Yesterday the work was so scarce that I logged in half my time as vacation and spent it surfing my social networks. On Twitter, CC Ekeke (@ccekeke) tweeted a link to the writer's newsletter he publishes called The Daily Novel. I read an article called Maximizing Digital Book Sales, by Carolyn McCray. It talked about improving your ranking in Amazon through tags and classifying. There are some categories in Amazon that are less populated and, therefore, less competitive -- shortening the distance to the hundredth place in the top 100 best-seller list. Some of the categories are classifications Amazon has total control over, but you can influence Amazon to classify your books by the use of tagging. This article explains how to use tagging to increase your visibility to Amazon and ultimately to more readers. Another tweet (and I apologize for forgetting which tweeter contributed) had a link to JK Rowling's address to a 2008 graduating class at Harvard. Her subject was the gifts of failure and imagination. It was so stirring. I had no idea she had had extraordinary experiences before she became a bestselling author. Blog surfing informed me that 2 Twitter followers have new books out: AL Fetherlin's Brynn, The Exorcist (she's gifting free review copies) and Elisa Hategan's Race Traitor, a thriller. I'm looking forward to reading both.
Showing posts with label novel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label novel. Show all posts
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
Writing, Cover art, and Graphs
Wrote last night. Just a little but it was good. Very good. Love the quick dialogue between the brothers, Gilbert and Julian.
I learned last night that Alfred Hitchcock made a graph for each movie that showed the ups and downs he put the audience through. The script was the embodiment of the graph. I could do that with my novels. It would look sort of like a roller coaster. It would identify lags so I could fix them.
I told Dani his last design was perfect. (see Dani's portfolio at http://www.multigrade.it/). At first I thought the figure in the drawing needed to be greyed out a little because it fought for attention with the white-lettered title and my name. But when I toned the figure down in GIMP, I saw it made the whole design less dramatic. So I told him, keep it as it is. This 3rd fulfills our contract. He's expensive but worth it.
Tamara came over and I sketched out the cover idea for The Entrepreneur. A 1950s fridge and lots of shadow and I want it to look sketched, not photographic. Tamara is a versatile artist. I've seen her draw wildlife and I've seen her draw people with varying degrees of cartoonish license. She created a cast of characters, a redneck family that she writes into hilarious situations of their own making. She also writes an agony column in the guise of the family's matriarch, Meemaw Skaggs. You can see them here: http://www.theskaggs.com/index.html.
I learned last night that Alfred Hitchcock made a graph for each movie that showed the ups and downs he put the audience through. The script was the embodiment of the graph. I could do that with my novels. It would look sort of like a roller coaster. It would identify lags so I could fix them.
I told Dani his last design was perfect. (see Dani's portfolio at http://www.multigrade.it/). At first I thought the figure in the drawing needed to be greyed out a little because it fought for attention with the white-lettered title and my name. But when I toned the figure down in GIMP, I saw it made the whole design less dramatic. So I told him, keep it as it is. This 3rd fulfills our contract. He's expensive but worth it.
Tamara came over and I sketched out the cover idea for The Entrepreneur. A 1950s fridge and lots of shadow and I want it to look sketched, not photographic. Tamara is a versatile artist. I've seen her draw wildlife and I've seen her draw people with varying degrees of cartoonish license. She created a cast of characters, a redneck family that she writes into hilarious situations of their own making. She also writes an agony column in the guise of the family's matriarch, Meemaw Skaggs. You can see them here: http://www.theskaggs.com/index.html.
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