Cover Reveal - Gethyon has arrived!

I have been sitting on this since Friday morning, and let me tell you  - it has been TORTURE! You try keeping a new cover under wraps for five days! I've been dying to show it off. It'll also be my last cover reveal for a while since I don't currently have any further titles upcoming. But this is the long awaited cover for Gethyon - a YA scifi novel being published by Champagne Books under their BURST imprint. I've been fortunate indeed in being paired up with the uber-talented Champagne cover artist - Misa Buckley - who also happens to be a fellow author, Brigader and friend. :) Isn't it gorgeous?!

 

I also have a little animated banner to match -

How cool is that?! And if you're after a cover or graphic yourself, I'm pleased to say Misa also does freelance work as Masquerade Graphics - please go and check out her work!

Action!
So, with my final reveal done, it's back to work. Last week I made my three submissions to the mentors in #pitchwars. Yesterday marked the start of submission for #pitchmas. I've entered my sfr Tethered for both of these - fingers crossed! Next Wednesday I should hear whether my submission for #pitchwars has paired me up with a mentor to help me polish and pitch! >.<
I've finished my short story for the SFR Brigade anthology! Yay! This despite a sick child which put me a couple of days behind schedule and left me fighting to catch up. Fortunately poor weather this weekend has meant I've had an excuse to be online and do a few bits, something that isn't normally permitted during weekends as that's designated family time.
Both Keir and Terms & Conditions Apply have now been entered for a couple of contests. Keir is in the NEFRA, both in the Paranormal/Furturistic Romance category and the Best First Novel. Terms & Conditions Apply has gone into the Silken Sands Self Published Star Contest as a short story entry. Wish me luck!

Happenings
I'm taking part in the Santa's Little Helper Scavenger Hunt organized by BTS and Freya's Bower - there's some great prizes, so check out the post here and see if you can grab yourself an early Christmas treat! I also have a guest post by Anna Hackett on the Carina Press Christmas SFR anthology - A Galactic Holiday - with details about the three authors who contributed and a snippet about their stories. There's also a giveaway - go here! I'm also a guest myself over on Backward Momentum tomorrow, courtesy of Jessica Subject. I'll be talking about avatars and my new sfr short story -Terms & Conditions Apply - plus there's a giveaway! However, if you'd like a shot at the prizes, here's the details!

One sparkly red and silver key ring

And one digital copy of my short in whatever format the winner desires. Both are available internationally, and it's open until the 10th December. Just enter the rafflecopter for your chance to win.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Terms & Conditions Apply received a second review on Amazon here that left me rather touched. It's short but sweet, and reassured me that the unconventional story isn't putting people off enjoying it. Phew!

Discoveries
Following a blog on sales stats by fellow author Gayle Ramage, I was directed to this useful little directory - Book Matchers, a kind of dating agency for readers with books, lol! Authors can list their books for free and are required to enter certain information about it. Readers can them come to the site, answer questions about what kind of book they'd like, and Book Matchers pairs them up with a hopefully perfect read. The service is completely free to use. Worth a shot?

I have to say I find myself very interested in sales figures from other authors. Generally the only ones willing to share are those selling hundreds a day, which leaves me feeling a little insignificant. I've not posted mine in public - for one thing, I'm not sure my publisher would be happy for me to do that - and I know there's a huge scale in differences between what some authors make. The majority I know generally have to work writing around a full time job, so I guess those in the higher sales rankings are the minority. Success for me wasn't about how much money I was making at the end of the day - although I'd love to be able to make a living from it!

What was your ambition when you first started writing?

Ping Pong
Donna, loved your post on cover design and glad I sparked something off. Maybe we should do a survey on what readers like to see most on the cover of a SFR title? I remember the majority liked my cover for Keir (although a few disliked it a lot) but I'm not sure conveys the SF elements of the story as well as it does the personality of my male MC and the tone of the story.

Laurie, I wonder how long we're going to have to wait for the news about Mars? All I've been seeing is confirmation of water on Mercury - incredible when you think how close to the sun it is!

Redesigning A Cover

Current Cover

The conversation with Dani ran something like this -

"Would you like to do an updated cover for The Bones of the Sea?"
I looked at the current cover. To be fair, it does look a little...shabby...compared to Keir and Terms & Conditions Apply. "Do you think Bones of the Sea needs a new cover? I know the text isn't great - I did that myself and the image was just a stock photo from Dreamstime." And despite having had GIMP for two years, I still can't figure out how to use it to put decent titles on my own cover art. Plus it is just a single stock image, one anybody can buy and use. But still...
"The text could be better, but I think it's a pretty good cover. I like the image."
I love the image but I would like the text to be better so we go for that. And so begins a day of ranting on Twitter, as not only do I fail to find the stock image on my memory sticks (always back up ALL your stuff, people!), but the DVD disk drive on my computer packs up. Argh!

Then Dani comes to the rescue and sends me this -

I was actually speechless. I LOVED it! Without even a discussion over image ideas, Dani had picked up on the key elements I'd always wanted in the cover but had neither the skills nor resources to achieve myself back when I published it in May 2011. I'd used a bought single stock image, with some text added - a wonderful image that I loved and I felt was evocative - but also easily available to anyone else to buy. This was just a rough draft she'd put together to get my thoughts on. And once I'd seen it, I wanted it.

Anyone who has read the story should be able to immediately identify with the image. Seeing this threw any plans of mine simply to put new text on the old cover. But the amount of bubbles meant that even at this size it was hard to make out the diver. At thumbnail - which is how most people will see it when browsing - it becomes impossible. So, much as I loved it, tweaking was needed. Below are three more versions, each with a tweak.

Larger Diver

No bubbles

Different diver

Dani wasn't prepared to give up tweaking until I was completely happy with the cover, and I have to say she's a joy to work with and one very talented lady. So this is my final new shiny cover for my free scifi short The Bones of the Sea - designed by Danielle Fine. Ta da!

Isn't it purty?! This will be replacing the old cover over the next week - I need to make adjustments to the interior of the book before re-uploading it to Smashwords. In the meantime, I highly recommend checking out Dani's website here if you're on the hunt for a cover design. (pssst, she also does editing and book trailers!).

In other news...

Action!

It's #pitchwars! This is "an upcoming event where agented authors, industry interns, and editors team up with aspiring writers to shine up their manuscripts and pitches to present to some awesome agents." You can check out all the details here. Currently the submission window is open until the 5th December for you to pick three mentors from the list (check carefully who is accepting what genres, as many are looking for those outside their normal preferred genre to read or write!) and submit your query and the first five pages of your manuscript. I have my mentors chosen and my query all ready to go, I just haven't...submitted yet. >.< This will be my first time pitching so I admit to being nervous. Yes, even with two book contracts under my belt. O.o There's also the #pitchMAS workshop on the 5th December here and you can see which agents and editors are judging the pitches here. The best of luck if you're taking part in either or both of those.

Discoveries

In line with Laurie's post about the latest space news, an article on io9 has shown the possibilities of exploring beyond our own solar system are getting closer to a reality rather than remaining a science fiction idea. Warp drive! Physicist Harold White is convinced he has a theory that will result "in an engine that can transport a spacecraft to the nearest star in a matter of weeks — and all without violating Einstein's law of relativity." Of course it's all theory at the moment - there's no time scale on when this might happen, but his convictions seems to take it from being more a case of if to when. So, it's unlikely in my lifetime - unless one of those technological leaps occurs - but perhaps our grandchildren will be hopping from one star to another in a matter of weeks. It's a wonderful thing to consider. You can read the entire article here.

The Plant People Are Coming!

Actually, they're already here. Most of my friends and followers know I have a small big obsession with weird and wonderful plants. So not many would be surprised that this post - 10 Creepy Plants That Shouldn't Exist - was an instant must-read for me. Some might be surprised that even I struggled to find some of the plants beautiful. Bleeding Tooth Fungus. The Doll's Eye. And the Cedar-Apple Rust Fungus. Weird definitely (although I'm going to admit to loving the Chinese Black Batflowers). Anyone looking for inspiration for alien and or gruesome flora could certainly find it here.

But one plant on the list just seemed a step beyond reality - the Chinese Fleeceflower. Now I know that there are often photos whizzing around the internet of plants shaped like people (or more often of a certain body part, ahem). But this isn't just a one-off humorous coincidence. No. The plant typically looks like a human being, and often a particularly well-endowed male one.

Of course, these aren't sentient. They aren't going to start walking around and taking over the planet. But there are plants that can move. Venus Flytraps, Sundews, the Mimosa plant that folds its leaves when touched, and various tropical vines that grow so fast you can watch them doing it. Plants will move themselves toward sunlight. It isn't a huge leap of the imagination to thinking about a sentient form of plant life existing. If one doesn't evolve here, then perhaps elsewhere it already has.

Sentient alien life forms that are plants aren't a new idea. Zhaan from Farscape, Jabe (a humanoid plant being from the Forest of Cheem) and the Vervoids from Doctor Who, and even Flora and the Monster Minds from Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors (anyone remember that?) had human-looking intelligent plant life.  So imagine these strange human-looking Chinese fleeceflowers developing the ability to move, and perhaps to think, and an intelligent race of plants doesn't seem too farfetched. As long as the triffids don't come first...

Pippa's Journal

I had a lot of trouble sitting on this one yesterday, but I have an exclusive cover reveal for Spacefreighters Lounge - for my sfr short story Terms & Conditions Apply. Ta dah!

 


What do you think? Isn't it pretty?! This was done by the oh so talented Danielle Fine, who was my editor for Keir at Lyrical Press Inc.  She's now free-lancing - doing covers, book trailers and editing - and she currently has my story in her queue for edits. So no release date as yet, but I just couldn't wait to show off the cover. :)

So why am I self-publishing this instead of submitting it? Well, I did consider submitting. The story was originally written for Misa Buckley's planned Venus Ascendant anthology, which unfortunately never launched. I wanted to self-publish another short story earlier this year (Samaritan), but after receiving some feedback on it via Critique Circle, I decided it needed a lot more work and put it back into the WIP pile. T&C started to play on my mind. I considered rewriting some of the elements that removing the canon for Venus Ascendant would entail, but after a discussion with Misa, she graciously gave me permission to use those elements. I could probably have found a publisher for it (oh, the arrogance! No, seriously, there were several options for submitting it) but 40% of a short story sale isn't very much. I love the bit of creative control I have from self-publishing shorts while submitting my novel-length works to publishers, so it seemed more practical to do this one myself.

The one thing I decided I would do is that I would be charging for this short, unlike The Bones of the Sea (which I self-published last year). That is, and always will be, a free story. T&C is three times the length of Bones, and will be professionally edited - and with its beautiful cover - so I feel putting a price on it is justified. And with Gethyon contracted by Champagne Books for a release date of June 2013, that will give me four titles out in the world by this time next year. Not bad for someone who sat and started writing their first full length sfr novel just three years ago this month.

But before you think I'm too busy patting myself on the back, I do have one confession. I didn't complete Camp Nanowrimo. Between children home for the school holidays, having my other half home for two weeks of that, the arrival of the contract, and much other excitment, When Dark Falls sidled to a stop at 29,427 words. I'm happy with that word count, although I would have liked to complete it. Ah well, maybe next year...

Laurie's Journal

Last time I hinted that I may have a ~*~ surprise! ~*~ for you this week. I do! But you’ll have to read on.

*waves plate of warm cookies in front of readers’ noses*

My theme for the week is “Thisssssss Close.”

Action!
Actions I've taken as a writer. Where am I? What am I doing?

As an author who had both hands and one foot already onboard a sleek little shuttle called Self-Publishing, the call(s) last Friday made me to hop back from the airlock so I could re-evaluate my options and reconfigure my trajectory plan. Nothing like pouring on the reverse thrusters in a hurry!

Since last Friday, I’ve been swept up in the force field called Golden Heartdom. I’ve been drafted into the ranks of the GH Class of 2011 (we who are yet unnamed, but hope to find a moniker at least half as good as the 2010 Unsinkables or the 2009 Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood.) I’ve also been inducted into The Golden Network, a membership of past and present Golden Heart nominees and alumni that have formed their own RWA chapter. Now I’m rubbing elbows with some of the people who used to be my writing idols. (*blink, blink* Is this really happening?)

My education in the last week alone could fill volumes. So what’s next? I have two concurrent tasks:

1. Finish the revisions to The Outer Planets at Warp 11
2. Begin querying agents on P2PC

One of my fellow GH class just sent her first query and nabbed an almost immediate offer of representation from a big name agent! Yes, all that happened in the last week. I need to get busy!

The Squeeze
Writers are sponges when it comes to soaking up writing tips and tricks. Here's where we squeeze out our sponges for the week.

For anyone who is considering self-publishing, I’ve discovered there’s an easy shortcut around the baffling and intimidating process of getting your document ready to self-publish. This secret is called “document formatters.” I was just about to send my work to L.K. Campbell (remember, I was “thisssss close”) who has formatted over 400 e-books for both self-published authors and e-publishers, as well as small print publishers. Her rates are very reasonable and her turnaround time is somewhere in the "instantaneous" range. (Remember, document formatters are not editors. They correctly format your document to submit for self-publishing. Be sure your document has been fully edited and is ready to publish before submitting to a document formatter.) She will also format short stories. Definitely worth checking out to save yourself from a first-time self-publishing nightmare.

Pssst!
The latest buzz. Submission calls. New publishers. Industry changes. Inspirational sayings or quotes for writers. And our take on them.

The Is Your Blog Easy to Love? article from The Bookshelf Muse is worth its weight in...well, er...it's worth a lot! YES! We’ve followed their advice and turned off the word verification and other stumbling blocks for the benefit and enjoyment of our readers.

Let us know you appreciate the gesture by chiming in with a comment. Really! We love hearing from you. We know you’re out there, you’re showing up on our scanners. :)

Great Quotes for Writers:

“A success isn’t someone who didn’t fail, it’s someone who didn’t quit.” -- Anonymous

Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts. -- Winston Churchill

Bookshelf
Books we're reading and mini-reviews. Writers must read voraciously. Sometimes we find gems in the literary universe or sometimes certain elements of a book really speak to us (and our muses). Do we know about book giveaways? A big debut? We'll dish on those.

Here’s my surprise. As I mentioned above, I came ohhhh soooo close to self-publishing.

Audience chants back: “How close were you?”

Thisssss close.

This fabulous cover for The Outer Planets was created by the enormously talented Amanda Kelsey of Razzle Dazzle Design. It was actually based on a spec cover, and when I saw it on Razzle Dazzle’s website , I sucked in my breath and whispered, “That’s Mitch and Lissa!”

I emailed Amanda to ask if she could do a couple of changes to the design. A few emails back and forth and I had this amazing end product. Of course, this may or may not be the “real” cover of The Outer Planets, depending what happens in the future, but I’m so proud of it that I wanted to share it with the world. Okay, the galaxy! 

It definitely says SF and R in bold letters, don't ya think? How do you like it?  Let me know in our (unmoderated, un-word verified) comments below.

Happenings
Events, conferences, cons as well as Facebook, Twitter and blog events.

We may have just witnessed the dawn of Mittenpunk on last week’s Six Sentence Sunday round. What’s Mittenpunk? It’s Steampunk that takes place in the winter. Has a new sub-subgenre just been born? Here’s the link to the original Mittenpunk Six Sentence Sunday post on Aislinn Kerry’s blog:

Ping Pong
We'll comment back to our co-bloggers on things they've posted on their journals.

@Donna Loved your article on SF(R) in film. It does get the mental main power drive on line, doesn’t it? Best of luck with your entry in the Fool For Love. I gave this one a hard look, but decided things were too crazy last week to try to pull together an entry, too.

@Sharon  Special thanks for all the tips, tricks and feedback you've given over the last week.  It sure helps to have someone who's been through this craziness a couple of times before.  :)