Category Archives: Writing

Writing

Dreaming

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The problem with not writing is my mind fills the hours with dreaming instead. Dreaming about completing books that I’ve set aside for the moment. Dreaming about sales that never come. Dreaming about future books in the queue.

Dreaming is not a good practice, IMHO, because dreams tend to grow out of proportion to what reality can deliver. I don’t discount how big God is, and that He can certainly work results that can exceed even our wildest dreams. But my experience is we have to make our best efforts and work out our dreams.

So this is going to be a rough period. Dreaming but not doing. I don’t know how long it’s going to last. I suppose this weekend I’ll at least do some research in the Civil War book. Although, with all the filing I have to do, maybe not.

Fifty Thousand Screaming People, Headshots, Writing

Rethinking

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Book sales in April through August are significantly better than they were in January through March. So why am I so depressed about book sales?

Because, except for a couple of special circumstances, I’ve had close to zero sales of late. Last month I put In Front of Fifty Thousand Screaming People on sale for $0.99; the regular price is $3.99. I did this, intending for it to last a week, because the sequel, Headshots, was to be released August 28, and I hoped a sale on the first might spark sales on the second. That’s what the conventional wisdom is, at least.

Well, the sale resulted in 7 sales of FTSP and exactly 1 sale of Headshots. I had two pre-orders of Headshots, but when I asked Amazon why only one sale they said the other pre-order was never paid, so they never shipped the book.  One sale of a novel that included a pre-order time and some notifications on Facebook is pathetic, to say the least.

The other special circumstance was the release of the paperback copy of The Gutter Chronicles, Volume 1 in June. I sold 23 copies of that in the office and to a couple of clients. Since then none. Except for these two circumstances, I’ve sold 47 books this year. That’s for 17 items published. It’s true, I don’t do a lot of promotion. I’m sure my FB friends get tired of what promotional posts I do make. My two blogs have almost no readers, so the promotion I do on them probably results in no sales. So, any sales I have are the occasional drive-by sale. I don’t know that I have any/many from relatives, acquaintances, or on-line friends. I know that a couple of co-workers bought electronic copies of The Gutter Chronicles earlier in the year.

I have several works-in-progress. I’ll probably finish and publish them, but beyond that I have no vision and no plan. I’ll write more about this on Friday.

Headshots, Writing

I Enjoy Editing

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Right now, or I guess I should say for the past several days, when not consumed by the busyness of life not related to writing, rather than writing I’ve been editing. I agreed to be a beta reader for a cousin who has completed a memoir, her sixth or seventh book. She has been beta reader for me a couple of times, and I was glad to finally be able to do this for her.

The memoir is painful to read, as her life had much trouble and trauma, things she had to overcome. I had some of that in my own life, but hers was different, more painful I think. Reading it has been hard. Until last night when I got to the point where she writes uplifting chapters about her Christian conversion. I have another 40 or 50 pages to go, which I hope to finish tonight. I was actually hoping to finish it last night, but a late start and a need to quit earlier than intended due to working on a sleep deficit put me behind where I wanted to be. Tonight, possibly I’ll finish, though I need to make a major grocery run tonight. We’ll see.

Some writers say they like to write, but they hate editing. They hate editing not only their own work but also the works of others. I don’t find it to be that way. Maybe all the editing I’ve had to do over the years for my engineering career has prepared me for editing in my creative writing. To me it’s an exciting thing to look at words on a page, figure out what the writer (myself or someone else) intended to communicate to the reader, and see if I can find a better way to say it.

A high school and college friend recently was one of my beta readers on Headshots. He sent me a couple of pages of notes, which identified some typos, and indicated places where he thought the plot was sub-optimal, or where character actions were not believable because something hadn’t been set up correctly. I agreed with most of his comments, and looked for ways to make those corrections to the text.

What I found was that fixing these things didn’t take a lot of time or words. Adding one sentence, somewhere in the text, might be all it took to foreshadow a coming event. A plot issue could be fixed in a similar manner. At other times, it took adding in a whole scene (maybe a short one) to fix the problem.  Either way, I enjoyed the process.

Now, I’m enjoying the editing I’m doing as a beta reader. For a memoir it’s different than for a novel. Events happened, and the memoir is conveying them factually along with the writer’s thoughts, emotions, reactions, etc. A memoir can’t have a plot hole, can it? Not really, but it can give information that is sprung on the reader in a less than optimal way. Found one of them last night. It can have good sentences and awkward sentences. Plenty for an editor to do.

Of course, we’ll see how the cuz likes it. “What? You want to change my sentence? No way!!” Or maybe, “It’s fine how it is, thank you.” Or possible, “Thanks; that will make it better.” As writers we fall in love with our words, sentences, paragraphs, and books/stories. Changing them is sometimes hard. The cuz might look at the Word file, filled with track changes notations, and wonder if it was a good idea sending it to me.

That’s okay. I have enjoyed the process. Maybe, if I don’t make it as a writer, I can be an editor some day.

Documenting America, Engineering, Headshots, Writing

Three Main Writing Paths

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That’s  what I’m following right now: three main writing paths.

First is the technical paper I wrote about in my last post here. Last Thursday-Friday I made good progress on it, though I didn’t finish it. I hope to get it in today. I worked on the paper over this past weekend, adding a good amount of text to what I already had. Yesterday I found the couple of missing data points, added them to the mix, and recalculated my results. I’m pleased with the way it turned out. Hopefully IECA will give me grace, and not kick me off the conference schedule.

The second path is my next non-fiction book, Documenting America – Civil War Edition. Last weekend I completed three chapters. Two of these I had started late last week, but they were in an unfinished state as I approached the weekend. I was able to finish those two, start a third, and finish it. I now have nine chapters complete (subject to editing, of course).  That’s between 1/3 and 1/4 of the book. My next step in it is research into the Battle of Battle of Shiloh, which takes me up to April 1862. The three chapters after that already have research started, though not far along. I hope to complete three chapters a week for this, which will see it done in seven to eight weeks, and thus published before the year is out.

However, I may slow down on that briefly, as I pick up Headshots again. I have received feedback on the full book from two beta readers, and on part of the book from another. This is plenty to allow me to look closely at those comments and see what edits are needed. One I already know, expressed by all three, is that the reader gets hit with too many characters in the first 14 pages or so. Somehow I need to either add other scenes without characters, which delay character introduction, or in some other way reduce/delay names. It will be a challenge.

One beta reader said a couple of things were incongruous. Too many murders, and them being unsolved makes the police/FBI look incompetent; and not enough media attention to a couple of items. Adding scenes of media attention won’t be too difficult. I’m not sure what to do about the murders. I don’t mean to make the police look incompetent. It’s just that the Mafia is good at hiding their tracks. Still, I can have some shooters picked up and be kept in lock-up. That I can do.

So, this week will be a mix of 1) completing my paper, 2) trying to continue with progress on DA-CWE, and 3) making major progress on Headshots edits, which I hope will be final edits. Then, since one beta reader said there were numerous typos, despite my two rounds of editing that included proofreading, I obviously have to do another.

Fun times ahead.

Engineering, Writing

Different Writing: A Professional Paper

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I continue with my creative writing endeavors. Last night I made good progress on Documenting America: Civil War Edition. I typed some writing from manuscript, and added to it on the computer to complete a chapter. Then I continued research into the next chapter to be written. Today I completed reading the source document, and read some background material. Tomorrow I’ll excerpt the material and write the chapter. Good stuff, good progress.

But my main writing work yesterday and today was working on my technical paper for the EC15 conference. The paper was due today to the International Erosion Control Association. I still haven’t finished and submitted it. The presentation will be in Portland, OR next February. Long lead time, I know.

The idea for this paper came to me over a year ago, and gelled into an outline at the EC14 conference in Nashville last February. The concept was: gather data from the bid forms from a number of projects about how erosion control work is bid out. Analyze the data, as well as qualitative information from the projects, to see if one method of contracting seems to be better. My hopes, and soft expectation, was that unit price contracting, as opposed to lump sum contracting, would be better for erosion and sediment control work. Hence the name of my paper: “Unit Price Contracting for Erosion and Sediment Control Work: Does it Improve Our Practice?”

I gathered the data (i.e. the bid forms) from ten projects several months ago, and talked with our employee who handled the field work on several of those projects. I’m a big fan of unit price contracting because it is a risk-sharing approach to construction contracting. Explaining what I mean with that would be way too long for a blog post. I teach a 90 minute class on that topic. I felt that going with this risk-sharing approach for erosion and sediment control work would result in better prices, better implementation  of devices and practices, better maintenance of these devices, and less pollution to the environment. It was the ultimate win-win situation to me.

But that’s my intuitive analysis, based on my own biases and qualitative analysis. What would the data say? As I said above, I gathered the data some time ago, and had aggregated it into one spreadsheet. I created my outline about a month ago, and wrote a tentative introductory sentence. There the paper stood until yesterday just afternoon.

At that time I started with the real writing. I had much more introduction to write, then get into an explanation of what I mean by “improved practice.” I also had a little more outline to think over, and dusting off and re-looking at the data. I did all this, and by the end of the day I had a little over 900 words. I anticipate the paper will run somewhere around 3,000 words, so this seemed like reasonable progress. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to finish the paper today, but I might get close.

The morning was full of meetings, site visits, and a little personal stuff. I got back to the paper around 1:30 p.m., ready to write the part about the hard data I collected and draw some conclusions out of it. I started writing, but when I got to the part where I should show what the data said, I realized I had never gone the next step and done a few calculations to see what the data actually said. Did it support my hope and anticipation that unit price contracting would result in less expensive erosion control measures that were equally effective as were those of a project that’s where the erosion control work is bid as a lump sum?

So I stopped writing and went back to the data. I quickly saw that I had too much data. I wasn’t going to be able to present all the data I had intended; it would overwhelm the paper. Including it in an appendix was a possibility, but for the moment I had to concentrate on what was in the paper.

I dug into it, and after an hour figured out what I had to do. I ran the calculations needed, from the data already in the spreadsheet, then ranked the projects according to which had the least expensive erosion control, then penciled in the type of bidding used (unit price, lump sum, mixed). To my great pleasure the five lowest cost projects (on a unit basis) for erosion control work were the five that were bid as unit prices! The most expensive three were the ones that trended most to lump sum, using fewer unit prices. My hope and expectation had been realized. On two projects I didn’t have enough data to do the full calculations and rank by unit cost.

I e-mailed the IECA education coordinator, telling her I wouldn’t have the paper in until Tuesday and hoped that would still be alright. I believe it will be. I printed the paper and have it here. I’ll work on it some, or maybe a lot, this weekend. Hopefully by Monday it will be written. All I’ll have to do is see if I can find the rest of the data for those two projects, and interview the field man to get his further opinion on the non-qualitative criteria.

I wish I had it done by the deadline, but I feel good about it. The end is in sight, and it will be a good paper.

Headshots, home improvements, Independence Day, Writing

What to do on a Holiday

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It’s Independence Day! On my other blog I’m going to sneak in an extra post about that. But on this blog, I’ll talk about what I’m going to do. Unfortunately, I have way too much to chose from.

Writing is something I could do, of course. I have a manuscript of edits for Headshots, things Lynda and I came up with as we read it aloud last weekend and earlier this week. The edits are: fixing typos, improving word use, improving sentence structure, eliminating redundancies, and correcting a few plot lapses (where I changed something as the book went on, or forgot I’d already written something another way). All but the last can be accomplished in a day, and I’m looking forward to doing so, possibly on Sunday. Another day is all it should take to fix the plot issues. I’ll then be very close to publishing.

Alas, I have some things I need to do before I can give time to the book. The back yard still looks like a disaster zone. I’ve cut most of the small branches from the tree cutting and piled them. Those piles need to be hauled off. Most of the branches that can easily be carried up to the road and hauled to the stump dump have been so hauled. I’ll have one more load to take. All the others I’ll be hauling off into the woods, far enough away, at the request of the wife, to be non-visible from the house. Dealing with the small stuff should be about a six hour job, I figure, or maybe more, too much to do on one day in this heat. But it would be nice today to get the one load to the dump and get two piles hauled into the woods.

Then I’ll begin dealing with those limbs that are big enough to justify cutting into firewood. On Tuesday I moved a bunch of them over to where they are at a convenient place to cut. Others are too heavy to move and will have to be cut into smaller pieces first. I’d like to pile a few more of them, and will try to do so today.

But, alas, we are dog sitting for the weekend, beginning today, and we have company coming in on Saturday. The toilet in the hall bathroom is turned off due to leaking, so fixing that by Saturday midday is a priority. As is getting some things from the store to feed the guests on Sunday. So a couple of hours must go into that.

As they must into clean-up and preparing the house for guests. We aren’t in bad shape, except for papers for filing or sorting on tables. Most of these are Lynda’s mom’s papers. We have taken over that part of her life. Lynda has been working on that sorting and filing this past week. It’s possible that most of that will be done by noon today, with me having to do little or none of it. I’m not even going to think about straightening the computer room, or perhaps will do it a little.

So, will I really get to write? Hopefully an hour on Friday, and on Saturday, and maybe two on Sunday. Except, I’m way behind on filing our own personal papers, and on my budget tracking spreadsheet, on my health expenses spreadsheet, and on our business financial sheets. I see close to ten hours of work on those, though I did make some headway on it last week and this. Then, of course, it is the start of blackberry season. Those blackberries don’t wait to ripen just because I have writing to do. So I will be taking time for them.

But I will write this weekend. I will write. If I keep saying that it might just come true. Now on to the back yard and the cleanup, while it’s still cool outside.

The Gutter Chronicles, Writing

Almost a Book Signing

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One of the things a self-published author is likely to not have, which a trade published author will have, is a book signing. That’s not an awful problem, as writers on both sides report that book signings really don’t bring a lot of people or sales to the writer. Still, there’s something magical about book signings. Just having one will, I would think, cause you to dream of long lines, piles of books flying off the table, and many fans saying nice things to you.

Yesterday my order of 25 copies of The Gutter Chronicles arrived at the office. I had pre-sold 19 of these (15 in the office; 4 offsite). I immediately began signing them, distributing, and collecting $8 per copy. I sat at my desk and signed. Then I took the copy across the building and delivered it. Then I went back to my desk and repeated the process with the next one. As I did this, two other people bought  the book and I signed the copies.

No, it wasn’t a book signing. But it was the first time I signed books in quantities and gave them to readers. It was a good feeling, even if it wasn’t a book signing. Perhaps, some day, I’ll have one of those too.

Short Stories, Writing

New Short Story: Saturday Haircuts, Tuesday Funeral

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SHTF Cover - trial 4 1601x2400Some time ago I decided to add two more short stories to my series on teen age grief at the loss of a parent. I’ve spoken of this series before. Originally it was a single short story. Then I decided to add another, and another. At that point I actually decided to plan out the series, thinking of what additional things I could write about concerning the topic.

About three or four months ago I wrote out the start of the short story in manuscript. I covered two pages of what I call “conference note pad” sized paper. Then it sat while I worked on getting the Thomas Carlyle book out, finishing a novel, and writing and publishing my other recent short story, “It Happened At The Burger Joint”. Once all that was put to bed, I knuckled down and wrote this one. The writing went fairly easy, as I had played the scenes out in my mind. I think it took only two days before I had the full story done, it coming in at about 2,700 words.

At that point I let it sit, for about a week, while I messed around with some other writing tasks. Two days ago I picked it up again, read it and did some edits. Printed it and read it again yesterday. Found a few more edits to make. It seemed to me as good as it was going to get. I created the two files for Kindle and Smashwords, and went ahead and published. Here are the links:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00L8GDT2G

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/451366

This puts me up to 16 published items, three of them this year. I’m hoping to add three or four more before saying goodbye to 2014.

It Happened At The Burger Joint, Short Stories, Writing

It Happened At The Burger Joint

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burgerjoint_cover_FINALOn Friday just passed I completed the work of publishing my latest short story. Titled “It Happened At The Burger Joint”, it is all about the reconnection of a man and woman who had worked together decades before at a hamburger fast food restaurant. Both went their separate ways, marrying other and having families. Eventually they meet again, though not under the best of circumstances. Yet, the meeting proves to be mutually beneficial.

It’s available on Amazon and Smashwords, and distributed to other e-book retailers via the Smashwords premium catalog. Here are the links:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KTW1JAE

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/445922

The cover proved to be difficult. I worked and worked on one, finding some applicable public domain photos to use. I tried working on it in both PowerPoint and G.I.M.P., and had something workable, but it didn’t look professional. It looked very much as if someone without graphic skills or artistic talent threw it together. I was about to go with what I had, when my Internet writing friend, Veronica Jones-Brown, who has done a couple of other covers for me, said to hang on, that she would work on something. She’s the one who did the cover you see in the post and in the sales links. Thank you, Veronica. I’ll get a check in the mail. Possibly, in a comment, I’ll put up the cover I had, just to show what I can’t do.

I sold one copy so far, to a high school classmate. That’s my first sale of anything in June.

Harmony of the gospels, Headshots, Writing

Typing Edits

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The last two nights the only writing work I did was type edits on my novel-in-progress, Headshots. The manuscript is currently at 220 pages, 62,000 words. About three weeks ago, maybe even a month, I printed the file and began reading through it, trying to remember all the plot lines and figure out what I needed to do to make sure nothing was lost.

I finished that reading and editing a week or so ago. Two new scenes were obvious to me to continue one plot thread that I had left hanging. I wrote them, and that brought the manuscript up to 225 pages and 64,360 words. But there it sat as I worked on book covers and other things, not necessarily writing-related.

Finally, Wednesday evening I found a little time to begin typing the edits. I think I got about 50 pages done then, and another 70 last night. That’s good progress, but it also means I have another 100+ to go. It’s tedious work. The edits are marked on the manuscript. I have to find the place in the computer file, type the edit, and mark it out on the manuscript. It’s not at all hard; it just takes time.

Then today, in my pre-work time, I decided to type edits to another book I wrote, A Harmony of the Gospels. I recently re-read this, for my morning devotional time. In doing so I found a few typos, and realized I had never changed the format of some footnotes as I’d intended to do. This morning I got all that done, a number of changes over 100 pages. I see that I also have some edits to type in the Passage Notes and Appendixes. I’ll perhaps begin work on those next week.

Edits typing is somewhat mindless work. Sometimes it takes a little more concentration, such as when the reason for the edit isn’t obvious, and I have to re-read the manuscript to gain some context. Occasionally, with my novel, while typing the edit I notice something else that should also be taken care of, and the edit is more extensive. Still, even with those times, typing edits isn’t likely to stimulate the brain to think great thoughts.

Last night I was interrupted by a Facebook contact from a high school friend of my sister, and we talked a bit. Otherwise I concentrated fairly well. A hundred some odd pages to go, and the edits will be done. I should be able to do that tonight and tomorrow. then I can begin writing the ending. Much of that has run through my mind in detail, so I don’t think I’ll have too much trouble getting that out—depending on whether I feel the need to add a little more to any given plot thread. Except for a trip that’s coming up, I’d say I should be done with the book in three weeks. Let it sit a couple of weeks, edit it again, type the edits, get feedback from beta readers, type that, and I’ll be ready to publish. Hopefully that can all happen before the end of June.