iyy24dkRgDljuy7VtW98jKPjYLbvuJLcUl2Un9n-u1s4Enia2zNbI3bifXAUb3X2LVmYEvfIw7h17D7_fkQ8HQZUkb1fvoPTuZl7E8xkTrQ9MQet6fvt4XzI0YE/s200/Why-Are-You-Here-1-5-a23368853.jpg" width="200" /></a>I see a therapist who's helping me address my inner demons and painful past, and she says that every book reveals something about the author. As such, each one of my books reveals a piece of me.</div>
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That's why my characters endure such pain, because I have. Through my experiences, I've become the black sheep of my family and almost every social circle I've been in, and many of my characters find themselves in similar situations. In Rise of the Fallen, Micah and I shared a journey together. I wrote Rise after I was fired. I was severely depressed and struggling to find my place in the world. Micah went through the same struggles in his book. In Heart of the Warrior, Severin feared showing his true self to those around him, as did Arion, because they both feared what others would think of them if they did. Sound familiar? In Rebel Obsession, Miriam had to overcome an overbearing father to find her own happiness, and Io wrestled with letting go of old beliefs to embrace new ones. Yep...that's me. In Return of the Assassin, both Malek and Gina wrestle with letting go of the past so they can progress into the future, which is what I'm going through now.</div>
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Each of my characters represents a part of me. Each story I write symbolizes a piece of my heart or soul. And readers seem to love it. My characters' lives aren't easy, but I'm living testimony that anything worth achieving is never easy. So while my books aren't an autobiography of my life, they do represent it, and readers seem to find resonance within the pages, based on the passionate comments I receive from them.</div>
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They say to write what you know. I know pain. I know suffering. I know what it means to be different. I also know what it means to rise above the negativity and find wholeness. So that's what I write.</div>
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This is why I'm here.</div>
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No more fear. I need to LIVE life, not just merely exist within it. And living means getting out of my own way and kicking fear to the curb so I can be truly inspired and inspiring...without regret. Thank you for reminding me of this, Dr. Ivan. :)</div>
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Blessings!</div>
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-D </div>
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Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-76996606749371411902013-10-13T07:39:00.003-07:002013-10-13T07:39:41.288-07:00Solving the "Had" Mystery - Is "Had" Really Bad?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqBJYAgKqEiVBsFdBgxOZyQ-87aOC5gObuK4pEe-htEgZ5QneAKAdpmdwaiU8yUf2PD3ojzB6L1i-QsaF6aSsxKfmrGy0WJo_OIJg35brNQBK9VFC3lRHlGXKiIYXb4oe2e3Uu_16kfBw/s1600/HadEnoughLogo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="126" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqBJYAgKqEiVBsFdBgxOZyQ-87aOC5gObuK4pEe-htEgZ5QneAKAdpmdwaiU8yUf2PD3ojzB6L1i-QsaF6aSsxKfmrGy0WJo_OIJg35brNQBK9VFC3lRHlGXKiIYXb4oe2e3Uu_16kfBw/s320/HadEnoughLogo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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A long time ago, one of my author friends beta read one of my manuscripts and gave me the feedback that I needed to eliminate the word "had." Apparently someone had told her that the word "had" is bad and should always be removed from fiction writing, so this poor gal was tearing her hair out to remove the word from her own writing, as well, which is impossible. I'll repeat that. Removing the word "had" entirely from a manuscript is impossible.<br />
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Still others will tell you that "had" is passive. I've been told this so many times that I actually researched the word "had" and passive voice pretty extensively to determine the rights and wrongs of usage.<br />
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Let's begin by defining passive voice. According to Grammar Girl (and every other writing reference I've consulted), passive voice is created when the object of the action is promoted to the subject position. For example, "I heard it through the grapevine" is active (subject-verb-object sentence format). To make that sentence passive, you would write, "It was heard by me through the grapevine" (object-verb-subject sentence format). Another way you can determine passive voice is to add "by zombies" at the end of the sentence. If the sentence makes sense, you have passive voice. If not, you have active voice. For example, "She set the book on the table by zombies" doesn't make sense, so "She set the book on the table" is active. However, "The book was set on the table by zombies" makes sense, so "The book was set on the table" is passive.<br />
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Additionally, many people think that just because a form of the word "be" is used (am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been), the voice is automatically passive. That's not the case. "I am alive" is active and uses a form of the word "be." Another example is "I am holding a pen," which is also active. "A pen is being held by me," would be passive.<br />
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To read more on this, visit Grammar Girl's site and the related article, <a href="http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/active-voice-versus-passive-voice?page=1" target="_blank">Active Voice vs. Active Voice</a>.<br />
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Now that we've defined passive voice and know what it is, let's tackle "had."<br />
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In writing, there are three basic verb tenses: present, past, and future.<br />
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Present: I live in Indianapolis.<br />
Past: I lived in Indianapolis.<br />
Future: I will live in Indianapolis.<br />
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By the way, all three of those examples are active sentences, not passive.<br />
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In addition to these basic verb tenses, there are several specialty verb tenses, as I call them. For example, There is present continuous, future perfect, future perfect continuous, past perfect, past perfect continuous, etc. I want to focus on past perfect and past perfect continuous.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ70C4G2mXFVKA6_q6QI5cyoz0zRGXFfS15Piyqizv2DCaxgxkuKCl9IUq_NUGFoPtvuXsfUJ2cCJGNR5KBnUxV8_s-Z8RJyoocFQYdGM8SqkfSvTY8iUUFQ2tgbNIYYyIMCZ6pev6_FM/s1600/past+perfect.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ70C4G2mXFVKA6_q6QI5cyoz0zRGXFfS15Piyqizv2DCaxgxkuKCl9IUq_NUGFoPtvuXsfUJ2cCJGNR5KBnUxV8_s-Z8RJyoocFQYdGM8SqkfSvTY8iUUFQ2tgbNIYYyIMCZ6pev6_FM/s200/past+perfect.jpg" width="200" /></a><u>Using the previous example:</u><br />
<b>Past perfect:</b> I had lived in Indianapolis before moving to Florida.<br />
<b>Past perfect continuous:</b> I had been living in Indianapolis for eighteen years when I moved to Florida.<br />
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First, let me point out that these sentences are active, not passive, despite the use of the word "had." Second, each sentence indicates a slightly different reference to time than the other. If you want to study this further, check out the <a href="http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/types.html" target="_blank">Types of Verbs page on Englishpage.com</a>. Along the left on the page, you can select the different verb tenses and study them, get more examples, and complete lessons to help you learn how and when to use them.<br />
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The point to remember here is that "had" is part of the past perfect verb tense and not necessarily passive.<br />
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<u>For example:</u><br />
<b>Active:</b> Donya <i><b>had written</b></i> many books before she won her first RWA Golden Heart Award.<br />
<b>Passive:</b> Many books <i><b>had been written</b></i> by Donya before she won her first RWA Golden Heart Award.<br />
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So, how does the past perfect tense affect your writing? Authors usually write in one of two verb tenses: present or past. When you write in present tense, writing flashbacks is as easy as writing in the simple past tense. However, when you write your stories in past tense the way I do, if you want to insert flashbacks or refer to something that came before, you must use the past perfect tense or risk confusing your reader.<br />
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Here's a short excerpt from my upcoming Return of the Assassin. The story is in Gina's point of view at this point:<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-indent: .4in;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-indent: .4in;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 150%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">She
closed her eyes and tried to push away Malek's memory, which was becoming
harder to do. Malek was the male she <i>had met</i>—and then left—in Chicago. The male
who <i>had saved</i> her when all she <i>had wanted</i> to do was die. The male who promised
to be a whole lot of holy-hell-I'm-in-trouble if she let him.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIarc4WIOKFdOw2V280CAkvahe1OVEq5hyphenhyphen8Eg5JY7EYa9YAqDj6tdzp6GM0tb4tHdZmSw9-IBN6D1vbrbjFx9EGUgOPD173uhMoKR1wFzFMoa-TkJsnNdEQ-3ITNYq8-Fjf8eSTEmbZFk/s1600/pastperfect.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIarc4WIOKFdOw2V280CAkvahe1OVEq5hyphenhyphen8Eg5JY7EYa9YAqDj6tdzp6GM0tb4tHdZmSw9-IBN6D1vbrbjFx9EGUgOPD173uhMoKR1wFzFMoa-TkJsnNdEQ-3ITNYq8-Fjf8eSTEmbZFk/s200/pastperfect.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
Since I write in past tense, I had to use past perfect in the italicized verbs to indicate action that came before in the story. If I had maintained the simple past tense, the reader wouldn't be able to distinguish whether I'm referring to the present moment within the story or a past moment from before. Go back and re-read the paragraph without "had" and you'll see what I mean. Sure, you might be able to figure out some of the timing by the context, but it's my job as an author to make the reader think as little as possible so they can simply enjoy the experience of the story. This is just one paragraph. Imagine having 30+ chapters of simple past tense where you have to think about the context to figure out the order and timing of events within the story, trying to figure out what is flashback or past events, and what is the present moment within the story? That would get exhausting, and no reader wants to work that hard. It's the author's job to remove the work for the reader. Using past perfect is the solution to helping the reader understand the story.<br />
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Now let's say you have a multi-paragraph or multi-page flashback. How do you write that without italicizing the whole segment, which is becoming an archaic practice, in favor of weaving the flashback seamlessly into the story? I suggest you use the 3 in-3 out rule, as explained in <a href="http://inthegardenofeva.com/tag/best-writing-advice/" target="_blank">The Best Writing Advice</a> blog post on InTheGardenOfEva.com. I've copied the pertinent text directly from her blog:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<div style="background-color: #f7f3ed; border: 0px; color: #121212; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
If you write your story in the past tense, you have to use the past-perfect for flashbacks. The past perfect is the tense used to talk about something that happened before something else that happened in the past. I call it “the had tense.” For example, the past perfect is bolded below:</div>
<div style="background-color: #f7f3ed; border: 0px; color: #121212; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<em style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">He walked into the bar and saw her standing near the pool table. The last time <strong style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">he’d seen</strong> her, she <strong style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">had stabbed</strong> a fork into his leg.</em></div>
<div style="background-color: #f7f3ed; border: 0px; color: #121212; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
But the past-perfect gets old awfully fast with all those “hads.” The solution is to start off your flashback with the first three verbs in past-perfect. This makes your reader aware of what’s going on. Then switch to simple past, which is much more pleasant to read. At the end of your flashback, make the last three verbs past-perfect to get your reader “out” of the flashback.</div>
</blockquote>
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If you read a lot, you've probably noticed as I have that fewer authors are using the italicized flashback in favor of the seamless, 3 in-3 out flashback. I use one of these flashbacks in Return of the Assassin, and while it felt weird and took a little finesse to work the verbs so that readers fell into the flashback easily and emerged from it just as easily, I like this method. And since more editors now frown upon italicized flashbacks that can be too jarring on readers, this is the way to go from now on.<br />
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So, see. "Had" isn't so bad. The word "had" has a vital place in fiction writing. It isn't a bad guy or an automatically passive villain. Yes, there are instances where "had" can be rewritten out for a stronger sentence, but that's not always the case. So go easy on your quest to rid the world of "had." He has a place, and his place is necessary.<br />
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Happy Writing!<br />
-D<br />
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<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-73338715490861433462013-10-09T20:48:00.000-07:002013-10-09T20:48:07.504-07:00Telling Truth From Fiction<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM9S8x-RBe_0nHh5yzZ0-pTupeCgWvmDMOaSKJd2bx-w5ERyZk8BJvezvGvAb6RcRAIw1bNup5TuBdVXqnrCm_I2wxusZmxMndcqOeoiQAAJih9-OnPVE7PI2GKhIML3BkgvuAhgAfIes/s1600/lying-fingers-crossed.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM9S8x-RBe_0nHh5yzZ0-pTupeCgWvmDMOaSKJd2bx-w5ERyZk8BJvezvGvAb6RcRAIw1bNup5TuBdVXqnrCm_I2wxusZmxMndcqOeoiQAAJih9-OnPVE7PI2GKhIML3BkgvuAhgAfIes/s320/lying-fingers-crossed.jpg" width="320" /></a>About three years ago, I met this gal who claimed to be an author. We were in a Facebook group together, and she sometimes posted in group chat that she had run off to talk to her publisher. I remember being so in awe. At that time, I had yet to publish my first book and was unemployed, working as a temp, and trying to figure out what to do about my dream to become published. So I grilled this girl with questions. She claimed to be published and said she was currently looking for the right deal before she published her next story. On a couple of occasions, she posted in our group chat that she had turned down another contract "from her publisher" because the "deal wasn't good enough." I was so excited to learn from her. I thought I was in the midst of royalty.<br />
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Imagine my disappointment when I later found out that this girl wasn't "published." She and a few others had written a story they posted on an online forum. That was the extent of her being published. And then I found out her "publisher" was really just a friend who was involved with e-publishing. At this point, I don't even think their was ever any discussion of a book contract, which is what she led us to believe.<br />
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So, basically, she embellished the truth so far that it became a lie. She made us all think she was only a step away from breaking into the big leagues. I still feel like an idiot that I believed her. I had viewed her as my mentor, and she lied to me.<br />
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Next story...<br />
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There was this gal who called herself an editor. She wanted to beta read one of my short stories. I sent it to her. When she sent it back, she had "edited" it. Only one problem: 95% of her "edits" were errors. For starters, she removed every incidence of a comma that separated two independent clauses that were connected by a conjunction, and she added commas between every independent/dependent clause combination.<br />
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Every grammar nazi reading this just snapped her red pencil.<br />
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Of all her "corrections" to my manuscript—and there were a lot—I think only two were acceptable. The rest created grammatical or punctuation errors. Here's the kicker: this gal now promotes herself as an editor on Facebook and elsewhere, and any number of authors could be hiring her right now to edit their books.<br />
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What's my point? My point is that you never really know who you're meeting online and whether they are what they claim to be in their bio...or whether or not what they're saying is true...or even whether or not they're good for your publishing health (some folks are simply toxic and will bleed you, suck you dry, and drain the life and love of writing right out of you if you let them). Online, you enter into a silent, blind agreement to trust what the other is telling you is the truth until they prove otherwise, but sometimes that can be too late. And for authors or wannabe authors, it usually is.<br />
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For example, if you're an author searching for an editor, you don't want to learn after you've shelled out $500+ dollars that the person you just paid to edit your story is a crackpot who has no business wielding a red pen over your precious baby you spent months creating. I mean, when the author knows more about grammar, punctuation, content, and story structure than the "editor" does, that's a huge red flag. And you certainly want to know that the author you're seeking advice and/or mentorship from knows what she's talking about and not just blowing ego-boosting smoke.<br />
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So, how do you find the right people? The<i> reputable</i> people?<br />
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1. <b>Patience.</b> Yes, I'm sorry to say, it takes time to find the right circle of authors and editors to associate yourself with. I learned this the hard way, but am proud to say I'm now so happy and proud to be involved with the people I've become associated with in the last year. If you feel like you're being dragged down by someone or a group of someones, that's when it's time to move on. You're growth and potential are no longer being served.<br />
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2. <b>Join reputable writing organizations such as Romance Writers of America or Mystery Writers of America and attend every meeting.</b> I joined RWA in January of this year, and it's been one of the best decisions I've made for my writing career. You're around like-minded people in these groups, which operate like small businesses. You learn from them and have incredible opportunities to get involved in the writing community, and the more involved in the writing community you become, the better you'll be as a writer. And the people in these organizations will be able to refer you to reputable editors, publishers, and other authors you can learn from.<br />
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3. <b>Pick up the Writer's Market books.</b> The creators of Writer's Digest update these every year, and there are a few you can purchase. I like the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Writers-Market-Deluxe-Edition-Online/dp/1599637332/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1381374045&sr=8-2&keywords=writer%27s+market+2014" target="_blank">Writer's Market Deluxe Edition</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Guide-Literary-Agents-Chuck-Sambuchino/dp/1599637286/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_y" target="_blank">Guide to Literary Agents</a> the best, but you can also buy editions for the novel and short story market, as well as a non-deluxe version. These books, while they can be dated with the speed the publishing industry changes nowadays, offer tons of advice and listings for professional organizations, contests, publishers, and agents. They can be a great way for you to research and find reputable industry professionals to connect, network, and consult with.<br />
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4. <b>Attend conferences and conventions.</b> What better place to meet the stars than at a book conference or convention? There are always workshops you can attend, and everywhere you go are opportunities to mingle with other authors, agents, editors, bloggers, publicists, publishers, etc. These are people serious about the craft and life of writing. These are the people you want to be associating with and getting to know. And everyone has a business card or material you can collect to reconnect with them later. I came home from RT in Kansas City this year with a whole bag of cards and informational material. These are excellent venues to tap into reputable industry professionals.<br />
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I would love to know what other ideas are out there for finding quality editors and constructive writing groups. Links in the comments are welcome.<br />
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Happy Writing!<br />
D<br />
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<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1734404180567424295.post-55699098827261675322013-09-15T05:45:00.000-07:002013-09-15T05:45:16.159-07:00Riding the BDSM Train Doesn't Mean You Can Shirk Your Research<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjds67egqG8wdJT2FNcDIhYb8FSGi6aUDpmdh3PwFP24RUb7dQWWO7452LV4U1Uqf2NmvOc8HsSNH96ri7CEjRY97xHJdHWnTC0DxVYp_k-_TYrtVcIV8xe0IyLtWQWE_GTxJZG1LdpYJs/s1600/flogger.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjds67egqG8wdJT2FNcDIhYb8FSGi6aUDpmdh3PwFP24RUb7dQWWO7452LV4U1Uqf2NmvOc8HsSNH96ri7CEjRY97xHJdHWnTC0DxVYp_k-_TYrtVcIV8xe0IyLtWQWE_GTxJZG1LdpYJs/s1600/flogger.jpg" /></a></div>
I read an excerpt yesterday from a book by a popular author. I've read other books by this author in the series this excerpted book belongs to, and BDSM figures prominently. But when I got to the line in the excerpt where the Dom makes reference to choosing a sub as being HIS choice, I stopped reading.<br />
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For the record, I don't engage in the lifestyle. I'm neither Dom nor sub. However, I have characters who are: Micah and Trace. Conesquently, I have done an enormous amount of research on BDSM, D/s relationships, scene parties, etc. The only thing I haven't been able to do yet as part of my research is actually to go to a scene party. With that said, even I know that it's not the Dom who chooses his or her sub. It's the sub who chooses his or her Dom. In the D/s relationships, the submissive possesses all the control.<br />
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Furthermore, simply because a man is a Dom in the scene does not mean he dominates in every other aspect of life and business, as well. In fact, a lot of the time, they don't. Doms might be successful, but not intently cruel and overbearing. From what I've been able to deduce, the D/s world is a bit of an opposite world, where the most controlling people in "regular" day-to-day affairs are more likely to become submissives, while the quieter, less domineering people in day-to-day affairs don the Dom hat (or the leather pants, as it were). That's not always the case, but my point is that Doms aren't necessarily dominating people, and submissives aren't necessarily timid and weak. And yet, in book after book after book where BDSM is the main shtick, that's pretty much what we see. And I think it's because the authors are too interested in getting on the BDSM train than to actually dig for the facts about the lifestyle, so they grab on to the cliches about the lifestyle and write an ignorant portrayal of it, glorifying it, as it were.<br />
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D/s relationships are about trust. The submissive puts their trust in their Dom, and their Dom does not abuse that trust. If the submissive uses their safe word (and any Dom who doesn't give their sub a safe word in a book is a Dom who doesn't know what he's doing), the Dom must stop immediately. It's not about a Dom controlling a sub, it's about a sub allowing a Dom to control him. There's a difference.<br />
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BDSM is almost therapeutic for some people. It allows people to explore another side of themselves—maybe one that's repressed—or to experience emotional and physical freedom in a safe environment. There are rules that must be followed, and from what I've discovered, it's almost as if there's an unspoken code of conduct participants must abide by if they want to be accepted in the scene.<br />
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Furthermore, a submissive must talk to his Dom, tell him what scares him, what he won't accept, and what he likes. Not just sexually, but in general. A Dom and a sub need to know one another very well, and a Dom won't push a new sub too far until he gets to know him better. In this way, a Dom can understand what makes the sub tick, and can use his fears to push the envelope ever-so-slightly in the scene for a more fulfilling experience for the sub. And yet, in book after book, we see Doms and subs engaging in instant, hardcore scenes before they even know each other. This just isn't plausible.<br />
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With that said, I've been told that if I want to read really good BDSM that's based on reality, I need to read Cherise Sinclair. So...that's what I'm doing. I just started reading <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Club-Shadowlands-Masters-ebook/dp/B00B1N3EBC/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1379245409&sr=1-1&keywords=Club+Shadowlands" target="_blank">Club Shadowlands</a>, book one in her Masters of the Shadowlands Series. And the bonus is that right now, it's free on Amazon. I also hear that the Beauty Series by Anne Rice (written under a different name) is a more accurate representation of BDSM.<br />
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With regard to other authors' portrayals of BDSM, I know this is fiction and certain liberties are taken to "Hollywoodize" books to be more entertaining. I get that. And the books <i>are</i> entertaining in some cases (in others, they are too contrived to be entertaining—at least for me), even if they depict the BDSM lifestyle inaccurately. But at the same time, I can see true Doms and subs sitting back and getting a good laugh at some of these books. The entertainer in me says, "Give the readers what they seem to want," but the purist in me says, "Make sure your portrayal is accurate." I think the best course lies somewhere in the middle, and a good author should be able to do both.<br />
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Happy Reading!<br />
<br />Donya Lynnehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00229964689354498931noreply@blogger.com2