Character names and titles are important in fiction (duh!) Different genres have different naming trends and types, if not outright rules. A clever writer can exploit or twist those, while a tone-deaf writer can suffer for them. Of course, it helps to read massively and currently in your target genres. I have a perennial problem…
Read More Character names and titlesI’ve been at a plateau for a while on the big fantasy project: polished, but not quite gleaming. This weekend, three things happened: I wrote a decent pitch for an upcoming pitch contest. I tightened the first chapter, and bridged new and old versions with really strong scenes. I forced more emotion into one character,…
Read More When writing goes exceptionally wellA brief but long overdue update, on erotic romance publisher Samhain. After announcing their closure late in 2015, they regrouped in a flurry of activity over 2016. But they’re closing for real at the end of February 2017, only a few days after releasing a last round of contracted books. Those first rights are burned,…
Read More Shame on SamhainMy friend A. G. Carpenter and the great people at Falstaff Books have released ‘Of Shade and Soul’, the second novella in her Southern gothic ‘Touch’ trilogy. Delaney Green might be dead, but she don’t mean to stay that way. As she searches for a way back to the realm of the living, and the…
Read More Of Shade and Soul: A Touch Trilogy NovellaMy debut novel MORO’S PRICE, a M/M space opera erotic romance, was first published in 2012. I’m pleased to announce that a newly revised version will be coming soon from NineStar Press. If you liked the original version, I think you’ll love this one. If all goes well, you’ll also be seeing the direct sequel…
Read More New version of Moro’s Price coming soon!I could almost get away with the stub listing ‘It sucked’. The many and varied ways 2016 achieved maximum suckage will be studied in later history (if there is anyone left alive to study it). I’m not raising my blood pressure detailing those slings and arrows tonight. Instead, I want to talk about good things.…
Read More 2016 year in reviewAs if 2016 hadn’t sucked badly enough before this, December saw news that two more publishers were going under with messy implosions. In both cases, authors and readers were left hanging. Torquere was a small erotic romance publisher once reasonably respected, but torpedoed by mismanagement over the last few years. The bigger news a few…
Read More More publishers behaving badlyThe predatory vanity publishing world is not limited to fiction. Academic and scientific papers are also a hot commodity, since the legitimate markets can have high entry barriers in fees and vetting. A host of predatory and often outright criminal publishers have surfaced to ‘serve’ those customers. Many scientists and academics need to publish work…
Read More Beall’s List and fake academic publishersWhile we’re looking at the economic and social issues coalescing around the Ghost Ship fire, we need to accept that exploitation of creatives is so common it’s basically a tenet of American culture. The vanity publishers I talk about in the ‘Filigree’s Rule’ section of this blog? They’re only one of the more-blatant tips of…
Read More White Walls, Ghost Ship, and the arts in AmericaCorel’s new digital arts platform Painter 17 is out now, and I’m fiddling around with it this week. I finished this teaser art piece for the new version of Moro’s Price in about 30 minutes, and that was because I was slowly playing around with some of the new Artist’s Favorites brushes. I should have…
Read More Painter 17 teaser art(Soon to be an artist’s book.) For a couple of years, I’ve been taken to task by well-meaning folks who want me to make only positive, light-hearted, beautiful books that affirm life and hope. And I do – I’ve got a lot of those on the workshop table, or in development. But being a nihilist,…
Read More Narrow ShoreI had to ponder this one for a week, because it hit home. I may be adding to this post over the next few days. Sherri S. Tepper was a powerful author and outspoken activist, who happened to write science fiction and fantasy. I first ran across her work in 1983, when my best friend…
Read More In memoriam: Sherri S. TepperIt’s one thing when a publisher circles the drain, and nearly everyone has known or suspected it would happen for months or years. It’s another, when a *good* small press fails. One that was, by most accounts, doing everything right: lasting for longer than two years, choosing great books and authors, designing excellent covers, marketing…
Read More Well, shucks…(Updated October 5, 2016) I have just made the saddest $25 win that I ever bet. (2nd update October 7,2016) I’ll keep that $25 safely unspent in case I need to return it.* Because a couple of years ago I privately bet a group of other authors that the embattled erotic romance publisher Ellora’s Cave was…
Read More Ellora’s Cave updateThis was going to be just a section in Filigree’s Rule, but I thought it deserved its own post. (Added info, as of 10/4/2016.) I have begged literary agents before: please clarify your stance on negotiating publishing offers for querying authors. We authors need to know beforehand, if you never do this and would rather…
Read More Agents, offers, assumptions, and bad behaviorWay back when, I graduated from high school in the same month I saw ‘Return of the Jedi’. Yes, that is how old I am, ha ha. From 1977 to 1983, I was a ‘Star Wars’ nerd. During the following years, I lost interest in the ‘Star Wars’ universe as expanded in dozens of books.…
Read More The Force Awakens…On their way to being art. Fire Mountain Gems had a closeout sale recently, during which I got some great items that will all make incredible book or jewelry art. Eventually. The first such transformation will be these six carved bone rings, originally from China & dyed with dark brown bands and peace symbols. For…
Read More Six Bone Rings…I’m having too much fun completely re-writing this book. Should revisions be fun? Slightly different names, timelines, inciting incidents, backstory. Still a big, messy space opera romance. Still familiar to the 1500 – 2000 of you who read the first one, but hopefully much better. The new first line of the new Chapter 1…
Read More First look: Moro’s Price revisions‘Breathe’ has been on my to-make list for a couple of years, ever since I stumbled on the quartet of Latin mottos that inspired it. Is it based in soaring social feelings and a genuine wish to see good in the world? Yes. Especially in this sordid election season and social turmoil. But there’s a…
Read More First look: ‘Breathe’ fiber art bookI didn’t know when I posted a quip from ‘Blazing Saddles’ a few days ago, how poignantly topical that would become. We just lost Gene Wilder, a devastatingly funny, wickedly honest, profoundly wise man. The signal-to-noise ratio of the world just got a bit stupider, meaner, and more callous with his passing.
Read More In memoriam: Gene Wilder